Monthly Archive: April 2004

Sharon’s Banana Republics

Bush and Blair have allowed Israel to dictate their Middle East policy and carry out a Palestinian politicide, writes Ali Safieh, Palestinian General Delegate to the UK and the Vatican. http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1194704,00.html

The strange case of the Muslim-loving Islamophobes

One of the fascinating things about some of the most vehemently anti-Islamic commentators in the blogosphere (they seldom make it into the mainstream press, at least not in the UK) is how concerned they...

Reaction to Rantisi murder

Israel’s assassination yesterday of yet another Hamas leader was shocking, but it should not surprise anyone that Israel, especially under the leadership of Ariel Sharon, would do such a thing. I haven’t bothered to...

So, it’s almost St. George’s day …

I don’t honestly know if it’s nearly St. George’s day, but it must be because people have brought it up on the radio again: why don’t we English celebrate our “national day” like the...

More on Sardar

The New Statesman finally got round to printing replies to Ziauddin Sardar’s “open the gates of ijtihad” waffle two issues ago (I blogged on this about a week ago). They didn’t print mine, but...

‘Shaikh’ Abdul-Qadir’s latest essay

I subscribe to a number of Yahoo groups on Islam and Bewleyupdates is one of them. The group was founded by Aisha Bewley, best known for her translation of the Qur’an, Qadi Iyaad’s Shifaa,...

About Abdul-Hadi Palazzi …

Those of you who visit my website often will have noticed a link to an article about “Shaikh” Abdul-Hadi Palazzi, an impostor from Italy who is the leader, or one of the leaders, of...

Victims’ Licence

George Monbiot has published a fascinating article on how being the victim of an atrocity (or the descendent of such a victim) appears to give people licence to commit fresh atrocities. The Germans, the...

ID cards and guilt by association

A couple of useful articles on the dangerously authoritarian tendencies of our current Home Secretary, David Blunkett: Now Blunkett plans to jail friends of terrorist suspects – Blunkett plans to jail people for merely...

A Conservative wants to know about Islam

Townhall.com, a page run by the Heritage Foundation which publishes a collection of articles by various US right-wing columnists, has published one by Doug Giles, “a no-nonsense, God-fearing student of society with a special...

Reply to Zia Sardar

Last week in the New Statesman they had Ziauddin Sardar, a darling of the British liberal media, spouting some of his well-known ideas. I am quite interested in Sardar because it was one of...

Adoption, the Saudis and our Ken

Jon Gaunt, BBC Radio’s resident loud-mouth, was mouthing off about adoption on BBC’s London radio (94.9 FM, 9am-12pm Monday-Friday) this morning. The thing that got his goat today was that parents who gave their...

Who are you marching with?

Anyone who has been on the anti-war demos in London and been irritated by all the Marxist banners should read the entry on Saraji’s blog – 5th April, “The Bloc Vote Mafia …”. With...

Good news from Rwanda

An entry in al-Muhajabah’s blog gives some news from Rwanda, where the number of Muslims has doubled since the genocide, in large part because Muslims stayed out of that atrocity and gave shelter to...

The MCB letter

BBC Interview with Inayat Bunglawala, about the recent letter to the mosques encouraging people to help the security forces

The Matrimonial Minefield

I’m sure I’m not the only convert to Islam who has found it difficult to find a wife. I’m 27, and converted to Islam in 1998 when I was 21. For much of that...