Jesus was a messenger of Allah, his Word, and a Spirit from him.

Site search

Montreal festival to open with Majidi’s epic on Prophet of Islam (S)

The 39th Montreal World Film Festival will open with the world premiere of “Muhammad (S), the Messenger of God”, renowned Iranian director Majid Majidi’s latest film about the childhood of the Prophet of Islam (S), the organizers announced on Tuesday.

A frequent visitor to the MWFF, Majidi will accompany his film to Montreal along with some main members of his cast and crew.

“The Festival is very proud to be able to host the premiere of this important work, a film of very high artistry aimed at a very wide audience,” said MWFF President Serge Losique.

“There have been many movies dealing with key figures of the world’s great religions, including Jesus, Moses and Buddha, but this is only the second epic screen treatment of Islam’s founder,” he added.    »»» Tehran Times

Go to article…

Imams try to ‘reclaim the internet’ with Haqiqah magazine

A new online magazine has been launched with the aim of “reclaiming the internet” from extremists.

Haqiqah – “the truth” or “the reality” – has been created by British Muslim scholars who say they want to do more to educate young people about the reality of extremist movements.

They say it is a direct response to the threat of radicalisation from groups such as Islamic State.

IS extremists have widely used social media to spread their message.

More than 100 imams gathered in London for the launch of the magazine, which has been started by the website Imams Online.

“Someone has to reclaim that territory from ISIS, and that can only be imams: religious leaders who guide and nourish their community,” according to Qari Asim, senior editor at imamsonline.com.

“But now that we live in a digital mobile world, some young people are not coming to the mosque so we must reach out to them – and this is the Muslims’ contribution to combat radicalisation on the net,” he said.

He termed the magazine a call to all Muslims to “log on, get informed, and share the magazine with all your friends and family online”.

Experts writing in the magazine aim to offer a counter-narrative to the radical rhetoric of IS and other groups, and provide clear explanations of verses of the Koran that have been used by extremists to urge youngsters from across Europe and the Islamic world to leave their homes to fight – and often to die – in Syria and Iraq.    »»» BBC News

Go to article…

Halal Sex Shop Opening For Muslims In Mecca

Halal is a lifestyle for many adherents of Islam, and the topic of sexuality is mostly taboo among Muslims. Combining the two might seem a toxic mix, but the recent appearance of sex shops catering to Muslims — even in Mecca, Saudi Arabia, the center of the Islamic faith — indicates there is a market for certain adult products.

A store called Halal Sex Shop is expected to open soon in Mecca, according to a report on Alyaoum24, an Arabic news portal, which did not specify an opening date. Owner Abdelaziz Aouragh said the products at his store are halal-observant and target married couples trying to enhance their sex lives. “Our products [do] not include inflatable dolls, but products that increase feelings of sensuality and improve the atmosphere between the couple in [their] sexual relationship,” Aouragh told Alyaoum24. While halal typically refers to food and beverages that are permissible for consumption by Muslims, it also guides the use of objects under Islamic law.

With the help of German company Beate Uhse, one of the largest sex product vendors in Europe, Aouragh is reportedly selling 18 Islam-appropriate sex toys in his Mecca store.    »»» International Business Times

Go to article…

Meet the Muslims who sacrificed themselves to save Jews and fight Nazis in World War II

Noor Inayat Khan led a very unusual life. She was born in 1914 to an Indian Sufi mystic of noble lineage and an American half-sister of Perry Baker, often credited with introducing yoga into America. As a child, she and her parents escaped the chaos of revolutionary Moscow in a carriage belonging to Tolstoy’s son. Raised in Paris in a mansion filled with her father’s students and devotees, Khan became a virtuoso of the harp and the veena, dressed in Western clothes, graduated from the Sorbonne and published a book of children’s tales — all before she was 25.

One year later, in May 1940, the Germans occupied Paris. Khan, her mother, and a younger brother and sister fled like millions of others, catching the last boat from Bordeaux to England, where she immediately joined the British war effort. In 1942, she was recruited by Churchill’s elite Special Operations Executive (SOE) to work in Paris as a wireless operator. Her clandestine efforts supported the French Underground as England prepared for the D-Day invasions. Among SOE agents, the wireless operator had the most dangerous job of all, because the occupation authorities were skilled at tracking their signals. The average survival time for a Resistance telegrapher in Paris was about six weeks.

Khan’s service continued from June 1943 until her capture and arrest by the Gestapo in October. In September 1944, she was murdered in Germany’s Dachau prison camp. In researching her story, I came across quite a number of other Muslims who bravely served the Allied cause — and sometimes made the ultimate sacrifice. History is rich with examples of their daring heroism and split-second decisions that helped defeat the Nazis.

Behic Erkin, the Turkish ambassador in Paris, provided citizenship papers and passports to thousands of Jews (many with only distant claims to Turkish connections) and arranged their evacuation by rail across Europe. One fateful day, Necdet Kent, the Turkish consul-general in Marseille, stymied the shipment of 80 Turkish Jews to Germany by forcing his way onto a train bearing them to their likely death and arranging for their return, unharmed, to France.

Abdol-Hossein Sardari used his position at the Iranian consulate in Paris to help thousands of Jews evade Nazi capture. Later dubbed the Iranian Schindler, he convinced the occupying Germans that Iranians were Aryans and that the Jews of Iran had been Iranian since the days of Cyrus the Great — and, therefore, should not be persecuted. Then he issued hundreds of Iranian passports to non-Iranian Jews and saved their lives.

Ahmed Somia, the Tunisian co-director of the French Muslim Hospital outside Paris, organized weapon caches, facilitated Resistance radio transmissions, treated wounded Resistance fighters, and helped save many downed U.S. and British pilots by hiding them in fake T.B. wards where Gestapo and French gendarmes feared to go.

In the Balkans, for instance, only 200 Jews lived in Albania before WWII. Yet by war’s end, almost 2,000 Jews lived in the country, because so many had fled Greece, Austria and other locations in Europe to take shelter there among the predominantly Muslim population, which hid and protected them.

As Cole wrote elsewhere, commemorating the 70th anniversary of D-Day: “While a few Muslims did support the Axis, out of resentment of Western colonialism…, they were tiny in their numbers compared to the Muslims who not only supported the Allies but actively fought on their behalf.”   »»» The Washington Post

Go to article…

Cambodia’s largest mosque opens in Phnom Penh

Cambodia’s largest and only Ottoman-style mosque was officially opened by Prime Minister Hun Sen in a ceremony attended by more than 1,000 people in the capital Friday.

Al-Serkal Grand Mosque in Phnom Penh’s Boeng Kak neighbourhood was funded by Eisa Bin Nasser Bin Abdullatif Alserkal, an Emirati businessman, and replaces a mosque that once sat on the same site before it was torn down in 2012.
Ahmad Yahya, president of the Cambodian Muslim Community Development Organization, described the mosque as “the biggest and most beautiful” of its kind, telling The Anadolu Agency that its construction has been an important bookmark in the story of the Muslim community in Cambodia.

“For the whole country, when they travel to Phnom Penh and from overseas, they come to this mosque to pray, and for tourists who come to Cambodia, they would like to come and pray,” he said.
The gleaming $2 million structure was a big draw Friday as hundreds of people milled around outside. The separate men’s and women’s prayer halls were packed.

Yahya said Hun Sen told the crowd he is proud of Cambodia’s Muslims, who are referred to as Cham and who were targeted by the ultra-Maoist Khmer Rouge regime in the 1970s.    »»» Sailan Muslim (Sri Lanka)

Go to article…

Serbia arrests suspects in Srebrenica massacre of thousands of Muslims

Prosecutors on Wednesday made Serbia’s first arrests of people suspected of the Srebrenica massacre killings, The Associated Press has learned. It is a milestone in healing the wounds of Europe’s worst civilian slaughter since World War II.

Serbian police arrested seven men accused of taking part in the slaughter of over 1,000 Muslims at a warehouse on the outskirts of Srebrenica, a joint team of Serbian and Bosnian prosecutors told the AP. Altogether, over 8,000 Bosnian Muslims were killed in the eastern Bosnian enclave by the Serbs in 1995 — the only atrocity in Europe to be labeled genocide by the United Nations since World War II.

The prosecutors said they were searching for more suspects in Serbia and in neighboring countries.

Serbia in the past has put on trial men who took a group of prisoners away from Srebrenica to be killed. And in 2011 it arrested Ratko Mladic — the warlord who masterminded the slaughter — and sent him to an international criminal court in The Hague, Netherlands. But Wednesday’s arrests were Serbia’s first attempt to bring to justice men who got their hands bloody in the killing machine known as the Srebrenica massacre 20 years ago this July.    »»» The China Post

Go to article…

‘All mosques’ destroyed in CAR conflict

Almost all of the 436 mosques in the Central African Republic have been destroyed by months of vicious fighting between Christians and Muslims, the US ambassador to the United Nations said Tuesday, calling the devastation “kind of crazy, chilling.”

Samantha Power spoke to reporters after a Security Council visit last week to the country. She expressed concern about an upcoming possible security vacuum as European Union and French forces pull out and a UN peacekeeping force is still not at full strength.

At least 5,000 people have been killed since Central African Republic exploded into unprecedented sectarian violence in December 2013. Nearly 1 million of the Texas-sized country’s 4.5 million residents have been displaced. Many of those who have fled are Muslim.   »»» ‘All mosques’ destroyed in CAR conflict | Arab News

Go to article…

Religion and money: is Islamic banking the way forward for Ethiopians?

Islam is the world’s second largest religion with more than 1.5 billion followers, making up more than 23% of the world’s population. Of these, 650 million Muslims hover at or below the poverty line. But although Islamic-compliant finance is a huge industry globally, when the international community talks about improving access to financial services in developing countries, making services Islamic-compliant is rarely top of the agenda.

Islamic-compliant financial products can take several forms and business models. However, the principles of Islamic finance are universal: you cannot make money off money. No one can charge or pay interest, or invest in items that Islam forbids such as alcohol and gambling.

Although a growing industry globally, within Ethiopia Islamic banking, which is also referred to as interest-free banking, is in its infancy. Around a third of Ethiopians identify as Muslim, making the country’s Muslim population larger than that in Saudi Arabia, Syria or Yemen. Access to finance in Ethiopia is generally very low. Nationally, only 14 % of the adult population has access to formal credit and savings products but this rate drops to 1% in rural areas. And, until recently, there were no financial institutions catering to the large population requiring Islamic-compliant products.
   »»» The Guardian (U.K.)

Go to article…

Fight against ISIS job of Muslims first, Jordan’s king says

Jordan’s King Abdullah addressed the European parliament on Tuesday.

He spoke about the threat of ISIS being a global issue, and that the terrorists do not represent Islam.

“Those outlaws of Islam who deny these truths [faith and tolerance] are vastly outnumbered by the ocean of believers – 1.6 billion Muslims worldwide. The terrorists have made Muslims their greatest target. We will not allow them to hijack our faith,” he said.

“The savage murder by Daesh (ISIS) of Jordan’s hero pilot outraged all Jordanians and horrified the world. And Jordan’s response has been swift, serious, and determined and our fight will continue,” he said. “We and other Arab and Muslim states defend not only our people but our faith. This has to be carried out by Muslim nations first and foremost. This is a fight within Islam and at the same time, the danger of extremism must be seen for what it is, global.”   »»»WDAM-TV 7-News (U.S.)

Go to article…

Anti-Islamic demonstration planned for Montréal neighbourhood

Followers of a German-based right wing group known for its inflammatory anti-Islamic rhetoric are planning to stage a demonstration later this month in a St-Leonard burough neighbourhood of Montréal (Canada) that has a significant Muslim population.

Pegida Quebec is an offshoot of a European group of the same name, which stands for “Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamization of the West”.

The group is on the radar of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS).

This week The Canadian Press agency said that CSIS had informed Public Saftey Minister Steve Blaney in September 2014 that there is a growing anti-Islam movement in Canada that poses an ongoing risk because many of its “proponents advocate violence”.

The German founder of the Pegida group, Lutz Bachmann, resigned two weeks ago after posting an image of himself made up as Adolph Hitler.   »»» CJAD 800 News (Québec, Canada)

Go to article…