Generations of university graduates have been deliberately deprived of any encounter with Islamic civilization. It is nothing less than an egregious disservice to students — no educational institution can strive for excellence if it allows such a disservice to continue.
As an Islamic state, Iran’s policies — both domestic and foreign — are based on certain fundamental principles. The guidelines for these policies were laid down by Imam Khomeini during his lifetime. After he passed away in June 1989, his successor, the Rahbar Imam Seyyed Ali Khamenei has adhered to these policies closely.
The days of the American empire are over; even US elites are writing its obituaries. The world Capitalist System was established on such factors as greed, living beyond means, using other people’s wealth, compound interest and a rigid focus on short-term profit.
While other forms of racism are frowned upon, Islamophobia is actively being promoted as an acceptable form of political behavior in the West. Muslims are a soft target and in such an environment, denigrating them carries little direct political costs.
There are many unknown victims of the US’s global war on Islamic dissidence. The plight of one of them hit the headlines earlier this summer, after years in which nothing was known of her. FAHAD ANSARI reports on the case of Dr. Aafia Siddiqui, a Muslimah now in US custody after disappearing in Pakistan in 2003.
In recent months, there has been a worrying rise in violent salafi sectarianism in the northern Lebanese port-city of Tripoli, a dangerous new development in the country’s delicate communal balance. KHALIL FADL discusses the background and potential of this trend among Lebanese Sunnis.
As the Olympic Games open in Beijing this month, Western activists will do their best to disrupt them in support of Tibetan independence. Less known is the history and struggle of the Uighur Muslims in Chinese-occupied Central Asia. FAHAD ANSARI discusses their plight.
In recent months, politics in the UK has been dominated by debate over how long the authorities should be allowed to hold suspected terrorist before they are charged or released. Fahad Ansari points out that in fact many Muslims are already held for years in British jails without trial.
As Iraq has lurched from one crisis to another since the US invasion in 2003, one figure has become increasingly influential and even dominant in the country’s politics: young Shi’a leader Muqtada al-Sadr. KHALIL FADL profiles the man some regard as a future leader of the country.
In recent years, there has been increasing awareness of the true nature of zionism and the Israeli state in the West. FAHAD ANSARI discusses the reasons for this change, and finds them in the determination of Palestinians to resist their oppression and dispossession.
When US president George W. Bush claimed last month that Iraq had been a victory for the US, hollow laughter echoed around the world. In this article, KHALIL FADL considers the real legacy of the Iraqwar, five years after the toppling of Saddam Hussein.
Last month, five young Muslims in Britain were cleared of terrorism charges on appeal, in the latest of a series of trials of Muslims in Britain. FAHAD ANSARI discusses the implications of the case and the growing criminilizations of Islam in Britain.
Until the US started recruiting Sunni tribal forces to use against resistance forces in Iraq last year, it was widely thought that Sunni opinion in Iraq was firmly against the occupation and in support of the resistance. In fact the situation is far more complex. KHALIL FADL reports.
Ethiopia’s war in Muslim Somalia has been one of the major news stories of the last year. However, less well-known is the fact that Somali Muslims living under Ethiopian rule in the Ogaden have a 700-year history of resistance against Ethiopian rule. FAHAD ANSARI reports.
On September 25, Iranian president Mahmood Ahmadinejad addressed the General Assembly of the UN. Here we reprint a slightly abridged translation of text of his address.
The siege at the Lal Masjid in Islamabad, which ended with a massacre of its occupants on July 10-11, has been widely portrayed as part of a global war between pro-Western moderation and extremist terrorism. Here, DR PERWEZ SHAFI of the Institute of Contemporary Islamic Thought (ICIT) locates it more accurately in the context of a different historical trajectory.
While Americans celebrate the US Declaration of Independence on July 4, campaigners around the world will mark the 2,000th day since the opening of the Guantanamo Bay detention center on January 11, 2002. In this issue, FAHAD ANSARI discusses the differences between the ideals that the US claims to represent and its own behavior in the world today.
The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) was in the headlines again last month. On June 12, Milan Martic, the former leader of the rebel Serb authorities in Croatia, was found guilty of most of the charges in the indictment against him. He was tried, found guilty and sentenced to 35 years' imprisonment by the ICTY.
Despite its reputation as a model of democracy in the non-Western world, India is in fact a country with serious human-rights problems, with many of the victims being Muslim. K. C. SALEEM, a Crescent correspondent in India, reports on the problem of extra-judicial killings in India.
To assess whether the Horn of Africa is the "hottest conflict zone in the world" – as some analysts have called it – it is enough to list the countries that constitute it and examine their relations with the US, which has a huge and disruptive influence in the region. Ethiopia, Eritrea, Djibouti, Somalia and Kenya are generally known as the components of the Horn, but neighboring Sudan and Uganda are so closely linked to them and embroiled in their conflicts that they are now also widely regarded as Horn countries.
