Message for Friday - G'd gives us conditions

إِنْ تَنْصُرُوا اللَّهَ يَنْصُرْكُمْ

G'd says in the Qur'an (Surah Maryam - Ayah 7):
If you help [in the cause] of G'd, he will help you.

فَاذْكُرُونِي أَذْكُرْكُمْ
He also says (Surah Al-Baqarah - Ayah 152):
Remember me, then I will remember you.

Humans beings can never fully repay G'd for the countless blessings and mercy, which He has bestowed. Even the people who reject G'd are not cut off from His some of His blessings. He allows humans physical health, means of getting daily provisions and the ability to obtain temporal hapiness.

G'd, however, gives his special blessings to those who rely on and obey Him. So Muslims understand that G'd has given directives that human beings are free to accept or reject. They, however, strive to adhere to His directives not only out of love of G'd, but also for the benefit of their souls in this life and the greater life to come.

واتقو الله لعلكم ترحمون
G'd says in the Qur'an (Surah Al-Hujurat - Ayah 10):
Respect your relationship with G'd in order that you receive mercy.

Therefore, this life is not just for folly and play. There are natural rules of reciprocity that G'd built into the creation. Buddhists call it karma. In other words, what goes around, comes around.

And surely G'd knows best.

Walid scheduled to be on talk radio discussing divestment of Sudan

Monday, 8/20/07, from 11 AM to Noon on WDET 101.9 FM in Detroit will be an hour segment focusing on the campaign to divestment from Sudan due to the horrible humanitarian crisis in Darfur.

Also scheduled to be on the show are MI State Reps Hansen Clarke (D) and Alma Wheeler Smith (D).

You may listen via stream on http://www.wdetfm.org/listenlive/

Save Darfur Coalition embellishing stats?

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/12/opinion/12dealey.html

An Atrocity That Needs No Exaggeration

By SAM DEALEY
Published: August 12, 2007
Washington

JUST last month, the House of Representatives passed the Darfur Accountability and Divestment Act and the United Nations Security Council decided to deploy up to 26,000 peacekeepers to Sudan. Both actions were due in no small way to the work of the Save Darfur Coalition. Through aggressive advertising campaigns, this group has done more than any other to focus world attention on the conflict in the Sudanese region.

But with a ruling Wednesday from Britain’s Advertising Standards Authority, Save Darfur now finds itself in the spotlight. Siding with a business group allied with the Sudanese government in Khartoum, the authority ruled that the high death tolls Save Darfur cites in its advertisements breached standards of truthfulness.(MORE)

Sunni - Shi'i cooperation in Michigan

The above picture is of a meeting organized by the Council of Islamic Organizations of Michigan (CIOM) regarding increasing cooperation and brotherhood between the Sunni and Shi'i schools of thought. Can you tell who are the Sunnis and who are the Shi'is in this picture?

Historically in Michigan going back to the 1930's, there has never been a major issue between Sunni and Shi'i relating to a void in cooperation and dialogue. In fact among the Syrians, whose families have been in Metro Detroit for approximately a centurty, there has always been intermarriages between Sunnis and Shi'is. Many Syrians and Lebanese have families that are half and half.

Furthermore, there has been interchanging of ideas and joint programs taking place between Sunni and Shi'i leaders going back to the Islamic Center of America's founding Imam and the founding Imam of the Albanian Islamic Center. We're talking about the 1960's here, not yesterday.

Sunni leaders have given lectures and led prayers in Shi'i majority centers and Shi'is have done similiar. In fact, I'm not a Shi'i, yet I've led prayers and have lectured in 6 Shi'i majority mosques in Metro Detroit.

Cut & paste to listen to a lecture that I gave about Sunni-Shi'i relations in November 2003:
http://www.ymaaudio.com/ram/Ramadan11162003_02.ram

After a rash of vandalism, which took place after the execution of Saddam Hussein, conspiracy theories flew around that perhaps Sunnis vandalized Shi'i centers like what's going on in Iraq.

That extrapolation, however, is only conjecture, not fact.

One theory is that so-called Yemeni Wahhabis aka Salafis were behind the vandalisms because of their love for Saddam. The fact of the matter is that Salafis are anti-nationalism and did not support Saddam's Ba'athist/Socialist government, which was far from a theocracy. Those outside of Iraq, such as some in Yemen, who were Pro-Saddam, are the same people who were or would have been Pro-Gamal Abdel Nasser, the deceased Arab Nationalist, who repressed Islamic movements in Egypt. Ironically, Abdel Nasser did give seed money, which helped the Islamic Center of America (Shi'i majority mosque) to get built.

Anyway, hardcore Ba'athists were and are primarily secular minded, not religious - the Ba'ath party was started by an Arab Christian by the way. Many of the top Ba'athists were also Shi'i such as the 1st Iraqi Prime Minister after the invasion, Ayad Al-Allawi. Tariq Aziz, Iraqi's Deputy Prime Minister under Saddam, is Christian.

Domestically speaking, the Iraqi Sunni population in Metro Detroit is miniscule. The portion of the Iraqi American population that benefitted the most from Saddam were Chaldeans, Iraqi Catholics. Saddam donated approximately half of a million dollars for the construction of a Chaldean Church and the Chaldean Community Center off of E. 7 Mile in Detroit.

SEE:
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/03/26/iraq/main546287.shtml

In fact due to his generous donations to the Chaldeans, Saddam received the Key to the City of Detroit while Mayor Coleman Young was in office.

This is not an assertion that a Chaldean or Arab Christian was behind the vandalisms. This is simply providing information to broaden the horizons of those who read about one belligerent call to an Iraqi-American restaurant in Arabic, which was vandalized or vandalism to the Karabala Islamic Educational Center in Dearborn that was stenciled grafitti in Arabic not to jump to conclusions. The FBI, Dearborn Police and Detroit Police have caught no one, and the acts of vandalism that increased in January 2007 appear to be unrelated.

There is no major Sunni - Shi'i split here.

Contradictory polices regarding Iraq

I just wanted to presented a couple of glaring contradictions regarding the Bush administration's policies regarding Iraq.

The more current contradiction is regarding our policy towards Iran as it relates to Iraq. On one hand, the Bush administration states that Iran is part of the "Axis of Evil" and is one of the major reasons of the instability in Iraq. On the other hand, "our guys" in Iraq and Afghanistan are not only on friendly terms with Iran but are also supported by them.

The older contradiction that has faded away is our excuse for being in Iraq in regards to promoting democracy in the region. Is there democracy in Iraq now with the current administration and legislature now in Iraq?

If we want to bring about democractic reform in the Middle East, shouldn't we have started with Egypt, who receives the most foreign aid from American besides Israel? Then again, maybe we don't want democracy in Egypt because the Egyptians might vote like the Palestinians did in the last election, right?

Of course, entire books can be writen about these two glaring contradictions.