My friend Sim is a strapping young man in his 20s. He is fitter than I could ever dream of becoming. Sim has run in the New York marathon for two years in a row, and hopes to run in many more to come. When you meet Sim you’re immediately struck by the warmth of his smile. Opinions are unanimous, Sim has a heart of gold — and the good looks to go with it!

Sim was recently flying back to New York from visiting with his parents in Texas, when the chipper middle-aged Texan lady sitting next to him asked in the most disarmingly matter-of-fact manner that only Texans are capable of, “You’re not a Muslim are you?” A question possibly prompted by Sim’s full-length beard and turban. When he responded, “No, I’m Sikh,” the woman was visibly relieved, so much so she hugged Sim (short for Simran, in case you’re wondering), adding “I’m so glad you’re not a Muslim. They want to take over America with ‘Siran’!” Simran, being the gentleman that he is, smiled politely, but later revealed to me that he had no idea how to respond to the exchange. And it’s true, it wasn’t a “simple” exchange that had occurred, which could or should be explained away as another example (and aren’t there so many?) of unwitting Texan folk who can’t tell the difference between a Sikh and a Muslim.

Admittedly, there is the initial (perhaps inevitable) surface explanation: Muslim men and Sikh men look so alike. It’s very easy to mistake one for the other. And we cannot forget the terrible repercussions of such misapprehensions (as with the murder of Balbir Singh four days after 9/11 by “a patriotic American”; and the mass shooting at a Sikh temple just in August of this year).

But then a little beyond the surface explanation lies something much more disconcerting. What if Simran had been a Muslim? What would the chipper Texan woman’s response have been then? “Oh, you’re Muslim! You Muslims want to take over America with ‘Siran’!” Perhaps there wouldn’t have been any verbal response, but just a worried sucking-in-of-air and pursing-of-lips, followed by a deathly silence? However, what could be said for certain is that a hug would not have been forthcoming!

READ MORE

The post Misapprehending Muslims and the Media’s Misinformation appeared first on The Islamic Hotline.

NEW YORK (JTA) — The recent conflict in Gaza and Israel casts a vivid spotlight on the need to strengthen relations between Jews and Muslims in countries around the world. It is crucial if we are to avoid importing the violence that has rocked the Holy Land to our communities.

The good news is that there is significant building of grass-roots Muslim-Jewish ties in North America, Europe and other regions — an ongoing process that is yielding positive results.

In the United States, mainstream Jewish organizations spoke up against the demagogic whipping-up of anti-Muslim hysteria like the cries in 2010 against the so-called Ground Zero mosque in New York City. American Jewish groups also spoke up against the passage this year by several state Legislatures of patently unconstitutional bills to “ban” Shariah law.

Read More

The post Building of Muslim-Jewish ties brings hope for Mideast appeared first on The Islamic Hotline.

Muslims demonstrating

Galveston, Texas – I’d rather be telling you about my driving trip around America and promoting my next book, Home Free: A Real American Road Trip, but I feel compelled to say something about the appalling, and tiresomely predictable, subject of Gaza. Or rather, not Gaza per se but the baleful effect that the decades-long festering sore that is Israel-Palestine has on public life here in the United States.

Read More

The post Gaza and the Need for Muslim Activism in America appeared first on The Islamic Hotline.

Today marks the 20th anniversary of the release Spike Lee’s masterpiece Malcolm X. Malcolm X is the most popular film about a Muslim in America.

Umar Lee one of America’s most outspoken Muslims was gracious enough to allow us to crosspost his excellent article.

=======================================================================================

From: http://umarlee.wordpress.com/2012/09/14/malcolm-and-me-what-malcolm-x-means-to-me-and-the-hip-hop-generation/

Twenty years ago I was in high-school in the northern suburbs of St. Louis. Far from Generation X I was a part of the Hip-Hop Generation at a racially and economically diverse school. This was not the sixties or seventies. There was no spirit of revolution in the air and the racial-fighting at our school, while still occasionally rearing its head, had subsided from just a decade earlier.

Our generation co-existed for the most part with kind of unwritten rules. White kids had their tables in the cafeteria and white students divided themselves along sub-categories: jocks, preps, burnouts, druggies, nerds, and so-called wanna-be’s who imitated black culture. Black kids had their own groupings: jocks, nerds, the disinterested and gang-bangers and dope-dealers from different neighborhoods with little interest in the non-social aspects of school. This was the height of the crack-epidemic in St. Louis and fighting over gang-colors and our school had kids coming from Kinloch, Berkeley and other neighborhoods at the center of these national tragedies.

Few talked about politics. A lot of the white kids were racist, and if you were cool with them they would talk about it: but they had good enough sense to keep it to themselves. Most came from blue-collar union households like mine and probably would have been socially-conservative Democrats if I had to guess ( many have become Tea Party Republicans and are out in St. Charles or Lincoln Counties now far from their North St. Louis family roots). The black kids didn’t talk about politics either for the most part. You would occasionally hear “fuck these white people” or “they prejudice” or the repeating of some rap-lyric and that was about it. Teenagers, of both races were more concerned with schooling, sports, fornication, music, and in the case of many kids from the ghetto making money in the streets. There were a handful of standouts though, such as black students named Lawrence and Marquis, and their motivation for getting turned onto politics was the socially-conscious hip-hop coming out of New York.

By the time we were in school hip-hop had come a long way from the parks of the South Bronx and Harlem and was in the mainstream. Most kids gravitated towards “gangster rap” that was popular in St. Louis. NWA, Too $hort, Ice-T, DJ Quick, MC Eiht from the West Coast along with Scarface and the Geto Boys out of Houston were popular in St. Louis and I liked them too. However, at this time, you could tune into MTV or BET and also hear the likes of A Tribe Called Quest, De La Soul, Poor Righteous Teachers, Pete Rock and C.L. Smooth, KRS-One and Boogie Down Productions, Public Enemy, Eric B. and Rakim, and a variety of other socially-conscious artists (which today you will seldom see or hear on the air as there is more money in minstrelism).

These positive artists talked about the pressing issues of our time: racism, poverty, greed, and history that needed to be taught. Those paying attention would get an education- “edutainment” as KRS-One said. Often, these lyrics would contain Islamic phrases or references to Allah. Some of this was because MC’s were Five-Percenters. Others were either Sunni Muslims or knew about the deen as the borough of Brooklyn, which was the cultural epicenter of the culture, had been the home of the Dar al Islam Movement and later the base of Imam Siraj Wahhaj.

The scene was set in 1992 for me to explore Islam. Imam Suhaib Webb refers to this generation as the Das FX Generation (a hip-hop group that came out in 1991) which he pins as the height of hip-hop influenced conversions at the time. I put it at 1992. Already interested in Islam from hip-hop along comes the hype to the release of the X film by the great filmmaker Spike Lee. In preparation for the film the Autobiography of Malcolm X as told to Alex Haley is re-released. Like so many thousands of others of my generation I read this book and filter it through the light of my own experiences. I have met hundreds who took Shahadah, including myself, largely as a result of reading the chapter on hajj in the book.

While powerfully moved by Malcolm’s story, and moved to tears by the hajj, I did not immediately convert. I let it marinate. In the meantime I began listening to the Death Certificate album of Ice Cube (one of the greatest albums of all-time and in the hip-hop canon). One side contained the Death Side and was for the streets and it was bumped by the mainstream. Then there was the Life Side which was a poetic and powerful in its assessment of the pain and condition of the people at the time and a call to reform. The next phase was the X Gear. Malcolm shirts and hats were everywhere and Malcolm’s name became a regular feature in hip-hop lyrics and his image began appearing in videos. Armed with an X shirt and hat I began attending the Islamic Center on West Pine and Vandeventer and by the opening-weekend of the film I was with other Muslim brothers outside of the old theatre at Union Station passing out fliers on Islam to moviegoers.

What did Malcolm mean to me? Why was he so powerful? Over the years I have discovered Malcolm is like Jesus. A modern day Christ. I do not mean this in the shariah sense as Prophethood ended with Muhammad (peace be upon him). I mean this in the sense that just as everyone claims Jesus everyone claims Malcolm.

To the Conservatives in America they are preserving a Judeo-Christian Ethic perfected by Jesus. The liberal serves the poor and calls for equality inspired by the words of Jesus. The slave-master believed bringing the savage Africans to Christendom justified slavery and Jim Crow was installed to preserve a white Christian order. Meanwhile, abolitionists and the Civil-Rights Movement were inspired by the person of Jesus more than anyone else.

Today liberals claim Malcolm as a man who was global in his thought and progressive. Communists and Marxists claim Malcolm as he advocated for African revolutions and other workers struggles. Some conservatives claim Malcolm because of his message of self-reliance and cultural-reform. Black Nationalists claim Malcolm because first off he was black and a leading figure in the black struggle in America and almost all of his words were geared towards black people. Muslims claim Malcolm because he came out of the Nation of Islam and later evolved to Sunni Islam after his hajj and rebuking of Elijah Mohammed.

Malcolm with his story of One God and One Humanity inspired me to pick up the Quran from my school library, inspired me to go to the Islamic Center and inspired my conversion like he did for so many others. Yet, others were inspired by Malcolm who never dreamed of converting. At the end of the day you get from Malcolm what you are looking for. The story of Malcolm Little become el-Hajj Malik el-Shabazz is one of evolution and change. It is a story about a constant search for the truth, striving to become a better person, speaking out against injustice, and seeking a true relationship with the Creator. That message is timeless and will lead different people in different directions. It led me to the deen. Malcolm will be reexamined generation after generation and mean something different in each time period. I have no doubt a hundred years from now Malcolm will be read in jail cells, ghettos and refugee camps, will be the father to the fatherless and will inspire. He came to me when I was a young man struggling with issues of race, class, and the injustice of America and looking for a voice and he spoke to me. The foundation he gave me means I will always support an understanding of Islam that has a message of liberation, social-justice, racial-equality and stands against White Supremacy and neo-colonialism. I never met the man, but he changed my life, as Malcolm changed other lives and will continue to do so.

This essay was inspired by my dear old friend Shaheed Williams of Wichita, Kansas who is writing a book on Malcolm. I told him we need to publish a collection of essays on Malcolm from different people and then realized getting people to write them would be like herding cats so here is my humble contribution to the memory of an American Shahid.

Umar Lee is a Muslim writer and author of the popular blog http://umarlee.wordpress.com and the recently released novel Tea Party Twelver and The Muslim Brothers.

The post Malcolm and Me: What Malcolm X Means To Me and The Hip-Hop Generation appeared first on The Islamic Hotline.

In response to the voilence erupted in Libya and Egypt and to the disorderly protest of the people there in the name of defending the honor of the Prophet s.a.a.w:

وَمَنْ أَحْسَنُ قَوْلًا مِّمَّن دَعَا إِلَى اللَّهِ وَعَمِلَ صَالِحًا وَقَالَ إِنَّنِي مِنَ الْمُسْلِمِينَ
“And who is better in speech than one who invites to Allah and does righteousness and says, “Indeed, I am of the Muslims.”

…وَلَا تَسْتَوِي الْحَسَنَةُ وَلَا السَّيِّئَةُ ۚ ادْفَعْ بِالَّتِي هِيَ أَحْسَنُ فَإِذَا الَّذِي بَيْنَكَ وَبَيْنَهُ عَدَاوَةٌ كَأَنَّهُ وَلِيٌّ حَمِيمٌ

“And not equal are the good deed and the bad. Repel [evil] by that [deed] which is better; and thereupon the one whom between you and him is enmity [will become] as though he was a devoted friend.”

وَمَا يُلَقَّاهَا إِلَّا الَّذِينَ صَبَرُوا وَمَا يُلَقَّاهَا إِلَّا ذُو حَظٍّ عَظِيمٍ

“But none is granted it except those who are patient, and none is granted it except one having a great portion [of good].”

**How can good prevail, if we respond to evil by escalating it with an act that is even worse?

The post In response to the anti-film violence erupting in the Middle East appeared first on The Islamic Hotline.

American Muslim leaders and organizations rushed on Wednesday to condemn the attacks on American diplomatic outposts in Libya and Egypt, issuing news releases and giving interviews that seemed aimed as much at an American audience as at Muslims overseas.

Referring to the anti-Muslim video at the center of the attacks that is believed to be American-made, they said that no matter how offensive the film, violence was unjustified and even un-Islamic. They stressed repeatedly that the film did not represent Americans’ attitudes toward Islam and Muslims. And they said they were appalled that a film that they said was so clearly intended to incite hatred and anger toward the United States had succeeded in doing so.

Imam Mohamed Magid, president of the Islamic Society of North America, an umbrella group of American mosques, denounced the violence at a news conference in Washington, appearing alongside a rabbi, a Baptist minister and the Libyan ambassador to the United States, Ali Aujali.

Mr. Magid said in a telephone interview that he and other American Muslim leaders had been contacting Muslim scholars in Egypt, Libya, Tunisia and Mauritania to tell them that those who made the film “do not represent the American people.”

He said, “Those who did this act of violence fall into the trap of the people who want them to act that way.”

Representative Keith Ellison, a Democrat from Minnesota and the first Muslim to be elected to Congress, said in a statement that the video at the center of the attacks was “amateurish and stupid” and “deeply offensive” — not just to Muslims, but to “anyone who respects the faith of others.”

However, he said: “People need to understand that the United States government had no role in creating this film. In fact, the government has condemned it and the American people have rejected it; it violates the American value of religious tolerance.”

He added: “Responding with violence is never justified. And those who think they are doing so in the name of Islam are wrong and ill informed.”

Salam al-Marayati, president of the Muslim Public Affairs Council, an advocacy group based in Los Angeles, said in a statement: “America is our home and is home to Islam, like so many other religions. Anyone who attempts to promote the misconception that Muslims are not integrated into America is fomenting more fear and destructive behavior.”

The post American Muslim Leaders Condemn Attacks appeared first on The Islamic Hotline.

In my new book The Myth of the Muslim Tide, I chronicle the widespread misunderstanding of Muslim immigration to the West. As with Jews and Catholics before, I discuss that Muslims are being seen as an impossible-to-integrate, fast-reproducing invasion force who follow a religion that’s more an ideology of conquest than a faith. Using the latest facts and figures, I illustrate the far less alarming truth about these new arrivals.

Here are 10 common myths about Muslims in the West:

1. Muslims have a higher birth rate than other religions, and will take over the world by population
Two generations ago, it seemed as if Islamic countries were destined for out-of-control population growth. People spoke of an “Islamic fertility rate” – – more than 5 children per family, on average – – and predicted minaret spires foresting the Earth. Today, it is readily apparent that Islam is not connected with population growth. Just look at Iran, the world’s only Islamic theocracy, where the average family had around 7 children in the 1980s – – and has 1.7 today, a lower rate than France or Britain. Or look at the United Arab Emirates, with 1.9 children per family. Or Turkey, ruled by an elected party of devout Muslims for a decade, which now has 2.15 children per family. Or Lebanon, where, despite Hezbollah’s rise, has only 1.86 children per family (so that its population will be shrinking). Around the world, the average Muslim family size has fallen from 4.3 children per family in 1995 to 2.9 in 2010, and is expected to fall below the population-growth rate, and converge with Western family sizes, by mid-century. This is a crucial sign that Muslim societies are undergoing a major modernizing, secularizing wave – – even if they elect Islamist parties while doing so.

2. Immigrants from Muslim countries are going to swamp us
People look at the huge families of many new Muslim immigrants and imagine them multiplying at exponential rates. But this is a bit of an illusion – -as are many of the figures suggesting that Muslim immigrants have fertility rates higher than in their homelands. This is because most new immigrants have most of their children in the years immediately after their arrival. The way we calculate Total Fertility Rate – – the measure of average family size – – is by taking the total number of births a woman has had and extrapolating it across her fertile life. As a result, immigrants appear to have more children than they really do. In reality, the family sizes of Muslim immigrant groups are converging fast with those of average Westerners – – faster, it seems, than either Jewish or Catholic immigrants did in their time. Muslims in France and Germany are now having only 2.2 children per family, barely above the national average. And while Pakistani immigrants in Britain have 3.5 children each, their British-born daughers have only 2.5. Across Europe, the difference between the Muslim and non-Muslim fertility rate has fallen from 0.7 to 0.4, and is headed toward a continent-wide convergence.

3. Muslims will become a majority in European countries
In fact, we now have several large-scale projections based on population-growth trends and immigration rates which show that the Muslim populations of Europe are growing increasingly slowly and that by the middle of this century – – even if immigration rates are not reduced – – the proportion of Muslims in Europe will probably peak somewhere short of 10% (it is currently around 7%). By that point, Muslims will have family sizes and age profiles not that different from Europe in general.

4. Muslims will become a dominant group of cultural outsiders in the United States
Despite the hysterical rhetoric coming from Newt Gingrich, Michelle Bachmann and their ilk, Muslims there are not only a very tiny group, but they are also one of the most integrated groups in the country – – especially if you consider that 69% of American Muslims are first-generation immigrants, and 71% of those immigrants arrived after 1990. There are only 2.6 million Muslims in the United States today. By 2030, that number is likely to rise to 6.2 million (because Muslims are young and fertile) – – at which point Muslim will be 1.7% of the population, almost as numerous as Jews and Episcopalians. Even though they’re new, American Muslims tend to be economically successful and highly educated. With 40% of them holding a college degree, they’re the second most educated group after Jews – – and far more educated than Americans in general, only 29% of whom have a degree.

5. Muslim immigrants in the West hold the same backward views that Muslims do in the Middle East and Pakistan
Actually, Muslims change their cultural views dramatically when they emigrate. For example, 62% of American Muslims say that “a way can be found for the state of Israel to exist so that the rights of Palestinians are addressed” – – a rate barely lower than that of average Americans (67%), and vastly ahead of the miniscule response among Middle Eastern Muslims – – for whom between 20% and 40% agreed with that statement. Similarly, 39% of American Muslims and 47% of German Muslims say they tolerate homosexuality, compared to single-figure responses in most Islamic countries – and those rates are rising with each immigrant generation. On these important questions, Muslim immigrants are converging with Western values fast.

6. Muslims in America are more loyal to their faith than their country
True, 49% of Americans from Muslim backgrounds say they consider themselves “Muslim first and American second” and 47% claim to attend a mosque on Friday. But you have to compare that to American Christians, 46% of whom say they identify themselves as “Christian first and American second” (that number rises to 70% among Evangelicals). And 45% of American Christians attend a church service every Sunday. In other words, Muslims have adopted exactly the same rate of religious observance as the people around them in their host country. We see this just as strongly in France, where a fifth of Muslims are atheist and only 5% attend a mosque regularly – almost the same rate as French Christians.

7. Poor Muslims are flooding out of overpopulated countries into the West
In fact, the poorest most overpopulated Muslim countries are producing the least emigration – – and very little of it is to the West. Immigration tends to come from the countries with the lowest population-growth rates, and it’s rarely to the closest countries. Muslims are far from the largest immigrant group – – even in countries that immediately adjoin the Islamic world. In Spain, which lies across a narrow state from poor Arab countries, only 13% of immigrants are Muslim: Most have come from Spanish-speaking countries across the Atlantic. In Britain, only 28% of immigrants are Muslim. And those numbers do not seem poised to increase.

8. Muslim immigrants are angry at the society around them
In fact, Muslim immigrants appear to be MORE satisfied with the world around them, and its secular institutions, than the general population. Muslim immigrants in the United States are more likely to say they are “satisfied with their lives” (84%) than average Americans are (75%) – – and that number rises to 90% for American-born Muslims. Even among Muslims in neighourhoods where the community mosque has been vandalized – – an increasingly frequent occurrence – – fully 76% say that their community is an “excellent” or “good” place to live. This usually extends into pride in national institutions. For example, 83% of British Muslims say they are “proud to be a British citizen,” versus only 79% of Britons in general – – and only 31% of Muslims agree that “Britain’s best days are behind her,” versus 45% of Britons in general.

9. Muslims in the West cheer for terrorist violence
While it might seem chilling to learn that 8% of American Muslims feel that violence against civilian targets is “often or sometimes justified” if the cause is right, you have to compare that to the response given by non-Muslim Americans, 24% of whom said that such attacks are “often or sometimes justified.” This is reflected in most major surveys. When a large-scale survey asked if “attacks on civilians are morally justified,” 1% of the French public, 1% of the German public and 3% of the British public answered yes; among Muslims, the responses were 2%, 0.5%, and 2%. Asked if it is “justifiable to use violence for a noble cause,” 7% of the French public agreed, along with 8% of French Muslims; 10% of the German public and fewer than 2% of German Muslims; 10% of the British public and 8% of British Muslims. This may well be because 85% of the victims of Islamic terrorism are Muslims.

10. Muslims have become so populous that the most common baby name in Britain is now Mohammed.
This is true – – but it means far less than you’d think. In 2010, if you combined all 12 spelling variants of the Islamic prophet’s name, “Mohammed” was more popular than any other name given to new babies. But that’s more a consequence of naming trends than anything else. In a great many Muslim cultures, ALL male babies are given “Mohammed” as an official first name. But among many Westerners – especially white Anglo-Saxons and black Christians – – there has been an explosion in unorthodox baby names – – as of 2011, these groups are 50% more likely than they were a generation ago to give their children uncommon baby names. As a result, Mohammed manages to reach the Number 1 spot without being all that common – – when combined, babies named after the Islamic prophet made up only 1% of British newborns in 2010.

Follow Doug Saunders on Twitter: www.twitter.com/DougSaunders

The post 10 Myths About Muslims in the West appeared first on The Islamic Hotline.

1. American Muslims are foreigners.

Islam was in America even before there was a United States. But Muslims didn’t peaceably emigrate — slave-traders brought them here.

Historians estimate that up to 30 percent of enslaved blacks were Muslims. West African prince Abdul Rahman, freed by President John Quincy Adams in 1828 after 40 years in captivity, was only one of many African Muslims kidnapped and sold into servitude in the New World. In early America, Muslim names could be found in reports of runaway slaves as well as among rosters of soldiers in the Revolutionary War. Muslims fought to preserve American independence in the War of 1812 and for the Union in the Civil War. And more than a century later, thousands of African Americans, including Cassius Clay and Malcolm Little, converted to Islam.

Currently, there are two Muslim members of Congress and thousands of Muslims on active duty in the armed forces. Sure, some Muslim soldiers may have been born elsewhere, but if you wear the uniform of the United States and are willing to die for this country, can you be really be considered a foreigner?

2. American Muslims are ethnically, culturally and politically monolithic.

In fact, the American Muslim community is the most diverse Muslim community in the world.

U.S. Muslims believe different things and honor their faith in different ways. When it comes to politics, a 2007 Pew study found that 63 percent of Muslim Americans “lean Democratic,” 11 percent “lean Republican” and 26 percent “lean independent.” Ethnically, despite the popular misperception, the majority of Muslims in the United States (and in the world, for that matter) are not Arabs — about 88 percent check a different box on their U.S. census form. At least one-quarter, for example, are African American. Anyone who thinks otherwise need look no further than the July 30, 2007, cover of Newsweek magazine, which featured a multicultural portrait of Islam in America.

Muslim Americans are also diverse in their sectarian affiliation. And whether they are Sunni or Shiite, their attendance at religious services varies. According to the State Department publication “Muslims in America — A Statistical Portrait,” Muslim Americans range from highly conservative to moderate to secular in their religious devotion, just like members of other faith communities.

With above-average median household incomes, they are also an indispensable part of the U.S. economy. Sixty-six percent of American Muslim households earn more than $50,000 per year — more than the average U.S. household.

3. American Muslims oppress women.

According to a 2009 study by Gallup, Muslim American women are not only more educated than Muslim women in Western Europe, but are also more educated than the average American. U.S. Muslim women report incomes closer to their male counterparts than American women of any other religion. They are at the helm of many key religious and civic organizations, such as the Arab-American Family Support Center, Azizah magazine, Karamah, Turning Point, the Islamic Networks Group and the American Society for Muslim Advancement.

Of course, challenges to gender justice remain worldwide. In the World Economic Forum’s 2009 Gender Gap Index, which ranks women’s participation in society, 18 of the 25 lowest-ranking countries have Muslim majorities. However, as documented by the Women’s Islamic Initiative in Spirituality and Equality , Muslim women are leading the struggle for change through their scholarship, civic engagement, education, advocacy and activism in the United States and across the world.

4. American Muslims often become “homegrown” terrorists.

According to the Triangle Center on Terrorism and Homeland Security, more non-Muslims than Muslims were involved in terrorist plots on U.S. soil in 2010. In a country in the grip of Islamophobia — where Rep. Peter King (R-N.Y.) can convene hearings on the radicalization of American Muslims — this has been overlooked. In 2010, the Triangle Center also found, the largest single source of initial information on planned terrorist attacks by Muslims in the United States was the Muslim American community.

As an American Muslim leader who worked with FBI agents on countering extremism right after Sept. 11, 2001, I fear that identifying Islam with terrorism threatens to erode American Muslims’ civil liberties and fuels the dangerous perception that the United States is at war with Islam. Policymakers must recognize that, more often than not, the terrorists the world should fear are motived by political and socioeconomic — not religious — concerns.

5. American Muslims want to bring sharia law to the United States.

In Islam, sharia is the divine ideal of justice and compassion, similar to the concept of natural law in the Western tradition. Though radicals exist on the fringes of Islam, as in every religion, most Muslim jurists agree on the principal objectives of sharia: the protection and promotion of life, religion, intellect, property, family and dignity. None of this includes turning the United States into a caliphate.

For centuries, most Islamic scholars around the world have agreed that Muslims must follow the laws of the land in which they live. This principle was established by the prophet Muhammad in A.D. 614-615, when he sent some of his followers to be protected by the Christian king of Abyssinia, where they co-existed peacefully. Not only do American Muslims have no scriptural, historical or political grounds to oppose the U.S. Constitution, but the U.S. Constitution is in line with the objectives and ideals of sharia. Muslims already practice sharia in the United States when they worship freely and follow U.S. laws.

In his 1776 publication “Thoughts on Government,” John Adams praised Muhammad as a “sober inquirer after truth.” And the Supreme Court building contains a likeness of the prophet, whose vision of justice is cited as an important precedent to the U.S. Constitution.

Feisal Abdul Rauf is the founder of the Cordoba Initiative.

The post 5 Myths about Muslims in America appeared first on The Islamic Hotline.

During the 2008 presidential campaign, rumors proliferated that Barack Obama was a Muslim who had been indoctrinated into militant Islam during childhood studies in a madrassa. The fact that the Democratic candidate had been a prominent and visible member of a Protestant church in Chicago for years somehow mattered not at all. The Obama campaign even created a Web site wholly devoted to answering conspiracy theories and smears.

Ultimately, though, it took a Republican in the form of Colin L. Powell to speak truth to fantasy. “He is not a Muslim, he’s a Christian. He’s always been a Christian,” the retired general and former cabinet secretary said on “Meet the Press.” “But the really right answer is, What if he is? Is there something wrong with being a Muslim in this country? The answer is no, that’s not America.”

Mr. Powell’s words echo now in the aftermath of last weekend’s massacre of six worshipers at a Sikh temple near Milwaukee. The narrative that has emerged in both media coverage and public discourse since then has been one of religious mistaken identity. It presumes that the killer, identified as a white supremacist named Wade M. Page, may have shot the Sikhs because he ignorantly believed they were Muslim.

Such a story line is accurate as far as it goes. Hundreds of times since the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, Sikhs have been the victims of bias crimes. The perpetrators have invariably assumed that because Sikh men wear turbans and have beards they are Muslims, even specifically Taliban. How terrible it is that it has taken the slayings in Wisconsin to serve as a national teachable moment about the theology and practices of the Sikh religion.

Yet the mistaken-identity narrative carries with it an unspoken, even unexamined premise. It implies that somehow the public would have — even should have — reacted differently had Mr. Page turned his gun on Muslims attending a mosque. It suggests that such a crime would be more explicable, more easily rationalized, less worthy of moral outrage.

“Islamophobia has become so mainstream in this country that Americans have been trained to expect violence against Muslims — not excuse it, but expect it,” said Reza Aslan, an Iranian-American writer and scholar on religion. “And that’s happened because you have an Islamophobia industry in this country devoted to making Americans think there’s an enemy within.”

As a Sikh, Vishavjit Singh has found himself wrestling with the subject these past few days. “If this had happened at a mosque, would our reaction be different?” asked Mr. Singh, a software engineer in suburban New York who also publishes political cartoons online at Sikhtoons.com. “I hope not, but the answer might be yes. You’d have the same amount of coverage, but you might have more voices saying, ‘Well, you know, it’s understandable, we’re at war, we’ve been at war.’ That’s an unfortunate commentary on our society today.”

The paradox is that bias crimes against Muslims are growing a decade after the Sept. 11 attacks. The number of such instances, as tallied by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, had been falling steadily from nearly 500 in 2001 to 107 in 2009. Then, in 2010, the most recent year for which the F.B.I. has data, the number leapt by 50 percent, to 160.

That spike does not look like either a mathematical or historical accident. During 2010, controversy erupted about the proposed “ground zero mosque,” which was actually a community center several blocks away. Prompted by several actual or attempted acts of terrorism by American Muslims, Representative Peter T. King began preparing for hearings in the spring of 2011 on supposedly widespread subversion among millions of American Muslims — an exercise in suspicion, if not guilt, by association.

While those public pageants have largely subsided, there remain well-endowed groups like Jihad Watch, ACT for America and Stop Islamization of America. Several states have passed statutes outlawing the application of Shariah, and thus lending credence to the canard that American Muslims seek to impose their religious law. Representative Michele Bachmann, a former candidate for the Republican presidential nomination, recently accused a Muslim aide to Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton of having ties to the Muslim Brotherhood.

Such talk adds up to what John Shuford, the director of the Institute for Hate Studies at Gonzaga University in Spokane, Wash., calls “enmification” — the process of turning a particular group into an enemy. Now that American Muslims have been enmified, violence against them is understood in a mitigated, mediated way.

“Rationalization (or the capability of being rationalized) is a good way of putting it,” Professor Shuford wrote in an e-mail message. “Not in the sense of rational behavior or excusability, but in the sense of being understandable, in the way that sometimes leaps in logic, mistaken or misinformed beliefs, outright ignorance and prejudice, and influential social narratives can be quite intelligible even to those who do not view the world in the same way.”

Just one day after the shootings near Milwaukee, a mosque in Joplin, Mo., was burned down. Several weeks earlier, it had also been set afire. This latest episode was covered mostly by the local news media and The Associated Press, with a few larger organizations picking up the wire-service story.

Certainly, an apparent bias crime against property, heinous as that is, does not compare in journalism’s calculus to the bigoted murder of six people. But it is at least worth pondering whether the Joplin arson also set off a kind of internal well-you-must-understand response.

“If it were a church or a synagogue that had been burned down twice, we’d be shocked by it,” Mr. Aslan said. “The narrative about the mosque burning has a sense of expectation to it.”

The problem with enmification, though, is that it knows few bounds. What started with the hatred of Muslims has repeatedly swept up Sikhs (and also, in some cases, Latinos) in its vortex.

“For the Sikh community, it doesn’t matter that it was mistaken for being Muslim,” said Eric Ward, an expert in hate crimes who was formerly with an interfaith coalition called the Center for New Community. “What matters is that individuals should not be targeted for their faith.”

E-mail: sgf1@columbia.edu

The post If the Sikh Temple Had Been a Mosque appeared first on The Islamic Hotline.

Muhammad was a social activist of his time. He shook the underpinnings of the unjust society he lived in by bringing about social reforms: he forbade exploitation of the vulnerable, protected the poor by establishing regular charity; and crippled an arrogant class and race-based system by upholding equality.

Welfare and social solidarity are the basis for the progress of a nation. The Islamic civilisation pioneered the implementation of social welfare by establishing institutions to provide support to individuals in all levels of society in a trust system known as waqf. There were institutions for the disabled, the blind, and those in need who would find shelter, food, and education. There were also institutions for mothers of young children – one of Salahuddin’s (Saladin) greatest acts of philanthropy was the establishment of two reservoirs by the gate of his fort in Damascus – one of milk and one of fresh drinking water for the mothers to take freely.

Muhammad said: “The best people are those who are most useful to others” and today Muslims still aspire to that maxim through participating in social and community projects. From supporting the homeless in London to working with children with learning disabilities, American Muslims are actively involved in making their communities better for everyone.

Source: Inspired by Muhammad

Check out MA’RUF’s Povertunity Campaign!

The post “One who sleeps while their neighbor is hungry, is not one of us.” appeared first on The Islamic Hotline.