Jefferson Corner

I have to admit, that I was always envious of our Jewish and Christian friends and neighbors as I see them get in their cars with their families, wife and children included and head to the church or the synagogue.
My twin daughters, Laila and Diala always raised me the questions as to why the Muslim mosque does not take a role similar to that of the church and synagogue. I always struggled with an answer and I too ask my self time and time why the mosques does not serve and provide the same support a church or a synagogue its members, not only fulfill the members spiritual needs but social needs and economic connections.
To reach a conclusion for this posting, I had to travel back in time to the time I arrived in the US as a young boy of 16 to the City of Gary, Indiana on a snowy March 1962. Believe it or not, Gary, Indiana of all places had a thriving Muslim community of several hundred families, Lebanese, Palestinians, Syrian, Turkish, Yugoslav, with Indians and Pakistanis coming in on Sunday from Chicago. Though it was a small community, it built a small mosque on West 11th street. The mosques were small compared to the surrounding churches and synagogue. My late father, who was back home in Palestine a mason, helped build the mosque together with many other participants who worked on the weekend to make sure the mosque, was ready for occupancy in less than two years.
During those days before more radical Muslims where able to take over the mosques all over the US and force their own brand of Islam, we used to go the mosque as a family. My late mother would cook and take food like other families so that after prayer and lesson we all would sit down at the tables and enjoy a meal together. In addition to my late mother and father, sisters and brothers will also join. Indeed the mosque in those days took us in and we participated in its affairs as an entire family and not male dominated institutions with no rooms for the family to be together.
Since those days when Islam was a more enlightened and much more enriching and supportive of the families and their needs, the mosques have changed quite a bit.
New Imams who for the most part do not speak good English and do not know much about the US let alone the city or the community they are, they took over the mosques and transformed the mosques in their own image and as they have back at home, where the mosques was not an institution oriented toward the families, but a place where men meet to pray, listen to some mediocre Imam tells them all the things they are doing, living in the land of non-believers. Of course and for the most part these new Imam have a very strict order of Islam, where women and children are not to be seen let alone heard. The mosque since those days in Gary, Indiana lost its unique place as both a spiritual and a social place, where families, made up of men and women, of children boys and girls would go and attend the prayers together, in the same room with a thin curtain erected during prayer, and once that is done, the entire family would rejoin each other and listen to the lecture and then go down stair and every one join together for a meal and family get together.
Unlike the mosques of these days, the churches and synagogue serve such an important community service to its members who also decide on the priest or the rabbi who lead their community and who also provide lots of social and spiritual advice. The members have a say so on all issues and policies with an executive board elected with real power and real authority unlike our mosques where small group of person appoint themselves as the guardian of our soul and sins and our mosques. In the church as well as in the synagogue, there is a real since of community, men and women, grandparents and children all are members of the community body and soul. The church and the synagogue plays a major role in helping introducing new families to the community, even help with business and commercial relation and of course support the families other social and families needs. There is sense of community that is totally messing in our mosques.
Yes, I want to sit together with my wife and children, listen to the lecture and the discussion. Yes I do accept the need to separate, men and women at prayer time, but not to banish them to the basement, but to give them a special section not to far from their families, and yes, I want us as family to get together with other families and not to be separate from my wife and children after the prayer time. This is time for the entire families to meet other families, husband and wife, and children. This is time for the entire family to meet another entire family. These days, at least away from the Muslim world there is major and urgent need to redefine the role of the mosques as a religious and social venue and not place where we hear retarded Imam tell us that Allah will roast us in hell rather than tell us that Allah loves us and care for us. We need to transform the mosque into a fee based membership organization where the members can make the decision as to who, yes, who will join our community, making sure that there is no room for the “takfeerieen” those who look at any one that does not obey them as a “kafer” a non believer. We need a mosque where the community makes the decision on employment and qualification and where members can question him/her as to where they stand on certain theological and social issues. Yes, we do need mosques where the Imams not only speak and understand the language of the country very well, but someone who also understand the culture and values of the country. We need Imams who also able and willing to build bridged within the community we live in and who are able to reach out to all members of the community, Christians and Jews and Hindus and others. Imams who knows and understand both the Jewish and Christian faiths and who also read the Torah and the Holy Bible. We need mosques that can take their rightful place within the Muslim community, taking us in as an entire family. Yes, I do look forward to the days when I can go together with the entire members of the family and share with them what Islam is all about. We need a mosques of the future not one of the past and not one of the Taliban type. We need enlightened Imam who sees us as members of the community, not living in the margins. After all we are part of this much larger community. Do not expect us to live in isolation from our neighbors and friends. Yes, there is nothing wrong and nothing in Islam that prevents a woman to lead prayer or for women to be active board members. Islam is not made up of men, only; it is made up of families.

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In the March 3rd edition of the Arabic Magazine “Al-majalla” I read with much enjoyment the last page, which is the domain page of the very well known, and much accomplished Sudanese writer and novelist Altayb Saleh.
Mr. Altayeb Saleh wrote about a certain Dr. Freeman Dyson who was during WW II a researcher in the physics department of the British Royal Air force planning the daily bombardment of German towns and cities.
The allies waged an aerial war unmatched for years to come with the exception of the attack on Iraq during the first gulf war and then during the War on Iraq waged by George Bush and Dick Cheney knowing the majority of casualties are civilians.
During the war, hundreds of thousands of civilians where burned to death, defined as collateral damage to the war against the Nazi war machine. Total cities and towns where completely wiped off the ground. Cities like Frankfurt, Hamburg and Dresden where totally destroyed. So much for war efficiency and Western morality.
Altayeb Saleh narrates the story of this Dr. Freeman Dyson who in 1984 decided to come out and say what he wanted to say during the war. Dr. Dyson was sick to his stomach from the daily and high numbers of victims killed by the allies during day and night bombing of Germany to the point where he just wanted to take his clothes off, go out to the streets and simply scream and vent his anger. However, he was too coward to do that and did his best to do his shares in keeping the number of causality to an acceptable low.
Being a coward reminds me of myself, when back in 1989 during a business visit to Tangier, Morocco I read with much dismay and anger an editorial written by one of the dean of Moroccan journalist, Abdul-Kareem Ghallab, a well-known Arab nationalist was the chief editor of Al Alam daily newspaper. On that day he came out with a scathing attack against French newspapers and politicians for raising questions about and protesting the massacre of 300 protestors by Algerian police the day before in Algiers. Mr. Ghallab was too angry at French newspapers and journalist, for “intervening in the internal affairs” of Algeria. Of course NO Arab paper and no Arab politicians and NO Arab intellectual spoke out against such massacres. It is seems it is a well-established tradition within the Arab World for all to remain silent when Arabs kill Arabs, and when government commit mass murder. Very brave tradition among Arab intellectuals and journalists.
I could not help but sit down in my hotel room at El-Minzah Hotel and write Mr. Ghallab a long letter, challenging him and other Arab journalists and intellectuals on the issue of when (killing and murdering citizen becomes a matter of “internal affairs” of a country.) Did the killing and murdering of 6 millions Jews is a matter of internal affairs for Nazi Germany? Is the killing and murder of thousands of Palestinians by the Israeli Army an internal affair of the State of Israel and no have a right to say something about? Is the murder of over 500,000 Rwandans is an internal affairs of Rwanda and no one has a right to protest? Is the killing and murder of tens of thousand of Iraqis by Saddam is an internal affair of Iraq? Or when the killing and cold-blooded murder of over 25,000 Syrians in City of Hamah becomes internal affairs of the state? I put to Mr. Ghallab, a very straight question. When does the killing by security forces does not become a matter of internal affairs? Of course I never got an answer back, since I signed the letter under the name “coward” and I was coward at the time, since I did not dare to reveal my real name, certainly not in 1989.
Two years ago and before his retirement, I did send Mr. Ghallab a copy of the same letter I sent him some years ago, and gave him my name and address. As expected I never did get a response. It is not in the style of Arab editors to write back.
Altayb Saleh story of Dr. Dyson just reminded me that at one time or another we are cowards and for one reason or another do not wish to come out and say what we should say. say or speak out on something we know is dead wrong.
However major changes took place in the Arab World since then, and especially in Morocco where newspapers and editors enjoy freedoms not available in most Arab countries, and things has changed where young editors and journalist never been on the payroll of government agencies either as employees or as informers. Times have changed for the most part where investigative journalism now fill the airways, where even Arab heads of states are not a taboo subjects. Yes, I was at one time a coward.

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The case of the “top” Islamic cleric in Australia. Sheik Taj el-Dene Elhilaly and his assumption that unveiled women invite rape and a similar retarded “fatwa” from Sheik Mohamed Kamal Mustafa, the former imam of the Spanish southern town of Fuengirola who published a book called” Women in Islam” in which he finds justifications if not promotion of “wife beating” as a way to solve marital problems and we need to add to that the likes of Syed Ikram Jilani of Oslo among others, raises serious problems and issues about how low can these “Islamic” clerics takes Islam. Perhaps unlike other religions with a well defined hierarchy of “priest hood” and rabbinic hierarchy, there are no such hierarchies in Islam, and any Islamic hierarchy of “imams” is an invention of modern states but not of the Holy Quran. The Holy Quran has more faith and trust in the judgment of individuals that did trust in these new “inventions”. These days, every Mohamed, Ali and Mahmoud or Taj eldin who failed at other professions becomes expert on Islam and takes over a mosques, such as the case in England, USA, Australia, among others, where mentally retarded and semi-illiterates becomes imams and start giving fatwas left and right and start to be the ugly, illiterate and retarded face of Islam. As a testimony of how low these mentally retarded and illiterate imams came to be we are not surprise that some of these think that the mentally retarded and murderers Taliblans are the “perfect” caliphates putting forward the Taliban state as a model of an Islamic state. There must be something very wrong with these people. Simply mentally sick. If Islam and early Muslims who opened the world to Islam where of such mentality and attitude, for sure Islam would not have left Mecca and would have been a religion that died before it started. These people and so many like them forget that Islam is a religion and faith of knowledge, of science, of education, of travel and most of all of social justice, with very strict and high standards of criminal accusation and convictions. With so many of these illiterate and retarded imams, who not only hijacked our mosques, but also hijacked our faith, perhaps it is time for us Muslim and for Islam to have another renaissance, similar to that of Europe in the Middle Ages. Perhaps what we need now more than ever is a “reformation movement” that will redefine again Islam as the way it was intended for “all ages”. Enough with today’s imams going back to thousands of years to find true and intelligent answers to days issue and concerns of Muslims. We all know that the “door” of “Ijtihad” or prudence was closed some centuries ago, as if modern day scholars are unable to reach for the truth except to going back in time. If Islam is the faith for all times, then we need scholars for the future and not only for the past and yes, why not for a new ‘reformation” movement that can take Islam to the future instead of keeping it in the past. Perhaps it is time for Muslims and those attending mosques to get more educated and more enlightened “imam:” than the retards we are getting these days to lead us in prayers. When I go to mosques I want to hear an intelligent and enlightened sermon, not to hear some imbecile who happens to recite few suras and never read another book in any language to give and share his ignorance with the believers. I am sure there are enough Islamic scholars in the US to take charge and lead us forward and liberate Muslims from retarded imams such as Sheik Taj el-Dene Elhilaly or Sheik Mohamed Kamal Mustafa or someone like Abu-Hamza Al-Masry. It is time to throw out these retards out of the mosques and reclaims our mosques again. Who said that Al-Azhar have to be the only “religious” reference for Muslims. There are enough intelligent and smart scholars in the US and Europe to lead the way to an Islamic Renaissance and redefine Islam as it was intended to be a religion, faith and way of life for all times and all ages. Not one defined by defined by terrorist leaders like the Bin Laden, Ayman Dhawahiri, Abu-Hamza Almasri, Abu-Qutada and all of these criminal terrorists. We need an Islam that is a religion of peace, of love, of reconciliation that bridges the gabs between people and culture. We want an Islam for all times.
Note: for some reasons, this posting does not appear all the times. Perhaps there are some organizations out there not too happy with what I post.

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These days there is so much talk about Iran and its nuclear program, with Secretary Rice traveling the globe to drum up support for UN sanctions against Iran. Of course so far, the Iranians insists the technology and use is for peaceful means, i.e., nuclear energy, while the US and its allies not knowing what it is going on insist the technology has military use. Caught in the Middle is the Gulf Arab countries worried both about Iran’s expanding military capabilities and worried about the safety of Iran’s nuclear program.
Meanwhile in Tel-Aviv, Washington, Berlin, Paris and London, no one talks of Israel’s 150 plus nuclear weapons and no one of course date to talk about Israel’s intentions giving the fact it did not sign the international treaty for the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons, Iran did and one has to say in defense of Iran it did and does allows intentional inspectors to visit its nuclear facilities. Of course we have to remember it was the US during the late Shah that gave Iran its first nuclear facilities, so why the fuss now?
The problem with Iran is it system of government which allows clergy men, the likes of Khameini to be the supreme ruler and the ultimate decision makers, thus depriving the democratic and electoral process out of true essence which is the people’s representation. I never understood nor could I accept the idea that Muslim clerics rule and have a say so in the people affairs, let alone accept Iran’s model of “Wilyat Al-Faqih” which translate to the supremacy of the clergy class. Of course the late Khomaini wanting to make sure that his class is never marginalized like in the days of the Shah, introduced the idea of Wilyat Al-Faqih to make sure that control of Iran is always with the clergy and never by the people’s representative. I am very leery and worried about the course of civilization when crazy Muslim, Jewish, Christian or Hindu clergy takes charge; the world is in real trouble.
Iran’s nuclear program is scaring the Arab gulf countries and for good reasons. In addition to having a neighbor with possible nuclear weapons next door, without any kind of system of checks and balances within the governing system and with the decision making process shifting from one center of power to another. In addition we always reminded of the failures in Chernynoble and in Three Miles Island and we know what a failure can mean to so many people within and outside the borders. Nuclear technology is nothing to miss around with and failures will mean death for a long time to come. One only need to look at Kazakhstan, where the Soviet conducted most of their nuclear experiment, half of the country, literary dead, and will be dead for millions of years.
Personally I am against the Arabs wasting their time and money on nuclear weapons, since I do not believe that nuclear weapons will solve any problem or provide any protection, and all the nuclear weapons in Israel, China, Russia, USA, France, UK, N.Korea, Pakistan and India are nothing but a waste of time, and any country that will use nuclear weapons will be doomed, even if it dooms others. Israel, a real source of danger for the world, is the only country with so much physiological damage and screwed up minds that may use nuclear weapons. But then will it use it against the Palestinians in Ramallah or in Gaza, giving the fact that Israeli technology so far is not far development to make a distinction between Arabs and Jews. But then who knows may be the Israelis with the help of the Americans will develop a weapon system that can kill only Arabs even if these Arabs are standing among bunch of Jews. Who knows every thing is possible.
The best thing for the Arabs, and especially the Gulf Arabs to do is try to form some kind of cooperation with Iran and jointly developed and invest in nuclear technology for peaceful means, making sure that Iran’s nuclear program is not for military use and by joining Iran in the development of its program insuring the safety and upping the technology given the fact that the Arab gulf countries have the financial and political connections to secure the best nuclear technology any where in the world.
The problem with Iran’s nuclear program is the fact that it did not sign a peace treaty with Israel and if and when it does, all of the problems the US, France, Germany, and England have with Iran will go away in an instant. It is not the issue of safety of the Arabs and the oil sources that is troubling America, it is the potential danger to Israel that such a technology may have. If the Islamic Republic of Iran establishes diplomatic relations with Israel the entire affairs will simply disappear from the radar screen and no one in the White House or in Berlin will talk about the crazy and unstable Mullahs of Iran.
Again, back to the Arab countries, I think the Arab atom bomb is a stupid idea and an irresponsible idea and is a waste of time, money, and efforts, when the Arab countries can put the cost of such investment in human development where it counts and not in weapons, they will never be allowed to have let alone use. The Arab world does not need more weapons, they need to put the costs of such weapons and invest it in infrastructures and in their own people. There are no needs to keep the West weapon factories going, while their own people are having a tough time finding a decent job. Let us see what Israel will do with all of its 150 nuclear bombs. Perhaps it will use them as it did the more than one million cluster bombs dropped on civilian targets in Lebanon.

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At the personal invitation of King Abdallah of Saudi Arabia the Palestinian warring factions of Hamas and Fatah signed a “peace agreement” in the Holy City of Mecca promising to form a “Unity Government” within one week and putting an end to the killing and murder that both organizations engaged in for the last several week.
The Palestinians have to remember that the Iraqis and the Afghans also signed a peace deals in Mecca only to return home and start killing and murdering each other again. I hope and all Palestinians hope that Hamas and Fatah will never ever engaged in any further acts of killing and murder again. While one has to be optimistic, there are certain leaderships within both organizations that have a lot to lose from any peace deal and stand to lose among their community of thugs.
The problem as I see it now with the daily announcement and with the stupid and unnecessary appearance of the many Hamas speakers who continue to make recognition of the State of Israel as the central issue of the Mecca accord, when there are other important issues to deal wit. Perhaps these people need to shut up and take few days off and give us a break from seeing and listening to many spokesmen crowding the air waives. Let us give this peace deal a chance and let the new government form first, announce its policies and programs and then these guys get their moment of glory before the TV cameras.
I read the agreement and yes, it is clear about ending the fighting and forming a unity government and yes, it does address the issues of recognizing and abiding by international agreements signed by the Palestinians.
One would think the new unity government take the opportunity of the support given by the Saudis and especially by both King Abdallah and Crown Prince Sultan to announce full support and commitment to King Abdallah’s Peace Plan announced in Beirut few years ago, and should seek funding from the Arab Gulf States and organize one hell of PR campaign inside Israel to gather support for the Arab Peace Plan, and wage an active campaign within the American Jewish community for such a peace plan given the fact that the US Jewish community always stood in the way of peace between Israel and the Arabs, for its own selfish interest of losing control over US Congress and lose it undue influence over America’s foreign policy.
Never understood why the Arabs and especially the Palestinians shied away from waging a peace campaign toward Israel. It certainly makes lots of sense and makes more sense than the stupid and senseless rockets fired from Gaza and certainly it is more effective than any suicide bombing and the killing of innocent people in cafes and restaurants in Tel-Aviv. I advocated this peace campaign soon after the conclusion of the Arab Summit Conference announcing the Arab Peace Plan with calls of putting some $ 50 millions toward this campaign.
The Palestinians more than ever need to have a vision for their own state and need to articulate this vision through actions and not words and need to prove to themselves that they have what it takes to build a modern nation- state where democracy and votes counts and where guns and militias have no place and where corruptions and incompetence are things of the past. Moreover, it is time for a massive and collective retirement of all those who served at one time or another with the late Yasser Arafat. They have proved, without any exception they are simply unfit to lead in liberation, are too incompetent to build a modern state and they have no vision for the future. 40 years of the same old people, the same old message, the same simple mind is just too much to take any more.
Reforming the PLO and dividing the cake like old times is no longer acceptable and we, in the Diaspora should not accept such a proposal, where those with few useless guns and no brains make all of the decisions. Of course it is time for the Palestinians in the Diaspora to step forward, make their voice counts and challenge those who have lead the Palestinian people from one disaster to another for the last 50 years. It is time for the Palestinians in the Diaspora to insist on having an independent voice separate from the PLO and insist on having an independent seat at the table in any future negotiations with Israel. There is so much talent outside of Palestine that it will be a crime for the Palestinians leadership under occupation not to make good use of and it will be a crime for the Diaspora Palestinians to leave their faith with the kind of leadership that we have seen for the last 50 years.

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These days we here so much talk of “international community” whether it is President George Bush, Secretary Rice, Prime Minister Blair or Chancellor Merkel, all speak of the “international community” whether they are talking about Iran’s nuclear programs, or Hamas government. These leaders speak as if they have been appointed and elected to speak for the rest of the world. The “international community” they speak about does not include countries in Africa, Asia or the Middle East; even it does not include some countries in Europe, let alone all of Latin and Central America. This if any, shows the arrogance of these leaders.
We must remember few years, the “international community” is the one that gave the Shah of Iran, all the weapons he needed and more to appoint himself as the guardian and ruler of the Arabian Gulf, it is the same “international community” that gave Saddam Hussain, all the weapons he needed including weapons of mass destructions which he put to effective use against his own people and that of Iran. It is the same “international community” that supported the wars in Sudan, Angola, Central America and supported dictatorships like Suharto of Indonesia. When we speak of the “international community” we must nit forgot that it is the one that supported and supplied Israel with its nuclear weapons program, that supported Israel’s twenty years occupation of south Lebanon and it is the same community that supports one of the longest and most criminal military occupations in modern time, that of Israel and its policy of ethnic cleansing and property theft inn the name of G-d and the jailing of over 350,000 Palestinians at one time or another.
One would and can accept the notion of an “international community” if this community has the moral standing and consistency and has track records of supporting freedoms and democracies throughout the world. The problem with this international community is it total silence on all the crimes committed by its proxies like Saddam Hussain, the Shah of Iran, and General Suharto and consistently supported all the prime ministers of Israel as they waged their relentless wars of killing, murdering Palestinians and the ethnic cleansing that forms the basic ideology of Jewish Zionism.
Since no one appointed the US, the UK or Germany as guardians of international rights these particular countries do not qualify to speak for the world community, a country like the US supported both Saddam Hussain and the Shah of Iran, and country like England that gave the Balfour Declaration depriving Palestinians of their natural rights to their homes and land and a country like German that put more than 6 millions Jews in death and gas chambers. It is very difficult to see how such countries with poor if not absent moral standing can speak of the “international community”. It is only when these countries can translate their moral claims to real practice can the rest of the international community accepting such leadership. Until then, please let s not hear again, the words “international community” from countries like the US, England ad Germany.

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