Dahr Jamail	Mohammed Omer

The 2008 Martha Gellhorn Prize for Journalism has been awarded to Washington Report correspondent Mohammed Omer, author of the monthly feature, “Gaza on the Ground.” He shares the prestigious award with independent American journalist Dahr Jamail, who for several years has been filing unembedded reports from Iraq (and whose articles have also appeared in the Washington Report). As the award announcement explained, “Working alone in extremely difficult and often dangerous circumstances, they have reported unpalatable truths validated by powerful facts that expose establishment propaganda, or ‘official drivel,’ as Martha Gellhorn called it.”

Gellhorn, regarded as one of the most distinguished journalists of the 20th century, traveled the globe and often reported from deep within zones of conflict. The Gellhorn Prize committee—Alexander Matthews, James Fox, Cynthia Kee, John Hatt, Jeremy Harding and John Pilger—chose Omer and Jamail from a record number of entries from the British press and abroad.

Mohammed Omer reports on life in the besieged Gaza Strip, where he maintains the web site Rafah Today, www.rafahtoday.org. A resident of Gaza’s Rafah refugee camp near the border with Egypt, he and his family have been affected by Israeli policies and current events every bit as much as the people about whom he reports. But as he explained in his recent article An Award for the Voiceless in Gaza, “My ambition was to get the truth out, not as pro-Palestinian or anti-Israeli, but as an independent voice and witness.”

In 2006 the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs sponsored a nationwide tour by Omer. He hopes to be able to leave Gaza this week for speaking engagements in Scandinavia, Greece and the Netherlands—and to receive the Gellhorn Prize at the June 16 awards ceremony in London. He previously was named the first recipient of the New America Media’s Best Youth Voice award.

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A shopkeeper changes the time on a clock in Lahore June 1, 2008. Pakistan put its clocks forward an hour on Sunday while shops have been ordered to close early as the country struggles with an acute electricity shortage. Setting clocks forward by an hour, to six hours ahead of GMT, should enable the country to take advantage of an extra hour of daylight in the evenings and save power.  REUTERS/Stringer   (PAKISTAN)

By Mahvish Akhtar, MMNS

Has it happened to you that you wake up in the morning already running a little late and realize that there is no electricity? Or that your favorite show is about to start and you get ready with your tea or coffee and sit down to watch it when all of a sudden you are staring at a snowing screen? And I am sure you have experienced something similar to a time when you are invited to a function or a wedding and while you are getting ready the electricity gives out on you. We are all well aware that make up tends to be extremely scary if applied in the dark. So, what do you do in a situation like this? Well, there is a lot one can do. In our society the kind of situation that we are facing people have made their own ways to deal with these uncomfortable and sometimes extremely difficult situations.

Everything we have mentioned is the relatively lighter side of not having electricity. We are still lucky enough to either have generators or UPS or some of us have rechargeable lights and fans. Sure it’s not the same as having the full on convenience of electricity but it is still better than nothing. There are people out there who don’t even have that. There are people who die from the heat. There are people who suffer illnesses and other major problems, lacking fans or any means of cooling themselves down.

To give some perspective I have a small story.

The Heavier Side of Life

Just recently I hired a maid, who would come every morning, clean the house and leave. She was a young girl of 14 or 15 not more than that. Every day she would get done with the work and come to me and ask me if there is something else she could do for me. I would tell her that she could leave once she was done cleaning but every day she would come and ask me if there was anything else. When I told her that was it she would ask me if I wanted her to massage my feet, or if I wanted that drawer on my dresser cleaned out. I didn’t understand why she wanted to do extra work without being asked to do so. Being confused for a long time I finally asked a friend about this strange behavior. She simply said she must be looking for some extra money. She must be thinking that by doing your other small chores you might give her some extra money. But I had not given her any extra money and she had not even asked for it. I still was not satisfied. One day when she was fixing my shoe closet after I had told her she could go I asked her. I said, “Why do you insist on staying here even after I have told you that you can go home? Don’t you like it in your own house?”  Without even looking at me she said in a very matter of fact way that it was because I had fans working all the time. I am one of the lucky ones who have a UPS, so even if the electricity goes the fans are still working. She did not want to go home because she did not have a way of even slightly comforting herself when the electricity was taken away in this scorching heat of Lahore.

I was taking a stroll in my neighborhood where I noticed 2 small boys playing, not wearing anything. I looked around to see if I could find their mother. I saw a woman standing nearby I went up to her and asked her if she knew the boys. She said she was their big sister. She told me that they live in the street next to mine and the boys were playing here so she came to watch them. I asked her why they were not wearing any clothes. She replied that they had developed rashes and hives because of the heat and the doctor had suggested to not let any fabric touch them and keep them cool so that’s why every day the sun goes down they let them play out for a while. It was around sixish–the sun was down but there was no wind whatsoever. I said to her that this is probably not such a good idea since it’s still not cool enough and their rashes could get aggravated maybe keeping them inside under a fan is a better idea. She said yes that’s what we were doing until yesterday when the lights went out in the morning and came back at 8 in the evening. Today she said is a repeat of yesterday, as far as we are concerned this is the coolest it’s going to be for them today.

Even worse, there are many people who die because of this heat and not having enough water to drink and a cool shade to lie under their bodies cannot handle it. God knows what will be the end result of all this. It is interesting how we have electricity shortage which is directly related to water shortage and our leaders are discussing whether making a new dam is a good idea or not. I wonder what makes them think this question is even up for debate. I wonder what makes them think that they can decide not to make damns and help generate more electricity. They can do this because they do not have shortage of electricity or water, or anything else that they might need for comfortable living.

Doing Business in the Dark

It would be very correct to assume that the businesses and the marketplace must be suffering greatly because of this problem. I wanted to know how they deal with this problem. The day I visited to talk to them at Jahangir Sons Bookstore they were facing an especially bad day. I was told that electricity had been shutting down every half hour. They said that our generator has been on for a whole day. The manager told me that the business is good but with the cost of generator it is becoming hard to make ends meet considering the growing prices of food as well. He said that it is so costly to keep the generator on all day that some times they think of closing early just to avoid the cost “but then its hard to do that when you are running a business and you know customers are counting on you”, adds the manager.

Bareeze’ in Liberty market has the same story. Of course their store is well known and they have more customers so it is not such a big issue for them. Surprisingly most shops and stores I spoke to in Liberty market didn’t complain much electricity problems in that area. They said that they had times load shedding which they had generators for so it was working out fine. Most of them however shifted quiet quickly to the situation at their homes and their neighborhoods. They were quick to tell me that this electricity problem was a menace in their homes. Most of them told me that electricity would be shut off for about 2 hours at a time in their homes. One cashier said that it’s terrible when his children come home from school all tired and sweating and they don’t even have a fan to rest under when they get home.

While I was talking to the cashier at Stylo shoestore a lady who was standing line right behind me (I ended up buying shoes while I was there) overheard our conversation and chimed in saying that sometimes she leaver her house when there is no light because there is an AC in her car and the stores are usually more comfortable than the house under the circumstances. I asked her what about her kids and other members of the family. She laughed and said I don’t do it every day. “Do know how much patrol is these days?” of course I know how high those prices are too. But it is sad when people are looking for ways to find comfort and relief in any way possible. I had heard of driving the baby around the block in the car to put him to sleep but this was something new for me. Is this going too far? Under these circumstances who knows what is going too far and what is not we are all doing the best we can to survive these days.

Beauty Parlors are also suffering because of this problem. Their business mostly relies on electricity. Sometimes even if they have generators they cannot use too many of their electrical tools because of too much load on the generator machine. Now when you get an appointment at a salon and ask them how long the procedure will take they give you an estimated time and always ad depending on the electricity so do come prepared for that. And usually they are right, usually the electricity goes and the customer has to wait that much longer to be done with whatever they are their to get done. A hair salon owner told me that these days rebonding is next to impossible because “we need electricity to use the straightened and we never know when we will have light and when we will not. Many times we can use generators but we cannot power so many things on one machine so it becomes a dilemma to cater to more then one customer at a time”.

A tailor who owns a small shop in the basement of a busy market told me that his business has been cut in half because of the electricity problem. Now he says I don’t take on too much work because I know I will not be able to complete it. I can’t afford a generator and when I don’t take enough work I don’t even make enough to feed my family. “When women come in here with a lot of clothes to get sown and tell me that they need it in a week I tell them its not possible. So, they take their clothes to a bigger shop that has a generator and can sow their clothes in less amount of time”.  This tailor is forced to take less work and even with that work he struggles to finish in the time he has given his customers with the electricity playing hide and seek constantly. Just recently this tailor fired his assistant because he couldn’t afford to pay him any more. He says things don’t seem to be getting any better. Now he is working hard and trying to save up as much as possible. I asked him what he was saving up for…he said he wants to save up enough to be able to buy a generator. He thinks once he has a generator all his problems will be solved.

Education Intervals

I guess there is something to be said about the power of generators. An O level student expressed his opinion when asked how he deals with not having electricity especially during exams by saying; “Generator Zindabad!” then he added that his neighbors keep the generators on all the time since it is convenient and they find it cheaper then electricity. Of course this was in Karachi where things are a bit more difficult in terms of electricity problems. I asked this young man what they do in school when there is no electricity. He said you just get used to it. When asked about how the learning process is in the heat he said, “I don’t think I learn anything in the heat. I mean the teachers are teaching but I don’t retain anything.” I asked him why and he said, “Because it’s HOT”.

An O level student who is my relative messaged me one day out of the blue. I asked her what’s up and why she is messaging me she said she was bored and just wanted to see what was up with me. That was not a normal thing for her to do so but I was glad that she had thought of messaging an old person like me just to chit chat. After a while of massaging back and forth she abruptly said that she had to go. I asked her what the hurry was and she said “the electricity is back I gotta go study for my exams who knows how long we have this luxury for”. Basically she was killing time talking to me while she was waiting for the electricity to come back so she could get back to her studying. While it made me feel not so great about myself it made me think of how time we waste because we have no way of utilizing it while the electricity is gone.

Time Goes On

Have you noticed how everything stops as the lights go out? Whatever people are doing they just drop it and start to look around waiting for the lights to come back on. If you are reading a book you will stop and spend at least a few minutes thinking about what you should do now. Very few times you will get an answer because there is very little that can be done in the dark. Even while taking an exam the lights go and everyone stops. There is pin drop silence. And as soon as the lights are back even if it’s five minutes to turn on the generators the students start to ask for more time for the loss of time because of the electricity. I guess the point I am trying to make is that we are wasting collective time of our nation. Nothing gets done while there is no light. Even if there are generators and UPS there are minimal things running and very little that can be done. Children can’t get on the computer and research for their homework. Businesses can’t use credit cards. Schools and colleges have teachers leaving classroom without teaching because it’s too hot for them to bear.

All of this makes us miss time to do things. We take much longer to accomplish things now compared with before because of the shortage of electricity. Our productivity as a nation is going down because out of the 8 hours we barely have 1 or 2 in which the work can actually get done. The problem is that it may seem like that the whole world is on stand still while the electricity is gone, that’s really not the case. Only we are on stand still. While we are waiting for the lights to turn back on time and life is passing us by. We wait and then we start the work while someone somewhere else started the work without any weight. Of course at the end of the day that person will take the fruits of the hard work we were not able to put in. Time goes on but we stay on a stand still by force. Does that seem fair at all?

People have turned this thing into a joke as well you will hear a person saying that well this is our government’s way of telling us to slow down. It is an automatic break even if one doesn’t want it. Well, if you one does not need a break it is better not to take one. And if we keep taking breaks at this speed there will be a time when there won’t be any work left for us because we would be devoured by the more powerful and strong. We have lost so many hours of our lives to this terrible menace of our society and we have no idea how many more we still have to lose.
We Know the Problem, Who Knows the Solution?

We have discussed what kind of problems are taking place in our society because of lack of electricity. Actually everything that we have mentioned above is just the tip of the iceberg. There is so much more that is going that if we tried to put all of this in one piece of writing it would go on forever. So, we will leave the description of the problem at this point and try to invest the leftover energy in figuring out how we can get to a solution. The question is this is a nationwide problem so to get this solved who do we go to? Do we try to track down the government officials and ask them what should be done? But we have heard plenty of them on television saying that there is nothing that can be done because this shortage of resource is worldwide and everyone feels it. However, we don’t see the rest of the world complaining and suffering from the consequences as we are.

Another thing comes to mind when we talk about looking up a solution. How about those heavily lighted stores and billboards? Yes I think that could be a valid misuse of electricity especially in a time where electricity is a scarce commodity. We see billboards lighted with hundreds of bulbs and we see big hotels and restaurants using up more energy and light than a small town. The first thing that needs to be done is to control the use of access energy anywhere that it is seen.

The problem with our nation is that we expect our government or our officials to do everything for us. We do not take responsibility for our own selves. I think if we really want to solve this problem we can by taking some extra interest and getting involved. The first thing that you can do to help is get your neighbors together and start a campaign in your neighborhood on not using electricity unnecessarily; For example extra lighting around the entire house of street on weddings, etc. Then you can convince your neighbors to go to the nearest restaurants and hotels and talk to their owners and managers and convince them to use less energy. Of course this will not be easy but if you go as a group and show your strength they might have to listen. It might be that you will have to visit them again and again to really get the point across but the trip is worth taking…don’t you think?  Keeping with the same spirit you can talk to store owners and shopkeepers around your area to conserve energy. This may not make a huge difference but imagine if each small town and neighborhood started these small campaigns, together we could save so much more than we realize right now.

Another thing that can be really helpful on a personal level and for one’s own household is to always turn off extra lights and use the least amount of energy in the few hours that the electricity is actually available. This is another good way of saving because majority of the houses started to watch how and where they spend their energy it would make a great difference in the overall outcome.

You know as well as I do that everything I am telling you are things that are part of long term planning. While it would be great if we started to do all these things and doing them will definitely make a difference it is also important to note that change does not occur over night. So, as far as now and here is concerned we are stuck with this problem and our leaders and rulers cannot seem to give us any answers. So, what do we do? We be patient and pray to Allah for that day when we have some control over our lives and we can make positive decisions to change the course of our lives as a nation.

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Courtesy Jamal Naji and Leila Fadel | McClatchy Newspapers

FALLUJAH, Iraq — At the western entrance to the Iraqi city of Fallujah Tuesday, Muamar Anad handed his residence badge to the U.S. Marines guarding the city. They checked to be sure that he was a city resident, and when they were done, Anad said, a Marine slipped a coin out of his pocket and put it in his hand.

Out of fear, he accepted it, Anad said. When he was inside the city, the college student said, he looked at one side of the coin. “Where will you spend eternity?” it asked.

He flipped it over, and on the other side it read, “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life. John 3:16.”

“They are trying to convert us to Christianity,” said Anad, a Sunni Muslim like most residents of this city in Anbar province. At home, he told his story, and his relatives echoed their disapproval: They’d been given the coins, too, he said.

Fallujah, the scene of a bloody U.S. offensive against Sunni insurgents in 2004, has calmed and grown less hostile to American troops since residents turned against al Qaida in Iraq, which had tried to force its brand of Islamist extremism on the population.

Now residents of the city are abuzz that some Americans whom they consider occupiers are also acting as Christian missionaries. Residents said some Marines at the western entrance to their city have been passing out the coins for two days in what they call a “humiliating” attempt to convert them to Christianity.
In the markets, people crowded around men with the coins, passing them to each other and asking in surprise, “Have you seen this?”
The head of the Sunni endowment in Fallujah, the organization that oversees Sunni places of worship and other religious establishments, demanded that the Marines stop.

“We say to the occupiers to stop this,” said Sheikh Mohammed Amin Abdel Hadi. “This can cause strife between the Iraqis and especially between Muslim and Christians . … Please stop these things and leave our homes because we are Muslims and we live in our homes in peace with other religions.”
A spokesman said the U.S. military is investigating.

“Multi-National Force-Iraq is investigating a report that U.S. military personnel in Fallujah handed-out material that is religious and evangelical in nature,” the spokesman, Rear Adm. Patrick Driscoll, said in a statement e-mailed to McClatchy. “Local commanders are investigating since the military prohibits proselytizing any religion, faith or practices.”

In interviews, residents of Fallujah repeated two words—“humiliation” and “weakness.”

“Because we are weak this is happening,” said a shop owner who gave his name as Abu Abdullah. “Passing Christianity this way is disrespectful.”

“The occupier is repeatedly trespassing on God and his religion,” said Omar Delli, 23. “Now the occupier is planting seeds of strife between the Muslims and Christians. We demand the government in Fallujah have a new demonstration to let the occupier know that these things are humiliating Islam and the Quran.”
The controversy over the coins that Iraqis said some Marines are passing out comes on the heels of a tempest triggered by a U.S. sniper who used the Quran, Islam’s holy book, for target practice. The sniper was pulled out of Iraq after Iraqi police on May 11 found a Quran with 14 bullet holes and graffiti on the pages.
Iraqi leaders condemned the actions, US generals apologized and President Bush offered a personal apology to Iraqi PM Nouri al Maliki.

In Fallujah, Mohammed Jaber saw one of the coins and said he thought of the bullets lodged in the Quran, the torture of Iraqi men at the Abu Ghraib prison in 2004 and the rape of a 14-year-old girl and her murder and that of her family in Mahmoudiya.

“Now we have this missionary way by these coins,” he said. “We feel the Muslims are weak and we hope that we will reach a point when we are strong to let them know what is wrong and what is right. “

Naji is a McClatchy special correspondent in Fallujah.  McClatchy Newspapers 2008

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10-24

Presidential Musings

By Imam Abdullah El-Amin

Barak Obama is the first Black person to make a serious run for the presidency

We all have obstacles placed before us from time to time. Sometimes they are small and can easily be knocked aside with minimal effort. Sometimes they are more challenging and require much more effort. But nevertheless, they can be knocked out.

Now back to Obama. We should do some serious reflecting on the presidential race this year. I’m not speaking of deciding who the best candidate is, or who looks best on TV or in front of a mirror. I’m speaking of the picture of our country. For the first time in United States history a person of African heritage has the possibility, and maybe the probability of becoming the President of the Nation and thus, the leader of the free world – this, in light of the fact that this is arguably the most racist country in the world, now that South Africa is “liberated.”

So you wonder, “what kind of Black man is this?’ What makes him different than Jesse Jackson or Al Sharpton? These two guys knew, and everybody else knew, they were at best running for President of Black America. Sharpton and Jackson never thought they had a chance of winning the presidency. They were just posturing.

But now you have men and women of the majority power race willing to vote into national office a person who only 35 or 40 years ago couldn’t drink out of the same public water fountain or use the same bathrooms. Amazing… but what’s different now? Sure, we know there are some white people who would never vote for a Black person no matter what. Now we don’t know whether or not he will actually win in November. That remains to be seen. But for Barak Obama to have actually gotten the democratic nomination is an amazing feat in itself. But how did it happen?

I contend that Barak Obama focuses more on his, and our, humanity more that his ethnic heritage or the suppression thereof. If you have noticed, you would have witnessed that Barak Obama doesn’t talk about what’s been done to him; he talks about what he can do for us, to paraphrase the late John F. Kennedy.

Although Obama emphatically states he is not a member of the Islamic faith, the ideals expressed in this race are in line with the dictates of worshiping The One God and the universality of mankind. You can espouse the tenants of the Qur’an even though you are Buddhist, Christian, Jew, or some other. In fact sometimes some of these people look more like the religion than some who call themselves Muslim. Now if he can rise that high and not be a Muslim, imagine what Muslims (who are the best people on earth, pound for pound) living sura 49:13 can do. In it ALLAH says that although He has made us humans different, He has only done so that we may know each other. That is the only reason.

So it’s not about what you call yourself that counts – it’s how you live. The number one pillar of our faith states that no one is above the son of Adam except his Creator. And when the Son of Adam believes this, and acts on it, nothing or nobody can suppress him or belittle him.

So how can a country inhabited by racist Caucasians nominate an African-American man to seek the highest office? The simple answer is they are human beings too and when the son of Adam exerts him/herself, they recognize it and respect it.

The Muslim is the highest person in his surroundings simply because he makes wudu, prays five times a day, fasts in Ramadan, etc. If Obama did that, he would be better still.

Obama is just the start. The Muslim and Islam is the end.

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By Dr. Aslam Abdullah, Editor-in-Chief of The Muslim Observer

In 2000, when we overwhelmingly voted for George W. Bush, we told ourselves that come 2004 we would be better organized. In 2004, after being ignored by almost every presidential candidate, we vowed to work for better Muslim participation in 2008. We are now in 2008 and there is not much out in public to convince us that we could be effective in the forthcoming elections.

Individually, our participation is no less than other citizens of the country. Some 60% of our community members vote regularly, and our contribution to candidates also run into the millions. Yet our voice in electoral politics as a community and as an effective component of the American pluralism is missing. The blame is not on political parties or their representatives. We ourselves are responsible for this situation.

Not many of us want to spare time for political work at the grass-roots level. Not many of us are willing to actively join the political parties, and many of us are not convinced theologically that democracy is the best type of political institution that humanity has experienced.

When I use the word “we,” I mean Muslims by and large as I am aware of the fact that the participation of African-American Muslims in the electoral process is much better than Muslims of immigrant backgrounds.

African-American Muslims have been effective in not only getting two of their leaders elected to Congress, but also in having a substantial number of their activists rise to important political positions at various state and city levels.

The lack of meaningful coordination and cooperation among these two segments of the Muslim community has obviously created conditions for the ineffectiveness of Muslims in the electoral process.

Muslims have three major approaches in electoral politics. Some are not convinced about the effectiveness of democracy, perhaps believing in theocratic government. This group, however, does not explain how it will select or elect its leader, and who would have the authority to implement and interpret the Qur`anic principles.

The second group believes Muslims must participate in the electoral process as a part of their religious obligation. Muslims must engage with the society around them.  Within this category are two sub-groups; one believes in the creation of a Muslim political party to impact the electoral politics; the other believes in the formation of a voting bloc to influence the election outcome.

A third group argues that Muslims should get personally involved in electoral politics. They should become part of the existing political parties and use their presence in those parties to promote an agenda that in their view might serve Muslim interests.

All these groups often ignore the divisions that exist among Muslims on horizontal and vertical lines. Everything that can divide people divides Muslims too. They also ignore the fact that there is hardly any debate among Muslims or their organizations or leaders on issues that concern the community and the country. For instance, take the recent Papal visit to the United States.

Muslim organizations were divided on the subject of meeting with the pope. Rather than discussing the issue beforehand,  the leadership decided to take the decision before discussing it with their peers, and those who are concerned about the issues. Those Muslims who sometimes read newspapers learned about the Muslim position through the reported news in secular media.

No Muslim media ever received any news item about the issue. The lack of debate among Muslims create apathetic conditions among the masses rendering all talks about political participation meaningless. Additionally, they ignore the objective conditions that exist on ground. None in the Muslim community has accurate information about Muslim voters.

To be more precise, not many Muslim communities have any data about Muslims living in their vicinity. It is almost impossible to talk about Muslim political activities without having any data of any sort.

The presence of all these realities is not an excuse not to do anything for the future. Perhaps a humble beginning can be made in terms of developing tools to collect accurate data about Muslim voters in each state, subdivided into congressional and precinct districts. This is not an easy task. The available data in county voters list is not very helpful, as many Muslims are not identifiable by name.

However, some beginning has to be done somewhere. We can no longer live on slogans and false figures. We have to make determined efforts to collect data about our electoral presence in each congressional district. We can initiate the process if we have dedicated people who may assume responsibilities to be the lead person in this respect. There are many who would like to work on this project, yet there is effectively no institution or organization that is willing to undertake the work. On the contrary, many Muslim groups and leaders believe that by simply making statements that Muslims are six million in America, they can attract the attention of national political leaders.

We also have to initiate debates among us on issues that concern the community and country. So far, we have remained only a foreign policy dominated community. We have not spoken on issues such as education, environment, crimes, violence, economy, health insurance. We have not contributed anything substantial to the existing debate on the issue. If we look at the themes of the major conventions and conferences organized by Muslims, we hardly find anything substantial on national issues. The lack of any discussion on national issues in the Muslim community delivers a negative message to the rest of the country. Thus, at each level, we must always engage ourselves with groups who are concerned with domestic issues. We do not have to always come up with something unique and different. We can fulfill this role in our individual or collective capacity.

We also have to encourage our women and youth to get involved in political arena by volunteering work for various offices at various levels. They can work as interns in various offices at city, state and congressional level.

However, for doing all the above, we need an effective organization. Either an existing organization should come forward to take a fresh initiative or a new organization is set up to do the job. Without being active we cannot be active. Without taking the road, we cannot start the journey, and without taking the first step we cannot begin the long journey.

At the initial stage let those who are interested in seeing Muslims become effective in electoral process should exchange ideas through emails. I can offer to coordinate these efforts. My email address is dr.aslamabdullah@gmail.com.

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By Neda Farooqi , MMNS

Eminent leaders gathered last Thursday to honor and award professionals in the Dearborn community at Byblos Banquet Center.  This was the third annual banquet hosted by the Arab American Professional Network (AAPN).

The event began with a welcoming address from James P. Allen, Chairman of the American Arab Chamber of Commerce. “Hospitality and service is part of our DNA,” said Allen.

The AAPN is a committee within the American Arab Chamber of Commerce that recruits new members and works on projects with the chamber. This committee also offers opportunities for social and professional advancement for the local community.
“We are helping others achieve their dreams and this is the key to individual and collective achievement,” said Allen. “The significance of the group is to think strategically and work together.

“We honor four men who exemplify the word ‘professional,’” said Allen.
The honorees included Edward J. Begale, Arab American Professional of the year in Education, the Late Dr. Farouck N. Obeid, Arab American Professional of the year in Medicine, Mohammed Sabbagh, Arab American Professional of the Year in Finance, and James C. Thomas, Arab American Professional of the Year in Law.
All recipients were recognized and awarded, except for the late Dr. Farouck Obeid, whose family was acknowledged.

Edward Begale is the vice chancellor for government relations at the University of Michigan-Dearborn. He represents the university to the local city and elected officials in Dearborn and Lansing. Begale also officiates as an assistant with the president of The Henry Ford.

“My advice to the young crowd is that success is all about networking,” said Begale. “I encourage every college student to have a mentor.”

Dr. Obeid was a trauma surgeon and a community leader for Dearborn residents. In 2005, Obeid led Hurley’s Bariatric and Minimally-Invasive Surgery Center and since 2002 he had been a professor of surgery at Michigan State University. He was also a cancer patient and passed away on March 8, 2008. He was 58 years old.
Mohammed Sabbagh is the vice president in Retail financial Services with JP Morgan Chase. Sabbagh is the bank branch manager of the local office at Ford Road and Outer Drive.

“For all the lawyers, especially the young ones, I take this award,” said James C. Thomas.

Thomas was admitted to various district courts including to the U.S. District Court and to the Michigan Supreme Court in 1974. His concentration includes criminal defense in both federal and state courts all through Michigan and the United States.

“The Arab American Chamber of Commerce was build on a few business networks. Now it has grown and reached nationally and internationally,” said Thomas.
The keynote speaker was Joseph Diederich, chief operating officer at Oakwood Healthcare, Inc. “This laze-faire attitude is old. Mistakes can be rare in the healthcare field because of vigilance.” Oakwood has 40 clinics, 10,000 employees, 17,000 volunteers.

“We pump back $400 million dollars back into this community,” said Mary Zatine, member of Oakwood Healthcare.

Charter One Bank, Comcast, Ford Motor Company, and IKEA were amongst the many corporate sponsors for the evening. Local businesses, such as Famous Hamburger, were also supporting the AAPN.

“I really enjoyed the event. It brings a diverse group of individuals, ranging from politicians to business owners,” said Adnan Ahmed, student at the University of Michigan-Dearborn and current Muslim Student Association member.

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Everett Islamic Center faces troubles

EVERETT,WA-The Islamic Center of Everett has been asked by the city to pave its gravel parking lot or risk eviction. The paving will cost $80,000 which the management doesn’t have. The owner of the land on which the center is located has only $9,000 and he doesn’t know where the rest of the money is going to come.

The center’s troubles with the city began  two years ago when neighbors complained of parked trailors on its lot. When city officials looked into the complaint, they discovered the mosque, which is on a lot zoned for duplexes, small condominium buildings or other medium-density residences, Everett spokeswoman Kate Reardon told the Herald..

The city’s investigation also revealed that a second house on the lot is being used as a boarding house — another use that’s prohibited by the lot’s current zoning, she said.

The mosque’s management is planning to apply for a special use permit and address other concerns of the city.

Laurel Islamic center plans to end parking woes

LAUREL,MD-The Laurel Islamic Center faces an acute parking problem each Friday. It has space for 28 cars but this is not enough for the 300 worshippers who come every Friday, the Gazette reported.

To end this recurring problem the center has submitted a conceptual site plan with Prince George’s County for an expansion project. The first phase would enlarge the parking lot to about 140 spaces, Islamic Center president Hayder Qaadri said. They expect an announcement of the first public hearing within 60 days.

The center has been working on expansion plans for five years and the upcoming public hearing would be the first for its conceptual site plan. For a project to be approved, Park and Planning holds a series of public hearings on a site plan. If the plan is approved, final details are worked out and permits are issued.

A new basketball court for public use and a Sunday school classroom addition to the mosque are also included in the expansion plans.

Rais Khan gets county scholarship

MONTGOMERY,MD-Rais Khan of John F.Kennedy High School has announced a $1000 scholarship for his record of high academic achievement by the Montgomery School Board.

Interfaith group blasts Dunkin’ on keffiyeh

An interfaith group that includes rabbis blasted Dunkin’ Donuts for yielding to pressure to pull an ad featuring a keffiyeh.

The online ad featured Rachael Ray, the celebrity cook, posing against a background of cherry blossoms, wearing a black and white keffiyeh scarf, and holding up iced coffee. Conservative bloggers led by Michelle Malkin complained about the ad, saying it endorsed Arab radicalism because of the keffiyeh’s identification with Yasser Arafat, the former Palestinian leader.

Dunkin’ Donuts pulled the ad, saying “the possibility of misperception detracted from its original intention to promote our iced coffee.”

The Interfaith Alliance, a religious freedom advocacy group, blasted the decision.
“Enough already,” Rev. C. Welton Gaddy, the alliance’s president, said in a statement. “Have we really reached the point where we are associating wearing a scarf of Middle Eastern origin with terrorist sympathies? Should we apply this standard to everything that comes from the Middle East? Or are we only applying this standard to our wardrobe?”

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Being happy throughout life needs one to be giving all the time: Fayyaz Merchant at the Inauguration of the Latest Oasis Seniors and Medical Campus

In the presence of hundreds of prominent political, social and professional of the Greater Houston Region at a Grand Dinner, John Young and CEO of Chaparral Group AL Fairfield, and Fayyaz Merchant of Merchants Group, Inc. (http://www.merchant2merchant.com/) proudly announced the inauguration of the new campus of Oasis Seniors and Medical Center (http://www.oasismedicalcampus.com/). Tanzeel Merchant, daughter of Mr. Merchant, who started the proceedings with translation of Chapter One of Quran, announced that she will be bringing the Ambulance Po Service to this facility (http://ambulancepro.com/). Ambulance Pro will be providing complete ambulance service to the residents of the senior center, where it will provide superior service by utilizing the new technologies. This will eventually become nationwide service to be achieved before the first quarter ends in 2011.

Keynote speaker on the occasion was the City of Houston Mayor Pro-Tem Adrian Garcia, who saluted the efforts of doctors and entrepreneurs coming together and creating a positive partnership of providing world class health facilities to our senior citizens. Also present was Congressman AL-Green, who talked about the ever depleting health care system of USA and lauded this initiative of Chaparral and Merchants Groups, gave Special Congressional Proclamations to the Oasis Center and Ambulance Pro. The City of Houston Councilman M. J. Khan talked about the good eastern values of serving the needs of the seniors, since when we were small; they had worked hard to bring us up. Others, who spoke on the occasion, included Mayor Leonard Scarcella of the City of Stafford, Terry Henley Alderman No. 4 and Mayor Pro Tem of the City of Meadows Place, Dr. Sohail Siddiqui, Dr. Warren Cross (Eye-Care), Dr. Asaf Qadeer, Sahar Wali and Ghulam Bombaywala.

AL Fairfield and Fayyaz Merchant giving details of the complex said that it is a 30 acre multiplex of 750-Million Dollars, where there will be 180 state-of-the-art assisted living residences for senior citizens, a 162,000 square feet hospital building and nine storey professional building with physician offices. Everything will be connected with each other by scenic bridges and sky-tunnels. Located on the campus will be emergency center and full acute care hospital facilities to service targeted market in cooperation with Ambulance Pro within ten mile radius around this site, which is located on the border of two locales, the City of Stafford and the City of Meadows Place. Another uniqueness of the facility is that group of doctors are working with the developers in arranging all the hospital privileges to completely fulfill the federal laws and state regulations. The physicians utilizing the hospital facilities will be those with their professional offices in the nine
story 206,000 square feet Oasis Medical Office Buildings. One of those physicians is Dr. Sohail Siddiqui, whose team will lease two floors, will be providing Long Term Care (LTEC) for acutely ill patients, as well general medical and surgical procedure location for the entire family.

On the long run, there is also idea of developing a Gymkhana style location within the campus to play games, sports and just relax and enjoy gourmet cuisines. For more information, please 713-468-1500 for Oasis Center and 713-224-6300 for Ambulance Pro.

DIL-Houston Organizes Grand Annual Gala Dinner – 2008

In a most colorful ceremony, the Developments in Literacy (DIL) Houston Chapter organized their Annual Gala Dinner 2008. Present on the occasion were hundreds of donors and well-wishers of DIL. This year was special, since now the Consul General of Pakistan Hon. Aquil Nadeem and his wife Tahsina Nadeem, have become Honorary Chairpersons of DIL. They as well as all the administrative members and volunteers of DIL-Houston were present, including President Zeba Shah, V.P. Naila Quresh, Secretary Tauseef Salma, Nadir Shah, Salma Siddiqi, Aquila Chawdahry, Rosie Khan, Abdullah Jafari and Uzma Bawkher. After the sumptuous dinner served right on time according to the traditions of DIL, a cultural extravaganza was presented.

For our readers, “the Developments in Literacy (DIL) is dedicated to providing quality education to disadvantaged children, especially girls, by establishing and operating schools in the underdeveloped regions of Pakistan, with a strong focus on gender equality and community participation. DIL’s vision is that no child in Pakistan poor or rich should be denied access to quality education. All children should have equal opportunity to reach their full potential and contribute toward the socio-economic betterment of their communities.

DIL was started in 1997 by Pakistani expatriates living in affluent Southern California, so as to give back to their country of origin. DIL grew over the years and quickly spread by opening Chapters in New York, San Francisco, Washington D.C., Houston, San Diego; Toronto and Ottawa, Canada; Singapore and the United Kingdom.

Today DIL is operating 182 schools in all four provinces of Pakistan and educating over 15,000 students. DIL establishes, adopts and operates primary and secondary schools in Pakistan for underprivileged children, particularly girls. DIL manages 149 schools in partnerships with seven non-governmental and non-profit organizations, and DIL directly operates 23 schools.

DIL is committed to raising the standard of education in all of its schools by providing ongoing teacher training, improving school construction and environment, establishing libraries and computer labs.

For more information, one can call Ms. Zeba Shah at 713-464-4648 or E-Mail zebashah1@yahoo.com

By Andrea Hopkins

CINCINNATI (Reuters) – The win by Barack Obama over Hillary Clinton in the race for the Democratic presidential nomination has left American women both sad and elated — that a woman came so close, but ultimately missed making history.

“It’s a shame,” said Cincinnati nurse Nicole Jones, 32. “I can’t help but think her being a strong, powerful woman has played a role — I’m not sure the general public is ready for a strong, powerful female. It’s very disappointing.”

While Clinton has not yet conceded defeat, Illinois Sen. Obama captured enough delegates on Tuesday to clinch the Democratic nomination, becoming the first black American to win the presidential nomination of a major U.S. party.
Obama will face Republican John McCain in the November race for the White House.

Clinton, 60, a New York senator and former first lady who entered the Democratic race as a heavy favorite, said she would consult party leaders and supporters about her next move.

Some women said Clinton should run again in 2012.

“I would like to have a woman as president. The country is almost there, some people just have to get used to the idea,” said Julie Miller, 34, manager of a Cincinnati coffee shop. “She should definitely try to run again.”

Debbie Walsh, director of the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers University, said there will be a grieving process for those who believed Clinton was the best chance to see a female in the Oval Office any time soon.

“For women of a certain age, and a lot of working class women, that real core of her support, these women never actually thought before there might be a woman president in their lifetime and they started to believe it could happen. And now that’s gone. That’s the disappointment,” Walsh said.

But while some women voters said they were saddened that 2008 is not the year the first woman U.S. president will be elected, others said the historic nomination of an African American took some sting out of the loss.

“I’m not putting my female side first. It’s also amazing that we have the first black man who is going to be the candidate. It’s historic on both sides,” said Heidi Henning, 42, a manager at a trade association in Chicago.

Sexism, Inspiration

Others hoped it could still be a historic year for women.

“I heard (Clinton) could be the vice president, and that would be great,” said Cincinnati marketer Nikki Smith, 25. “It’s awesome that she ran and got as close as she did. It’s important for women to be in these positions.”

Marie Wilson, president and founder The White House Project, which trains women for political leadership, said women may look at Clinton’s campaign with some sorrow because she did not win — but will also be inspired.

“It’s a continuum. It’s be an agony at first that she got this far, then it will shift,” said Wilson. “Women have latched onto her persistence and courage rather than the fact that she’s had a hard time. (We’re seeing) more young women saying they are motivated because they have seen her persist.”

As the long battle between Clinton and Obama wore on, many women began to believe sexism — particularly in the media — was hurting Clinton’s chances.

But Rosemary Camposano, communications director of the WomenCount political action committee formed to fight for Clinton’s right to continue her campaign, said even that could ultimately be beneficial.

“What it has done is energized a lot of women to get into the process, because women have taken it personally when she is called a bitch … because that is not about her policies, that is an attack on her as a woman,” said Camposano.

“She has sparked what will be the second generation of — I don’t want to say the women’s movement — but women have found a voice with this process that will not go away.”

Feminist and author Naomi Wolf said that while she was frustrated by the sexism in the media coverage of Clinton, her loss perhaps had less to do with Clinton being a woman than the fact she faced such a strong opponent in Obama.

“(Women) will give her credit for being up against formidable new product, a fresh, charismatic visionary leader exactly in sync with the times,” Wolf said. “There is a lot to be proud of and a lot to regret …. She’s already made issue of ‘Can a woman run?’ much less important.”

Cincinnati architect Jane Goode agreed.

“I think people have trouble hearing women, hearing what we have to say. When we’re tough they don’t like,” Goode said as she stopped for coffee at Starbucks. Still, while Clinton ran “an admirable race,” Goode did not base her vote on gender.
“I’ve been an Obama supporter for quite a while.”

(Additional reporting by Andrew Stern in Chicago; editing by David Wiessler)

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