NEW DELHI: Rather than cross swords with Indian Muslims over terrorism being linked with their religion (Islam), the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) has for the first time reached out to the India’s largest minority community with a new approach. The VHP has requested 13 Muslim organizations to state through a fatwa, that India is a friend of Islam. The fatwa should also state that jihad should not be waged either against India and/or Hindus, with the latter not being kafirs. Whether VHP’s move is politically motivated and/or has been deliberately taken to gain some media coverage, the letter certainly conveys a strong unwritten message. The VHP appears keen to begin erasing perceptions held about it as a hard-core, anti-Muslim, extremist Hindu organization.
With home to around 120 million Muslims, who constitute nearly 13 percent of the total population, VHP has apparently realized that political importance of their votes cannot be ignored today’s electoral race. The Muslim-vote has become all the more important because of numerous parties having surfaced over the past two decades. It would have been a different situation, were Indian polity dominated by only one party or even just two/three parties spread across the country. With each in the political race vying to attract the needed majority to their camps, the minority-vote would have probably carried little importance for a few parties. Indian political culture has come a long way from what it was when a single-party (Congress) government prevailed. Without doubt, the Hindutva-agenda helped Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) make its mark as a national party. It cannot however be ignored that the BJP assumed power to head a coalition government, only after putting the Hindutva-agenda on the backburner. Undeniably, the Gujarat-carnage (2002) played a major role in pushing BJP-led coalition out of power, marking return of Congress with a coalition government. Emergence of numerous political parties across the country, certainly indicate, that the era of coalition government is here to stay for quite some time, which has contributed to new importance being given to the Muslim-vote.
Political compulsions have contributed to VHP also to try and turn a “friendly†face towards Indian Muslims. The VHP wants Indian Muslim clerics to clear misconceptions created by threats allegedly send by suspected terrorist groups, such as Indian Mujahideen. Quoting from emails allegedly send by these terrorist groups, the VHP wants a fatwa from Indian Muslim clerics declaring that India is not Dar-ul-Haram. With India being Dar-ul-Aman, “a land of peace where all Muslims can practice and propagate their religion uninterrupted,†the fatwa should state, Muslims are not required to wage a religious war against the country and the people living here. The political message carried by VHP’s letter is certainly suggestive of it having taken a major step indirectly stating that saffron brigade is no longer keen on pursuing an anti-Muslim drive. Rather the time has come, when it ceased pursuing the same and started making efforts in this direction, with the letter apparently a part of this drive. The VHP is also conscious that amid the backdrop of Ayodhya-issue (demolition of Babari Masjid in 1992), Gujarat-carnage and other such moves targeting Muslims, the minority community is not going to be easily convinced by attempts being made to win them over from the platform of saffron brigade. The VHP thereby realizes that it is imperative to convey this message to the Indian Muslims through their own clerics.
The VHP must have probably deliberated on numerous options before deciding to send the letter to Muslim organizations. Had the same message been expressed through leaders associated with saffron brigade, in addition to it being given little importance by others, there also prevailed the risk of it being misunderstood and not conveying the message the VHP desired. So, ironically, the very group known till date for spreading communal venom against Indian Muslims, has approached Muslim organizations in writing. There is no denying that Ayodhya-issue and Gujarat-carnage have considerably refrained the Muslim community together with secular Indian Hindus from rendering any political support to the saffron brigade. Their political behavior is guided strongly by their desire to prevent saffron brigade and its political representatives from assuming power at the center.
The secular Indians, Muslims and non-Muslims, do not need to be taught by organizations such as VHP about what is Indian secularism. The VHP is apparently aware of this hard reality as much as others are. Notwithstanding all the reservations about VHP having taken this step, guided by political compulsions of the moment, the significance of it having actually moved towards this stage cannot be sidelined. The VHP, as suggested by the letter’s contents, is keen on changing the image held about it by secular Indians, Muslims as well as non-Muslims. This is in itself is suggestive of a significant change taking place gradually but definitely in mind-set of the saffron brigade, with its most extremist associate trying to reach out to Indian Muslims, by saying that India is a friend of Muslims and their religion. It is their way of accepting that stage of playing politics by propagating and arousing anti-Muslim politico-communal frenzy carries little, practically no importance in today’s Indian political culture.
In physical science, freezing or solidification is the process in which a liquid turns into a solid when cold enough. The freezing point is the temperature at which this happens. Melting, the process of turning a solid to a liquid, is almost the exact opposite of freezing. All known liquids undergo freezing when the temperature is lowered, with the sole exception of helium, which remains liquid at absolute zero and can only be solidified under pressure. For most substances, the melting and freezing points are the same temperature, however, certain substances possess differing solid-liquid transition temperatures. For example, agar melts at 85 °C (185 °F) and solidifies from 31 °C to 40 °C (89.6 °F to 104 °F); this process is known as thermal hysteresis.
Most liquids freeze by crystallization, formation of crystalline solid from the uniform liquid. This is a first-order thermodynamic phase transition, which means that as long as solid and liquid coexist, the equilibrium temperature of the system remains constant and equal to the melting point. Crystallization consists of two major events, nucleation and crystal growth. Nucleation is the step where the molecules start to gather into clusters, on the nanometer scale, arranging in a defined and periodic manner that defines the crystal structure. The crystal growth is the subsequent growth of the nuclei that succeed in achieving the critical cluster size.
In spite of the second law of thermodynamics, crystallization of pure liquids usually begins at lower temperature than the melting point, due to high activation energy of homogeneous nucleation.
Freezing does not start until the temperature is low enough to provide enough energy to form stable nuclei. In presence of irregularities on the surface of the containing vessel, solid or gaseous impurities, pre-formed solid crystals, or other nucleators, heterogeneous nucleation may occur, where some energy is released by the partial destruction of the previous interface, rising the supercooling point to be near or equal to the melting point. The melting point of water at 1 atmosphere of pressure is very close to 0 °C (32 °F, 273.15 K), and in the presence of nucleating substances the freezing point of water is close to the melting point, but in the absence of nucleators water can super cool to −42 °C (−43.6 °F, 231 K) before freezing.
Freezing is an exothermic process, meaning that as liquid changes into solid, heat is released. This is often seen as counter-intuitive, since the temperature of the material does not rise during freezing, except if the liquid was supercooled, but this can be understood since heat must be continually removed from the freezing liquid or the freezing process will stop. The energy released upon freezing is a type of latent heat known as enthalpy of fusion and is exactly the same as the energy required to melt the same amount of the solid.
While the U.S. Senate is meeting for a rare Saturday session to debate the $780-billion plan in an effort to stimulate the U.S. economy, online scammers are busy coming up with new and interesting ways to cash in on the action.
Researchers from the SANS Internet Storm Center have discovered a new scam that offers unsuspecting victims a refund from the US Internal Revenue Service.
According to the ISC, the new scam comes in the form of an e-mail with the subject line of "Economic Stimulus Payment form ID: [SP-251.9475]" that invites recipients to download and submit an attached form in order to receive their stimulus payment.
The attachment, which contains JavaScript, will be executed by your browser when the file is viewed. This means you don’t need to click on anything within the browser for something potentially malicious to happen.
IRS E-mail and Web Policy
This new scam is typical of tax time behavior by the bad guys and the stimulus package only offers scammers the chance to get more creative. As such, it might be useful to re-examine what the IRS will and will not do on the Web.
The IRS does not initiate taxpayer communications through e-mail.
The IRS does not request detailed personal information through e-mail
The IRS does not send e-mail requesting your PIN numbers, passwords or similar access information for credit cards, banks or other financial accounts
If you receive an e-mail from someone claiming to be the IRS or directing you to an IRS site:
Do not reply
Do not open any attachments. Attachments may contain malicious code that will infect your computer
Do not click on any links. If you clicked on links in a suspicious e-mail or phishing Web site and entered confidential information, visit the IRS Identity Theft page
Whenever you’re unsure about an e-mail, then best course of action is to delete it and if you must investigate further, do it via the telephone. As Adrien de Beaupre says about the fake Stimulus payments: "is if it looks too good to be true, it is."
He’s facing pressure to increase US troop levels there. Has Washington learned nothing from the Soviet experience?
Courtesy Walter Rodgers
between the U.S. troop commander in the area and local tribal leaders near Khas Kunar refugee camp, Kunar Province, eastern Afghanistan February 18, 2009.
REUTERS/Oleg Popov
Oakton, Va. – History may not repeat itself, but all too often it recycles mistakes. In 1961, before the Vietnam War became full-fledged, former Gen. Douglas MacArthur warned President Kennedy not to fight a land war in Asia. Over the next 14 years, more than 58,000 Americans died as Washington ignored his advice and ramped up operations.
Today, the US is stuck in another land war in Asia: Afghanistan. The original mission was to capture Osama bin Laden, disable Al Qaeda, remove the Taliban, and keep the country from being a safe haven for terrorists. After seven years of fighting, hundreds of dead US soldiers and thousands more wounded, those objectives have not been met.
And now the US wants to double down, adding as many as 30,000 additional US troops there to get the job done.
Sharp lessons from the Soviets
It’s unfathomable that Washington learned so little from the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, which ended in an ignominious retreat followed by the collapse of the Soviet Union three years later. The Soviets lost 15,000 soldiers.
In the brief honeymoon after the collapse of communism in the early 1990s, US and Russian intellectuals and officials met to analyze the Afghan war and concluded it would have required 750,000 to 1 million Soviet troops to subdue Afghanistan. But Moscow never deployed more than 100,000 troops in Afghanistan at any one time. The Soviets discovered they could win battles but never hold more than a few cities in a country the size of Texas.
The United States now has 33,000 troops in Afghanistan. Even if President Obama agrees to double that amount, the effort will be wasted. Half a million US troops might not be enough. It wasn’t in Vietnam. Mr. Obama needs to recognize that hesitation to expand the war in Afghanistan has nothing to do with will or cowardice and everything to do with wisdom.
The totalitarian Soviets lacked the political will to deploy three quarters of a million troops. Kremlin mossbacks knew even the docile Russian populace of the Communist era wouldn’t buy it. In 1979, when the ruling Politburo reluctantly decided to send in the troops, it was bitterly opposed by the chief of staff, Marshal of the Army Nikolai Ograkov. He flatly first told then-Defense Minister Dimitri Ustinov and later party leader Leonid Brezhnev that a war in Afghanistan would be a huge mistake. So controversial was the decision to commit Russian forces that only a handful of senior members of the ruling Politburo participated. In the end, those elders chose to go in, primarily because they feared the US was trying to destabilize Afghanistan and sew it into the West’s patchwork encirclement of the Soviet Union.
It took nine years before Moscow concluded that its war in Afghanistan was a mistake. After the cold war, Russia declassified documents on Afghanistan and the West learned that on more than a dozen occasions between March of 1979 and the December invasion, Brezhnev refused to intervene despite destabilization of the Soviet Union’s southern border.
As a correspondent based in Moscow in the 1980s, I made several trips into Afghanistan with the Soviets. When I returned to Moscow, my Russian office manager asked me what it was like there. Waxing enthusiastic, I told her, “It was magnificent, straight out of Kipling and the 19th century.†Her blue Slavic eyes narrowed. “No, Walt, you are wrong. Afghanistan is the 14th century.â€
After 9/11, when hordes of reporters traveled to this mystical, medieval land, the recommended reading was historical fiction of the late George MacDonald Fraser’s first “Flashman†volume on the Anglo-Afghan War of 1839-1842. The entire retreating British column of upwards of 16,000 men, women, and children – save for one survivor – was wiped out by the forefathers of those who drove the Soviets out 150 years later. Obama would be well advised to read “Flashman†and realize how little Afghanistan has changed.
It would be delusional to expect any American expeditionary force to liberate and enlighten Afghans, freeing women from resurgent Taliban. There’s an adage familiar to all who worked there: “There only two times an Afghan woman leaves her home: when she gets married and when she dies.†Afghanistan is a land polka-dotted in graveyards beyond counting. UNICEF says 20 percent of all Afghan children die before their fifth birthday. The entire US Army will not be able to convert greedy warlords to modernity.
Afghanistan is a feudal quilt of tribes. It’s disingenuous to call it a country. It is a failed state, perhaps best babysat by its regional neighbors: Russia, Iran, China, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and India.
Their individual interests and goals in Afghanistan may differ, but none is eager to have a rejuvenated Al Qaeda caliphate led by loose cannons such as Ayman al-Zawahiri or Osama bin Laden, whom they cannot control. If three regional superpowers – India, China, and Russia – opt to sit on the sidelines in their own neighborhood, what logic is there for American intervention from an ocean and continent away?
Even as they request more troops, US generals have acknowledged that an Iraq-style “surge†won’t work. “Afghanistan is not Iraq,†said Gen. David McKiernan, who leads US and NATO forces in Afghanistan. General McKiernan, who led ground forces in Iraq in 2003, has described Afghanistan as “a far more complex environment than I ever found in Iraq.†Today, the Pentagon talks of achieving not victory or lasting democracy but merely progress against militants.
No good options left
There are no good options left after the Bush administration’s unnecessary war in Iraq. An increased American intervention in Afghanistan might have been more welcome six years ago. Now it is probably too late. Yet a total American withdrawal from Afghanistan would leave in its wake anarchy and bloodbath. An ugly Taliban triumph would ensue. The Taliban need to be contained, but not exclusively by the US, so Obama must persuade NATO and Afghanistan’s near neighbors to play a larger, perhaps dominant, role.
Pakistan can no longer labor under the ill usion that it can manipulate events from across the border. If the Pakistanis have learned anything since 9/11, it should be that Afghanistan’s growing destabilization increasingly threatens their own society. Imagine for a moment that the Obama administration were to announce a withdrawal from Afghanistan in six months. The regional powers who know their own neighborhood far better than Washington would quickly come up with a formula and the troops to stabilize the failed state. If there is no constituency among these neighbors to “fix†Afghanistan, then the US can no more go it alone than could the Russians.
The resurgent Taliban may be unstoppable. The Bush administration was warned of that four years ago but spent most of its resources instead in Iraq. Still, accommodation with the Taliban, who are brutal and medieval, is not the same as capitulation to bin Laden. Recall that in the late 1990s, the Taliban was initially reluctant to have an Arab-led Islamist jihad waged from Afghanistan. The past seven years of US bombing and war in the countryside have sharply reminded the Taliban that they were better off without bin Laden as a guest. The Sudanese were persuaded of that more than a decade ago.
The idea of creating a secular national army in Afghanistan to fend off the20Taliban is not only tardy but smacks of the usual American mind-set of throwing money and advisers at a problem. The Afghan tribes speak Pashto, Dari, Uzbek, and Turkmen with some Baluchi, Pashai, and Nuristani thrown in for good measure. Which language is the Afghan Army going to fight in?
The real challenge to a new Afghan Army, however, is that it is not aflame with the Islamic cohesiveness that fires the Taliban. Until it is, it will be little more than a collection of uninspired, unmotivated militiamen more interested in collecting a monthly American paycheck than in creating a unified nation out of the ashes of 30 years of war.
It is still not clear what Obama thinks other than that, unlike George W. Bush, he says Afghanistan is more central to the war on terror than Iraq. On that he is correct. Washington and Kabul just agreed to a strategic review of the war. Whatever option Obama chooses, he must not risk the same mistake the Soviets made in underestimating the energized power of the Islamic faith. An enlarged American footprint in Afghanistan runs the risk of repeating Russia’s fatal miscalculations. War, like politics, is the art of the possible.
Obama must remember that it is intolerable in the eyes of Muslims to be subjugated and occupied by non-Muslims, whether in Iraq or Afghanistan. Western military occupation didn’t work for the Crusaders in the Levant, for Napoleon in Egypt, or for the British in Iraq. Obama needs to be mindful of this as he decides whether to expand a war in southwest Asia, a historic graveyard of empires.
• Walter Rodgers is a former senior international correspondent for CNN.
Saudi Arabia awards multibillion-dollar railway contracts to consortiums including Chinese companies.
China may keep a tight leash on its own Muslims, but its railway companies are winning lucrative contracts in the Middle East to facilitate Islam’s most important pilgrimage.
Chinese contractors appear to have won over half of Saudi Arabia’s $5.2 billion spending plan to build railway links along the route of the Hajj. They’ll get more as Middle Eastern countries plow money into expanding the region’s rail network.
Chinese President Hu Jintao left Saudi Arabia on Thursday, with a $1.8 billion railway deal inked during his four-day trip. China Railway Construction Corp., a Saudi company and an undisclosed French firm will build a railway from Mecca to Medina that will run at speeds of 230 mph, cutting travel time to just half an hour, compared with a drive that typically takes several hours. The project is slated to be completed by 2013.
On Friday, China Railway Engineering Corp. was part of a consortium that won a $1.8 billion contract to build another Mecca-Medina rail link, going through the Red Sea port of Jeddah. Both rail projects should help ease traffic from the deluge of worshippers during the Hajj, the annual Islamic pilgrimage to the holy cities. Hundreds have been trampled to death due to stampedes in past years.
While the Mecca deal marks a big overseas contract for China Railway Construction, it is medium-scale compared with the builder’s domestic projects, and so will have a limited impact on its stock price, said BOCI Research analyst Patrick Li. The Chinese railway company had a $5.4 billion initial public offer last March, and its shares have lost only 9.2% of their value since then amid a general market slide.
Riyadh’s plans to spend 450 billion riyals ($120.1 billion) to upgrade the country’s infrastructure over the next five years could represent a bonanza for Chinese builders. Meanwhile, the fact that Hu chose Saudi Arabia as the destination for his first overseas trip in the new year also marks Beijing’s interested in firming up relations with the world’s top oil producer.
Beijing has long regarded its Muslim population, concentrated in the country’s northwestern provinces, with wariness. Organized religious activity is strictly limited and controlled by the Communist Party. Unrest in Xinjiang Province during the run-up to the 2008 Beijing Summer Olympics led to a sharp crackdown.
In Hong Kong trading, China Railway Construction (other-otc: CWYCF – news – people ) added 20 Hong Kong cents (3 cents), or 1.9%, to 10.90 Hong Kong dollars ($1.41).
A top student and now the top high school scorer in state history, Bilqis Abdul-Qaadir knows there is more to life than a game. But does she have game.
Courtesy Marty Dobrow, Boston Globe
Springfield–Bilqis Abdul-Qaadir walks quietly through the halls of the New Leadership Charter School. She is soft-spoken and polite. The youngest child of a devout Muslim family, the 5-foot-3-inch senior believes in modesty, and is determined not to call attention to herself.
It is an impossible dream.
Bilqis cannot help standing out. For one thing, she is the top-ranked student in her class. She wants to study pre-med in college with an eye toward being a cardiac surgeon. “The heart,†she says, “is most interesting to me.â€
Then there is her presence on the basketball court, where she is a magnet for the eyes of all fans, and not just because she competes with her legs and arms completely covered beneath her uniform, and with a hijab (or head scarf) over the top of her head. The point guard dazzles every night with a game that is a nonstop whir of creative fury. She darts into the lane against much bigger players, flicking in layups and reverses and hitting teammates with no-look passes. She drains pull-up jumpers and step-back 3-pointers. Despite a steady diet of double-teams and box-and-one defenses designed to stop her, she is averaging, this season, an astonishing 41.3 points per game.
A fifth-year varsity player, Bilqis (pronounced BILL-KEACE) will attend the University of Memphis this fall on a full scholarship and will become the first player at a top tier Division 1 school to compete in full Muslim dress.
Her look has drawn some curiosity, and, at times, some taunts.
“Sometimes they yell out, ‘Terrorist!’ “ said teammate Ashanti Miller. “She gets mad, but she doesn’t lash out. I don’t know how she handles it. She just takes it.â€
In post-Sept. 11 America, Bilqis isn’t the first Islamic athlete to endure virulent trash talk. But over time, she says, such abuse has become less frequent. Of course, the fact that she’s got more game than any player on the floor tends to silence the crowd.
Or bring them to their feet. Last week, before a packed gym of friends, family, fans, and media, the 18-year-old Bilqis became the top scorer in Massachusetts high school history, breaking the mark of 2,710 points that basketball legend Rebecca Lobo set in the winter of 1991-92.
Like the game she plays, Bilqis Abdul-Qaadir was born in Springfield. She grew up in a home that fostered her academic focus, her devotion to Islam, and her passion for all things basketball.
Both of her parents, Alooah and Tariq, grew up in the city. Neither was raised Muslim.
The daughter of an engineer and a high school teacher, Alooah was raised as Karen Aloo Humphrey and attended St. John’s Congregational Church. In ninth grade she started going out with Charles Cross, a bright and athletic teenager with an endearing sense of humor. They eventually went their separate ways, not reconnecting until Cross moved back to the area in the late 1980s, some two decades later.
He went looking for Karen, and found her – sort of. “I could see she had changed a bit,†he recalled with a wry smile. “The attire was different.â€
She was now Alooah, having converted to Islam in 1975. She was, to say the least, a busy woman. She had six children, three girls followed by three boys, ranging from 13-year-old Tahira to 4-year-old Yusuf. She home-schooled all of them, having become disenchanted with the local public schools after teaching in them for four years. She also ran Alooah’s Family Daycare out of her home (still going strong after 30 years). What’s more, she had recently been widowed, her husband, Jamal Abdul-Ali, having succumbed at age 43 to pneumonia.
Into this world stepped Cross, who had been living for years in New York and Florida, with, he acknowledges, a lack of direction. “At that time, my life was in question,†he says. “I knew that I needed something different. She said, ‘You think you might ever embrace Islam?’ “
In 1989, he recited the Shahadah (the Islamic creed) and became Tariq Abdul-Qaadir. He and Alooah were married that year. In November 1990, they had their only child, a girl named after the Queen of Sheba – Bilqis.
“Qisi started right in that room right there,†said Alooah on a recent Friday afternoon, pointing to the living room where several toddlers napped on mats beneath a green Nerf basketball hoop. She was 3 years old, playing on a Little Tikes basket, getting one shot after another blocked by her brothers. “If she’d hit a shot, we’d make a big deal of it,†Alooah recalled. “She kept playing and playing. She didn’t care how big you were. She was determined.â€
She played on teams with and against boys throughout her childhood. “The boys kind of understood that I wasn’t just an ordinary girl playing basketball,†she said. “They needed me [in order] to win.â€
By age 10, she was playing with high school students at the AAU level. Her biggest basketball influence was her brother, Yusuf Abdul-Ali. “His game is like a flow,†she says. “That’s what I want mine to be, nice and smooth.â€
In 2004, Yusuf led his New Leadership team all the way to the state title game, the first-ever appearance for a charter school. Often at halftime that year, the on-court entertainment was provided by 13-year-old Bilqis, dribbling her way through teenage boys and going hard to the hoop.
The next season, while Yusuf moved on to a full scholarship at Division 2 Bentley, Bilqis was unleashed as an eighth-grader on the New Leadership varsity, playing her first game Dec. 15 in Pittsfield at St. Joseph-Central.
Ken Sadlowski, then the St. Joseph-Central coach, had not had an opportunity to scout the opposition. In pregame warm-ups, the point guard for New Leadership didn’t seem that exceptional. She was tiny – just 4 feet 10 inches and about 80 pounds – so her No. 1 jersey flopped around on her. (Having not yet reached puberty, she was not required to cover herself in Islamic garb.)
Then the game began. Bilqis was everywhere, driving the lane with utter fearlessness, and stealing the ball again and again and again – 16 times before the night was through. “It was almost like she was faster than light,†Sadlowski recalled last week.
When Sadlowski looked at the scorebook after the New Leadership win, he couldn’t believe his eyes. Bilqis Abdul-Qaadir had scored 43 points.
Later that year, she received her first recruiting letter from UCLA.
As a freshman, Bilqis had to cover up for the first time. Though she was well-steeped in Islam and had grown accustomed to fasting at Ramadan and praying five times a day (sometimes seeking the solitude of the nurse’s office at school), she was still a self-conscious teenager; fitting in mattered deeply. Alooah recalls dropping Bilqis off for the first practice in her new garb and seeing the tears welling up in her daughter’s eyes. “Come on, you can do this,†Alooah said. “It’s going to be OK.â€
Her uniform was a work in progress: billowing sweat pants and a long cotton shirt beneath the jersey, a head scarf tied in back. Bilqis was hot and uncomfortable. “Some games were like, ‘Oh, this is crazy,’ “ she said, “But I played through it, because I never wanted to stop playing. I wasn’t going to let covering stop me.â€
By the end of that season, she had already scored 1,000 points.
Last year as a junior, her career total hit 2,000. By then, she had achieved a new level of comfort. The physical part of it came through her discovery of lighter fabrics with moisture-wicking qualities that kept her cool. In a larger way, she began to sense that she had an opportunity to challenge stereotypes about Muslim women and to provide some inspiration. As her mother saw it, and as Bilqis began to see it, too, there was no inconsistency between her religious traditions and being a woman with high ambitions – and a ferocious game.
Basketball has evolved some as well. In 2004, the University of South Florida became embroiled in a controversy when player Andrea Armstrong converted to Islam and wanted to modify her uniform accordingly. She was initially told by her coach, Jose Fernandez, that such attire was not appropriate for games or practices. Ultimately, the coach and the school relented, but Armstrong wound up leaving the team anyway.
More recently, the number of Muslim girls participating in sports in traditional clothing has increased. From 2005-07, Dewnya Bakri was a reserve guard for the NAIA program at the University of Michigan-Dearborn, playing in her hijab and full covering.
Bilqis has known for a while that she was destined to break some barriers as a prized recruit at the Division 1 level. She wanted to find a basketball program and a university that would serve as a second home.
University of Memphis first-year coach Melissa McFerrin was hoping to provide it.
“I’ve watched Qisi play since she was in eighth grade and have absolutely loved her style, loved her passion about how she plays the game,†says McFerrin. “This is the kind of kid I want to start my program with.â€
When Bilqis and her family visited, McFerrin made sure to connect them with an Islamic student group. The Abdul-Qaadirs also visited a nearby mosque.
“I’d like to really inspire a lot of young Muslim girls if they want to play basketball,†she says. “Anything is possible. They can do it, too.â€
She is already an inspiration for some of her peers at the New Leadership Charter School. Teammate Tiffany Clark credits Bilqis with “showing me the right way to do things.†It was through Bilqis’s example, Clark insists, that she turned from a wavering student to a senior on the honor roll. “She’s focused all the time. She’s always on task.â€During games, says her coach, John Williams, Bilqis is unselfish, always looking to set up her teammates. Still, in leading the Wildcats to their fifth straight winning record, she has had to score a lot. In tallying 702 points this season, she has accounted for a whopping 72.9 percent of the team’s total. Her career mark of 2,895 points makes her a good bet to hit the 3,000 milestone, with three regular-season games and at least one playoff contest ahead.
Surpassing Lobo’s state record for either gender became a foregone conclusion early in the year. Bilqis almost managed to do it in front of Lobo Jan. 16. Lobo came to Springfield College that night to see New Leadership play against Millbury as part of the HoopHall Classic. Bilqis needed 38 points to tie the record, and struggled at first against a powerful opponent. In the last quarter, she caught fire, building her total to 36, and then firing up a 3-pointer in the game’s final minute. It rimmed out, leaving her at 2,708 points and knocking hard at the door of history.
Then last Monday night she took the floor at Commerce, a home game rescheduled from New Leadership’s gym at the Rebecca Johnson Elementary School to accommodate a crowd of 1,000 people. When Bilqis came out for layups she couldn’t resist sneaking a wave to her family. Her parents were there, her grandparents, her brother Yusuf. The mayor of Springfield, Domenic Sarno, was on hand. Melissa McFerrin flew up from Memphis.
When Bilqis hit the first of two free throws to put her over the top, the game was stopped for a full 10 minutes. The gym was completely unified in focus, fans and players on both teams standing and clapping.
“I think everybody was more excited than I was,†she later reflected. “I didn’t realize it was going to be this big.â€
When the game resumed, Bilqis went back to the foul line, took the basketball in her hands, and bounced it once.
DUBAI, Middle-East (Our Bureau Report): This past week on Pakistan GEO TV, viewers worldwide were mesmerized by the recitation of Qari Saad Nomani. Qari Saad Nomani, also known as Sheikh Muhammad Saad Nomani Madani is a miraculous Qari in the Islamic World, known for his unique ability to render the recitation of the Quran in manner recited by many world famous Qaris, of the world.
Qari Nomani has been gifted with the talent to read with more than 85 qaris and imams, including the Imams of the two Holy Mosques of the Muslim world in Makkah and Madinah.
Among his tutors are Shaikh Muhammad Abdul Majed Zakir (Senior Qari from Riyadh and Ustaad of many world renowned Quraa, including Sheikh Abdur Rahman Al Sudais and Sheikh Ali Jaber, Shaikh Khaleel Abdur Rahman Al Qari’ (Senior Qari from Madinah and Ustaad of World renowned Quraa incl. Sheikh Subaiyyel and Sheikh M. Ayoob, Sheikh Shafiq bin Sulaiman Al Qazi, Sheikh Muhammad Ayub) [ex-guest Imam of Al-Masjid al-Nabawi], Sheikh Ali Al Huzaifi (Imam of Al-Masjid al-Nabawi), and Sheikh Muhammad Khalil (Imam of Masjid-e-Quba) Madinah Munawwarah.
Qari Saad Nomani is of Pakistani descent and was born in Madina, Saudi Arabia. Later, he migrated to Jeddah and then to Madinah. Currently he is in (Madina) Saudi Arabia. He has completed his M.A. in Islamic Studies from Darululoom Karachi under the aegis of Justice (retired) Sheikh Mufti Muhammad Taqi Usmani.
Qari Saad Nomani is from the progeny of Imam Abu Hanifah, one of the four Imams of Ahlussunnah Wal Jama’ah, and is the 26th in the generation. Abu Hanifah R.A.’s real name was Noman (Numan or Nauman) hence the surname of Nomani / Numani.
Recently he was invited to England and performed Qira’at throughout the UK including East London Mosque. He has also appeared on Islam Channel UK. Often his voice is broadcast on major Islamic radio stations in different parts of the world. He has also travelled extensively including to Canada, Australia, Italy, South Africa, Kenya and other Gulf States.
After listening to him last week on GEO, people in USA are looking forward to Qari Nomani’s visit to America: For organizing this, one can call 832-687-8868.
If you want this world-renowned qari, Saad Nomani to visit the USA, call 832-687-8868 to arrange such a visit.
Courtesy Barak Ravid, Haaretz Correspondent, and AP
The Obama administration said late Saturday it would participate in planning a United Nations conference on racism, despite concerns the meeting will be used by Arab nations and others to criticize Israel.
The U.S. will decide later whether to participate in “Durban 2,†the second UN-sponsored World Conference Against Racism.
The State Department said it would send diplomats next week to participate in preparatory meetings for the World Conference Against Racism, which is set to be held in Geneva, Switzerland in April and which some countries including Israel have already decided to boycott.
In a statement released late Saturday, the State Department said the U.S. delegation to the planning discussions would review current direction of conference preparations and whether U.S. participation in the conference itself is warranted.
“This will be the first opportunity the (Obama) administration has had to engage in the negotiations for the Durban Review, and – in line with our commitment to diplomacy – the U.S. has decided to send a delegation to engage in the negotiations on the text of the conference document,†the department said.
“The intent of our participation is to work to try to change the direction in which the review conference is heading,†it said. “We hope to work with other countries that want the Conference to responsibly and productively address racism around the world.â€
Officials in Jerusalem expressed concern that Israel and Barack Obama’s administration are on a collision course over the U.S. decision to participate in the conference.
The Foreign Ministry has sought to block efforts by senior U.S. officials to convince Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to alter American policy set during the Bush administration not to attend the conference, which is regarded by Israel as a forum of anti-Semitic and anti-Israeli vitriol.
Israel is boycotting the conference because a declaration equating Zionism with racism is expected to be made there. In addition, it is expected that the organizers and participants will charge that Israel is committing genocide against the Palestinians, and, like before in Durban, will make anti-Semitic statements.
The Bush administration agreed with Israel last year that the U.S. would not participate unless it received guarantees that the conference would not become a stage for anti-Semitism and one-sided criticism of Israel, as occured during the first Durban meeting in 2001.
Canada also announced that it was boycotting the conference and the Foreign Ministry has tried in recent months to convince European Union countries to also avoid participating.
The Foreign Ministry received confidential telegraphs from Israel’s embassies in DC, the United Nations and Geneva, about a possible change in the policy of the new U.S. administration regarding “Durban 2.â€
“Iran and Arab countries will once more take over the conference, and if the U.S. participates in ‘Durban 2,’ it will be a major blow,†a senior Israeli diplomat told Haaretz. “This will pull the rug from under us and will lead to the participation of many more countries in the conference.â€
In one of the telegrams, a number of Obama officials reportedly pressed Secretary of State Clinton to announce the U.S. would participate in the conference.
One of the leading officials pressuring Clinton on “Durban 2†is the new U.S. ambassador to the UN, Susan Rice, who was Obama’s close campaign adviser.
Rice is also pushing for the U.S. to join the UN Human Rights Council, which is based in Geneva, which was boycotted by the U.S for criticism of Israel.
He was a self-confessed al-Qaida insider who in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks was interviewed by all the major news networks eager to hear his fiery rhetoric.
Following the 7/7 bombings, he told us that he had now recognised the error of his ways and was committed to countering “Islamismâ€. He was going to spill the beans in a keenly anticipated book called Leaving al-Qaida relating how he had gone about recruiting British Muslims to go overseas and fight.
The American CBS network’s flagship documentary programme 60 Minutes broadcast an interview with him in March 2007 in which he talked about his “recruiting and fundraising techniques†in his extremist days.
Government ministers such as Tony McNulty sought an audience with him in order to listen to his learned thoughts on how to de-radicalise young Muslims.
Nick Cohen praised him for steering British Muslims:… away from violence while teaching wider society that radical Islam is not a rational reaction to Western provocation, but a totalitarian ideology with a life of its own.
In Manchester in April (2007), Hassan Butt, a one-time jihadist who is now opposed to extremism, was stabbed and beaten for speaking out against fanaticism. He now lives in hiding. There was only one problem with all this though – it was complete nonsense.
Hassan Butt’s admission in court that he was a “professional liar†who said what “the media wanted to hear†because all he was really interested in was making money will not have come as a surprise to many British Muslims who have long viewed him as a charlatan.
Butt “confessed he had also stabbed himself in the arm to make it appear as if he had been attacked by extremists for speaking out against violence.â€
The tens of millions of pounds that the government has poured into its preventing violent extremism programme has inevitably attracted a number of self-professed “ex-Islamists†who are prepared to say exactly what the government and sections of the media want to hear ie that the rise of violent extremism in the UK has little to do with our government’s warmongering abroad and is mainly the fault of “Islamist ideology.â€
Such an answer of course perfectly suits the government, which does not favour closer scrutiny of the impact of some of its actions abroad.
It also suits those like Cohen who were enthusiastic propagandists for those misbegotten wars.
With the election of Barack Obama and his warmly received call for there to be a “new partnership based on mutual respect and mutual interest†between the United States and the Muslim world, there at long last exists an opportunity to make amends for some of the disastrous mistakes of the past.
If we in the UK are to also avail ourselves of that opportunity it will require the government to do more than simply offer what are in effect bribes to those who are willing to turn a blind eye to its unjust policies.
NEW YORK (Reuters) – The founder of a U.S. Muslim television network has been arrested and charged with murdering his wife by beheading her, the network’s Web site and local media reported.
Muzzammil Hassan, founder and CEO of Buffalo, N.Y.-based Bridges TV which launched in 2004 with a mission to show Muslims in a more positive light, was charged after reporting the death of his wife, Aasiya Hassan, 37, on Thursday night.
After Hassan, 44, told police his wife was at the Bridges TV offices, in the village of Orchard Park, they found her body there, beheaded, The Buffalo News reported.
Authorities said Aasiya Hassan, with whom Hassan had two children, had recently filed for divorce and had an order of protection mandating that he leave their home as of February 6.
He was being held in a county detention center charged with second-degree murder.
“Our deepest condolences and prayers go out to the families of the victim,†a statement on the network’s Web site said on Monday. “We request that their right to privacy be respected.â€
“There had been problems before and there had been prior incidents of physical abuse,†Corey Hogan, whose law firm Hogan Willig represented Aasiya Hassan in the divorce proceeding, told the newspaper.
My name is Hunaid Baliwala and I have been at Bridges since May of 2005. I am writing to you as the newly appointed interim General Manager of Bridges TV. Previously, I held a number of operations and business development roles.
We apologize that we have not been able to connect with you earlier, as we were trying to deal with this shocking event and did not have access to our facilities.
At Bridges TV, all the staff members are deeply shocked and saddened by the murder of Aasiya Hassan [Zubair] and subsequent arrest of Muzzammil Hassan. Our deepest condolences and prayers go out to the victim’s family. This appears to be the most tragic of domestic violence incidents and, although we have heard statistics that imply that more than three cases of domestic violence occur every day in the US, no one here could ever imagine that this may happen to our beloved colleague.
While the staff is obviously in a state of shock given how closely we all worked with both Aasiya and Muzzammil, we are all unwavering in our determination that, for the sake of Aasiya’s vision of this channel, we remain strong and continue the good work that she had initiated. We have a strong staff and I am confident in the success of the Company moving forward.
I would like to request that the right to privacy for the families and staff be respected as we continue to go about our daily business routine.
The two biggest issues that we currently face at Bridges TV are the negative publicity generated by this domestic violence incident and the ongoing funding constraint. Both are extremely time sensitive and are being addressed directly by myself and our Board of Directors (composed primarily of our investors). Without your support we would not have been able to come this far. Therefore, we value your continued support and will need it to get through this challenging time. If you have any ideas and suggestions please do not hesitate to contact me. Given all the myriad of activities at Bridges TV, I may not be able to respond to each correspondence but please let me assure you that all will be read and absorbed by our team. We are all resolute in fulfilling Aasiya’s mission for Bridges TV.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has agreed to attend an international donors conference in Cairo next month to help rebuild the Gaza Strip after Israel’s December invasion, Egypt’s foreign minister said on Thursday.
Speaking after meeting Clinton, Ahmed Aboul Gheit said the top U.S. diplomat would attend the March 2 meeting, which is being held in coordination with the Palestinian Authority.
“We expect lots of commitments from everybody, lots of commitments for reconstruction,†Aboul Gheit told reporters outside the State Department.
Preliminary estimates put the damage in Hamas-run Gaza after Israel’s offensive, which killed 1,300 Palestinians, at nearly $2 billion.
Saudi Arabia has said it would donate $1 billion but the United States has not yet indicated what it will contribute. There are also U.S. concerns that funds not be channeled through Hamas, which Washington brands a terrorist group.
A senior State Department official confirmed Clinton would be in Cairo but said it had not yet been formally announced and details were still being made.
“They agreed on the shared commitment to bring about a comprehensive peace and the need to have a successful Cairo conference,†he said of Clinton’s meeting with Aboul Gheit.
He did not have estimates of what the United States might contribute toward rebuilding Gaza.
“(The United States) hopes that conditions on the ground will allow the United States and other members of the international community to provide substantial levels of assistance to the people of Gaza,†the State Department said on Wednesday in a statement.
Aboul Gheit said he had urged Clinton and the Obama administration to show a strong commitment to Arab-Israeli peace and told her 2009 was a “crucial year.â€
The Bush administration was accused by many Arabs of siding with Israel on key issues and Aboul Gheit said he expected a more even-handed approach, particularly in urging an end to Israeli settlement activity.
“They say they understand the problem of settlement activities and that it has to come to an end. All these are very encouraging signs,†he said.
Israeli-Palestinian peace talks revived by the Bush administration are stalled, particularly after Israel’s invasion of Gaza.
The Obama administration has appointed a special envoy to tackle the Israeli-Palestinian crisis but the political stalemate in Israel after this week’s elections and delays in forming a new government will likely delay further a resumption of peace moves.
(Reporting by Sue Pleming, Editing by Sandra Maler)
Before the dust surrounding the UAE’s financial turmoil, which has propelled the tiny monarchy into an unexpected economic crisis, has even settled a new political storm has thrust the nation into headlines heard around the World. Seeking to reestablish its Islamic roots, after decades of catering to Western tourists, the Dubai government is becoming stricter as to what is, and isn’t, acceptable within its borders. Authorities have acted swiftly to issue bans consistent with the current theme of renewing the nation’s Islamic heritage. This past week Israeli tennis player, Shahar Peer, was denied an entry visa into the UAE. As a result, she was unable to participate in the WTA tour. The move taken by authorities to ban Peer from playing was symbolic to show solidarity with the plight of Palestinian people. The decision may have far-reaching consequences for the UAE, with WTA Chief Executive Larry Scott, threatening to remove Dubai from next year’s tour schedule. Authorities have remained unapologetic regardless of future threats.
The latest ban to take effect comes as the first International Festival of Literature in Dubai is set to get underway next week on February 26. One of the invited authors, Geraldine Bedell, who wrote a book entitled The Gulf Between Us has been unceremoniously barred from attending the event. Apparently, organizers failed to read the entire book prior to issuing the invitation. The controversy surrounds one of the minor characters who is a gay sheikh involved in a torrid love affair with an Englishman. The story is set in the Middle East which was the initial reason why the author was selected to participate in the event. Homosexuality is considered a taboo subject in the Gulf, even though it does exist, as it contravenes Shari’ah.
This is not the first time that a book has been banned by Dubai authorities. In September 2008, British author Christopher Davison found himself on the wrong side of a ban.
He wrote a book entitled Dubai: The Vulnerability of Success, which was extremely critical of the unprecedented growth of construction and industry in the region. The book notably cast an unflattering light on the UAE’s ruling family and it was banned from being sold within the country.
The latest ban has drawn criticism from literati from around the world. However, despite the controversy, world-famous authors including Margaret Atwood, Louis de Bernières, Jung Chang and Frank McCourt, to name only a few, are still expected to attend the event.
As the UAE’s love affair with the West appears set to come to a bittersweet end, it’s likely that more bans will follow in a bid to uphold the Islamic values and morals of the country. However with a shaky stock market, plummeting economy and growing exodus of expatriate skilled laborers, the question that remains unanswered is whether it is too late for the UAE to reassert its’ Islamic identity when it finds itself largely at the mercy of wealthy non-Muslim foreign investors.
If you believe that ALLAH is the only God and nothing is higher than yourself except God, then you must also believe in yourself as the cream of creation and a majestic piece of work created by ALLAH. Believing in yourself as the top of the creation mountain means not allowing the Shaytan to have any authority over you as you go about your everyday lives, which are not always peaches and ice cream.
One of the most senseless actions a person can be involved in is Road Rage. Here you have a person you don’t even know that cuts you off in traffic and gets in front of you. You get so angry that you don’t even think about the fact there is always someone else (or a traffic light) ahead of them. Now, as noted, you probably never saw this person before in your life and probably will never see him/her again. So why would you chase them down, give them the finger, and possibly incite more retaliation? A good rule of thumb is “If you see someone that is crazier than you are…let them go.â€
This road rage seems to be brought on by the same weak-minded insecurity as the cowardly act of domestic violence.
This week, a prominent member of the Buffalo, NY Muslim community and TV channel owner, brutally murdered his wife. To say I was shocked is an understatement to say the least. You see, I knew and worked with the alleged perpetrator for many years. I even assisted him in building the TV station. And all that time I never had any idea that, first, abuse was going on in the home and second, that this person had the capability to commit such a brutal act.
Then it dawned on me that we all have the capability and ability (and sometimes the desire) to commit such acts. It is only through the grace of ALLAH that He blesses most of us to have a balanced, sane mind. I have no idea what makes people snap and go out of their human nature. But I do know that if you concentrate too much on any part of creation, and allow it to rise above your own nature, which is the highest of creation, you will knock yourself off the lofty position ALLAH has placed you on and become lower than Shaytan.
Prophet Muhammad (s) reminded the believers to “Do not become angry.†If you allow another human being, or any part of creation, to make you get destructive, you are submitting to the will of the Shaytan devil.
ALLAH, The Almighty, gives strict, explicit instruction to a man on dealing with a disobedient wife (though I’m not saying the wife was disobedient – I don’t know. The times I met her, she seemed a nice peaceful lady). He (ALLAH) says first you admonish her (talk to her). If that doesn’t work, you withhold sexual relations from her. And if that doesn’t work you GO AWAY FROM HER. You notice I didn’t say “beat her†or “strike her lightly†as many in the Muslim world believe). Prophet Muhammad (s), who is our human example, is never reported to have abused or even struck any of his wives. So in that case, beating a woman is forbidden.
People become abusive for many different reasons. Abusive men for the most part, have a need to control. They must have the female under their thumb and demand complete submission. They also are so insecure that they cannot bear the thought of the spouse leaving them. I understand this was the case of my friend in Buffalo who had been threatened with divorce and had some sort of peace bond out on him.
Let this tragic unfortunate incident be a lesson to us brothers and sisters. Keep your thoughts on being submissive to the will of ALLAH. Don’t let the admiration…or fear of another human being turn you into a monster.
We pray for the soul of the deceased and pray Almighty ALLAH accepts her good deeds and has mercy on her for her misdeeds.
Last week I discussed the the Keynesian and supply-side economic theories. This week I will attempt to show the factors that have contributed to our current economic crisis.
These are multiple factors at work, rather than any single economic theory discussed earlier. Factors include the lack of financial accountability, a lack of understanding of the working mechanisms of economics, internal degeneration at a moral or socio-political level or at the economic level (corruption and greed) and external aggression, or wars.
Accountability
The classical example is the debacle of the Savings and Loan banks of the 1980’s. The S&L’s original purpose was to help homeowners obtain mortgages. As the interest rate rose in the late 70’s (following the Vietnam war) they could not afford to continue their prior commitments of low interest loans. To help the S&Ls, congress deregulated the industry by removing the restrictions on loans they could make. The scammers took over. Just over a decade later, at the end of the 80’s, the collapse was imminent and congress had to bail out the industry with taxpayer money. As the saying went, “Why rob a bank when you can own one.â€
Another example is the uncounted billions spent on the Iraq and Afghanistan wars.
Lack of understanding of current economic situation
President Bush maintained till his last days in office that “The fundamentals of our economy are sound,†and this refrain was repeated by John McCain. When a giant century-old financial institution, Lehman Brothers, failed and filed for bankruptcy he said. “There is tremendous turmoil in our financial markets and Wall Street.â€
People who bore the brunt understood how deep was the recession, with a precipitous decline in employment, business activity almost coming to a stop, falling housing market, and the overall situation pointing to a deep depression. Amazingly, it took a full year of economic distress, from December 2007, when economic activity last peaked, to declare that a recession had actually been taking place.
When Obama became president he realized the severity of the recession. That prompted him to say: “I didn’t know I was going to inherit this,†and he declared the economy would be his top priority.
Internal Degeneration
Moral and socio-political degeneration is on rise. The recent episodes of NY’s Governor Eliot Spitzer’s prostitution scandal, or Portland’s Mayor Sam Adams affair with an intern are just the tips of the iceberg.
Unethical involvement of the two U.S. senators, Christopher Dodd, (Chairman of the banking committee), and Kent Conrad, (Chairman of the Budget and member of the finance committee), are also well known. They both are former cabinet members and the latter is a former ambassador to the United Nations. They received loans from financial institutions that waived fees, points, lender fees, etc; through a little known program for prominent people.
The recent corrupt practices of Governor Blagojevich and the Ponzi scheme run by Bernard Lawrence “Bernie†Madoff are still fresh in our minds. Madoff was once Chairman of the NASDAQ stock exchange and founded his Wall Street firm, Bernard L. Investment Securities LLC, in 1960. His investment fraud (about $8 billion) was carried out by a single person.
Greed of some of the executives of big corporations, like Enron, Lehman Brothers, Washington Mutual, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, AIG, Merrill Lynch and others have been equally guilty in corruptive procedures and greed by awarding themselves big payoffs, some even after receiving government bail outs. The greed of companies like Halliburton and Blackwater are inexcusable; they are only concerned with their profit, irrespective of human lives.
These are some of the examples of privileged people fighting hard to keep their privileges instead of privileges of the common people. This kind of moral, degeneration on all its levels, is partly to blame for our present economic chaos.
Wars
The Roman Empire fell because their leader bankrupted it. Look at the red ink now! A huge national debt that has tripled since George W Bush took power. External wars of Roman Empire with Attila the Hun and other non-Roman barbarians started the empire’s decline in the 5th century.
The Ottoman Empire fought many wars with Russia. But it was the Crimean War that weakened the Empire.
From 1897 to 1907, the sun didn’t set on the British Empire. From 1899 to 1902, it fought a war against the independent Boer republic of South Africa. It was longer and costlier than Britain expected. Although the British won the “dirty little war,†it became so expensive in terms of finance and human resources that the war eroded its position in the world. That was the beginning of the sun set for that empire.
From 1965 to 1973, America fought a long and unpopular war in Vietnam. Apart from the human lives lost (58,000 Americans and appalling Vietnamese deaths) there was incalculable suffering and sorrow for millions. The financial cost was $1.5 billion; accounting for inflation it would be more.
This led to the monetary debacle of the late 70’s and early 80’s, with high unemployment, high inflation and productivity at a standstill, leading to “stagflation.†Rising oil prices added to the trade deficit, creating a situation in which the dollar had no value against the gold that supposedly backed it. Because of this huge disparity, the US in 1975 floated the dollar with respect to gold and other currencies. This act signaled a loss of confidence in the dollar and consequently in the US. The price of gold rose from $35 an ounce in 1969 to $900 in 1980.
From 1979 to 1989, the Soviets invaded Afghanistan. This left the Soviet economy in tatters. The ruble fell to its lowest point against other currencies and became worthless. It weakened the whole USSR, ultimately leading to its dismemberment.
The US invaded Afghanistan on October 7, 2001, and Iraq on March 20, 2003, on the pretext of removing WMD. What an irony, we used WMD to remove nonexistent WMD. Both wars have proved costly in money and lives. The US has spent over a trillion dollars to sustain its war machines. This has undermined our credibility worldwide and has weakened the dollar. Our national debt has tripled, almost surpassing $12 trillion.
In a recent article in the Wall Street Journal, a Russian professor Igor Panarin predicted the end of the US by the end of 2010. He says America will disintegrate into six countries. According to him a moral and an economic collapse will trigger a civil war and eventual breakup of the US (andrew.osborn@wsj.com). We know it is nonsense but it does give you an insight of the world thinking and the magnitude of the problem we face.
Financial insecurity is most dreaded, especially in the developed countries, and yet no economist or politician dares to discuss the role of the Iraq and Afghan wars as primary reasons for our present economic mess.
Causes and Cures of our economic mess will continue next week. I will discuss the creation of the economic bubble, why it was necessary, and what caused it to burst. What, in my opinion, we should do to guard ourselves.
I hope you are reading Investment page of Bob Wood. If you have been following his advice, I am sure you have benefitted from it.
Regardless of what sect, linguistic group or ethnicity we belong to, most of us pray to Allah Almighty for even the minutest things in our life. Sometimes, our dua are answered, and other times they are delayed, and some other times, we do not see the response. What does the Qur`an tell us about the right methodology of dua, and when does it get answered?
During these difficult times we all need duas and additionally a positive response to our duas.
In one of the passages of the Qur`an, Allah records the dua of the Muslims of Mecca who after the establishment of a Muslim state in Medina were left stranded, facing severe persecution. They were subject to all kinds of harassment and torture. They prayed to Allah Almighty saying, ‘Our Lord, take us out of this city whose inhabitants are wrongdoers! Give us a protector from You! Give us a helper from You!’? (Surat an-Nisa’: 75)
Allah has the power to whisk each of them away from Mecca without anyone knowing. Allah has the power of causing destruction to the city.
Allah has the power of punishing the oppressor in an exemplary manner. But the manner Allah chose to respond to the prayers of the Muslims of Mecca was unique and practical.
He asked the Muslims of Medina who had created a state and were in control of material resources the following; “What reason could you have for not fighting in the Way of Allah-for those men, women and children who are oppressed and say, ‘Our Lord, take us out of this city whose inhabitants are wrongdoers! Give us a protector from You! Give us a helper from You!’? (Surat an-Nisa’: 75)
The prayer was responded to. and thus Allah taught us how the prayer is responded.
He invites the people who are well established and settled to come to the rescue of those who are less fortunate.
In these difficult times, our prayers will be responded when those who are in a position of authority and influence sincerely come forward to help those who are in need of help.
Based on this model of the Qur`anic message, can those amongst us who have been blessed with knowledge and resources create an alternative to help overcome their economic woes and can they be the ones inspired by Allah to help people get a response to their du’a.
Wow, so you’re really going to do it? You’re going to take matters into your own hands and manage your own investments? Well, good for you!
What the heck, right? How much worse will you do than most professional investors have done lately?
Now for the hard part: investing is difficult to do well, especially in terrible economic times, such as we’re seeing now. This appears to be the worst decade for investors since the 1930s, and none of the old rules for success are working well.
Of course, has successful investing in the markets ever been easy? I’ve mentioned in this column previously the research work of Dalbar, who has found that investors consistently do the wrong things. Even during the secular bull market in equities, which ended in 2000, the average investor in stocks would have fared better by staying with bond funds.
Most investors become overly active, making too many trades when simply sitting and waiting will provide the best course. And too many of us do the most obviously wrong things, namely, buying high amid the excitement of big, trailing performance and then selling in discouragement at what later proves to be the best time to buy.
Yet if you are among that big crowd nursing large losses incurred during the past few years, you’ve probably noticed that professional investors haven’t done much better. Most have trailed the passively-managed index funds again and again.
So if you’re ready to strap yourself into the big chair and do this yourself, look at it this way: you finally have your best interests aligned with those of your portfolio manager! And by now you’ve taken that short journey of discovery to learn all about asset allocation, diversification and Modern Portfolio Theory.
Great! Now for the next step: forget everything you learned about asset allocation, diversification and Modern Portfolio Theory! Do a complete brain dump, and get all that nonsense out of your head before you hurt yourself with it! Let’s face facts: if those theories were any good at all, everyone would have used them and achieved perfectly satisfactory results.
The amazing thing about those academic ideas is that everyone seems to use them, yet very few ever achieve expected results from them. That result, in itself, argues strongly against using the most widely accepted methods for building and managing your investments.
The only real reason for learning about academic theories on investing is knowing how they are meant to be useful. But in economic times like today, when all asset classes are falling in tandem, just what is the benefit of spreading your risks among several different types of investments? How much will this method smooth volatility while generating sufficient long-term returns?
During the bear cycle from 2000 to 2002, domestic large caps, mid caps, small caps, and international and emerging markets stocks all fell in unison. In a bull market, spreading your risks around makes sense, but, in a bear market, all bets are off.
So now that we have a good idea of what does not work with alarming regularity, what should we do instead? I believe your first step is most important. Simply ask yourself this: “Is now a good time to be adding risk to my portfolio?†Or should you be decreasing risk? Obviously, with the domestic market’s having careened through its worst calendar year since 1931 and with this new year’s suffering from a similar, bad beginning, shouldn’t we be seeking decreased amounts of risk? With the S&P 500 now sitting about where it was 12 years ago, can there be any doubt that we are experiencing a secular, or long-running bear market for domestic stocks? I am convinced that there is no room whatsoever for domestic stocks in your portfolio. That’s right. I advocate, and have advocated for as long as I have been writing this column, that investors should allocate zero dollars to domestic stocks.
That guideline assumes that you will have your portfolio almost totally invested in overseas markets. And, you ask, haven’t those investments performed even worse than our home market since the start of last year? So answering that question brings me to the next useful suggestion for what to consider including in your portfolio: include shares of mutual funds that are designed to do well in down markets.
That seems rather obvious now, doesn’t it? And while such funds have been the big winners during this decade to date, they still have a place in your portfolio today. I use them liberally in my own managed accounts.
Some may think this a little late for those investing in those types of funds since the markets have already taken a pretty good beating over the past year and a half. That might sound right to you, but remember that 2008 was the worst year for the Nikkei 225 in Japan, and that bear market began almost 20 years ago!
Sure, the S&P 500 has fallen significantly in recent months, but so have earnings for companies that comprise that index. Actually, companies’ earnings have fallen faster than the index share price; specifically, even though the index has fallen so much, the average price-to-earnings ratio of index stocks has actually risen!
A recent Wall Street Journal article pointed out that, over the past four quarters, the combined earnings for the companies in the S&P 500 amounts to a paltry $28.75. Assigning an average P/E of 15 gives a level for that index that most would be mildly shocked at seeing.
One problem with today’s investing in international and emerging markets shares is that all asset classes seem to be strongly correlated. So when our domestic market drops, it tends to take down with it markets around the world.
At some point, I am sure that situation will change, and the decoupling I have been anticipating, which has been roundly called dead by almost everyone offering an opinion about it, will indeed be seen. In fact, decoupling has already begun; it’s just not so obvious to those who object, since they aren’t looking very hard. All these points have been leading to some suggestions for building your own do-it-yourself portfolio. Again, let’s consider secular, long-term trends and how they make all the difference. While the domestic stock market has been a steady loser for this past decade, other markets and asset classes have done well.
Beginning with the international markets I have liked best, look at stock markets in Brazil, China and India, which are higher today than at the start of this decade. In addition, gold shares have done well, with the price of the metal, itself, much higher today than at the start of the year 2000. Given how these positions have generated positive gains for so long, they can be expected to regain investor favor before long. In fact, the Chinese market is showing a great start to 2009, and gold shares are moving higher, too.
My basic investment philosophy for the past few years remains intact today. I am adhering to a ‘’short here, long there’’ strategy, whereby I hold shares of bear market funds in domestic markets, offset by long-side allocations in international and emerging markets stocks and funds. But I strongly suggest that you buy mutual funds for your portfolio instead of the more volatile individual issues.
This type of allocation may well shock any traditional investor who looks at it, since it is so opposite to conventional investing wisdom. All I can say is that — as odd as it looks, perhaps even reckless to some professionals — it works! And, in the end, isn’t that the one thing that matters?
Take your time, allocate even more than you think right to cash for now, and build this kind of portfolio slowly, over the next few months. And as always, if it goes wrong in today’ non-conventional investment environment, don’t yell at me! If you’re losing money, so am I!
Have a great week. Bob
Bob Wood ChFC, CLU Yusuf Kadiwala. Registered Investment Advisors, KMA, Inc., invest@muslimobserver.com.
Thousands of Shi’ite Muslims trudged through snow-covered sidewalks in Dearborn Sunday afternoon in a procession to remember the death of a Muslim leader killed in 7th century Iraq.
The 2-mile procession featured colorful flags in honor of Imam Hussain, the grandson of Islam’s prophet, religious songs, and cries of “We support you, Oh Hussain.â€
The worshippers started at the Karbalaa Islamic Education Center on Warren Ave., the main commercial strip of Dearborn, and then walked to nearby Hemlock Park. There, they recited poetry and tapped their chests in mourning rituals known as latmiya.
Dearborn Police Lt. Wayne Seccombe estimated the crowd was between 2,000 and 5,000.
“We are here as lovers of Imam Hussain, lovers of freedom, of justice, of democracy,†said Imam Husham Al-Husainy, the head of the Karbalaa center and the parade’s organizer. “Imam Hussain is still alive with us, even though he was martyred 1400 years ago. His spirit is still alive.â€
The parade was held close to the 40th day after the death anniversary of Imam Hussain, who was killed in battle. Shi’ite Muslims, a minority among the broader Muslim community, remember Hussain every year during a holiday known as Ashura.
