Category Archives: Current Events

Camp Ashraf Violence

Iranian dissidents killed in Iraq camp, U.N. demands inquiry
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Turkish Fragments — Literature Review

Turkish Fragments   Orhan Pamuk, The Museum of Innocence. Translated by Maureen Freely. New York: Knopf, 2009. Nurdan Gürbilek, The New Cultural Climate in Turkey: Living in a Shop Window. Translated by Victoria Holbrook. London: Zed Books, 2011. The year 2009 brought us an English translation of the Turkish Nobel Laureate Orhan Pamuk’s The Museum
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Medina: Saudis take a bulldozer to Islam’s history Authorities are building a mosque so big it will hold 1.6m people – but are demolishing irreplaceable monuments to do it

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Ataturk NOT Honored in Ankara This Weekend

Article link here: Crowd sidesteps police, walks toward Anıtkabir ISTANBUL DHA photo Crowds gathered in Ulus Square for banned Republic Day celebrations began walking toward Anıtkabir, the mausoleum of founder of the Turkish Republic Mustafa Kemal Atatürk after police barriers were upheld. Main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu commented on the ongoing
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What have they done to my hajj?

Article What have they done to my hajj? The spirituality of the Muslim pilgrimage is being ruined by skyscrapers and traffic jams around the holy site, while rising costs mean it is a ritual that only the rich can afford Ajmal Masroor guardian.co.uk, Sunday 28 October 2012 10.12 EDT Jump to comments (137) The four-faced […] Continue reading

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Mecca’s Urban Development

Mecca’s mega architecture casts shadow over hajj Towering over Mecca, this is the world’s second-tallest building – and it is just a tiny part of a voracious development that has seen historic sites bulldozed and locals forced into shantytowns. As the hajj begins, Oliver Wainwright reports     Continue reading

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60 Minutes Feature on Fethullah Gulen

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O4OtHpUCqy0[/youtube]
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Umayyad Mosque in Aleppo Burnt

Today, the Umayyad mosque of Aleppo went up in flames.  As this appears to have been modelled on the original Umayyad mosque in Damascus, remind me not to make any more predictions about prominent landmarks going up in flames. [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nDMjg8BAOms&utm_source=buffer&buffer_share=91bce[/youtube] Continue reading

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The History and Philosophy of Representational Art in Islam

This book: There exists a widespread belief that Islam can countenance no representational religious art, that any depiction of religious figures will trip the wire of Newsweek’s “Muslim Rage.” Such a belief is so firmly held in the west that it easily underwrote the government-propagated claim that the attack on the US Consulate in Benghazi … Continue reading » Continue reading

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Omid Safi – What Would Muhammad Do? “Why Mitt Romney is wrong about a “Judeo-Christian” America”

In this article, Prof. Omid Safi of the University of North Carolina argues about the usage of the term “Judeo-Christian” in U.S. presidential politics. Continue reading

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