Articles

The zionist state of Israel has existed in Palestine for nearly 60 years - more than the lifetimes of most Muslims. It is treated as an integral and permanent part of the world map in the hegemonic discourse of the modern West, and all too often by many Muslims as well. A. K. KURTHA reminds us of the Islamic obligation to defeat zionism.

As Muslims around the world rallied in defence of the Haram in al-Quds, FAHAD ANSARI was concerned by some of the attitudes he found during a protest in London.

In the sixty years since the creation of Israel in 1947, Palestinians have repeatedly had to defend the Haram al-Sharif in Jerusalem against threats to it. The latest occasion was last month, when Israeli authorities demolished a ramp leading to the Meghribi gate in the compound’s western wall. RAJNAARA AKHTAR, of Friends of Al-Aqsa, explains the reasons for the Palestinians’ fears.

Muslims in America are living under increasing pressure because of the atmosphere created by the political establishment and media since September 2001. Zionist and other interest groups have joined in, but some Muslims are fighting back. TAHIR MAHMOUD reports.

It was as long ago as 1999 that NATO launched air attacks on Serbia, ostensibly to end the ‘ethnic cleansing' of Kosovan Albanians, and the UN Security Council turned Kosova into a protectorate of the UN, with six countries – America, Britain, France, Germany, Italy and Russia – acting as the ‘contact group'. Yet the UN is still administering the province, and NATO troops (about 17,000 of them) remain in place to preserve a grudging peace between the Albanian Kosovars and the remaining Serb minority.

After months of optimism, Malaysia finally admitted last month that its negotiations over the free trade agreement (FTA) with the US are going nowhere. The Malaysian government has been shunning an infant movement which is slowly gaining momentum to oppose any FTA with Washington. With other ‘developing' countries, the Americans have listed Malaysia as their next target for an FTA, salivating at the prospect of laying hands on this economically booming southeast-Asian region.

When bands of pro-government hoodlums and thugs, armed with sticks, chains, knives and assault and sniper rifles, attacked students in and around the campus of the Beirut Arab University on January 25, Lebanon again peered into the abyss of civil war. But it backed away, mainly thanks to the rigorous exercise of self-restraint on the part of the opposition

It is not easy to resist a sense of déja vu while watching the components of the US’s new drive to curb the escalating insurgency and extreme inter-communal violence gripping Iraq fall into place. Earlier attempts to shake up the disastrous US military effort inIraq have been failures. All indications are that the new, much-touted drive, which forms the cornerstone of America’s exit strategy from Iraq, is unlikely to fare any better.

President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan is to visit Pakistan this month, ostensibly to help increasing tensions between the two countries. He has his work cut out for him. Last month, Karzai had rubbished such “high profile” visits while Pakistani prime minister Shaukat Aziz was in Kabul for talks on January 6. Despite Karzai’s outburst, Aziz announced that Islamabad would increase its development aid to Afghanistan to US$350 million. He politely sidestepped Karzai’s tantrum by pointing out that both Pakistanand Afghanistan need to address their own internal problems.

Elections due to take place in Bangladesh on January 22 were cancelled abruptly on January 11. The country’s caretaker government, headed by president Iajuddin Ahmed, resigned at the same time and a new caretaker government, headed by Dr Fakhruddin Ahmed, governor of the State Bank, was sworn in.w