Articles

It is no doubt important to be important. Nowhere in the world, however, is it more important to be ‘important’ than in the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. While everything else is in terminal decline, the VIP culture is alive and well and thriving as never before.

I was invited as a speaker to Al-Quds Day meeting on January 31, 1997, which was part of the Ramadan activities held by Sincan municipality, a district of Ankara. Before the program, I sent the organizers a video cassette exposing the crimes of Zionism and highlighting the Palestinian cause.

The west, we are so often told, owes its pre-eminence to the universality of its liberal values and democracy of its political institutions. It is these, we are further told, which entitles it to lead the world, claiming the moral high ground on every issue, and imposing its will (for the greater public good, of course) on all others.

In a desperate bid to save his own skin and displaying total contempt for Muslim lives, US president Bill Clinton, a self-confessed liar and philanderer, unleashed cruise missiles against Iraq on December 16.

A fresh debate on whether Israel should unilaterally extricate itself from its costly occupation of parts of southern Lebanon has bubbled up again in the Zionist State over the past few weeks.

The 19th annual meeting of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), held in Abu Dhabi from December 7-9, was a far cry from the heady days of high oil prices when Arab monarchies were awash with petro-dollars.

Hamas leader Shaikh Ahmad Yassin, whom Yasser Arafat was obliged by public pressure to greet as a hero when he returned to Ghazzah last year after eight years in an Israeli jail, was placed under house arrest by Palestinian police on October 29.

Malaysian prime minister Mahathir Mohamed must be getting a sinking feeling that events are fast slipping out of his control. This is not to suggest that the Malaysian judiciary, press or the police have turned against him.

Istanbul, once a magnificent city of Islamic civilization, known to Muslims of another age as Jannatu dunya (paradise on earth), is today laid open for inspection by the prying eyes of western tourists.

Rubbing salt into the raw wounds of Muslims, police arrested thousands of Muslims across India on the eve of the sixth anniversary of the demolition of the historic Babri Mosque in Ayodhya.