Ibn Taymiyya jihad fatwa (re-)interpretation

Tom Heneghan, Reuters India, Muslim scholars recast jihadists' favourite fatwa, 31 Mar 2010 "Prominent Muslim scholars have recast a famous medieval fatwa on jihad, arguing the religious edict radical Islamists often cite to justify killing cannot be used in a globalised world that respects faith and civil rights.

"A conference in Mardin in southeastern Turkey declared the fatwa by 14th century scholar Ibn Taymiyya rules out militant violence and the medieval Muslim division of the world into a "house of Islam" and "house of unbelief" no longer applies."

More information: Mardin Conference from where the above screenshot is taken. The website contains details of the scholars who attended. There's a transcripts page, which presumably will be updated in due course.

Egypt: cybercrime workshop

George Haddad, globalarabnetwork.com, Egypt: Workshop on fight against cyber-crime, 29 Mar 2010 "An announcement said the two-day seminar, to be held on 30 and 31 March 2010 in Cairo, Egypt, will gather 245 participants nominated by the respective ministry or national authority of the beneficiary country. It will present the phenomenon of cybercrime, discuss the legal framework, and focus on responsibilities of the law enforcement agencies and Internet service providers."

قطر .

Hannan Taha, globalarabnetwork.com, Qatar Receives Approval for Arabic Internet Domains, 30 Mar 2010 "The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) announced that Qatar has received approval to have its internet domains written in Arabic, one of the first countries in the world to receive approval to use non‐Latin language scripts in domain names. Once implemented, Internet Domains ending in the Arabic equivalent of “.qatar”(" قطر ." ) can be registered in Qatar’s native Arabic‐language."

Nigerian Shaira Court Facebook and Twitter 'ban'

Ayo Okulaja, Next, Sharia court upholds ban on Facebook, 31 Mar 2010 "A Sharia court sitting in Kaduna on Tuesday upheld last week’s ruling that an online discussion on the first wrist amputation in the country be banned.

"The online forum was launched by the Civil Rights Congress (CRC), a civil society organisation, to mark the 10th anniversary of the first Sharia-court ordered amputation in Nigeria - that of Buba Bello Jangebe, alias ‘Kare Garke’ (ranch raider), by the Zamfara State government.

"The Magajin Gari Sharia court last week ordered the CRC and its head, Shehu Sani, to suspend its online debate on the amputation through an interim injunction that restrained the respondents from opening a chat forum on Facebook, Twitter, or any blog for the purpose of the debate on the amputation of Mr. Jangebe pending yesterday’s hearing of the case."

Also see

worldnewsvine.com, Victor Ulasi, Update: Nigerian religious court bans the use of Facebook and Twitter, 30 Mar 2010 "The President of the Association of Muslim Brotherhood of Nigeria, Ustaz Safiyan Abubakar made it known that on no grounds should the internet be used to discuss Sharia in such place that is abominable to God, or neither is anyone allowed to make mockery to Islam just because he is a human right activist.

"We are not against Civil Right Congress discussing about the arm amputation of Mallam Bellow Jangebe in anyway because the amputation was politically inspired but the discussion of Sharia been supreme or not supreme and deciding if the Sharia is right or wrong is totally unacceptable because Islam is Supreme and Sharia is been practiced by the teachings of Islam. Facebook and Twitter are unholy place to talk about Sharia, doing that is an intimidation and undermining of the teachings of Islam. Only a foul gives to dog what is holy,” Abubakar added."

Moscow metro bombings

Reuters, Russia's "silent war" spills into Moscow, 30 Mar 2010 "Russia says the bombings, which killed 39 people, were carried out by a group with links to the North Caucasus, giving credibility to statements by Chechen rebel leader Doku Umarov that he would attack Russian cities and energy pipelines."

Guardian, Suicide bombers kill nine more in Russia, 31 Mar 2010

CBC, Black Widows: The brides of Allah, 30 Mar 2010 "The Black Widows is what Russian journalists call female Islamist suicide bombers who have participated in more than 30 attacks that have killed about 900 people in Russia since July 2001, when Khava Barayeva and Luisa Magomadova rammed their explosives packed truck into a Russian military headquarters building in the Chechen village of Alkhan Yurt."

Paul Quinn-Judge, Foreign Policy, Russia's Terror Goes Viral, 29 Mar 2010

"The metro bombings in Moscow make clear that terrorism is far from exorcized from Russia. So where has it been hiding these last few, quiet years? The Web..."

"... Now that he is gone, Buryatsky is quickly becoming an online legend, reinforced by his letters, now being selectively released by guerrilla websites. They depict his hatred for "dying Russia" and the "pigs" who serve it, and his own growing obsession -- a "wild hunger" as he called it in one letter -- to become a shahid, or martyr. It would not be surprising if his last message -- the one filmed on his phone and later confiscated by the FSB -- surfaces on some guerrilla website, leaked by sympathizers inside the local police. "

Microsoft translator widget

Gaith Saqer, arabcrunch.com, Translation War Intensifies: Microsoft Launched Translator Widget in 32 Languages Including Arabic and Chinese, 25 Mar 2010 "Microsoft released Maren a desktop Transliteration application last year, and already has 150,000 downloads according to sources, an app that is superior to Yamli and Ta3reeb as It works on all MS Windows applications where users can compose documents, blogs, e-mails, instant messages, or even leave comments on friends’ Facebook pages all in Arabic."

Maren is here

I've previously blogged on these tools. Here's the widget for this page:

As with all machine translations, this carries an accuracy warning! I cannot get it to function in the sidebar at present.

A Middle East bookshelf

Brian Whitaker has provided this useful A Middle East bookshelf as an introductory reading list. There are some good suggestions here, and plenty of scope for discussion...

Abu Yahya al-Libi('s brother)

Jarret Brachman, Today I Interviewed Abu Yahya al-Libi’s Older Brother, Abd al-Wahhab Muhammad Qaid (Abu Idris) "In what I would call the culminating interview of my career, today I spent 2-hours with Abu Yahya al-Libi’s older brother in the warden’s office at Bu Salim Reform and Rehabilitation Center (prison). No photos allowed on this one, which is too bad b/c I cant possibly convey how surreal of an experience this was."

I think this interview/scoop will be very interesting.

Saudi Arabia

David George-Cosh, The National, Yahoo aims to go local in Saudi Arabian expansion, 23 Mar 2010 "Yahoo, the world’s second-largest internet search company, has applied for a trade licence in Saudi Arabia to establish a sales and editorial presence in the kingdom’s growing media market."

Saudi Arabia

Tom Gara, The National, Saudi Arabia looms largest in Web development visions, 27 Mar 2010 "As the Arab Web industry found its voice at its first gathering last week, there was talk of an entrepreneurial boom in Jordan, Dubai’s digital advertising industry and the emergence of Cairo as an online centre.

"But ask a Web business, or more importantly, an online advertiser, where they want to see their digital properties growing, and the answer is almost unanimous: Saudi Arabia."

Saot Al Arab

startuparabia.com, Saot Al Arab, What Would You Do If You Were The Leader? "Saot Al Arab (The voice of Arabs) is an interesting and ambitious non-profit project that was recently launched for the Arab world, asking visitors what they would do if they were in the leader’s chair, what would be the first project they would launch."

Interesting idea, transferable to other contexts

"Oh Allah, we seek refuge with You from the snooze button"

Aishah, muslimmatters.org, Oh Allah, we seek refuge with You from the snooze button, 29 Mar 2010 "It’s 5:45 and your Fajr alarm has just begun ringing. You tried to be smart and set the alarm and your ringer as the same tone so you’d think that someone was calling you, because, of course, answering a call is much more exciting than trying to figure out how to snooze the alarm this early in the morning. But, you’re smarter than you thought, and caught on to the trick. The reverse psychology failed." non-tech (apart from the alarm clock - but a nice piece)

Hissa Hilal

Independent, Saudi woman poet lashes out at clerics in 'Arabic Idol', "The X Factor it isn't – but Abu Dhabi's live poetry talent contest, The Million's Poet, which is broadcast across the Arab world, features something far more subversive than its British equivalent could ever manage.

"Tonight, Hissa Hilal, a mother-of-four from Saudi Arabia, takes to the stage in the last round of a competition that she has taken by storm with a scathing critique of the conservative clerics who hold sway in her country. Her poetry has earned her the praise of the judges, the acclaim of the viewing public – and more than a few death threats."



Middle East Online, ‘Fatwa’ poetess makes it to Million’s Poet final, 18 Mar 2010

Discussion on Hissa Hilal features prominently online

Islam Online "on-strike" [update]

صوت إسلام أون لاين
The above link goes to Voice of IslamOnline.net, a blog collecting videos, campaign information and news on this major story. Some recent 'catch-up' links are below:


Ramadan Al Sherbini, GulfNews, Website workers defiant after boss dismissed, 26 Mar 2010


Fox News, Moderates forced out of top Islam Web site, 26 Mar 2010


"The Qatari government has forced out the moderate leadership of a popular Islamic Web site and plans to reshape it into a more religiously conservative outlet, former employees of the site said Thursday.
Sheik Youssef al-Qaradawi, the widely respected cleric who co-founded IslamOnline and is known as a relative moderate, is no longer the head of al-Balagh, the company which funds the Web site, said his secretary, Youssef Aboul-Naga."

I was surprised to see Fox describe al-Qaradawi as 'relative moderate'(discuss) ...


Zawya, Negotiations beak down between IOL staff and Qatar, 26 Mar 2010

"Representatives of Abdullah El-Naggar, head of Media International's board and member of the board of Al-Balagh foundation, IOL's main funder, met Thursday afternoon with a team of lawyers headed by Yasser Fathy.  
""They demanded that all employees resign in order to receive their financial packages," Fathy told Daily News Egypt.

""This is a [classic] case of Egyptian employees being hampered at the hands of a foreign management.""

ikhwanWeb.com, A Statement Clarifying the Real Situation at IslamOnline.net, Mar 26, 2010‎

ikhwanWeb.com, Ousted Islamonline's employees launch new website, 26 Mar 2010  

"The launching of a new website project titled "Alam Al-Umma" or "Islamic Nation Information," was revealed after the website Islamonline's employees were unjustly relieved from their positions on the website earlier this month."

Diana Mukkaled, Asharq Alawsat, IslamOnline: What Moderation?, 26 Mar 2010

""Whatever the case may be, this is a crisis that raises a question that relates to all aspects of Islam in the post-9/11 era; what kind of media for what kind of Islam after more than a decade of crises where politicians, philosophers, and activists have explored and analyzed everything connected to Islam to the point that the media is leaning towards irrational fear rather than towards research and knowledge?""

Hadeel al-Shalchi, AP, Moderates forced out of top Islam Web site, 26 Mar 2010 "Fathi Abu Hatab, who has been with the company for 10 years, said repeated pressures from management to change the site's approach prompted them to go on strike.

""Our Doha correspondent wasn't allowed to cover the Doha Film Festival because it was deemed unIslamic. We were receiving complaints (from management) about our discussions on women's health, homosexuality, and films.""

'Jihadi Cool'

Dina Temple-Raston, NPR, Jihadi Cool: Terrorist Recruiters' Latest Weapon, 26 Mar 2010

"With so many terrorism cases emerging in the U.S. in the past nine months, experts are trying to understand why so much is happening now. One explanation has less to do with religion than with adventure. The latest wave of jihadists traveling to Pakistan and elsewhere for training may have been motivated by a sense of jihadi cool."

I have referred to this concept in iMuslims and elsewhere. The link has audio, transcript and report.

Conference announcement: The Arabic Language and the Internet/اللغة العربية والإنترنت

Conference announcement: 

La Fondation Temimi pour la Recherche Scientifique et l’Information

The Arabic Language and the Internet

In recent years, the internet has come to dominate our lives. E-mails and instant messaging and chat are rapidly replacing conventional forms of communication. The Web is becoming the first resource people use for information enquiries, leisure and general activities. All of this has generated an expansion in the variety and creativity of language. This phenomenon is spreading worldwide (see Crystal regarding English, 2001, 2004, 2006 and Danet and Herring, 2007 for a variety of languages including Arabic). The linguistic plurality in the Arab world and the addition of the new factor (the internet) make researching this area not only fascinating, but also necessary. The emergence of the Internet made the debate over the status of the Standard Arabic (high) and the various dialects (diglossia) (low) more or less out of date, especially with the appearance of a “new” forms of writing that is making its way into Arabic literature, encouraging the use of the dialect (e.g. Ayza Atgawiz عايزة أتجوز(2008), Ruz bi laban li shakhsain رز بلبن لشخصين (2008) and many more by Dar Al Shourouq). As a direct reaction to this phenomenon, debate in the Arab world, including calls of “saving” Arabic are taking place across the region. “New” organizations have appeared, decrying the impacts of globalization on the Arabic language, culture and identity and calling for an immediate rescue of the language (e.g., the new Lebanese Organization “Fi’il Amr” فعل أمر. Its aim is not only to preserve the language, but also to seek ways of making it adaptable to the new technologies and to highlight the dominance of foreign languages, particularly English in the everyday use. The linguistic hegemony is manifested on the internet in various ways. It appears in the discourses related to language, identity and power (e.g., Arabic hegemony over the local language of Tamazight, the dominance of French/English as the languages of the colonizers and their relationships with the global hegemonic power of the West over East).

The internet has also opened up a public space in which all manner of ideas and ideologies interact with each other and compete for attention, each making arguments through the debates that take place on websites, blogs, Facebook, Tweeter…etc (e.g., the Islamist versus the Secular websites) without a confident answer that this public sphere is actually leading to “change”. Their messages are transmitted through the use of language, which in itself is loaded with power-related issues that contribute to either the existing culture or help in the emergence of a new cultural field. The internet has helped the emergence of e-Arabic. It is a language (e-Arabic) that mixes, borrows and adapts, uses numbers, Roman letters, Arabic script characters, emotions and words from other languages (English and French) to engage not only with the globalised discourse as such but also to examine the specific ways in which the local frames the global. The questions that arise are related to whether or not this “new” language is strengthening or weakening Arabic? Is this not a case of language variations as a result of contacts and change? Is change here a “blessing” and part of a natural cycle or “curse” on Arabic? In other words, what is the scale of the impacts of globalization on Arab(ic) language and culture?

The organizers, the Centre for the Advanced Studies of the Arab World (CASAW) based in the United Kingdom and Fondation Temimi pour la recherche scientifique et l’information (FTRSI) in Tunisia have made significant contributions to producing research on the society, history, and cultures of the Arab world. Both have Arabic as a central research preoccupation. This conference aims at exploring the latest research on Arabic and the Internet, from within the Arab world and intentionally, in the fields of linguistics, cultural studies, political science, sociology, literature, history and geography. The organizers seek to examine language as an embedded component in every discipline. Therefore, possible topics might include, but are not limited to:

• Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) and dialects in and their relationship with the internet.
1. Arabic diglossia, power and identity formation
2. Multilingualism in the Arab regions.
3. National language versus foreign/second language and their manifestation on the internet.

• Arabic language, literature and the visual arts and their role in shaping the cultural field in the Arab world under the impact of the Internet.
1. The emergence of “new” Arabic literature as result of internet use.
2. Use of image (Flickr), social networks (Facebook, Tweeter...etc) as forms of expression.
3. The relationship between the internet, Arabic literature and culture in general.

• Arabic language and power and the question of “change” in the Arab world both virtually and physically.
1. The role of Arabic Language Academies in monitoring and regulating the new terminologies.
2. In what way “change” is received/assimilated in the Arab world?
3. How different/similar is the “change” (if any) between the virtual and the physical spaces?

• The cyber sphere and the marginal/oppositional voices appearing in the Arab world. The emergence of “new” voices virtually, what forms of Arabic they use and why?
1. Marginal and oppositional voices in the Arab world.
2. The emergence of local voices promoting local languages (Tamazight...etc).

Proposals across disciplines are welcomed. Please send abstract of 250 words by email to both:

Prof. Temimi: fondationtemimi@yahoo.fr /fondationtemimi@gnet.tn
Dr. Anissa Daoudi: anissa.daoudi@durham.ac.uk

The deadline for submission is June 2010.

مؤسسة التميمي للبحث العلمي والمعلومات

ومركز الدراسات المتقدمة للعالم العربي تنظمان :

المؤتمر الثلاثون لمنتدى الفكر المعاصر حول :

اللغة العربية والإنترنت

مؤسسة التميمي:_10 – 13 ديسمبر  2010

المنشور الأول

أصبحت شبكة الإنترنت في السنوات الأخيرة تهيمن على حياتنا وغدت رسائل البريد الإلكتروني والرسائل الفورية والدردشة، قد عوضت وبسرعة الأشكال التقليدية للاتصالات، حيث تمكنت شبكة الانترنت من أن تصبح المصدر الأول الذي يلجأ إليه الجميع من اجل البحث عن المعلومات، والأنشطة الترفيهية والعامة وهذا ما أدى إلى توليد وتوسيع دائرة توظيف اللغة العربية تجاه هذه الظاهرة، شأنها في ذلك شأن بقية اللغات في العالم والتي تفاعلت معها سلبا وإيجابا  (انظر كريستال فيما يتعلق باللغة الإنجليزية، 2001، 2004، 2006، ودانيت وهيرنج، 2007 لمجموعة متنوعة من اللغات بما فيها اللغة العربية).أما بالنسبة للغة الضاد فقد أدّى ظهور الإنترنت إلى جعل النقاش حول اللغة العربية الفصحى واللهجات المختلفة (diglossia) احدى مظاهر التعلق بهاته اللغة، وخاصة مع ظهور "نماذج" جديدة من الكتابة التي بدأت تجد طريقها إلى الأدب العربي، من خلال تشجيع استخدام اللهجة المحلية *. وكرد فعل مباشر لهذه الظاهرة، فإن النقاش في العالم العربي، يتضمن الدعوات المتضاربة فمنها من يتباكى ويطالب "بإنقاذ" اللغة العربية ومنها من يرى في ذلك نتاج طبيعي وصحي لاحتكاك اللغات المختلفة بعضها مع البعض.

وقد ظهرت أيضا منظمات "جديدة"، تدعو إلى شجب آثار العولمة على اللغة العربية والثقافة والهوية وإنقاذ فوري للغة على سبيل المثال، المنظمة اللبنانية الجديدة "فعل أمر والتي هدفها ليس فقط الحفاظ على اللغة العربية، ولكن أيضا البحث عن سبل لجعلها قابلة للتكيف مع التكنولوجيات الجديدة، وتسليط الضوء على هيمنة اللغات الأجنبية عليها، وبخاصةً اللغة الانجليزية في الاستخدام اليومي. وعليه فإن البحث في هذا المجال ليس مجرد موضوع للاستهلاك فقط، بل أمرا ملحا وضرورياً أيضاً.

إن مظاهر التعدّد اللغوي في العالم العربي جعل من قضية الهيمنة اللغوية ملفا دقيقا جدّا تتضح وتبرز آثارها جليّة على شبكة الانترنت بطرق مختلفة. وقد برزت في الخطابات التي تتعلق باللغة والهوية والسلطة. وهيمنة اللغة العربية على اللغة المحلية مثلا الأمازيغية، وهيمنة اللغة الفرنسية / الإنجليزية بوصفهما من لغات المستعمر وعلاقاتهما مع القوى العالمية المهيمنة في الغرب على الشرق. كما فتحت شبكة الانترنت أيضا الفضاء لبروز الرأي العام والذي يؤشر على مختلف الأفكار والأيديولوجيات التي تقوم بالتفاعل مع بعضها البعض وتتنافس على جلب الاهتمام بها، بفتح منابر للنقاش على مواقع الانترنت (مثل بلوجات، فيس بوك، تويتر... إلخ ). نأخذ عـلى سبيل المثال، المواقع الإسلامية والعلمانية، ونجد أن كلاهما يعمل لجلب أكبر عدد من القراء والمنخرطين دون الحصول على إجابة أكيدة بأن هذه المعركة قد تساعد في الواقع على"التغيير"، وكل هاته المعارك تنتقل عن طريق استخدام اللغة، والتي هي في حدّ ذاتها محمّلة بقضايا مرتبطة بالسلطة وتساهم في إثراء الثقافة الحالية أو تساعـد في نشوء حقل  ثقافي جـديد. لقد ساعـدت شبـكة الإنترنت عـلى ظهـور الـلغة العربية الإلكترونية(eArabic). إنها الـلغة (e-Arabic) التي تقوم بمزج واستعارة وتكيّف، واستخدام الأرقام والحروف الرومانية والحروف العربية والصور التي تعبر عن المشاعر(emotions) والكلمات من لغات أخرى (مثلا اللغة الإنجليزية والفرنسية) للمشاركة ليس فقط في النقاش العولمي، ولكن أيضا لدراسة الطرق المحددة التي تمتزج فيها الأطر المحلية بالعالمية. وكل هذا يؤدي إلى طرح أسئلة حول ما إذا كانت هذه اللغة الجديدة تقوم بإضعاف أو تقوية اللغة العربية؟ أليست هذه التباينات اللغوية نتيجة للاتصالات والاحتكاك المؤدي إلى التغيير؟ وهل التغيير هنا هو "نعمة" أم هو جزء من دورة طبيعية أو "نقمة" على اللغة العربية؟ وبمعنى أخر، ما هو المقياس لتأثيرات العولمة على اللغة العربية كلغة وثقافة؟

وقد خطط مركز الدراسات المتقدمة للعالم العربي (CASAW) ومقرها المملكة المتحدة ومؤسسة التميمي للبحث العلمي والمعلومات (FTRSI) بتونس بتبني مشروع عقد مؤتمر بهذا الخصوص متناولين عديد الإشكاليات حول المجتمع، والتاريخ، والثقافات في العالم العربي. وهذا انطلاقا من تعامل هاتين المؤسستين الأكاديميتين مع اللغة العربية باعتبارها الوعاء الحضاري لهذا الاهتمام البحثي الرئيسي. ويهدف هذا المؤتمر إلى استكشاف أحدث الأبحاث في مجالات اللغة العربية والإنترنت، من المشاركين العرب والدوليين، في مجال اللسانيات والدراسات الثقافية والعلوم السياسية وعلم الاجتماع والأداب والتاريخ والجغرافيا. أما الموضوعات المحتملة تناولها فهي على التوالي :

أولا - اللغة العربية الفصحى الحديثة (MSA) واللهجات وعلاقتها مع شبكة الانترنت :

1 - ازدواجية اللغة العربية  diglossia، والسلطة وتشكيل الهوية.

2 - التعددية اللغويةmultilingualism  في العالم العربي.

3 - اللغة القومية مقابل اللغة الأجنبية أو اللغة الثانية ومظاهرها على شبكة الانترنت.

ثانيا - اللغة العربية والأدب والفنون البصرية ودورهم في تشكيل الحقل الثقافي في العالم العربي تحت تأثير الإنترنت :

4 - ظهور الأدب العربي "الجديد" نتيجة لاستخدام الانترنت.

5 - استخدام الصور (فليكر)، والشبكات الاجتماعية (فيس بوك، وتويتر... الخ) بوصفها أشكالا للتعبير.

6 - العلاقة بين الانترنت والأدب العربي والثقافة بصفة عامة.

ثالثا - اللغة العربية والسلطة، ومسألة "التغيير" في العالم العربي :

7 - دور أكاديميات اللغة العربية في مراقبة وتنظيم المصطلحات الجديدة.

8 - الطريقة التى تم بها تلقى /استيعاب  "التغيير" في العالم العربي؟

9 - مدى اختلاف / تماثل "التغيير" (إن وجد) بين المساحات الفعلية والمادية؟

رابعا - اللغة العربية والأصوات المعارضة :

10 - الأصوات الهامشية والمعارضة في العالم العربي.

11 - وظهور أصوات محلية تقوم بتعزيز أو تحسين اللغات المحلية (الأمازيغية والفرنكو-عربي... الخ).

إن جميع المقترحات من مختلف التخصصات، سوف تكون موضع ترحيب. وعليه نوجه إليكم المنشور الأول لهذا المؤتمر مرفقة ببطاقة الاشتراك، فالرجاء التفضل بملئها وإرجاعها إلينا قريبا، مع العلم أن مؤتمرنا سوف يعقد في الفترة ما بين 17 و19 من شهر نوفمبر 2010.

فالرجاء التفضل بإعلامنا بتأكيد مشاركتكم في هذا المؤتمر المتخصص ومدنا لاحقا بموجز للبحث على أن يتم  توجيهه إلى كل من : الأستاذ التميمي : fondationtemimi@yahoo.fr / fondationtemimi@gnet.tn

- الدكتورة أنيسة داودي :Anissa.Daoudi@durham.ac.uk هذا وسوف نمدكم بكل المعلومات الجديدة حول هذا المؤتمر.

د. أنيسة داودي

د. عبد الجليل التميمي

منى الطحاوي تتضامن مع العاملين في اسلام اون لاين

Mona Eltahawy discussing Islam and the net, focusing on her support of Islam Online staff (with a reference to iMuslims)

Number crunching: MuslimWestFacts

I attended an interesting lecture by Dalia Mogahed today in London, relating the findings of the Gallup/Coexist Foundation World Poll. It reminded me that there's a great deal of useful data available on MuslimWestFacts associated with perceptions, opinions and trends. The findings are also available in Arabic, and appear to be regularly updated. It's a great resource, especially for students/researchers, and was effectively summarised by Mogahed in her presentation. You can read more in John L. Esposito and Dalia Mogahed, Who Speaks for Islam? What a Billion Muslims Really Think (Gallup, 2008).

Hawza Project

Details on the Clerical Authority in Shi'i Islam Project, which focuses on the roles of hawza in education and training. Project updates, including future activities, can be obtained via a contact form on the site.

Al Azhar English Training Centre

New Generation is a social networking site organised by Al Azhar English Training Centre (AAETC) in Cairo, a joint project between the British Council, the UK Foreign Office and Al Azhar University. It's a place where students can participate in English language discussion groups, blogs, forums and photos. Students are interested in discussing religion with other students in the UK (and elsewhere). It looks like a good initiative (and a lot of fun for the students). If you are interested, contact the blog directly - and not myself...