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Mid-Ramadan Report

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Written by Karima Hamdan.

Just in case you haven’t noticed it’s Ramadan. You’ve been busy, we’ve been busy so lets just get on with it and mention a few stories that may have missed the media mill.

 

 

Is This the Stupidest Man Alive?

I know…quite a crowded field, what with Taj Hargey and all, but I think I may have come across the Usain Bolt of idiocy.

Enter: Mitt Romney.

Due to the current Recession, Romney appears to have applied his keen management consultant skills to the task, efficiently streamlining his ‘charm offensive’ to be just…offensive. Romney has left a trail of outrage in his wake. His latest act of moronism (a natural alternative to his Mormonism) is not so much idiotic as it is prejudiced, ignorant and just plain hateful.

In a speech to a $25,000 (£16,000)-a-head fundraising event in Jerusalem, he cited culture and the hand of providence as the reason for the economic success of ‘The Only Democracy in the Middle East’.
“As I come here and I look out over this city and consider the accomplishments of the people of this nation, I recognise the power of at least culture and a few other things.”

The ‘few other things’ he conveniently fails to mention include the estimated $114 billion in aid (that’s a conservative estimate) that the US has forked out since 1949 to prop up ‘The Only Democracy in the Middle East”.  In fact, the said ‘Democracy’ has received more handouts than any other country on Earth.

Oh, and that is not including the $70 million dollar increase in aid that Obama announced the day before Romney arrived. Romney’s “Hand of Providence” seems almost as miraculous as Diego Maradonna’s “Hand of God”

Mitt Romney’s current campaign slogan is Mitt Romney: Believe in America.
Can I humbly suggest changing that to: Mitt Romney: Sounds clever to stupid people.

Quiet Massacres
Whilst many were enjoying the spectacle of the Queen falling out of a helicopter, elsewhere in the world it seems that some have missed the Olympic memo to halt all hostilities during the games.

We are reminded everyday about the conflict in Syria with the lightly armed rebels on one side, out gunned, out numbered but not outshone by Assad’s military on the other. And in between are the civilians caught between the army’s indiscriminate shelling and the knowledge that if the rebels lose they may suffer the same fate at Hama did in 1982 when Hafeez Al Assad cold bloodedly massacred between 20,000 and 40,000 Sunni Muslims after a failed uprising then.

Less well know is what is happening to the Muslim minority Rohingya in Burma. Their own government stripped them of their citizenship earlier this year. They are being crushed between relentless state sponsored torture, murder and rape carried out by Buddhist monks on behalf of the Burmese government and the closed borders of Bangladesh who has refused to accept any more refugees.

Amnesty International and the UN have been quite vocal in their decrying of the situation in Burma. Notably silent has been the much feted Aung San Suu Kyi.  When asked about the situation she ducked and dived and generally refused to give any support to the Muslims of Burma – fully aware that she wasn’t going to win any votes supporting the Rohingya. Also notably silent is the Dalai Lama. Several NGOs have said that Buddhist monks have been actively preventing aid from reaching Muslim refugee camps and several Buddhist monasteries have been very vocal in stoking up ethnic tensions. Whilst it is true that the Dalai Lama is Tibetan and not Burmese, he has certainly waxed lyrical when denouncing other conflicts and  his silence in the face of his co-religionists’ actions seems at odds with his public stance on non-violence.

Fasting and Not Fasting
A number of Muslim athletes have turned up to these Olympics armed with Spandex covered designer-fatwas exempting them from fasting. Some even have a royal decree from which ever tinpot princeling the British placed to rule over them during that bit of British history not mentioned during the opening ceremony.

This is quite strange considering that the exemptions from fasting have been pretty clear cut for nearly one and a half thousand years…and I don’t recall one for “potentially compromising athletic performance”. The fiqh is pretty clear – if you aren’t ill and you intend to stay in the Olympic village for 15 days or more then make like the Nike advertisement and ‘Just do it’…remember speed on the track or in the water will never be fast enough to outrun the sin of not fasting.

 

Abu Huraira Radi Allahu Ta’ala Anhu related that Rasulullah Sallal Laahu Ta’ala Alayhi Wa Sallam said: If anyone omits his fast even for one day in Ramadan without a valid excuse or without being ill, then if he were to fast for the rest of his life he could not make up for it.  (Bukhari)

Recalcitrant athletes may have no choice in the matter as food runs out in the Olympic village causing a fasting of sorts for those there. Things are not as easy for Muslims in the rest of the world. In China authorities in the northwestern province of Xinjiang (home to 9 million mostly Muslim Uighurs) have banned Muslim officials  and students from fasting during the month of Ramadan. In an official statement the government specified that
“It is forbidden for Communist Party cadres, civil officials (including those who have retired) and students to participate in Ramadan religious activities.”
The statement went on to urge party leaders to bring “gifts” of food to local village leaders to ensure that they were eating during Ramadan. Schools have also been told to ensure that students do not enter mosques during Ramadan. Remember all that bunkum about the Beijing Olympics being the stimulus to improve China’s human rights record? No? Neither it seems does the Communist Party.

Meanwhile in France Muslim instructors at a summer camp for children have been suspended (in some reports sacked) because they were fasting. According to the local council that employed them it is a ‘breach of care’ to attempt to take care of children whilst fasting. Whilst I am all for force feeding traditionally diet-driven, wafer thin French mothers like the geese that make Foie Gras, this seems a bridge too far.

This is another example of the fallacy of the argument of niqab ban apologists who invariably say that the niqab is a specific problem to the West and just as long as we jettison that we all should get along fine. To them I say, the niqab is the very thin end of a very large wedge…defend it or get used to munching your way through Ramadan.

Follow the bouncing ball
There has been genuine concern over these last few weeks of our cold soggy summer that the temperature may fall low enough to allow the female beach volleyball competitors at the Olympics to wear long sleeved t-shirts and leggings instead of the traditional bikinis. In Team GB’s women’s beach volleyball press conference instead of any discussion about rankings, medal hopes etc etc the only questions to be had were journalists trying to extract promises from the women that they would wear bikinis whatever the weather. BBC Radio 4’s PM programme (at 52 minutes in) was even inspired to investigate why there was such a huge interest in the sport – 500,000 people have tickets in this Olympics. The answer was emphatic – the bikinis…or more specifically what is inside the bikini. The suffragettes depicted in the opening ceremony would be thrilled I’m sure.

Contrast this to the frosty reception that the Egyptian intelligentsia has given their new First Lady Naglaa Ali Mahmoud who, horror of horrors, wears not only a hijaab but also an abaya. Despite refusing to accept the title of ‘First Lady’; declining to live a pampered, privileged existence in the presidential palace, preferring her own home instead; and by all accounts being a down to earth matter of fact sort of woman genuinely interested in the concerns of ordinary people; Ms Mahmoud or Umm Ahmed as she prefers is ruffling more than a few feathers of people who equate liberation with exhibitionism.

Considering the paternalistic tones adopted by the Olympic committee who were over the moon at the inclusion of a handful of women athletes from Muslims countries as somehow demonstrating that they were making inroads into ‘women’s rights’-  I can only assume that these rights also include participating in soft pornography under the guise of sports. The respectable daily newspapers must lament that there are only two weeks every four years when they get a chance to splash page 3 girl photos on their covers under the guise of serious journalism.  One waits with baited breath for pole dancing to be included as an Olympic sport. It has a great deal in common with beach volleyball. Both are physically demanding, both require a certain amount of training and skill. And both are for the turgid titillation of sweaty, mouth breathing Neanderthals who more than likely were bottle-fed as infants.  All that remains is to do something about the male beach volley-ballers who insist on wearing shariah-compliant long shorts and loose tops.  Don’t they know that this is 2012?

Who is oppressed and who is liberated? The answer is not as straightforward as it appears.

The Samosa Olympics
Coming soon at an iftari table near you: who will break the world record of eating the most fried savory triangles in an Usain Bolt beating time…
…before staggering to the masjid to pray tarawih prayers whilst emitting industrial strength burps and only able to do sujood by ishara.
It is the other end of the slippery spectrum which sees others using Ramadan as a month of dieting rather than a month of worship.
There must be a balance to be had between breaking your fast with a low carb protein shake and a lettuce leaf and breaking your fast by trying to eat your own body weight in fried food.
The Sahel region is an impoverished area of West Africa home to 18 million Muslims in the countries of Mauritania, Mali, Niger, Burkina Faso, Senegal and Chad. It appears to be sinking back into a major food crisis with over 1 million children suffering from severe malnutrition, and 2 million children suffering from moderate malnutrition.

Contrast this with the obscene wastage of food that goes on in Ramadan. In Abu Dhabi alone last year it was estimated that 50 tonnes of food was thrown away each day. Qataris spend twice as much money on food in Ramadan than is spent in the entire remainder of the year.

It may focus the mind to reflect on this whilst we groan under the weight of food that there are others not as privileged.

7 minutes of Terror
At about 6:30 am GMT on Monday 6th August, the $2.5bn NASA Mars Curiosity Rover will hopefully touch down on Martian soil after a nearly 9 month journey.

The rover itself as well as its elaborate landing is a remarkable feat of engineering and imagination. What is even more interesting is the analogy offered up to us by the mission. After years in planning and months flying through the void of space, the rover will experience what NASA is calling 7 minutes of terror, where it will hurtle through the thin atmosphere of Mars attempting to slow down enough in order to land safely.

The space craft only has enough fuel for 6 course corrections during the voyage to Mars and so each one needs to be calculated and recalculated for the fuel to be used in the wisest possible way. Therein lies the analogy – Ramadan is the course correction in our journey of life. We only have a finite number of ‘course corrections’ before we begin our descent. We must use each one of them to do the utmost and not squander any or we may find that our descent also ends in terror.

Conclusion

Whilst most of us will never be Olympians, we are given the opportunity to participate in a more worthwhile endeavour with rewards that will InshAllah exceed our wildest expectations.

With more than half the distance done, we are now on the home straight. Whilst our strength may be flagging, tiredness nipping at our heels and we may feel like slowing down – this is the time to push ourselves even more.

The sahabah used the divide the year between one Ramadan and the next thus – for the 6 months immediately after Ramadan they would pray that Allah subhanawatala would accept their Ramadan. The next 6 months they would pray that Allah subhanawatala would give them enough life to see another Ramadan.

May Allah subhanawatala accept our fasting and prayers and allow us to utilise this Ramadan to the greatest of our ability and allow us to live to the next one.

..ورمضان إلى رمضان كفارة لما بينهما

There is expiation of sins for the time between one Ramadan and another (Muslim)


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