BY: Habeeb Salloum/Contributing writer “The Damascene swords are not made any more. We have long lost the secret of how they were produced. There are only a few left, mostly in museums and rare antique shops. But look! I have one here! If you can afford it, its only $10,000.” The Damascene merchant was dramatic … Continued
By Pamela Falk
Observer.com
U.S. ambassador to the United Nations Samantha Power. (Photo: Luiz Rampelotto/Pacific Press/LightRocket via Getty Images)
Visitors from around the world flock to the Met to view art history’s great masterpieces and attend fashionable galas, but to negotiate international relations is surely a first. New York’s premier museum recently became the unlikely venue for a high-security, invite-only meeting organized by Samantha Power, President Barack Obama’s envoy to the United Nations. Mixing business with pleasure, the U.S. ambassador invited key international diplomats to tour the museum’s newest exhibition of Islamic art.
Joining Power to see “Court & Cosmos: The Great Age of the Seljuqs,” an exhibition of artifacts from a short-lived Turkic dynasty, were diplomats from 15 countries, including Afghanistan, Algeria, Egypt, Iraq, Qatar, Senegal and Palestine. Power’s hope: the historic artworks would provide the edification needed to soften the tone of regional discord. Just a day before the museum tour, Syria’s besieged city of Aleppo was plunged into chaos.
Ambassador Power was once a trusted campaign policy advisor to President Obama, and served as a member of the National Security Council before heading to the U.N. in 2013. With only six months left on at her current post, the ambassador is looking to create legacy results.
“She does a lot of events outside of Turtle Bay,” said Rae Lynn Wargo, an aide to Power.
The ambassador has found taking discussions away from the occasionally numbing rhetoric of the U.N. has proved effective for diplomacy. In the past, Power has sparred on Twitter with outspoken Russian ambassador Vitaly Churkin regarding her meeting with the punk band Pussy Riot, played basketball with Arab and Israeli youth, and sung karaoke at the South Korean ambassador’s residence. She frequently brings her work home with her to the Waldorf Tower penthouse she shares with her Harvard professor husband Cass Sunstein.
As it turns out, Power’s tour is not the first time the museum has hosted VIP politicians. When the U.N. General Assembly is on, small groups of government representatives have been known to swing through. Notable visitors included Secretary of State John Kerry and Crown Prince Naruhito of Japan, according to the museum’s vice president of communications Elyse Topalian.
The exhibition at the Met includes exquisite relics from an ancient culture that once occupied the now war-torn region spanning Iran, Iraq, Turkey and Syria from the 11th through 13th centuries. In the show’s catalogue and in an earlier book, historian A.C.S. Peacock wrote that the Sunni nomadic group, who briefly captured Mosul, Iraq, suffered from divisions during its short dynasty, which is best known for its literacy, innovation and religious tolerance.
“In the Middle Ages, many Muslim societies placed great emphasis on learning and had large libraries and great respect for our shared history,” Met Museum president Daniel Weiss said.
Diplomats spent two hours in the galleries, sharing perspectives on the Seljuqs and, it seemed to this reporter (the only member of the media invited), they managed to find some common ground.
Sheila Canby, curator of Islamic art, directed the visiting diplomats to view a 13th century basin from Jazira. “The relationship,” she said of the ancient Muslims and crusaders, “was complicated,” with some conquest and some cooperation.
“It is important to show that Islamic history is not about fanatics waving flags,” said Weiss. “Most people get it that Muslim world history and culture is not about ISIS.”
Amr Al-Azm, an anthropology professor at Shawnee State University in Ohio who specializes in the region, joined the tour. “I am like a kid in a candy shop, these are treasures of Islam,” said Al-Azm, an anthropology professor at Shawnee State University in Ohio. “A people without their history are lost.”
Al-Azm told the group that Aleppo’s ISIS brigades, such as the Zangids, take their names from ancient civilizations.
“Those who choose those brigade names, are they on the extremist side? On the al-Nusra side or ISIL?” Power asked, intrigued.
“More on the al-Nusra side,” Al-Azm answered.
“This is not the Security Council,” Jordan’s ambassador Dina Kawar chimed in, eliciting laughter. Evoking candor was the point of Power’s tour.
“The exposition shows a period of our history where cultural influences were able to produce the epitome of beautiful artistic pieces,” said Kawar. “When you see the exposition and you watch D’aesh [ISIS] destroying our cultural heritage, claiming it as unreligious, you realize the urgent need to unite against such a dark force…Cultural diplomacy is certainly the most effective and the most necessary at this stage”
Power pushes hard but artfully, and she may be on the right track. Some of the biggest breakthroughs in diplomatic relations since World War II have occurred outside the hallowed halls of government: in the bucolic estate of Bretton Woods, Camp David, the Wye Plantation, and Potsdam. There has been Henry Kissinger’s “shuttle diplomacy” and Richard Nixon’s “ping-pong” diplomacy. Whether Power’s “museum diplomacy” will help mend Middle East fences is hard to predict, but she succeeded at focusing diplomats on history and art. Not a bad place to get the conversation started before she exits the corridors of the U.N.
Source: observer.com
BY: Habeeb Salloum/Contributing writer To fully realize the extensive influence of Arabic on the Spanish language and culture let us relate an imaginary journey made to Andalusia, the name itself a pure symbol of this impact. The Arabic name for this part of the Iberian Peninsula is al-Andalus – a corruption of ‘the Vandals’, a … Continued
By Amanullah De Sondy
The Washington Post
In reaction to the mass shooting at a gay nightclub in Orlando, people hug outside the Stonewall Inn near a vigil for the victims in New York on Sunday. (Bryan R. Smith/AFP via Getty Images)
Muslim Americans. LGBT Americans. One would imagine that the marginalized would unite.
From the straight Muslim man who is profiled at the airport for his bushy, long beard to the transgender Muslim who fears being shunned from the mosque held so dear to heart and faith — is there so much distance?
Yet those who are marginalized are not immune to their own prejudices and phobias. Omar Mateen, who killed at least 49 people in a gay nightclub in Orlando on Sunday morning, offers a chilling example.
I’ve spent more than a decade researching Islamic masculinities, including five years living and teaching in Florida before I moved last year. I have heard some Western Muslim leaders step haltingly toward acceptance. But most of what I have heard, when Muslim leaders speak to the LGBT believers in their midst, is callous disregard or deafening silence.
We can no longer go on without accepting every Muslim of every sexuality. Sunday’s violence in Orlando proves that all too painfully.
As I have monitored the evolving statements of Western Muslim leaders — most of whom are straight — over the years, here’s what I have heard: a slight movement with regard to LGBT issues by some. Many are silent, but some have realized that the issue must now be publicly addressed, especially with the rise of countries adopting same-sex-marriage bills.
There are lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Muslims who stand proud in their understanding that they have a God-given right to claim their gender and sexuality. But the religious leaders who speak out at all on LGBT issues say only this — reluctant and guarded — “Hate the sin and not the sinner.” From the discussions I have had informally with these leaders, this is as far as they think they can go without losing their own followers.
This sort of cautious stance echoes repeatedly. Muslim writer Mehdi Hasan headlined his 2013 essay on the subject, “As a Muslim, I struggle with the idea of homosexuality — but I oppose homophobia.” University of Oxford professor Tariq Ramadan wrote before that, “Homosexuality is forbidden in Islam,” but “we must avoid condemning or rejecting individuals.” There are dozens more statements like these only a YouTube search away.
In the anxious day since the shooting in Orlando, this horrific event seems to be making Muslim communities at last stand up and make bolder statements about the LGBT community. But not all offer support. There are those on social media — Muslim and Christian, in the Middle East and the United States — who basically applaud the disgusting actions of Mateen. And surely it is easier to focus on “the other” than to admit that there is a true overlap between the Muslim community and the LGBT community, and between Islamophobia and homophobia.
But today, Muslim communities are saying it: LGBT Muslims do exist. They face both Islamophobia and homophobia every day. And they are grieving.
This is a thorny issue within Muslim communities, who find it difficult to find the rainbow within historical, rigid understandings of the tradition. But it is possible to find different colors of a tradition, text or law if we begin by associating that text with the lives of those who uphold it.
Of course, it is also easy to find the dark, gloom or heterocentric within the Muslim tradition. We must remember that much of this “tradition” was written by heterosexual Muslim men who may have been pressured to uphold particular forms of gender and sexual custom in print.
The challenge for Muslim communities around the globe today is to find and appreciate differences and pluralism and to support the lives of believers who do not fit societal norms. It is imperative if we want to support those on the margins who are hurt and damaged.
We need to think carefully about what goes through the mind of that closeted Muslim man listening to the statements today, who may well end up married to someone of the opposite sex because he fears losing his position in his Muslim community. We need to think carefully about what these statements do to empower heterosexual Muslim individuals, who then stand to represent not just Islam but the “ideal” gender and sexuality.
Are the small steps by Muslim leaders enough? Is this slight movement enough to prevent hatred and killing? There is no quick fix to this tension. But just as heterosexual Muslims combat Islamophobia through their loud voices, they must also now listen and accept the voices of LGBT Muslims as equals within the fold of Islam.
Much of our effort in the West to combat extremist ideology relies on building bridges between people, and many Muslim leaders are the first to take to the podium in interfaith dialogue. In light of the Orlando shooting, it is now untenable to have this dialogue of action without including and accepting every face of marginalization within faith communities — especially the LGBT people who are essential partners in our desire for a bright and colorful world.
Source: www.washingtonpost.com
BY YEGANEH TORBATI
REUTERS
Accustomed to generating controversy in their native Middle East with lyrics tackling love, sex and political apathy, members of Lebanese alt-rock band Mashrou’ Leila thought a summer U.S. tour would bring them a welcome respite.
Instead, as news spread on Sunday that an American man claiming allegiance to Islamic State had killed 49 people in a packed gay nightclub in Florida, the band found itself at the crossroads of tensions between the gay and Muslim communities, spilling out on social media and in online commentary.
Mashrou’ Leila has broken ground in the Arab world with an openly gay lead singer and stances espousing gender equality and sexual freedom. In doing so, the band embodies the two communities most shaken by Sunday’s shooting – lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people targeted by the Orlando gunman, and Muslims who feel unfairly blamed for the violence perpetrated in the name of their religion.
“We come from a part of the world where I’ve always felt not accepted because of my sexuality,” Hamed Sinno, Mashrou’ Leila’s lead singer, said in an interview on Monday.
Seeking out information in the hours after the attack, Sinno said he came across comments on social media that he felt sought to pit Muslims and gays against each other.
“By the time they even started getting the names of the victims out, the media had already spun it as this whole LGBT community versus Muslim community” phenomenon, he said. “So many of us are at the intersection of these two communities. Suddenly I felt excluded, I felt I wasn’t allowed to mourn.”
Sinno said the band had already experienced several brushes with anti-Muslim bias in its two weeks in the United States. An airport security guard told them that if Donald Trump won the presidency, “all of this is gonna change,” apparently referring to the Republican presidential candidate’s pledge to ban Muslims from entering the country if he is elected.
The band’s danceable tunes have earned them an avid global following but also condemnations from Arab leaders who say their lyrics go against the region’s traditional values. In April, Jordanian authorities banned the group from the country, band members said, though they later relented after an international outcry.
One song, “Shim el-Yasmine,” describes Sinno’s desire to introduce his male lover to his parents, while “Lil Watan” skewers political apathy in the Middle East.
It is wrong-headed to blame Sunday’s attack on Islam, said Sinno, a U.S. citizen. The FBI said the Orlando gunman, Omar Mateen, called during the massacre to pledge allegiance to Islamic State, the jihadist group that later claimed responsibility for the attack.
But the depth of Mateen’s commitment to Islamic State was unclear. His father said the attack was not motivated by religion and suggested it was rather his son’s anti-gay sentiments.
“The issue is not Islam more than any other religion,” Sinno said. “Most of the attacks that happen against the queer community in the U.S. are not by Muslims, they’re by Christian fanatics.”
In front of a sold-out crowd on Monday night at the Hamilton venue in downtown Washington, D.C., the band briefly addressed the tragedy, the worst mass shooting in modern American history. Staff at the Hamilton said they decided to up security measures following Sunday’s attack, and patrons and their bags were carefully screened before entering the concert.
“There are a bunch of us who are queer, who feel assaulted by that attack who can’t mourn because we’re also from Muslim families, and we exist,” Sinno said to cheers from the crowd, before the band launched into the next song.
Source: www.reuters.com
BY: Clara Ana Ruplinger/Contributing Writer Recent news sources say that the writer of the box office hit film, The Gladiator, David Franzoni, wants to cast Leonardo DiCaprio as poet Jalaluddin al-Rumi, and Robert Downey Jr. as Shams of Tabriz, Rumi’s mentor. This line up of actors were selected for an upcoming film about the Iranian … Continued
How one man and his tea house are trying to foster a sense of understanding and community in the US city of Cleveland. By Angelo Merendino Aljazeera Cleveland, US – Ayman Alkayali is no stranger to feeling like a foreigner. Ayman’s parents were born in Palestine: his mother in Jaffa and his father in Ramla. … Continued
BY: Kristina Perry/Contributing Writer Growing from the recent boom in subscription goods services, PalBox is a fair trade and 501(c)(3) organization that sends organic and cultural Palestinian goods in a quarterly box. Half of all proceeds from purchases of PalBox benefit the International Solidarity Movement, a nonviolent means of resisting Israeli occupation and oppression. Inside the … Continued
Nesreen Issa
The Huffington Post
In Arab countries, you count the days in anticipation of Ramadan. In the United States, we also count the days as we wait for Ramadan. We close our eyes and day-dream about its spiritual details, which, in a way, we miss out on. We fantasize about listening to the morning call to prayer that signals the beginning of our fast — we imagine it as if it were coming straight from the mosque’s minaret. Our hearts beat as we imagine the maghreb (sunset) call to prayer.
Ramadan in the United States is not as dreary as some people may think. The Muslim diaspora here is large, and the ties between them grow stronger during Ramadan. Mosques and homes become decorated with religious symbols, such as lanterns and crescents.
If you walk into Arab grocery stores, you would definitely get a taste of Ramadan. You’d run into people asking about the price of dates, or buying Vimto — a Ramadan favorite — or looking for a crescent-shaped ornament to place on their doors. At the end of the day, you’ll have an iftar table, large or small, with a special Ramadan flair.
We eat katayef (a Ramadan pastry) like everyone else does, but the difference is that we bake it at home. We go through the hassle so that we’d be able to hold the piece of katayef in our hands, take in its scent, and say that we are truly observing Ramadan.
In the United States, unlike in Arab countries, Muslims exert extra effort to create a Ramadan atmosphere.
If you’ve lived in the United States your whole life, you wouldn’t find it difficult to enjoy Ramadan. You would be able to get together with your family and relatives, and have an experience similar to that of any other Muslim in the Arab world.
If you were a visitor to the United States, and your trip happened to coincide with Ramadan — don’t worry or despair. If you want to retain that spiritual experience this Ramadan, you should try to go to cities where there is an abundance of Arab restaurants, such as Chicago, and you’ll find Ramadan in one of them. You will see other Muslims waiting for the call to prayer so that they could start eating. Everyone there will be fasting like you, and will say a prayer before they break their fast with a glass of water and dates. You won’t feel like you’re missing out just because you’re in the United States.
You’ll feel as if you’re experiencing all the Ramadans of the world, combined in one Ramadan in America.
The night prayers during the last 10 days of Ramadan are particularly beautiful here. If you go to the mosque at midnight, you would find young and old worshippers, parents and students, united in worship until sunrise. Many Muslims here — those who speak Arabic and those who don’t — make an effort to read the Quran in full throughout the month.
The diaspora here works really hard, and they work even harder during Ramadan. They organize events, group iftars and charity banquets at mosques and schools. They also organize Quran competitions, in which young and old Muslims from Turkey, Ethiopia, and Arab countries participate. We do all this with love, and we try to breathe that love into our children, so that Ramadan may become a shining light, even away from home.
The taraweeh prayers (special night prayers) make up a central part of Ramadan. Are taraweeh prayers different in the United States? I would say yes, but the difference is not necessarily for the worse. I have lived in Arab countries as well as in the United States, and I used to attend taraweeh prayers there — and I miss the company at the mosque and the taraweeh sermon. But taraweeh prayers in the United States will also make you feel like you’re observing Ramadan. You’ll walk into the mosque and you’ll find it beckoning you, as if saying: “I have Ramadan here, come!”
You’ll run into Palestinians, Syrians, and Indians, and you’ll exchange smiles with a Sudanese or an Egyptian Muslim from across the room. You’ll hear “Ramadan Mubarak” from a Pakistani Muslim. At that point, you’ll feel as if you’re experiencing all the Ramadans of the world, combined in one Ramadan in America.
Ramadan is part of our identity, wherever we are. We will keep observing Ramadan to show the whole world that it is is alive in our hearts.
Source: www.huffingtonpost.com
Getty Images By Rob Wile Fusion.com An analysis by the Pew Research Center of Census data has determined that Arabic is now the fastest-growing language being spoken in U.S. homes. Pew looked at American Community Survey data from 2006 to 2014 that asked what languages are spoken in an individual’s home. Between 2010 and 2014, … Continued
By P.F. Wilson
City Pages
“I was born in Kuwait after the first Gulf War,” says comedian Mo Amer, “or, as I like to call it ‘The Prequel.’” Born to Palestinian parents, Amer lived a comfortable life in Kuwait. “People ask, ‘Why did you leave?’ Very simple. Our house spoke to us.” Houses don’t speak, of course, unless they are in, say, Amityville, New York, but Amer elaborates: “If a bomb lands a 100 feet from your house, it will speak to you. Boom! ‘Get out!’”
Amer’s parents sent him and his brother to the U.S. when he was about nine years old. Fortunately, he was fluent in English, although there was still some culture shock. “I went to a nice, private British school in Kuwait,” he says. “I spoke British English. I wore a bow tie and a vest.”
Until their parents came to America, Mo’s brother was his guardian, and enrolled him in public school in Houston. “My brother neglected to tell them I spoke English, so they put me in an English as a second language class. I was the only guy who spoke English.” His classmates immediately began speaking Spanish to him. “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” he says in an English accent. “I think my parents sent me to the wrong country!”
Sadly, Amer’s father passed away just a few years after he came to Texas. When he wasn’t skipping school, Amer began acting out in class. A teacher intervened, and encouraged him channel that energy into more artistic pursuits. Having seen Bill Cosby at the Astrodome a few years earlier, Amer decided comedy would be his focus.
Watching Amer perform today, his Arab/British English background isn’t immediately apparent, as he is decidedly a Texan. “Damn right,” he agrees. “I do take pride in being a Texan. All my memories and childhood friends I grew up with are from there, so I absolutely have an affinity and a special place in my heart for Texas.”
He does go into his heritage quite a bit onstage, however, such as when he talks about performing in the South. “I was working in Arkansas, and everything was going great,” he tells an audience. “People are laughing, and then I say I’m an Arab-American. Suddenly the whole room gets quiet. One guy in the back goes, ‘Ah, hell no.’ One black couple got up and left.”
Amer isn’t averse to poking fun at his culture, though, or even his own name. “I didn’t know how popular my name was until I watched the Egyptian soccer team on ESPN Deportes,” he says. “They were showing the play-by-play: ‘Mohammad has the ball and passes to Mohammad to Aqmed to Mohammad to Mohammad, back to Mohammad, Mohammad to Mohammad to Aqmed to Mohammad. Mohammad! Goal!’ Was that just one guy on the team passing the ball to himself?”
That bit always kills with audiences, but as an observer of all things, including culture, Amer is keenly aware of the current U.S. climate — one that in some circles is hostile to his culture. That’s why, he feels, it’s even more important that he be a successful comic.
“People will look at it and go, ‘Wow, this guy did it in this time,’” he says, “because when I first started, 20 years ago, there was only like two or three of us that were doing standup from my background.” Amer feels he has an obligation to future generations. “I want to introduce people, through this art form, that we’re something other than terrorists or the evil Muslims that are often portrayed in the media.”
“It’s surprising America hasn’t learned from its previous mistakes and continues to experience the same crap it did with Japanese Americans in World War II or black people in the Civil Rights movement, and way before that,” he says. “I think it’s really important to be able to introduce our community to people so they can see who we really are, and I think standup is great for that purpose. I love being a standup for that reason. I get to talk about things from my perspective and my own experiences and people can walk away with a new perspective. But it’s not a specific agenda. My goal is to be hilarious.”
Source: www.citypages.com
With all the anti-Arab bashing we see in the news every week, Arab America is determined to expose those who discriminate against our community. We will recognize those who vilify the positive influence and contributions Arabs have made to the fabric of American society. And we will use hummus as our weapon. By naming those … Continued
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