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Opinion : SAUDI IS A HOLY LAND – WHAT'S MY OWN WITH QATAR?

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SAUDI IS A HOLY LAND – WHAT’S MY OWN WITH QATAR?

I have been questioned privately by friends, colleagues and associates about my concern on the imbroglio between the state of Qatar and the kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Someone even claimed that my sympathy for the state of Qatar is informed by my loyalty to the Muslim Brotherhood movement. Well, in a situation like this, assumptions and accusations cannot take the place of facts and axioms.

I am not a member of the Brotherhood movement and I have no any interaction with the Nigerian groups that claim allegiance to the movement, beyond the mere fraternity that exists amongst brothers of the same faith. All the teachers of Islamic creed in Nigeria are my brothers. I respect them. I admire them, and I have always interacted with all of them, including those in the Salafi class and the haraki trend!

I have greatly benefited from the work of Shaykh Yuusuf Alqaradawiy, particularly his research on different areas of Fiqh Waaqi’ and the contemporary Islamic thoughts. But there is hardly a contemporary scholar whose love has completely overwhelmed my heart like the distinguished scholar, Shaykh Muhammad Saalih Al-Uthaymin. You can check it out by comparing his works with those of his contemporaries in the same school, you’ll find a conspicuously unique scholar in all areas of Islamic thoughts!

However, my love for these scholars shouldn’t deprive me of my own personality as Abdur Rauf Saheed, a Nigerian Muslim researcher in global politics; a dawah activist, whose interest cut across all areas of Muslims’ concern; a business man, whose occasional sojourn traverses the Middle-East and its environ, particularly the gulf. No! My respect for the holy sanctuaries, Bn Baaz, Al-Uthaymin and even Al-Qaradhawi shouldn’t becloud my mental space. I am “me” and they are “themselves”, they’ll not render my own account in the day of judgement. May Allah be pleased with them all.

I really sympathize with all my brothers whose role models are the Saudi’s scholars. I can feel their pain, they are indeed embarrassed by this Saudi’s shameless dance in the market place, more so that the Mufti Shaykh Ibrahim AlShaykh had to legitimize the shameful act with a spurious verdict. It’s a pathetic situation which no any reasonable person, with a sense of modesty, can ever defend. So, my brothers have no any option in this regard than to resort to calling the crisis a fitan that requires our collective silence.

Even lately, a brother I love so much had said the crisis (which has already divided the Ummah) does not concern us. Then, what’s our concern with the world around us if this doesn’t concern us? Was it the Americans’ election of Trump which attracted our attention last year that really concern us? I can feel your pain, brother. Who would ever pray to be put to shame by his blind allegiance to a kingdom that is foolishly subservient to the enemies?

Those who are well conversant with the contemporary history of Islam will boldly testify to how the kingdom has been consistently manipulated by the West. From the era of the fall of caliphacy till date, it has always been a story of back-stabbing, betrayals and deceits in the peninsula. The West knows how foolish we are, they only fear the progressive Muslim thinkers amongst us – Those who think beyond the rudiments of the five daily obligatory prayers, those who seek Islamisation of the polity are not cordoned by the West.

I am not therefore surprised if the Brotherhood movement is the ultimate target of the whole crisis. At what stage did a movement that partakes in democratic processes become a terrorist group? Can a movement with a large parliamentarian representation in Jordan and Bahrain be called a terrorist group? Is it possible that members of a terrorist group would fold their arms and watch themselves killed; their wealth and property confiscated and their wives and children thrown into deadly dungeons as it happened in Egypt? Allah will definitely judge this Saudi’s claim!

And about the Shaykh, I still marvel at the Muslim world’s thought system. What could have ever made a distinguished scholar whose major “fault”, as always analysed by the Saudi clergy, is his liberal approache to jurispudential issues, a terrorist? You call Qaradhawi a liberal scholar who trivializes serious jurispudential facts, and yet you call him a radical. Nothing radicalises as much as the Saudi’s teachings of pristine Islam. Give someone the right Tawheed, and watch him stand against anything but Allah. What a commendable radical phenomenon!

Qaradhawi has been teaching Islam in Qatar for more than three decades, and no one (single) Qatari has ever partaken in any major terrorist act. From the 9/11 disaster, to Al-Qaeda networks and the ISIS camps in the Levant, thousands of Saudis are involved. On several occasions, I have been told by the exuberant Saudi youths, who drive their parents’ luxury cars as taxicab during vacations, of how much they love Bn Laden and how much of hatred they bear against the state. I always wonder if those boys were not taught in school to be absolutely loyal, even in distress!

By Allah, in whose hand is my soul, the United States’ administration, as well as the CIA is not unaware of this little fact, including the difference between the Saudi’s anti Bidi’ah, Tawheedi orientation and Qaradhawi’s fiqh waaqi’. They know which one has the potential of radicalising the Muslim minds and which one is dangerous to their own global political hegemony. The CIA has the records of the Qatari’s annual budget on both social and scientific research and it is equally aware of how subservient is the Saudi kingdom to the American authority. It is just a matter of finishing with one before annihilating the other!

Definitely, Trump has his own mission. During his campaign, we all heard him saying that Saudi Arabia hated America so much and was behind 9/11. We’ve however just heard a new pop music from the white supremacist who now sees the kingdom as the bedrock of regional security and moderation, America’s best friend and foremost ally in the “war on terror”. In a similar approach, less than two weeks after calling Qatar a “crucial strategic partner” in his Riyadh speech, and boasting of selling it some “beautiful” American weapons, he suddenly began to jeer against it, accusing Doha of supporting terrorism.

But, is Qatar truly a terrorist state? Some guys are bittered for whatever reason and they wouldn’t mind bringing the entire human race to an involuntary halt, if nobody is prepared to give a listening ear. They’ve tried it on several occasions. They collapsed skyscrapers, killed people in millions in different operations. Whether they are wrong or right, the world must feel secure. It all seems crazy, but they are not mad. They have families like you and I – wives, children, parents, cousins, uncles and aunties. Thus, they would probably listen if someone reasonable is also willing to give them a listening ear, and Qatar did. Does that make it a terrorist state?

In the words of the analyst, Marwaan Bisharah, “Qatar has $30bn worth of investments in the United States and stands out as the host of the largest American military base in the Middle East, from which much of the “war on terror” is being fought in Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan. Thus, most of the trumped up charges against Qatar are either demonstrably thin, false or totally irrational. For example, the Saudi monarchy accuses Qatar of supporting the Taliban because it opened an office for the Afghan insurgency, when in fact it did so at the behest of the US administration to facilitate peace talks”.

Would you call the United States a terrorist nation for hosting the same Taliban leaders in Washington immediately they flushed out the northern alliance from Kabul? It sounds so ridiculous when I heard that Qatar is also accused of backing the anti-regime militants in Syria, and I wonder if Saudi Arabia was not the major financier of An-Nusra, a significant part of which had later collapsed into ISIS. General Joseph Vogel, chief of the US military’s Central Command, had once written that Qatar is indeed a “key and critical” ally that could be of much help in facilitating a sustainable deal in Syria”.

I have not found any of these allegations as stupid as the one that bothers on Qatar’s diplomatic ties with Iran. This allegation is so nauseating that it provokes my vomit, as it clearly stupifies most of us who claim to be Sunnis in creed, but with strong acrimony against the Iranian Shites. We know of Fiqh, a’qeedah and ma’malaat, but how much of siyaasat Al A’lamiyah do we know? And then easily, we fall for any political deception orchestrated by the Saudi monarchy.

I must clearly affirm from the onset that I hate that sick ideology called Shiism. I am not comfortable with those who curse and ridicule my symbols of faith and piety, my heroes and models – the companions of the holy Prophet Muhammad. I fought to the last, with all my strength, a certain Shiite Imam in my neighbourhood in Lagos, not because I hated him, but simply because he was a Shiite. He was indeed a man I respected, and he reciprocated in kind, until his creed became my object of attack!

However, the Saudi’s politics with Iran is not about this ideology, but rather, it is a regional politics of the power play, involving the US. In the region, Saudi Arabia is never secure with the Iranian military might. But if Iran could just play the diplomacy of humility in its relationship with the Saudi kingdom, the game will change. We had a similar example in the days of Khatami, the liberal president of Iran who came on board with a campaign for dialogue among civilization. On this basis, he was able to reach out to the United States, hitherto called the Great Satan by Khomeini; the Vatican, the European Union and the Sunni enclave, Saudi Arabia,

It was of course not by any means astounding to some international politics analysts that president Khatami could easily win the diplomatic loyalties of these avowed enemies of his country, with his liberalisation policy, but it indeed baffled every watcher of Saudi’s foreign policy that the house of Saud could easily be swayed into befriending the enemies of the companions. Nevertheless, the whole scenario was, to me, very interesting, because I know the Saudis too well.

It is interesting to know that, the United States, amongst the historic aftermaths of this iranian policy, gladly welcomed president Khatami on a state visit to Washington and the Saudi kingdom also enjoyed the diplomatic ties with Tehran, with an astronomical boost in trade and social interactions. They knew that Khatami was a Shiite, an ayotollahi professor of philosophy, and that his subjects, the unrepentant Iranians, were still predominantly the Shiites who cursed the companions; but the monarchy shifted its gaze away and no scholar could dare the state power.

However, something occurred in the era of this unusual diplomatic romance which many observers, especially Muslims, had thought would shatter Iran’s diplomatic relations with Saudi Arabia. Of course, I was in Umrah and i did withness it. It was during a ziyaarah procession at the prophet’s grave inside the holy sanctuary in Medina, a notorious Shite cleric from Iran after saying his salaam to the holy Prophet, walked towards Abubakri and Umar’s graves and then spat heavily on them in disgust. The organized queue of the belivers was enraged and the cursed iranian cleric was almost lynched, but for his immediate rescue by the Saudi police.

The day after was a Friday which the Saudis and other visitors to the Prophet’s mosque would not forget in a hurry, as the famous Imam Hudhaifi climbed the pulpit to deliver a powerful, historic Friday sermon, tongue-lashing the kingdom’s leadership for its newly found satanic friendship with the Shites who came visiting, desecrating the two leading companions’ graves. The khutbah was so severe, and immediately after he said his tasleem, which heralded the two rakat prayer to an end, he was whisked away by the state security agency for interrogation. Yet, this infuriating event didn’t frustrate the ties!

Therefore, if Qatar is pressured by Saudi Arabia to disengage with Iran, it’s not about the creed of Shiism. In fact, the Saudi monarchy doesn’t love Islam as much as its ultra conservative scholars do. It’s all about the kingdom’s interest and a foreign policy engendered by regional politics. Of course, in the region, Iran is right now winning, with a strategic military support from Russia, as it now diplomatically superintends over both Iraq and Syria, the two Shia dominated countries that ordinarily cut the interest of both the United States and Saudi Arabia.

Unfortunately, in spite of the kingdom’s abundance of wealth and its goodwill of Muslim solidarity, the virtual lack of experience in international diplomacy on the part of its new crown Prince, Muhammad Bn Salman, under whose ego lies the entire crisis, the kingdom has become a losing giant in the region as much as it is frustrated!

Thus, going through the newly released list of those thirteen demands sent to Qatar, as well as the ten day ultimatum attached, it doesn’t take much technicalities in the knowledge of diplomacy and global poolitics to conclude that the kingdom is far removed from matching its counterparts in the game of power-play. Its demands are smacks of total hypocrisy, sans a touch of diplomacy!

Abu Mazeedatil khayr Bn Sa’eed

 

 

This is an opinion of the author and does not reflect knowislam.com.ng policy.

Just In : Facebook hits 2 Billion users

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active users have hit the two billion mark -or more than a quarter of the world’s population.

“As of this morning, the Facebook community is now officially 2 billion people!” co-founder and chief executive Mark Zuckerberg wrote in a post on his Facebook page marking the milestone.

“We’re making progress connecting the world, and now let’s bring the world closer together,” he wrote. “It’s an honor to be on this journey with you.”

Naomi Gleit, a vice president at the internet giant, credited millions of small communities at Facebook for helping drive growth.

 

More than a billion people take part in “groups” at Facebook each month and more than 800 million people “like” something at the social network on an average day, she added.

Founded in 2004, Facebook hit the billion-user mark five years ago.

Meanwhile, the social network announced that it deleted about 66,000 posts a week in the last two months in an effort to crack down on what it deems to be hate speech.

The company said in a blog post that deleting posts can “feel like censorship”, but that it is working on explaining its process better and improving its enforcement of hate speech.

Facebook defines hate speech as attacks on people based on their race, sexual orientation and other “protected characteristics”.

As part of that effort, Facebook says it plans to hire an additional 3,000 people in the next year to review posts. That is on top of the 4,500 people it currently has reviewing posts.

Social network rivals

As it has grown, Facebook has also consistently updated features to fend off challengers such as Snapchat and adapt to trends such as the migration of news and streaming video online.

In the latest move to deepen its reach, Facebook revealed it is starting production on high-quality television series and gaming shows to be broadcast on its platform.

 

Working with a small group of partners, Facebook aims to start putting out episodes of its forthcoming series by the end of the summer, Nick Grudin, the vice president for media partnerships, told the AFP news agency.

Facebook’s initiative follows similar moves by Netflix, Amazon and the online television platform Hulu, which have thrown themselves into content production, as have YouTube and Apple.

Facebook is also partnering with other technology and social media giants like Microsoft, Twitter and YouTube to launch an anti-terror partnership aimed at thwarting the spread of “extremist” content online.

The “Global Internet Forum to Counter Terrorism” intends to share engineering, research and knowledge to help “continue to make our hosted consumer services hostile to terrorists and violent extremists,” the companies said.

“We believe that by working together, sharing the best technological and operational elements of our individual efforts, we can have a greater impact on the threat of terrorist content online,” said a joint statement.

Source: News agencies

Cybersecurity : Disruptions caused by hackers in several European countries

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Banks, companies, government offices in Ukraine, Denmark and Russia, among others targeted by cyberattacks.

 

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There is very little information yet about who might be behind the disruption [Reuters]

A massive new international cyberattack via a ransomware virus dubbed Petya has paralysed businesses across Europe and is spreading elsewhere.

Several major corporations on Tuesday said they had been targeted in the cyberattack which started in Ukraine and Russia before hitting other European countries.

Danish shipping giant Maersk, Russia’s Rosneft oil firm, British advertising agency WPP and the French industrial group Saint-Gobain all said they came under attack and put protection protocols in place to avoid data loss.

One of the countries particularly hit was Ukraine, where serious intrusions at the power grid, banks and government offices were experienced. Boryspil Airport in the capital, Kiev, was also affected.

TARGETS HIT IN CYBERATTACK:

UKRAINE: A number of Ukrainian banks and companies, including the state power distributor, were hit by a cyber attack that disrupted some operations, the Ukrainian central bank said. Kiev’s Boryspil Airport was also hit.

ROSNEFT: Russia’s top oil producer said its servers had been hit been a large-scale cyberattack but its oil production was unaffected.

A.P. MOLLER-MAERSK: The Danish shipping giant A.P. said a cyberattack had caused outages at its computer systems across the world. Maersk’s port operator APM Terminals was also hit.

WPP: The world’s biggest advertising company said computer systems within several of its agencies had been hit by a suspected cyberattack.

MERCK & Co: The pharmaceutical company Merck & Co. said on Twitter its computer network was compromised as part of a global hack.

RUSSIAN BANKS: Russia’s central bank said there had been “computer attacks” on Russian banks and that in isolated cases their IT systems had been infected.

SAINT GOBAIN: The French construction materials company Saint Gobain said it had been a victim of a cyberattack.

DEUTSCHE POST: The German postal and logistics company said systems of its Express division in the Ukraine have in part been affected by a cyberattack.

METRO: The German retailer said its wholesale stores in the Ukraine had been hit by a cyberattack.

EVRAZ: The Russian steelmaker said its information systems had been hit by a cyberattack but its output was not affected.

NORWAY: A ransomware cyberattack is affecting an unnamed international company, the country’s national security authority said.

 

Artem Shevchenko, head of the communications department at the Ukrainian ministry of internal affairs, told Al Jazeera that authorities had launched a criminal investigation after the “unprecedented cyberattack”.

“Ukraine has never faced [such a cyberattack] before,” he said from Kiev, adding that “all state authorities are involved in the fighting” of the virus.

“The cyber police has received more than 200 reports about interferences in computers with damaging software. Under attack are the state and corporate sector: post offices, banks, transport infrastructure, the main office of the railway station, and other facilities.”

Pavlo Rozenko, the country’s deputy prime minister, posted a picture of a darkened computer screen to Twitter, saying that the computer system at the government’s headquarters has been shut down.

The National Bank of Ukraine said in a statement it had warned banks “about an external hacker attack on the websites of some Ukrainian banks”.

Banks were experiencing “difficulty in servicing customers and performing banking operations” due to the attacks, it added.

A cyberattack was also reported by the Kyivenergopower company in the capital. “We were forced to turn off all of our computers,” a company representative told Interfax Ukraine agency.

Ransomware suspected

Researchers with multiple technology companies identified the ransomware as Petya, malware that makes computers inoperable by encrypting their hard drives and demands ransoms in exchange for a digital key to restore access.

The cyberattack comes as the world is still recovering from a previous outbreak of ransomware, called WannaCry or WannaCrypt, which spread rapidly since mid-May using digital break-in tools originally created by the US National Security Agency and recently leaked to the web.

The spread of the WannaCry ransomware which locked up hundreds of thousands computers in more than 150 countries has slowed in June, but security experts have warned that new versions of the worm may strike.

Commenting on Tuesday’s cyberattack, Gavin Millard, a cyber security analyst, told Al Jazeera from London: “It looks like a derivitive of a quite well-known ransomware called Petya, but the code has been modified to act somewhat like WannaCry.”

He added: “Looking through some of the forensic data, it is actually leveraging the same vulnerability as WannaCry to spread the violence. With virus infections of this nature, it is quite often not a targeted attack. It is mostly a parient zero that spreads it to whoever they connect to.”

WannaCry: A new era of cyber security – Counting the Cost

Major impact

In Denmark, Maersk said a cyberattack had caused outages at its computer systems across the world.

“We are talking about a cyberattack,” said Anders Rosendahl, a spokesman for the Copenhagen-based shipping giant. “It has affected all branches of our business, at home and abroad.”

Rosneft, Russia’s leading oil producer, also said on Twitter that a powerful hacking attack has been carried out against the company’s servers.

Cyber crime and security: A Russian perspective – Counting the Cost (feature)

It said the attack “could have had serious consequences” but said that thanks to a back-up system “the production and extraction of oil were not stopped.”

Russian steelmaker Evraz said it was also affected by cyber attacks, adding that production was not affected.

Britain’s WPP, the world’s biggest advertising agency, said on Tuesday that it had been hit by a cyberattack, one of many major companies to face major disruption.

A spokesman confirmed it had been affected without giving any further details. The company’s website was not available.

US pharmaceutical giant Merck said it had been hit, posting on Twitter that its “computer network was compromised today as part of global hack. Other organisations have also been affected”.

In Germany, the country’s federal cyber agency said German companies were also affected and urging firms to report any issues to authorities.

The BSI agency did not name the companies affected, although German postal and logistics company Deutsche Post earlier said its systems in Ukraine had been affected.

The cyberattack had also affected an unnamed “international company” in Norway, the country’s national security authority said.

“We see there is a ransomware attack that is actually ongoing. Only one international company has been affected in Norway,” said a spokeswoman for the authority, who declined to name the company.

Who is to blame for the massive ransomware attack?

Source: Al Jazeera and news agencies

Deadly blast targets police near Kenya-Somalia border

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Not less than eight people, including four children have being killed in suspected al-Shabab bombing in Lamu county.

The incident happened on Tuesday outside of Kiunga town.

 

At least four children and four policemen have been killed in a roadside explosion in southeastern Kenya, near the border with Somalia, according to police.
Noah Mwivanda, a senior police officer in Lamu County, said Tuesday’s blast happened between Mararani and Kiunga towns.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility.
The deadly incident bore the hallmarks of similar bombings blamed on Somalia’s al-Shabab armed group, which has previously targeted security forces in the region.
It increases the death toll from homemade explosives in the last three months to 46, with policemen as the majority of fatalities.
Al-Shabab has carried out more than 100 attacks on Kenya since 2011.
It says the attacks are retribution for Kenya sending troops to Somalia to fight them.
Kenya’s President Uhuru Kenyatta, who is campaigning for re-election in August, did not immediately comment on the latest explosion.
On Monday, Kenyatta said if re-elected he would “strengthen the Anti-Terrorism Police Unit by acquiring more specialised vehicles to counter and deter the security threats emerging from terrorist groups”.
Kenya has managed to stop the frequency of al-Shabab attacks in its capital, Nairobi, and major towns, but human rights groups say the government uses methods such as extrajudicial killings that can fuel revenge attacks.

 

Source: Al-Jazeera News

The massacre of Muslims in Northern Nigeria

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Yelwa Massacre
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The Yelwa massacre took place on May 2, 2004, in Yelwa, Nigeria. According to reports more than 630 Muslims were killed by SOME Christians youths. The youths surrounded Yelwa and many were bare- chested; others wore shirts on which they had reportedly pinned white name tags identifying them as members of the Christian Association of Nigeria. Each tag had a number instead of a name: a code, it seemed, for identification. They attacked the town.
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According to Human Rights Watch, 660 Muslims were massacred over the course of the next two days, including patients in the Al-Amin clinic. Twelve Mosques and 300 houses went up in flames. Young girls were marched to a nearby Christian town and forced to eat pork and drink alcohol. Many were raped, and 50 were killed.
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It is true that Fulani herdsmen do not have monopoly of violence in the country. Long before the killer herdsmen there were SOME marauding Christian Youths of Northern Nigeria.
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The point of this post is that violence in the north is not and has never been one sided. As a matter of fact Muslim casualties are usually much higher and underreported. So one group should stop feeling like the sole victims of violence. We are all victims.

 

Igho Hakeem Ohwojeheri

'US-led strike' in Syria's al-Mayadeen kills dozens

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 suspected US-led raid killed dozens of people, mostly civilian inmates, at an ISIL-run jail in Deir Az Zorn says monitor

 

The US is supporting an alliance of Kurdish and Arab fighters in their assault on ISIL in Syria [File: AFP]
The US is supporting an alliance of Kurdish and Arab fighters in their assault on ISIL in Syria [File: AFP]

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Not less than 57 had died from a suspected US-led coalition rain on an ISIL-run prison in Eastern Syria.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said on Tuesday that most of the fatalities in the town of al-Mayadeen in Deir Az Zor province were civilian inmates.

At least 15 ISIL fighters were also killed in the raid, the UK-based monitor, which tracks developments in Syria’s long-running conflict via a network of contacts on the ground, said.

Al-Ikhbariya, a Syrian state-run TV station, also cited its Deir Az Zor correspondent as saying coalition fighter jets had destroyed a building in al-Mayadeen used as a prison by ISIL to hold a “large number of civilians”

An activist-run media outlet in Deir Az Zor also reported the hit, which it said took place at dawn on Monday.

The US Central Command confirmed to the Associated Press news agency on Tuesday that it struck ISIL facilities in al-Mayadeen on June 25 and 26, but made no direct reference to the alleged ISIL prison.

CENTCOM said it will assess the allegations that civilian prisoners were killed, and it would publish the results of its assessment in its monthly civilian casualty report.

It said the Mayadeen mission was “meticulously planned and executed to reduce the risk … to non-combatants”

 

The  US-led coalition is supporting an alliance of Kurdish and Arab fighters in their assault on ISIL in its de -acto capital of Raqqa in northern Syria.

“The removal of these facilities disrupts ISIS’s ability to facilitate and provoke terrorist attacks against the coalition, our partner forces and in our homelands,” Colonel Joe Scrocca, coalition director of public affairs, said in an email to Reuters news agency.

ISIL is believed to have moved most of its leadership to Mayadeen, southeast of Raqqa, according to US intelligence officials.

Among operations reportedly moved to Mayadeen, about 80km west of the Iraqi border, are its online propaganda operation and its limited command and control of attacks in Europe and elsewhere, they said.

Source: Al Jazeera and news agencies

Why Quran calls woman a tilth for man?

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“Your wives are as a tilth unto you; so approach your tilth when or how ye will; but do some good act for your souls beforehand; and fear Allah. And know that ye are to meet Him (in the Hereafter), and give (these) good tidings to those who believe.” (Al-Quran 2:223)

 

Yes, woman is called the tilth for man, but it is not that a parallel is being drawn between her and tilth. Actually it is a simile, that it is man whose seed a woman carries in her womb. It is in this context that this simile is given for understanding. For those who really understand the Quran, this verse asks for better attitude towards women. you see, a farmer looks after his tilth, waters it, protects it against all climate conditions. In the same way man is supposed to take every care of woman, for he has been given more physical strength and has been made her protector and manager of her affairs.

And Allah knows best!

Funsho Animashaun @ knowislam.ng.com

Israel bombs Gaza after rocket fire

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No casualties after Israel targets at least three areas in the Hamas-run territory, according to Palestinian officials.

Israel said it will hold Hamas to any rocket fire launched from the Gaza Strip [Reuters]

The Israeli army has bombed targets in the Gaza Strip overnight after a rocket was fired from the blockaded Palestinian territory.

Israeli attacks were recorded in at least three locations in Hamas-governed Gaza, Palestinian security sources and witnesses said, with Hamas bases struck near the southern city of Rafah and Gaza City, as well as an empty area in the centre of Gaza.

The interior ministry in Gaza said in a statement the attack from Israel caused damage but it did not provide specifics.

Ashraf al-Qidra, Palestinian health ministry spokesman, said no casualities were recorded as a result of the attacks.

Ovijaa Odraei, Israeli army spokesperson, said the strikes were in “response to projectile fire” launched from Gaza.

The rocket was claimed by a previously unheard-of Salafist group, but Odraei said on Facebook that Hamas was responsible for any attack on Israel because Gaza was under Hamas rule.

In a statement, Fawzi Barhoum, Hamas spokesman, accused Israel of fabricating false claims of rocket fire in order to justify strikes in Gaza.

He said Israel is playing what he called “a dangerous and transparent game”.

Hamas leaders earlier this month said they were not interested in escalating tensions, even as electricity cutsrequested by Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, and facilitated by Israel, threatened to lead to new violence.

This was echoed by Avidgor Lieberman, Israel’s defence minister, on Monday, who said Israel has “no intention of launching a military operation” against Gaza.

Source: Al Jazeera and news agencies

Feuding Fatwas Creating Problems For Russia's Muslims

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Feuding Fatwas Creating Problems For Russia’s Muslims And Russian State – OpEd

In many federal subjects of the Russian Federation, there are now multiple Muslim Spiritual Directorates each headed by a more or less independent mufti who has the authority to issue fatwas , the Arabic term for “legal opinions,” that are intended to guide the lives of Muslims.

But as Islam has become more important in the lives of the Muslims of Russia, that has created a problem for them as well as one for the Russian state. Muslims have the option to choose among the fatwas on offer, many of which contradict each other, and the Russian state is faced with uncertainty about just what advice even Russian-based muftis are giving.

That is not a new problem or exclusively a Russian one. Within Islam, believers are remarkably free to choose which fatwas they consider authoritative; and in Russia, there have long been complaints about the absence of any one single Muslim “patriarch” or “pope” who alone can speak with legal authority.

However, this problem has been compounded in Russia by three factors: the remarkable and largely uncontrolled growth in the number of MSDs which has meant that in most federal subjects there is more than one, the impact of foreign missionaries and scholars on the Muslims of Russia, and the low – thanks to Soviet oppression – level of religious knowledge among them.

In a comment for Radio Liberty, journalist Lyubov Merenkova describes the problem this way: Within Islam, “there is no clear structure in which one body is subordinate to another and fulfills the directives of the one above it. No one has the right to issue
fatwas which operate on the entire territory of the country. And while there is a supreme mufti, he is no more ‘supreme’ than the leaders of other major Muslim organizations of Russia” (kavkazr.com/a/podelili-musulman/28557132.html ).
Further complicating this situation, she continues, is the fact that it is enshrined in state law which allows believers to form a primary organization and then any three of these have the right to form a superordinate one on their own.

At present, according to the MSD of the Russian Federation which is within the Council of Muftis of Russia (SMR), there are 136 superordinate Muslim organizations or MSDs of various titles (dumrf.ru/common/org ). But that list is clearly incomplete. It doesn’t include, for example, the Spiritual Assembly of Muslims of Russia which was set up in November 2016.

Four institutions, what some call the super-MSDs because they include other MSDs as members, are recognised as especially authoritative: the SMR, the Central MSD, the Coordination Center for Muslims of the North Caucasus and the Spiritual Assembly of Muslims of Russia – although one commentator says there are now really seven that deserve that ranking (ng.ru/ng_religii/2017-06-21/13_422_raiting.html ).

“From a legal point of view,” Merenkova continues, “all these structures are parallel and their leaders have equal rights.” But in reality, they don’t even control the actions of their subordinate MSDs and muftis in many cases. (The head of the Central MSD calls himself and is called by others “the supreme mufti” only because his body is the heir to the original MSD created in tsarist times.)

That is creating legal chaos within the Muslim community. In some small places, there may be several MSDs represented and their muftis may have issued fatwas which contradict one another. In one village, the journalist there, there often are “three organizations” and so Muslims are free to choose which
fatwa they will be guided by.

And there is no clear way out, Marenkova says. Not only are Muslim parishes free to exit existing MSDs and create new ones, but existing MSDs are free to ignore the super-MSDs of which they are a part or even shift from one of these to another at their complete discretion. There is little those above can do to stop that.

source:Newsnow
Nafysah @.Knowislam.com.ng.

Johan Gustafsson: Swede held by al-Qaeda in Mali freed

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Johan Gustafsson was abducted in Timbuktu, northern Mali, in November 2011 along with a South African and a Dutch.

A picture of freed hostage Johan Gustafsson and his family at Arlanda airport after his arrival in Sweden [Marcus Ericsson via Reuters]

A Swede who had been held hostage by al-Qaeda in Mali since 2011 has been freed, the Swedish government has announced.

Johan Gustafsson returned home and was reunited with his family, Foreign Minister Margot Wallstrom told reporters late on Monday as she showed a picture of the ex-captive surrounded by his relatives.

“I welcomed him home, and I can say that he is in good health and is holding up well, given the circumstances,” she said.

Wallstrom refused to provide details about how Sweden secured Gustafsson’s release, saying only that it occurred “a couple of days ago” and was the result of “several years of efforts” by police, politicians and diplomats, as well as Swedish and international authorities.

She also did not comment on whether a ransom was paid. She said only that “Sweden’s policy is to not pay ransoms in the event of kidnappings”.

‘Malian officials helped’

A Malian security source meanwhile told the AFP news agency that officials in the West African country had “helped secure the release of the Swedish hostage. He was released in the Mali desert”.

Gustafsson, 42, was abducted in Timbuktu, northern Mali, in November 2011 along with South African national Stephen McGown and Dutchman Sjaak Rijke.

There was no immediate word on the fate of McGown. Rijke had been freed in 2015 by French special forces.

Gustafsson was on a motorcycle trip from Sweden to South Africa when he was kidnapped.

He, Rijke and McGown were seized along with several others by a group of armed men while on the terrace of their hotel.

Rijke’s wife managed to escape, but a German who tried to resist the abduction was killed.

Al-Qaeda’s North African affiliate, al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), claimed responsibility for the kidnappings.

It was one of several groups that took control of Mali’s north in 2012 before being overthrown by a French-led military operation launched in January 2013.

Source: News agencies

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