As Senator Barack Obama courted voters in Iowa last December, Representative Keith Ellison, the country's first Muslim congressman, stepped forward eagerly to help.

Ellison believed that Obama's message of unity resonated deeply with American Muslims.

He volunteered to speak on Obama's behalf at a mosque in Cedar Rapids, one of the nation's oldest Muslim enclaves.

But before the rally could take place, aides to Obama asked Ellison to cancel the trip because it might stir controversy.

Another aide appeared at Ellison's Washington office to explain.

"I will never forget the quote," Ellison said, leaning forward in his chair as he recalled the aide's words.

"He said, 'We have a very tightly wrapped message.'

When Obama began his presidential campaign, Muslim Americans from California to Virginia responded with enthusiasm, seeing him as a long -awaited champion of civil liberties, religious tolerance and diplomacy in foreign affairs. But more than a year later, many say, he has not returned their embrace.

While the senator has visited churches and synagogues, he has yet to appear at a single mosque.

Muslim and Arab-American organizations have tried repeatedly to arrange meetings with Obama, but officials with those groups say their invitations - unlike those of their Jewish and Christian counterparts - have been ignored.

Last week, two Muslim women wearing head scarves were barred by campaign volunteers from appearing behind Obama at a rally in Detroit.

In interviews, Muslim political and civic leaders said they understood that their support for Obama could be a problem for him at a time when some Americans are deeply suspicious of Muslims.

Yet those leaders nonetheless expressed disappointment and even anger at the distance that Obama has kept from them.

"This is the 'hope campaign,' this is the 'change campaign'," said Ellison, Democrat of Minnesota.

'Ball of fire' if Iran attacked: IAEA chief

The Occupying Dirty Regime (Isreal) with the help of its master (US of A) and supporters (Frace, Britain, Germany etc) has an ADVANCED Nuclear Weapons Program that is CLOSE to IAEA Inspection! Its the Only Country in the Middle East to have WMDs- A state with 200 Nuclear Warheads!

While it talks of Iran developing atomic bomb, this hypocratic regime along with other hypocrites sits on STOCKPILES that can destroy our world Thousands of TIME! We only have one world and we need to destroy it only Once!

Why is it that it sits on 200 Nuclear Warheads, while our Big Brother along with other Security Council Members  sits on THOUSANDS of Nuclear, Chemical & Biological Warheads, ARE still developing more advanced and tactical weapons and simulating Atomic Blasts on super Computers to prepare more deadly weapons!

While 110 countries signed the recent non-use of Cluster Bombs, treaty, Our Big Brother (US of A) and its evil younger sibling Isreal  DIDNOT!!!

Mohamed ElBaradei expressed his concern over his inability to continue in his role as director general of IAEA if the Islamic republic of Iran was attacked.

A report by the New York Times on Friday cited US officials as saying that a major military exercise carried out by Israel earlier this month seemed to be a practice for any potential strike against Iran's nuclear facilities.

Tehran had made it very clear that it only wants nuclear technology for peaceful energy purposes- Look into the Fatawa Issued by the Grand Ayotollah Ali Hosayni Khamieni for more on Irans position on developing WMDs! (Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has issued a fatwa saying the production, stockpiling and use of nuclear weapons was forbidden under Islam. The fatwa was cited in an official statement by the Iranian government at an August 2005 meeting of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in Vienna.)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ali_Khamenei

However if attacked or provoked the iranian government might be forced into channeling its resources into developing a Bomb!

Iran had previously stopped its program completely for 2-3 years during which the Guradians of the World (Security council + Germany) dragged their feet on negotiations with Iran!

Iran in recent times had made it amply clear that it will not negotiate with world powers over its nuclear programme if it is required to suspend its enrichment activities- Iran is a signatory to NPT and its activities are open to IAEA Inspection while Isreal is NOT a signatory to NPT and its Atomic Sites are barred from IAEA Inspection!

While it is repeatedly pointed out in the western media that the Iranian President has issued a threat against Isreal it is never brought into focus the threats that Isreali politicians, French & American Politicians have issued against Iran from Time to Time!

Former president J.Schirac said that Iran will be razed to ground even before it attacked Isreal!!!

Clinton makes threat against Iran as voters go to polls: threatened to obliterate Iran if it launched a nuclear strike against Israel. "I want the Iranians to know that if I'm the president, we will attack Iran (if it attacks Israel)."- All the while Iran has said unless attacked, it will not attack Isreal!

More US, Israeli threats against Iran

“Israel will not tolerate the possibility of a nuclear Iran, and neither should any country in the free world.” Bush had never shied away from the talk of a Military Action aganist Iran either!

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2008/jun2008/iran-j05.shtml

Israeli Deputy Prime Minister : the War Monger, Shaul Mofaz recently warned that Iran would face attack if it pursues according to him is, its nuclear weapons programme.

Leading Indian writer Amitav Ghosh's critically acclaimed new novel Sea of Poppies is set during a time when opium trade out of India was flourishing during British rule.

The novel spans three continents and close to two centuries and is the first in a planned historical trilogy set in the 19th century.

Ghosh, a trained anthropologist and historian with a doctorate from Oxford University, spoke to the BBC's Soutik Biswas on the colonial opium trade.

Sea of Poppies is a historical novel. Is it the fact that the British were the world's biggest opium suppliers two centuries ago that led you into this story?

I should correct you. It was not two centuries ago. Under the British Raj, an enormous amount of opium was being exported out of India until the 1920s.

And no, the opium story was not really the trigger for the novel. What basically interested me when I started this book were the lives of the Indian indentured workers, especially those who left India from the Bihar region.

Before the British came, India was one of the world's great economies. For 200 years India dwindled and dwindled into almost nothing Send your comments on the interview

But once I started researching into it, it was kind of inescapable - all the roads led back to opium. The indentured emigration [out of India] really started in the 1830s and that was [around the time of] the peak of the opium traffic. That decade culminated in the opium wars against China.

Also all the indentured workers at that time came from all the opium growing regions in the Benares and Ghazipur areas. So there was such an overlap there was no escaping opium.

When and how did you end up researching and learning more about the British opium trade out of India?

I was looking into it as I began writing the book about five years ago. Like most Indians, I had very little idea about opium.

I had no idea that India was the largest opium exporter for centuries. I had no idea that opium was essentially the commodity which financed the British Raj in India.

'Opium accounted for a large part of India's economy' Photo courtesy: Wellcome Library

It is not a coincidence that 20 years after the opium trade stopped, the Raj more or less packed up its bags and left. India was not a paying proposition any longer.

What did you discover in the course of your research? How big was the trade?

Opium steadily accounted for about 17-20% of Indian revenues. If you think in those terms, [the fact that] one single commodity accounted for such an enormous part of your economy is unbelievable, extraordinary.

In fact the revenues don't account for entire profits generated [out of opium trade] -there was shipping, there were so many ancillary industries around opium.

How and when did opium exports out of India to China begin?

The idea of exporting opium to China started with Warren Hastings (the first governor general of British India) in 1780.

The situation was eerily similar to [what is happening] today. There was a huge balance of payments problem in relation to China. China was exporting enormous amounts, but wasn't interested in importing any European goods. That was when Hastings came up with idea that the only way of balancing trade was to export opium to China.

In the 1780s he sent the first shipment of opium to China. It was a small shipment and they could hardly get rid of it. There wasn't much demand. [But], within 10 years, demand for opium increased by factors of magnitude. It was incredible - within a period of 10-30 years how much the opium trade spread and increased.

Afghanistan is now the biggest opium producer in the world

In the period that Hastings started exporting opium in the 1780s until about 1809-1810, most of the opium in India was grown in the Bengal presidency (in eastern India).

After that the Malwa region in western India began growing opium. Finally twice as much opium was growing in western India and there was a huge export from that region. What do you think the major princely states lived off?

What kind of human devastation did opium growing wreak on the Indians?

I can't say I have an accurate picture. Whether it was devastation or not we don't know. There is so little we know [about this aspect].

Some reformers were trying to stop the opium trade and we know from their petitions and letters that there was fair amount of resistance. There seem to have been a lot of difficulties for peasants - they were switching to an agricultural monoculture, and that was causing problems.

With so much poppy being grown, didn't local people get addicted to it?

It happened. One of the curious things I was not aware of was that there are many different ways of consuming opium. One of the ways was to eat it in a bowl. This was somehow the commonest way of taking opium in India - either eating it or dissolving it in water.

Sea of Poppies is Ghosh's seventh novel

East of India and eastwards through China there was a different way of consuming it which was by smoking it. That was very much more addictive.

It was not traditionally the case that people smoked opium in India. Opium also was a part of social life - it was offered during certain ceremonies. So it was a very complex picture.

If there was any direct damage to India, it lay in the disruption of the agricultural timetable. But the damage that was done to China was incalculable.

Both Indian and British history appear to have glossed over this part of colonial rule.

Absolutely. Opium was the fundamental undergirding of our economy for centuries. It is strange that [even] for someone like me who studied history and knew a fair amount about Indian history, I was completely unaware of it.

Why do you think that happened?

I think the reason is some sort of whitewashing of the past.

On the Indian side, there is a sort of shame, I suppose. Also, just a general unawareness. I mean how many people are aware that the Ghazipur opium factory [in India] continues to be one of the single largest opium producers in the world? It is without a doubt the largest legitimate opium factory in the world.

Don't you find it ironic that the tables have turned in a sense with Afghanistan becoming the world's biggest opium producer with most of it sold in the affluent West?

It is strange. But it's an irony in which no one can take any comfort. Opium is a destructive thing for anyone, anywhere.

And it remains a potent driver of economies, at least in a place like Afghanistan..

And, before that in Burma.

Sea of Poppies appears to be a scathing critique of British colonialism. Do you think colonialism has had a pretty easy ride in India and there is not enough examination of the extent of how it affected the country adversely?

It's such an ironic thing. Before the British came, India was one of the world's great economies. For 200 years India dwindled and dwindled into almost nothing. Fifty years after they left we have finally begun to reclaim our place in the world.

All the empirical facts show you that British rule was a disaster for India. Before the British came 25% of the world trade originated in India. By the time they left it was less than 1%.

Lot of Indians believe that the British built institutions, the police, bureaucracy.

I don't know what people think about when they say such things.

When they talk about [the British building] modern institutions it amazes me.

Was there no police force in India before the British came? Of course there was. There were darogas (policemen), there were chowkis (police stations). In fact the British took the word chowki and put it into English. So to say such things is absurd.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7460682.stm

How Desperate Are These People!

Fake Furqan Authored by Anis Shorrosh: Christian Evangelist & Pathological Liar!

We have all heard about the "Fake Furqan" a "New Quran" (authobillah) right?

They take their priests and their anchorites to be their lords in derogation of Allah, and (they take as their Lord) Christ the son of Mary; yet they were commanded to worship but One Allah: there is no god but He. Praise and glory to Him: (Far is He) from having the partners they associate (with Him)- (Al-Quran 9:31)

Fain would they put out the light of Allah with their mouths, but Allah disdaineth (aught) save that He shall perfect His light, however much the disbelievers are averse- (Al-Quran 9:32)

Written by Abu Kathir    Sunday, 08 June 2008

http://www.islamnewsroom.com/content/view/499/61/

Last month, three Muslim men were arrested in Britain in connection with the London bombings of July 2005. In light of such situations, a number of non-Muslims and Muslims alike yearn for "moderate," peace-loving Muslims to speak out against the violent acts sometimes perpetrated in the name of Islam. And to avoid association with terrorism, some Muslims adopt a "moderate" label to describe themselves.

I am a Muslim who embraces peace. But, if we must attach stereotypical tags, I'd rather be considered "orthodox" than "moderate."

"Moderate" implies that Muslims who are more orthodox are somehow backward and violent. And in our current cultural climate, progress and peace are restricted to "moderate" Muslims. To be a "moderate" Muslim is to be a "good," malleable Muslim in the eyes of Western society.

I recently attended a debate about Western liberalism and Islam at the University of Cambridge where I'm pursuing my master's degree. I expected debaters on one side to present a bigoted laundry list of complaints against Islam and its alleged incompatibility with liberalism, and they did.

But what was more disturbing was that those on the other side, in theory supported the harmony of Islam and Western liberalism, but they based their argument on spurious terms. While these debaters - including a former top government official and a Nobel peace prize winner - were well-intentioned, they in fact wrought more harm than good. Through implied references to moderate Muslims, they offered a simplistic, paternalistic discourse that suggested Muslims would one day catch up with Western civilization.

In the aftermath of September 11, much has been said about the need for "moderate Muslims." But to be a "moderate" Muslim also implies that Osama bin Laden and Co. must represent the pinnacle of orthodoxy; that a criterion of orthodox Islam somehow inherently entails violence; and, consequently, that if I espouse peace, I am not adhering to my full religious duties.

I refuse to live as a "moderate" Muslim if its side effect is an unintentional admission that suicide bombing is a religious obligation for the orthodox faithful. True orthodoxy is simply the attempt to adhere piously to a religion's tenets.

The public relations drive for "moderate Islam" is injurious to the entire international community. It may provisionally ease the pain when so-called Islamic extremists strike. But it really creates deeper wounds that will require thicker bandages because it indirectly labels the entire religion of Islam as violent.

The term moderate Muslim is actually a redundancy. In the Islamic tradition, the concept of the "middle way" is central. Muslims believe that Islam is a path of intrinsic moderation, wasatiyya. This concept is the namesake of a British Muslim grass-roots organization, the Radical Middle Way. It is an initiative to counter Islam's violent reputation with factual scholarship.

This was demonstrated through a day-long conference that the organization sponsored in February. The best speaker of the night was Abdallah bin Bayyah, an elderly Mauritanian sheikh dressed all in traditional white Arab garb, offset by a long gray beard.

The words coming out of the sheikh's mouth - all in Arabic - were remarkably progressive. He confronted inaccurate assumptions about Islam, spoke of tolerance, and told fellow Muslims an unA-pleasant truth: "Perhaps much of this current crisis springs from us," he said, kindly admonishing them. He chastised Muslims for inadequately explaining their beliefs, thereby letting other, illiberal voices speak for them.

I was shocked by his blunt though nuanced analysis, given his traditional, religious appearance. And then I was troubled by my shock. To what extent had I, a hijabi Muslim woman studying Middle Eastern/Islamic studies, internalized the untruthful representations of my own fellow Muslims? For far too long, I had been fed a false snapshot of what Islamic orthodoxy really means.

The sheikh continued, challenging Mr. bin Laden's violent interpretation of jihad, citing Koranic verses and prophetic narrations. He referred to jihad as any "good action" and recounted a recent conversation with a non-Muslim lawyer who asked if electing a respectable official would be considered jihad. The sheikh answered "yes" because voting for someone who supports the truth and upholds justice is a good action.

The sheikh, not bin Laden, is a depiction of true Islamic orthodoxy. The sheikh, not bin Laden, is the man trained in Islamic jurisprudence. The sheikh, not bin Laden, is the authentic religious scholar. But to call him a moderate Muslim would be a misnomer.

Asma Khalid is pursuing her master's degree in Middle Eastern/ Islamic studies at the University of Cambridge in England. This article was first published in The Christian Science Monitor on 23rd April 2007.

http://www.radicalmiddleway.co.uk/news.php?id=2&art=10