Jimmy's Corner

According to the radical criteria of judging political actions, we are all traitors. To the radicals if a Muslim co-operates with those who oppress, or even have conflict with, other Muslims then it is an act of treason. Applying the criteria to today's situation I found myself concluding to the following:

1. Fatah negotiated with Israel; Israel kills Palestinians, then Fatah are traitors.
2. Egypt deals with Israel; Israel kills fellow Arabs and Muslims. Then Egyptians are traitors.
3. Emirates Airlines sells Israel ad-boards in London; Israel kills fellow Arabs and Muslims, then Emirates are traitors.
4. Hamas shakes hands with Russia; Russians killed thousands of Muslims in Chechnya, Hamas are traitors.
5. Iran co-operates with Russia; Russians killed thousands of Muslims in Chechnya, Iran are traitors.
6. Palestinians used to received aids from Danes; Danes offended Muslims, Palestinians are traitors.
7. Bin Laden asks America for truce, America supports Israel, Israel kills Arabs and Muslims, Bin Laden is a traitor.

And the list goes longer the more you search.

The conclusion is: WE ARE ALL TRAITORS... But if we are all traitors, then against whom do we commit this act of treason???

The thoughts up there are the product of the radicals' criteria on judging people's actions and deeds. Criteria that put Emirates Airlines, Egypt, Palestinian people, Hamas, Fatah and Bin Laden all on equal feet. Doesn't it show how stupid they are?

After digging to a depth of 100 meters last year, Russian scientists found traces of copper wire dating back 1000 years, and came to the conclusion that their ancestors already had a telephone network one thousand years ago.

So, not to be outdone, in the weeks that followed, American scientists dug 200 meters and headlines in the US papers read: "US scientists have found traces of 2000 year old optical fibres, and have concluded that their ancestors already had advanced high-tech digital telephone 1000 years earlier than the Russians."

One week later, the Egyptian newspapers reported the following: "After digging as deep as 500 meters, Egyptian scientists have found absolutely nothing. They have concluded that 5000 years ago, their ancestors were already using wireless technology."

While surfing Al-Mujaz website (the website for the Arabic and Muslim minority in Denmark), I ran into a very interesting piece of news. The Danish newspaper Politiken interviewed Dr. Tarek Ramadan who is the grandson of Sheikh Hassan Al-Bana (the one who first established the Muslim Brotherhood Movement in Egypt. In the interview Dr. Tarek Ramadan said that the Imams in Denmark committed a great mistake by taking the problem of the Danish cartoons out of Danish borders to the Middle East. Moreover, when asked if he considers them as traitors he answered "Yes, it is treason". Dr. Ramdan added that he went to Denmark in October 2005 and urged the imams there not to protest against the cartoons because such protests is just what the Danish right-wing is waiting for.

Dr. Tarek Ramadan is famous for his theories and books about what is called (I don't know by who) the European version of Islam. He has two PhDs in the philosophy and sciences of Islam. He sounds to be well known all over Europe as he gives lectures in many European cities, Al Mujaz says.

Well, I decided just to put the piece of news as it is from Al-Mujaz and add no comments on it. However, I had a couple of questions about what Dr. Tarek Ramadan said in the interview:

1. If Dr. Ramadan believed that the Danish right-wing just wanted the protests, does this mean that he believes that the cartoons might have really been published on purpose as some Danish imams say? (try to get what I am aiming at)
2. Why doesn't Dr. Tarek Ramadan express and share his opinions about the crisis in Arabic media as well?

Will Emirates Airlines be the new victim?
I have received an email urging Muslims to boycott Emirates Airlines and to send emails rebuking the worldwide famous airlines company for agreeing to let Arsenal sign a deal with an Israeli tourist company, and using Danish products on its airplanes.

It was announced on the Danish Arla Foods' website that Emirates Airlines uses Arla's products on board of its airplanes. However, the page displaying the announcement was removed!!!

On the Arab forums now they are discussing the fact that Emirates Airlines has become a "strategic partner" with Israel as they signed a deal with Israeli Ministry of Tourism giving Israel the right to put banners in the new Emirates Stadium of London's giant soccer club Arsenal. There are calls to boycott the greatest Arab airline company and people are posting script letters and emails to be sent to Emirates Airlines offices rebuking the company for such deals.

Well, the difference between those who run the giant Emirates Airlines and those who are calling for the boycott of Emirates Airline is quite simple: in Emirates Airlines they know how to work and know what's right and what's wrong, but those who are so angry for the deals are just mere morons who live and die like parrots saying what they do not understand.

Being a company searching for the best ways to offer their customers the best service available, Emirates Airlines signed the deal with Arla Foods which -I am sure- offered the best prices and the best products. These guys are not going to throw their money away or lose their world position for satisfying some fanatics who live in their own worlds. I truly appreciate the decision made by Emirates Airlines officials for not being drawn into an aimless stupid boycott, putting the good of their company as a top priority.

As for the deal with the Israeli Ministry of Tourism, here is Haartez story:

English Premiership club Arsenal will promote tourism to Israel under a $612,000 sponsorship deal signed yesterday. The two-year agreement, signed by Israeli and Arsenal officials in Tel Aviv, is the London soccer club's second with a Middle Eastern partner.

[...]

The deal was signed by Edelman and Tourism Minister Abraham Hirchson. The ads will be launched at the beginning of the 2006-2007 season.

Hirchson said Israel would pay 350,000 pounds ($612,000) to Arsenal, and be allowed to display its televised ads for five minutes during soccer matches. He called it a "breakthrough" agreement with one of the top soccer clubs in the world, allowing Israel to reach "tens of millions" of viewers worldwide.

[...]

Yesterday's deal is Arsenal's second with Israel. Last year, the club announced a youth development program in Israel as part of the club's attempt to search for talent around the globe.

As I understand from this article, England's giant soccer team Arsenal is the side that signed the deal with the Israeli Ministry of Tourism, and Arsenal had another deal with Israel even before Emirates Airlines' contract with the team goes into action. Yes, Emirates Airlines knew that Israeli is going to advertise on banners in Emirates Stadium and they had no objections on that. And the question is: why would they have any objections?


Israel is going to pay for the ad-boards, which means financial income to the company, wasn't that the reason why Emirates Airlines dealt with Arsenal in the first place??? Moreover, if Emirates Airlines refused the deal, Israel could have finished the deal with any other soccer club and still they will carry out their new tourism policy. All what Emirates Airlines was going to gain is the wrath of the English fans who could consider such a refusal or objection as a kind of racism, which could have endangered Emirates Airlines advertising campaign in England even before it starts.

Emirates Airlines has done the right thing, and made the right choice. But still they will be the new victims of stupidity and ignorance. Those who think they know and think better than those who run a world famous airline company will not let it go, and who knows, maybe one day we will see demonstrations attacking Emirates Airlines offices in the Arab countries.

I say it: Fly Emirates

Facts on Emirates Airlines:

• Established in May 1985
• United States astronaut Buzz Aldrin and former U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright were passengers on the airline's first flight from Dubai to New York City.
• Emirates was the first airline in the world to introduce Personal Television Screens for passengers. This was in 1992.
• Emirates is currently main sponsor of Collingwood Football Club and will become main sponsor of Arsenal F.C. from the 2005/2006 English football season. See also Emirates Stadium.
• Emirates was the sponsor of Chelsea F.C.
• In fiscal year 2005, Emirates achieved a record result of Dh2.6 billion ($708 million) net profit from Dh19.1 billion ($5.2 billion) operating revenue in what was another difficult year for the global aviation industry, marred by high fuel prices and the natural disaster in South East Asia. Emirates carried 12.52 million passengers, 2.1 million more than the previous year. It employs 16,119 staff.

UPDATE:
It is not a real update but it is an important thought I thought I should add. Emirates Airlines is located in Dubai and belongs to the United Arab Emirates, the mother country of the company involved in the ports deal in the United States.

I have been thinking for so long time before I put my fingers on the keyboard and start typing this post. I have been thinking if it is the right time to publish this or not. Actually I have reached the conclusion that it is just the best time to write and publish this.

It has become a fashion these days to find anyone, literally anyone, coming out of no where with his very own interpretations and understanding of faith and religion that only serve his own benefits and needs. Everybody nowadays just come out with a new interpretation of religion, negating or ignoring the main message of this religion, to justify his own ends and the means he uses to reach this end, and even preaching for his interpretation. I am not against freedom of thought or the freedom of looking and exploring religion from different perspectives. Nevertheless, I am attacking those who interpret religion in the own way ignoring the main message of this religion just to reach some very personal ends. The problem is there with every religion everywhere, however, I am tackling here how the problem affects Islam and Muslims.

It is no surprise to find Bin Laden coming out with his interpretation of Islam, ignoring the main teachings and message of Islam just to serve his ends and the means he uses to reach these ends, and even preaching for his interpretation in order to win supporters. It is no surprise to find extremists looking at religion from this very narrow angel, taking what they think is good for supporting their beliefs, leaving, ignoring or even negating any part that contradicts with what they believe or with their ends. It has even become a habit to watch preachers on satellite channels interpreting and answering questions about Islam from their own points of view, building their ideas on very weak logic that is based on solid evidence of proof in Islam. Moreover, it is now a fashion to read for writers who are not Muslims, writing about Islam from their own perspective and saying it loud and clear “I am did not read into Islam”. Therefore, it is never a surprise to find them offering the falsest ideas about Islam, simply because they do not know it. I am not saying “Don’t look at religion from different perspectives”, I am saying if you want to find a new interpretation of Islam just do it within the main frame of the main message of the religion, or else you will be misguiding people which is the last thing people need these days. You can’t bring a BMW and remove all the BMW logos from it and put Ford logos on and then ask me to believe you it is a Ford not a BMW, this is misguiding and lying. Another example, you can’t turn gold into silver, but you can make different shapes of gold, that look different in shape but they are all from the same source.

Actually what Bin Laden, extremists, pay-me preachers and non-Muslim writers do in this case is a sort of monopolizing religion. Each is treating religion as his very own commodity and asking everyone to believe in what he is preaching; one for the sake of making supporters for his wars, others for the sake of having a hold on people’s minds, others for making money out of the satellite channels and others for attracting converts from Islam. Such a monopoly of religion is the worst misguiding ever for people who try to reach the truth. Additionally, it just produces generations with distorted backgrounds and principles about what their religion really is, those who run to burn embassies or bomb innocent civilians are just a direct natural result of monopolizing religion and faith.

Ironically, monopolizing religion has become a means to achieve the most stupid goals. For example, internet users use Islam to spread chain letters. You might think it is silly that I am taking chain letters as an example, but here is a story that tells how dangerous the situation has become. Some of my friends were walking in the street when some young lady stopped and handed them a sheet of paper. The paper is a printed version of an email starting with “I swear I got this in my email”, as if whatever is received in emails is something should be taken for granted. It is talking about some unknown sheikh that went asleep in the Prophet’s Mosque in Medina, Saudi Arabia. He dreamt of Prophet Muhammad telling him that the world has gone into a mess, 40000 people died this week, the Day of Judgment is so close and he should send this message to everyone he knows. Or else he will be cursed forever, and God will let him down in the Day of Judgment and will have no mercy on him. Moreover, anyone who receives the message and never passes it to anyone else will be cursed the same way, and the message should be passed to all contacts in less than 96 hours or the curse will fall. Then it gives examples of a man who lost his son as he read it and did not pass it, and a business man who got 45000 (of money, no currency mentioned) more on a deal he finished as he passed the message as soon as he read it.

This message made no difference between Islam and any other old pagan religion in which curses of gods fall on those who do not respond to one order in their lives. If you just judge Islam from the perspective of the one who wrote it, it will be a religion in which all the good deeds a Muslim does can go in vain if he doesn’t respond and send a chain letter. Ironically, the ignorance of the one who wrote this message is very evident in the number of spelling mistakes everywhere in the body of the message. And the greatest problem is there as there are people who believed it, printed it and went to the streets handing it to everyone they meet. And that’s how a man who can barely know how to write Arabic, monopolizes religion and affects others making them believe in a version of Islam that has nothing to do with the real Islam.

This monopoly over religion is a natural result of the absence of effective religious institutions that work on the spread of the real word of Islam. No wonder extremists and terrorists make the best use of such absence to spread their poisons in the minds of ideologically lost Muslims, turning them into remote-controlled robots that just receive order and motivations and one press on a button is enough to make them go burn and destroy. Additionally, such monopoly over religion is one of the main reasons why other cultures have distorted image of Islam as all they see is just the ideology of those who burn and kill, and who in fact have nothing to do with the true message of Islam.

To those who ask for reform, reform the minds of Muslims and you will not need to find a way to reform Islam. The problem is there with minds not with the religion.

To those who try to show the true image of Islam to the world, start from the inside. Reform yourself, your image will be reformed and the world will see its true shape.

As bird flu panic spreads all over Egypt, I have received many warnings on my email such as:

• Villagers threw their dead chicken in the Nile, so do not drink water, it is infected with H5N1 virus.
• Do not eat chicken or eggs or any of these things' products, bird flu might kill you.

Then it got even hotter:

• Do not eat meat as cows in Egypt turned to be mad cows and many infections were reported (no source was mentioned).
• Do not eat fish as they live in water, and water is infected with bird flu, so fish are infected with BIRD flu virus.

And as the last warnings were proved wrong and stupid as they look, here are my expectations of the last warnings to come:

• Do not breathe as birds infected with bird flu fly in the air, so the air is infected and you might get killed.
• Do not drink water as fish have sex in the water.

Long life ignorance!

Can anyone argue with this cartoon? Can anyone say it is not true?
It just reflects the status-quo in one of the Muslim nations, where ignorance and extremism burn all. Muslims who pray in the same manner bomb their own mosques and kill each other as they come out from prayers. This indicates ignorance, extremism and hypocrisy if you ask me...
They are ignorant of their religion, of its ethics and teachings and simply represent the mind of the so-called Muslims who brag about a religion they are ignorant of and never apply, living everywhere in the world.

Some would say the problem is there with the religion itself, but I say: No, there problem is not with Islam, but with those narrow-minded stupid ignorant followers of Islam. Just like Dody said in his article Reclaiming Islam, the problem is not with Islam, it is the Muslims who need reform. The way some radical or extremist Muslims interpret and understand Islam is not the religion's mistake, but the mistake of those ill rigid narrow minds that see only what supports their desires and needs, ignoring the very true word and teachings of Islam.

Those ill ignorant minds are not only burning the world with their extremism, but also burning their own religion, mosques and people. To me this indicates that extremism and violence is not directed from Islam to "infidels", "disbelievers" or "others". Yet, it is directed from ignorant extremists to the whole world and everything that contradicts their own views, be it Muslim or not, be it a mosque, a temple or a church, no difference.

The Iraqi version of those extremists fall in a category of extremists that think they fight for their religion while they fight against it. They have a shrine destroyed, so they destroy more mosques, and the result is the fall of more than 400 victims in less than a week... Their ignorance make them like robots with remote controls, just press the button and they go off burning, killing, bombing and kidnapping, tarnishing the image of their religion and then run to the streets asking why the world sees them as terrorists.

Moreover, unfortunately, unlike the voices of the extremists, the voices of other true Muslims go and vanish with no echoes (and from now on I am not using the word "moderate" for Muslims as moderate Muslims are just the ones, they do not represent the moderate image of their religion, but the true one). A rally in London against terrorism held by 10000 Muslim that almost blocked Piccadilly went loud chanting against terrorism, Bin Laden and Wahabis. However, no one noticed, rarely someone commented... Their calls practically went astray.

Still the voices of true Muslims should go louder than the bangs of bombs and sounds of bullets, as only their voices that will reform other Muslims and tell the truth about the religion.

Beijing is launching a campaign to stamp out widespread public spitting in an effort to clean up its image for the 2008 Olympics. Yahoo! News

I think the Egyptian government will import this law from China (along with the zillions of Chinese products it imports) in order to end the showers ministers and politicians have wherever they appear in public.

Here is a list of the fines (and awards) I think will be applied in Egypt if no-spitting low is enforced:

• 100 EGP award for spitting at a Kefaya (Egyptian movement for change) sign/member.
• 500 EGP award for spitting at Ayman Nour's picture and logo.
• 1000 EGP award for spitting at a Muslim Brotherhood member.
• 1000 EGP fine for spitting at an NDP member's picture.
• 5000 EGP fine for spitting when a politican appears on TV.
• 10000 EGP fine and unlimited time behind bars for spitting at a police officer.
• A bullet in the head fine for spitting at the president.

I wonder how many bullets will be shot!

Keys: EGP is an abbreviation of Egyptian Pound which is Egypt's currency.