Myrtus

Female Imams in China

Morocco is not the first country to produce female Imams after all, it turns out that China beat everyone else to it. 

As part of a silent revolution in China, Muslim women are leading prayers, something considered unthinkable in Islamic countries.

Wuzhong has the highest concentration of female imams in China. Over 20 of them lead prayers and advise women on religious affairs in this predominantly Muslim town.

Love & Peace

Hi everyone!

We finally got hooked back up on broadband today. YAYYYY! 

So much has happened in the last two weeks.  I started writing a post that slowly became long and dreadful.  After I reread it I realized that although a lot of good stuff happened, some things are better left unsaid.

Peace and love baybee, that's all that really matters. (:

The really good news.....as some of you know, my daughter was undergoing a bunch of tests on her foot.  The initial diagnosis about a month ago was a "tumor" that needed to be surgically removed.  After all the tests, second and even third opinions it was determined that it was an old bruise that wasn't healing well.  She does have to wear some special inserts in her shoe to relieve the pain and help the healing process, but that's far better news compared to the initial scare.

So how is everyone doing?  Anybody here?

Morocco Battles Militancy With TV Broadcasts

Morocco on Monday connected its largest mosques to a television network to broadcast a tolerant version of Islam as part of a government drive to fight radical Islamic fundamentalism, officials said.

The move effectively puts the country's largest mosques under the government's direct control, curbing the role of radical Muslim preachers in many places of worship. Morocco has been on alert against the influence of radical Islamists since 2003 when suicide bombings killed 45 people.

I found this next part to be particularly interesting.

Last month Morocco appointed 50 women as the first female state mosque preachers to combat the influence of female radical Islamists at mosques and other public places, such as hospitals and prisons. The government had earlier bolstered the authority of the country's Higher Council of Ulemas on religious matters to try to cut the impact of fatwas issued by more radical, freelance clerics.

I say they ask our own Queen Myrtus to podcast for them. :)

Read about it ...

Bedouin to Represent Israel

Ismail Khaldi used to be a shepherd; now he’s been appointed Israeli consul in San Francisco

In a few weeks Ismail Khaldi, a 35-year old Bedouin shepherd from the village of Khawalid in the Zevulun Valley, will leave his family and move to the United States to serve as Israeli consul in San Francisco, as the first Bedouin diplomat.

Israel definitely could do a better job integrating and enfranchising its minorities. Good luck to the guy!

Read the whole thing ...

Iran -- Bloggers' Biggest Prison

Iran's government is really out of control and on a purposefully rebellious course. Seriously, they deny the Holocaust, persecute religious minorities, and are the only country in the world to execute minors.

And, although, interestingly the head of the Jewish Agency for Israel and World Zionist Organization recently Invited Iranian President Ahmadinejad to Jerusalem to tour Yad Vashem, Israel's Holocaust museum, it might not do any good (even if AJ accepted) given the level of reform that is needed. I mean, who would openly flaunt their disregard for international human rights by sending a known criminal to the newly created United Nations Human Rights Council?

Seriously what is their point??

... the U.S.-based Mission for Establishment of Human Rights in Iran (MEHR IRAN) said that it was a “mockery of human rights” if Mortazavi was allowed to attend the council’s current session.

“He is responsible for numerous imprisonment, tortures and executions in Iran and should be arrested by Swiss judiciary and be tried for crimes against humanity utilising all available international avenues including the International Court of Justice, International Criminal Court and treaties such as Convention Against Torture”, the group said.

On Thursday, François Bugingo, the president of the press freedoms organisation Reporters Without Borders (RSF), said “The presence in Geneva of Mortazavi, a man who was directly involved in the death of Canadian-Iranian photojournalist Zahra Kazemi, is absolutely unacceptable.

Kazemi was arrested on 23 June 2003 while photographing the families of prisoners outside Evin Prison, north of Tehran. Tortured while in detention, she died from her injuries on 10 July 2003.

“By sending Said Mortazavi as a human rights delegate to Geneva, the Iranian government is showing its real face”, Kazemi’s son, Stephan Hachemi, said.

“Iran continues to be the Middle East’s biggest prison for journalists and bloggers, with 13 jailed last year. Threats, interrogation, summonses, arrests and arbitrary detention are all on the increase. Journalists often manage to stay out of prison only by paying very high bail. The situation has not improved since hardliner Mahmoud Ahmadinejad took over as president”, RSF said.

Muslim Gays Seek Lesbians For Wives

It sucks having to live a lie just to make other people happy.

On a Web site for gay South Asians, 27-year-old Syed Mansoor uploaded the following message last summer:

"Hi, I am looking for a lesbian girl for marriage. I am gay but I would like to get married because of pressure from parents and society. I would like this marriage to be a 'normal' marriage except for the sex part, please don't expect any sexual relationship from me.

"Being an Indian gay person, I believe it is so much worth it to give up sex and have a nice otherwise normal family. We can be good friends and don't have to repent all our life for being gay/lesbian."

Across the globe and especially in America, hundreds of other gay Muslims have started to pursue marriages of convenience--or MOC, as they are known-- in which gay Muslims seek out lesbian Muslims, and vice versa, for appearances' sake.

Read the whole thing ...

Peeking Under the Robe

Head-to-toe black robes rarely make it into the pages of women's fashion magazines. But Elle magazine is changing that with the launch of its first Middle East edition this week.

The issue, which arrives on newsstands in Lebanon, Jordan and Morocco on Friday, mixes glossy photos of stylish clothes with fashion advice for readers who wear loose-fitting abayas or chadors in public but want to look chic underneath and indoors. In one spread photographed in a Damascus souk, a model pairs a purple Etro dress with a violet head scarf; in another photo she's wearing a long black embroidered robe with Ferragamo sandals.

"We can mix the East and the West in fashion," says Desiree Sadek, publisher of Elle's Middle East edition, which is part of Hachette Filipacchi Medias, a division of French media group Lagardere SCA.

Women in most Muslim countries cover their heads and bodies in public in keeping with religious tradition. But underneath, a growing number of them are wearing elegant, fashionable and often-revealing attire. In Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, social calendars are filled with women-only parties in lavish homes, featuring buffets, music, dancing and karaoke. Camera phones click madly, and photos of women in slinky dresses and glimmering tube tops are zapped to boyfriends and suitors.

I can't tell you how many people think that Muslim women wear the chador inside their own homes.

Read more ...

Obsessed With Rivalry

OK, how lame, petty, and desperate can they get? The Arab League has turned the issue of a Ghanian player in the World Cup waving the Israel flag into an international diplomatic incident. Someone needs to explain to them that, yes, there are people in the world who support the other side, and it's too bad if it turns out to be someone from a team they want to root for. I think the A.L. needs to get over it and just root for someone else. Let's face it, they'll never be as pissed off as Brooklyn Dodger fans, yet they found other teams to root for and so will the Arab League. It's called sports, not foreign policy, and it doesn't mean a darn thing except to their egos.

I gotta a feeling all this hate has got to be bad for their blood pressure.

Ghana's foreign minister has apologised to Arab nations after a player raised the Israeli flag to celebrate a World Cup victory.

Nana Addo Akufo-Addo said the action of defender John Paintsil, who waved the flag after Ghana's 2-0 win over the Czech Republic last Saturday were not intended to disrespect the Arab world.

Paintsil, who plays for Hapoel Tel Aviv, waved the flag at a party of Isreali fans who travelled to the World Cup finals to watch him in action with the Black Stars.

Akufo-Addo met ambassadors from the Palestinian Authority, Libya, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Algeria and Morocco and apologised to them.

"The incident was the act of an individual, who was completely ignorant of its political and diplomatic implications, and clearly had no official support," he said on Thursday.

"The government of Ghana deeply regrets this act by one of our citizens.

"Ghana has not drifted from its even-handed diplomacy in the Arab-Israeli conflict and we hope that this incident will not affect our relations with our Arab brothers and sisters."

Ghana's Football Association apologised on Monday for Paintsil's conduct and the Arab League said on Wednesday it had received an official apology from Ghana over the incident.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/world_cup_2006/teams/ghana/5107704.stm

Porn Star Seeks Bin Laden

You all should know by now that I don't make this stuff up.

Italy's most famous porn star Cicciolina has offered herself to Osama Bin Laden.

The 55-year-old actress said it was about time somebody tackled the terrorist and claimed she could be just the woman for the job.

You know what? I think she's right and she is the woman to do the job. And that puts bin Laden in big trouble.

You see, it turns out I know a secret you don't. However, I am going to share it with you because I am magnanimous and plus I have a big mouth. Besides, bin Laden never reads this blog, and al Zawahiri stopped reading after the gay animal kingdom post permanently traumatized him, so we're safe.

Bin Laden is in huge trouble because Ms. Cicciolina is not who she says she is. She's really ... <drum roll please>

He-Man in drag!

See?

 

Now go get him, girl!

hehehe ...

Did Chinese Eunuch Beat Columbus to the Americas?

A MAP has come to light that may support the thesis that a Chinese eunuch admiral discovered America decades before Christopher Columbus. At the very least it will fuel debate.

Bought by Liu Gang, a Chinese lawyer, in 2001 from a book dealer in Shanghai, the map is dated 1418 and shows with remarkable accuracy the whole world — each continent with its correct shape, latitude and longitude. Mr Liu has carried out extensive research to try to authenticate the map, which he plans to unveil to the public in Beijing on Monday (ed -- Jan., 2006).

Gavin Menzies, the British author, contends that the discovery is further proof that Zheng He, a Chinese navigator, and not Columbus, discovered America.

Read more ...