Today's Top Islamic News (DAILY)

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Makkah to be made most advanced city in the world
Galal Fakkar | Arab News


JEDDAH: Makkah Gov. Prince Khaled Al-Faisal has emphasized the importance of making Makkah one of the most beautiful, clean, civilized and advanced cities in the world.

Launching the first competition for the beautification of Makkah at the Park Hyatt Hotel in Jeddah, he said the Saudi leadership was keen to make Makkah one of the most developed and beautiful cities in the world.

A number of artists, consuls general, businessmen, government officials and media persons attended the ceremony organized by the Makkah municipality.

“The development strategy for Makkah has been at the heart of the Kingdom’s Five-Year Development Plans,” the prince said. “If Makkah had not been here, this region would not have attained such an important cultural and political position in the world,” he added. He said all development proposals and initiatives for Makkah’s development came from the vicinity of the Holy Kaaba.

“We are honored to serve the House of God and we have a responsibility to develop Makkah and ensure that peace and security prevail there for the welfare of pilgrims who come from different parts of the world,” he said.

He commended the efforts of those, including artists and businessmen who have taken the initiative for the beautification of Makkah.

Makkah Mayor Osama Al-Bar said the preparation for the first Islamic competition for the beautification of Makkah had taken two years to make a plan, taking into account Makkah’s preeminent position in the Islamic world.

He said the municipality intended to ensure the participation of a large number of artists from Arab and Islamic countries in the competition, adding that it would be publicized in the international media.

Spelling out the main objectives of the competition, Al-Bar said it primarily aimed at the beautification of Makkah by converting its corners into museums of Islamic artwork.

“It also offers a good opportunity for Muslim artists around the world to display their skills and standards,” the mayor said.

He said the competition also aims at spreading art by depicting Makkah’s heritage in artworks. It will help to exchange the participants’ expertise.

Prizes worth $300,000 will be given to the winners, said artist Taha Sabban, a member of the contest’s preparatory committee. The art works will be displayed at 12 locations in the city.

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Yemen, the joke is on you ...
By Marwan Bishara, Al Jazeera's senior political analyst

Author says that by offering military support the West might prolong an autocratic regime [EPA]

Marginalised by regional developments and intimidated by Washington's Cold War and Gulf War victories, two Yemenis - so goes the joke - wondered if their country should declare war on the US, force it to occupy Yemen and care for it.

"But what if we won?" wondered one. "We would have to care for America!"

As the US and Britain prepare for covert war on Yemen, and following on their failures in Somalia, Iraq and Afghanistan/Pakistan, Yemenis might wonder if the joke is becoming a reality.

Over the last few days, London has called for an international conference on Yemen (after it called for another on Afghanistan) under US-British auspices to see how best to support the government of Ali Abdullah Saleh, the Yemeni president, against al-Qaeda.

From fragile to failed

In depth


Profile: Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula
The $30bn pair of underpants
Neither wars nor drones

Videos:
Suspect 'a gentleman, not fanatic'
Yemen - New frontline for US wars?
One does not have to be a Yemen expert to tell you that further destabilising Yemen along the lines of Pakistan or Somalia is not sound policy, and that Yemen's proximity to the Gulf and the Horn of Africa does not bode well for regional stability.

But that is exactly what will happen if the US/UK "counterterrorism" policy focuses on providing military support to a three-decade-old government that presides over an unstable and decentralised country.

By offering more military training, arms, naval patrolling, intelligence sharing and possibly shared offensive operations, the West might help prolong and sustain an autocratic regime that faces secessionist movements in the North and South.

Mostly, though, it will aggravate a fragile state of Yemen into a failing state.

Even if estimates are exaggerated (Yemen's interior minister in 2002 put the number of guns at 60 million), Yemeni tribes are better armed than any other in the region and will not surrender their weapons quietly to the central government, especially in light of the declared foreign intrusion into their country's affairs.

Forgotten front?

But the US military presence, like that of al-Qaeda, is hardly new. In the decade since the bombing of the USS Cole off the coast of Yemen in 2000, Washington has sent special forces into the country, took out suspected "terrorists" and shared in various raids against al-Qaeda targets in the country.

But that is ignored by an ever more influential class of pseudo-experts and self-declared "terrorogists" whose careers revolve around advising the US/UK government on how to advance their interests in the Middle East through force.

They reckon Yemen has been the ignored "forgotten front" of the "war on terror" and advise much more of the same security and military solutions.

They disingenuously ignore the decade of covert American military co-operation and security operations in Yemen that utterly failed, and they dangerously advocate raising the stakes in a country that suffers from any number of tribal, religious, regional, cultural and economic tensions and conflicts that only feed into instability and violence.

Blowback

Many Yemenis were first radicalised in Afghanistan [AFP]
Dealing with Yemen must begin with understanding why this country can serve as fertile ground for al-Qaeda and recognising the US' role in it (not to mention the old colonial British rule).

Young Yemenis were first radicalised in Afghanistan, where tens of thousands went to fight the Soviets under the auspices of a CIA covert war there. But the end of the Cold War did not mean the end of the "Arab Afghans", who later formed the core of al-Qaeda, whether in Afghanistan or in their homelands.

Thousands who came back to Yemen and joined local radical religious groups looked on with bitterness and betrayal as half a million US soldiers deployed next door in Saudi Arabia in 1991, the birthplace of the prophet.

The fact that the Yemeni government, as well as popular sentiment, opposed US military action against Iraq only empowered the newly formed radical groups.

Furthermore, Gulf regimes disappointed by Yemen's opposition to the war to liberate Kuwait, sent around a million Yemeni expats home, thus exasperating unemployment levels and reducing foreign remittances by a high margin, and in the process, fertilising the ground for extremism.

But the US role in Afghanistan in the 1980s and its role in the Gulf in the 1990s are only two examples of how US military interference has had major political repercussion in Yemen.

US support for Israel and its occupation of Arab Palestinian, Lebanese and Syrian lands, and Washington's intervention in neighbouring Somalia have also led to direct and indirect hostility towards the US.

Domestic politics

A soldier and savvy political operator, President Ali Abdullah Saleh was not exactly innocent or idle as international and regional events affected his country.

Although Saleh has made serious attempts to strengthen the state's unity, economy and institutions since taking power in 1978, his main concern has been the stability and primacy of his regime.

In the first of three decades in power, Saleh the military man secured his position in then North Yemen by playing off the tribes, some of which were supported by Saudi Arabia.

In the 1990s, he secured national unity with South Yemen, merging the two into one state, first through political process and establishing partnership, and later by winning the war (1994) against the Southern leaders who tried to secede once again. But most importantly, he achieved unity by solidifying his power and boxing in his potential adversaries by playing off Northern-led Islamists against Socialist secular Southerners.

And over the last decade, Saleh has exploited the US "war on terror" to break his once-empowered Islamist partners turned political adversaries.

Following al-Qaeda's attack against British interests and the USS Cole in 2000, Saleh was reluctant to co-operate overtly with the US administration.

However, after the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington (and an attack on a French oil tanker in 2002), Saleh agreed to co-operate with the US on all security fronts after obtaining American assurances that Yemen would not be targeted by the US in the "war on terror" as was Afghanistan and Iraq.

The US put the guru of the Yemeni Islamist movement, Sheikh Abdul Majid Az-Zindani, on its "terrorist watch list", and the Yemeni government put all the religious schools under its supervision.

To no avail

However, none of this helped Saleh secure his regime. Recent clashes in the Northern region of the country with the Houthis led to Saudi military interference on the side of the government and exposed the weakness of the regime.

Likewise, Saleh's inability to reduce the unabated political and security tensions in the South, as socio-economic conditions continued to deteriorate in the rest of the country, has all but exposed and amplified the weakness of his regime and its dependency on foreign economic and military aid.

However, with half of the population illiterate or living under the poverty line and one third unemployed, any attempt at a military solution could only exacerbate an already untenable situation.

Barack Obama, the US president, would be well advised to remember the advice given to his predecessor by General Colin Powell: "If you break it Mr president, you will own it."

Paradoxically, if the US continues to fail successfully in its "war on terror", it is those local autocratic leaders like Saleh who end up caring for its security instead of their own national interests.

The joke is on all of us ...

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Troops killed in Afghan explosions
About 113,000 foreign troops are in Afghanistan fighting Taliban-led fighters [AFP]

Two separate roadside bomb attacks in Afghanistan have left four US troops and a British soldier dead.

The US soldiers, the first American military casualties in Afghanistan in the new year, were killed in an explosion on Sunday in the south of the country, Nato-led forces said in a statement.

The UK soldier died while on foot patrol in Helmand province, Britain's ministry of defence said on Monday.

The Taliban said that a series of explosions on Sunday in Panjwai district of southern Kandahar had killed several foreign soldiers, but their report could not be verified immediately.

Meanwhile, the Afghan defence ministry said its soldiers killed more than 10 Taliban fighters on Sunday in northern Kunduz province's Imam Sahib district.

Nato and the US have 113,000 troops in Afghanistan fighting Taliban-led fighters, who are aiming to overthrow the government of Hamid Karzai, the Afghan president.

Break suspended

On Monday, Karzai ordered parliament to suspend a winter break so that politicians can vote on new cabinet nominees, after politicians rejected over two thirds of his original candidates.

Parliament refused 17 out of 24 of his nominees on Saturday, casting Afghanistan into further political array after a UN-backed probe in October threw out nearly one third of his votes from August's presidential poll.

Karzai's decree ordered that the legislature should delay its 45-day recess until he proposes new ministers in place of those rejected by the parliamentarians at the weekend, his office said in a statement.

It ordered "the national assembly to postpone leave until the members of the cabinet are approved".

If Karzai fails to have his cabinet approved in the next few weeks he will have to head to a London conference later this month seeking extra funds from Western donors without being able to say who will control a significant chunk of them.
Source: Agencies

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White Power USA

White supremacist groups in the US claim that their membership is growing [GALLO/GETTY]

Almost a year ago the inauguration of President Barack Obama was hailed as a turning point in US race relations. The country was said to be entering a new era of post-racial politics, on the path to a future of greater diversity and tolerance.

But while crowds flocked to Washington to witness the swearing in, others were refusing to join the party. Racially motivated threats against Obama rose to new heights in the first months of his presidency, with the US seeing nine high-profile race killings in 2009.

Meanwhile white supremacist and neo-Nazi groups claim their membership is growing and that visits to their websites are increasing.

Is the racial undercurrent that has long structured US politics reasserting itself?

Filmmakers Rick Rowley and Jackie Soohen went inside the white nationalist movement to investigate.

Some of the images seen and opinions heard in the film are disturbing.

This episode of People & Power airs from Wednesday, January 6, at the following times GMT: Wednesday: 1230; Thursday: 0130, 1400, 1930; Friday: 0630, 1630; Saturday: 0330, 2030; Sunday: 0030, 0530; Monday: 0830.
Source: Al Jazeera

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U.S. screens visitors from Muslim countries
06/01/2010 06:00:00 AM GMT


(Reuters) The new measures mean that passenger of those 14 nations will be patted down automatically

CAIRO — The U.S. has toughened security measures for U.S.-bound airline passengers from or via 14 countries, mostly Muslim, raising fears of profiling based on nationality, the Washington Post reported Monday, January 4.

"Because effective aviation security must begin beyond our borders, (Transportation Security Administration) TSA is mandating that every individual flying into the US from anywhere in the world traveling from or through nations that are state sponsors of terrorism or other countries of interest will be required to go through enhanced screening," said TSA spokesman Greg Soule.

The list includes Cuba, Iran, Sudan and Syria, all designated by the US State Department as "state sponsors of terrorism".

The ten designated "states of interest" are Afghanistan, Algeria, Iraq, Lebanon, Libya, Nigeria, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Somalia and Yemen.

Passengers holding passports from those nations, or taking flights that originate or pass through any of them, will have their carry-on luggage searched and would undergo advanced explosive detection or imaging scans.

Passengers traveling from others countries will be subject to random screening or so-called threat-based screens.

"The directive also increases the use of enhanced screening technologies and mandates threat-based and random screening for passengers on US-bound international flights," Soule said.

The screening standards are enforced and monitored by TSA personnel and foreign security inspectors around the world.

Additional behavioral detection officials are also in airports to observe passengers for any signs that might offer a hint of a plot.

There have been no comprehensive changes in screening at domestic airports but passengers may notice more canine bomb-detection teams or face occasional extra checks of carry-on bags.

The procedures, which came into effect on Monday, follow a failed December 25 bombing attempt on a Detroit-bound airliner by a Nigerian accused of links to Al-Qaeda in Yemen.

* Fears

A Homeland Security official defended the new measures as only meant to make airlines safer.

"Out of abundance of caution and based on the latest intelligence in this evolving threat environment, additional screening measures are necessary to keep transportation safe."

Yet, many fear that the US might be moving towards broader racial profiling.

"I understand there needs to be additional security in light of what was attempted on Christmas Day," Nawar Shora, the legal director at the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, told the New York Times.

He added that the rule wrongly implies that all citizens of certain nations are suspect.

"But this is extreme and very dangerous," he said, adding that they intend to file a formal protest.

The new measures mean that any citizen of those 14 nations will for the first time be patted down automatically before boarding any flight to the US.

"All of a sudden people are labeled as being related to terrorism just because of the nation they are from."

Source: IslamOnline

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U.S. screens visitors from Muslim countries
06/01/2010 06:00:00 AM GMT


(Reuters) The new measures mean that passenger of those 14 nations will be patted down automatically

CAIRO — The U.S. has toughened security measures for U.S.-bound airline passengers from or via 14 countries, mostly Muslim, raising fears of profiling based on nationality, the Washington Post reported Monday, January 4.

"Because effective aviation security must begin beyond our borders, (Transportation Security Administration) TSA is mandating that every individual flying into the US from anywhere in the world traveling from or through nations that are state sponsors of terrorism or other countries of interest will be required to go through enhanced screening," said TSA spokesman Greg Soule.

The list includes Cuba, Iran, Sudan and Syria, all designated by the US State Department as "state sponsors of terrorism".

The ten designated "states of interest" are Afghanistan, Algeria, Iraq, Lebanon, Libya, Nigeria, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Somalia and Yemen.

Passengers holding passports from those nations, or taking flights that originate or pass through any of them, will have their carry-on luggage searched and would undergo advanced explosive detection or imaging scans.

Passengers traveling from others countries will be subject to random screening or so-called threat-based screens.

"The directive also increases the use of enhanced screening technologies and mandates threat-based and random screening for passengers on US-bound international flights," Soule said.

The screening standards are enforced and monitored by TSA personnel and foreign security inspectors around the world.

Additional behavioral detection officials are also in airports to observe passengers for any signs that might offer a hint of a plot.

There have been no comprehensive changes in screening at domestic airports but passengers may notice more canine bomb-detection teams or face occasional extra checks of carry-on bags.

The procedures, which came into effect on Monday, follow a failed December 25 bombing attempt on a Detroit-bound airliner by a Nigerian accused of links to Al-Qaeda in Yemen.

* Fears

A Homeland Security official defended the new measures as only meant to make airlines safer.

"Out of abundance of caution and based on the latest intelligence in this evolving threat environment, additional screening measures are necessary to keep transportation safe."

Yet, many fear that the US might be moving towards broader racial profiling.

"I understand there needs to be additional security in light of what was attempted on Christmas Day," Nawar Shora, the legal director at the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, told the New York Times.

He added that the rule wrongly implies that all citizens of certain nations are suspect.

"But this is extreme and very dangerous," he said, adding that they intend to file a formal protest.

The new measures mean that any citizen of those 14 nations will for the first time be patted down automatically before boarding any flight to the US.

"All of a sudden people are labeled as being related to terrorism just because of the nation they are from."

Source: IslamOnline

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U.S. screens visitors from Muslim countries
06/01/2010 06:00:00 AM GMT


(Reuters) The new measures mean that passenger of those 14 nations will be patted down automatically

CAIRO — The U.S. has toughened security measures for U.S.-bound airline passengers from or via 14 countries, mostly Muslim, raising fears of profiling based on nationality, the Washington Post reported Monday, January 4.

"Because effective aviation security must begin beyond our borders, (Transportation Security Administration) TSA is mandating that every individual flying into the US from anywhere in the world traveling from or through nations that are state sponsors of terrorism or other countries of interest will be required to go through enhanced screening," said TSA spokesman Greg Soule.

The list includes Cuba, Iran, Sudan and Syria, all designated by the US State Department as "state sponsors of terrorism".

The ten designated "states of interest" are Afghanistan, Algeria, Iraq, Lebanon, Libya, Nigeria, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Somalia and Yemen.

Passengers holding passports from those nations, or taking flights that originate or pass through any of them, will have their carry-on luggage searched and would undergo advanced explosive detection or imaging scans.

Passengers traveling from others countries will be subject to random screening or so-called threat-based screens.

"The directive also increases the use of enhanced screening technologies and mandates threat-based and random screening for passengers on US-bound international flights," Soule said.

The screening standards are enforced and monitored by TSA personnel and foreign security inspectors around the world.

Additional behavioral detection officials are also in airports to observe passengers for any signs that might offer a hint of a plot.

There have been no comprehensive changes in screening at domestic airports but passengers may notice more canine bomb-detection teams or face occasional extra checks of carry-on bags.

The procedures, which came into effect on Monday, follow a failed December 25 bombing attempt on a Detroit-bound airliner by a Nigerian accused of links to Al-Qaeda in Yemen.

* Fears

A Homeland Security official defended the new measures as only meant to make airlines safer.

"Out of abundance of caution and based on the latest intelligence in this evolving threat environment, additional screening measures are necessary to keep transportation safe."

Yet, many fear that the US might be moving towards broader racial profiling.

"I understand there needs to be additional security in light of what was attempted on Christmas Day," Nawar Shora, the legal director at the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, told the New York Times.

He added that the rule wrongly implies that all citizens of certain nations are suspect.

"But this is extreme and very dangerous," he said, adding that they intend to file a formal protest.

The new measures mean that any citizen of those 14 nations will for the first time be patted down automatically before boarding any flight to the US.

"All of a sudden people are labeled as being related to terrorism just because of the nation they are from."

Source: IslamOnline

[Shades]

U.S. screens visitors from Muslim countries
06/01/2010 06:00:00 AM GMT


(Reuters) The new measures mean that passenger of those 14 nations will be patted down automatically

CAIRO — The U.S. has toughened security measures for U.S.-bound airline passengers from or via 14 countries, mostly Muslim, raising fears of profiling based on nationality, the Washington Post reported Monday, January 4.

"Because effective aviation security must begin beyond our borders, (Transportation Security Administration) TSA is mandating that every individual flying into the US from anywhere in the world traveling from or through nations that are state sponsors of terrorism or other countries of interest will be required to go through enhanced screening," said TSA spokesman Greg Soule.

The list includes Cuba, Iran, Sudan and Syria, all designated by the US State Department as "state sponsors of terrorism".

The ten designated "states of interest" are Afghanistan, Algeria, Iraq, Lebanon, Libya, Nigeria, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Somalia and Yemen.

Passengers holding passports from those nations, or taking flights that originate or pass through any of them, will have their carry-on luggage searched and would undergo advanced explosive detection or imaging scans.

Passengers traveling from others countries will be subject to random screening or so-called threat-based screens.

"The directive also increases the use of enhanced screening technologies and mandates threat-based and random screening for passengers on US-bound international flights," Soule said.

The screening standards are enforced and monitored by TSA personnel and foreign security inspectors around the world.

Additional behavioral detection officials are also in airports to observe passengers for any signs that might offer a hint of a plot.

There have been no comprehensive changes in screening at domestic airports but passengers may notice more canine bomb-detection teams or face occasional extra checks of carry-on bags.

The procedures, which came into effect on Monday, follow a failed December 25 bombing attempt on a Detroit-bound airliner by a Nigerian accused of links to Al-Qaeda in Yemen.

* Fears

A Homeland Security official defended the new measures as only meant to make airlines safer.

"Out of abundance of caution and based on the latest intelligence in this evolving threat environment, additional screening measures are necessary to keep transportation safe."

Yet, many fear that the US might be moving towards broader racial profiling.

"I understand there needs to be additional security in light of what was attempted on Christmas Day," Nawar Shora, the legal director at the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, told the New York Times.

He added that the rule wrongly implies that all citizens of certain nations are suspect.

"But this is extreme and very dangerous," he said, adding that they intend to file a formal protest.

The new measures mean that any citizen of those 14 nations will for the first time be patted down automatically before boarding any flight to the US.

"All of a sudden people are labeled as being related to terrorism just because of the nation they are from."

Source: IslamOnline

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Japan's finance minister calls for weaker yen
Thu, 07 Jan 2010 10:25:13 GMTJapan's newly appointed Finance Minister Naoto Kan says he will cooperate with Japan's central bank to get the currency to "appropriate" levels.
Japan's newly appointed Finance Minister Naoto Kan says he wants the yen to weaken in order to aid the recovery of the Japanese economy.

Speaking at his inaugural press conference on Thursday, Kan said it would be "nice" to see the Japanese currency weaken.

Kan said he would seek to work with Japan's central bank to get the currency to "appropriate" levels.

The new policy is seen as a break from what his predecessor, Hirohisa Fuji, was criticized for -- tolerating a strong yen, which hurts Japan's exporters.

His remarks caused the yen fall against the dollar on the foreign exchange markets.

The dollar rose to 92.63 yen, from 92.15 yen in the wake of Kan's remarks.

Kan's predecessor Hirohisa Fuji resigned due to ill health. He had maintained that in principle, Japan should refrain from market intervention to weaken the yen and protect exporters.

Kan inherits the job at a time when Japan faces deflation, a fragile economy and huge public debt.

MVZ/JG

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CAIRO –- A Massachusetts college decision to bar the wearing of face veils is drawing fire from Muslim and non-Muslim civil rights groups as an illegal move that jeopardizes rights and targets religious freedom of Muslims in particular.

“It’s a very strange policy,’’ Ibrahim Hooper, spokesman for the Washington-based civil liberties group the Council on American-Islamic Relations, told the Boston Globe on Wednesday, January 6.

“I don’t know where it came from. The only thing we can conclude is that it’s designed to specifically target Muslims.’’

The College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences issued a decision to ban students or others on its campuses from wearing clothing that obscures the face, including face veils and burqas worn by Muslim women.

College officials say that the rule, which went into effect January 1, is designed to promote safety and was imposed after a “periodic assessment of public safety policies’’ at the private college.

“This is another measure that public safety [officials at the college] wanted to implement to keep the campus safer,’’ Michael Ratty, a spokesman for the college, which has campuses in Boston, Worcester, and Manchester, N.H., said.

"It is not directed to any group or individual. It applies to all students and faculty."

But Muslims slammed the move as a form of religious discrimination for Muslims who believe they must cover their faces.

“I think they have two Muslim women wearing face veils, that made them feel uncomfortable and they had to do something about it,” said Hooper.

Even security activists like Jonathan Kassa, executive director of Security on Campus, a nonprofit that advocates for safer US college campuses, are not in favor of the rule, which they fear sacrificing rights in the name of security.

The majority of Muslim scholars believe that a woman is not obliged to cover her face but believe that it is up to women to decide whether to take on the face veil.

* Illegal

Civil liberties groups and campus activists are also opposing the college decision as toeing the American constitution’s red-line of respecting religious freedoms.

It is “puzzling and possibly illegal,” Sarah Wunsch, staff attorney at the Massachusetts American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), told The Globe describing the new rule.

Hooper affirmed he had not heard of any similar policies adopted at any other US college.

He added that a minority of Muslims believe that wearing clothes that cover the face is required, but that stopping them from practicing their faith remains "un-American."

“If this went to court I would feel comfortable the women would prevail because of the legal precedent that has been set.”

CAIR says that the ban should have an exemption for those who wear face veils for religious reasons, as is the case with some Muslim women, so that not to jeopardize religious rights.

As the college’s the policy includes a medical exemption, it should also include a religious exemption, Hooper noted.

“People should have the right to practice their faith as they see fit, not as others see fit.”
Source: IslamOnline