What’s the GOP response? “It’s a TRAP!“

This post: "Republicans have been whining about not …" was originally posted at Talk Islam - a crescent waxing eloquent. The RSS feed may not be used at other sites without permission. You can subscribe to this RSS feed for Talk Islam at http://talkislam.info/feed/

A while ago, I wrote a very personal post which was deleted very soon after I published it. You see, I have a dark secret that I have kept to myself for much of my life. A secret that I wish I had the courage to share with someone close to me. One that has, in my mind robbed me of the innocence of childhood. I was a victim of sexual abuse.

I am not writing this post to gain some sort of pity, or to be encouraged by my readers to tell someone I know, or even to confront my abusers. I am writing this post to alert parents. Most instances of child molestation are committed by individuals that are close to the child or family. The offender is often a family member…someone who has easy access to the child, and someone who the child is relatively comfortable around. Unfortunately, this was true in my case.

It pains me to say this, but parents need to stop being so trusting of their relatives. It is important that if you leave your child home with a relative that you ask your child what they did with their uncle (for example). Children are innocent, they will tell you. I wish till this day that my mother would have forsaken all political correctness and politeness and that she had explained to me what a good touch and bad touch was so that I might have been able to salvage my childhood.
….

And don’t for a second think that we are free from such a fitna because we are Muslim. Child molestation is big problem in our communities…it just doesn’t get talked about. I want to change that. Start talking…to your child, your neighbor, a family member, your shaykh or community member. Make the community aware of this horrible problem.

This post: "Hijaabified Beauty takes on child abuse …" was originally posted at Talk Islam - a crescent waxing eloquent. The RSS feed may not be used at other sites without permission. You can subscribe to this RSS feed for Talk Islam at http://talkislam.info/feed/

In the corridors of the University of Jordan, young women sway their hips in tight jeans, embracing the latest fashion trend the West has to offer. Their male counterparts seem no less committed to showing off their looks, nor to a deeply rooted urge to catch the attention of flashy girls.

This is one of the few places where young people can mix in a country built on strict gender segregation. Despite the superficially Western influenced culture, many young people express exasperation with the traditional mentality governing most people.

But girls and boys, like in many oriental societies, often break the taboo and engage in a romantic relation. But the fate of most romantic adventures is in the end determined by family more than the lovers themselves.

“This romantic relationship is veiled with secrecy, fear and deception,” admits Ehsan, a fourth year engineering student at the university of Jordan who says he must keep his family in the dark over this relationship if he wants to one day marry the girl.

“My family does not know I have a girlfriend. Her family might kill her if they know,” he said.
….

“Some of the young people refuse old tradition and want to make their own choices,” he said. “But this culture needs time to grow.”

In Jordan, the majority of the 5.6 million population is made up of young people, with a ratio of two females to every male.

This post: "Love in Jordan: ‘Dress Western act Orie…" was originally posted at Talk Islam - a crescent waxing eloquent. The RSS feed may not be used at other sites without permission. You can subscribe to this RSS feed for Talk Islam at http://talkislam.info/feed/

The Taliban based in Orakzai Agency confirmed on Tuesday that Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan chief Hakeemullah Mehsud is dead.

However, Alam Tariq the offiicial Taliban spokesman has not yet made a statement.

Sources said that Maulvi Noor Jamal has been nominated as Mehsud’s succesor.
….

Maulvi Noor Jamal is a native of the Orakzai Agency and rose to power as the leader of the Taliban in the Kurram tribal area.

He was also given responsibilities for Orakzai when the military began the Waziristan offensive in October.

Jamal is in his late thirties and was a maulana at a local madrassah before he was made the leader of the Taliban in Kurram.

He had a close relationship with Mehsud and is known for his brutality. One resident who left Khurram for fear of being wanted by him said Jamal “…kills humans like one will kill chickens.” Jamal is also the man who is allegedly overseeing the flogging of two men and a teenage boy in a recently broadcast video.

This post: "Taliban confirm Hakeemullah’s death. Th…" was originally posted at Talk Islam - a crescent waxing eloquent. The RSS feed may not be used at other sites without permission. You can subscribe to this RSS feed for Talk Islam at http://talkislam.info/feed/

A senior leader of al Qaeda’s affiliate in Somalia has declared jihad against neighboring Kenya for supporting the weak Somali Transitional Federal Government.

This post: "There aren’t enough good targets in Som…" was originally posted at Talk Islam - a crescent waxing eloquent. The RSS feed may not be used at other sites without permission. You can subscribe to this RSS feed for Talk Islam at http://talkislam.info/feed/

A more provocative — and perhaps more ominous — analogy today might be between the CIA’s escalating drone war in the contemporary Pakistani tribal borderlands and Richard Nixon’s secret bombing campaign against the Cambodian equivalent. To briefly recapitulate that ancient history: In the late 1960s, Cambodia was ruled by a “neutralist” king, Norodom Sihanouk, leading a weak government that had little relevance to its poor and barely educated citizens. In its borderlands, largely beyond its control, the North Vietnamese and Vietcong found “sanctuaries.”

Sihanouk, helpless to do anything, looked the other way. In the meantime, sheltered by local villagers in distant areas of rural Cambodia was a small insurgent group, little-known communist fundamentalists who called themselves the Khmer Rouge. (Think of them as the 1970s equivalent of the Pakistani Taliban who have settled into the wild borderlands of that country largely beyond the control of the Pakistani government.) They were then weak and incapable of challenging Sihanouk — until, that is, those secret bombing raids by American B-52s began. As these intensified in the summer of 1969, areas of the country began to destabilize (helped on in 1970 by a U.S.-encouraged military coup in the capital Phnom Penh), and the Khmer Rouge began to gain strength.

The Taliban sure hope so…

This post: "Could US drone strikes push Pakistan int…" was originally posted at Talk Islam - a crescent waxing eloquent. The RSS feed may not be used at other sites without permission. You can subscribe to this RSS feed for Talk Islam at http://talkislam.info/feed/

The [Louay] Safi affair reveals the deep divisions within the U.S. government over how to combat terrorism and over what constitutes moderate Islam.

Some believe insight into Islamist thinking can be gained only by engaging a wide range of people in North America’s close-knit Muslim community, where leaders may well have ties to extremists – ties that do not necessarily signal alliances or support. Others argue that engagement should be limited or shunned to avoid legitimizing radicals or embarrassing the government.

Safi is a senior official of the Islamic Society of North America, the country’s largest Muslim organization. ISNA has been consulted for years by Washington and is described as a partner in the fight against terrorism. In addition to serving as ISNA’s communications director, Safi runs its program certifying Muslim chaplains for work in the U.S. military and prison system. He publicly denounces terrorism and advocates peace.
….

“You have a schizophrenic government and a schizophrenic institution,” Zelikow said, referring to ISNA. “The schizophrenia cuts right into how the government views the whole Fort Hood affair. We don’t know whether to treat him [Hasan] as part of an international conspiracy or as a lone wolf who happened to have gotten solace from a radical imam.”

This post: "An experienced military trainer who taug…" was originally posted at Talk Islam - a crescent waxing eloquent. The RSS feed may not be used at other sites without permission. You can subscribe to this RSS feed for Talk Islam at http://talkislam.info/feed/

The Detroit Board of Police Commissioners has passed a resolution calling “to have the truth be revealed” in the investigation of Imam Luqman Ameen Abdullah, the Muslim cleric killed in a shootout with FBI agents seeking to arrest him.

After a meeting Thursday evening, the board declared in the resolution it “will continue to strive for the objective scrutiny and resolution to the fatal shooting of Cleric Imam Luqman Ameen Abdullah, not presuming guilt or innocence.”

This post: "The Detroit Board of Police Commissioner…" was originally posted at Talk Islam - a crescent waxing eloquent. The RSS feed may not be used at other sites without permission. You can subscribe to this RSS feed for Talk Islam at http://talkislam.info/feed/

This post: "Sri Lanka arrests General Fonseka…." was originally posted at Talk Islam - a crescent waxing eloquent. The RSS feed may not be used at other sites without permission. You can subscribe to this RSS feed for Talk Islam at http://talkislam.info/feed/

The problem of inter-communal marriages is largely new in Iraq, where the community one belonged to was previously of little importance in the quest for a spouse. Executed dictator Saddam Hussein’s regime comprised a Sunni Arab elite but was largely secular.

“The situation deteriorated after the fall of the former regime and the sectarian violence that followed.”

Sociologist Suha al-Shamaa, who also works in the women’s section at the human rights ministry, said: “Before the U.S. occupation of 2003, the question of which community a woman belonged to was not asked. Today it’s essential.”
….

As many as 41.5 percent of Iraqi men and women over 12 years old are single, the WFP says, and 4.2 percent are widowed.

This post: "Sectarian strife makes love difficult in…" was originally posted at Talk Islam - a crescent waxing eloquent. The RSS feed may not be used at other sites without permission. You can subscribe to this RSS feed for Talk Islam at http://talkislam.info/feed/