Headlines:
- Turkey Conspiring with Russia over Idlib
- Mahathir Rejects ‘Same-Sex Marriage’ but Accepts the Rest of Western Culture
- Conflict between UK and Europe over Brexit points to the Failure of the Idea of the EU
- Theresa May Demands Respect from EU after Brexit Humiliation
- Nawaz Sharif: Ex-PM and Daughter Released from Pakistan Prison
- China is Treating Islam like a Mental Illness
Turkey Conspiring with Russia over Idlib
Despite recent threats from Russia and Iran to support the Assad government in a major military assault on Idlib, these powers have yet to make any serious moves against the last key area held by the revolution. According to Reuters:
Turkey’s defense ministry said on Friday the borders of the demilitarized zone to be set up in Syria’s Idlib region were agreed in meetings with a Russian committee.
The borders were agreed taking into account the area’s geographical structure and residential areas, it said, adding that the meetings were held between Sept. 19-21 at Turkey’s defense ministry.
Turkey’s President Tayyip Erdogan and Russia’s Vladimir Putin announced an agreement on Monday under which Russian and Turkish troops will enforce the new demilitarized zone in the Idlib region, from which “radical” rebels will be required to withdraw by the middle of next month.
Russian threats were simply an attempt to accelerate talks between Turkey and the revolutionaries in order to arrange their withdrawal from Idlib, just as Turkey did previously in Aleppo, which Russian power was unable to break despite the full force of its airpower in Syria.
Syria is proving yet again that disbelievers fear fighting believers. Every ‘success’ of the Assad regime against the revolution has been preceded by deals and arrangements with the external powers that are backing the different factions of the revolution. They provide finance, arms, intelligence and planning for the leaders of major revolutionary factions, and this enables them to then control these factions with or without their knowledge and will. But the revolution in Syria still exists in the hearts and minds of the proud Muslims there, which treacherous deals can never eliminate.
Mahathir Rejects ‘Same-Sex Marriage’ but Accepts the Rest of Western Culture
Following widespread Western media coverage of Malaysian restrictions on illegal sexual relations, Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad has been forced to issue a media statement defending these restrictions while even though he has also been criticising the punishment meted out for this. According to Reuters:
Malaysia cannot accept same-sex marriage or lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) rights, Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad said on Friday, amid growing instances of persecution of LGBT community in the Muslim-majority country.
“In Malaysia there are some things we cannot accept, even though it is seen as human rights in Western countries,” Mahathir, 93, told reporters. “We cannot accept LGBT, marriage between men and men, women and women.”
His comments are likely to spark further debate in the country where activists have voiced concern over the hostility towards LGBT groups both from within society and from the administration.
Two women were caned this month for “attempting lesbian sex” in Terengganu, a conservative state in the east. Mahathir denounced the punishment, saying it “did not reflect the justice or compassion of Islam”.
Mahathir is only making this statement to pacify domestic public opinion; otherwise he is fully committed to Western values and culture, as he presides over the continuation of the system of government left behind by the British after their colonialization of Malaysia, and continues until this day to follow and protect British interests in his country and the wider region. There is nothing stopping our agent rulers from importing ever degrading Western culture except their fear of the anger of Muslims.
The West will not cease in their efforts to make man more animal than even the animals. The concept of inbuilt, inherited `sexual preferences is a complete fiction without any scientific backing. Preferences and tastes are merely shaped by the influences and norms of the society in which one lives, or by the individual in accordance with the concepts that he adopts in life. The West has undertaken a great many measures to break the family system, to individualise and atomise society, making people dependent on the state alone, thus preserving the power of the elite, and this is merely the most recent of these measures.
In contrast, Islam safeguards the family, strengthens the relations between people, minimises the role of the state, and builds genuine and sincere love between man and man, and between woman and woman, without corrupting it with narcissistic hedonism. The West cannot understand true selfless love because their egotistical culture is unable to rationalise anything other than material utilitarianism. Only Islam, revealed by the Creator (swt) of man, in full agreement with human nature, is able to promote selfless love. The Mother of Believers Aisha (ra) indicated the extent of the close bond between the noble Prophet ﷺ and her father Abu Bakr (ra), in one narration: «وَلَمْ يَمُرَّ عَلَيْنَا يَوْمٌ إِلاَّ يَأْتِينَا فِيهِ رَسُولُ اللَّهِ صلى الله عليه وسلم طَرَفَىِ النَّهَارِ بُكْرَةً وَعَشِيَّةً» “Not a day passed but the Prophet visited us, both in the mornings and evenings.” [Bukhari 465]
Conflict between UK and Europe over Brexit points to the failure of the idea of the EU
According to Reuters:
If Theresa May felt ambushed, as British media saw it, at the Salzburg EU summit, she has only herself to blame for irritating continental leaders with her stand on Brexit, EU officials and diplomats said on Friday…
Several participants spoke of anger among the leaders at an opinion column May placed in a German newspaper on the first day of the summit that flatly rejected EU negotiator Michel Barnier’s plan for avoiding a dangerous new border in Ireland.
A report that May’s hardline pro-Brexit trade minister planned to do away with EU food safety standards in order to cut a trade deal with Washington also soured the mood and dampened plans to make a show of compromise with the prime minister.
And recent efforts by traveling British ministers to try to pull individual member states away from Barnier’s common negotiating stance, as well as perceptions that May herself was trying to bypass the EU’s point man and parley directly with her peers in Salzburg, also backfired, prompting the 27 others to rally even more closely together and behind Barnier.
Harsh language on either side, and the fighting talk May came out with on Friday in response could increase the chance of talks collapsing and Britain quitting the bloc in March without a deal to ease economic disruption, some diplomats said.
Europe, the birthplace of the Peace of Westphalia that provided the framework for the modern nation-state concept, continues to suffer its consequences. The European Union was supposed to finally bring some degree of unity to Europe but its short-troubled existence has only further confirmed the deep divisions between the nations of Europe. It is not possible to make the ‘nation state’ work without the philosophical fiction of national identity and the destructive impulses of nationalism.
Islam recognises the existence of families and tribes related by blood but not of geographically defined nations somehow linked by common language or history. Islam is the one true Deen that is not dependent on fictional beliefs or fanatical passions despite the propaganda against it. It is rather the West that holds to such things despite professing civil rationality. With Allah’s permission, the world will soon see the re-established Islamic Khilafah (Caliphate) State on the method of the Prophet ﷺ that shall rebuild a civilisation that unifies man with man in his path towards renaissance, seeking the pleasure only of Allah (swt) and the good of this world and the hereafter.
Theresa May Demands Respect from EU after Brexit Humiliation
UK Prime Minister Theresa May said Friday that negotiations with the European Union were “at an impasse” after a disastrous summit at which her Brexit plan was largely rejected. May struck a defiant tone during a Downing Street statement in which she called for the European Union to “respect” the British position and the result of the June 2016 referendum. A day after returning from the summit in Salzburg, she called for the EU to spell out its objections to her plan or come up with an alternative. “Throughout this process, I have treated the EU with nothing but respect. The UK expects the same. A good relationship at the end of this process depends on it,” she said. Downing Street had hoped the informal Salzburg summit would pave the way to a resolution of outstanding issues in Brexit talks before a formal meeting in October. Instead, the leaders of the 27 remaining EU nations were unexpectedly resolute in their opposition to her proposals. Donald Tusk, President of the European Council, said key aspects of the plan, agreed at the Prime Minister’s Chequers country retreat in July, “will not work” in their current form. French President Emmanuel Macron went even further, saying that the entire Brexit project was sold to the British people by “liars” who immediately fled the stage, unwilling to see their project through. In her Downing Street statement, May refused to budge and said the ball was in the EU’s court. “At this late stage in the negotiations, it is not acceptable to simply reject the other side’s proposals without a detailed explanation and counter proposals,” she said. “So we now need to hear from the EU what the real issues are and what their alternative is so that we can discuss them. Until we do, we cannot make progress. In the meantime, we must and will continue the work of preparing ourselves for no deal.” May will face tough questions at her Conservative Party’s annual conference, which begins September 30. [Source: CNN]
From the outset, May has struggled to forge a unified position over brexit has she has fought tooth and nail to appease three interest groups: the conservative party, industrialist supports of May and the electorate. This weakness has served only to strengthen the hand of the EU in the brexit talks.
Nawaz Sharif: Ex-PM and Daughter Released from Pakistan Prison
Pakistan’s former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has been released from prison, two months after he began a 10-year jail sentence for corruption. The release came hours after a court suspended the sentences of Sharif and his daughter Maryam, who were jailed shortly before July’s general election. Sharif’s Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) lost to Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) later that month. The decision came during the Sharifs’ appeal. They have denied wrongdoing. The car carrying Sharif, his daughter and son-in-law Safdar Awan was showered with rose petals by supporters as their convoy left Adiala jail. Sharif was sentenced in July after being found guilty of corrupt practices related to the ownership of four luxury properties in central London linked to his family. He says the charges are politically motivated. The three-time prime minister was ousted from power a year earlier by Pakistan’s Supreme Court, after his children were linked to offshore companies in the Panama Papers leaks of 2015. His daughter, Maryam Nawaz Sharif, received seven years for abetting a crime and one year for not co-operating – sentences which were due to run concurrently – while son-in-law Safdar Awan was given a one-year sentence for not co-operating. The convictions also barred them from seeking public office for up to 10 years after release. All three had the jail sentences imposed by the lower court on 6 July suspended by Islamabad’s high court, as part of an appeals hearing. “The prosecution has failed to show the properties belong to Nawaz Sharif. It also failed to prove how was Maryam Nawaz sentenced under the same charge sheet which convicted Nawaz Sharif,” Justice Athar Minallah told the court. Their convictions remain under appeal within the top court, but a date for a hearing has yet to be fixed. The anti-graft body that launched the case, the National Accountability Bureau, can still appeal to the Supreme Court against the latest ruling. The trio were released on bail of $4,000 each on Wednesday evening. [Source: BBC]
Nawaz’s release coincides with Khan’s meeting with US Secretary of state and his visit to Saudi Arabia. One may recall that under Musharraf’s rule, the US and Saudi Arabia also obtained the release Sharif from prison. The deal brokered at the time was that Sharif would live in exile and not partake in Pakistani politics. Is a similar deal on the table? And what happened to Imran Khan’s pledges of eradicating poverty.
China is Treating Islam like a Mental Illness
One million Muslims are being held right now in Chinese internment camps, according to estimates cited by the UN and U.S. officials. Former inmates—most of whom are Uighurs, a largely Muslim ethnic minority—have told reporters that over the course of an indoctrination process lasting several months, they were forced to renounce Islam, criticize their own Islamic beliefs and those of fellow inmates, and recite Communist Party propaganda songs for hours each day. There are media reports of inmates being forced to eat pork and drink alcohol, which are forbidden to Muslims, as well as reports of torture and death. The sheer scale of the internment camp system, which according to The Wall Street Journal has doubled in China’s northwestern Xinjiang region just within the last year, is mindboggling. The U.S. Congressional-Executive Commission on China describes it as “the largest mass incarceration of a minority population in the world today.” Beijing began by targeting Uighur extremists, but now even benign manifestations of Muslim identity—like growing a long beard—can get a Uighur sent to a camp, the Journal noted. Earlier this month, when a UN panel confronted a senior Chinese official about the camps, he said there are “no such things as reeducation centers,” even though government documents refer to the facilities that way. Instead, he claimed they’re just vocational schools for criminals. China has long feared that Uighurs will attempt to establish their own national homeland in Xinjiang, which they refer to as East Turkestan. In 2009, ethnic riots there resulted in hundreds of deaths, and some radical Uighurs have carried out terrorist attacks in recent years. Chinese officials have claimed that in order to suppress the threat of Uighur separatism and extremism, the government needs to crack down not only on those Uighurs who show signs of having been radicalized, but on a significant swath of the population. The medical analogy is one way the government tries to justify its policy of large-scale internment: After all, attempting to inoculate a whole population against, say, the flu, requires giving flu shots not just to the already-afflicted few, but to a critical mass of people. In fact, using this rhetoric, China has tried to defend a system of arrest quotas for Uighurs. Police officers confirmed to Radio Free Asia that they are under orders to meet specific population targets when rounding up people for internment. In one township, police officials said they were being ordered to send 40 percent of the local population to the camps. [Source: The Atlantis]
No matter how hard China tries to suppress Islam, Allah will make His Deen prevail. هُوَ الَّذِي أَرْسَلَ رَسُولَهُ بِالْهُدَى وَدِينِ الْحَقِّ لِيُظْهِرَهُ عَلَى الدِّينِ كُلِّهِ وَلَوْ كَرِهَ الْمُشْرِكُونَ “It is He Who has sent His Rasool with guidance and true Deen (faith) to make it prevail over all other deens (faiths) even though the mushrikin may hate it.” [Al Tawbah:33]