religion

Saudi epigraphist Mohammed Almaghthawi (@mohammed93athar) has published some rock inscriptions from around Medina in western Arabia that are dated to 769, which speak of an epidemic outbreak in that year. This outbreak is otherwise unknown to historians. The inscriptions ask God to deliver them from this calamity, and clearly take pride in the city of […]

Antisemitism

Knowledge of the Holocaust wanes for Millennials, Gen Z, Even as Anti-Semitism Rises

Cronkite News Arizona PBS

By Jonmaesha Beltran | – (Cronkite News) – PHOENIX – Seventy-five years after the atrocities of Auschwitz, memories of the Holocaust are fading for younger generations who learn little about genocides in school, according to education advocates who believe they have the answer: Make it Arizona law to teach about the horrors of the Nazi’s […]

Entertainment

Arif “The Greatest Ears in Town” Mardin: How a Turkish Muslim Nurtured the Music of Aretha Franklin, Dione Warwick, and Nora Jones

Shalom Goldman

Middlebury, VT (Special to Informed Comment) – In the mid-twentieth century many American jazz musicians converted to Islam . Some took Muslim names ( Ahmed Jamal and Yusef Lateef) ; others identified as Muslim but kept their Christian names (Art Blakey, McCoy Tyner). These musicians helped shape the sound of American music and no less […]

Fundamentalism

Could Instability in Lebanon Further Strengthen Hezbollah, or Will the Sectarian order Collapse?

Tareq A. Ramadan

Detroit (Special to Informed Comment) – Since its inception as a French mandate at the San Remo Conference in 1920, Lebanon has lived on the cusp of chaos economically, militarily, and politically. For many, life in the mountainous country has been synonymous with major political crises (like the events of 1958 and Operation Blue Bat, […]

Arab Americans

With Bernie Sanders in Dearborn, Arab-Americans and Muslim-Americans take the Political Stage

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Bernie Sanders’ rally at Dearborn, Michigan with a crowd that included Arab-Americans, on stage and off, was a frontal attack on one of the last permissible prejudices in America. Media personalities have been fired (and rightly so) for bigoted public statements about African-Americans and other minorities. But Arab-Americans and Muslim-Americans […]

Bill of Rights

From Stoning Gays to Endorsing Slavery: The Problem with Bible Classes in State Schools

James A. Haught

(Syndicated to Informed Comment) – Here in Appalachia’s Bible Belt, conservatives in the Legislature want to force all West Virginia public high schools to teach Bible classes, as occurs in several other Republican-controlled states. I wonder how such classes handle Bible topics like these: First, the Bible decrees that gay males must be killed. Leviticus […]

Assyrians

Trump Administration Says Iraq is Dangerous for Christians, until it Wants to Deport Them

ProPublica

By Yeganeh Torbati | – To deport Iraqi Christians, Trump’s immigration officials rely on testimony saying they won’t be at particular risk. But to justify funding and attention, officials elsewhere in the administration say the Christians face grave danger. (ProPublica) – Even as U.S. immigration officials have pushed to deport hundreds of Iraqi Christians over […]

Displaced and Refugees

Targeting Muslims, India is Abolishing Birthright Citizenship

The Conversation

By Rahul Sambaraju and Suryapratim Roy | – The fallout from two controversial changes to citizenship laws continues to rock India. At least 35 people have died in sectarian violence in New Delhi which began on February 23. Muslims homes and businesses have been attacked and mosques vandalised by mobs. All schools in the capital […]

Inscriptions

The Prophet Muhammad’s Wives and Muslim Women in Early Arabian Rock Inscriptions

Juan Cole

Ahmad Bin Ghanim al-Ida’ published a photograph of an inscription he found south of al-Ula (near ancient Hijr) in Saudi Arabia. It was picked up and transcribed by Saudi archeologist Mohammed al-Maghthawi. The inscription says, “God, forgive Muhammad the Prophet, and join with him his wives, and, God, forgive the male and female believers, and […]