Islam

YouTubers will be let down by the Queen of Jordan

Julien — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 16:05:29 +0200

The latest member of the YouTube community is none other than Queen Rania of Jordan. In an effort to challenge western stereotypes about the Arab world, the net-surfing monarch decided to launch an online debate. Yet, after attracting almost 5000 responses, she seems to have lost interest in the scheme.

Fitna is just a really bad film

Julien — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 15:50:52 +0100

A few months ago we announced that Dutch politician Geert Wilders was preparing an anti-Islamic film that would "add fuel to the fire". Yesterday, the long awaited video made its debut online. We ask our Observers what effects it might have in their countries, from Holland to Pakistan. After all the fuss, maybe not that much.

The film was supposed to be released on a specially created website, but the American company Network Solutions, which manages domain names worldwide, refused to allow Wilders to use Fitnathemovie.com. So the rightwing party leader decided to use the viral method instead. The film was released at 7pm last night on several internet platforms. "Non-censored" video sharing site LiveLeak was the first to host it, followed by Google Video. Rightwing blogs then posted the URLs so that people could find it. Wilders knew to use peer to peer networks (Kazaa, eMule etc) so that the video was soon all over the Internet in various formats. His was a clever move, as such networks are notoriously difficult to censor. In just three hours, the film had been watched more than a million times on LiveLeak alone, and three million by the following afternoon, which probably makes it one of the fastest selling videos on the net.

"Obama never studied in an Islamic madrassa"

Julien — Tue, 11 Mar 2008 16:09:38 +0100

Rully Dasaad, a fellow pupil at Barack Obama's primary school - labeled as an "Islamic madrassa" by the conservative American media - tells us about their childhood growing up in Jakarta, Indonesia, and the polemic that it's causing now.

First, a look at the democratic candidate's early youth: in 1961, when Barack Obama was a baby, his parents divorced. His mother remarried with Indonesian Lolo Soetero, before moving the family to Jakarta in 1967, where Obama's half-sister Maya Soetoro was born. "Barry", as his friends called him there, was then six. The family was comfortable, but not rich enough to send the future senator to the capital's international school, where most expat children went. So Obama studied for two years at the Catholic school Fransiskus Assisis, before joining the state primary school SDN Besuki Menteng 01, where he also stayed for two years. This small state school located in a pretty district of the capital would become the centre of American media attention in January 2007, when Insight Magazine declared it an Islamic madrassa establishment. In 1971, and after four years in Asia, Barack Obama headed to Hawaii to be brought up by his grandparents. He never returned to the Indonesian islands, but his former school friends still remember him.

Post written with the help of our Observer in Jakarta, Dyssia Hayat.

A film to fuel the fire

Julien — Tue, 26 Feb 2008 12:29:10 +0100

An image of the Koran taken from the film. The text says: “Warning: this book contains shocking images”. Published 26 Jan. 08 by De Telegraaf

Article compiled with the help of our Observer in Holland, Carl Konigel.

This Friday the Pakistani authorities ordered a countrywide block on YouTube. According to an official quoted by AP, this radical measure was put in place to stop anyone from seeing the trailer of Geert Wilders' new film. However, not one shot of the film is available on YouTube. Only Dutch daily De Telegraaf has received the images, and they have so far only published a few screenshots on their site. So, despite no one having yet seen the film, every one from Holland to Pakistan is dreading it and the fuel it will add to an already-raging fire.

Ashura around the world

Julien — Mon, 21 Jan 2008 17:59:02 +0100

Throughout the Middle East last week, Shia Muslims were dancing in the streets chanting ‘ô Hussein' in commemoration of the martyr Imam Hussein, grandson of the Prophet Muhammad, who died in 680 AD. During the ceremony, many participants had blood seeping from their backs and chests as they cut themselves with knives, whips and chains in order to share the pain of their martyr, killed in the battle of Karbala together with 72 of his family members. During the battle, said to be one of the most important in Muslim history, Hussein was defeated by the military force of Yazid I, the Umayyad caliph.

A predominantly Shia event, but also celebrated by Sunni Muslims, the festival aggravated tensions between the two sides and caused violent outbreaks in Iraq. However, the celebration of mourning went ahead as usual elsewhere- even in Washington and London- although not with quite the same flamboyance as in Middle Eastern countries. See the videos and commentary below.