* Police in Kandahar have arrested 10 men connected to the acid attacks of November 12th. President Hamid Karzai has called for the public execution of the attackers.

* Imam Samudra, Amroza Nurhasyim and Ali Ghufron - the “Bali bombers” - were executed on November 8th. The executions had been put off for some time due to security concerns in Indonesia. Jemaah Islamiyah’s steady rise in influence, which includes the ability to mobilize university-age students for disruptive demonstrations - means that an execution like this could trigger a backlash of Islamist violence. 

Thankfully, the security situation on the ground has remained stable. Increased police presence has helped, to be sure - but so has the fact that Indonesians themselves have no sympathy for terrorists - and no appreciation for the lack of remorse demonstrated by the Bali bombers.

More about the situation in Indonesia soon - including commentary on a controversial (and I think absolutely frightening) proposed measure to track HIV/AIDS patients with microchip technology.

AP Photo / CNN

 ”Kandahar is not safe. But we can’t stay at home, we want an education.” -Atifa, 16, acid attack victim - Kandahar, Afghanistan

Kandahar: this morning, two men sprayed a group of female students with acid - blinding at least two of them. It is unclear how many of the students were injured. Government spokesman Parwaz Ayoubi called the attackers “enemies of education”, suggesting that the insurgents who attacked the pupils were making a statement about the education of females.

According to Al-Jazeera’s coverage of the incident, Latefeh - one of the injured students - says that this attack will not prevent her from pursuing her education or stop her from learning. The Afghan government reinforces their commitment to education, saying that attacks like these, by “unIslamic enemies of the country” will not prevent six million children from attending school.

Unfortunately, though, schoolrooms today were largely empty. Parents have held their children home for fear that they may be attacked - and children are afraid for their safety.

See BBC coverage here.

To help:

* Learn about and support the work of Barakat.

* Check out some of the positive work being done by female educators and UNICEF.

* RAWA was founded by Afghan women for Afghan women. Educate yourself about their efforts here.

* Afghan-Network has a list of NGOs needing your help to support their work in Afghanistan, including Islamic Relief. Please click here to see this list and offer your support.

* Acid attacks are a pervasive problem. Learn about how women in Pakistan are fighting acid attacks, keeping their faith, and restoring hope.

* These attacks also happen in places like Vietnam, Cambodia, Colombia, the UK and the United States. Here is more coverage and some tips on what you can do to help.

“It’s the answer that led those who have been told for so long by so many to be cynical, and fearful, and doubtful about what we can achieve to put their hands on the arc of history and bend it once more toward the hope of a better day.”

- President-elect Barack Obama, Grant Park, Chicago

Read the full speech here.

President-elect Barack Obama

Congratulations to the man, the family, the nation and the globe.

November 4, 2008: The entrance to my polling place reflects the makeup of the surrounding community

This afternoon, I cast my ballot for Barack Obama.

Less than ten minutes after arriving my polling location, I was stating my address and handing over my identification. An enthusiastic election official complimented my passport photo and directed me to one of the many available voting booths. From behind the privacy of a partition, I made my selections. I then walked over to the optical scanning machine to insert my ballot. I was assisted by a gentleman who was ultra-cautious to look away from the paper in my hand, sending me on my way with an accented “congratulations.”

For me, there were no lines. No one tried to influence my vote by threatening my liberty, my safety or my status. Gender, race, religion, class, sexual orientation, profession, political persuasion - none of these prevented me from excercising my right to vote. Not only is my choice of candidate my secret to keep (or share!), but it also isn’t something that could cost me my citizenship or my life. Walking away, I was more or less confident that my vote was accurately counted.

My 2008 ballot

Well - duh, right? I’m in America, not one of those “other” places, where intimidation is par for the course or where women and minorities are barred from voting.

Not so fast. It isn’t all democracy and free choice here in these United States. In fact, the fight against basic American rights is not just sobering - it’s frightening.

In Virginia, flyers bearing a mockup of the state’s official seal were distributed, indicating that Democrats should actually show up to vote on Wednesday — the day after election day. Latino voters have been phoned in Nevada and elsewhere, being told that they can vote over the phone rather than by showing up at the polls. Individuals have even been threatened with jail should they show up to cast their ballots.

These attempts at thieving Americans’ rights have targeted youth and minorities - groups who have come out in overwhelming support of Barack Obama. For the Republicans, there could be no greater stain on their patriotic party line than this crime against the very principles upon which this country was founded.

Disenfranchisement is nothing new. In fact, the stories you’re hearing here and on the news only begin to scratch the surface on just how disempowering the American electoral process is for many.

For as monumental as it would be for an African-American candidate to win today’s election, it is just as significant that America’s criminal disenfranchisement laws mean that 13% of African-American men cannot vote at all. We live under a criminal justice system that already disproportionately targets black men. What this means around election time is that in some states, one in five black men is stripped of his voting rights. Human Rights Watch projects that, given current rates of incarceration, some 40% of African-American men will at some point find themselves permanently disenfranchised.

Nationwide, 1.4 million Americans (of all races) are prevented from voting - despite having already served their criminal sentences. These are ex-offenders who have re-entered society and who are expected to meet other requirements of law-abiding citizenship, including the payment of taxes.

Preventing these individuals from voting serves no defendable purpose. To argue that preventing ex-offenders from voting preserves the “virtue” of the voting booth is to say that our criminal justice system is not a place for rehabilitation or reform - but merely a “holding tank” for the subhuman. It also asserts that “virtue” is effectively a qualifier for American citizenship, including for the natural-born. Individual virtue is not the same as respect for the law, and possible governmental determination of who is “less virtuous” is a terrifying prospect.

“Restrictions on the franchise in the United States seem to be singularly unreasonable as well as racially discriminatory, in violation of democratic principles and international human rights law.” - Human Rights Watch

What can you do?

* Check out the ACLU’s website on voting rights.

* Learn more from Human Rights Watch.

* The Democratic Party provides resources here.

Yes, another Rachel Maddow video. Bear with me. I’ll quit it eventually. Wait…bullpucky. No I won’t. Enjoy:

Your girl is going to be busy over the next 24 hours - working at the Barack Obama headquarters in my area.

So let me take this time to say - get out there and vote! Don’t know where? Check out this handy tool.

To keep yourself smartly aware of election news and the latest in all other politics, check out Rachel Maddow’s MSNBC page here.

Ninjabi comics: smartly discrediting Islamophobia

In this entry, I provided several links to breaking news from the Muslim world. One of the stories was that of a young Muslim woman who had allegedly been attacked at her university. Safia Jilani, 19, claimed that a masked gunman had attacked her because she is a Muslim. Her account of being knocked unconscious in a restroom of course raised both concern and outrage. Officials put the campus on lockdown in order to conduct a thorough investigation. Campus police offered Muslim students the option of free rides and escorts if they felt unsafe navigating the campus alone. Hundreds of students held a demonstration in support of Ms. Jilani, and concerned bloggers spread the news quickly, calling for action on her behalf.

Then, police investigation determined that Ms. Jilani’s story had been fabricated - she had in fact not been attacked.

Another incident in question is the gassing of a mosque in Dayton, Ohio. It has been reported that perhaps this incident was fabricated as well.

Many non-Muslim Americans would readily acknowledge that, post-9/11, Muslims (and those thought to be one of us!) have been subject to Islamophobic backlash. Fueled by fear and often ignorance, some people have chosen to react to Muslims in negative ways - including with violence. (And good-old-fashioned capitalism). At the same time, many non-Muslims have been at the forefront of constructive initiatives to increase dialogue and understanding, including countering anti-Muslim sentiment in their communities. These allies aren’t just joining us in denouncing crimes against Muslims. They’re also risking ostracization within their own circles for doing what’s right. Don’t we owe them due respect by acting with integrity ourselves?

I mention the latest developments in these two cases not just to keep you updated - but also to caution our own against crying wolf.

If the blatantly Islamophobic, ridiculous and divisive campaign to convince us all that Barack Obama is a “stealth Muslim” out to “destroy Israel” and the American way of life tells us anything — it’s that what Muslims need is not just better representation in the public eye. We also need the help of reasonable non-Muslims who are willing to decry and combat this kind of absurdity. (Hey, Colin Powell - thanks! And Campbell Brown - shukran!)

The question becomes: can we expect our allies to continue taking risks for us when they find out about made-up cases of anti-Muslim violence? What could be more alienating to well-intentioned non-Muslims than pulling stunts involving tall tales of oppression? The truth is, anti-Muslim sentiment does exist. As do sexism, racism, and plenty of other “isms” ready to compromise a just society (not to mention ruin your day). Let’s not risk our cries falling on deaf ears, tired from stories like the above.

Do something constructive to combat discrimination: check out this organization’s work.

…and the ever-talented Suheir Hammad. She’s got the support of Muslims and non-Muslims by using art for change.

For months before their father allegedly murdered them, Sarah and Amina Said confided in their friends about the threats he had made against their lives. Classmates remember the girls showing up to school with “welts and bruises”, getting in trouble for talking to non-Muslim boys and for acting “too Western.”

Despite these signs of danger, no one intervened before the girls were found dead in their father’s taxicab in Texas. Shot to death on New Year’s Day, the girls had already tried escaping when their father threatened them with a firearm earlier.

In December of 2007, the girls and their mother temporarily fled when their father, Yaser Said, was enraged to find out that the girls had non-Muslim boyfriends. They were lured back home by promises that no harm would come to them upon their return.

Now, the FBI is calling the murders a possible case of a double ”honor killing“ - making the deaths of Sarah and Amina Said the first time the FBI has used the term. The FBI’s recognition of honor killings is significant in at least one respect: understanding “honor” could help law enforcement officials better identify the motivation behind slayings like these.

But how does this help Sarah and Amina Said? Theoretically, understanding honor killings would increase community sensitivity about the kinds of threats the Said sisters were experiencing.

Unfortunately for Sarah and Amina, this is a case of too little, too late. While I believe that it is crucial for law enforcement officials at every level to understand cultural motivations for murder, it seems that the issue here was not that their community didn’t understand honor killings. The issue, rather, was relativism in the face of obvious abuse.

I’ve often called out the Muslim community for not doing enough about honor killings. This time, however, I take issue with my fellow Americans. A Muslim man may be to blame for the killings of Sarah and Amina Said - but it is not just his hands that are bloodied now. Indeed, those who knew of the danger the girls were in are guilty as well.

The girls arrived at school with welts and bruises. Friends and family knew that when Sarah and Amina said their father was “going to kill” them - it was very likely that he was serious. The girls’ non-Muslim family members now champion themselves as knowing “all along” that the girls would eventually be murdered by their father, and that it would in fact be an honor killing.

Whose “culture” is to blame this time? Texas law requires anyone who suspects that a child is being abused to report the case to the Department of Family and Protective Services. This document, on display where the girls attended school, provides the contact information necessary to anonymously report cases of child abuse. Further, according to both Texas law and the school policy, anyone who fails to report a possible case of child abuse is committing a crime.

So, what gives? It seems that everyone knew that the girls were in danger. They weren’t isolated from extended family - including non-Muslim relatives who were concerned about their father’s violence and railed against his “culture”. Why didn’t these informed individuals stop at nothing to get the girls out of there? It can’t be possible that any reasonable individual would call this a “cultural” or “family issue” and step aside.

Unless, of course, they were engaging the very worst of American culture: relativism. It got the best of us when communities and authorities called domestic violence a “private matter” and when we waited to intervene in Bosnia. It makes us lazy cowards when it tells us that we have no place in the conversation about female genital cutting, even when it happens on our own soil. And now it’s cost Sarah and Amina their lives.

Many are ready to make “other” cultures out to be evil, dangerous or scary. But if we can’t take action to assist those in danger right here - it is our attitudes and our inaction that are dangerous and even deadly.

It is too late for Sarah and Amina. But it needn’t be too late for other young women in danger - if we recognize and heed our responsibility to help them. We have every resource before us and no reason to remain silent.

Take action:

* Learn about the International Campaign Against Honour Killings

* Check out the resources available in your area. If you’re in Maryland, a new Muslim women’s shelter has just opened.

* Find the right person to call by seeing lists like this one, provided by the Feminist Majority Foundation.

As always, Muslimah Media Watch brings us the latest in news from the Muslim world, focusing on women’s issues. Check out this week’s (very thorough) update. Some selections:

* Women have started a group called Sisters Against Violent Extremism. The idea? Courageous dialogue will not just transgress national boundaries - but mobilize women to make positive change. They’re redefining the conversation from Sri Lanka to New York. Stay updated by subscribing to their newsletter.

* If you’re already at the Women Without Borders website, you’ll see a link to Men for Change. They feel that “to be free means being equal in every way” - and they’re taking on issues from honor killings in Pakistan to domestic violence in the United States. Mashallah.

* Iran steps up threats against Shirin Ebadi.

* A community in Uganda has banned female genital cutting. Community leaders are petitioning the country’s government to ban the practice nationwide. They’re not waiting around for the United Nation’s goal to “significantly reduce” female genital cutting by 2015.

* A Muslim woman was brutally attacked on her campus in Chicago. This follows a string of anti-Muslim incidents at the school, including the vandalism of the young woman’s locker with hate speech.

Check out the rest of MMW’s weekly links here.

Dear readers:

I hope this latest post finds you well. I apologize for my silence over the past few weeks - with Ramadan’s arrival came some personal challenges, and your girl’s in a tough spot! In the coming days and weeks, however, I will do my best to keep this blog properly updated inshallah. If you’ve emailed me, though - it will be a while before I’m able to respond adequately. My apologies and please bear with me.

I hope that all who are observing have had a blessed Ramadan. To those who have emailed me this question - yes, I fast during Ramadan. Curious about Ramadan? Read here for more information.

Also, a blessed Rosh Hashanah to our Jewish brothers and sisters.

This past Friday, members of the Islamic Society of Greater Dayton, Ohio, were forced to evacuate their mosque during maghrib prayers. Someone - no one is sure who - allegedly released a “chemical irritant” through the windows of the mosque. Two people were hospitalized, and several were treated at the scene for troubled breathing and burning eyes.  This incident occurred just days after DVDs of “Obsession: Radical Islam’s War Against the West” were distributed free-of-charge in the city’s newspapers, alongside a paid advertising campaign about the film, which is being distributed in more than 70 papers nationwide. (To learn about the film, click here).

Further investigation hasn’t turned up anything conclusive just yet. While emergency personnel reported a suspicious odor in the basement of the building, they also said that there was no indication of this being a hate crime. You know - despite it targeting a specific religious group, in a building designated for the gathering of that group, during a major religious holiday.

* See Aziz Poonawalla’s take on the incident here.

* NPR reports on the organization responsible for distributing DVDs of “Obsession”.

(photo: Shawn Baldwin for the New York Times)

This morning, a large portion of a stone cliff fell and toppled apartment buildings in one of Cairo’s poorest neighborhoods. At least 24 people are dead, and it is feared that hundreds of people, including entire families, are still trapped beneath the rubble. Officials have been slow in responding to the disaster - which has struck mainly working class families living in substandard conditions to begin with.

Read more here and here. Above all, please take a moment to keep Cairo in your thoughts and prayers this Ramadan.

I’ve gotten a few emails asking about where I’ve been - fret not! I’m traveling over the next week and a half to resolve some personal matters. I have really limited ‘net access, but will be back soon (inshallah)!

Irum Saeed, survivor of an acid attack (photo: MSNBC)

My post on acid attacks in Pakistan was viewed 4,000 times in less than 24 hours. No post of mine has ever gotten that much traffic so quickly. The post quickly skyrocketed to seven thousand and counting. While reactions have been mixed, many of you are taking action. Thank you.

Emails have continued to come in, asking about the welfare of Pakistan’s women. While so many accounts are bleak, I was referred to a story last night that I need to share with you.

Meet Saira Liaqat and Urooj Akbar, who work at a Lahore beauty salon founded by Massarat Misbah. They are acid attack survivors who have found new promise after experiencing the unthinkable.

Massarat Misbah is not an acid attack survivor herself. However, five years ago, she encountered a woman whose face had been maimed in an attack by her husband. The woman needed assistance, and Misbah came to her aide. She also placed an ad in a local newspaper looking for other women who needed help. Misbah learned that several of the women who had been maimed had wanted to work in beauty salons like her own.

Since then, Misbah has founded the Depilex Smileagain Foundation, which employs acid attack survivors to work in beauty salons. She has arranged for ten women take beauty courses in Italy last year. The Foundation also raises money to help women find refuge and obtain medical care.

“I’m independent now, I stand on my own two feet,” she says. “I have a job, I work, I earn. In fact, I’m living on my own … which isn’t an easy thing for a woman to do in Pakistan, for a lone woman to survive.”

- Urooj Akbar

Regular clients of these women are inspired by their resilience, and they also say that they’re more aware of the trials faced by women in their society.

Read the rest of their story here, and learn more about the Depilex Smileagain Foundation here.

***

PS: I know I owe you some Jumu’ah Dispatches! I’ll get on it as soon as I can. I also received a comment from a reader asking me some really interesting questions about human rights, liberalism, and more. Rather than answer it buried in a comments section of another post, I’ll dedicate an entry to my answer when I’ve got more time on my hands.