January 29- February 4

Is the FBI Spying on Muslims? Court Decides Bureau Doesn't Have to Reveal Surveillance of Muslim Americans

Is the FBI Spying on Muslims? Court Decides Bureau Doesn't Have to Reveal Surveillance of Muslim Americans

Newsweek

A federal appeals court overturned a lower court’s ruling that would have compelled the FBI to release documents describing the agency’s spying on the Muslim population.
Read More

No longer the voice of the Arabs: The rise and fall of Egyptian Arabic

No longer the voice of the Arabs: The rise and fall of Egyptian Arabic

The Economist

The once ascendant Egyptian dialect of Arabic has lost ground to the rising popularity of other dialects in Middle Eastern media.
Read More

‘Bilal’ review: Ancient story of a real-life Muslim hero is pretty but feels like theology class

‘Bilal’ review: Ancient story of a real-life Muslim hero is pretty but feels like theology class

Washington Post

Jane Horwitz reviews the $30 million dollar animated biography of Bilal, a companion of the Prophet. The picture is the first animated CGI project produced in Dubai.
Read More

Senior AfD Member Vows To Ban Islam Across Europe, Starting From Istanbul’s Bosporus

Senior AfD Member Vows To Ban Islam Across Europe, Starting From Istanbul’s Bosporus

Daily Sabah

To ‘live their lives freely,’ A senior member of the anti-Islam, right-wing AfD vowed that once the party comes to power, they would ban Islam starting from the Bosphorus in Istanbul- where the continent begins.
Read More

‘Halal’ Internet Means More Control In Iran After Unrest

‘Halal’ Internet Means More Control In Iran After Unrest

AP News

Iranian authorities are continuing their work on their National Internet Network in the aftermath of protests, aiming to balance modern Internet access with the state’s Islamic principles.
Read More

H&M Recall a Range of Socks After Pattern Appears to Resemble the Word Allah Written in Arabic Upside-Down

H&M Recall a Range of Socks After Pattern Appears to Resemble the Word Allah Written in Arabic Upside-Down

The Independent UK

According to a company spokesperson, the pattern, meant to represent a Lego figurine, unintentionally resembled Allah when held upside-down.
Read More

Why The Trump Administration Is Trying To Make Muslim Immigrants Seem Dangerous

Why The Trump Administration Is Trying To Make Muslim Immigrants Seem Dangerous

Washington Post

Despite clear evidence and the complex delicacies of terrorism and bigotry, the Trump Administration is continuing to push the narrative that immigrants, particularly Muslims, are incompatible and dangerous to American society.
Read More

EXCLUSIVE: US Pastor Who Led Prayers at Trump's Inauguration Says the West is At War With Muslims As He Warns Freedom of Speech Is At Risk Following Campaign To Ban Him From The UK

EXCLUSIVE: US Pastor Who Led Prayers at Trump's Inauguration Says the West is At War With Muslims As He Warns Freedom of Speech Is At Risk Following Campaign To Ban Him From The UK

Daily Mail

U.S. based Pastor Franklin Graham, in a controversial statement, claims that ‘the West is at war with Islam as a whole,’ among other Islamophobic remarks, in a problematic response to seeing a proposal to ban him from the U.K.
Read More

US Census Fails to Add MENA Category: Arabs to Remain 'White' in Count

US Census Fails to Add MENA Category: Arabs to Remain 'White' in Count

Middle East Eye

The U.S. government has not added a MENA designation in the Census, meaning that people from the region will continue to be demographically categorized as ‘white.’
Read More

Malaysia’s Top Court Annuls Unilateral Conversions of Minors

Malaysia’s Top Court Annuls Unilateral Conversions of Minors

AP News

Malaysia’s top court decreed that both parents must consent to the religious conversion of a minor, ruling unanimously in favor of a Hindu woman whose ex-husband converted their three children to Islam without telling her.
Read More

Many Muslim Refugees Will Face Additional Scrutiny Under Trump Plan

Many Muslim Refugees Will Face Additional Scrutiny Under Trump Plan

NY Times

The Trump Administration said it is resuming the admission of refugees from eleven countries with additional screening that it said will increase security but which refugee groups say will make it harder for Muslims to find safe haven in the U.S.
Read More

Afghan Clerical Council Condemns Wave of Deadly Attacks

Afghan Clerical Council Condemns Wave of Deadly Attacks

AP News

About one hundred Afghan clerics gathered to condemn the attacks for targeting the innocent, but refused to discuss the revival of Islamic militants in Afghanistan.
Read More

Indian Muslim Cleric Says Women Watching Soccer Un-Islamic

Indian Muslim Cleric Says Women Watching Soccer Un-Islamic

AP News

A senior cleric at an influential Islamic seminary in northern India has issued a religious decree saying that Muslim women should not watch men playing soccer, citing moral reasons.
Read More

Linda Sarsour: Trump’s Anti-Muslim Rhetoric Helps Unite America Against Him

Linda Sarsour: Trump’s Anti-Muslim Rhetoric Helps Unite America Against Him

Time

Speaking on the events from the Presidency over the past year, Women’s March co-chair Linda Sarsour says the divisive rhetoric of President Trump’s has provided the necessary platform for Americans to unite to against him.
Read More

Oxford Islamic Academic In Custody In France On Rape Accusations

Oxford Islamic Academic In Custody In France On Rape Accusations

Reuters

Prominent academic Tariq Ramadan, a professor of Islamic studies at the University of Oxford, has been taken into custody by French police following accusations of rape, a judicial source said.
Read More

Indonesia's Conservative Aceh Orders Headscarves For Muslim Flight Attendants

Indonesia's Conservative Aceh Orders Headscarves For Muslim Flight Attendants

AP News

The only province to implement Islamic law, authorities in Aceh, Indonesia order that female flight attendants wear headscarves when flying in.
Read More

Accused Philly Cop Shooter Said He 'thought about Allah' As He Pulled Trigger

Accused Philly Cop Shooter Said He 'thought about Allah' As He Pulled Trigger

Philadelphia Inquirer

Looking to close a case on a Philadelphia policeman’s shooting, investigators are questions the authenticity of the officers claim of Islamist religious motivation.
Read More

Ghana Sisters Blending style, tradition for Muslim women

Ghana Sisters Blending style, tradition for Muslim women

AP News

Looking to find a balance between vibrant, west-African fashion and Islamic dress code, two sisters in Ghana are creating Islamic-friendly fashion from the locally produced fabrics that are wildly popular across West Africa.
Read More

German Nationalist, Muslim Convert: Politician is both

German Nationalist, Muslim Convert: Politician is both

AP News

Addressing the media over the news of his conversion, member of the right-wing German AfD Arthur Wagner says he is ‘deadly serious’ over ‘creating a consensus between German Islam and conservative Germans.’
Read More

Hijabs Held Aloft As Iranian Women Protest Compulsory Cover-Up

Hijabs Held Aloft As Iranian Women Protest Compulsory Cover-Up

Reuters

Fighting the ideology behind the compulsory hijab, Iranian women, lead by activist Masih Alinejad, are holding their hijabs aloft across social media.
Read More

Why Thomas Jefferson Owned a Qur’an

Why Thomas Jefferson Owned a Qur’an

Smithsonian Magazine

The presence of a Qur’an translation in Thomas Jefferson’s library is only part of a much larger Islamic and Muslim presence in the United States’ early history.
Read More

Hijab: Denial of Right To Hijab Is War Against Islam – Al-Muminaat

Hijab: Denial of Right To Hijab Is War Against Islam – Al-Muminaat

Vanguard

Addressing journalists at a press conference to commemorate the World Hijab Day at its headquarters, leader of Al-Muminaat warned that various incidences of discriminations, denials, persecutions, profiling, harassments in public institutions of wearing the Hijab must stop forthwith.
Read More

This Is What Life Is Like Under Sharia Law

This Is What Life Is Like Under Sharia Law

Vice

Travelling to Banda Aceh, Indonesia, where Sharia police roam the streets to punish and report people drinking or gambling, Vice News investigates the nature of Sharia and society, and connections to terrorism.
Read More

Man convicted of murder over van attack on Muslims in London

Man convicted of murder over van attack on Muslims in London

Washington Post

Saying ‘I want to kill more Muslims,’ a man who steeped himself in far-right, anti-Muslim ideas before driving a van into a crowd of worshippers near a north London mosque was convicted Thursday of murder and attempted murder.
Read More

'Brainwashed' children of Islamist fighters worry Germany: spy chief

'Brainwashed' children of Islamist fighters worry Germany: spy chief

Reuters

Germany’s domestic intelligence chief wants the government to review laws restricting the surveillance of minors to guard against the children of Islamist fighters returning to the country as “sleeper agents” who could carry out attacks.
Read More

How Muslim Women Use Fashion To Exert Political Influence

How Muslim Women Use Fashion To Exert Political Influence

The Atlantic

Muslim women can use their dress both to signify piety or religiosity and as a political statement, according to a scholar on religious garb in Iran, Turkey, and Indonesia.
Read More

Sharia marriages should be registered under UK law, says independent review

Sharia marriages should be registered under UK law, says independent review

The Independent

In light of many women having suffered under the incongruity of having their Sharia marriages officially recognized, Muslims should undergo a civil marriage as well as a religious ceremony to make sure women are protected under the law, an independent review of Sharia councils has said.
Read More

Dave Eggers’ The Monk of Mokha: A Portal Into America’s Love Affair With Qahwa

Dave Eggers’ The Monk of Mokha: A Portal Into America’s Love Affair With Qahwa

The Islamic Monthly

A review of Dave Eggers’ new non-fiction book, and Pultizer Prize finalist, on the history of coffee and Mokhtar Alkhanshali’s coffee business in Yemen.
Read More

Muslim Women Are Trending, but Some of Us Are Still Invisible

Muslim Women Are Trending, but Some of Us Are Still Invisible

Rewire

Muslim women in the public eye do not match the broad diversity of Muslim women, a population with a diversity in ethnicity, dress, and piety.
Read More

The Sufi-Salafi Rift

The Sufi-Salafi Rift

Carnegie Endowment for International Peace

Salafist attacks on Libyan Sufis have increased in recent months, driven by socio-economic, political, and doctrinal differences.
Read More

Trump nominee for U.N. migration post called Muslims violent, Christians top priority

Trump nominee for U.N. migration post called Muslims violent, Christians top priority

Washington Post

Ken Isaacs, the administration’s nominee for director general of the United Nations’ International Organization for Migration, or IOM, has made controversial Islamophobic remarks on social media accounts and has shown a history of climate change denial.
Read More

 

Maydan editors selected some of the most thought-provoking news items on issues around Islam, religion and public-life for you. Let us know what you have been reading. Drop us a line at mediaroundups@themaydan.com!