IslamicLawBlog

The film "Fitna" is an assault on the religion of Islam. It wounds deeply-held spiritual feelings of millions of Muslims around the world. It is a call for hatred and discrimination aginst Muslims in the Netherlands and elsewhere in Europe. Made by a race-supremacist Dutch parliamentarian, the film argues that the Quran incites violence. The Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance, and other UN experts, have condemned the film in the following words: "While on the one hand, freedom of expression is a fundamental human right that must be respected, it does not extend to include incitement to racial or religious hatred which is itself clearly a violation of human rights. Public expressions that paint adherents of a particular religion as a threat to peace or global stability are irresponsible." The European Union (EU), however, has drawn an opposite conclusion from that of the UN experts. While co...

Pakistan's newly-elected Parliament meets on Monday, March 17, to form a new government. Monday is "democracy day" ending the eight years of military rule. Former Army Chief Pervez Musharraf, however, refuses to step down and claims to be the nation's lawful President. Close to a two-thirds majority of the Parliament and an overwhelming majority of lawyers of Pakistan see Musharraf as a usurper. Facing a hostile Parliament and an uncompromising Bar, Musharraf would offer to make a deal. He would relinquish power if he could safely leave the country (and perhaps fly away to the United States). This essay argues that Pakistan's Parliament must not pardon Musharraf, openly or secretly. The people of Pakistan want their day in court. Read More

If the winning parties in Pakistan will fight the American war on terror, they will be welcome as moderate parties. If the new government will say no to "the war on terror" and make an effort to bring peace to the nation, it will come under economic and military pressure to change. Unfortunately, some (not all) US policymakers prefer that Muslim governments fight and kill "extremists and radicals." This is a recipe for internal strife and civil war. Pakistan needs to wake up, as must all Muslim nations, to say NO to the genocidal "war on terror." Consultation, negotiation, conciliation, and arbitration are the Islamic methods of dispute resolution. These are also the methods of international law. These methods are mandatory when disputes are among Muslims. Hopefully, the winning political parties in Pakistan will use these methods to resolve internal disputes. Read More

Sloganeers, propagandists and politicians often use the word "genocide" in ways that the law does not permit. But rarely is the crime of genocide invoked when Western militaries murder Muslim groups. This essay argues that the internationally recognized crime of genocide applies to the intentional killings that NATO troops commit on a weekly basis in the poor villages and mute mountains of Afghanistan to destroy the Taliban, a puritanical Islamic group. NATO combat troops bombard and kill people in Taliban enclaves and meeting places. They also murder defenseless Afghan civilians. The dehumanized label of "Taliban" is used to cloak the nameless victims of NATO operations. Some political opposition to this practice is building in NATO countries, such as Canada, where calls are heard to withdraw troops from Afghanistan or divert them to non-combat tasks. Read the complete essay

The Hollywood has turned the novel, The Kite Runner , written by an Afghan-American into a movie. The picturesque movie, more than the prosaic novel, strives hard to sow the seeds of ethnic hatred, sectarian hostility, and possibly violence between diverse national groups of Afghanistan. According to the story, the Sunni bully rapes the Shia boy. The Sunni rapist belongs to the dominant ethnic group, called Pushtuns. The sodomized boy is the member of a minority ethnic group, known as Hazarajat. When the Taliban come to power, the Sunni rapist joins the puritanical movement and becomes a state official---but continues to rape boys. To perhaps make the story attractive to Hollywood filmmakers, the Sunni rapist bully---blond and blue-eyed---is shown to be the son of Afghan father and German mother—a crude suggestion that when Muslims marry Germans, demons are born. The movie is presumably hate speech, allowed under the First Amendment of the United States Constitution. It is unclear whet...

Tuesday, September 25, 2007 Ali Khan [Washburn University School of Law]: Lee C. Bollinger is what you may call crème de la crème. His credentials as a law professor, a legal scholar of the First Amendment, the former dean of the University of Michigan Law School, and now the President of Columbia University have been incredible. With these many feathers in his cap, one would bet Bollinger has mastered the art of dignified advocacy. His indecorous manners in challenging the Iranian President at his Monday appearance at Columbia, however, caught many by surprise. Ignoring the calls that Ahmadinejad, whose views on the holocaust are hurtful, should not be invited to a prestigious American university, Bollinger invoked the First Amendment to defend the invitation. But once the Iranian President was captive on campus at Columbia, Bollinger turned on the guest. With well-prepared ill-will and rehearsed abusive language, Bollinger squirted a barrage of curses, calling the Iranian President ...

By Ali Khan The Bhutto assassination might force Pakistani rulers to reconsider supporting the war on terror that has been forced upon the entire Muslim world. Just as Spain withdrew from the war in Iraq after the Madrid terrorist bombings, Pakistan too might use Bhutto's death to withdraw from the war in Afghanistan. For sure, Pakistan is no Spain. It will be much harder for corrupt Pakistani rulers to say no to billions of dollars coming from America. If Islamabad does not change its devious ways, however, the war on terror will consume and destroy Pakistan. Subservience and Subversion Since its birth in 1947, Pakistan has been a subservient but subversive ally of the United States. Lacking resources and strong political institutions, Pakistani rulers have played the role of makkar noker (cunning servant) who takes pleasure in servitude but nonetheless resents and subverts the wellbeing of the master. That duplicitous Pakistani officials can outsmart naïve American policymakers ...