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Islamic World News ( 16 Feb 2020, NewAgeIslam.Com)

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Framers of Constitution Rejected Notion Of Hindu India And Muslim India: Supreme Court Justice Chandrachud

New Age Islam News Bureau

16 Feb 2020

Freedom Movement 2.0' The Sit-In At Park Circus, Calcutta (Photo By Sandipan Chatterjee)

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• Framers of Constitution Rejected Notion Of Hindu India And Muslim India: Supreme Court Justice Chandrachud

• Leader of the Islamic Revolution: Need to Promote Islamic Lifestyle

• Seize the Moment And End Misery Of Over 40 Years Of War, Khalilzad Urges Afghans

• Marawi City Shari’a District Court Judge, Wife Scolded By SC For Unauthorized Mecca Pilgrimage

• Saudi Newspaper Slams Muslim Brotherhood As ‘Nazis’

• US Officials Question Detroit-Area Imam Who Mourned Soleimani

• Pakistan, Turkey Pondering Over Joint Projects for Promotion of Islamic Heritage: Firdous

• Trump’s Invisible Wall Is Not Just for Muslims

• Tunisian Islamist Party Says Will Not To Grant Confidence To New Government

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India

• Framers of Constitution Rejected Notion Of Hindu India And Muslim India: Supreme Court Justice Chandrachud

• TN Muslim organisations protest police lathicharge in Chennai

• Anti-CAA agitation: CPM once again extends a hand to the Muslim League

• Cong Ups Ante On 4% Reservations for Muslims In Telangana

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Mideast

• Leader of the Islamic Revolution: Need to Promote Islamic Lifestyle

• Air strikes on Yemen kill 31 civilians after Saudi jet crash

• Islamic Revolution paved way for women to be active: Pres. Rouhani

• Where is the place of Islamic Revolution in world calculations?

• 41st anniversary of victory of Islamic Revolution held on Ivory Coast

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South Asia

• Seize the Moment And End Misery Of Over 40 Years Of War, Khalilzad Urges Afghans

• Islamic congregation begins in Saptari

• 5 Taliban militants killed, 25 IEDs defused in Kandahar

• The phobia of novel China’s Coronavirus and the fate of Afghan students in Wuhan

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Southeast Asia

• Marawi City Shari’a District Court Judge, Wife Scolded By SC For Unauthorized Mecca Pilgrimage

• Make Islamic Finance Part Of Halal Ecosystem, Says INCEIF

• 30 attend workshop on mosque tourism

• Uncle at Tiong Bahru mosque shows how to use hand sanitiser, ends with impeccable finger heart

• Former sports minister Imam Nahrawi indicted for accepting Rp 20 billion in bribes

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Arab world

• Saudi Newspaper Slams Muslim Brotherhood As ‘Nazis’

• Muslim World League Chief, Croatian President Discuss Ways to Promote Tolerance

• Ivanka Trump tours Louvre Abu Dhabi, Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque

• Saudi crackdown over Iqama misuse not Pakistan-specific: FO

• Sheikh Mohammed, Sheikh Hamdan arrive at Global Women's Forum Dubai

• Rockets strike near US embassy in Iraq, no casualties reported

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Europe

• US Officials Question Detroit-Area Imam Who Mourned Soleimani

• Jihad Jane: ‘This story has nothing to do with religion’

• Teenager’s attack on Islam tests France’s stance on religion

• Rochester's Ahmadiyya Muslim Community uses public service to celebrate

• Muslim couple condemns court ruling allowing doctors to let their baby die

• Europe honors Gen. Soleimani: Posters adorn cities across Italy

• Turkey hits back at Russia claims over Syria's Idlib Chinese tourist in France is Europe's first coronavirus death

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Pakistan

• Pakistan, Turkey Pondering Over Joint Projects for Promotion of Islamic Heritage: Firdous

• UN chief arrives in Islamabad on 4-day official visit

• Princess Beatrice of York, former EU leaders visiting Pakistan for ski trip

• CPNE president condoles Naeemul Haque’s demise

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North America

• Trump’s Invisible Wall Is Not Just for Muslims

• US defence chief says Taliban deal is promising but not without risk

• Don Brown: Deadly 'green on blue' attacks by Islamic allied nation troops against Americans must end

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Africa

• Tunisian Islamist Party Says Will Not To Grant Confidence To New Government

• Bugiri imam is sixth Muslim cleric to be killed in five years

• Performance of Islamic banking in Morocco is below expectations

• More than 6,000 bodies found in Burundi mass graves

Compiled By New Age Islam News Bureau

URL: https://www.newageislam.com/islamic-world-news/framers-constitution-rejected-notion-hindu/d/121076

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India

Muslims Lead Anti-CAA Protests In Bengal But Hindus Look The Other Way

Rajat Roy

16-02-2020

Sameeda Khatun was a regular at the sit-in at Park Circus, Calcutta, since the very first day—January 7. Until she passed away on February 2. The loudspeakers were switched off at the protest site the next day as a mark of respect to the 56-year-old. Protestors got together to offer financial support to her family, but the larger community, especially Hindus, did little to express solidarity with them. This is symbolic of a pattern in the ongoing movement against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act in West Bengal—Muslims, fearing further segregation and marginalisation, are leading the movement, but most Hindus are not joining them. “Why are there no such sit-INS in Jadavpur University and other Hindu-dominated places?” asks Sabir Ahmed, a researcher with Pratichi Institute. CPI(M) leader and Jadavpur University professor Partha Pratim Biswas says a sit-in at “Bansdroni or similar places in Calcutta and its suburbs where Hindu refugees reside would have gone a long way to bridge the gap between Muslims and Hindus in the movement”. The Hindu refugees, once supporters of the Left, are not responding to the call to mobilise against CAA. The TMC and the Congress too are organising marches and demonstrations, but those run parallel to the movement of ordinary citizens spearheaded by Muslims, who are more than 28 per cent of the population, with students and women at the frontline of street agitations across Bengal.

“We know Muslims would be against us, but we will surely win the support of the majority within the Hindu community,” says BJP state vice president Jayprakash Majumdar. BJP and RSS workers are campaigning door to door in Hindu-dominated areas of districts such as Murshidabad, Malda and Birbhum. “A few elite Hindus are with us and leading the protest in the district town, but mostly Muslims are participating in protests in rural Bengal,” says Tahedil Islam, leader of a small organisation campaigning against CAA in Murshidabad, a district with 66 per cent Muslim population. In Malda, which is 51 per cent Muslim, the BJP is wooing adivasis and bahujan castes like the Rajbonshis. Last year, adivasi politician Khagen Murmu was elected from the Malda (North) Lok Sabha constituency after switching from the CPI(M) to the BJP.

“Muslims would be against us, but we will surely win the support of most Hindus,” says a top Bengal BJP leader.

On February 2, Dharma Prasar Bibhag, a wing of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, organised a mass wedding for 133 adivasi couples—many already living as partners, some with grown-up children—with much fanfare in Malda. Protesting against what they saw as a cultural invasion, adivasi protestors ended up vandalising the yagna pandal before the police intervened. Mohan Hansda of the Jharkhand Disham Party said it was a ploy of the BJP and the VHP to convert adivasis to Hinduism. Adivasis are being encouraged to inculcate Hindu rituals—in the case of marriage, applying vermilion on the forehead of the bride and holding yagna. At the Malda mass wedding, the VHP also issued the couples a marriage certificate. A spokesman argued that people are looking for certificates in the post-CAA situation, and this would help them.

In Birbhum, the Bangla Sanskriti Mancha (BSM), a five-year-old citizens’ organisation, has managed to wean away a number of adivasis from the BJP camp. Some of the adivasi youth had been seen campaigning for the BJP during the 2019 elections. Adivasis, Dalits and Muslims are holding protest marches and rallies together. According to BSM president and college teacher Samirul Islam, they have also been partially successful in encouraging Hindus to join the protests. At meetings of small groups of Hindus and Muslims, they talk about why even Hindu refugees are not safe—that they would have to prove their citizenship with legacy certificates to figure on the National Register of Citizens. “This gets a positive response in some Hindu-majority areas,” says Samirul.

https://www.outlookindia.com/magazine/story/india-news-muslims-lead-anti-caa-protests-in-bengal-but-hindus-look-the-other-way/302766

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How Muslims are creating a new vocabulary of secularism for Indian democracy

5 hours ago

Sharik Laliwala

The demonstrations against the Citizenship Amendment Act and the proposed National Register of Citizens have re-inserted secularism into India’s mainstream political vocabulary. This shift in political discourse has come at the behest of the Muslim community and was then picked up by students, civil society groups and political parties. The arguments made by the Muslim community – even by Islamic activists – against these citizenship initiatives are mostly articulated in the language of Constitutional rights guaranteed to all Indians.

This focus on fundamental rights belies the conventional wisdom that the hegemony of majoritarian politics would provoke radical tendencies among the Indian Muslims. The onslaught of Hindutva politics, implemented by the Bharatiya Janata Party, is increasing state hostility against Muslims day by day. It is exacerbating their socio-economic marginalisation. Bias against Muslims is not just evident in the deliberate misconduct by police forces but is even written into the law. For instance, the Disturbed Areas Act in Gujarat severely restricts property transactions between Hindus and Muslims in urban Gujarat to “maintain demographic equilibrium”.

On top of that, the Muslim community’s political representation is at one of its worst levels since Independence: the current Lok Sabha has only 25 Muslim MPs out of 543 MPs, six more than in the last Lok Sabha. This translates into a little over 4.5% share in the Lok Sabha, even though Muslims form 14.2% of India’s population. In January 2018, out of BJP’s 1,418 MLAs, only four were Muslim – though the BJP’s dominance in Northern and Western Indian states has somewhat faded since then.

Despite this, the growing invisibilisation of Indian Muslims – the “fifth column” of Indian society for the Hindu nationalists – has not led to radicalisation, barring exceptional instances in Jammu and Kashmir and a few anecdotal instances in Kerala. To the contrary, as the recent pro-democracy protests show, India’s Muslims are introducing a new vernacular idiom of secularism through civic symbols while sometimes innovatively merging them with religious motifs.

This signifies a fundamental transformation in the political strategy of the Muslim community over the years: Indian Muslims are privileging a language of rights over the religious-moral duties emphasised by Islamic reformists.

Muslim feminist groups have almost always employed an understanding of human rights. A case in point is Bharatiya Muslim Mahila Andolan, which has been vocal about women being denied entry to dargahs and demanding autonomy over personal life decisions. However, the “non-religious” groups among Muslims – such as pasmanda, or low-caste and Dalit Muslims, organisations working primarily in Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and Maharashtra, have devoted their energies to addressing the question of caste-based socio-economic backwardness among Muslims through representative politics.

In the current pro-democracy protests, especially by leaderless Muslim women in many parts of India, the act of holding portraits of BR Ambedkar, MK Gandhi, Savitribai Phule; reading the Preamble of the Indian Constitution; and upholding the national flag have been prioritised over religious ideals, at least in the public sphere. Indeed, the storm of Hindutva is making Muslims secular – quite unlike, Mohammad Iqbal’s poetic revelation about the “storm of West”. This is not to claim that Indian Muslims were not aligned with secular aims earlier, but to indicate that the active assertion of constitutional and secular symbols is their new and unique contribution.

Women are leading the Citizenship Amendment Act protest at Delhi's Shaheen Bagh. Credit: Anushree Fadnavis/Reuters

To speak this rights-based language more confidently, Muslims are increasingly adopting socio-political and educational means for progress, reducing the emphasis on moral reform. Despite the stereotype, most Muslim children in India attend secular schools. In 2006, only 7% of Muslim children of school-going age (7-19 years) attended a madrassa. Half of those who went to a madrassa undertook part-time religious education as they also attended a mainstream school.

Even Islamists have begun to articulate themselves through a rights-centred vocabulary, though they often prefer religious morality over constitutional ideals, especially on the issue of personal law and religious practices.

My research on two Islamic reformist organisations operating in Gujarat, a state that was the laboratory for Hindu nationalist politics, confirms this discernible shift in prioritising socio-economic concerns over reformist activities. For example, Muslim charity schools run by these groups, with gender-segregated classrooms and a part-time religious syllabus, use the state-prescribed curriculum – in some sense, merging the site of a secular school with that of a part-time madrassa. Their aim is clear: to develop skills and learning capacities among Muslim children in light of continuous state neglect. By doing so, these Islamic activists negotiate secular modernity on their own terms, via justifications from Islam. They find a new moral ground to adopt secular positions by somewhat renouncing rigidities held regarding the infallibility of religious truth.

My findings are congruent with those described by Irfan Ahmed in his 2009 book Islamism and Democracy in India, which traces the remarkable metamorphosis in the value system of the Jamaat-e-Islami Hind, an Islamist group founded in 1941. From a rejection of secular democracy and nationalism around the time of the Indian subcontinent’s Partition, the Jamaat began to trust religious pluralism, tolerance and a democratic system, particularly from the 1990s. These ideological transformations are most crucial, given Jamaat’s support to the Pakistan movement, including its role in Pakistan’s Islamisation project and alleged participation in terrorist activities through its student wing, Students’ Islamic Movement of India.

The Jamaat in India has not only abandoned its aim of establishing an Islamic state but also prompts its members to pursue careers in the social sciences, journalism and the civil services, while frequently collaborating with civil society organisations. This trend also can be witnessed in the functioning of political parties specially devoted to the Muslim question such as Asaduddin Owaisi’s All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen and the Welfare Party of India.

Political parties centred on Muslim identity, including Asaduddin Owaisi’s All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen, are evolving. Credit: AIMIM/Twitter

This discursive shift is slowly allowing Muslim groups to nurture solidarities with other marginalised groups facing similar threats and insecurities. The overwhelming Muslim support for Bhim Army chief Chandrashekhar Azad among Muslims in the past few years exemplifies this tendency. However, the alliance between Muslims and Hindu Dalits is still somewhat incoherent given the over-representation of elite ashraf castes in Muslim groups whose socio-economic interests do not match with Dalit-led associations.

All this makes it clear that Indian Muslims have entered a post-Islamist phase, marrying a constitutional phraseology of freedom, justice and equality with religious notions. Their renewed faith in this vernacularised secular politics is borne out of the frustrations with the dominant liberal brand of secularism, which either preferred a limited adoption of mostly majoritarian religious symbols or abhorred display of religion in public altogether.

At best, the liberal custodians of secularism overlooked socio-economic concerns of the Muslim community – especially of the low-caste and Dalit Muslims – rallying behind an empty discourse supporting secularism, without mass appeal. At worst, Muslims were castigated as a community with antediluvian beliefs. By exposing these fault-lines, though it is premature to say, the pro-democracy agitations led by Indian Muslims have provided a new life and meaning to not just secular democracy but even participatory democracy.

https://scroll.in/article/952470/how-muslims-are-creating-a-new-vocabulary-of-secularism-for-indian-democracy

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Cong Ups Ante On 4% Reservations For Muslims In Telangana

Feb 16, 2020

Hyderabad: Congress on Saturday sought to reassure the Muslim community that it will put up a strong fight in the Supreme Court to ensure that 4% reservations for Muslims in Telangana is continued.

Telangana Congress president N Uttam Kumar Reddy praised the role played by former minister Mohammed Ali Shabbir and the then chief minister YS Rajashekhara Reddy in giving 4% quota to backward groups among Muslims in 2004. tnn

https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/hyderabad/cong-ups-ante-on4-muslim-quota/articleshowprint/74154385.cms

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Framers Of Constitution Rejected Notion Of Hindu India And Muslim India: Supreme Court Justice Chandrachud

Feb 15, 2020

Amid ongoing protests against CAA-NRC-NPR and accusations of high-handedness in some states, Supreme Court judge Justice DY Chandrachud on Saturday said "blanket labelling" of dissent as anti-national or anti-democratic strikes at the "heart" of the country's commitment to protect Constitutional values and promote deliberative democracy.

calling dissent a "safety valve" of democracy, Justice Chandrachud said the use of state machinery to curb dissent instils fear, which violates the rule of law.

"The blanket labelling of dissent as anti-national or anti-democratic strikes at the heart of our commitment to protect constitutional values and the promotion of deliberative democracy," he said as he delivered a lecture in Gujarat.

Protecting dissent is but a reminder that while a democratic elected government offers us a legitimate tool for development and social coordination, they can never claim a monopoly over the values and identities that define our plural society, Justice Chandrachud said.

He was speaking on the topic "The Hues That Make India: From Plurality to Pluralism," as part of the 15th Justice PD Desai Memorial Lecture organised.

"Employment of state machinery to curb dissent instils fear and creates a chilling atmosphere on free peace which violates the rule of law and distracts from the constitutional vision of pluralist society," he added.

His comments came amid ongoing protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), the National Register of Citizens (NRC) and the National Population Register (NPR). Massive protests have emerged across the country with BJP-ruled states cracking down hard against the protesters.

"The destruction of spaces for questioning and dissent destroys the basis of all growth--political, economic, cultural and social. In this sense, dissent is a safety valve of democracy," he said.

Justice Chandrachud also stated that silencing of dissent and the generation of fear in the minds of people go beyond the violation of personal liberties and a commitment to constitutional value.

Notably, Justice Chandrachud was part of a bench that had in January sought response of the Uttar Pradesh government on a plea seeking quashing of notices sent to alleged protesters by the district administration for recovering losses caused by damage to public properties during anti-CAA agitations in the state.

"The attack on dissent strikes at the heart of a dialogue-based democratic society and hence, a state is required to ensure that it deploys its machinery to protect the freedom of speech and expression within the bounds of law, and dismantle any attempt to instil fear or curb free speech," he opined.

Commitment to the protection of deliberative dialogue is an essential aspect of every democracy, particularly a successful one, Justice Chandrachud said.

He added, "A democracy welded to the ideal of reason and deliberation ensures that minority opinions are not strangulated and ensures that every outcome is not a result merely of numbers but of a shared consensus".

Justice Chandrachud said the "true test" of a democracy is its ability to ensure the creation and protection of spaces where every individual can voice their opinion without the fear of retribution.

"Inherent in the liberal promise of the Constitution is a commitment to a plurality of opinion. A legitimate government committed to deliberate dialogue does not seek to restrict political contestation but welcomes it," he further said.

Justice Chandrachud also underlined the importance of mutual respect and protection of space for divergent opinions.

"Taking democracy seriously requires us to respond respectfully to the intelligence of others and to participate vigorously, but as an equal in determining how we should live together," the supreme court judge said.

Democracy is judged not just by the institutions that formally exist but by the extent to which different voices from diverse sections of the people can actually be heard, respected and accounted for, he said.

According to Justice Chandrachud, the "great threat to pluralism" is the suppression of differences and silencing of popular and unpopular voices offering an alternative or opposing views.

The supreme court judge further said the country was conceptualised"as incorporating its vast diversity and not eliminating it".

"National unity denotes shared cultural values and a commitment to the fundamental ideal of Constitution in which all individuals are guaranteed not just fundamental rights but also the conditions for their free and safe exercise," he said.

He said the country'spluralism underlines a commitment to protect "the very idea of India as a refuge to people of various states, races, languages and beliefs".

"In providing spaces to a multitude of culture and free space to diversity and dissent, we reaffirm to our commitment to the idea that the making of our nation is a continuous process of deliberation and belongs to every individual," he said.

Justice Chandrachud also referred to a "positive obligation" for protecting a plural identity.

"The framers of the Constitution rejected the notion of a Hindu India and a Muslim India. They recognised only the Republic of India," he said.

Justice Chandrachud also said the framers put trust on the future generations to create a common bond of what it means to be an Indian, which "shunned homogeneity and celebrated diversity in what is meant to be an Indian".

He compared the "layered Indian identity" to Matryoshka dolls, and said this is what makes us Indian "and must be central to our understanding of pluralism and efforts to foster it.

"Homogeneity is not the defining feature of Indianness. Our differences are not our weakness. Our ability to transcend these difference in our recognition of our shared humanity is a source of our strength.

"India is a sub continent of diversity in itself. Pluralism has already achieved its greatest triumph -- the existence of India. The nation's continued survival shows us that our desire for a shared pursuit of happiness outweighs the difference in the colour of our skin, the languages we speak, or the name we give the almighty," he added.

https://www.dnaindia.com/india/report-framers-of-constitution-rejected-notion-of-hindu-india-and-muslim-india-justice-chandrachud-2813887

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TN Muslim organisations protest police lathicharge in Chennai

February 15, 2020

As part of the protest, shops owned by Muslims downed shutters, even as Muslims organisations, led by Tamil Nadu Muslim Munnetra Kazhagam, planned to take out a procession to the Collectorate in Udhagamandalam in Nilgiris district, the police said.

As the procession reached the bus stand, police prevented them from proceeding further. Nearly 400 activists raised slogans and staged a protest condemning the police action on anti-CAA (Citizenship Amendment Act) protestors in Chennai on Friday.

A similar demonstration was held in Coonoor in the Nilgiris district where they announced to intensify the agitation, they said. Meanwhile, over 700 members, including women, belonging to various Muslim organisations squatted in the middle of the road near the Collectorate in Tirupur.

Led by Tamil Nadu Thowheed Jamaath, the activists raised slogans against the police and demanded the state government to take action against the police officials involved in the lathicharge.

https://www.oneindia.com/india/tn-muslim-organisations-protest-police-lathicharge-in-chennai-3034111.html

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Constitution makers rejected ideas of Hindu India, Muslim India: Justice Chandrachud

February 15, 2020

The makers of Indian Constitution had rejected the ideas of Hindu India and Muslim India but wanted to build a Republic of India, said Supreme Court judge Justice DY Chandrachud on Saturday.

Justice Chandrachud said this while delivering a lecture in Gujarat. He was speaking on the topic 'The Hues That Make India: From Plurality to Pluralism', as part of the 15th Justice PD Desai Memorial Lecture organised in Ahemedabad.

"The framers of the Constitution rejected the notion of a Hindu India and a Muslim India. They recognised only the Republic of India," Justice Chandrachud said.

He said the Indian Constitution envisages pluralism and no individual or institution can claim a monopoly over the idea of India.

In his lecture, Justice Chandrachud also referred to a "positive obligation" for protecting a plural identity.

He said the framers of Indian Constitution put trust on the future generations to create a common bond of what it means to be an Indian, which "shunned homogeneity and celebrated diversity in what is meant to be an Indian".

He compared the "layered Indian identity" to Matryoshka dolls, and said this is what makes us Indian "and must be central to our understanding of pluralism and efforts to foster it.

"Homogeneity is not the defining feature of Indianness. Our differences are not our weakness. Our ability to transcend these differences in our recognition of our shared humanity is a source of our strength," Justice Chandrachud said.

"India is a sub-continent of diversity in itself. Pluralism has already achieved its greatest triumph - the existence of India. The nation's continued survival shows us that our desire for a shared pursuit of happiness outweighs the difference in the colour of our skin, the languages we speak, or the name we give the almighty," he added.

https://www.indiatoday.in/india/story/constitution-makers-rejected-ideas-of-hindu-india-muslim-india-justice-chandrachud-1646812-2020-02-15

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Anti-CAA agitation: CPM once again extends a hand to the Muslim League

FEBRUARY 16, 2020

Thiruvananthapuram: It looks like the CPM is determined to drive a wedge between the Congress and the

Muslim League on the issue of a joint struggle against Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA). After some

vacillation, the League had unequivocally stated it was not for a joint agitation with the CPM. The CPM is not

ready to leave it at that.

The party's State Committee, which had met during the last two days, has decided to exhort cadres to

constantly be in touch with “non-Left leaning” individuals who were part of the CPM's 'human chain' on

January 26 and make them participate in the various anti-CAA protests to be held across the State on March

23 to mark Bhagat Singh's martyrdom. “We want the March 23 protests to take forward the unity that we

could forge on January 26,” CPM state secretary Kodiyeri Balakrishnan told reporters after the State

Committee meeting here on Sunday.

Non-'Left leaning' is euphemism for Muslim League. “Minorities had taken part in the human chain in a big

way,” said Kodiyeri, making his rst public appearance after a long absence for treatment. “Truth is, even

people from other non-Left parties had also participated,” he added.

Even top League leaders had admitted that some of its cadres may have participated in the CPM's 'human

chain' on January 26. However, the presence of League's Beypore Mandalam vice president K M Basheer, and

his subsequent unapologetic comments, had stung the League. Basheer was promptly suspended. Eventually,

the League concluded that it was politically unwise to take part in protests organised by the CPM.

But after the State Committee meeting, the CPM state secretary said the doors were still open. “Except for

the Jamaat-e-Islami and SDPI (Social Democratic Party of India), we would like all secular forces to take part

in the joint protests,” said Kodiyeri.

The CPM state secretary called for a “broad understanding” against communal forces. Chief Minister Pinarayi

Vijayan's similar pitch during the just concluded Assembly session was rejected by the Muslim League. Like

Pinarayi, Kodiyeri too blamed the Congress for being intransigent. “The Congress is not taking a helpful

stand. For them, anti-communism is more important than opposing the RSS. But we know there are secular

minded people within the UDF and our future course of action will be organised in such a way as to include

them also,” Kodiyeri said.

The CPM will also intensify its campaign agaisnt that it calls “Islamic extremism”. Kodiyeri said that like the

RSS, there were sections within Islam that were trying to create a communal divide. He specicaly named

Jamaat-e-Islami and SDPI for trying to inculcate hatred for Hindus. “Both are trying for communal

polarisation,” he said. “Jamaat-e-Islami is red by the thought of freeing India through Islam. SDPI is using

religion as a weapon for terrorism. If RSS incites people to chant 'Jai Shri Ram', Muslim fundamentalists ar

https://english.manoramaonline.com/news/kerala/2020/02/16/anti-caa-agitation-cpm-once-again-extends-a-hand-to-muslim-league.html

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Pakistan

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PTI govt all set to borrow Rs200b from Islamic banks

By Salman Siddiqui

February 16, 2020

KARACHI: For the second time, the government is all set to borrow Rs200 billion from Islamic banks to partially pay off dues owed to energy firms, but this time it has invited consortiums to submit the desired return in order to acquire the loan at the minimum possible price.

At least one Shariah-compliant consortium, led by Meezan Bank, submitted the bid (desired return) for lending the money by Friday (February 14), which was the last date for the submission of financing proposals, an industry official told The Express Tribune on Saturday.

“I guess a maximum of two consortiums may have submitted bids considering that around Rs500-600 billion worth of excess liquidity is lying at the Shariah-compliant banks and Islamic windows operated by conventional banks,” he said.

The bids are scheduled to be opened in the presence of the consortiums’ representatives on Monday, he said.

The government floated the first Pakistan Energy Sukuk worth Rs200 billion at a return of Kibor plus 0.8% for a period of 10 years in March 2019.

The government was expected to launch the second energy Sukuk on the same terms and conditions, meaning that banks were supposed to receive Kibor plus 0.8% without competitive bidding, which took place last time.

“However, the government scrapped the previous conditions for the second issue of Sukuk and invited fresh financial proposals,” the industry official said. “The Sukuk is expected to be launched by mid-March 2020.”

Power Holding Limited (PHL), a public-sector company wholly owned by the government of Pakistan, will issue the 100% government-guaranteed Sukuk.

This will be SLR (statutory liquidity requirement) eligible based on Ijarah (sale and lease back arrangement) with a subsequent listing on the Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX), according to a PHL tender.

Funds are being raised “to fulfill financing requirements including but not limited to the settlement of part of prevailing circular debt related to the energy sector,” the tender read.

The circular debt has accumulated to Rs1.8 trillion compared to around Rs1.4 trillion at the beginning of 2019. It stood at Rs1.14 trillion sometime during the tenure of previous Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) government, it was learnt.

The second Sukuk was scheduled to be launched in June 2019 but it was delayed after the International Monetary Fund (IMF) barred the government from issuing a fresh guarantee for the Sukuk as it had fully utilised the capacity agreed under the ongoing IMF loan programme of $6 billion.

Later, the government persuaded the lender to relax the condition for the sovereign guarantee for the second energy Sukuk.

The IMF asked the government this week to raise electricity tariff for the second time since June-July 2019 in a bid to get rid of the increasing circular debt in the energy sector.

The debt accumulates due to power leakages and theft and low recovery of bills including from multiple state-owned offices, schools, police stations, mosques and monuments.

The situation caused a reduction in the working capital of independent power producers, oil and gas marketing firms like Pakistan State Oil (PSO), Sui Northern Gas Pipelines Limited (SNGPL) and Sui Southern Gas Company Limited (SSGCL).

https://tribune.com.pk/story/2157664/2-govt-set-borrow-rs200b-islamic-banks/

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Agriculture needs govt’s special attention: Fakhar Imam

OUR STAFF REPORT

February 16, 2020

ISLAMABAD-Urging the need for special attention to agriculture, the convener of the parliamentary body on agriculture Syed Fakhar Imam said growth in the agricultural productivity has lost momentum, leaving Pakistan’s rural population to face continuing high levels of poverty, and food insecurity.

He said this in a meeting with the DG of the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) of the United Nations, Qu Dongyu.

The members of special committee of the National Assembly Special Committee on Agricultural Products were also present in the meeting.

The Convener of the Sub-Committee Fakhar Imam presented a holistic picture of Pakistan’s agro-economy and listed key constraints that hindered successful transformation of Pakistan’s agriculture sector. He outlined that Pakistan’s progress in agriculture sector was far below its true potential.

He stated that agriculture sector over the last three decades has been relegated to secondary priorities in the policy making circles and urged the need for special attention to agriculture.

Highlighting the rationale for the formation of a Special Committee on Agricultural Products, he added that reversing Pakistan’s agricultural stagnation warranted building political momentum, ownership and close scrutiny of agriculture policies.

He underlined the need for strategic investments in agricultural science, technology, research, infrastructure and high value agriculture production.

Qu Dongyu remarked that Pakistan- a country with enormous agricultural potential constrained by significant challenges-was a key priority in FAO’s long international partnerships and called for further deepening the mutual cooperation to tackle food insecurity, malnutrition and rural poverty.

It is pertinent to mention that it was the first international visit of Qu Dongyu after assuming office of the Director General of FAO in June, 2019.

Chairman Parliamentary Committee on CPEC, Sher Ali Arbab who attended the call on as special invitee outlined that FAO’s technical support to Parliament was indispensable to evidence based policy formulation and oversight.

He added that further strengthening strategic partnership with FAO was vital to move Pakistan away from subsistence farming to high yielding modern agriculture.

FAO country representative for Pakistan Mina Dawlatchahi called for wider engagement with Pakistan on gender inclusive agricultural development.

https://nation.com.pk/16-Feb-2020/agriculture-needs-govt-s-special-attention-fakhar-imam

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Pakistan, Turkey pondering over joint projects for promotion of Islamic heritage: Firdous

FEBRUARY 16, 2020

Special Assistant on Information and Broadcasting Firdous Ashiq Awan on Saturday said that Pakistan and Turkey have been pondering over several joint projects for the promotion and preservation of Islamic architecture and heritage. In a series of tweets, she said exhibitions and workshops would be conducted to promote cultural heritage and calligraphy. The special assistant termed the MoUs between the state media of Pakistan and Turkey as a welcome and positive step. She said these MoUs would enable both the countries to screen each other’ s dramas and promote the cause of Muslim Ummah. Awan said both the countries have also agreed to enhance cooperation in the field of cinema which will help us revive and promote our industry.

https://dailytimes.com.pk/558682/pakistan-turkey-pondering-over-joint-projects-for-promotion-of-islamic-heritage-firdous/

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UN chief arrives in Islamabad on 4-day official visit

February 16, 2020

Upon his arrival at Nur Khan Airbase — his first official visit to Pakistan as UN chief — Guterres was received by Pakistan’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations Munir Akram as well as senior officials of the Foreign Office and United Nations in Pakistan.

Ahead of his arrival, Guterres said he would express gratitude for those serving as peacekeepers.

Taking to Twitter, he said: "Pakistan is one of the most consistent and reliable contributors to UN peacekeeping efforts around the world.

"I am travelling to Pakistan, where I plan to express my gratitude to the people #ServingForPeace."

During his visit, the UN chief will speak at the international conference '40 Years of Hosting Afghan Refugees in Pakistan'.

The two-day conference in Islamabad, starting on February 17, will be a recognition of Pakistan’s "tremendous generosity" in hosting millions of refugees from Afghanistan over four decades, his spokesman Stephane Dujarric said during a regular noon briefing at the UN Headquarters in New York on Friday.

The conference, which is being organised by the Government of Pakistan and the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR), will be inaugurated by Prime Minister Imran Khan. Various senior US officials will also attend the conference.

During his visit, Guterres is expected to meet with Prime Minister Imran and other high-level government officials, his spokesman said.

Dujarric said the UN chief will also meet Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi and speak at an event on sustainable development and climate change. The UN Secretary General will meet President Arif Alvi on Monday.

On Tuesday, he will visit Lahore where he will meet students and attend an event on Pakistan’s polio vaccination campaign. He will also travel to Kartarpur to visit the Sikh holy site of Gurdwara Kartarpur Sahib.

Responding to a question, the spokesman said the UN chief will not be visiting the disputed Kashmir region during this trip.

https://www.dawn.com/news/1534822/un-chief-arrives-in-islamabad-on-4-day-official-visit

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Princess Beatrice of York, former EU leaders visiting Pakistan for ski trip

16-02-2020

Prime Minister Imran Khan on Saturday met with Princess Beatrice of York, a member of the British royal family, and other prominent European leaders, including the former prime minister of Spain Jose Maria Aznar and former Italian prime minister Matteo Renzi.

The group is visiting Pakistan for a ski trip, according to a post on the premier’s Instagram account.

Ali Jehangir Siddiqui who is Pakistan’s ambassador-at-large for investment in an honorary capacity was also present on the occasion.

They group was welcomed to the country by Special Assistant to the Prime Minister on Overseas Pakistanis and Human Resource Development Sayed Zulfi Bukhari.

Princess Beatrice is the daughter of Prince Andrew, the Duke of York.

Her visit to Pakistan comes four months after Britain’s Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, Prince William and Kate Middleton, visited the country for a five-day tour. It was the first royal visit from Britain to Pakistan in 13 years after a visit by Prince Charles, the Prince of Wales, and his wife Camilla Parker, the Duchess of Cornwall, in 2006.

https://www.pakistantoday.com.pk/2020/02/16/princess-beatrice-of-york-former-eu-leaders-visiting-pakistan-for-ski-trip/

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CPNE president condoles Naeemul Haque’s demise

16-02-2020

Council of Pakistan Newspaper Editors (CPNE) President Arif Nizami has expressed his grief over the demise of PM’s Special Assistant on Political Affairs and close friend, Naeemul Haque, who passed away in Karachi at the age of 70 after fighting a two-year-long battle with blood cancer.

Condoling the death of the founding member of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), Nizami said that Haque was a great friend and would be greatly missed.

“Very sad to hear about the passing away of Naeemul Haque. May his soul rest in peace. My profound condolences to the bereaved family and the PTI,” he said in a statement.

The CPNE president said that Naeemul Haque had played a pivotal role in strengthening the PTI and promoting a positive change in Pakistan as part of the party’s ideology.

https://www.pakistantoday.com.pk/2020/02/15/cpne-president-condoles-naeemul-haques-demise/

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Mideast

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Jews should demand compensation for centuries of abuse under Islam

Ezequiel Doiny

16/02/20

The Jizya was a discriminatory tax imposed only on non-muslims until the late 1800s. Non-muslims had to either convert to Islam or abandon their lands to avoid it. If they did not pay they were imprisoned, tortured and slaved.

Muslim rulers instituted the jizya to reduce the number of Jews living in the Holy Land, in what was then called Palestine (the Roman term for the area, with no connection to the Arabs who call themselves Palestinians today) before the British Mandate was instituted in 1922.

until the late 1800s entire ancient Jewish communities had to flee Palestine to escape the brutality of Muslim authorities.

As Egyptian historian Bat Ye’or writes in her book, The Dhimmi: “The Jizya was paid in a humiliating public ceremony in which the non-Muslim while paying was struck in the head. If these taxes were not paid women and children were reduced to slavery, men were imprisoned and tortured until a ransom was paid for them."

"The Jewish communities in many cities under Muslim Rule were ruined by such demands. This custom of legalized financial abuses and extortion shattered the indigenous pre-Arab populations almost totally eliminating what remained of its peasantry…

"In 1849 the Jews of Tiberias envisaged exile because of the brutality, exactions, and injustice of the Muslim authorities. In addition to ordinary taxes, an Arab Sheik that ruled Hevron demanded that Jews pay an extra five thousand piastres annually for the protections of their lives and property. The Sheik threatened to attack and expel them from Hevron if it was not paid.”

It is the Jews who lived under Muslim rule who were the true victims of colonialism… "By the time the Arab conquerors had swept over the Middle East and North Africa, the Jews had been living in the region for 1,000 years…

Lyn Julius commented about the incontrovertible findings in George Bensoussan’ book Juifs en pays arabes: le grand deracinement 1850 – 1975:

“…Bensoussan, threatens to stand the notion of ”Jewish colonialism” on its head: it is the Jews who lived under Muslim rule who were the true victims of colonialism…

By the time the Arab conquerors had swept over the Middle East and North Africa, the Jews had been living in the region for 1,000 years…

"Under Islam, according to the eighth-century Pact of Omar, indigenous Jews and Christians were permitted to practise as long as they acquiesced to the dhimmi condition of inferiority and institutionalised humiliation…

“… Bensoussan observes that the Islamic order was built on a ”colonial” notion – submission. The Muslim submits to Allah, the Muslim woman submits to her husband, the non-Muslim dhimmi submits to the Muslim. At the very bottom of the pile is the slave…

"He produces incontrovertible evidence that, 100 years before Israel was established, most Jews in Arab and Muslim lands lived in misery and fear….

"Jews were regularly mobbed, robbed, their possessions looted, beaten up on the slightest pretext, or false charge brought by a jealous neighbour. Jews were feminised in the Muslim imagination – cowardly, submissive, unable to stand up for themselves.

“…Bensoussan”s great achievement is not just to blow out of the water the myth of Arab-Jewish coexistence predating the creation of Israel, but unfashionably to place the colonial boot on the Arab foot…

"A sovereign Jewish state in the land of Israel begins to look like the liberation of a colonized, indigenous people from 14 centuries of subjugation…”

Simon Sebag Montefiore describes, in his book Jerusalem, the Arab Conquest of the Eastern Roman Empire (Chapter 16, page 166) that Arabs built the Al Aqsa Mosque in Temple Mount to make Muslims the legitimate heirs of Jewish sanctity: “In 518, aged thirty-five, Justinian found himself the real ruler of the Eastern empire when his uncle Justin was raised to the throne…"

"Justinian demoted Judaism from a permited religion and banned Passover if it fell before Easter, converted synagogues into churches, forcibly baptized Jews, and commandeered Jewish History: in 537, when Justinian dedicated his breathtaking Church of Hagia Sophia (Holy Wisdom” in Constantinople, he is said to have reflected 'Solomon, I have surpassed thee.'

"Then he turned to Jerusalem to trump Solomon’s Temple. In 543 Justinian and Theodora started to build a basilica, the Nea Church of St.Mary Mother of God, almost 400 feet long and 187 feet high, with walls 16 feet thick, facing away from the Temple Mount and designed to overpower Solomon’s site…

"The Holy City was ruled by the rituals of Orthodox Christianity… The city was set up to host thousands of pilgrims: the grandees stayed with the patriarch; the poor pilgrims in the dormitories of Justinian’s hospices which had beds for 3,000; and ascetics in caves, often old Jewish tombs, in the surrounding hills…

"…Heraclitus seized power (of the Bizantine Empire) in 610…Constantinople was besieged by the Persians ( then Zoroastrians)…(Heraclitus) outmanoeuvred the Persian forces …then defeated their main army…

"… In 632 Muhammad, aged about sixty-two, died (in Saudi Arabia) and was succeeded by his father in law, Abu Bakr…

"Abu Bakr managed to pacify Arabia. Then he turned to the Bizantine and Persian empires, which Muslims regarded as evanescent, sinful and corrupt. The Commander dispatched contingent of warriors on camels to raid Iraq and Palestine…in Mecca, Abu Bakr died and was succeeded by Omar…

" …Heraclitus dispatched an army to stop the Arabs…After months of skirmishing, the Arabs finally lured the Byzantines to battle amidst the impenetrable gorges of the Yarmuk river between today’s Jordan, Syria and Israeli Golan…and on August 636…

"Khalid cut of their retreat and by the end of the battle, the Christians were so exhausted that the Arabs found them lying down in their cloaks, ripe for the slaughter. Even the emperor’s brother was killed and Heraclitus himself never recovered from this defeat, one of the decisive battles in history, that lost Syria and Palestine. Byzantine rule, weakened by the Persian war, seems to have collapsed like a house of cards…

"The Arabs converged on the city which they called Ilya (Aelia Capitolina, the Roman name (for Jerusalem))… Omar offered Jerusalem a Covenant – dhimma- of Surrender that promised religious tolerance to the Christians in return for payment of jizya tax of submission. Once this was agreed, Omar set out for Jerusalem…

"Omar knew that Muhammad had revered David and Solomon. 'Take me to the sanctuary of David,' he ordered Sophronius (Jerusalem’s Christian Patriarch). He and his warriors entered Temple Mount, probably through the Prophet’s Gate in the south, and found it contaminated by 'a dungheap which the Christians had put there to offend the Jews.

"Omar asked to be shown the Holy of Holies. A Jewish convert, Kaab al Ahbar, known as the Rabbi, replied that if the Commander preserved 'the wall'(perhaps referring to the last Herodian remains, including the Western Wall), 'I will reveal to him where are the ruins of the Temple.'

"Kaab showed Omar the foundation stone of the Temple, the rock which the Arabs called the Sakhra.Aided by his troops, Omar began to clear the debris to create somewhere to pray.

"Kaab sugested he place this north of the foundation stone 'so you will face make two qiblas, that of Moses and that of Muhammad.'

“'You still lean towards the Jews,' Omar supposedly told Kaab, placing his first prayer house south of the rock, roughly where the al-Aqsa Mosque stands today, so that it clearly faced Mecca.

"Omar had followed Muhammad’s wish to reach past Christianity to restore and co-opt this place of ancient holiness, to make Muslims the legitimate heirs of Jewish sanctity and outflank the Christians.” (Simon Sebag Montefiore “Jerusalem” page 166-184)

The roots of the Arab-Israeli conflict are theological, Muslims claim they have a stronger claim to Jewish Holy Sites than the Jews and use this as a justification to build their mosques there.

On March 25, 2019 Arutz 7 reported "Iran Broadcasting Authority (IRIB) head Abdolali Ali-Asgari, talking about superiority and great nations, said that while in ancient times G-d had given the Jewish People superiority, the Iranian people - the countrymen of the Prophet Muhammad's companion Salman the Persian - were chosen to "shoulder the heavy burden of truth and progress in the world" after the Jews "pursued worldly ornaments and behaved unjustly."

Ishrat Hussain Muhammad wrote in Quora “… Moses & Prophet Abraham PBUH were Muslims...The Islamic belief is that all the prophets including the last prophet Mohammad PBUH were following the will of the God and all prophets were teaching same thing and from same God, therefore Islam considers all prophets to be Muslims…” According to Islam Jewish Prophets like Abraham, Moses and David were actually Muslim and Jewish Holy Sites are actually Islamic Holy Sites.

According to Islamic replacement theology Islam replaced Judaism and Muslims replaced the Jews as the inheritors of Jewish Holy sites. Based on this view, Muslims justify Islamic colonialism, the occupation of Jewish Holy Sites and deny the connection of modern Jews to Jewish Holy Sites and to the land of Israel.

Israel allows Muslims to pray in Al Aqsa but Jews were not allowed to pray in Hevron's Cave of the Patriarchs (Judaism's second holiest site)or in Jerusalem's Western Wall during the Jordanian Occupation (1948-1967).

Today Jews are not allowed to pray in any Jewish holy sites under Islamic rule and are humiliated if they try.

On August 5, 2019 Tzvi Joffre wrote: "The site where Aaron, Moses' brother, is said to be buried near Petra was closed by Jordan's Ministry of Awqaf Islamic Affairs and Antiquities on Thursday after Israeli tourists were filmed performing 'Jewish rituals' at the site on the anniversary of Aaron's death.

Tour guide Roni Ayalon told Ynet that the group was subjected to humiliating treatment by Jordanian authorities.

"They took off the women's head scarves. All the boys' yarmulkes were taken off. They took off everyone's shirts to see if they had tzitzit (religious fringes) under their clothes and took [the tzitzit] off them.

"If there was this kind of humiliation of an Arab on our side who wanted to enter Jerusalem and they would dare to tell him to take off his shirt or confiscate his Koran, there would be a world war....But they can do whatever they want to us."

According to Ayalon, the group was forbidden from praying while traveling in Jordan, even in their hotel room. Walla News reported that Jordanian police arrived at the hotel near Petra and searched the Israelis' rooms to confiscate religious items.

The Awqaf ministry strongly condemned the entry of the tourists and said an investigation will be opened to find out who was responsible for allowing them into the site, the official Jordan News Agency reported.

Former Jordanian tourism minister Maha al-Khatib said, "There is a Zionist scheme to claim ownership of any part of our Arab homeland, especially in archaeological sites."

On July 26, 2019 Elder of Zion reported "Palestine Today has an article about Joseph's Tomb in Schechem (Nablus) and how the semi-regular Jewish pilgrims that visit the site have "turned it into a place that spreads death and blackness to the villagers" who live nearby.

The article goes through a history of the site, saying that Palestinians are divided between believing that it is the tomb of the Biblical Joseph or of an Arab named Yusuf Dweikat.

It quotes a researcher of archeology from An-Najah National University named Louai Abu al-Saud. Al Saud. Abu Al-Saud did not deny or confirm that the 'Prophet Joseph' is buried in this grave, but he said that in case that is proven - from an archeological point of view - that this grave is the grave of Joseph, 'then we Palestinians, as Arabs and Muslims, are worthier of ownership of it than the Jews.'

Palestinianism is now a replacement theology for Judaism. But Jews face Temple Mount when they pray, Arabs face Mecca even when in or around Temple Mount. Despite being the holiest site of Judaism, Jews are not allowed to pray on the Temple Mount.

On February 27, 2019 Elder of Zion reported "Arab and Muslim media, especially Palestinian Arab media, routinely deny that there were ever any Jewish Temples on the Temple Mount."

Howver, this academic paper by Milka Levy-Rubin about why the Dome of the Rock was built to begin with gives copious amounts of proof that show that the Muslims who built the Dome chose the site precisely because of its association with the two Temples.

The main point of the paper, published by the Bulletin of SOAS at the University of London in 2017, is that the Dome of the Rock was meant to be a rebuilding of the Temple of Solomon which would fulfill the need by Muslims to have their own significant holy place in their conquered lands that could compete with the Hagia Sophia church in Constantinople which claimed to have surpassed the beauty of Solomon’s temple.

The image linked below from the Ottoman Imperial Archives says that the Al Aqsa Mosque was built on the site of Solomon’s Temple.

Since the creation of the State of Israel Jews can defend themselves against Islamic persecution. Other minorities like the decimated Yazidi continue to be vulnerable to persecution by Islamic forces today because they don't have their own State to protect them.

For centuries Jews endured humiliation and abuse under Islamic rule, for centuries Jews were denied the freedom to pray in most of Judaism's holiest Sites converted into mosques, for centuries Jews were subject to institutionalized financial abuse in the name of Jizya, it is time to demand compensation.The Jizya was a discriminatory tax imposed only on non-muslims until the late 1800s. Non-muslims had to either convert to Islam or abandon their lands to avoid it. If they did not pay they were imprisoned, tortured and slaved.

Until the late 1800s entire ancient Jewish communities had to flee Palestine to escape the brutality of Muslim authorities.

it is the Jews who lived under Muslim rule who were the true victims of colonialism… "By the time the Arab conquerors had swept over the Middle East and North Africa, the Jews had been living in the region for 1,000 years…

Lyn Julius commented about the incontrovertible findings in George Bensoussan’ book Juifs en pays arabes: le grand deracinement 1850 – 1975:

“…Bensoussan, threatens to stand the notion of ”Jewish colonialism” on its head: it is the Jews who lived under Muslim rule who were the true victims of colonialism…

"By the time the Arab conquerors had swept over the Middle East and North Africa, the Jews had been living in the region for 1,000 years…