An Arab Woman Blues - Reflections in a sealed bottle...

Many thoughts racing through my mind at this very late hour of night, very early hour of morning. For me it's still night...shrouded in Darkness. My thoughts race, like laser beams, I need to make sense of events. I have to make sense of events. I have to, it's imperative. I will consecrate this post to several Notes to Self, that I shall share out loud on this blog, I need to jot down everything. It does not matter if it does not make sense to you, it will eventually. Hence this post will be regularly updated with my own notes - hopefully all the pieces of the puzzle will fit in the end, as am sure they will. #SYRIA - IRAN  Just read a very important piece from the Wall Street Journal. Iran officially acknowledges that it will be sending Iranian Revolutionary Guards, plus hundreds of foot soldiers, as well as "civilian" Basijis to reinforce the Assad regime  i.e to fight along his side. Now, this is in itself is not news to me. Everyone knows that Iranian ope

The message of Islam is first and foremost a message of Unicity of the Creator and by correlation Unity of the Creation. In that particular context, the unity of the believers and that of Muslims specifically. Yet, this unity in Faith is far from being present. The Shia-Sunni Fitna or divide is more than just a thorn in the body of Islam, it is actually a poisoned dagger that pits one brother against the other, and stabs in the back when one is unguarded. Such is the state of the Muslim Umma. Who started it, when did it start, why did it start ? It is a long story, and I can't in the limited space of this post go into all the historical details, into incidents that took place 1'400 years ago, political incidents to be more precise. I say political because they were political in nature. Centuries later, they re-surfaced with greater brutality, with greater vindictiveness, taking on the form of political treason and betrayal, the form of organized and systematic ethnic

This post is a message and an invitation to watch the historical Ramadan series, aired on Arabic TVs all over and which deal with the advent of Islam in 7th century Arabia, and recounts the story of one of the Caliphs - Omar (may God be pleased with him) The detailed historical research that has gone into making these episodes is priceless. It starts off BEFORE the advent of the Islamic message as revealed to the Prophet Mohammed (Peace & Blessings be upon him) and covers the Meccan and Hijra (exile /exodus) period to Medina until the prophet's death and after.  It gives excellent background information on pre-Islamic 7th century Arabia ; on the customs, traditions, belief system, tribal and clan system of the early Arabs...and the rest... I can't recommend it enough and am pleased to say that MBC the producer of this series have actually subtitled the early episodes into English and will do so for the remaining ones. This is a must for non Arabic speakers intereste