Why Muslims Should Support Intelligent Design

By Mustafa Akyol

I have traveled a lot around the United States and the United Kingdom, lecturing to Muslim audiences. One common trait I have noticed is the concern Muslims feel for the future of their children. Several conferences I attended had topics such as “Saving Our Families” or “How to Raise Our Children as Good Muslims.” The reason for this concern is obvious: These Muslim families are living in a highly secularized society that has cultural traits that are destructive to traditional values. The profane culture of MTV, pornography, consumerism and hedonism—what political scientist Benjamin Barber calls “The McWorld”—is at odds with Muslim values.

The McWorld is powerful in winning converts. Many Muslim parents living in the West are dismayed to see their kids envying the lives of pop-stars instead of Islamic sages. The solution many Muslim families find is to create cultural enclaves where, they hope, the McWorld cannot penetrate. They want to educate their children in local Islamic schools and keep them in an “Islamic atmosphere” as much as they can. However, such cultural enclaves have little chance of matching Western society in terms of appeal. For Muslim youngsters living in the United States or in Western Europe, the popular profane life is colorful and attractive. They may not lose their faith altogether, but they lose a coherent identity based on that faith. They become cultural wanderlings.

The resulting psychological trauma in these young people can have a much worse side effect: As we have seen in the September 11 conspirators, an identity crisis can turn some young Muslims into terrorists. Seeking asylum from the distress they feel for being renegade Muslims, they think they can find peace in a radical political ideology, a kind of necrophilic nihilism, hidden under the cloak of Islam.

Let’s Face Modernity

But perhaps Muslims don’t need those cultural enclaves. The colorful life of the West that we call modernity may not be totally bad, but only in some of its aspects. There might be no problem in wearing jeans, eating fast food—health problems notwithstanding—or listening to pop music as long as one knows that God exists and that he has a moral obligation to Him. If a young person gains this consciousness, in fact, he will be more powerful and confident in the modern world, by being open to its opportunities and offerings, but consciously aware of the necessity of maintaining his integrity and moral standards.
The core issue, surely, is to have faith in God and see the world out of Godly hearts and minds. Once a believer is standing firmly on that solid ground, he doesn’t need to close the door to foreign cultures. When he has achieved a continuing consciousness of God, then he walks with God in every path that life opens for him.

Yes, but how will the Muslim achieve that consciousness?

To find an answer, first we have to understand the problems we face. The problem with modernity is its neglect of the divine: It makes people live as if God does not exist. Only doctrinal atheists declare the Nietzschean claim “God is dead,” but many ordinary people live as if this is reality. Movies, books, soap operas, and songs portray a lifestyle in which nobody thinks about God. He is absent from their minds, yet they have an appearance of happiness. Advertisements impose the big lie that we can find happiness by consuming some special product. Insurance companies are what people trust. Popular science ascribes to us humans a nature that has originated wholly by natural laws. And opinion leaders dismiss religion as a thing of the past.

The Qur’an tells us that Prophet Shu`aib (peace and blessings be upon him), who was sent to the people of Madyan, warned them that they [neglect God as a thing cast behind your back] (11:91). This is the dominant culture in today’s world. Man turns his back on God and rarely gives Him any thought.

But this neglect does not result merely from ignorance or lack of thought. There is a doctrinal basis for the modern neglect of God. That basis is a grand narrative lying beneath every aspect of the secular world. It is called materialism, and it is the principal foe we must face and deal with.

Materialism Is Our Adversary

Materialism is the philosophy that argues that matter is all there is. It denies the existence of all spiritual entities, and, of course, God. According to a materialist, the universe is not created by God; it is self-existent. He, therefore, assumes that everything in the universe, including the life within it, is the product of blind, purposeless forces of physics and chemistry. Materialism denies the existence of the human soul, too. According to this view, we are nothing but highly organized molecules, and our ideas, feelings, and emotions are simply chemical reactions inside our brain cells. In short, materialism is the philosophical underpinning of atheism.

Since its beginning, Islam has carried on an intellectual war against materialism. The Qur’an emphasizes the irrationality of men’s denial of God: [How do you deny God when you were dead and He gave you life? Again He will cause you to die and again bring you to life, then you shall be brought back to Him] (2:28).

Yet the sharpest encounter between Islam and materialism occurred when medieval Muslims read the works of the philosophers of ancient Greece and translated them into Arabic. Some of those ancient Greeks were materialists. They argued that the universe had no beginning, that it existed from eternity. This idea seemed attractive to some Muslims of the time. That is why Imam Ghazali, the Muslim equivalent of Thomas Aquinas, wrote extensively against “the philosophers” and their materialism, especially in his monumental work The Incoherence of the Philosophers. Ghazali insisted that the universe was created ex nihilo (from nothingness) and this was evidence for the divine. It is interesting to note that Ghazali’s thesis was confirmed in the 20th century with the commonly accepted big bang theory, which implies a beginning for the material universe.

Ghazali’s powerful authority expelled materialism from Muslim minds for a long time, but it reappeared in the 19th century. Europe of that time was flooded with materialist theories from thinkers like Marx, Darwin, Comte, Durkheim, and Freud. The Westernized intellectuals of Islamic lands, especially of the late Ottoman Empire, were influenced by these theories and became voluntary tools in transferring them to their societies. Atheists or agnostics like Abdullah Cevdet or Suphi Ethem, quoted the works of Charles Darwin and Ernst Haeckel to argue that man is a mere animal. Muslim thinkers countered their arguments. Ismail Fenni Ertugrul, for example, in his book The Collapse of the School of Materialism argued that the universe is not a self-existing entity as the materialists claim; it was created by God. Ertugrul also explained that the universe and life within it are designed by God and they tell us about His infinite might and knowledge.

After the collapse of Ottoman Empire in 1918, the war of ideas continued in former Ottoman states, especially in the most Westernized one of all, Turkey. Materialist theories quickly became the worldview of the Turkish intelligentsia and the ruling paradigm in the country’s education system. This is why Said Nursi (1878-1960), probably the most influential Muslim scholar in Turkey for the whole 20th century, put great emphasis on the fight against materialism. During the Second World War he urged his followers to concentrate on the greater war, the war of ideas. The biggest problem, he said, is that “many are losing their faith because of the plague of materialism.” Based on the same conviction, contemporary Muslim intellectuals like Harun Yahya put great emphasis on the case against materialism and its main pillar, Darwinism.That emphasis is right on target. Materialism is the problem Muslims have with the modern world, and it is the worldview we must stand against. Muslims should have no objection to modern science and technology, art and esthetics, the good things of life and open society. Our objection should be against the intellectual “plague” which invades our lives and leads people to believe in a godless world.

So the way to save our faith and our families in the modern world is not to shut them away from it, but to understand and refute its underlying misconceptions. This will give us dignity and integrity, and may help others to see the ultimate reality. But how can we refute materialism, a philosophy so powerfully incorporated into the most powerful civilization, the West?

Well, there is good news. We are not alone in this battle. There is another powerful component in the West that is determined to root out materialism. That force is Christianity.

Christianity as Our Ally

Some political conflicts in history, like the Crusades of the medieval age or the allegedly “Islamic” terrorism of today, have created distrust between many Christians and Muslims. However, there is no inherent clash between these two great religions. From the Muslim point of view, in fact, Christians are the closest friends and allies in the world. The Qur’an boldly declares [Nearest among men in love to the believers will you find those who say, ‘We are Christians’: because amongst these are men devoted to learning and men who have renounced the world, and they are not arrogant] (5:82).

Muslims share many details of faith with Christians. Besides our common faith in God the Creator, we both believe that Jesus Christ was the Word of God (An-Nisaa’ 4:171) and that he had a virgin birth and performed many miracles (Al-Ma’idah 5:110). Islamic tradition also holds that Jesus will return towards the end of time and save humanity from unbelief.

Our common faith in God is so important that God commands Muslims to make a call for alliance to Christians and Jews, the People of the Book (Scripture): [Say: O People of the Scripture! Come to an agreement between us and you: that we shall worship none but God, and that we shall ascribe no partner unto Him, and that none of us shall take others for lords beside God] (Aal-`Imran 3:64).

Based on this Qur’anic vision, we can confidently conclude that Muslims should cooperate with faithful Christians and Jews in matters that are important to each of these three monotheistic faiths.

And what can be more important than the case against materialism, the modern denial of God?

Intelligent Design as Our Common Cause

Interestingly, Said Nursi, in the 1950s, foresaw an alliance between Islam and Christianity against materialism. He prophetically wrote, “A tyrannical current born of naturalist and materialist philosophy will gradually gain strength and spread at the end of time, reaching such a degree that it denies God. ... Although defeated before the atheistic current while separate, Christianity and Islam will have the capability to defeat and rout it as a result of their alliance” (Nursi, Letters, s. 77-78). Half a century after Nursi, the stage for that alliance is set.

Intellectual Muslims, fed up with the pathological anti-Western hatred of the radicals who defame Islam by their violent acts, are seeking the right way to express and stand for their faith and identity in the modern world.

Intellectual Christians have already found that way. They encountered materialism before we did, because it grew right in the heart of Christendom. They have been standing against it for several decades. And recently they have initiated a bold movement—a “wedge” as they call it—to split the foundations of materialism.

This “wedge” is the code name for the Intelligent Design Movement, formed in the early 1990s by Christian scientists and intellectuals. The leader of the movement is Phillip E. Johnson, a prominent professor of law from the University of California, Berkeley. During a sabbatical year in London in 1987, Dr. Johnson read about Darwinism and noticed that Darwinian ideologues like Richard Dawkins use deceptive arguments to sell their unsubstantiated story. He decided to dedicate the rest of life to unravel this sophisticated fallacy. His first book, Darwin on Trial (1991), annoyed the Darwinist establishment terribly, but it was just a beginning. In the following years, serious scientists like Michael Behe from Lehigh University, William Dembski from Baylor University, and Paul Nelson from the University of Chicago joined the ranks of the movement.

Today the movement, headed by the Discovery Institute in Seattle and the Intelligent Design Network in Kansas, is leading a great battle first to free school textbooks and then the whole of society from the Darwinist dogma and the materialist philosophy it supports.
ntelligent Design (ID) is a term that implies creation. The universe and life are not products of blind forces of nature, ID holds, but show evidence that they were designed by an intelligence. The ID Movement has deliberately chosen not to specify the identity of the Designer. Through science you can demonstrate convincingly that there is a designer, but you can’t go further without invoking theology. Everybody has the right to believe in a Designer according his own theology. What makes the movement effective is its emphasis on solid scientific evidence.

This non-theological nature of the ID Movement also makes it inter-religious. Whether you are a Christian, a Jew, a Muslim, or any other kind of theist, you can identify with the movement. This movement defines the particular paradigm of science we would like to have, and it is science that defines society in the long run.

Muslims should also note the great similarity between the arguments of the Intelligent Design Movement and Islamic sources. Hundreds of verses in the Qur’an call people to examine the natural world and see in it the evidence of God. Great Islamic scholars like Ghazali wrote large volumes about design in animals, plants, and the human body. What Intelligent Design theorists like Behe or Dembski do today is to refine the same argument with the findings of modern science.

In short, Intelligent Design is not alien to Islam. It is very much our cause, and we should do everything we can to support it.

A Call for Action

Here are a few suggestions:

Muslim Students: Go and learn about Intelligent Design. Learn why Darwinism is wrong. Then raise this issue in your classrooms. Question your biology teachers and your textbooks. Form Muslim Student Associations and get in touch with the Intelligent Design groups in your area. Organize lectures by ID scientists and write under the title “The Fall of Darwinism, The Greatest Myth Ever.”

Muslim Families: If you have children in schools, pay attention to their biology classes. Are they being indoctrinated by the myths of Darwinism? If so, appeal to your school board and question this theory by appealing to the work of the ID scientists. Get help from Christian families who support the Intelligent Design cause in your school board.

Muslim Intellectuals: Write and speak about this in your newspapers, magazines, Web sites, lectures, speeches, khutbahs (sermons), and the like. We cannot raise a Muslim generation by merely speaking about the Islamic victories in the past; we have to do something for today. And don’t think that Darwinism is compatible with Islam by referring to some vague theories of limited evolution developed by some medieval Muslims. The real issue at stake here is not whether some organisms have a common ancestor or not. The real issue is whether life is created by God or evolved by itself. We cannot be neutral on this. We have to defend faith against unbelief. This is our raison d’être, the reason why we exist.

If Muslims get involved in this debate, they will help both themselves and Western society. They will also see their common values with Christians more clearly. This alliance will help counter the doomsday calls for a “clash of civilizations.” In fact, if there should be a clash in the 21st century, it should not be between Islam and the West, but between theism and materialism. And since the battlefields in this clash are labs, lecture halls, and Web sites, it will be a much safer place for controversy.

Nasib umat Islam Selatan Thai dipinggirkan ASEAN

Saya sengaja berkejang mata untuk melihat adakah isu penting ini akan dibangkitkan dalam Sidang Kemuncak ASEAN ke 11 yang sedang berlangsung di Kuala Lumpur. BERNAMA malam tadi melaporkan PM Abdullah Ahmad Badawi sebagai berkata selaku Pengerusi Persidangan:


We strongly condemn such acts of terror, we condemn acts of terrorism in all its forms and manifestations. We continue to reject any attempt to associate terrorism with any race, religion, nationality and ethnic group.

Kami mengutuk sekeras-kerasnya sebarang tindakan keganasan, kami mengutuk serangan keganasan dalam apa sahaja bentuk dan tindakan. Kami akan terus menentang sebarang usaha untuk mengaitkan tindakan keganasan dengan mana-mana kaum, agama, kerakyatan dan kumpulan ethnic.

Sayang isu keganasan di Selatan Thai yang melibatkan umat Islam minoriti tidak disentuh. Jika kita bersungguh mahu mendesak Myanmar umpamanya untuk membebaskan Suu Kyi dan kembali ke jalan demokrasi, mengapa kita tidak boleh mengusulkan sesuatu penyelesaian yang bermakna di Selatan Thai.

Penyelesaian bermakna yang dapat menyelamatkan nyawa dan maruah umat Islam yang sekian lama tertindas dan hidup dalam kebimbangan.

Siapa lagi yang akan membangkitkan isu ini jika tidak Malaysia yang rakyatnya memiliki pertalian darah dan persaudaraan dengan masyarakat terlibat.

Kita tidak lagi sanggup melihat berulangnya Peristiwa Berdarah di Takbai dimana umat Islam yang berpuasa telah diperlakukan dengan begitu hina dan menyayat hati sekali. Kita tidak mahu lagi melihat umat Islam di kawasan tersebut lari lintang-pukang menyeberang masuk ke sempadan kita lantaran hidup dalam ketakutan.

Apa lagi forum yang sesuai jika tidak melalui ASEAN yang kebetulan kita selaku Tuan Rumahnya kali ini. .OIC yang sepatutnya membela nasib dan kebajikan masyarakat Islam sedunia, malangnya sekadar membisu sehingga hari ini, dan ternyata tidak boleh diharapkan!

Syabas kepada Sekretariat Pemuda Islam Asean (Amsec) yang begitu prihatin membangkitkan bukan sekadar isu di Selatan Thai, tetapi juga konflik di Aceh dan Mindanao yang melibatkan umat Islam. Mengapa penyelesaian diplomatik tidak diusahakan dan diberi perhatian oleh ASEAN?

Dalam isu masyarakat Islam di Selatan Thai umpamanya, Pengerusi AMSEC Tuan Hj. Mahfuz Omar telah berkata:

Asean perlu melihat tragedi di Selatan Thai sebagi isu bersama bukannya masalah dalaman Bangkok kerana itu Asean perlu membincangkan isu ini di Kuala Lumpur dan mengambil ketetapan untuk mengatasinya termasuk membentuk pasukan tentera pengaman atau pemantau di Selatan Thai

Tak perlulah kita pergi jauh dengan menghulurkan leher kita dalam konflik di seberang sana benua, sedangkan yang berada di depan mata, kita diam membisu. Malaysia sepatutnya mengunakan pengaruhnya terutama sebagai tuan rumah untuk membuka perbincangan dalam isu ini. Kita sepatutnya serius menutup pintu dan ruang bagi konflik keganasan dengan mengusulkan perdamaian.

Apabila konflik seumpama ini dibiarkan tanpa pembelaan diplomatik maka tatkala itulah keganasan akan bermaharajalela. Ketika itu sia-sia sahajalah kalau sekadar mahu mengutuk dan mengkritik. Lihatlah apa yang berlaku di Iraq, Afghanistan dan Timur Tengah hari ini. Dalam hal ini kita semua perlu ketepikan kepentingan politik ataupun apa sahaja, dan bersama menggembeling tenaga untuk membentuk sebuah rantau yang aman dan sejahtera.

A Teen Discovers Islam Through the Teachings of Jesus

By Harry Joseph

For many years of my young life, but most profoundly in recent times, I have been in avid pursuit of God and His universal Truth. I live in a New England suburban town, and I enjoy many things, including music, reading, and camping; however, religion and God have always been important in my life, and I have always had a relationship with Him.

I was previously a Christian and was very happy and content with my faith; however, I came to realize that much of what I believed was “un-Christian” by doctrinal standards. Also, I was becoming rather interested and intrigued by other religions in an attempt to promote universality, yet many Christians are against learning, and especially practicing other religions. Mind you, I have received my share of “watch out with that stuff and don’t be deceived” and “the Bible is God’s only truth.” However, I realized that a loving, kind, and merciful God such as Allah would not limit Himself to one group of people. Soon enough, I was immersed in the teachings of Gautama Buddha and of Hindu yogis, and yes, I even got myself a copy of the Holy Qur’an.

I’m not entirely sure why I first decided to buy an English Interpretation of the Qur’an, but I believe it had something to do with me wanting to learn about a faith which was almost entirely foreign to me. As I eagerly thumbed through the pages I felt something inside me saying, very quietly at first, “This is indeed the Word of God.” Now, being a Christian I was taught that the Bible is God’s only preserved, perfect, and unchanged Word.

At first, Islam was just an interest of mine, some intellectual theology that I could dabble in from time to time. I was at first very reluctant to call the Qur’an the Word of God, and I didn’t really know much about Muhammad (pbuh) at the time.

Meanwhile, I also spent time reading the Bible, especially the teachings of Jesus (pbuh) and the wisdom literature in the Old Testament. While reading what Jesus taught, I thought to myself, “This Messenger taught Truth, and God has given me so much through him. Yet, why are so many Christians hypocritical, often harsh against others beliefs, and why has Church doctrine invented beliefs calling it God’s Word?” When thoughts like this and thoughts pertaining to the falseness of the Trinity (which was invented at the Council of Nicaea in 325 AD) came into my mind, it was at this time when Islam began coming into my life.

My history teacher, a Christian, once told me that every misconception about Islam is untrue (i.e. Muhammad was a terrorist, he is the Muslim Jesus, peace be upon both Prophets, etc, etc) and was very pleased with my reading of the Qur’an and open-mindedness. I soon came to accept the truth of Islam; ironically, to Christians at least, there was a prominent figure that inspired me to convert to Islam: Jesus Christ (pbuh).

I recognized the similarity and importance of what he taught in many passages of the Qur’an. I saw how the Qur’an states that Jesus (pbuh) and his teachings contain guidance, salvation, and Light. Also, I believe Muslims and Sufis refer to him sometimes as the “Word of God,” “Spirit of God,” etc, and that Muslims believe (or at least the Qur’an says) he is near stationed to God. Almost immediately I was researching Islam on the internet and I thought, “Surely this is a true faith!”

I was also influenced by Yusuf Islam, or Cat Stevens, one of my favourite musicians of all time; he made a statement in converting to Islam, and showed me that one does not need to be Arab to be a Muslim. Since I too am an avid musician in pursuit of a musical career, Yusuf showed me that living a righteous life before God should never be put aside due to music. So, I eventually took shahadah (I believe in the one true God, Allah, and that Muhammad is a Messenger of God) and became an “official” Muslim. I was fourteen upon my conversion, and er... well I'm still fourteen, but Islam has already affected me quite profoundly.

ow, just because I now began referring to myself as a Muslim instead of a Christian didn’t mean that I had to give up beliefs. I never believed in a Trinitarian God or that Jesus was God Himself; after all, Jesus taught to abide by his word and to obey the Father, and that the Father is greater than he. The only main difference was that I now recognized the validity of Muhammad’s (pbuh) prophethood and the Truth of the Qur’an.

However, Islam was different to me in some respects than Christianity, but in ways that were pleasant and helpful. For example, I have always had a good relationship with God because of Jesus (pbuh) and his teachings, and I have always seen Christianity as a religion focused on God’s love. At school I have many Jewish friends, and I have partaken in the Sabbath with some of them, attended holidays, etc, and I noticed that they are very law abiding, yet in talking to my friends, it seemed to me as though they didn’t have that same connection/relationship with God that I and many other Christians I knew had. So my feeling was this: Christianity is great because it is focused around the love of God, but there is a lot of blind faith and mysteries involved, and that Judaism is great because many Jews live in accordance to the laws of the Torah, yet in my personal observances, it seemed as though many lacked some of that relationship.

Islam is both a religion which requires certain beliefs and is focused around the love of God/a relationship with Him, and it also has a strong aspect of law abiding, and ritual; in short, it has the passion and love of Christianity and the law and ritual of Judaism. These two are of course a fine combination if one wishes to know God and be obedient of His commandments.

As I partially mentioned before, my conversion to Islam was not an entirely huge step for me, because I was already a very spiritual person in touch with God; however, upon my conversion I found myself reading the Qur’an a lot, learning about the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) and researching all aspects of Islam. Soon enough, I learned how to do the ritual prayer and even if I don’t pray at all during the day (I’m trying to improve on that), I usually pray at night, often for long periods of time (20 minutes to an hour) because after the ritual prayer I stay prostrate before God thanking Him for what he has blessed me with, praising Him, etc. Prayer is indeed the door to the Eternal, and when I finish praying I feel “intoxicated” with God’s presence and I am often at a heart-warming peace.

My family has no qualms about me converting to Islam; I still believe in Jesus (I wouldn’t be a Muslim if I didn’t!), I haven’t gone to extremes like changing my name to an Arabic one, and I will still celebrate Christmas and Easter with my family in addition to Ramadan and other Muslim holidays. I know that neither Christian holiday is prescribed by God, yet I feel I need celebrate them now not because of my religious upbringing, but mainly for love of my family, and I see no harm in doing so as long as I know in my heart what it is that I am really celebrating. I have been brought up to shun the pagan ideas and commercialism that pertains to these holidays. I know not how my friends will react to my conversion, but it’s not like I shall be walking around campus professing that I am a Muslim, but if anyone asks me or religious status comes up in conversation, I will be proud to say I am a Muslim, just as I was proud to say I was a Christian. I hope to God that anyone who hears about my religious conversion will see me the same way as they did before.

The main impact that Islam has had on my life is that now, more than ever, I find myself in great obedience to God. I’m almost never angry, I don’t swear, I obey the Qur’an to the best of my abilities, and any minor sin I may commit (i.e. lust) I ask immediate forgiveness from God. I am also very jovial and peaceful, and I have excelled in wisdom. God even inspired me to write an essay in which I propose a non-Trinitarian way of viewing the nature of God which can be fully accepted by both Muslims and Christians.

feel as though in recent times I know God more than ever. I have also become greatly influenced by Sufism; the writings of Sufi saints are filled with wisdom, simplicity, and they profess their love of God so greatly. In reading the Sufi wisdom/religious literature, I realized something very important: I was always taught to believe in God and Jesus (pbuh) so that I may have eternal life, yet one day I realized that I do not believe in God and His Messengers and His commandments so that I can live forever, but because of my undying love and supreme reverence for the Almighty.

God exists here and now, on Earth, and you must look inside yourselves and around you at His Creation to find Him. Why wait for eternity to come when you can experience God’s presence anywhere at any time? Islam has indeed made me spiritually stronger than ever, and I thank God for inviting me to be a part of it. I wish the entire world could know how great Islam really is and stop judging it by the actions of a few men (terrorists and fundamentalists) who bring shame to Islam and the name of God.

As advice to Muslims and non-Muslims alike, don’t take seriously what is written negatively about Islam on the internet, especially on Christian websites: I have read horrible things including: Islam is a cult, it leads people away from God, Muslims don’t believe in Jesus, Allah is not God or Yahweh, and even a site which poked fun at Islam, instructing Christians how to kindly point out contradictions in the Qur’an or Muslim belief to get Muslims to convert to Christianity, etc.

The real truth is, it doesn’t matter what religious title you hold (Christian, Muslim, Jew, Hindu); it is one’s relationship with God and obeying His commands that leads to eternal life and salvation. To any Christian who may be sceptical about this simple statement on the ticket to eternal life, ask Jesus: “Whoever hears my word and believes in the one who sent me (God) has eternal life.” (Jn 5:24) And to support it with a Qur’anic passage: “O believers, believe in God and His Messenger(s), and the Book He has sent down on His Messenger (Muhammad), and the Book (Gospel) which he sent down before.” (Qur’an 4:135) In the prior, as in the latter, there is no complex theology: just God and His Messengers.

I hope and pray that there shall be a day when every person shall bow before God Almighty, and love Him with the greatest of love. May the Truth guide all men to salvation, and may the Eternal engulf them in His ever embracing Light.

PA, Hamas Slam US Election "Intervention"

GAZA CITY, December 17, 2005 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) – The Palestinian Authority and the resistance group Hamas slammed on Saturday, December 17, what they called American interventions in the Palestinian elections.

"Elections should remain opened for all parties," Palestinian Authority spokesman Nabil Abu Rudaina told the Doha-based Al-Jazeera news channel.

"The legislative elections will be held on time and all Palestinian sides have the right to participate. Otherwise, they would not be democratic."

Abu Rudaina called on the international community to convince the Bush administration not to adopt the resolution.

"This does not serve the peace process nor the US efforts to maintain peace in the area."

PA chief negotiator Saeb Erekat said the position of the US Congress "is refused lock, stock and barrel."

In a resolution approved on Friday, December 16, by 397 to 17 votes with seven abstentions, the US House of Representatives threatened the PA that it risked losing US financial aid and other support if it allowed Hamas to contest the legislative polls.

A welcoming Israeli Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom said Saturday the PA must prevent Hamas from contesting the elections, scheduled on January 25.

"The participation of Hamas in the elections can put us back 50 years," he told Israel Radio.

US Democracy

"The only democracy allowed by Washington is that which serve its interests," Hamas averred.

Hamas, which scored a resounding victory Friday in local elections in the main West Bank cities, blasted the American resolution.

"This is a flagrant intervention in Palestinian domestic affairs," the resistance group said in a statement, a copy of which was faxed to IslamOnline.net.

It said the resolution reflected the double-standard policy of the Bush administration and debunk its democratization rhetoric.

The statement urged the PA to stand firm against such American interventions and conditional aid.

The resolution warned the PA that all financial aid offered to the Palestinians would be withheld in case Hamas joined the government.

Hamas won in three out of four West Bank cities in a local ballot seen as a bellwether for a January election, official results published Saturday showed.

The group won 13 seats out of 15 in the traditional Fatah stronghold of Nablus.

In the northern West Bank city of Jenin, Hamas won eight seats and Fatah won seven. In al-Bireh, it won nine seats versus four for Fatah.

Hamas's only loss was in Ramallah, the current seat of the Palestinian government, where it won three seats in the 15-seat local council.

"The elections were free, fair and transparent," Jamal al-Shobaki, head of Local Election Commission, told reporters at a news conference announcing the results.

The results illustrated Hamas's grass-roots strength especially at a time when Abbas's ruling Fatah faction is in disarray after a group of popular leaders broke away to form their own faction for the January election.

Hamas's support among Palestinians is partly the result of its corruption-free reputation, charity network and struggle against the Israeli occupation.

Hamas did well in the previous three rounds of the municipal vote and it is expected to make a strong showing in the last phase to be held in early 2006 in Al-Khalil (Hebron) and Gaza City.