Selamat Hari Raya!

Ex-ISA Detainee Looking Forward To Aidilfitri With Family

KUALA LUMPUR, Sept 16 — After seven years of welcoming Syawal without his family, Mat Sah Mohamad Satray is grateful to be able to celebrate the coming Hari Raya with his loved ones.

“I can’t wait to see my only son, who is now 16 years old. When I left him, he was only nine years old,” he told reporters when met at his father’s house in Ampang.

His wife and son are in Sabah.

Mat Sah was among five members of the Jemaah Islamiah Malaysia who were released from detention under the Internal Security Act (ISA) today.

Mat Sah said he was informed that he would be released four days ago. — Bernama

Five JI Men Released From ISA Detention

ISA: Semakin Kuat Semakin Yakin

Klik sini untuk menonton video. Memang betul kata Puan Norlaila: tidak perlu mengucapkan terima kasih kepada kerajaan. Sepatutnya kerajaan yang meminta maaf dan membayar pampasan kepada keluarga Encik Mat Sah untuk penderitaan yang telah dialami selama 7 tahun.

Behind The Baram Blockades

Over the past week, there have been numerous reports about the blockades by several Penan communities in Tutoh-Apoh, Patah, and Baram, Sarawak. The blockades were to halt the transportation of logs by several logging business groups.

These groups have been harvesting timber within the traditional territories of the surrounding villages in the above-mentioned places.

According to community representatives, the blockades were set up for several interrelated reasons. Firstly, with the advent of large monoculture plantations, the people's forest resources are in a state of acute decline.

If logging had devastating impact on affected communities, plantations would be worst off. Clear-felling operations entail the total destruction of the people's land and forest resources, including their communal water catchments.

Secondly, this impending deforestation disaster is certainly linked to the lack of land rights of the native communities to their traditional territories. For years, the communities' numerous applications for their village forest reserves to be gazetted into Communal Forest Reserves have never been approved by the state.

The people maintain that logging has failed to produce meaningful benefits to local communities and has instead, over the years severely compromised their quality of life. They point out that local people even miss out on employment opportunities, as companies seem to prefer to hire Indonesian labour.

The people also stress that their efforts to negotiate with the companies and their agents have often been futile. The protestors are determined not to give in into any intimidations or threats to dismantle the barricades unless their demands are met.

Foremost, they call for all logging and plantation operations to be halted on their land, a call, that if left unheeded, may lead to significant food deprivation and widespread malnutrition among the people.

Equally important, the people also want their Native Customary Rights (NCR) to be fully recognised, and that they be allowed to exercise self-determination with regards to any development plans that may affect them.

In our view, all the demands above certainly require an urgent comprehensive response at a policy level from the Sarawak state government.

We find the statement attributed to Sarawak's Rural Development Minister James Masing in an AFP news article published on Aug 23, which describes the Penan communities as "good storytellers" and that their land rights disputes "were often aimed at wringing more compensation from companies" as most regretful.

Similarly, we find the insinuations about the communities' blockades by state assemblyperson Lihan Jok equally unacceptable. Lihan was quoted by Utusan Borneo on Aug 30, suggesting that the blockades appear to show the Penan communities are uncivilised, this despite the fact that many are highly educated.

In fact, the latest blockades leads to questions about the sustainability claims of the Sarawak timber and plantation industries. Many Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) reports of the projects in the area seem to suggest that plantation development is necessary in Sarawak due to the depletion in timber resources in the state.

However, timber harvesting for Dipterocarp forests within the Sarawak PFE supposedly operates under a 25-year cutting cycle. If it is indeed true that timber has been largely depleted in just 30 years since large-scale logging commenced in the state, Sarawak should no longer claim to be practising sustainable forestry management.

We believe that the Sarawak state government has also failed to take full cognisance of our judicial decisions on native rights. The Federal Court in 2007 has ruled that native rights owes its existence to native customary laws and not to any modern statute or legislation, while affirming that individual and communal native rights have equal legal force. Our Appeals Court has affirmed that such rights cover both cultivated and forested areas.

SAM is of the view that the continuous occurrence of land rights protests in Sarawak is a result of the absence of a participatory and consultative demarcation process of native territorial boundaries in Sarawak.

Such a process should incorporate the Free, Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC) mechanism and a set of substantiation procedures designed to yield corroborative evidence to support each native land rights claim.

Given all the facts above, we call on the Sarawak state government to fulfil all the demands made by the blockading communities and exercise restraint in dealing with the protest.

In our view, unless Sarawak halts further forest conversions in the state and subsequently establishes a consultative demarcation process which takes cognisance of the full stature, nature and extent of the NCR as ruled by our judiciary, any sustainability claims made on both the timber and plantation industries in Sarawak must be treated with great caution.

S M Mohamed Idris is the president of Sahabat Alam Malaysia (SAM)

Tony Blair: Without God's Truth at its centre, no community can fulfil its potential

The Independent UK, 1 Sept 2009.

The limits to individualism are in one sense plain. We only need to contemplate the financial crisis to understand that the pursuit of maximum short-term profit, without proper regard to the communal good, is a mistake and leads to neither profit nor good. Yet, at a deeper level, the case against a purely individualistic or materialistic philosophy has to be made. Young people today have access to technology, to opportunity, to experiences good and bad on a scale my generation never knew and my father's generation would find fantastical, like something out of science fiction.

The danger is clear: that pursuit of pleasure becomes an end in itself. It is here that faith can step in, can show us a proper sense of duty to others, responsibility for the world around us, and can lead us to, as the Holy Father calls it, caritas in veritate.

After the experience of fascism, Soviet Communism or viewing life in North Korea or the cultural revolution in China, it is easier for us to grasp the dangers of a too-powerful state.

But I would argue that even the concept of community has its limitations. We use the word in two senses: one to distinguish it from government, to emphasise civic society if you like; the other sense is just to describe the general community of public opinion. In politics, of course, especially in a democracy, "the people" are the boss; public opinion is to be courted and if not surrendered to, as least managed.

It is here that Faith enlarges and enriches the idea of community. The recent Papal Encyclical is a remarkable document in many respects. It repays reading and re-reading. But one strand throughout it is a strong rejoinder to the notion of relativism, to the description of the human condition in society as just some amoral negotiation or set of compromises with modernity; or even just obedience to the majority opinion. Not that it is anti-technology or anti-modern; or indeed anti-democratic. But it widens and deepens the relationship between individuals and the community in which they live. It puts God's Truth at the centre of it. In one passage, it describes humanism devoid of faith as "inhuman humanism": "Without God, man neither knows which way to go, nor even understands who he is."

This is an extract from a speech given to the Communion and Liberation meeting in Rimini, Italy, last week.

Of Islam, Churches and Temples

By Art Harun (Blogger) 1 September 2009

Shouldn't we, Muslims, ask ourselves whether we are - to a certain, if not large, extent - not to blame for the ridicule that has befallen our great way of life known as Islam? Are we blind or too much blinkered by what we believe to be the ways of Islam so much so that we are unable to see the signs before us? Or is it a fact that we just could not care less?

Many of us, Muslims, nowadays have become uptight about Islam. And to make matters worse, in our country, Islam is tied up to our race, - by a Constitutional provision, no less! - our Malayness, so to speak. Thus, it comes as no surprise that Islam and Malayness are almost interchangeable. Say something which could be remotely perceived as against Islam, and you would be challenging not only Islam, but the whole Malay race. And vice versa.

And these people declare that they are the defenders of Islam. The Caliphs. Defenders of the faith. As if Islam is not so great without them. As if God would retreat into oblivion without their help and undying assistance.

In the name of Islam they would do things. And some times in doing so, they smear the good name of Islam. They reduce God into a creature of hate, prejudice and intolerance. Why? Just look at the picture.

(I am sorry for the language. But I have to publish it verbatim to make my point).

These people were apparently angry with DAP for insulting Islam (or what they perceived as DAP insulting Islam). And so these very good Muslims spent some money on banners and gathered to show their displeasure. All in the name of Allah and Islam of course. Very Islamic indeed.

On Friday, 28th August 2009, right after Friday prayers, it is now well known to the whole civilised world, that a group of people gathered in front of the mosque. They then carried a severed head of a cow - complete with blood and all - and walked all the way to the State Secretariat building. Apparently, they were protesting against the Government's plan to relocate a Hindu temple to their area, which according to them, is a Muslim dominated area.That was the apparent reason. The real reason or motivation we will never know, of course.

The who's who of that group promised bloodshed if that plan is not changed. He said that the temple would disturb them and the noises from the temple would disturb their prayers etcetera. They then stomped and spat on the cow head.

All in the name of Islam. In the name of Allah the Almighty, the Compassionate, the Merciful. Allah the Provider and the Giver. Isn't Islam great? Isn't Islam so wonderful that it has defenders ever ready to defend itself?

I have just one question to them. If all of you are so pious and God fearing, how is it that some noises from a temple could disturb you and your prayers?

And what's with the cow head? You spat on it. You stomped on it. What was the whole purpose? To revile and mock another faith? Well, don't I have news for all of you.

God - and this our God, not any other God - says:

وَمَا أَرْسَلْنَاكَ إِلَّا رَحْمَةً لِّلْعَالَمِينَ {21:107}

"And We have not sent you but as a mercy to the worlds." (Translation by Shakir)

Our Prophet Muhammad - peace be upon him - was sent as a mercy to the whole world. Not just to Muslims, to me or to you but to the whole world.

And Prophet Muhammad - peace be upon him -, in his last sermon, said:

“People, hear that your Lord is One, and that your father is one. You must know that no Arab has superiority over a non-Arab, no non-Arab has superiority over an Arab, or a red man over a black man, or a black man over a red, except in terms of what each person has of piety. Have I delivered the message?”

Yes, all human beings are the same, regardless of whether they are Muslims or non-Muslims, Arab or non-Arab, Malay or Indian, section 23 residents or Kampung Buah Pala dwellers. The Prophet said so. And as if to ensure that his followers had understood what he had just said, he ended that message by asking, "have I delivered the message?"

Quite obviously, to some so called defenders of the faith - whose faith may be easily disturbed by some noises from some temples - the message has not been so clearly delivered.

And what about this:

وَلاَ تَسُبُّواْ الَّذِينَ يَدْعُونَ مِن دُونِ اللّهِ فَيَسُبُّواْ اللّهَ عَدْوًا بِغَيْرِ عِلْمٍ كَذَلِكَ زَيَّنَّا لِكُلِّ أُمَّةٍ عَمَلَهُمْ ثُمَّ إِلَى رَبِّهِم مَّرْجِعُهُمْ فَيُنَبِّئُهُم بِمَا كَانُواْ يَعْمَلُونَ {6:108

"Revile not ye those whom they call upon besides Allah, lest they out of spite revile Allah in their ignorance. Thus have We made alluring to each people its own doings. In the end will they return to their Lord, and We shall then tell them the truth of all that they did." (Translation by Yusuf Ali).

(Isn't it an irony of sort that the above verse is from Surah Al-An'aam, which means "the Cattle"?).

Did you all read the Quran? God prohibits us, Muslims, from reviling others who do not believe in Allah. Lest they would, out of spite, revile Allah. And what were you doing with the cow head? If that was not reviling the Hindus, I do not know what is.

In fact, in all His wisdom, God had seen it fit even to defend some churches, monasteries and synagogues:

لَّذِينَ أُخْرِجُوا مِن دِيَارِهِمْ بِغَيْرِ حَقٍّ إِلَّا أَن يَقُولُوا رَبُّنَا اللَّهُ وَلَوْلَا دَفْعُ اللَّهِ النَّاسَ بَعْضَهُم بِبَعْضٍ لَّهُدِّمَتْ صَوَامِعُ وَبِيَعٌ وَصَلَوَاتٌ وَمَسَاجِدُ يُذْكَرُ فِيهَا اسْمُ اللَّهِ كَثِيراً وَلَيَنصُرَنَّ اللَّهُ مَن يَنصُرُهُ إِنَّ اللَّهَ لَقَوِيٌّ عَزِيزٌ {22:40

"They are those who have been expelled from their homes in defiance of right,- (for no cause) except that they say, "our Lord is Allah". Did not Allah check one set of people by means of another, there would surely have been pulled down monasteries, churches, synagogues, and mosques, in which the name of Allah is commemorated in abundant measure. Allah will certainly aid those who aid his (cause);- for verily Allah is full of Strength, Exalted in Might, (able to enforce His Will)." (translation by Yususf Ali).

God creates all of us human beings. Of different colours and races. And also religions. Had He wanted all of us to be His followers, He could have.

وَلَوْ شَاء رَبُّكَ لآمَنَ مَن فِي الأَرْضِ كُلُّهُمْ جَمِيعًا أَفَأَنتَ تُكْرِهُ النَّاسَ حَتَّى يَكُونُواْ مُؤْمِنِينَ {10:99

"If it had been thy Lord's will, they would all have believed,- all who are on earth! wilt thou then compel mankind, against their will, to believe!" (translation by Yusuf Ali).

That is His way. Because as oft said, there is no compulsion in Islam.

And what will be the punishment for all of you who marched last Friday, spat and stomped on the cow head, all in the name of our faith, Islam and our God, Allah? God bless you all. Because this is what the Prophet - whom I believe is also your Prophet - said:

“Beware! Whoever is cruel and hard on a non-Muslim minority, curtails their rights, burdens them with more than they can bear, or takes anything from them against their free will; I (Prophet Muhammad) will complain against the person on the Day of Judgment.” (by Abu Dawud)

Yes, you will get some personal attention from the Prophet himself on the day of judgment. Congratulations guys.

It is interesting to note, what Sheikh Yusuf al Qaradawi said about these kind of people. Strange. Because while he was saying the followings, he could have been talking about those people who were involved in that despicable act last Friday. This is what he said:

"A clear separating line should be drawn here between the teachings of Islam, which prohibit attacking non-Muslim places of worship, and the acts of some Muslims who possess a narrow-minded view of Islam.

Those people harm Islam and Muslims with their wrong behavior; as the threat they pose to Islam is much more than that of the enemies of Islam.

Along the same line, a traditional Arabic proverb reads, "A wise enemy is better than a foolish friend."

The fanaticism we see in some certain people is often due to reasons that have nothing to do with religion, even if it takes the form of religion. In fact, its reasons may turn out to be social, economic, or political after thorough study. That is why we see it appearing in certain areas and not others; as some social circumstances and inherited traditions sow the seed of fanaticism and help it grow. Therefore, it is unfair to accuse religion of being responsible for such fanatic acts."

To top it all up, that this wholly seditious and unIslamic act was done just after they performed the Friday prayer and in the holy month of Ramadhan is an irony not missed by all Muslims and non-Muslims alike.

Well done.