My Iraqi immigrant grandfather used to have a small novelty shop where he sold hair accessories, lipstick-shaped erasers and noisy, battery-operated toys. He soon learned enough English phrases to complete a business transaction. All other communication he handled with gestures and the warmest smile. During his many hospital stays in…
Read MoreIt seems like every week we in the U.S. have another mass shooting to decipher and process. So, the June 12 shooting in Orlando was not the first time I posted a call to action on Facebook, contacted my elected representatives about gun control, or held my breath and hoped…
Read MoreA HUSBAND and wife in Pakistan can never be alone again. In between them sit the clerics of Pakistan’s Council of Islamic Ideology (CII). However small the space may be, the mullah in the middle would like to prescribe what is to happen between them. He tells the wife that…
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The news of Sadiq Khan winning the mayoral race in London spread like wildfire in Muslim circles. WhatsApp groups, Twitter, Facebook, texts and emails were full of surprise and pride. In a time of rising Islamophobia in the western world this news was welcome validation that Islamophobia can be overcome….
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A week ago my hijab-wearing Pakistani mom was driving down the street when a man in a silver Lexus began to honk and gesture wildly. My mom ignored him, keeping her gaze planted firmly on the road ahead. When she reached a red light and slowed to a stop, this…
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In 1982, I began fasting half-days during Ramadan for the first time, my hands painted with henna in celebration. I was in Mrs. Campbell’s third grade class; the only Muslim in a school of more than three hundred children. She growled my name “So-fee-AAH! We do not write on our…
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Changes to the Bill, the Community Hearing and the Mayor’s Budget A great deal has happened since my January 2016 article on Paid Family Leave, including the Community Hearing at the D.C. Council. Here are the updates on D.C.’s Universal Paid Leave Act of 2015 and what you need to…
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altM’s Founder, Editor-in-Chief, and religious liberties lawyer Asma Uddin reviews the Marrakesh Declaration, and what it means for religious freedom. In the 13th century, when the Mongols conquered Baghdad, their ruler Hulagu Khan gathered the religious scholars in the city and asked them: According to spiritual law, which option is…
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This election cycle has been difficult to experience, even for adults. Civil conversations and respect for diversity have been sidelined, and the loudest voices in politics and on television now are frighteningly extreme. Unsurprisingly the hateful rhetoric has filtered into American schools. The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) has just…
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On February 10, Abdul Jamil Kamawal, a 68-year-old Afghani American man, was bludgeoned to death with a shovel in a suburb of Portland, Oregon. Remembered as “a pillar in the Muslim community,” he had helped refugees settle in the region for over two decades. Abdul Jamil Kamawal He also founded…
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