Talib, Taliban, Tullab

“Talib means student, one student. Tullab means students. Taliban means 2 students, and some people said students in general. So I’m sorry you guys students of Northwestern, you’re the local Taliban.” – Maulana Yusuf Abdullah

"Profiling is a violation of national standards against racial discrimination. It is not something that our country was founded on." – Capt. James Yusuf Yee

That was part of the quotes that I found nice and interesting. =D

Believe it or not, I never thought the against Islam thing isn’t decreasing. Maybe because I always live in many Muslim areas, therefore the non-Muslims are aware of us as good Muslims. And to include the scariness, the thing that happen to Malaysia (the burning churches) might increase the ‘phobia’, or should I say ‘against Islam actions’.

As I bring this up to increase the awareness among us, it is our job to explain Islam to others. Not particularly in States, but in Malaysia as well. And as we want respect from others, we should respect them too, right? ;)

A bit background of both Yusufs:

Maulana Yusuf Abdullah - He memorized the Quran as a child and studied Islamic Studies and Arabic in India. He graduated from Darul Uloom Deoband, one of the leading Islamic Universities in the world. He is fluent in Arabic and Urdu and proficient in Persian. After completing his Islamic education, he returned to the US and got a Bachelor’s degree in Finance from the University of Illinois in Chicago. He worked in the consulting workforce for Accenture and is currently a manager at Tellabs. He continues to work for the Muslim community in the Chicagoland area by lecturing on Islamic topics at mosques and universities, leading taraweeh prayers and holding tafseer classes.

Chaplain James Yusuf Yee - a former US Army Chaplain and graduate of West Point who served as the Muslim Chaplain for the U.S. prison camp in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba that would become controversial for its treatment of detainees designated as “enemy combatants” by the U.S. government. After being officially recognized twice for outstanding performance, Captain Yee was arrested and imprisoned in a Naval brig for 76 days in September 2003 while being falsely accused of spying, espionage, and aiding the alleged Taliban and Al-Qaeda prisoners. He was held in solitary confinement and subjected to the same sensory deprivation techniques that were being used against the prisoners in Cuba that he had been ministering to. Eventually, all criminal charges were dropped.

ps: too bad I forgot to bring my camera that day~~

Sources:
http://planitpurple.northwestern.edu/event/398468
http://www.usnews.com/blogs/paper-trail/2010/01/22/northwestern-event-fights-islamaphobia.html
http://topics.nytimes.com/topics/reference/timestopics/people/y/james_j_yee/index.html