Baithak World Jun 01: New Face of Islam, Egyptian Emergency, Princess Lubna, David Hirsh, Robert Fisk, Headlines, RealNews

Intellectually and theologically, a lot of the most ambitious work is being done by a group of scholars based in Ankara, Turkey, who expect to publish new editions of the Hadith before the end of the year. They have collected all 170,000 known narrations of the Prophet's sayings. These are supposed to record Muhammad's words and deeds as a guide to daily life and a key to some of the mysteries of the Qur'an. But many of those anecdotes came out of a specific historical context, and those who told the stories or, much later, recorded them, were not always reliable. Sometimes they confused "universal values of Islam with geographical, cultural and religious values of their time and place," says Mehmet Gormez, a theology professor at the University of Ankara who's working on the project. "Every Hadith narration has ... a context. We want to give every narration a home again." The New Face of Islam [thanks A]

The People's Assembly voted on Monday to extend the emergency law for another two years. The extension came in spite of promises, repeated endlessly in 2006, that emergency rule would be replaced by an anti-terror bill once the current extension expired. The emergency law, in force since 1981, grants police and security forces sweeping powers, allowing them, in effect, to hold Egyptian citizens indefinitely, without charge. Some 305 MPs voted in favour of the extension, and just 103 voted against. Emergency since 1981?

BLUE SKIES AHEAD Sheika Lubna al-Qasimi, the U.A.E.'s foreign trade minister, at Abu Dhabi's Beach Rotana hotel.

Photograph by: Lynsey Addario

Princess Lubna is the U.A.E.'s biggest business envoy, paving the way for billions in new investment. She's the first female foreign trade minister in the Middle East—and the first anywhere with her own perfume line. Mover and Sheika by John Arlidge

A boycott of Israeli academics would harm the Palestine solidarity effort, it would harm the Israeli peace movement and it would harm the peace process. It would mis-educate young people who were concerned about the Middle East to believe that it was a simple problem of good against evil. It would harm the boycotting universities and unions and it would harm the boycotted universities. It would act as a catalyst for antisemitic ways of thinking and it would constitute in itself an antisemitic exclusion. The only good the boycott campaign does is to make some comfortable and self-righteous people, far away from the violence, feel that they are 'doing something' to help. Arguments against the academic boycott of Israel - David Hirsh

Six thousand dead in Afghanistan, tens of thousands dead in Iraq, a suicide bombing a day in Mesopotamia, the highest level of suicides ever in the US military – the Arab press wisely ran this story head to head with Hayden's boasts – and permanent US bases in Iraq after 31 December. And we've won? Less than two years ago, we had an equally insane assessment of the war when General Peter Pace, the weird (and now mercifully retired) chairman of the US joint chiefs of staff, said of the American war in Iraq that "we are not winning but we are not losing". At which point, George Bush's Defence Secretary, Robert Gates, said he agreed with Pace that "we are not winning but we are not losing". Robert Fisk: So al-Qa'ida's defeated, eh? Go tell it to the marines

Headlines

Arab women push boundaries gently

Remembering Youssef Idris

M J Akbar From Promise to Compromise
Michelangelo for Readers With Deep Pockets
Democrat settlement blow to Clinton
Na'ima B Robert: Amazing glimpse into the lives of UK Muslim women
Inside the world of UK Muslim women
An Open Letter to Defense Minister, Ehud Barak
When the Kettle Calls the Pot BlackUri Avnery
Condensed literature
Islamic body (Deoband) issues fatwa against terrorism
Tariq Ali Looks Back in the Global Struggle for Social Justice
S Tharoor: Be more tolerant towards creative fields

Inconvenient Truths: Get Ready to Rethink What it Means to Be Green
1: Live in Cities
2: A/C Is OK
3: Organics Are Not The Answer
4: Farm the Forests
5: China Is the Solution
6: Accept Genetic Engineering
7: Carbon Trading Doesn't Work
8: Embrace Nuclear Power
9: Used Cars — Not Hybrids
10: Prepare for the Worst

Doonesbury@SLATE

Paul Jay presents RealNews

Iraqi clerics against US bases Clerics call for referendum on proposal to indefinitely station US troops in Iraq view China: Changing horizons, changing diet Guardian: Food crisis, part 4, reports on the impact of urbanization and consumerism in China view Kabul's new drug crisis Guardian: Iran and Pakistan deporting drug addicts to Afghanistan view