The Thinking Muslim

The Labour Party is en route to form the next government of the United Kingdom with what most analysts describe as a landslide majority. The Conservatives have resided over a failed government, with Brexit, economic crisis and poor public services now associated with the Rishi Sunak’s lacklustre government. Labour’s leader, Keir Starmer is comfortably ahead in the polls and it is now openly stated...

This interview was conducted before the most recent verdict in the High Court rejecting the right of a student to conduct Muslim prayers in British schools. Over the past few years there has been intense debate about the place of Muslim practice in liberal western societies. Across the west, partly because of the war on terror, politicians talk of unwelcome cultural shifts and the the need to chas...

Join our Patreon to get access to exclusive monthly Zoom calls: https://www.patreon.com/TheThinkingMu... and help us expand this podcast. You can email Clive on clivestaffordsmith2020@gmail.com Please send your letters to Clive. Make them more than a couple of lines. Clive also needs a team of lawyers to help him in Texas. If you want to help fund Dr Aafia’s legal costs, below is Clive's paypal ca...

The 17th Ramadan marks the most decisive battle in the history of early Islam. Dr Wajid Akhtar, founder of Charity Week for Orphans and Children in Need and Council member of the British Islamic Medical Association discusses the great battle of Badr, the most consequential battle in Islamic history. Join our Patreon to get access to exclusive monthly Zoom calls: https://www.patreon.com/TheThinking...

Join our Patreon to get access to exclusive monthly Zoom calls:    / thethinkingmuslim   Every year, the list of beleaguered Muslim countries and people increases, and with it, the demand for charity. We are used to giving in sadaqa – and our kindness as a community is rarely matched. The Muslim community in the UK alone gives upwards of £1bn in charity – much of which goe...

Join our Patreon to get access to exclusive monthly Zoom calls:    / thethinkingmuslim   We are in the month of Ramadan where Muslims worldwide share in the simple yet profound act of fasting from dawn to dusk. Our collective commitment to this activity is often met with surprise by others who do not share our faith; how can someone be so devoted to a creator, and why is s...

We are all angry. We live in an unjust world. The so-called rules-based system, the rhetoric surrounding human rights, the endless speeches on democracy and freedom – all of it turned out to be hollow. The death and destruction in gaza is juxtaposed with the triviality with which the political elites in the west talk of human life. We are angry.  How does a Muslim deal with this visceral ange...

Join our Patreon to get access to exclusive monthly Zoom calls: https://www.patreon.com/TheThinkingMu... The current slaughter meted out on innocents in Gaza, fully supported Western Governments, is founded upon a bed of lies. It is said that the truth is the first casualty of war, yet in this war the truth is not hidden –the decapitated bodies, crushed skulls, emaciated children, the callous shel...

Join our Patreon to get access to exclusive monthly Zoom calls: https://www.patreon.com/TheThinkingMuslim At the time where our attention is fixed on Gaza, rightly, another conflict is taking place with horrendous cost to human life. Sadly As always, our ummah has become subject to the political ambitions of egotistical actors and their outside backers. Sudan is burning. There are 8 million people...

Join our Patreon to get access to exclusive monthly Zoom calls:    / thethinkingmuslim   Sami Hamdi for the past five months has helped us untangle and understand the motives and actions of the actors that wage genocide in Gaza. The conflict, if that is even a proper term to use, seems to be continuing despite discussions of an end game. At the time of recording this inter...

We had a problem with our guest’s audio this week. Apologies for this, we wanted to however get this episode out. Join our Patreon to get access to exclusive monthly Zoom calls: https://www.patreon.com/TheThinkingMu... This past few weeks in Pakistan have been a rollercoaster ride. We have seen the continued, brazen army interference in elections that for so long has earned the country the dubious...

Our guest this week, Dr Sohail Hanif, argues that we need to reconnect with not just our relationship with our umma but also have to reorient our lives to live like the murabitun of the past, those who saw themselves as within a wider objective of thinking about deen and the umma and their part within this rubric. In this endeavour, to change our mentality, we have to reconfigure how we view some...

How do we learn from the wisdom of others in a world intent on ruthless autonomy? Today, with the Gaza war as our backdrop, we ask Dr Yakoob Ahmed what pieces of advice he would give to his 18-year-old self. Dr Yakoob Ahmed is an academic specialising in late Ottoman history. He is a PhD graduate of the School of Oriental and African Studies and currently teaches Islamic history at Istanbul Univer...

The recent ICJ interim order has been interpreted in many ways by its proponents, who hail it a victory and its opponents, who denounce it as an Israeli conspiracy. However, many have questioned the efficacy of the interim order, pointing to the ICJ’s lack of enforcement and the absence of an explicit mention of a ceasefire. To help us understand the complexities surrounding the judgement, we have...

When we consider the ongoing slaughter that is Gaza and the West's complicity, it's not the world leaders, East or West, who have captured our collective imagination – it's the ordinary people who have made the difference. It's the journalists, poets – the doctors and nurses that have helped the world see the atrocities of settler colonialism and its abject violence. Certainly, a defused media has...

Zionism is the ideology that underpins the barbarism that has been meted out on Palestinians, its latest chapter being the slaughter that is currently happening in Gaza. Yet its ideals remain respectable in establishment circles. In the United States, political leaders fall over one another to declare their un denying loyalty to the creed and in Britain, there has been a long tradition of Christia...

Today, we are confronting nothing short of a campaign of ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians of Gaza, not seen since the Nakba or Catastrophe of 1948. Yet many in the Western world are silent to the suffering. Much of what justifies Israel and its actions in the West is premised on history, and many European and American historians have been ready to present a compelling argument for Zionism and...

We have now passed three months of the Gaza slaughter, and according to the UN, Gaza has become uninhabitable. During these past few days, we have seen another frenetic series of diplomatic meetings by US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken in the region as the US looks to consolidate the status quo. The genocidal intent of the Israeli state. If it was unclear at the start of the conflict, it is cl...

In the long durée of Islamic history, we often lose sight that every generation, even the best generation, that of the companions, had deep challenges to overcome. Our enemies have continuously worked to undermine our unity, and it is often the hard lessons of these challenges that help us overcome our petty disputes and territorial differences. This episode we focus on the notion of unity and its...

** This interview was recorded a few hours before South Africa initiated its ICJ case - the Genocide Convention is discussed in detail here. When we consider the disgraceful actions of the Israeli state, it becomes evident that they operate in a system of impunity. But what, if anything, can we do about this? My guest today, Tayab Ali, is a lawyer specialising in criminal trials. He is a partner a...

The events in Gaza, the horrific slaughter of over 20,000 Gazans remains a deep wound all people of conscience have had to contend with over the past two months. The callous way with which the lives of young innocents can be so openly calculated and traded is shocking yet predictable in equal measure. Much of what has happened is premised on a set of collective myths the west has attempted to perp...

Join our Patreon to get access to exclusive monthly Zoom calls: https://www.patreon.com/TheThinkingMuslim The plight of the Uyghur Muslims in East Turkestan has been described as a genocide. An entire ethnic, cultural and religious group is being erased. We hear stories of mass detention, the banning of Ramadan, and the closure and demolition of mosques. We also hear the disturbing reports of wome...

As the unrelenting Gaza killing of civilians continues unabated, another potential ethnic cleansing in Palestine is underway – again in plain sight. The gradual conquest of Palestinian land is continuing at pace. Armed Israeli settlers, with the full backing of the state, pillage and forcibly vacate entire villages and farming communities. Yet the international community remains mute. This is ethn...

Join our Patreon to get access to exclusive monthly Zoom calls: https://www.patreon.com/TheThinkingMuslim This past week, the world has reflected on the death of former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. As Nixon's national security advisor, he was notorious for his ultra-realist approach to international politics, which saw the policy of triangulation with China and the Soviet Union that was piv...

The events of the past 6 weeks have exposed the sheer double standards that apply to the implementation of international law. The so-called liberal international order has been found to be nothing short of hypocritical. Gaza has exposed not only this duplicity but also the very ideas that undergird such a system. Today, we explore these ideas. Many surmise that the West has taken a wrong turn, and...