We can't let the Taliban have the final say

It is always disturbing to be reminded of the atrocities and brutality of the Taliban (warning: contains images of horrific violence and brutality) in Afghanistan. With the ever-changing allegiances of the different factions and leaders and no discernible difference between the politics and religious views of the Taliban, Northern Alliance and Hamid Karzi's religious extremist bed-fellows, there is no solution to the dismal human rights situation and abject poverty (in material and spirit) in Afghanistan.

Karzi's acquiescence to religious extremism (seen most recently the "Family Code" which disinherits women, legalises spousal rape, child marriage, etc.) shows that groups like RAWA that are fighting for freedom, peace and human rights are firmly shut out of formal politics and still face life-threatening risks.

It is important that the innocent and defenseless victims of the Taliban and other religious fanatics in Afghanistan be remembered. Their stories should be told and kept from being blown away with the dust of history.

Who was this woman murdered by the Taliban on the dirt of a football pitch? How will she be remembered and by whom? What was she like? Was she funny and outgoing or shy? Did she tell jokes? What was her laugh like? What colour were her eyes? What was her favourite flavour of ice-cream? Was she kind to her sisters and brothers? Did she like reading and telling stories? Was she clumsy and apologetic when she knocked over a glass of tea? Did she like cooking or was she lazy but sly and quick to convince her sister that she was a terrible cook who would only ruin an evening meal?

How long did she have to wait, trembling and crying knowing her death was inevitable? Or was she calm and resigned? Did she hope someone would notice? Did she fear that nobody would ever know what happened to her? What "crime" had she committed before having her memories, dreams and fears shot out of the back of her head by a hate-fuelled fanatic? Did she know her killers? Her accuser? Did she have children or elderly parents she had to care for? Who betrayed her and let the Taliban take her? Was she loved? Is she missed?

What was her name?

Maybe her's is a story that can never be told but there must be others and they must be.

Religious lunatics try to keep women down in Afghanistan

The war in Afghanistan is still going on, but the real war is a civil war between decent Afghan people and religious lunatics trying to keep women down who will stop at nothing to deny them basic rights such as the right to education. We can only hop that groups like the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan still have the stomach for the struggle they're involved in. I suspect they might still have it.

No god but God and the fight for Islam's heart

It will take many more [years of violence] to cleanse Islam of its new false idols—bigotry and fanaticism—worshipped by those who have replaced Muhammad's original vision of tolerance and unity with their own ideals of hatred and discord. But the cleansing is inevitable, and the tide of reform cannot be stopped. The Islamic Reformation is already here. We are all living in it.

Thus ends Reza Aslan's No god but God: The Origins, Evolution and Future of Islam, an apologia for and defence of Islam.

Early in the book Aslan states that there is no "clash of fundamentalisms" nor "clash of civilisations", but rather a civil war within Islam for the heart and soul of the faith. His emphasis is on the faith, not the religion. The religion is the schism, the splits, the murderous rampages, the desecration of rival sects' mosques and the power struggles. The faith is that there is no god by God, that all men are equal before God, etc.

YouTube is awash with videos from keyboard jihadists fighting against their co-religionists by making slideshows denouncing shirk, Shi'ite and Sufi kufar. The influence of Deobandi, Salafist, Wahhabi theology and frequency with which other Muslims are denounced as apostates is not something new in the years since the terrorist attacks on New York. And neither is the progressive, inclusive response in Islam.

Whenever people talk about Christianity, the West, Islam, the Middle East, Iran, Israel, Gaza, etc. they find it so easy to gloss over the very real diversity and division of opinion, faith and belief, seeing everything and everyone as monolithic, homogenous blocks. Islam has a long history of internal conflict and bloodshed, but also a long history of a struggle to include not only all Muslims, but other monotheists within its greater Ummah.

The problem for people like Reza Aslan is not that they are fewer in number, but they lack the example of a government that respects freedom and human rights, the backing of a state with natural resources and the support of a media hell-bent on showing all Muslims as an unfathomable enemy.