Tag: Religion

The cost of a Ramadan iftar meal around the world | Religion News

As the sun sets during the Islamic holy month of Ramadan, Muslims from around the world gather to break their fast with dates and water followed by a meal known as iftar.

There are some 1.9 billion Muslims around the world, approximately 25 percent of the global population. For many however, rising food prices have meant that households have had to consider cutting back on some of their favourite Ramadan dishes.

To see just how much the prices of various ingredients have increased over the past year, Al Jazeera compared the prices of dozens of ingredients from a variety of supermarket chains from 14 countries around the world. Below are pictures of these traditional meals along with their corresponding prices, listed alphabetically.

Argentina

From South America, we have a locally inspired main dish with beef asado, featuring various cuts of grilled meat with chimichurri – a tangy parsley dipping sauce.

As a side, we have empanadas, a popular savoury pastry consisting of ground beef or vegetables, and for dessert, dulce de leche pancakes with a sweet and creamy caramel sauce, topped with fresh fruit.

To drink, Argentinians will often enjoy a traditional herbal tea made from the yerba mate plant.

Argentina has experienced one of the world’s highest levels of inflation, with the cost of food increasing 303 percent in February 2024 compared with February of the previous year.

To prepare this particular iftar meal, Al Jazeera calculated that a single serving would cost about 7,200 pesos ($8.4) today, compared with about 1,782 pesos ($2) in 2023, reflecting an increase of more than four times.

(Al Jazeera)

Australia

For the world’s largest island, Australia’s iftar experience is a reflection of the country’s multicultural landscape, blending flavours from across the globe.

At the heart of the meal is a “halal snack pack”, a popular street food turned staple dish of shaved lamb over a bed of hot chips and topped with garlic and barbeque sauce.

For the side, a hearty lentil soup with vegetables is often enjoyed and for those with a sweet tooth, there are lamingtons – sponge cake coated in chocolate, filled with jam and blanketed with desiccated coconut.

Best served chilled, cordial is a sweet and refreshing fruit concentrate to rehydrate after a summer day of fasting.

Similar to other Western countries, Australia has also struggled to curb inflation. Al Jazeera calculated that it costs about 12.5 Australian dollars ($8.1) to have this meal in 2024, up from about 11 Australian dollars ($7) the year before.

The biggest price increases came from key ingredients including meat and eggs.

INTERACTIVE_IFTAR_AUSTRALIA_MARCH11_2024 copy 4-1711518964
(Al Jazeera)

Bosnia and Herzegovina

Among the highest Muslim populations in Europe, Bosnia and Herzegovina has a variety of traditional foods reflecting its multicultural heritage. A solid choice on a Bosnian iftar table is pita krompiruša, a baked dish consisting of layers of thin phyllo dough filled with a savoury mixture of mashed potatoes, onions and spices.

Following the hearty start, the meal transitions to topa, a slow-cooked side of melted cheese and butter. The transition to sweetness is marked by hurmašica, a syrup-soaked dessert that is both sweet and comforting.

Concluding the iftar is a glass of sok od drenjina, a popular beverage made from the fruit of the Cornelian cherry tree.

Combining all meals, Al Jazeera calculated that it costs about 2.9 BAM ($1.6) for a single serving of this meal this Ramadan. In 2023 the same meal cost 2.7 BAM ($1.5), a 7 percent increase.

The higher cost of potatoes, sugar and butter was mainly responsible for a more expensive Bosnian iftar meal in 2024.

Egypt

A country steeped in centuries-old traditions and culinary heritage, an Egyptian iftar table may include a local delicacy of grape leaves stuffed with a mixture of rice, minced meat and spices.

For a nutritious and comforting soup, chopped molokhiya (jute leaves) prepared with garlic and coriander is always a good choice, followed by kunafa, a sweet and cheesy dessert staple eaten across the Middle East and North Africa.

To quench one’s thirst, qamar al-din, a traditional apricot drink, is a crowd favourite.

Egypt is currently experiencing record levels of inflation and a depreciating currency. This has meant that the prices of many ingredients, most notably ghee and sugar, are nearly three times more expensive than they were last Ramadan.

Al Jazeera calculated that this Ramadan, it will cost roughly 68 Egyptian pounds ($1.4) to prepare a single serving of the meal above. In 2023, the same meal cost 39 Egyptian pounds ($0.8), an increase of 74 percent.

India

India has a great variety of iftar meals to choose from. Among one of the favourites is ghugni, a vegetarian curry made of peas or chickpeas and cooked with onions, tomatoes and various spices.

For sides, there’s pakora, a deep-fried vegetable fritter made with onions and green chillies. For dessert, we have suji halwa, a semolina pudding cooked with ghee and sugar and topped with nuts.

To cleanse the palate, one can reach for a glass of refreshing rose drink made from rose syrup, water and often a splash of lime or mint.

In combining these ingredients, Al Jazeera calculated that it costs roughly 149 rupees ($1.8) to prepare a serving of this meal this Ramadan. The same meal last year actually cost 162 rupees ($1.9), a decrease of 9 percent.

The main reason for this was the drop in the price of onions which were used widely in this dish. The price of all other other ingredients either increased or stayed the same.

India is the world’s largest exporter of onions. In December, the country imposed a ban on all onion exports to increase domestic availability and drive down prices which have more than halved since the ban took effect. On March 23, the ban, which was due to expire on March 31, was extended indefinitely.

(Al Jazeera)

Indonesia

In the world’s largest Muslim nation, spanning six thousand inhabited islands, Indonesia’s iftar traditions are locally inspired by the unique flavour of bubur – a traditional rice porridge topped with shredded chicken, peanuts, greens and an array of spices.

A favourite side dish is, bakwan, a crispy vegetable fritter containing a variety of vegetables such as shredded carrots, cabbage and bean sprouts. For those with a sweet tooth, there is kolak pisang, a sweet dessert made with bananas cooked in coconut milk, sugar and pandan leaves.

And to wrap up the flavourful meal, wash it down with a glass of es timun suri, a refreshing melon and coconut-infused drink.

To prepare the meal, Al Jazeera calculated that it costs about 66,600 rupiah ($4.2) for a serving this year. The cost last year was 62,600 rupiah ($3.9), about 6 percent lower.

(Al Jazeera)

Malaysia

A predominantly Muslim nation, Malaysian cuisine is locally inspired with beef rendang, a rich and spicy coconut milk-based beef dish.

As a side, Malaysians often enjoy sayur lodeh, a fragrant vegetable stew made of coconut milk, with eggplant, beans and nuts.

To complement the rich flavours, many Malaysians will reach for a glass of sirap bandung, a sweet rose syrup-infused milk.

And to top things off, a popular dessert is seri muka, a two-layered rice and pandan custard.

Combining all the necessary ingredients, Al Jazeera calculated that it costs roughly 6.9 ringgits ($1.5) to prepare a single serving of this meal in 2024. In 2023 the same meal cost about 6.4 ringgits ($1.3), an increase of 7 percent.

For Malaysia’s iftar, the largest price increases over the past year were in fresh food items, including eggs and coconut milk.

(Al Jazeera)

Nigeria

Nigerian cuisine is known for its diverse ingredients and vibrant spices. For the main course, Nigerians, like many across West Africa, will often enjoy jollof rice, a red aromatic rice, served with chicken.

To enhance the flavours, one could enjoy moi moi – a savoury pudding made from black-eyed peas or beans.

And for dessert, a good choice is a fresh fruit salad.

To top things off, a Nigerian iftar is best served with zobo, a popular beverage made from dried hibiscus flowers.

Africa’s most populous nation has seen a worsening inflation rate, aggressively increasing the price of poultry and other fresh food items.

Al Jazeera calculated that in 2024 it costs about 6,500 naira ($4.4) to prepare a serving of this meal, compared with about 3,860 naira ($2.6) the year before – an increase of about 68 percent.

(Al Jazeera)

Pakistan

Nearing Iftar time in Pakistan, the atmosphere is imbued with anticipation and warmth starting with dahi baray – lentil fritters, doused in yoghurt and topped with sweet and spicy chutneys.

On the side, we have fruit chaat, a sweet and savoury fruit salad sprinkled with chaat masala. For dessert is jalebi – a popular street food made with flour and sugar with a gooey centre.

A beautiful round-off for iftar is a rose-flavoured drink.

Totalling up the grocery cost, Al Jazeera calculated a serving of this iftar meal to be 172 rupees ($0.6). In 2023 the same meal cost 141 rupees ($0.5), about an 18 percent increase.

Pakistan’s inflation levels have remained high with food inflation reaching a record high of 48.65 percent in May 2023. Looking at our list of ingredients, we found that the largest price hikes were seen in vegetables, sugar and ghee.

Palestine

One of the most widely eaten dishes across Palestine and the Levant region is maklouba, which translates from Arabic to “upside-down”. It is a flavourful rice dish with layers of sliced eggplants, meat and other vegetables cooked together in a pot, then flipped upside-down onto a serving platter before eating.

Complementing the maklouba is dagga – a traditional spicy tomato and cucumber salad covered in olive oil.

For dessert, a great Ramadan choice is katayif, a type of semi-circular stuffed pancake often filled with walnuts or cheese and then dipped in syrup.

Tamir hindi is a popular drink made with tamarind and sugar.

Totalling up the grocery cost, Al Jazeera calculated that it costs about 31.5 shekels ($9) to prepare a serving of this iftar meal in the occupied West Bank this Ramadan. The same meal cost 28.5 shekels ($8) in 2023, an 11 percent increase.

Olive oil had the most significant price increase, nearly doubling from 30 shekels ($8.2) per litre in 2023 to 55 shekels ($15) this year. The price of meat also saw a 10 percent increase.

Observing Ramadan in Gaza amid Israel’s continuing assault has been a huge challenge for many Palestinians. Preparing a meal is a luxury that many can’t afford. According to people on the ground, a single egg now costs 6 shekels ($1.64).

Despite this, families are trying to keep their spirits and traditions alive by preparing whatever meals they can. Al Jazeera spoke to some of these displaced families who are now living in tents in Rafah.

(Al Jazeera)

South Africa

The Rainbow Nation has a variety of racial and ethnic groups. Preparing a traditional meal means bringing together various foods. For the main course, South Africans can enjoy a classic combo of pap en vleis, also known as shisa nyama – a maize meal porridge eaten with barbecued meat.

Accompanying this is chakalaka, a spicy vegetable relish made with onions, tomatoes, carrots, beans and spices. For dessert, koeksisters – braided deep-fried dough drenched in syrup – provide a crunchy treat.

To round off the meal, a “Stoney” – carbonated ginger beer – offers a refreshing end to the iftar.

Like many countries, South Africa is battling rising inflation. Al Jazeera calculated that it costs about 77 rand ($4.0) to prepare a serving of the iftar meal above. In 2023 the same meal cost 68 rand ($3.6), about a 13 percent increase.

The biggest price increases came from the price of store-bought chakalaka and pantry items such as cake flour and sugar.

Turkey

As the sun sets in Turkey, many families will feast on dolma – stuffed vegetables with a mixture of rice, meat and herbs.

On the side, is a bowl of cacik, a creamy yoghurt and cucumber dip. For dessert, one of the many choices might be a bowl of muhallebi, a milk pudding flavoured with cinnamon and nuts.

And to support digestion, salgam, a fermented turnip beverage is a good choice.

Turkey has also seen soaring levels of inflation. Setting out the table for iftar, Al Jazeera calculated that a serving of this meal costs about 60.5 lira ($1.9), compared with about 50.6 lira ($1.6) a year ago – an increase of about 20 percent.

Among the biggest price hikes came in the form of dairy products including milk and yoghurt.

(Al Jazeera)

United Kingdom

There are roughly four million Muslims in the UK. Like many other non-Muslim majority countries, the choice of iftar meals depends largely on a household’s ethnic background. A hearty British seafood iftar could comprise a slice of salmon fillet served with a side of greens and a bowl of rice.

Served after the main course could be a bowl of fruit yoghurt.

Packed with antioxidants, and aiding digestion could be a hot cup of green tea.

For this year’s iftar, Al Jazeera calculated that it costs roughly 2.2 pounds ($2.7) for a single serving of the meal above. That’s a marginal increase of about 4 percent from the previous year of 2.1 pounds ($2.6).

In 2022, the UK experienced seven months of double-digit inflation peaking at 11.1 percent in October. The rate has since settled at about 4 percent during the first few months of 2024.

(Al Jazeera)

United States

The United States has a diverse Muslim community with about three to four million members – or about one percent of the population. A popular main dish enjoyed across many American households is the culinary classic oven-roasted chicken infused with herbs and spices.

Complementing the roast, one might find the traditional Middle Eastern green salad topped with crispy pieces of toasted bread known as fattoush.

For dessert, one can’t go wrong with a piece of kunafa, a sweet and cheesy dessert topped with nuts.

To round off the evening, one can reach for a flavoured milk of your choice.

To prepare this year’s meal, Al Jazeera estimated costs are roughly $7.1 per serving this Ramadan. Last year the same meal cost about $6.7, an increase of about 5 percent.

For the most part, the prices of the ingredients needed to prepare this meal have held firm with slight increases in the price of poultry and dairy.

(Al Jazeera)

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Praying for Armageddon: Evangelicals, the US and the Middle East | Israel War on Gaza

Episode 1 of a doomsday political thriller about evangelical Christian influence on US foreign policy in the Middle East.

The first episode of Praying for Armageddon goes inside the evangelical Christian movement to explore its influence on US democracy and foreign policy.

Preparing for the “end times”, a grassroots pastor gathers an army of veterans in the heartland of the United States, and megachurch ministers provide spiritual advice to politicians in the nation’s capital.

They call for the “final battle” which they believe will trigger the second coming of Christ. Central to their apocalyptic prophecy is Israel. It is with their blessing that the Trump administration controversially recognises Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and moves the US embassy there in 2018.

“It feels like everyone has a say about the destiny and the future of Jerusalem except for the Palestinians living in it,” says Palestinian activist Fayrouz Sharqawi.

Praying for Armageddon is a documentary film by Tonje Hessen Schei. 

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India’s Citizenship Amendment Act is a devious anti-Muslim dog whistle | India Election 2024

India moved a step closer to formalising itself as a majoritarian country with the announcement of the rules to operationalise the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), which was passed back in 2019 with much controversy. This is yet another move by the Indian government led by the Hindu-supremacist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to stir the simmering communal cauldron.

The move has reignited the debate about the objective of the Act itself. Passed in 2019, the CAA was criticised by jurists and others for being discriminatory against certain communities, mainly Muslims. The Act claims to provide a faster pathway to Indian citizenship for Hindus, Sikhs, Christians, Jains, Buddhists and other minorities who have come to India illegally from Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Afghanistan. The absence of Muslims in this list has been causing outrage and communal tensions since the conception of the Act. In a clear violation of the Indian Constitution, which demands all people to be treated equally under the law, the CAA changes the very concept of Indian citizenship and makes it faith-based. It opens a new path to Indian citizenship for all, except Muslims.

The CAA is a reiteration of the ideology of the BJP, which holds that Muslims do not belong to India in the same way that Hindus do. The government claims that with this amendment it is merely seeking to help those who had to leave these three countries because of religious persecution. Muslims are not in the list, as it is assumed that Muslims cannot be religiously persecuted in Muslim-majority countries. Critics point out, however, that Muslim communities like Hazaras and Ahmadis, who undisputedly face religious persecution in their homelands, would not have been left out, if the aim was to help victims of religious persecution in these countries.

It is also intriguing that the amendment is aiming to help migrants from these three countries only and leaving out those from countries like Sri Lanka, Myanmar and Bhutan. Many Tamil Hindus, who had to leave Sri Lanka due to persecution, have been languishing in India as refugees without any state support for decades. This is because India does not have a clear policy for refugees and is not even a signatory to the International Covenant on Refugees. So the government’s talk of empathy for the persecuted people from the neighbouring countries sounds hollow.

The real aim of the CCA is to keep the focus on Muslims or Islam in the most devious and cunning way by singling out three Muslim-majority countries where religious persecution takes place. The idea is to reinforce the prejudice in Hindus that wherever Muslims are in majority, other communities are bound to suffer.

One can read between the lines what the BJP government actually wants to say. It claimed in a document it issued to explain the objective of the law that: “Due to the persecution of minorities in those three Muslim countries, the name of Islam was badly tarnished all around the world. However, Islam, being a peaceful religion, never preaches or suggests hatred/violence/any persecution on religious grounds. This Act, showing compassion and compensation for the persecution, protects Islam from being tarnished in the name of persecution.”

The government claims that CAA seeks to salvage the image of Islam which is getting tarnished due to persecution of non-Muslims in these countries. Even if we ignore the horrible wording of the text, one can see that it is nothing but a sinister act of dog-whistling. The followers of the BJP often refer to Islam mockingly as a peaceful religion and Muslims as peaceful people. But if we take this text at its face value, what the CAA does is quite contrary to this claim. It actually says that these Muslim-majority countries persecute their minorities.

There is one more thing. Defending the CAA, the leaders of the BJP, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi himself, have been saying that it is also to complete the unfinished business of the partition of India in 1947. What could that be? According to them, the creation of Pakistan implied a complete transfer of population. Which means all Muslims needed to move to “their” designated country, Pakistan, and all Hindus to India. Since millions of Muslims remained in India, what needs to be done is to make India a Hindu-first country by placing Muslims on an inferior plane. This is what this Act does ideologically. Muslims cannot attain citizenship through this law, but Hindus can.

This Act should be seen as part of the ideological design of the BJP which has enacted other laws restricting the lives of Muslims like the religious freedom laws, anti-cow slaughter laws, and anti-triple talaq law, which put restrictions on Muslims in ways which Hindus would never be. In India, Muslims can be converted, but they cannot convert; Muslim men deserting their wives without a process would be jailed but not Hindus. Muslims cannot have their food choices, but there is no such restriction on Hindus. The CAA is yet another way to legalise religious inequality and discrimination, mainly against Muslims.

Muslims have reasons beyond its ideological or psychological purpose to fear this Act. The Home Minister had averred that the CAA should not be seen in isolation. It is to be seen along with the creation of a National Register of Citizens (NRC). The NRC process would identify so-called “outsiders” or “infiltrators” and weed them out. He has said repeatedly that the NRC would be applied to the entire country. It is again a dog-whistle executive exercise which tells Hindus that outsiders – who other than Muslims? – would be deprived of citizenship rights through the process of the NRC. At the same time, Hindus were also assured that those who were left out would be included using the CAA. They can get citizenship, but not the Muslims.

The NRC has been implemented in the state of Assam. It was done to appease the Assamese chauvinists who had been demanding non-Assamese outsiders to be thrown out. An accord was reached between them and the government of India after violent agitations. The government promised that those who have entered Assam after 1971 would be identified and declared “illegal”. The NRC was that process of identifying and excluding the outsiders. The NRC process created havoc in Assam. Approximately 1.9 million people could not find a place in the NRC. But contrary to the claim of the BJP, and the popular perception, more Hindus than Muslims, nearly 1.5 million, got excluded.

These are mostly Bengali Hindus. The BJP treats them as its natural constituents. It was to allay their fears that the CAA was brought: to say that the Hindus thus excluded would get in using the CAA route, but Muslims would remain out. It also changed the cut-off year. Those who have entered till 2014 were eligible to get citizenship through CAA. But Muslims cannot use this route, only Hindus can. We can see that persons in similar situations, living in India for decades or even centuries, but unable to show the required papers, are treated differently by the CAA. Hindus would be allowed to use it to naturalise themselves as citizens, but Muslims would not be able to do it.

The unsaid argument is that Muslims have these Muslim-majority countries to go to, but Hindus have only India.

There are well-meaning people in India who say that there is no need to fear the NRC outside Assam as it has not been announced. So Muslims need not be anxious. But can one take the assertion of the home minister that NRC would be implemented, and implemented in the entire country, made on the floor of the parliament, lightly?

It has also been pointed out that the claims by the government to provide succour to the persecuted people of Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Bangladesh are insincere as those who have entered India after 2014 are not eligible. This law was enacted in 2019. So does the government want us to believe that there has been no religious persecution in these countries after 2014? But the BJP can always assure its constituents that changes would be brought in the law to correct this anomaly.

While these questions are legitimate, one cannot underestimate the larger ideological message of this law: There are two sets of rules in India, one for Hindus and one for Muslims, and Hindus will always have more rights than Muslims. It is no surprise that Muslims understand it well.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial stance.

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Why is India’s Citizenship Amendment Act so controversial? | India Election 2024 News

The Indian government on Monday announced the implementation of the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), a law that was passed by parliament in 2019 but was not enforced until now.

This decision on the CAA – whose passage in parliament had set off protests across the country five years ago over allegations of an anti-Muslim bias – comes weeks before Prime Minister Narendra Modi seeks a third term in office through national elections.

So what is the law about, and why is it so controversial?

What is the Citizenship Amendment Act in India?

The Act, which was an amendment to the 1955 Citizenship Act, was first introduced in the parliament in July 2016 and passed in December 2019.

Before the CAA, any foreign national seeking Indian citizenship through naturalisation needed to have spent 11 years in India to become eligible.

The CAA expedites Indian citizenship applications of Hindus, Parsis, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains and Christians who escaped to India from religious persecution in Muslim-majority Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan before December 31, 2014. They become eligible for citizenship in five years. Applicants from these faiths are eligible even if they are currently living in India without valid visas or other required paperwork.

Home Minister Amit Shah, a close confidant of Modi, posted on X that the law will enable minorities persecuted on religious grounds in neighbouring countries to acquire Indian citizenship.

But what about Muslim asylum seekers?

Before the CAA, India’s citizenship law did not make religion a determinant of a person’s eligibility for an Indian passport. All those seeking naturalisation had to show that they were in India legally, and needed to wait for the same period – 11 years – to become eligible for citizenship.

That’s what the CAA changes – introducing for the first time in independent India’s history – a religious test for citizenship.

Muslim victims of religious persecution in Pakistan (like the Ahmadiyya), Afghanistan (the Hazara) or other neighbouring nations (such as the Rohingya in Myanmar), will still need to wait for 11 years before they become eligible for Indian citizenship. And unlike Hindus, Parsis, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains and Christians, they need valid documentation to justify their presence in India.

This, many legal experts have argued, violates Article 14 of the Indian Constitution, which says: “The State shall not deny to any person equality before the law or the equal protection of the laws within the territory of India.”

In 2019, Human Rights Watch (HRW) published a statement describing the law as discriminatory against Muslims.

But other communities – including many who have long sought refuge in India – have also been denied the benefits of the law.

Human rights watchdog Amnesty India said in an X post on Monday that the law goes against the constitutional values of equality and “legitimizes discrimination based on religion”. Amnesty India added that the act also denies benefits to Tamils from Sri Lanka, and immigrants from countries like Nepal and Bhutan.

In 2019, after the law was passed, large protests broke out across India. Violent clashes erupted in New Delhi. More than 100 people were killed across the country, mostly Muslims. Hundreds of others were injured.

How can beneficiaries get faster citizenship?

The Indian government announced that those eligible under the CAA can apply for Indian citizenship using an online portal, launched by Shah’s home ministry on Tuesday.

A committee headed by the Director of Census Operations will review applications, a government notification on Monday said. The panel will have seven other members.

What’s next?

There are more than 200 petitions against the law still pending before Indian courts even as the CAA has come into effect.

Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party government has denied that the law is discriminatory towards Muslims, arguing that it only seeks to protect those escaping religious persecution. A statement released by the Home Ministry said “many misconceptions have been spread” about the law and its implementation was delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

At the same time, critics fear that the Hindu majoritarian BJP will also seek to implement another initiative, the National Register of Citizens (NRC), which aims to identify and deport immigrants in India without valid papers.

Combined, the CAA and NRC could allow the government to expel all of those deemed “illegal” migrants – and then allow Hindus, Parsis, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains and Christians to re-enter, while denying the same opportunity to Muslims.

BJP leaders have previously made remarks discriminating against Muslim refugees. Home Minister Shah has, in the past, called Bangladeshi immigrants “termites”, “infiltrators” and a threat to national security.

What is the NRC and how is it linked to the CAA?

The NRC is a register that is meant to identify and deport “illegal” immigrants.

It has only been implemented in India’s northeast state of Assam so far, where nearly two million people, including Hindus and Muslims, were left out of the citizenship list in August 2019. The BJP has declared its intent to implement the NRC nationwide.

What has the response been so far?

Protests have erupted in parts of India as a result of the CAA implementation.

Students of Jamia Millia Islamia, a university in New Delhi, told Al Jazeera that protests broke out in the institute and police arrived. Security forces conducted flag marches in areas near Delhi’s Shaheen Bagh, which became a hub of protests over the CAA in 2019 and 2020.

Critics have also pointed out how the law has deliberately been implemented right as elections are about to take place. Yogendra Yadav, a political scientist and activist who was closely associated with the anti-CAA protests, told Al Jazeera that this move of voter polarisation by the BJP before elections is unsurprising.

Jairam Ramesh, spokesperson for the opposition Congress party posted on X: “After seeking nine extensions for the notification of the rules, the timing right before the elections is evidently designed to polarise the elections, especially in West Bengal and Assam”.

The opposition Communist Party of India (Marxist), which governs the southern state of Kerala, called for state-wide protests on Tuesday against the CAA.

Activists from several organisations in Assam, including the All Assam Students’ Union (AASU), burned copies of the law, calling for a statewide shutdown on Tuesday. Different student groups are organising similar protests in other regional states, including Meghalaya and Tripura. Many of these groups are opposed to the CAA not because of its allegedly discriminatory nature but because they oppose the legalisation of citizenship status for any foreign nationals.



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‘Dark day’: India on edge over religion-based citizenship law before polls | India Election 2024 News

New Delhi, India — Protests have erupted in parts of India over the Narendra Modi government’s implementation of a controversial citizenship law ahead of national elections, as security forces rushed to areas of the national capital that had previously been epicentres of large demonstrations against the legislation.

The notification of the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA) on Monday introduces the country’s first religion-based citizenship test after decades of a constitutional setup that swears — at least officially — by secularism. Critics say the law discriminates against Muslim asylum seekers.

The amendment expedites citizenship for refugees from India’s neighbouring nations who are Hindu, Sikh, Christian or from other religious minorities — but not if they are Muslim. As a result, the benefits do not extend to the Rohingya from Myanmar, persecuted Ahmadiyya from Pakistan, or the Hazara from Afghanistan, for instance.

“The CAA has always been about creating two tiers of citizenships in India: non-Muslims and Muslims,” said Yogendra Yadav, a political scientist and activist who was closely associated with the anti-CAA protests. “It is voter polarisation [by the BJP] before elections but are we surprised?”

Parliament passed the CAA in 2019, but Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government has since delayed its implementation. Months-long protests against the law brought parts of New Delhi to a standstill, as the capital was hit by sectarian violence in early 2020. More than 100 people were killed in the violence, mostly Muslims.

On Monday, after the government announced the notification of the law, protests broke out at the Jamia Millia Islamia university in New Delhi, students told Al Jazeera. Soon, police forces arrived as tensions rose.

Police were also rushed to northeast Delhi, which had witnessed some of the worst violence after the passage of the 2019 law. Security forces also conducted flag marches in areas near Shaheen Bagh, which became a hub of protests against the CAA in 2019 and 2020.

Separately, in the northeastern state of Assam, activists from several organisations, including the All Assam Students’ Union (AASU), burned copies of the law and called for a statewide shutdown on Tuesday. Similar protests are also lined up in other regional states, including Meghalaya and Tripura, by various student groups. Many of these groups are critical of the law not because of allegations that it discriminates against Muslims — but because they oppose any influx of refugees from other nations.

‘Timed to polarise’

Lawyers and critics of the government have also questioned the timing of the implementation of the law — on the eve of Ramadan, which began in India on Tuesday, and weeks before national elections, which are expected to be held in April and May.

Different groups have filed more than 200 petitions challenging the law that are still pending before courts.

“The CAA is unconstitutional and discriminatory on several grounds, including exclusion based on religion,” said Prashant Bhushan, a senior Supreme Court lawyer. “The timing of the notification is meant to polarise the electorate upon the Hindu-Muslim divide.”

The Modi government has previously linked the CAA to another controversial initiative, the proposed National Register of Citizens (NRC) that could lead to the deportation of millions who have lived in India for generations but do not have identity papers proving the legal status of their ancestors. Muslim groups and rights activists say the combination of the CAA and the NRC could be used to target members of India’s 200 million-strong Muslim population. “You will use NRC to exclude people, then use CAA to only selectively include people,” said Bhushan.

Asaduddin Owaisi, a member of parliament from Hyderabad and leader of the opposition All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen party, said the “divisive” law is “meant to target only Muslims”, adding that people will have no choice but to oppose it again.

The Indian government has repeatedly denied these accusations, saying the CAA is meant to grant citizenship, not to take it away from anyone. It called the earlier protests politically motivated.

‘Divide and distract’

The introduction of the CAA law comes at a time when the Modi government is facing scrutiny over an electoral bonds scheme that allowed corporate groups to donate millions of dollars to political parties without any transparency over who was giving whom how much. In February, India’s Supreme Court struck down the scheme, calling it unconstitutional, and ordering the public sector State Bank of India (SBI) — which implemented the electoral bonds initiative — to reveal details of donors.

The top court told the SBI to release the details by Tuesday, in a setback for the government, which had attempted to shield that information from public scrutiny. Hours later, the Modi administration announced the CAA implementation.

“It is a diabolic attempt to divide and distract,” said Yadav. “Divide along the communal lines and distract from the issue of electoral bonds.”

The publication of the notification on Monday evening “appears to be an attempt to manage the headlines after the Supreme Court’s severe strictures on the Electoral Bonds Scandal”, said Jairam Ramesh, a senior leader of the opposition Congress party.

For millions of Muslims in India, though, the moment brings back memories of a tumultuous period four years ago.

‘Fight for identity’

Ahad was 18 when he skipped his college in New Delhi to join hundreds of women in Shaheen Bagh, a Muslim working-class neighbourhood, to block a crucial road between the capital and Noida, a suburb, as part of anti-CAA protests. “It was a fight for our identity, our existence,” recalled Ahad, who requested he only be identified by his first name.

Four years later, the law was notified at a time when he and his friends were busy with Ramadan preparations. “The government timed it like an ace,” he said, heading out of home for tarawih prayers. “Everyone around us is busy planning for Ramadan, and the news came out of nowhere.”

After the violence broke out in New Delhi in February 2020, the government clamped down on the activists and student leaders organising protests. Nearly 750 cases were filed in connection with the violence – mostly notably “FIR 59”, which features 18 people accused of conspiring to instigate the violence and charged under sections of the law that relate to terrorism. The accused include student leaders Umar Khalid, Sharjeel Imam and Gulfisha Fatima.

For Safoora Zargar, one of the co-accused in FIR 59, the implementation of CAA marks a “dark day for Indian democracy”.

“The anti-CAA protests had given Muslims the voice and space that we needed and contributed significantly in shaping many important narratives with rest to citizenship in the country.”

Zargar was three months pregnant when she was arrested by the police and imprisoned in New Delhi’s overcrowded Tihar Central Jail in the middle of the pandemic. She was released more than two months later on orders of the Delhi High Court on humanitarian grounds.

Yadav, who was also part of the demonstrations in part of the country, said the Shaheen Bagh blockade came under the spotlight but the movement at large “was a glorious chapter in the history of India, where citizens stood up against an attempt to divide the country”.

“More than anti-CAA protest, it was an Equal Citizenship Movement,” he said, adding that the protests did not fail. “Historians will look at independent India and they would remember anti-CAA as we today remember the first revolt of 1857 that led India’s independence movement.”

Nadeem Khan, civil rights activist and co-founder of a campaign called United Against Hate, said the CAA seeks to fundamentally alter the character of the Indian republic. “We believe that the CAA is a dishonest attempt on the part of the government to further its Hindutva agenda under the garb of providing assistance to refugees.” Hindutva is the Hindu majoritarian political ideology of the BJP and many of its allied groups.

Still, say activists who opposed the CAA in 2019, they will continue to fight against what they argue are discriminatory policies — even with friends and colleagues still behind bars.

“I can say for sure that this does not break the spirit or resolve [of the political prisoners],” said Zargar. “The anti-CAA movement is not just about one law, it is about justice and equality for all. No citizen of this country should settle for anything less.”

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Russia, NATO at odds over pope’s call for Ukraine to show ‘white flag’ | Russia-Ukraine war News

Moscow said the pope’s comment was ‘quite understandable’ while NATO said ‘it’s not the time to talk about surrender’.

The Kremlin has said Pope Francis’s call for talks to end the war in Ukraine was “quite understandable”, while NATO’s secretary general said now was not the time to talk about “surrender”.

Pope Francis said in an interview recorded last month that Ukraine should have “the courage of the white flag” to negotiate an end to a war that is now in its third year.

As Russia makes gains on the battlefield, the West grapples with how to support Ukraine and the prospect of a dramatic change in United States policy if Donald Trump wins November’s presidential election.

“It is quite understandable that he [the pope] spoke in favour of negotiations,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Monday.

He said Russian President Vladimir Putin had repeatedly said his country was open to peace talks.

“Unfortunately, both the statements of the pope and the repeated statements of other parties, including ours, have recently received absolutely harsh refusals,” he said.

Moscow’s offers to negotiate have invariably been predicated on Kyiv giving up the territory that Moscow has seized and declared to be part of Russia, amounting to more than a sixth of Ukraine.

Peskov said Western hopes of inflicting a “strategic defeat” on Russia were “the deepest misconception”, adding: “The course of events, primarily on the battlefield, is the clearest evidence of this.”

‘Not the time to talk about surrender’: Stoltenberg

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said negotiations that would preserve Ukraine as a sovereign and independent nation would only come when Putin realised he would not win on the battlefield.

“If we want a negotiated, peaceful, lasting solution, the way to get there is to provide military support to Ukraine,” he told the Reuters news agency at NATO headquarters in Brussels.

Asked if this meant now was not the time to talk about a white flag, he said: “It’s not the time to talk about surrender by the Ukrainians. That will be a tragedy for the Ukrainians.”

“It will also be dangerous for all of us. Because then the lesson learned in Moscow is that when they use military force, when they kill thousands of people, when they invade another country, they get what they want,” he said.

Pope Francis with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, at the Vatican, May 13, 2023 [Vatican Media/­Handout via Reuters]

On Sunday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy dismissed Pope Francis’s call for talks with Russia as “virtual mediation” from a distance.

In his nightly video address, Zelenskyy did not directly refer to Francis or his remarks, but said the pope’s ideas had nothing to do with efforts by religious figures in Ukraine to help the country.

“They support us with prayer, with their discussion and with deeds. This is indeed what a church with the people is,” Zelenskyy said.

“Not 2,500km [1,550 miles] away, somewhere, virtual mediation between someone who wants to live and someone who wants to destroy you.”

Zelenskyy, who signed a decree in 2022 ruling out talks with Putin, said last week that Russia will not be invited to a peace summit due to be held in Switzerland.

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‘No empty words’: Muslim Canadians use Ramadan to urge Gaza action | Israel War on Gaza News

Montreal, Canada – Ramadan is a time of self-reflection, family and joy for more than 1.8 billion Muslims around the world.

But with Israel’s war on Gaza dragging on, killing more than 31,000 Palestinians and plunging the tiny coastal enclave deeper into a humanitarian crisis, this year’s Islamic holy month – which began on Sunday night – has a different feeling.

In Canada, the Muslim community’s pain over the situation in Gaza – and a widely held belief that Canadian politicians are not doing enough to stem the crisis – has spurred an unprecedented campaign this Ramadan.

“We’re seeing our brothers and sisters in Palestine die every single day. We’re seeing a number of horrific images flooding in,” said Fatema Abdalla, advocacy officer with the National Council of Canadian Muslims (NCCM).

“So this Ramadan is definitely going to be much harder for everyone.”

NCCM is among more than 300 Muslim groups in the North American country that delivered an ultimatum to Canadian politicians: Act to end the war and defend Palestinian rights, or you will not get to speak to congregants during community gatherings this month.

The organisations, which include advocacy groups as well as mosques and cultural centres, demanded five things from lawmakers, from condemning Israeli war crimes to opposing Canada’s arms transfers to Israel and supporting an immediate ceasefire in Gaza.

“If MPs cannot publicly commit to all of these asks, then we can unfortunately not provide them a platform to address our congregations,” Abdalla said.

‘Very disappointed’

Like other countries around the world, Canada has for months seen major protests demanding an end to the Gaza war, which began in early October.

Israel’s attacks on the besieged Palestinian territory have caused widespread devastation and displacement, and the Israeli government also continues to block much-needed aid deliveries.

The United Nations has warned of widespread starvation and disease while the International Court of Justice ruled in late January that there is a plausible risk of genocide in the enclave — and ordered Israel to prevent genocidal acts from taking place.

“We’re very disappointed in the response of our elected officials [in Canada] to the catastrophic destruction in Gaza,” said Nawaz Tahir, a spokesperson for Hikma Public Affairs Council, an advocacy group for Muslims in and around the city of London, Ontario, which signed the letter.

“Historically, we have invited political officials to our events, to our mosques, to celebrate the concept of community during Ramadan. It’s hard to do that when there has been such a lack of response to really the mass murder of our brothers and sisters in Palestine,” he told Al Jazeera.

Canada has maintained close ties to Israel for decades, and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government remains a staunch ally of the country.

For the first two months of the Gaza war, Ottawa resisted public pressure to call for a lasting ceasefire, instead backing a push for “humanitarian pauses”. In December, Canada changed course and backed a ceasefire motion at the UN General Assembly.

But Trudeau’s government faces continued calls to do more, including suspending the transfer of military goods to Israel over fears they could be used in rights abuses against Palestinians in Gaza.

The prime minister wished Muslim Canadians a happy Ramadan in a statement on Sunday, acknowledging that the holy month comes at a “particularly challenging time” due to the situation unfolding in Gaza. “Canada reaffirms our call for a sustainable ceasefire in Gaza and the safe, unimpeded access to humanitarian relief for civilians,” he said.

Abd Alfatah Twakkal, a board member with the Canadian Council of Imams, a group that signed the Ramadan letter, stressed that Muslim Canadians want concrete action. “We don’t want tokenism. We don’t want empty words,” he told Al Jazeera.

Twakkal said the letter also goes beyond members of the Canadian government alone. “This is not a partisan issue. This is for any MP that sees the travesty and the catastrophe of what has unfolded and continues to unfold [in Gaza],” he said.

“We can’t just sit back and say nothing,” he added. “This is at the very least something that we need to do, to speak out and say, ‘Look, we have to take whatever steps within our means … to be able to put an end to the genocide that is taking place.’”

A man holds prayer beads as Muslim Canadians pray on the first night of Ramadan at the Anatolia Islamic Centre in Mississauga, Ontario, on March 10, 2024 [Mert Alper Dervış/Anadolu Agency]

Growing political power

Political analysts said the community’s letter reflects its growing political power.

According to the 2021 census, nearly 1.8 million people identified themselves as Muslim. The percentage of Muslims in the Canadian population more than doubled from 2001 to 2021 from 2 percent to 4.9 percent.

Muslims have been in Canada since the mid-1800s, but Naved Bakali, an assistant professor of anti-racism education at the University of Windsor in Ontario, explained that “the bulk of the immigration to Canada from Muslim-majority nations came in the ’60s and ’70s.”

As a result, Bakali said this “relatively young community” has typically been content with “performative and service-level engagement and basic representation”, such as visits by politicians to their places of worship.

While the community is home to a wide range of political views, Muslim Canadians have traditionally been supportive of Trudeau’s Liberal Party, according to Bakali.

The Liberals have long presented themselves as defenders of multiculturalism and immigration in Canada, and Trudeau came to power in 2015 in part by denouncing Conservative Party policies that critics said were Islamophobic.

Against that backdrop, Bakali told Al Jazeera that the Ramadan letter is a signal that “if the [Muslim] community doesn’t feel that it’s seen by a political party, I don’t think that that political party can rely on that unconditional support.”

He added: “There’s a lack of trust … and they don’t want to be used as a political piece in all of this. They want to feel that they’re heard and that they are being respected as a community.”

Demonstrators rally in Montreal, Canada, to demand a Gaza ceasefire on November 18, 2023 [File: Alexis Aubin/AFP]

‘Showing humanity’

That was echoed by Tahir. “There has been a political awakening in the Muslim community” in Canada as a result of the Gaza war, he said, “and I think that that is leading towards stronger engagement in politics by Muslims.”

Tahir explained that while some Canadian lawmakers immediately asked to sign on to the demands put forward in the Ramadan letter, others are taking time to consider the situation. But he said he believes MPs are taking note of the community’s position.

“We had one member of parliament tell us that their office received 10,000 letters about Palestine since October,” he told Al Jazeera.

Tahir also drew a connection between what is happening in the Gaza Strip and anti-Muslim hate incidents in Canada, which community groups said have increased sharply since the war began.

“We have seen the very real impact of Islamophobia in Canada,” Tahir said, pointing to a 2021 attack that killed four members of a Muslim family. Authorities described it as an act of anti-Muslim “terrorism”, and a judge recently sentenced the attacker to life in prison.

Ultimately, Tahir stressed that Canada’s elected officials need to act – both at home and abroad.

“We want them to be more conscious of taking action as opposed to coming to our mosques, getting a few pictures, sending out a few tweets. We’re past that now,” he said. “We want to see a true and sincere commitment to fighting Islamophobia and showing humanity in our foreign policy.”

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Ancient find reveals new evidence of Malaysia’s multicultural past | History News

Kedah, Malaysia – Until six months ago, none of the inhabitants of the village of Bukit Choras, set amid rice fields near the steep and lush hill of the same name in northwestern Malaysia, had any idea they had been living next to an archaeological wonder all their lives.

It was only after a team of 11 researchers cleared the thick bushes and secondary jungle from the top of the hill, and gently scraped away at the soil that a missing piece of Southeast Asian history was revealed.

The 1,200-year-old Buddhist stupa of Bukit Choras was discovered last August in Malaysia’s Bujang Valley – a river basin scattered with several clusters of protohistoric sites in the country’s northwestern Kedah state.

The stupa is the best preserved in the country and experts say it could hold the key to Malaysia’s long history of multiculturalism.

“This site is an anomaly because it stands all by itself,” Nasha Rodziadi Khaw told Al Jazeera. Nasha is the chief researcher of the team from the University of Science Malaysia’s Global Archaeology Research Centre (CGAR) in the northwestern island of Penang, who supervised the excavation between August 28 and September 12 last year.

Bukit Choras is situated near the small town of Yan on Kedah’s southern coast about 370km north of the capital, Kuala Lumpur.

Nasha Rodziadi Khaw led the team of scientists who unearthed Bukit Choras’s stupa [Kit Yeng Chan/Al Jazeera]

Unlike the 184 archaeological sites previously identified in the Bujang Valley, which lie to the south, the stupa is isolated on the northern side of Mount Jerai, which was once a cape and a pivotal navigation point for seafaring traders who ventured to this part of the world from as far as the Arabian peninsula.

“We are still not sure of Bukit Choras’s function. It may have been a military garrison or coastal trade outpost, but we need to do further excavation [to assess]. Based on our preliminary findings, it shows plenty of similarities with other sites found in Java and Sumatra, Indonesia,” said Nasha, whose team will continue to work at the site throughout the first half of 2024.

A forlorn discovery

According to Nasha, Bukit Choras was first reported in 1850 by a British officer looking for treasures, and then, in 1937, briefly studied by another British scholar, HG Quaritch Wales. Wales undertook some minor excavations, but only reported finding a squarish Buddhist stupa, taking note of its measurements. He never provided any illustration or plate for the site.

Nearly 50 years later, in 1984, the then-director of the Bujang Valley Archaeological Museum returned to Bukit Choras to do some site cleaning and documentation, but the site remained largely undisturbed.

“I realised that nobody had done proper investigation [since then] and managed to get a fund to survey the site in 2017,” Nasha told Al Jazeera.

“We used electronic waves to do physical detection of what was hidden underground and found there were some big structures underneath.”

Nasha received more funding from Malaysia’s Ministry of Higher Education to conduct proper excavations in 2022, and his team was stunned to discover how well-preserved the site was compared with those unearthed in the Bujang Valley between the 1930s and 1950s – some of which had deteriorated because of erosion, human activities and even accidental destruction.

“At first we only excavated 40 percent of the whole Bukit Choras site, finding a stupa about nine metres long,” said Nasha. “But the most important discovery was two stucco statues of Buddha in good condition that have never been found in the area before.”

Stucco, Nasha explained, was thought to only be found in Java and Sumatra in neighbouring Indonesia, as well as in India, at the time.

Ancient ties

Placed in two niches together with an inscription in Pallava (the language of the Pallava Dynasty that ruled in South India between the 3rd and 8th century CE), Bukit Choras’s two Buddha statues have architectural features resembling those of other ancient artefacts from the Srivijaya kingdom that prospered between the 7th and 11th centuries CE, in an area from southern Thailand, through the Malay peninsula and into Java. The statues are now being studied and restored at CGAR on Penang island.

“The discovery of two still intact, human size statues and the inscription is very significant for further studies,” Mohd Azmi, the commissioner of Malaysia’s National Heritage Department, told Al Jazeera. “This shows that the site has not been disturbed and has the potential to give new evidence on Ancient Kedah’s history.”

Excavation trenches at the Sungai Batu Archaeological Complex [Kit Yeng Chan/Al Jazeera]

The discoveries in the Bujang Valley testify to an ancient civilisation that archaeologists refer to as the “Ancient Kedah Kingdom”. It prospered between the 2nd and the 14th century CE, stretching across the northwestern coast of the Malay peninsula and into Thailand predating the arrival of Islam in the region.

Ancient Kedah grew rich on international trade as well as the production of iron and glass beads, prospering as a multiethnic and multireligious ancient Southeast Asian polity where residents and foreign traders lived together.

Nasha points out that findings in the area suggest that for centuries, traders from China, India and even the Middle East came to the area to do business – and were often forced to spend long spells in Kedah when the harsh monsoon seasons made sailing back home impossible.

Temples and artefacts were built by local labourers mixing foreign architectural motifs and knowledge with two main influences.

“First is Buddhism, classified in areas such as Sungai Mas, Kuala Muda, and Sungai Batu in Semeling, plus the most recent being the temple site at Bukit Choras,” explained Asyaari Muhamad, a senior archaeologist and the director of the Institute of the Malay World & Civilisation at the Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, referring to some of the Bujang Valley sites.

“The rest, such as the archaeological site in the Pengkalan Bujang complex [near the village of] Merbok, received Hindu influences. This classification is [based on] the discovery of artefacts and temple structures symbolising the religious beliefs or influences at that time,” he said.

All of Ancient Kedah’s temples functioned as places of worship mostly for the mixed population of migrant traders and workers.

“In [the area of] Sungai Bujang, for example, most of the temples are clustered together near the main trading area and used to cater for the religious needs of the traders, while in Sungai Muda, they catered to the traders and workers of the local glass bead and pottery-making sites,” said Nasha.

Tuyeres, or air conduits, for the ancient iron smelting sites whose remains were found at Sungai Batu Archaeological Complex [Kit Yeng Chan/Al Jazeera]

“We believe it was the same in Sungai Batu, the main site for Ancient Kedah’s iron smelting furnaces, where we found evidence of a community and its temples. But in Bukit Choras, proof of economic activities or industry has not yet been found,” he said.

Archaeological discoveries suggest that while Ancient Kedah thrived for centuries, it went into decline when climate transformed the large maritime bay and accessible riverways leading to the iron smelting site of Sungai Batu into mangrove and tidal swamps that were impassable to ships.

“Multiculturalism is not new in the Malay peninsula and Ancient Kedah,” added Nasha. “It started with trade in the 2nd century, when there was an increase of connectivity between China, India and Southeast Asia, and continued well into the Melaka kingdom, which we know was also a multicultural society, and continues today.”

The Malaysia of the 21st century is also a multiethnic and multireligious Southeast Asian nation made up of a majority of Malay Muslims, followed by Chinese, Indians and more than 50 other ethnic groups living across the peninsula and the northern half of the island of Borneo in the states of Sarawak and Sabah.

Asyaari said it was important for researchers to collaborate and reach a better understanding of the origins of civilisations in and beyond the Malay peninsula.

“Any statements about new or previous findings need to be carefully examined so that […] a theory, discovery, and the results of a study do not become an issue and controversial in nature,” he said.

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Muslim countries announce start of Ramadan in shadow of Gaza war | Religion News

This year’s observance, for many, is marred by Israel’s war on Gaza.

Saudi officials have spotted the crescent moon and declared the the holy fasting month of Ramadan for many of the world’s 1.8 billion Muslims.

The officials saw the moon Sunday night, making Monday the first day of the fasting month, Saudi state television reported.

The month consists of Muslims abstaining from food and water from sunrise to sunset as they reflect more deeply on their faith and hold family gatherings. This year’s observance, for many, is marred by Israel’s war on Gaza.

After officials in Sunni-majority Saudi Arabia spotted the moon, many Gulf Arab nations, as well as Iraq, Syria and Egypt, followed the announcement to confirm they as well would start fasting on Monday.

Some Asia-Pacific countries, however, like Australia, Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore, said they will begin Ramadan on Tuesday after failing to see the crescent moon.

Oman, on the easternmost edge of the Arabian Peninsula, similarly announced Ramadan would begin on Tuesday. Jordan will also begin Ramadan on Tuesday.

Ramadan works on a lunar calendar. and moon-sighting methodologies often vary between countries, meaning some nations declare the start of the month earlier or later.

Saudi King Salman specifically made reference to the war in Gaza in comments following the Ramadan announcement.

“As it pains us that the month of Ramadan falls this year, in light of the attacks our brothers in Palestine are suffering from, we stress the need for the international community to assume its responsibilities, to stop these brutal crimes, and provide safe humanitarian and relief corridors,” the king said.

Saudi Arabia had been urging its public to watch the skies from Sunday night in preparation for the sighting of the crescent moon.

In Iran, which views itself as the worldwide leader of Shia Muslims, authorities typically begin Ramadan a day after Sunnis start. The office of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei announced Ramadan will start on Tuesday there, according to the state-run IRNA news agency.

Palestinian women in Gaza are seen volunteering to prepare food to distribute to families who fled Israeli attacks and took refuge in Rafah city, March 10, 2024 [Jehad Alshrafi/Anadolu Agency]

During Ramadan, those observing have a pre-dawn meal, or “suhoor,” to sustain themselves during the daylight hours, and later break their fast with “iftar,” often a large meal.

During the month, Muslims try to avoid conflict and focus on acts of charity. However, Israel’s war on the Gaza Strip is looming large for many Muslims. There were hopes that a ceasefire agreement between Israel and the Palestinian group Hamas could be reached before Ramadan began.

More than 31,000 people have been killed in the Israeli assault on Gaza, according to Palestinian health authorities in the besieged territory, and aid agencies have warned of a looming famine in parts of the Gaza Strip.

Hassuna Tabib Hassnan, a dentist displaced from Gaza City in the north of the besieged Gaza Strip, told the AFP news agency: “We had hoped that for Ramadan [we] would be in our homes, but unfortunately it is clear that we will live in displacement, pain and oppression.”

Meanwhile, Israeli restrictions on Muslims praying at Jerusalem’s Al-Aqsa Mosque, Islam’s third-holiest site, may further also ramp up tensions in the region.

Palestinians walk past stalls set up in a street in Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip on March 10, 2024, as Muslims prepare for the holy fasting month of Ramadan [Mohammed Abed/AFP]

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Ukraine rejects pope’s call to ‘raise the white flag’ to end Russia’s war | Russia-Ukraine war News

The Catholic leader, 87, told a Swiss broadcaster that Ukraine should negotiate with Russia and raised the idea of surrender.

Ukraine has rejected Pope Francis’s call to hold negotiations with Russia more than two years into its invasion, saying that Kyiv will “never” surrender.

“Our flag is a yellow and blue one. This is the flag by which we live, die, and prevail. We shall never raise any other flags,” Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said on social media Sunday, a day after the pope said Kyiv should “have the courage to raise the white flag”.

The 87-year-old Catholic leader said in an interview with Swiss broadcaster RTS that Ukraine should negotiate with Russia, which has seized large swathes of Ukrainian territory since it launched its full-scale invasion in February 2022.

In part of the interview released on Saturday, the Catholic leader raised the prospect of surrender.

“I believe that the strongest are those who see the situation, think about the people, and have the courage to raise the white flag and negotiate,” Pope Francis said in an interview that the Vatican said was conducted in early February.

Kuleba called on the pope to stand “on the side of good” and not put the opposing sides “on the same footing and call it ‘negotiations’”.

Kuleba also appeared to reference some Catholic church collaboration with Nazi forces during World War II when he said the following: “At the same time, when it comes to the white flag, we know this Vatican strategy from the first half of the 20th century.”

“I urge to avoid repeating the mistakes of the past and to support Ukraine and its people in their just struggle for their lives,” Kuleba added.

He also thanked Pope Francis for his “constant prayers for peace” and said Kyiv hoped he would visit Ukraine.

“We continue to hope that after two years of devastating war in the heart of Europe, the Pontiff will find an opportunity to pay an Apostolic visit to Ukraine to support over a million Ukrainian Catholics, over five million Greek-Catholics and all Ukrainians,” Kuleba said.

The foreign minister of Poland, a vocal ally of Kyiv, also condemned the pope’s remarks.

“How about, for balance, encouraging Putin to have the courage to withdraw his army from Ukraine? Peace would immediately ensue without the need for negotiations,” Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski said in a post on X.

In a separate post, Sikorski made parallels between those calling for negotiations while “denying [Ukraine] the means to defend itself” and European leaders’ “appeasement” of Adolf Hitler before World War II.

Andrii Yurash, Ukraine’s ambassador to the Holy See, compared the pope’s comments to calls for “talking with Hitler” while raising “a white flag to satisfy him”.

Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk, the head of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, also said Sunday that surrender is not on the minds of Ukrainians.

“Ukraine is wounded, but unconquered! Ukraine is exhausted, but it stands and will endure. Believe me, it never crosses anyone’s mind to surrender. Even where there is fighting today: listen to our people in Kherson, Zaporizhzhia, Odesa, Kharkiv, Sumy,” he said.

Vatican spokesman Matteo Bruni later clarified that the pope supported “a stop to hostilities [and] a truce achieved with the courage of negotiations”, rather than an outright Ukrainian surrender.

While Pope Francis has tried to maintain the Vatican’s traditional diplomatic neutrality, he has also expressed some sympathy with the Russian rationale for invading Ukraine, such as when he noted that NATO was “barking at Russia’s door” with its eastward expansion.

Ukraine has remained steadfast on not engaging directly with Russia on peace talks, with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy saying multiple times that peace negotiations must come from the country that has been invaded.



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