Reflections Of A Muslimah

Five daughters. Imagine that. Gone in one go.

I come from a family of Five Sisters and the bonds we have are unbreakable. We're together through thick and thin. Some of the happiest and memorable moments I have spent were with my Sisters.

In the on-going Israeli massacre of Gaza, among hundreds that were killed and are still being killed was the story of a family which lost five daughters.

Washington Post reports:

JERUSALEM, Dec. 29 -- Trapped in the rubble, Iman Balousha, dressed in her green pajamas, said she could hear her sisters' cries. "Mother! Mother! Where is my mother? Pull me out!" Their muffled voices slipped through the toppled bricks.

Early Monday, an Israeli airstrike on the Jabalya refugee camp in the Gaza Strip destroyed the family's house, located next to the Emad Aqeel mosque, the intended target, which was also flattened. Rescuers tried frantically to save the girls. Iman was lucky: She was half-buried in the debris.

One by one, the cries stopped, Iman recalled in an interview. She could see the leg of her 4-year-old sister, Jawaher, whom her family called Ayah. She could touch her hair. But minutes later, Ayah stopped breathing.

"I've lost five sisters," Iman, 16, said at a relative's house Monday evening, her soft voice fading. Tears slid down her face. Her mother, Samira, held her 16-month-old son, whose face was bruised and specked with dried blood.

"Does my 12-days-old baby have a rocket with her?" Samira demanded. "Or my son, does he have a missile with him? Or did my daughters have AK-47s beside them? Why did they target them?" The five daughters who died were ages 4 to 17.

What really hurts is that they were aged from four to seventeen. Children and teenagers. These are the ones being killed in this inhumane War.

Assalāmu ‘alaykum wa rahmatullāhi Wabarakath,

I know I haven't blogged for a while. I went through one of my phases where I lost the inclination to write/blog here. But I'm back, I guess. I might just change the layout completely.

There were so many things that I wanted to blog about initially, Muntadar Al-Zaidis shoe-throwing incident, The Mumbai attacks, The War Of Terror and other things.

Is it just me, or our current World situation just keeps on getting worse?

The Gaza attacks were the last straw. It is absolute indiscriminate killing. It's sickening. Open random bombs dropped on civilians. The blockade which resulted in people dying. What is more shocking is the case of our current so-called 'Muslim' leaders today of our nations. They are silent, probably calling for another 'meeting' and doing nothing. Absolutely nothing to help the Muslim Ummah. Weak, pathetic and cowardly. They're happy as long as they don't upset the superpowers of this World: USA & Israel. Sickening, isn't it?

The death toll that I checked last night for Gaza was around 300, and I'm sure it must've increased by today. My heart bleeds for Gaza, for the Palestinians, The Iraqis, The Afghanis, for the Prisoners in Gitmo and Afghanistan and the Somalis. For the Women who are raped, the Children that are killed, the Men who are tortured. For all those who suffer. And yet, all we do is, protest. And protest. And protest. After a while, our voices die down and no action is taken.



The genocide goes on. We need more then to just voice our anger, our thoughts. We need a constant voice, we need action, we need to make sure our voices don't die down again. We need to unite.

Assalāmu ‘alaykum wa rahmatullāhi Wabarakath,

I think about death sometimes, and its a really check for me personally, in terms of my actions and deeds. Whenever I'm falling 'off' the path, i just need to remind myself of death. It says in the Qur'an, 'Every soul shall taste death'. Every soul, every breathing thing, will one day finally end. There is no cure to death and no coming back. It will come to the youngest, the oldest, the rich andthe poor. No mansion or palaces or guards will save you from it.

To me, death is the only certainty in this uncertain life. Ironic, isn't it? That the only certainty one has, is the end. Everything else is unpredictable - unknown. Your next breath, your next second and your next action is unknown. When I was studying Literature they would make us repeatedly discuss subjects like death, life, greed, lust, balance, vice, etc. And an oft repeated theme about death was that it was the only one thing that was certain. Sometimes characters would depend on it as a relief from the pain they would in this World, while at other times they were so sick of mundane rituals that they called 'life', a life without purpose, that they longed to just end. If anyone is going through a depressive mood, pick up a play by Samuel Beckett!

I came across this video on Youtube by Aqimsalatak, and its a wakeup message to all those Muslims who are straying off the path, thinking they can waste away their youth for the dunya and become 'good Muslims' when they're older:



:(

Jazak'Allahkhairan to the people behind Aqimsalatak! MashaAllah, very powerful videos.

Masalama

PS: Don't forget to fast tomorrow, the day of Arafah! The day that will expiate sins of two years, inshaAllah.