Pakistan Floods. Do Muslims Care?
Assalamu alaikum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh,
Protesters are demanding that plane loads of aid must continuously be flown to Pakistan to provide whatever is needed to help the 30 million people affected by the devastating floods.
Huge demonstrations in Cairo, Kuwait, Qatar, Kuala Lumpur, Istanbul, and across the Muslim world.
None of the above has happened.
Do Muslims really care about each other?
Yes. However,
A) People feel helpless
They can’t imagine making a massive difference to the flood victims. So, they make dua and donate some money to a charity organisation - knowing it’s a drop in the ocean when 30 million people affected by floods need $billions.
Before the Pakistan floods, they’ve seen widespread hunger in Afghanistan and Somalia, suffering of the Rohingyas, and brutal occupation in Kashmir and Palestine - to name some ongoing disasters facing our ummah.
B) Distractions of the belly and life
In many Muslim countries, people are constantly pre-occupied with the challenge of just surviving till the next day due to harsh living conditions; high inflation, lack of jobs, poor healthcare and governments who steal our wealth, beat our backs and collude with our enemies.
This is the case from Istanbul, to Cairo to Jakarta to Dhaka.
In other Muslim countries, governments ensure that people are distracted by the frivolities that come with embracing aspects of the secular Western lifestyle and the importance it gives to entertainment.
Therefore, Qatar’s rulers are spending over $200 billion on the football world cup. Saudi Arabia has become a global sponsor and venue for big boxing matches, concerts and all sorts of other western entertainment.
C) Nationalism stops us acting as one
Yes, we feel for our ummah in Pakistan, Syria, Somalia or East Turkistan, yet some of us also feel we must ‘look after our country’s issues’. Nationalism has become one of the lenses through which we see each other.
So, we think it’s good ‘our government’ gives some aid to help Muslims in Pakistan (or elsewhere), however it’s not OK to share everything we have with them -as the Ansar did with the Muhajireen in Madinah after the Prophet’s (ﷺ) Hijrah.
So, Allah’s verse in Sura Al-Anfal 8:72 وَإِنِ ٱسْتَنصَرُوكُمْ فِى ٱلدِّينِ فَعَلَيْكُمُ ‘
But if they seek your help in faith, it is your obligation to help them” has become mere words, not a command we must follow, or a solution to our problems.
A believe in nationalism and the colonially imposed borders that divide us stop us acting as one ummah that spares no effort in helping fellow Muslims -as Allah (swt) ordered.
Do the following to overcome helplessness and seek Allah’s help
1) Help the suffering Muslims however you can
Donate to those helping on the ground with the floods or other disasters. Raise awareness about the suffering of the Rohingyas and others. Call for the Islamic solution to the disaster in Lebanon and the liberation of Palestine and Kashmir.
2) Reject nationalism. Think as an ummah.
Our blood is one. Our lands are one. Our resources are one.
This is what the Qur’an and Sunnah teach us. When he was the Khalifah, this is what motivated Sayyidina Umar ibn al-Khattab (ra) to write to his provincial governors demanding that they send food to Madina, hence food came from Iraq, Egypt and elsewhere.
With the Islamic understanding, today, across the Muslim world, we should be demanding that the hundreds of $billions in oil revenue belong to the ummah, not to the Saudi, Kuwaiti or other regimes imposed over us.
3) We need a new leadership to break the cycle
Across the Muslim world, democracy and dictatorships have only produced self-serving politicians who impoverish us and rule for the benefit of their families and a few elites.
Famine and all the problems facing sayeedena Umar (ra) were able to be addressed because he implemented the Islamic Khilafah ruling system left to us by Our Beloved Prophet (ﷺ).
It is a leadership that the Muslims of Pakistan and elsewhere will trust and rally behind because it implements Allah’s revelation that we all believe in.
We need to mobilise the ummah to demand the re-establishment of the Khilafah system.
Anything short of that effort means we don’t really care about addressing the problems we face. It means ignoring Allah’s guidance and allowing the cycle of disaster after disaster that our ummah faces.
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Love and salams,
Taji
🧔 What have I been up to?
I discovered www.Veed.io - a simple but powerful online video editor. The free version leaves a small watermark at the top of your videos but it’s worth it.
I love editing videos in a web browser and that it can automatically generate captions so you have the spoken text on the screen -crucial for social media videos.
I’ve used it for some of my Tiktok videos including
Joshua VS Usyk fight in Saudi Arabia
Debate with Salman Rushdie Supporter
📖 Ayah and Hadith
إِنَّ ٱلَّذِينَ ءَامَنُوا۟ وَٱلَّذِينَ هَاجَرُوا۟ وَجَـٰهَدُوا۟ فِى سَبِيلِ ٱللَّهِ أُو۟لَـٰٓئِكَ يَرْجُونَ رَحْمَتَ ٱللَّهِ ۚ وَٱللَّهُ غَفُورٌ رَّحِيمٌ
“Surely those who have believed, emigrated, and struggled in the Way of Allah—they can hope for Allah’s mercy. And Allah is All-Forgiving, Most Merciful. [Al-Baqarah 2:218]
Quote of the Week
“We were the most humiliated people on earth and God gave us honour through Islam. If we ever seek honour through anything else, God will humiliate us again.”
– Umar ibn al-Khattab (ra)
❤ My Favourite Things
Podcast – The East India Company – Episode 1 of Empire, a new history podcast hosted by William Dalrymple and Anita Anand.
The first series looks at the British in India: The East India Company, The Raj, Gandhi, Independence and Partition.
In the opening episode, William and Anita discuss the rise of The East India Company, exploring how a small corporation founded in Tudor England - with only a handful of employees - came to rule India.
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