There very well may be an “Ethiopian Spring” brewing in the Horn of Africa! It all began back in July of 2011. The Ethiopian government, through the offices of the Islamic Supreme Council of Ethiopia, called a conference to be attended by the known Islamic scholars and leaders of Ethiopia. The scholars and leaders dutifully heeded the government summons. It was not long after the start of the conference that most of the attendees walked out in utter disgust at the proposals that were being made. Basically, the Ethiopian government was delivering that day an edict—that had been prepared with the help of Haggai Erlich, the Israeli-Zionist author specializing in Ethiopian history—that henceforth all Ethiopian Muslims would be mandated to follow, the particular controversial, indeed heretical, teachings of the Lebanese Ahbash Movement!
The attendees could not believe what they were hearing! Here was a secular government that had huddled with an Israeli-Zionist writer to dictate to the 40 million plus Muslims of the Federal Republic of Ethiopia how they should, indeed must, practice their religion from now into the foreseeable future. Clearly, the conference was an insult on three counts!
The Ethiopian government has lately launched an over all campaign against the belief of Ethiopian Muslims. For its evil plan, it brought a deviant group called Ahbash from Lebanon. Since June 2011 Ethiopian Muslims are being forced at gun point to attend trainings. Using the pretext to fight religious extremism, the EPRDF government is terrorizing the Muslim community in particular and all Ethiopians in general. This material is a part of a counter measure taken by Ethiopian Muslims in the Diaspora with the objective of exposing the conspiracy which according to the producers is paramount to declaring war on Ethiopian Muslims and Islam in Ethiopia.
(CNN) – Every religion has its true believers and its doubters, its pious and its pragmatists, but new evidence suggests that Muslims tend to be more committed to their faith than other believers.
Muslims are much more likely than Christians and Hindus to say that their own faith is the only true path to paradise, according to a recent global survey, and they are more inclined to say their religion is an important part of their daily lives.
Muslims also have a much greater tendency to say their religion motivates them to do good works, said the survey, released over the summer by Ipsos-Mori, a British research company that polls around the world.
Islam is the world’s second-largest religion — behind Christianity and ahead of Hinduism, the third largest. With some 1.5 billion followers and rising, Islam’s influence may be growing even faster than its numbers as the Arab Spring topples long-reigning secular rulers and opens the way to religiously inspired political parties. Read More
There are over 1.6 billion Muslims in the world today, making up approximately 23% of the world’s population, or more than one-fifth of mankind. As well as being citizens of their respective countries, they also have a sense of belonging to the ‘ummah’, the worldwide Muslim community. This publication sets out to ascertain the influence some Muslims have on this community, or on behalf of the community. Influence is: any person who has the power (be it cultural, ideological, financial, political or otherwise) to make a change that will have a significant impact on the Muslim World. Note that the impact can be either positive or negative. The influence can be of a religious scholar directly addressing Muslims and influencing their beliefs, ideas and behaviour, or it can be of a ruler shaping the socio-economic factors within which people live their lives, or of artists forming popular culture. The first two examples also point to the fact that the lists, and especially the Top 50, are dominated by religious scholars and heads of state. Their dominant and lasting influence cannot be denied, especially the rulers, who in many cases also appoint religious scholars to their respective positions. This doesn’t discount the influence from other sectors of society. Read More
By Richard Allen Greene, CNN
