News and Analysis (5/2/20)

Fasting “can be difficult under normal circumstances for incarcerated people…. The Cook County Sheriff’s Office is no longer allowing religious volunteers to conduct in-person services in the jail”:

• COVID-19 Brings Challenges for Muslim Inmates During Ramadan (Injustice Watch / Herald & Review)

“Government officials piled some 9 tons of gold — an amount equal to about $500 million — on Tehran-bound jets this month as payment for Iran’s assistance in reviving Venezuela’s crippled gasoline refineries”:

• Iran Is Hauling Gold Bars Out of Venezuela’s Almost-Empty Vaults (Bloomberg)

Pompeo’s plan “to extend a conventional weapons embargo on Tehran that is legally set to end under the Iran nuclear deal, provoking anger and disbelief from European allies”:

• US Splits with Allies Again as It Looks to Extend Iran Weapons Ban (CNN)

The keys to a successful prisoner swap are mutual interest, a like-for-like exchange, and a willingness to share the credit:

• A Further Iran-US Prisoner Exchange Is Overdue (Al-Monitor)

The 27-year-old founder of MuslimGirl.com and “first Muslim woman to run for federal office from New Jersey” received a phone call filled with anti-Muslims racial slurs threatening to kill her and her family:

• Activists Decry Threat Against Muslim Congressional Candidate (Al-Jazeera)

“By initiating gunfights with guerrilla fighters, jailing people for going to buy food and medicine, bringing charges against journalists, and beating doctors, paramedics and municipal workers, India is tightening its grip” …

• India Is Using the Pandemic to Intensify Its Crackdown in Kashmir (Washington Post)

… leaving the people of Kashmir to endure a quiet Ramadan in a devastated economy:

• Quiet and Desolate Ramadan in Kashmir amid Back-to-back Lockdowns (Al-Jazeera)

After years happily married “to a devout Muslim while raising our children in a faith that was not my own … I realized that … Islam was no longer something outside myself but housed within”:

• For My First Ramadan as a Muslim, I Am Filling My Home with New Life (Washington Post)

As “Muslims around the world are observing Ramadan, a time of fasting, spiritual reflection and charitable work,” a mosque in Connecticut “is giving out grab and go meals to first responders and people in need”:

• Connecticut’s Muslim Community Gives Back During Ramadan and the Pandemic (News 8)

The singer/philanthropist wonders why we humans are “the only earthly creatures who have to live with the knowledge of their own mortality” and “what might be beyond the final wall we must all climb one day”:

• Yusuf Islam AKA Cat Stevens to Lead BBC Ramadan Series (The Guardian)