Ramadaan call for Middle East peace
AS Muslims around the world start their fast in the holiest month, Ramadaan, they are calling for peace in the Middle East.
In a quick vox pop of Muslims in the CBD, everyone expressed concern about events in the Middle East.
Shop owner Syed Mudassac Ali, 35, from Ottery, said this was a holy time for him and his family: “We would like to use this time to be grateful for waking up every day. I am keeping them (the people of the Middle East) in my prayers, because I am grateful for my life and my family.”
Mudassac Ali said he was hoping for contentment. “Just to be content for me and my family, and for peace across the world,” he said.
Shumiez Basson, 53, from Mowbray, is hoping for peace during this sacred time.
“Peace, and for our politics to be resolved, because if that is taken care of, it would be like a heavy burden lifted,” Basson said.
She said she was hoping the same for Palestine, “and the rest of the Middle East where people are dying and where there is war”.
It has been a tough week for Muslims across the country, who were in the headlines after the Durban mosque attack, and after Israeli forces shot and killed up to 55 Palestinians on Monday, and injured over 2 000 people. On Tuesday, thousands of Muslims took to the streets, along with several pro-Palestine organisations.
Arafat Yeasin, 25, from Bokaap, said: “Ramadaan gives us an opportunity to experience what the poor go through on a daily basis, and this is why this time is so important for us as Muslims.” He said his biggest wish was for a blessed future, and his family back home in Bangladesh.
Muslim Judicial Council president, Shaykh Irafaan Abrahams, said: “Ramadaan is… a time for Muslims to reflect on their relationship with mankind and their own inner transformation towards purifying the heart.”