Stories

Shady Hafez, who is of Syrian Arab and Algonquin descent, reflects on what the closing of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission means for him and his generation.

Last month, Project Communitas presented a webinar by Professor Amarnath Amarasingam, a Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council Postdoctoral Fellow at Dalhousie University’s Resilience Research Centre. The webinar addressed the Syrian conflict in the context of the rising number of foreign fighters traveling recently to the region.

Muslim Link interviewed Islamic Relief Canada’s current CEO Zaid Al-Rawni about working within one of Canada’s largest Muslim charities.

Salang Kabob House Restaurant, a staple of Ottawa’s Bayshore community located at 2934 Carling Avenue, has a new owner, Pakistani Canadian Ihsan Sandhu.

L’essence salon is the latest entrepreneurial adventure for Turkish Canadian couple Mustafa and Selma Elevli. Muslim Link sat down with the couple to talk about their beauty salon and the lessons they have learned over their years as a business-owning family in Ottawa.

In response to the conversations emerging from opinion pieces we have published on the new Ontario Sex Ed curriculum, Muslim Link is starting a series of interviews with several members of North America’s Muslim communities on sexual education. We’ll be exploring the challenges Muslim Canadians, especially Muslim youth, are facing in relation to sexual health education and morality.

Sobia Faisal-Ali, a PhD researcher who conducted a survey of 403 North American Muslims between the ages of 17 to 35 exploring issues of sexual health education and experiences, shares her findings with us.

Recently, as I skimmed through my housemate’s book treasures, I found a new addition to her collection with the title “Signs on the Horizons” by Michael Sugich. Later that day, coincidently, I was informed of the author’s planned visit to Ottawa next week for a series of events hosted by Sanad Collective (see events details at the end of the article).

Two primary objectives of the residential school system were to remove and isolate children from the influence of their homes, families, traditions and cultures, and to assimilate them into the dominant culture. These objectives were based on the assumption Aboriginal cultures and spiritual beliefs were inferior and unequal. Indeed, some sought, as it was infamously said, “to kill the Indian in the child.” Today, we recognize that this policy of assimilation was wrong, has caused great harm, and has no place in our country. Prime Minister Stephen Harper, official apology, June 11, 2008

"Have your children tested for STDs," said a Muslim family doctor during a health session at a Toronto mosque a few years ago. Her message was that unbeknownst to the audience, many of their children were sexually active from an early age.

After years of working in community development and youth engagement across Ottawa, Hamid Mousa has been working with the Ottawa Police Service (OPS) since 2008. Currently the OPS Community Development Coordinator, Mousa, a Palestinian Canadian, began as a refugee to this country.

Ottawa now has a free Muslim matchmaking service, Love Coordinates. Created and facilitated by Yemeni Canadian couple, Hend Bindari and Hesham Saleh, serve as coordinators in introducing individuals based on the criteria the individuals specify. Bindari is well-known as the co-founder of Misk Academy of Quranic Sciences for Women, and Saleh is a well-known Islamic lecturer. Married in 2010, the couple has chosen to expand their matchmaking services from just friends to the wider community.

When Muslim Link published the opinion piece, A Muslim Principal on Ontario's New Sex Ed Curriculum by jeewan chanicka, we did not expect how popular the article would be. But clearly the subject of the revised health curriculum is on many Muslim parents’ minds and communities across Ontario are organizing parent’s forums on the topic, such as the one being organized by Abraar School on May 2nd. Muslim Link plans to cover these events in Ottawa.

Assma Galuta, aka Asoomii Jay, 25, has been an active YouTuber since 2011 when she began doing hijab tutorials. “I saw a lot of my friends removing their hijab and it made me sad,” she explained, “They were just doing it to fit in with their Canadian friends and they would say ‘I don’t look good in a hijab’ or ‘I don’t feel welcome in a hijab’. I started my YouTube Channel because I wanted to show girls that they could still look pretty and feel pretty and be stylish and wear the hijab.” Her channel became popular internationally with thousands of subscribers on YouTube and tens of thousands of Facebook followers.

Muslim Link attended this year’sI.LEAD Conference and asked participants to reflect on what community means to them. Here is a response from Pakistani Canadian Yumna Rashid, a recent teacher’s college grad and mother of three, who regularly volunteers with the Islam Care Centre.

Muslim Link attended this year’s I.LEAD Conference and asked participants to reflect on what community means to them. Here is a response from Somali Canadian Faisa Omar, a graduate student in neuroscience, who regularly does photography and videography for community events and Muslim Link's A Muslim History of Ottawa, volunteers with Ottawa Islamic School, and runs a weekend duqsi (Quran School in Somali) in her home for neighbourhood children.

Muslim Link attended this year’s I.LEAD Conference and asked participants to reflect on what community means to them. Here is a response from Arab Canadian Amr Daouk, a graduate student in mechanical engineering, who recently co-coordinated Islam Awareness Week at Carleton University.

Sheikh Waleed Basyouni has been invited by Al Maghrib Institute Canada to speak about the dangers of violent religious extremism in Ottawa on Sunday, April 5th. Muslim Link interviewed the Egyptian American graduate of Saudi Arabia’s Al-Imam Muhammad University, who is currently an imam in Texas’s Clear Lake Islamic Center, about why he feels it is important for Muslims to speak out against groups like ISIS.

South African Canadian Zakira Jogiat participated in her Canadian Citizenship Ceremony while wearing niqab. She reflects on the opportunities for dialogue the current niqab debates have opened up.

Born and raised in Montreal, Indo-Pakistani Canadian Navaid Aziz, 33, stumbled upon a vocation as an Islamic scholar when he was accepted to the Islamic University of Madinah in Saudi Arabia at 17. Now an imam in Calgary, Aziz will be coming to Ottawa’s I.LEAD Conference to discuss youth empowerment, countering radicalization in Muslim communities, and creating a balanced and just Muslim community.

A twitter photo by Amna Qureshi just went viral. Posted in protest of Montrealer Rania El-Alloul being told by Judge Eliana Marengo that she had to remove her hijab in order to be “suitably dressed” in a “secular” Canadian courtroom. The incident made the ongoing Islamophobia that Muslim women who wear hijab or niqab face in accessing services a national issue. It also raised the question of how Muslim women lawyers who veil will be treated within the legal system.
As part of Muslim Link’s ongoing So You Want To… Series where we interview Muslims about their programs of study or career choices, Amna Qureshi, a graduate from the Law School at the University of Ottawa discusses the opportunities and challenges pursuing a law degree offers for Muslim women. A Pakistani Canadian, Qureshi now works as a staff lawyer at Legal Aid Alberta.