Word: azeem
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That's a truth that non-Muslim Europeans might do well to remember; after all, in Europe's Dark Ages, it was great European Muslim universities like the one in Córdoba that kept the lamp of learning alight. Islam's stress on education helped propel London barrister Azeem Suterwalla through Oxford and Harvard. "My religion gives me drive and purpose," he says, and it has also helped shape his political and professional views, giving him "a feeling of obligation" to help the Muslim umma. It was a concern about the state of Muslims in Gaza and Kashmir that...
...been a long time since anyone in this oasis village near the Afghan border had received a letter from America. So, quite a crowd gathered when the Pakistani postman strolled into the dusty courtyard of Mohamed Azeem's house and delivered the letter. Azeem didn't know anyone in America. The envelope had a pretty stamp depicting Mt. McKinley, and an unusual return address: Detainee, JBC, 160 Camp X- Ray. Even more mysterious, the missive bore the name of Azeem's son, Issa Khan, given up for dead months ago by his family...
...Azeem tore open the envelope with the whole village looking on. He recognized Issa's writing, and his sad, ashen eyes lit up. "Kind Father, Mother & Sisters," the letter read. "I'm in the United States. I've been arrested. I hope I'll be released soon, since I'm innocent." Azeem shouted for his wife, Sardara, who tottered into the courtyard, disrupting the chickens; racked by grief, she'd suffered several seizures since their son went missing. "Issa's alive!" Azeem cried, adding with bewilderment: "But he's in America...
...rides on buses and trucks that were headed over icy mountain ranges. But soon after he arrived, the war swept him away. After the U.S.-backed Northern Alliance captured Mazar-e-Sharif from the Taliban, his parents heard nothing from him. "We were sure he'd been killed," says Azeem. Khan was a Pashtun, and the Uzbek conquerors of the city hated Pashtuns...
...first to "come down the chute", as Rumsfeld put it, are a handful Pakistanis. Back in the village, Issa Khan's family waits hopefully for his return. "We'll send a convoy of cars from the village to pick him up, with music and everything," promises his father Azeem. "Then we'll help him find his wife and baby in Afghanistan." Clutching a photo of his son, Azeem says: "No, I don't hold any grudge against the Americans." Then he adds with a grin: "But after all this trouble, the Americans should give him a job there. Please write...