Word: islamics
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Today the Horn of Africa also arouses keen strategic interest among world powers. Not far from the Red Sea and thus close to Arabia, Ethiopia is a possible conduit for turmoil from the northeast. As Christianity and Islam flowed south to Ethiopia centuries ago, Meles tells TIME, so today "with all sorts of terrorist activities [in the Middle East], we are susceptible to that influence too." Ethiopia's eastern neighbor Somalia is already home to the oldest jihadi bases in Africa and has been a sanctuary, the U.S. believes, for three senior al-Qaeda planners who blew up the American...
...TIME: The U.S. sets great store by its good relations with Ethiopia. Why? Meles: We are African and a critical part of Africa. But we are close to the Middle East. And the three major religions, Christianity, Islam and Judaism came to Ethiopia much earlier than much of Europe. So the Middle Eastern influence has historically been huge. And in view of the fact that much of the Middle East is currently in turmoil, the Gulf in particular, with all sorts of terrorist activities, we are susceptible to that influence too. But we are in the middle of Africa...
...take African instruments and play them with [Western] electric instruments." He describes the music as a patchwork, similar to the hodge-podge clothing worn by members of his Baye Fall religion, a Sufi branch of Islam which subsitutes Koranic studies and piety for hard labor. The group's motto dieuf dieul ("you reap what you sow") impels followers to show their devotion to god through work; in Kane's case, through his music...
...moderate, and Turkey has always been a radically different place from its neighbors to the east. Today's ruling AK Party (AKP) is a democratic movement with roots in the Anatolian heartland, where economic success is valued as highly as piety. Its leaders, Gul among them, have renounced Islamism, or the belief that Islam has a role in guiding affairs of state. Gul himself holds a Ph.D. in economics and spearheaded Turkey's efforts to reform its economy and legal system to bring it in line with European Union norms...
...next day, I attended a concert of Persian classical music at Niyavaran Palace, one of the former Shah's residences in northern Tehran. A decade ago, there were no such concerts to attend in Tehran because the mullahs frowned on music as un-Islamic. This summer there were concerts scheduled across the country, several of them including orchestras with female musicians. At least 3,000 people, among them many women in black chadors, mingled before the candlelit steps of the palace under a velvet sky. The country's preeminent poets and directors sat alongside government officials and their chador-clad...