Mohamed Taha Mohamed Ahmed, the editor in chief of the Sudanese Al-Wifaq newspaper was sadly kidnapped and beheaded.

Last year, Taha was charged with insulting religion. Despite calls for his execution and extensive demonstrations, the charges were dropped.

The charges stemmed from an article that was reprinted by Taha that questioned the ancestry of Prophet Muhammad.

Many news media stated that Taha merely reprinted material from books by the famed 14th century Egyptian historian and prolific author, al-Maqrizi المقريزي. For example, the BBC, BBC Arabic, ABC Australia, and Asharq al-Awsat (in Arabic, with one user comment correcting the Maqrizi). It was also picked up at face value by academics, such as Howard Friedman who says:

A typically Egyptian fruit seems to have its origin from faraway places.

Known as Harankash حرنكش or الست المستحية or الست المستخبية (the shy woman), it is sold by street vendors. It has an orange color, and sweetish taste that has a tangy sour tone.

The scientific name is Physalis peruviana It belongs to the Solanacea family, and is closely related to the tomatoes. Its native land is Central America, Peru and Chile, from which it has been transplanted to parts of Africa, including Egypt.

The fruit is wrapped in a papery husk, giving it its name. It is eaten as a casual fruit in Egypt, and said to be on the menu for diplomatic receptions, as a distinctive Egyptian fruit.

One of the less common fruits in Egypt is the sycamore fig, known locally as gemeiz جميز. In English, it is known as Sycamore, Sycomore, Fig Mulberry. In Turkish, it is known as cumbez.

Botanical Information

The Sycamore fig tree should not be confused with other trees called sycamore in northern Europe, which are actually maples.

The sycamore fig tree (Ficus sycomorus sycomorus, and F. sycomorus gnaphalocarpa) belong to the fig family, which includes the common edible fig (Ficus carica), and the Banyan tree.

An Orthodox Hasidic Jew was removed from an Air Canada Jazz flight from Montreal to New York City on September 1.The man started to pray when the flight was heading to the runway. In normal Jewish manner, the prayer involved the man covering his head with a shawl and "rocking back and forth" while reading from a book.A passenger said:

"The attendant actually recognized out loud that he wasn't a Muslim and that she was sorry for the situation but they had to ask him to leave".

The poor man spoke neither English nor French and hence could not communicate with anyone.

These are some statistics on top downloads from drupal.org.

It is separated by category, rather than have them all grouped together.

The BBC has an interesting set of graphs showing how America changed after September 11.Defense spending went up and maintained that trend ever since. Hate crimes against Muslims had a sharp rise that went down afterwards, but is still many ordered of magnitude more than before September 11.Presidential approval rating went briefly up then continued a steady slide.

British journalist Peter Taylor comes to the conclusion that no matter what Tony Blair says, terrorism in Britain is all about the invasion of Iraq.

He also notes that dialog worked with the IRA and ETA, and asks why not Al-Qaeda.

He quotes Michael Scheuer, a CIA veteran, former head of the Bin Laden unity, and author of Imperial Hubris: Why the West is losing the war on terror, who identifies Iraq's invasion as a major recruiting propaganda for Al-Qaeda. 

Steve Irwin, better known from the TV program Crocodile Hunter, is dead.

Steve Irwin

I personally did not like the fact that his TV programs focused mainly on sensationalist handling of dangerous animals in various stunts.

However, there is another side of Irwin that is mainly conservation and environmentalism. He quietly lobbied the government and prevented the establishment of a game hunting tourism industry for salt water crocodiles in the North West of Australia, and bought vast tracts of land for conservation.

Stingrays and food

Irwin's death was not brought on by a crocodile, but rather a stingray, while diving in Australia's barrier reef.

Rev. Gabriele Amorth has called Harry Potter the "king of darkness, the devil".While it is well known that the Catholic Church opposes magic, historically as well as currently, it is hard to see this extends to pure fiction and fantasy.Amorth is reported to have himself performed 30,000 exorcism, which means one a day for 83 years, or 27 years if he does 3 per day (including weekends)! From CBC news.

Two new Drupal sites in Arabic.The first is Maktoob News. Maktoob was the first free Arabic email service, and is now a portal for Arabic speakers.Also, there is Akhbaruna, which means "our news" in Arabic. This is a volunteer effort not backed by any corporation.