Time Passes Quickly As We Near The World's End

Bismillahi rahmani raheem,
I have not posted in my poor blog for sometime now. I posted once in this blog last week and Salim was concerned about its validity so to be on the safe side I deleted that post. So it has been more than 3 weeks since I posted that post about Israel propaganda but I feel it was like a few days ago.

Anyway, have you thought about how soon time seems to fly and days become weeks and months and before you know it's a new year? It reminds me of a Hadeeth (saying) of Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) about time passing quickly when the end of the world nears. If I recall that Hadeeth correctly prophet Muhammad (pbuh) had said something to the effect that, when the end of the world nears time will pass so fast, that a year will be like a month and a month will be like a week and a week will be like a day and a day will be like a hour and a hour will be like a minute and a minute will be like the time taken for a leaf to burn. How true is prophet Muhammad’s prophecy. Indeed I am always shocked how soon time seems to pass. I hardly could keep track with hours let alone minutes when I am doing something interesting. The most striking example of how fast time passes is every Friday when I'm getting ready for Jummah prayers. Then sometimes I wonder, “Why, it was like yesterday I got ready for Jummah last week!” and then remember the Hadeeth I just mentioned.

Anyway, what with my studies and all the other things in a youths life and my limited and very slow access to the Internet I am very sad I have not been able to post here as regularly as I hoped. I remember when I started this blog about 6 months ago, I had more spare time and I hoped to post every fourth or fifth day but that turned out to be only a hope. I am now lucky if I get time to go see what’s happening in my favourite news websites and forums.

But I didn't entirely stop blogging these few weeks. I posted some posts in the Muslim Unity blog. You might find them interesting. Here are the links to them:

1) A Christian Internet Monk's Opinion About the Blogosphere

2) Saudi Arabia: King Abdullah "Marrying" Israel to fight Shia Muslims

3) Who will be the Caliph of the Caliphate?

4) A Prayer that'll help you in your quest for Knowledge

Spellbinders: The Art of Israel and American Propaganda

Bismillahi rahmani raheem,
I got this image from a Israeli propaganda advertisement in a popular Western website. Notice the cunning way they have used the words "The Israel Project" to cast Israel as something good whereas in reality it is a cruel Zionist, Western imperialist project. See the way they've used "fight terrorist propaganda". Little will the target internet viewers, the average Western visitor to that website ignorant of the truth and history of Israel-Palestine conflict guess this advertisement itself is a terrorist propaganda!

The average Western citizen knows a lot about sports, video games, girls, alcohol, drugs, cars, music, and his/her job, but knows and cares little about the way the world works and are easily led to believe Israeli American propaganda.

I came across the following article about the principles that underline Israel and American propaganda  in the Muslim Public Affairs Committee of UK website (www.mpacuk.org)


Spellbinders: The Art of Zionist & US Propaganda

Paul J. Balles considers the three main strengths of Zionist and American propaganda: simplicity, repetitiveness and the ignorance of its target audience.

I've looked at life from both sides now
From win and lose and still somehow
It's life's illusions I recall
I really don't know life at all. - Joni Mitchell

Hypnotists, magicians, politicians, sloganeers and propagandists succeed or fail depending on how well they enchant people with illusions.

"The Israelis made their desert bloom." - Zionist illusions

"There is no need to argue with the masses, slogans are much more effective. Slogans are like strong drinks to people. - Joseph Goebbels

"The Israelis built the only industrialized economy in the entire Middle East." - Israeli slogan

"Propaganda must limit itself to a few themes and repeat them incessantly." - Adolph Hitler

"The Israelis built the only liberal democracy in the Middle East." - Illusionist chant

"Propaganda is to a democracy what the bludgeon is to a totalitarian state." - Noam Chomsky

"The Middle East conflict is not about Israel's occupation of the territories; it is about the refusal of the Arabs to make peace with Israel, which is an inevitable by-product of their desire to destroy it." ­ Zionist propaganda

"... Effective propaganda must limit its points to a few and these points must be repeated until even the last member of the audience understands what is meant by them." - Adolph Hitler

"The Israelis treated the Arabs who remained in Israel well. To this day the very large Arab minority, which lives inside the state of Israel, has more rights and privileges than any other Arab population in the entire Middle East." - Disinformation magic by David Horowitz

"... the rank and file are usually much more primitive than we imagine. Propaganda must therefore always be essentially simple and repetitious." - Joseph Goebbels

Consider the next two quotations, with a shift in venue from Israel to America, together:

"The most brilliant propagandist technique will yield no success unless one fundamental principle is borne in mind constantly... it must confine itself to a few points and repeat them over and over." - Joseph Goebbels

"See, in my line of work you got to keep repeating things over and over and over again for the truth to sink in, to kind of catapult the propaganda." - George W. Bush

Here's why hype has worked for the Zionists, for Carl Rove, for the neo-conservatives and, until his lies started to catch up with him, for George W. Bush:

"The essence of propaganda consists in winning people over to an idea so sincerely, so vitally, that in the end they succumb to it utterly and can never escape from it." - Joseph Goebbels

The scientist Carl Sagan referred to essentially the same effect on the public:

"One of the saddest lessons of history is this: if we've been bamboozled long enough, we tend to reject any evidence of the bamboozle. The bamboozle has captured us. Once you give a charlatan power over you, you almost never get it back." - Carl Sagan

Finally, a word from the master craftsman's first protégé:

"Through clever and constant application of propaganda, people can be made to see paradise as hell, and also the other way round, to consider the most wretched sort of life as paradise." - Adolf Hitler

Who are the later protégés? Consider the observation of a master visionary:

"Blinding ignorance does mislead us. O! Wretched mortals, open your eyes!" - Leonardo da Vinci

Burj Dubai Tower and World's Tallest Building Competition

Bismillahi rahmani raheem,
The Burj Dubai (Tower of Dubai) now under construction in UAE is going to be the tallest building in the world upon completion in 2008. It is estimated to cost about 900 million US dollars and will probably be over twice the size of the famous Empire State Building. But the Tower is designed to be the centre of a large-scale, mixed-use development with another 19 residential towers among other constructions. The complete development will cost more than US$ 8 billion. The official height of the building or the number of stories cannot be confirmed because the final height is officially being kept a secret due to competition purposes!

Wikipedia reports, "Though unconfirmed, Burj Dubai has been through several height increases since its inception. Originally proposed as virtually a clone of the 560 m Grollo Tower proposal from Australia, the tower was soon redesigned to an original Skidmore Owings and Merrill design seen above and discussed below. This design stood approximately 705 metres tall. Contradictory information abounds regarding the official final height of the building, which is to be expected considering the building seeks to acquire the designation as the world's tallest structure upon completion in 2008. The website Burjdubaiskyscraper.com mentions a rumoured final height of 916 metres as of a posting on September 28, 2006, but this is contradicted by a September 20 posting of a GoWealthy.com article listing a height over 940 metres or 3084 feet." But whatever the final height will be it is going to handsomely beat the current world’s tallest building, Taipei 101 in Taiwan and even the tallest freestanding structure (on land) Toronto's CN Tower.

No doubt Burj Dubai Tower will be a very beautiful and amazing engineering feat. It will be an architectural marvel. It will be a symbol of Dubai's achievements and a national pride for the people of Dubai and UAE and possibly even to all Muslims. But the question remains, is it absolutely necessary to build such a tall building? Why waste money unnecessarily when there are so many critical and noble things to do? What is the use or who cares for such world records?

The average man on the streets doesn't give two hoots for any world record. A Dane told me that before the Danish cartoon controversy many Americans thought Denmark was the capital of Sweden! There you have it. We live in a world where the average citizen don't know nor care whether Denmark is a country or city! What fat chance is there for Dubai Tower making a world impression? It is nothing but an extravagant Arab monument of oil wealth, conceit, ego and a white elephant. Anyone with a commonsense will see this building for what it is - 'another imprudent petrodollar extravaganza'.

In recent years UAE has become an ultra modern state thanks to visionary leaders and oil money. Today, together with Singapore and Hong Kong, Dubai is one of the commercial hubs of Asia. The country has a highly advance infrastructure and all the luxuries 21st century can provide. But the UAE is yet to develop in industrial production, scientific and technological fields. Why not invest this money in science and technological research? This way the country will benefit for many generations and also UAE will quickly become an industrial developed nation. Why not stop spending on extravagant buildings and hotels but invest this money in these fields and make Dubai the Asian technological hub? Or what about making UAE an international educational centre by building state-of-the-art universities and research institutes like in Australia or Canada? Billions of dollars spent on extravagant monuments if invested wisely is sufficient to make UAE both a technological and educational hub. That will bring Dubai more world attention and accolade than 20 such Towers of Dubai ever will.

UAE already has made enough world records and super structures by building the most cost hotels, buildings and huge artificial islands. Dubai is spending 900 million dollars on Burj Dubai Tower alone. Yet the Muslims are starving to death all over the world. Imagine what 900 million dollars would do for the Tsunami devastated Indonesian Muslims. Just imagine if the Dubai invested the billions it spends on vain constructions in constructing factories, schools, roads in neighbouring poor Arab nation of Yemen? Within a decade or two Yemen will become a very stable and industrially developed country which will benefit its 20 million people who are now having a very hard time.

Before I wrap up, let me remind you of Prophet Muhammad’s warning regarding tall Buildings. Prophet Muhammad (sal) said one of the signs of the day of judgement is competition to build tall buildings. This doesn't mean it's not good to build tall buildings and there are occasions when we need high rise buildings like in congested areas. But it's very sad to see our Muslims wasting money to build tall and extravagant buildings for competition purposes. Muslims are playing with billions when millions of Muslims starve. Allah almighty has warned us we will be held accountable for every cent that passed through our hands in this life. What will Muslims fate be on the day of judgement?