When it comes to Islam, terminologies can be baffling and hotly disputed. Muslims, Islam, Islamism, and radicalism can all be confusing labels. But with the escalating waves of terror flowing around the globe, it is paramount to demystify the fog of terms and highlight a wide segment of Muslims that nowadays are largely ignored amidst the frenzy of both terrorism and Islamophobia. Who are non-Islamist Muslims?

Islam is a religion that is followed by millions of people from various countries and races who identify as Muslims. Non-Islamists are a diverse grand collection of Muslims, with various sects and beliefs that believe in Islam as a faith, and the Prophet Mohamed as a messenger from God. They can be Orthodox Muslims (Sunni or Shia), or heterodox sects such as Ahmadi or Ismaili. They have lived in areas for generations or in many diaspora communities. What unites them all is their deep…

“Think of the climate change issue as a closet, and behind the door are lurking all kinds of monsters — and there’s a long list of them,” — Steve Pacala.

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It has been said that Nature is a serial killer. Within her vast managerie of life, climate, and the physical world, there are many, many terrible processes that could mortally impact individuals, larger groups, entire species and even families of species. And if you were to look for the means by which Nature performs her worst violence, the mass extinction events, your eyes would almost immediately settle upon the uncomfortable issue of climate change, an issue all too relevant today.

Of twelve major mass extinction events identified in past geological epochs, ten were likely caused by climate change. Marked by layers of rocks almost entirely devoid of complex life, these periods in which Earth became little more than a…

W.J. Astore

In May 1968, nine Catholic activists set fire to draft records in Catonsville, Maryland, in a deliberate act of sabotage and protest against the Vietnam War.  For the crime of destroying government property, a crime they freely admitted, they were tried in federal court in Baltimore and found guilty.  I’ve been reading the edited trial transcript (with commentary) by Daniel Berrigan, one of the Catonsville Nine and a Catholic priest.  What unified these nine people was their moral opposition to the Vietnam War, a moral revulsion to the acts their country was committing in Vietnam, a revulsion that drove them to burn draft records with a weak brew of homemade napalm so as to gain the attention of their fellow citizens.

On this Easter Weekend, I would like to focus on a few of the statements made by the Catonsville Nine, as recorded by Daniel Berrigan in “The…

A meeting where professionals and residents of the highland town join forces to make Jarabacoa a pollution-free community will be hosted by the Fernando Arturo de Meriño Agroforestry at Pinar Dorado Hotel University.

In the heels of the agreement reached at the recent summit in France, 195 countries aim to fight global warming to keep it “well below 2 degrees above pre-industrial levels.”

This initiative is being adopted throughout Latin America and the Caribbean now begins in Jarabacoa, where meeting aims to issue a document to  join “wills” and identify the sources of environmental pollution, deforestation, soil degradation and loss of water resources and greenhouse gas emissions.

In an emailed document, the UAFAM said the document signatories will pledge to work to analyze the needs to mitigate and adapt to climate change to protect the municipality’s productive ac

Take a dunk on the wild side. Jarabacoa white water rafting.

tivities.

The result, based on comparisons between tree rings from the Florida Keys and a historical record of shipwrecks, finds that there were far fewer hurricanes, or tropical cyclones, from 1645 through 1715, when the planet went through what is called the “Maunder Minimum.” This was an era in which very low sunspot activity correlated with relatively cooler temperatures here on the Earth (the Maunder Minimum was part of a cooler period known to climate history as the “Little…

Panos Caribbean has urged the new prime minister of Jamaica, Andrew Holness, and his team to give priority to climate change, especially in light of developments at the Paris Climate Talks, held in December 2015.

Jamaica had a strong delegation present at the talks and has provided leadership on climate change matters for the Caribbean. Panos said it is hopeful that the momentum built coming out of Paris can be continued under the new government.

Under the new deal from the talks, issues such as climate financing and adaptation to climate change were clearly articulated. Jamaica stands to benefit from the provisions under the agreement if no time is lost in ratifying the agreement and fully implementing the island’s climate change policy framework and action plan.

There is already broad consensus from the local scientific community as to the need for urgent action on climate change. This is given the…