To commemorate the end of Ramadan, the Empire State Building in New York City decided to use green lighting (photos below). As AFP report:
New York’s iconic Empire State Building is to be lit up green from Friday in honor of the Muslim holiday of Eid, the biggest festival in the Muslim calendar marking the end of Ramadan, officials said.
“This is the first time that the Empire State Building will be illuminated for Eid, and the lighting will become an annual event in the same tradition of the yearly lightings for Christmas and Hannukah,” according to a statement.
When most of us look at these pictures, we see, well, green but Michelle Malkin and ridiculous C-list pundit and “2005 weblog finalist” Debbi Schlussel see red. In fact, Schlussel concludes looking at the building is like being forced to drink cyanide-laced grape-flavoured Flavor-Aid by a cult leader in Guyana:
If only Jim Jones were around today . . . Kool-Aid Purple Lighting atop the Empire State. “Interreligious Understanding.”
Just asking us to look at the HAMAS-Green is like forcing us to drink the Purple.
Err, yeah. Right.
Anyway, here’s what the Empire State Building looks like:
(More photos here)
28 comments ↓
Since when was green the colour of Islam? Islam do not have a colour or logo/symbols for the specific reason as not to be misused like previous colours and symbols/logos.
Huh?
Shaykh Muhammad Salih Ibn Uthaymeen recommended that if Muslims in the West needed a colour or symbol to distinguish themselves from others that they used green.
Ali Eteraz opposes it and says it’s unconstitutional for the state to endorse religion in this way.
OMG, stop whinging.
It’s a NICE GESTURE.
First, green is definitely the colour most associated with Islam — that doesn’t mean it’s an “official” one but if you’re going to light up a magnificent monument in honour of an Islamic holiday, I’d say “green” is a good choice.
Second, with respect to Ali Eteraz’s post, lighten up. Acknowledging a religious holiday is endorsing the religion? Yah, right.
DDD: So what? Who cares what Ali thinks?
The Empire State Building is owned by the late Henry Helmsley’s investment company. It’s a privately-owned building and so they can do whatever they want with it.
My Best Eid Ever in America
By Mahmoud El-Yousseph
October 16, 2007
My best Eid ever in America was this year on Friday, Oct.12 as I celebrated the three-day feast marking the end of Ramadan. My oldest son Yousef came home on military leave to visit shortly before Eid. My 23 year-old daughter, Nadia, who teaches English and American culture in Europe also came home. She handed hand me as a surprise a pair of socks that I wore the exact day I came to America 30 years ago this month. That blew me away!
For the first time ever, My family and I attended the Eid prayer not at a rented out sport complex or party hall, but at the newly built Noor mosque- an elegant and state of the art facility in Hilliard, Ohio.
The first day of Eid began early Friday morning as I read messages in my inbox. The first message read:
“The world-famous Empire State Building will be lit in green from Friday to Sunday in celebration of Eid-ul-Fitr.” This act of kindness warmed my heart and made my Eid very special one. Green colour in Islam is a symbol of a happy occasion.
I was more delighted to read further that, “So far the landmark tower is lighted in traditional colors every year only on the occasions of Christmas and Hannukah. From this year on, lighting on Eid too will become an annual event.”
The Empire State Building which is located in Manhattan has been recently nominated as America ’s favorite building.
Believe or not, America is more Muslim-friendly since 9/11, and more so than the rest of the western world. In case you have any doubt, please read the three items that were reported this year:
June 2, 2007 AP wire service story about Bilan Nur, a 22 year-old Somali woman from Phoenix, Arizona : She worked for several years for Alamo Rent -A-Car. The company fired her for refusing the take off her hijab (headscarf). Nur registered a complaint at the Federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. The EEOC sued the company. A federal jury said the company must pay her $288,000 for firing her for wearing the hijab. A federal judge agreed, and the company declined to comment. Yes, Justice is blind in America !
July 20, 2007: According to the Chicago Tribune, two Muslim women from the Cincinnati area were able to get their driver’s license photographs wearing the hijab free of charge. This took place after clerks at separate bureau office wrongly demanded that the women remove the scarves for the photo.
Tom Hunter, spokesman for the Department of Public Transportation sent a message to 216 state registrar’s offices informing staff that wearing the hijab while taking a photograph is allowed and legally exempt under Ohio law. Mr. Hunter stressed in his message that asking a Muslim woman to remove her hijab is like asking a non Muslim woman to remove her shirt. That is a man of honor and integrity!
Mulims were very proud and will never forget when on On Sep.1, 2001, when the U.S. Postal Service’s expanded its Holiday Celebrations Series with a new stamp highlighting the Muslim holiday of Eid.
The postage stamp was to honor and commemorate two important Islamic celebrations: Eid ul-Fitr and Eid al-Adha. Eid al-Adha commemorates Prophet Ibrahim’s (peace be upon him) willingness to sacrifice his son Ismail upon God’s commandment. The two Eids are usually two months and ten days apart.
“The Eid stamp helps highlight the business, educational, and military contributions of the estimated seven million Muslims in our country whose cultural heritage has become an integral part of the fabric of our great nation.”
There is another popular event called collective ‘Iftar” take a place every year during Ramadan. Iftar is the meal eaten after sunset when the fast is broken. For many years, the White House, U.S. State Department, the Pentagon, all branches of U.S. military and St. James Episcopal Church of Columbus, Ohio host such an event. They meet Muslims and get to know who they are which help break the stereotypes that Muslim face every day. To Muslims, that means recognition and respect.
America does not need to spend millions of dollars on public relations campaigns at Al-Jazeera and other satellite networks in the Middle East to promote a positive image. The aforementioned acts of respect and goodwill gestures I mentioned will win the hearts and minds of Muslims here and abroad. Thank you America for making this my best Eid Ever !
Mahmoud El-Yousseph
USAF Retired Veteran
::
Mahmoud, I am happy that you think that in America it is more friendly towards Muslims, and i understand the security reasons in some countries, but until today the problem is not the streets or the everyday dealling, its the airports. I get treated like a criminal all over the world, and get interview in most entry points and airports, specially Germany, UK, USA and even here in Australia, in Australia they even search my bags and strip search me. In Uk, I usually have an hour long interview, the USA pretty much the same plus the finger printing check which should only be reserved to crooks. all these things don’t look good at all when traveling with clients and clients waiting to pick you up from airport and you are either escorted or followed closely by the local federal/state police.
I don’t mind the extra checks but I resent the singling out that is very obvious.
Omar,
The nightmare of airport travel affects us all. Long lineups at security, intrusive personal questions, hateful border checks. Who’s at fault? Blame your co-religionists who thought that executing thousands of innocent people on behalf of your god would advance the cause of islam.
That muslims are now given extra attention everywhere should be no surprise…
Flanstein,
I liked your other nick better. They say that the first step to being cured is admitting you have a problem.
Nevermind – there’s always hope.
Rubbish Flanstein,
I don’t believe that you could afford to fly in an aircraft, even a budget carrier. I don’t even believe that anyone in your trailer-park has been inside an aircraft except to clean it.
This is a sample of his great work,
don’t be so shy Flanstein, a one track mind is better than none at all.
I think that, when we Muslims finally become the majority in the USA, insha Allah, another three Empire State Buildings should be constructed in order to form the corners of a huge mosque, with the buildings as minarets. When lit up green at Eid, it will be visible from outerspace from the Bismillah Space Shuttle. Please forwards this message to David Horowitz, Mad Mel Philips and all the other Islamophobes of the world as my Eid gift to them. Aren’t I a naughty boy?
“when we Muslims finally become the majority in the USA”
If that were ever to come true…(shudder) the US would be turned into another stone-age-islamic hellhole, with space travel a distant memory…
hell holes like this
http://www.burj-al-arab.com/
or this
http://travel.timesonline.co.u.....716337.ece
or this
http://www.seychelles.travel/e.....ecrets.php
,if it is a hellhole then what does it say about americans like you who fall over themselves to go and work there.
or perhaps you are thinking about this
http://austrolabe.com/2007/05/.....hort-film/
I didn’t know your mama worked in a petrol station, but at least she is off the street.
Oh yes, tcell, we’re all flocking to live in the islamic world – and the rumours of muslims lining up to find peace and prosperity in the west through immigration? Nonsense of course. Why would anyone want to leave the paradise that is Somalia, or Egypt, Albania, Pakistan, Azerbaijan and Iran, Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia or Libya?
Jeremy Clarkson concludes his piece by saying that in some parts of America people have started to mate with vegetables. There is no flora in your family tree is there Flan? I wouldn’t offend you by making a throwaway comment about a turnip?
what about Saudi Arabia? its full of Americans, and yanks are falling over themselves to come even though the locals like to BBQ you people.
BTW Flanstien, could you help me get a green card? I have always wanted to come to America, I could live with you and teach you how to cook, and you could teach me about drug use, selfishness and pornography.
Now, now, T-Cell – there are some good things about the USA, although not the kind of things that Mr. Flan might approve of. I’m thinking specifically of its small but nonetheless impressive array of Islamic Studies academics – from Akbar Ahmed to Alan Godlas to Muhammad Zaman. And that’s despite the fact that in a recent survey of academics, a majority thought the US today is actually worse than during the McCarthy era!
Flan, if the Muslim world isn’t the best place in the world why do the Americans keep sending their young people to die for our sake?
Our sake, Dawud? Or the sake of the Likudniks and their power mad ravings?
“what about Saudi Arabia? its full of Americans, and yanks are falling over themselves to come even though the locals like to BBQ you people.”
Some people will do anything for money….like live in a culture where women aren’t even allowed to drive cars…
There aren’t too many people from civilization that actually want CITIZENSHIP in an islamic country – is there tcell?
Yakoub – once again we noted the plethora of muslim recipients for this years Nobel prizes. Perhaps if they gave Nobel’s for “Islamic Studies”, suicide belt construction or Jew-hatred, you guys would clean up….
flan you have shifted your position, answer the question.
also answer dawoud’s question.
I sense a retreat here.
if these places are such hellholes, why are there lots of Americans there? In a place that doesn’t allow women to drive, where the locals pathologically hate americans .
And yet you line up at the airport to come and to be treated this way.
If you were paying attention, I had answered the question. People come to a few mid-east countries to work (Saudi’s are famous for being incapable of doing anything for themselves, so they need westerners to do it for them. I know some friends who went to work for the phone company – they spent three years living in a compound putting up with the religious police – they couldn’t wait to leave…)
Dubai has some cool, over-the-top hotels – so rich Europeans spend some time there – but elsewhere? Virtually the entire Islamic world is a hell-hole of hatred, violence, oppression and backwardness. Who would want to live there?
The question is this: are people immigrating to muslim countries from the west? The answer, as you already know, is a resounding NO!
Tcell,
As it relates to muslims hating kaffir in SA, they are simply following the words of your “god”…
Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah, and those who are with him are harsh against the disbelievers, and Merciful among themselves… [Al-Fath: 29]
Oh I see they are just there out of the goodness of their hearts?
This isn’t America Flan, idiot comments might work at home but they don’t work anywhere else.
So why do they go to these “hellholes”?
Saudi Arabia isn’t as bad as these Americans say it is, because clearly nobody forced them to go.
where else? what about Langkawi in malasyia, Oman, Tunsia, Moroccco, the seychelles.
Now answer Dawoud assertion that Americans must love Muslim hellhole countries like Iraq, because you people are prepared to die there in thousands, to make the country safe for the IRANIANS.
tcell,
You’ve never been accused of being the sharpest knife in the drawer – have you?
Read this slowly (try not to move your lips)…perhaps you will understand:
Muslims are – in large numbers – trying to emigrate to the west from the hell-holes that they live in. Are civilized folks from Sweden, Ireland, Canada, etc trying to emigrate to islamic countries?
Think about this question. Formulate an answer.
Some more facts:
I oppose the war in Iraq
I do not think we should waste a single life to help islamic barbarians. If I was running things, I’d nuke any islamic country involved in attacking, protecting or funding the monsters that attacked us – that includes SA.
I would restrict muslims from coming to our country for any reason – since you all seem to be a potential enemy.
That’s fascinating, Flanstein. But how would you know who is a Muslim? If people want to come to “our country”, they can just “convert”, lie about their religion, or not disclose it.
thank you flan, getting you to unmask your real views has been difficult, but I am delighted now that everyone can see who you are
@ t cell
…but I am delighted now that everyone can see who you are
I let everyone know who flanstein was a week ago. Was I wrong?
Leave a Comment