Who Controls the Narrative? From Karbala to Iran to the World Map - Maulana Syed Muhammad Rizvi

Bismillahirrahmanirrahim. Alhamdulillah, O Lord of the worlds. Alhamdulillah, we praise Him, we ask His forgiveness, we ask His forgiveness, we ask His guidance. And we seek refuge in Allah from the evil of our souls and from the bad of our deeds. Who is guided by Allah, is a misguided one, and who is astray is a misguided one. And we bear witness that there is no god but Allah, no partner. And we bear witness that Muhammad is His servant and Messenger. The messenger of Allah, the messenger of Allah, and the messenger of Allah, and the mercy of the worlds. And we pray to Allah, the pure ones, who are guided by Allah, and who are astray. We seek refuge in Allah from the evil of our souls and from the bad of our deeds. I would like to begin by thanking Allah, that we live in an era where there is vast and fast access to information about different issues around the world. The powerful and the tyrannical forces can no longer control the narrative. They have their own narration, but we also see the other side very quickly and very fast. On the first day of the war, waged against Iran by the United States of America and Israel, the very first victim was actually a girl school in Minab, which was attacked with a missile, killing at least 156 people. And out of them 120 were the school girls. And they also actually attacked the sports complex and residential area in the town of Lamar at the same time, killing at least 21 civilians, including seven children. We see that, you know, America just said we'll do the investigation. Initially they were saying, oh, maybe this is Iran itself has done a mistake or something. But now we see the report coming in from the experts of the independent international fact-finding mission on Iran under the UN Human Rights Organization, where they are concluding that the school which was close to the IRGC compound, it was attacked and the school was clearly identifiable as a school. There was no information indicating that it was used for military purpose. These experts from UN, based on the evidence that they have gathered, they have reasonable grounds to believe that the US carried out this strike on the school. They also concluded that the school was the intended point of impact. It was not a mistake. And the damage did not result from an errant, you know, strike or collateral damage. And this is, you know, when we look at those both incidents and the report from the fact-finding mission, you know, they are saying that reasonable grounds, that there were reasonable grounds to believe that the US committed the war crime of launching an indiscriminate attack resulting in loss of life and injury to civilians or damage to civilian objects. The US, as we see all the time, you know, they have their own narrative of trying to blame the victim. And this is a very old tactic used by the oppressors, you know, and this is where I have this, what can I do? I'm biased on this issue. I always go back to our own history. What we see now is nothing new. You know, this issue of blaming the victim. If you look at the events of Karbala, initially Yazid didn't have any problem in taking the credit that I'm the victor here to display his victory and also, you know, use Karbala as a warning for those who would raise their hands, their heads against him. But gradually, you know, when the public opinion started shifting, he distanced himself from it by now pinning the blame on the governor of Iraq, Ibn Ziyad. You know, even Sunni historians, even modern historians, people like Tahaw Sen and others from Egypt, they say if really Yazid wanted to, you know, when he says it's not me, it's only everything was done by Ibn Ziyad, why didn't he reprimand him, demote him, punish him or dismiss him? Nothing happened. And so this is just a game, you know, trying to, you know, deflect this blame from himself. And if you look at it, you will see that the letter, you know, writers in history, those who follow the Omayyid line, they now try to pin the massacre of Karbala on the sheers of Kufa. And we hear this all the time, even now during our own time. You know, a very short answer for that is from my late father, Rahmatullah Ali, once he was confronted by a Wahhabi preacher in Tanzania, where he was trying to say that, oh, you are the sheers, you were killed, you are the one who killed Hussein, and now you're sitting and crying. My father didn't want to sit down and have a long discussion about historical facts and things, and I said, listen, if that is the fact that we killed Imam Hussein, means our people, then why don't me and you sit down and recite these words together? La'an allahu ummatan qatalatka la'an allahu ummatan dalamatka la'an allahu ummatan samyad bidalika faradiyat bih I'm willing to say that to those who are responsible for killing Hussein, you say it, he shied away and went away, because he knew if he does it, la'anat it goes on his, you know, leaders of the past. And this is where you come to realize that, you know, this is a very old game, and we just have to be, you know, thankful to Allah, Subhanahu wa ta'ala, that now we have the means of even incidents happening far away, you can, we can shift through it to see what is the truth. May Allah, Subhanahu wa ta'ala, you know, open our eyes, give us the wisdom to understand what is Haqq and what is Batil. Inna ahsan al-Hadiyyis kitabu Allah al-Aziz bismillahir rahmanir raheem. Wa al-Aziz, inda al-insana la fi khusr illa al-lathin aaman wa amal as-swalihat wa ta'an subil Haqq wa ta'an subil Saber. Awadu billahi milash shaytan illa ayn al-rajim, ismallahi rahmanir raheem. Alhamdulillahi illa dillahi illa hu al-halim al-karim, ghafer al-zumbe wa qaab al-tawba wa hu al-ghafer al-raheem. Wa nashhadu an la ilaha illa hu al-atuf al al-u'ibad bi judihi wa al-awad al-mudunibina bi hillmi. Wa nashhadu an na muhammad an nabiyehu wa habiba. Sayyid al-murusalina wa shafi al-mudunibin wa rahmatun li al-'alamin. As-swalallahu alayhi wa al-alih. Adda'in ala sabi'ilillahi bil-hikmatu wa l-mawad al-hasana qadatu al-umman wa awliya an-n'ima wa ma'adin al-rahma. O re-seek me ba'adu allah bi-tawba masalafan dunubikum. I think the narration that we see, the narrative from the United States of America basically, that's why they don't like the international court of justice. They want to just, you know, suppress this totally. And this whole problem of, you know, United Nations Security Council, you see that the new block coming up in the name of BRICS. One of the main issues in the hilly when they talked about it was the reforming the United Nations, especially the Security Council. Because it's just paralyzing everything. Nothing can be done because of this veto powers that, you know, five members, permanent members have there. So we see that, you know, the people who have the power in their hand, they are misusing it. Even now, although we talk about democracy, we talk about, you know, freedom for nations to determine their own, you know, future, but they would like to have their own veto power there. In one way or another, to, you know, support their own allies, even if they are, you know, going against the democratic values that they claim to follow actually. This brings me to another interesting, you know, event or the story I would say. Because when we study history, it is important to not only look at the source, you need to know the writer. You can't just pick up, you know, a history book and start reading. In general, any book actually, but especially when we talk about history, we have to know the social, political environment in which the writer lived and in which he was writing. Because there are different kinds of pressures which are there. You know, sometimes the pressures are there obvious, sometimes they are, you know, very subtle. And the writer is influenced by that. Even if you look at the Muslim historians, you know, the most famous and the earliest, a seerah biography of Rasulullah sallallahu alaihi wa sallam is known as the seerah of Ibn Hisham, which is very easily available. But the seerah of Ibn Hisham is not his original work. It is summary of somebody who came before him early century, I think just in the second, early century of the Hijrah, by the name of Ibn Ishaq. Ibn Ishaq is the man writer. Ibn Hisham came later on and summarized it. And if you look at it, you will see he says in summarizing the book of Ibn Ishaq, I have taken away those portions which will make the government angry. And this now is talking about the days of Banu Abbas. Ibn Hisham lived at the Abbasid time. So anything which will be negative towards Banu Abbas, I avoided it and many similar issues. So anything to do with sheers would be, you know, ignored and not written there. And so this kind of, you know, bias which is there in grind in the minds of the historians. Let me give you a quotation from somebody that is based on a paper I had on in the 90s about Ghadir and the Orientalist, how the Western scholars looked at Ghadir and how they handled them. And there I have a quotation from Marshall Hatzkan, who was a very prominent scholar of Muslim history here in the West. And he says something very interesting. He says, bias comes especially in the questions he poses and in the type of category he uses referring to the historians. Where indeed bias is especially hard to track down because it is hard to suspect the very terms one uses, which seems so innocently neutral. So the environment has its own impact on how the historian is writing the book. I think a very good example I would like to share today is this whole new world map. I remember I talked about this a long time ago when I was in Vancouver. You know, if you look at the world map which has been common, we have been looking at it from our school days till now, wherever you go. And this has been there for four centuries. But if you look at it, it has this Western bias in it. It gives an impression that Northern hemisphere nations are larger than they are and therefore certainly reinforcing perceptions of where global strength lies. You know, and this was presented in the United Nations General Assembly to watch for the new world map. And it was adapted when the resolution was passed, 164 countries of the world voted for it. Six of them abstained. One said no. Now who is that? That's the United States of America. Because the size of the US became reduced in the new map that they have come up with. And this is where, if we can see the map there, you will see that the new world map is known as equal Earth, whereas the one we have been using for the last four centuries is the marketer map. Now even the map itself has this very subtle bias in it, the way it was prepared. You know, if you look at Europe, it looks much bigger than what it is. And Africa was even smaller than its real size. And the new one, you will see that the size has been adjusted, although those whose size has been reduced, they are not happy with it. But you know, majority of 164 countries have accepted that as the standard there. But let me go to the, you know, something I've been thinking about it for a long time, looking at that map. You know, when we use the word Middle East, middle from where? Or you say far east, far from where? It's not, you know, this way or that way, the Earth is round. So from which point are looking at it and you are saying this is Middle East or this is Far East? That itself is a very subtle bias there. You know, it was the European geographers who actually came up with this term. Because they are there in Europe, they are looking at the Orient, east. And they came up with three terms, Near East. Near East means the Balkans and the Ottoman Empire, Turkish. Middle East means the region between Mediterranean and India. Far East is the, you know, countries towards the Pacific Ocean. You're talking about China and Japan. But this is where you see that, you know, the bias is there in green, you know, from childhood we look at it that way. But suppose you print the same map and you will see some of those maps are there, where Makka is right there in the center. And then you say, okay, let's now use the terms. You know, whatever is the east of Makka, you know, this is where Afghanistan and India and sub-quantity will be the Near East if you are in Makka. Thailand to China and Japan, this will be the Middle East. Australia would be the Far East. And then you look at the other side, you know, Europe will be the Near West and America will be the Far West. So it all depends on how you are looking at it. My point here is not to say, you know, change the terms, we will still be using the same terminology if you don't want to get confused. What I'm saying that even when the words are used and the terms are invented, there is a bias in it and we have to read through it to realize that, you know, not everything is being projected in the true manner. May Allah SWT, Aril Al Haqq, may He show us the truth and may He always keep us among those who are Ahlul Haqq. Allahumma swallaha ala Sayyid al-mursaleen wa shafiil al-mudunabin, Nabiya Muhammad swallahu alaihi wa alaihi wa salam, wa ala Imam al-Muttakheen wa Ameer al-Mu'minina Ali ibn al-Talib, salawat allaha alaihi wa ala Sayyid al-Nisa'il al-Alamin, Sayyid al-Nafahatimita bint al-Rasool Allah, salawat allaha alaihi wa ala Sayyid al-Shababi, Ahal al-Jannah al-Hasr al-Mustaba wa al-Hussein al-Shahid al-Bakarbala, alaihim as-salatu wa salam, wa ala Ayimat al-Maslamin Ali ibn al-Hasain wa Muhammad ibn Ali, wa Ja'far ibn Muhammad wa Musa ibn Ja'far, wa Ali ibn Musa ibn Ali, wa Ali ibn Muhammad wa al-Hasr ibn Ali, alaihim as-salatu wa salam. Allahumma swallaha ala Maulana al-Hujjat ibn al-Hasr al-Sahib al-Asr al-Zaban, mawhi asr al-Badaf al-Taghiyan, ahadim ya ibn al-Tashirk al-Bandifaq, hasr al-Furl al-Baghri al-Shiqaq, salawat allaha wa salam alaihi wa la ba'il kiram, matta salat al-Tiyali wa al-ayyam, Allahumma ajil faraj wa sahil maqraja, wa kuhl nathurana bin nathrath minna ilayh, wa jallna mil al-Mustashhidina bina yadeh, Allahumma jallna minna yadzakiru, fa tanfa'ah al-dikra, inlallaha ya aml al-Balad wa al-Hussein wa itaiz al-Qurba, wa yannhan al-Fahshai wa al-Munkari wa al-Baghri, ya aidukum la alakum tathakirun.