Muslim students hold Peace conference at Rutgers University

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Muslim students hold Peace conference at Rutgers University

On Tuesday, March 24th, 2015 the Ahmadi Muslim Student Association held Muhammad (pbuh) Messenger of Peace conference at the Rutgers University Student Center in New Brunswick campus of New Jersey.

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This year, the theme focused on building bridges among faith communities by exploring the life of prophet Muhammad, his ideologies and contrast them with the negative and misunderstood version portrayed in the media due to extremists actions carried out by ISIS and the like, in the name of Islam.

The event started at 6.30 PM with refreshments and a short video introducing the history of violent extremism in America, carried out by the likes of Timothy McVeigh, who where motivated by personal ideology and not driven by faith. Mr. Safwan Akbar moderated the program. Imam Azhar Haneef addressed the audience with opening remarks. He commented on the fact that in this day and age, we often mix extremists and their political ideologies with Islam. However, the religion of Islam provides absolutely no foundation for supporting the actions of these extremists.

The second guest speaker for the evening was Mr. Tariq Sharif, Vice President of marketing at Dunn& Bradstreet. Mr. Sharif focused on the life of Prophet Muhammad from recorded history and highlighted several incidents relating to matters of state affairs, his reaction towards slander, dissention and even personal abuse by his critics. His exposition brought out the benevolent and tolerant character of prophet Muhammad.

Keynote speaker, Harris Zafar delivered his talk on the topic of apparent conflict between Islam and freedom of expression. Detailed in his analysis of current affairs including in the Muslim countries and Charlie Hebdo incident, Harris pointed out the apparent ongoing conflict within Muslim communities driven by misrepresentation of true Islamic teaching of prophet Muhammad for political gains.

The student center hall was packed with about 200 attendees with 60 guests including NJ State Senator Hon. Bob Smith (D) of district 17 who delivered a brief address thanking the community to hold this event at the campus. He emphasized the need for faith communities to participate and engage in dialogue and the democratic process. Several guests provided very positive feedback for the program and one repeat guest mentioned – “this is my 3rd time attending, and I always enjoy this program, it is very well put, professionally delivered and I learn a lot about Islam from this event.”

The program concluded with a short question answer session presided by Imam Azhar Haneef and the panel. Dr. Mir Sharif Ahmad, president of the central NJ chapter of the Ahmadiyya Muslim community closed the event thanking everyone. Several media outlets including TV Asia and Verizon FIOS Channel 1 news team covered the event and broadcast at the 10 pm nightly news.

News Coverage from various sources on this event.

USA Today

Screenshot from 2015-03-30 21:02:44

Network news coverage from Channel 1

South Asian Times.

MTA World News

MyCentralJersey.com

The Muslim Times

 

By |2019-01-22T20:00:39+00:00March 25th, 2015|News, Videos|Comments Off on Muslim students hold Peace conference at Rutgers University

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