Award-winning journalist-cum-academic Lawrence (Larry) Pintak has been on a mission for years trying to explain Islam to Americans, with his latest volume nailing it in the age of hysterical xenophobia and white supremacy.  The cover of America and Islam: Soundbites, Suicide Bombs and the Road to Donald Trump sets the …

Most American journalists probably know little about covering Islam accurately, fairly, ethically and contextually amid rising levels of xenophobia, hate speech and “fake news” in the U.S., but help is on the way. In 1980, I arrived in Beirut as CBS News Middle East correspondent. My qualifications for covering this complex …

On November 21, 2016, the Middle East Centre of St Antony’s College, Oxford hosted the roundtable and launch of Public Culture and Islam in Modern Egypt: Media, Intellectuals and Society (London: I.B.Tauris, 2016) with myself and Morgan Clarke (Institute of Social and Cultural Anthropology, Oxford) who is a social anthropologist …

December 29, 2015—An Egyptian appeals court announced its decision to reduce the jail sentence of controversial religious researcher and television host Islam al-Beheiry today. Convicted in absentia last May for contempt of religion, al-Beheiry had lost an earlier appeal attempt in October.

Female preachers are proving themselves a force to be reckoned with on Arab satellite TV channels, preaching head-to-head with men in shows dedicated to religious debate. Appearing on such channels as Dream, Orbit, Iqra, ART, MBC, and Al Jazeera, these preachers often issue religious rulings (fatwas) on the air and …

Mohammad Hammam, Executive Manager of Iqra Satellite Channel, Talks to TBS As one of the fastest growing religions in the world, Islam has become both a media focus and a media victim in recent years.  According to 30-year-old Muhammad Hammam, executive manager of Iqra, the Arab world's longest-established Islamic satellite …

20 November 2004, Cairo Ahmad al-Farrag is one of the pioneers of religious television broadcasting in the Arab world. His long-running program Nur ala Nur, or "Light Upon Light" was the first of its kind in Egypt and a model for future religious talk shows. It also was the first …

Hamza Yusuf Hanson was born in Walla Walla, Washington, and raised in northern California. He became Muslim in 1977 in Santa Barbara, California and subsequently moved to the Middle East and studied Arabic and Islam for four years in the United Arab Emirates and later in Medina, Algeria, Morocco, and …

In the aftermath of the attacks of September 11, 2001, renewed fears about the threat of "Islamic Fundamentalism" conjured images of bearded and turbaned zealots spoiling for holy war against the West. More than three years later, such stereotypes seem confirmed in the grim reality of the morning's headlines, as …

17 October, 2004 in Doha, Qatar Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi is one of the best known, longest established, and most controversial of Arab world satellite preachers. TBS's senior editor S. Abdallah Schleifer interviewed Sheikh al-Qaradawi in Doha about his relationship with the medium. TBS: When did you first start speaking about Islam on television? What …