Israel, Gaza, and the Empire of Lies: Dr. Gabor Maté on Truth and Trauma

Dive deep into the Israeli genocide in Gaza through the eyes of Dr. Gabor Maté, a holocaust survivor and leading expert on trauma, as he breaks down the human cost behind Israel's crimes against humanity. 

From the trauma that fuels oppression to the chilling parallels between what Nazi Germany did to Jews and what Israel is now doing to Palestinians — Maté holds nothing back.

This powerful conversation brings together voices like Omar El Akkad, Mohammed El Kurd, Francesca Albanese, and Ahmed Eldin to offer honest, nuanced perspectives on the ongoing humanitarian crisis, the roots of violence, and the urgent need for truth and justice.

In this video, you’ll get:

Dr. Gabor Maté’s insights on how trauma fuels cycles of violence affecting both Israelis and Palestinians.

A clear and compassionate overview of the Gaza war, including the civilian toll and why this so-called war is being described as genocide by international observers.

A critical look at the Netanyahu government’s role and the global response, including debates over the normalization of mass killing and calls to stop arming Israel.

Perfect for anyone seeking to understand the Israel-Gaza war beyond the headlines — this video uses clear language to unpack complex ideas on genocide, war, trauma, and the ongoing struggle for justice.

Stay informed on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and Gaza genocide with expert voices guiding you through the facts and emotions driving this devastating chapter in world history.

Kavita Sidhu & Yasmin Mogahed - Finding faith, A father’s role and Afterlife

 

Two inspiring voices from different walks of life. Actress and humanitarian Kavita Sidhu, alongside renowned Islamic scholar and author Yasmin Mogahed, engage in a heartfelt discussion about the ongoing situation in Palestine.

Together, they explore the resilience of the Palestinian people, their unwavering faith, and how they find strength to smile despite unimaginable hardship.

Abdullah Ibn Rawahah (ra): The Warrior Poet | The Firsts | Dr. Omar Suleiman

 

O My Soul, Death Is Inevitable,So It Is Better for You to Be Martyred

Abdullah ibn Rawaahah ibn Tha'labah (Arabic: عبدالله ابن رواحة‎‎) was one of the companions of Rasulullah ﷺ.
Abdullah ibn Rawaahah RA was from the Arabian tribe, the Banu Khazraj. At a time when writing was not a common skill he was a writer and a poet.
Abdullah-bin-Rawaha RA was originally a Christian writer from Madinah and was also known as Abu Amru’ Al-Ansari Al-Khazraji Al-Badri. He was one of the most active persons from among the Ansar to support the faith of Islam and strengthen its structure.

Mesut Özil: The Muhammad Ali of Our Time

 

I completely agree with CJ Werle here: International football superstar Mesut Özil is the Muhammad Ali of our time, risking reputation and livelihood to speak out forcibly against the world’s worst human rights abuses.

Whereas millions of ethnic Uyghurs have been forcibly disappeared in a network of Chinese-government-run concentration camps, torture dungeons, and possibly mass graves, international football superstar Mesut Özil, a German-born Muslim, has been forcibly erased from the world’s premier football league and international attention for daring to speak out against Beijing.

It all started with a tweet posted on December 13, 2019, when he condemned China for its persecution of Uyghur Muslims, and the governments of Muslim majority countries for their complicit silence.

“Qur’ans are burned, mosques are closed, madrassas are banned, religious scholars are killed one by one. The brothers are forced into the camps. Chinese men are settled in their families instead of them. The sisters are forced to marry Chinese men,” reads an excerpt from Özil’s tweet. “Despite all this, the Ummah of Prophet Muhammad is silent. Doesn’t object/say anything.”

Friends and advisers had warned Özil that there would be consequences for speaking out.

According to the New York Times, friends and advisers had warned Özil –– who was then under contract with the English Premier League (EPL) team Arsenal –– that there would be consequences, but Özil felt compelled by his religious faith to act. He ignored their warnings. The consequences came swift.

Not only did Arsenal distance itself from their star player, saying, “The content published is Özil’s opinion,” and that as a football club, it adhered to the “principle of not involving itself in politics” –– which is nonsense, given Arsenal has publicly expressed support for an array of political causes, including Black Lives Matter. In response to Özil’s activism, China disappeared Özil’s name from video games, social media, and Internet search engines, while threatening to ban telecasts of Arsenal’s future fixtures.

Ten months later, Özil’s name also disappeared from Arsenal’s rostered list of players, ending his time in the world’s top football competition with a £13,975,000 annual salary. Arsenal traded him to Turkish club Fenerbahce in the 13th ranked league in Europe.

His fall couldn’t have been greater. In 2018, he became the world’s highest paid player in history, earning £350,000 per week in the top-flight EPL, but today he pulls in only a fraction of that, roughly £60,000 per week, playing in the second-rate Süper Lig. Barely six months after he condemned China for its persecution of Uyghur Muslims, Adidas ended its seven-year, £22 million sponsorship deal with Özil.

Notably, Adidas has been accused of profiting from the mass detainment of Uyghurs in Xinjiang, where detainees have been forced into picking cotton.

Speaking out against what the United States government has now identified as “genocide” has exacted a massive financial and emotional cost on Özil. Yet he remains undeterred, using his massive social media following to raise awareness about the brutalities endured by Palestinians under Israeli occupation, Syrians under Russian bombardment, and Yemenis caught in the middle of a proxy war.

Özil prayed for the “safety and well-being of our Muslim brothers and sisters in India.”

To celebrate the Islamic holy night of Lailat al-Qadr on April 27, Özil prayed for the “safety and well-being of our Muslim brothers and sisters in India,” calling the Indian government’s crackdown on the religious minority “shameful” before asking, “What is happening to human rights in the so-called largest democracy in the world?”

Clearly, Özil is undeterred and unintimidated by India’s growing economic clout. He fears no man and no government. He answers only to God and his own moral compass.

While far from a perfect analogy, Özil is the Muhammad Ali of our era, and like “the Greatest” heavyweight boxing champion of all time, he has risked reputation and livelihood in speaking out forcibly against the world’s worst human rights abuses.

Ali told reporters back in 1966, “I ain’t got no quarrel with them Vietcong,” which was followed with, “No Vietcong ever called me [N-word],” a line that perfectly couched his ethical opposition to an unjust foreign war in support for civil rights at home. Sixteen months later on June 20, 1967, Ali was sentenced to 5 years in prison for refusing to be inducted into the US armed forces.

Although he managed to stay out of prison while appealing his case to the US Supreme Court on religious grounds, he was stripped of his boxing titles and denied the right to fight professionally for nearly four years. But the Supreme Court overturned his conviction and his actions as a conscientious objector to the Vietnam War made him an icon of the American civil rights movement.

It’s impossible to imagine the late Muhammad Ali isn’t an inspiration to Özil in an era of hyper-commercialism.

It’s impossible to imagine the late Muhammad Ali isn’t an inspiration to Özil in an era of hyper-commercialism, where very few athletes are willing to put principles before profit.

Most live by the mantra quipped by NBA hall of famer Michael Jordan, who explained away his refusal to endorse Democrat Harvey Gantt, an African American, in a 1990 US Senate race against Republican Jesse Helms, a notorious and vicious racist, by saying, “Republicans buy sneakers, too.”

Well, China buys football merchandise and EPL products, too –– but Özil dared to use his global following to stand up against the abuse committed by Beijing against Uyghur Muslims in Xinjiang. He knew that he would have to write off the world’s largest economy as a market, including his six million followers on the Chinese social media network Wiebo and his fan club there, which boasted more than 50,000 signed-up members.

He knew that “he might become too toxic even for any club with Chinese owners, or sponsors eager to do business there,” reported the New York Times.

With the world bedeviled and besieged by intractable conflicts, fledgling and ongoing genocides, and the hate that flows from rising ultranationalist impulses, we need the likes of Mesut Özil and Muhammad Ali more than ever.

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The Life and Legacy of Imam Shamil (d. 1871 CE) | Shaykh Dr. Yasir Qadhi

WHAT WAS OUR PROPHET صَلَّى اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ LIKE?

 

• He was the mildest of people and also the warmest and most generous of them.
• He would fix his own sandals, patch his own clothes and help his family with the daily errands.
• He was very shy; shyer than a virgin in her chamber.
• He would respond to the invitation of slaves.
• He would visit the sick.
• He would walk alone [without guards].
• He would allow others to saddle-up with him on his mount.
• He would accept gifts.
• He would eat food that was sent as a gift; but he never consumed anything that had been given as charity.
• He did not have enough dates with which to be satisfied, nor was he satisfied with barley-bread for more than three consecutive days.
• He would eat whatever food was readily available.
• He never criticized food.
• He never ate lying down, and ate whatever was closest to him.
• He loved perfumes and disliked foul odors.
• He honored people of virtue, and kept affectionate ties with nobles and dignitaries.
• He never rejected anyone and would accept the excuse of those who presented excuses.
• He would joke, but never would he utter anything untrue.
• He laughed, but not loudly.
• He would not let any time pass without being in the service of God or being engaged in whatever was essential for his own self-development.
• He never cursed women, nor abused servants.
• He never hit anyone, except for in jihad in God’s cause.
• He did not perform revenge for his own sake, but did so when God’s limits had been transgressed.
• If he was presented with two options he took the easier of the two, unless it entailed disobedience or the severing of ties – in which case he would be the furthest away from it.
• He would sit in an assembly wherever it was convenient and would mingle among his Companions as one of them, so much so that when strangers came, they couldn’t tell him from others, except after inquiring as to who he was.
• He would take to long periods of silence, but when he did speak he did so slowly and clearly, repeating himself so that he would be understood.
• He used to pardon, even when he was in a position to punish.
• He wouldn’t confront anyone with what they did not like.
• He was the most truthful of men.
• He was the one who most fulfilled his trusts, pledges and commitments.
• He was the easiest going of people; the most affable; and the most generous in friendship.
• Whoever looked at him unexpectedly, was amazed by him.
• Whoever knew him, loved him.
• His Companions, whenever they spoke about worldly affairs, he would join in with them; and when, in recollecting their pre-Islamic days, they would laughed, he would simply smile.
• He was also the bravest of men. One of his Companions recounts: When the fighting grew intense, we would seek shelter behind God’s Messenger.

Source: Summary of Mukhtasar Minhaj al-Qasideen by Imam Ibn Qudamah (pp. 157-158)

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Hon. Malcolm X: Oxford Union

I enjoy replaying this vintage gem every now and then  -- Malcolm X debating at Oxford University in 1964. In this classic video, you get a good feel for Malcolm X's presence and message, not to mention the social issues that were alive during the day. You'll hear X's trademark claim that liberty can be attained by "whatever means necessary," including force, if the government won't guarantee it, and that "intelligently directed extremism" will achieve liberty far more effectively than pacifist strategies. (He's clearly alluding to Martin Luther King.) You can listen to the speech in its entirety here (Real Audio), something that is well worth doing. But I'd also encourage you to watch the dramatic closing minutes and pay some attention to the nice rhetorical slide, where X takes lines from Shakespeare's Hamlet and uses them to justify his "by whatever means necessary" position. You'd probably never expect to see Hamlet getting invoked that way, let alone Malcolm X speaking at Oxford. A wonderful set of contrasts.

“I read once, passingly, about a man named Shakespeare. I only read about him passingly, but I remember one thing he wrote that kind of moved me. He put it in the mouth of Hamlet, I think, it was, who said, ‘To be or not to be.’ He was in doubt about something—whether it was nobler in the mind of man to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune—moderation—or to take up arms against a sea of troubles and by opposing end them. And I go for that. If you take up arms, you’ll end it, but if you sit around and wait for the one who’s in power to make up his mind that he should end it, you’ll be waiting a long time. And in my opinion, the young generation of whites, blacks, browns, whatever else there is, you’re living at a time of extremism, a time of revolution, a time when there’s got to be a change. People in power have misused it, and now there has to be a change and a better world has to be built, and the only way it’s going to be built—is with extreme methods. And I, for one, will join in with anyone—I don’t care what color you are—as long as you want to change this miserable condition that exists on this earth.”

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AKON REVEALS THAT HIS MUSLIM FAITH IS THE SECRET TO HIS SUCCESS

Akon is an unlikely superstar, according to Akon himself. He bets there's a good chance no other Billboard Hot 100 chart-topper has been a St. Louis-born Senegalese with a given name like Aliaune Damala Bouga Time Puru Nacka Lu Lu Lu Badara Akon Thiam.

The early years of his career were spent in semi-obscurity, writing and producing records for other rappers. But here we are in 2019, and Akon has become a household name. Even if you don’t regularly sing his nostalgic 00s bops into your hairbrush, chances are you’d still be familiar with his humanitarian missions in Africa.

Earlier this week, fans were let in on the secret to Akon’s success.

Ditching the dance floor, Akon took to the stage at the Sharjah Entrepreneurial Festival, tracing his journey from "car thief to pop star and entrepreneur" to the 2,000 people in attendance.

“Always perfect your craft," he explained. He added, however, that "sometimes things happen when you don’t want them to happen, and when God wants it to happen. And I think that’s a side that entrepreneurs dismiss – the spiritual side of your goal, or the spiritual side of your success.”

“It makes you ask the question: what is success? Is it fame or fortune? Does that measure what success means to you? Or is it faith?” he questioned. “For me, real success is faith. If God is not smiling upon me, I am not successful. I don’t care even if I have a billion dollars in the bank. And what good am I if have a billion dollars sitting in the bank in the first place?”

He credited his Muslim faith for allowing him to step back and reassess his career trajectory even when he was a rising star in the music industry, stating that it was his spiritual mindset that mapped out his plans for the future as a successful humanitarian entrepreneur.

Hinting that his motivations truly lie in reaching the hereafter, he revealed, “I don’t believe in having that much money sitting away without applying it to changing somebody’s life. Now I may not make a million dollars out of that transaction, but I may get a few good credits to go to paradise. I am cool with that.”

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Hajar: The legacy of our Black mother and one of Islam’s most important women

Hājar was a Black woman of Nubian descent who was formerly a slave. She is the wife of Ibrahīm (Abraham) and gave birth to Isma’il (Ishmael), peace be upon them both.

One of the most powerful narratives of her life is when Ibrahīm is commanded by God to leave her and Isma’il alone in the desert. It is important to note that Ibrahīm prayed to God for offspring for almost 86 years of his life. In being blessed with Isma’il through Hājar, he was not only grateful to God but also began envisioning his life as a father – someone who could watch his son grow and develop under his mentorship and love.

Through His Divine Wisdom, God the All-Mighty soon reminds Ibrahīm who the True Possessor of all Bounties is by directing him to leave both his child, who was only an infant at this time, and his wife in an uncultivated valley, far from any human support or natural sustenance.

Upon the three of them reaching this barren land, Ibrahīm turns around and begins to walk away. He is shedding tears, but is unable to turn back when his wife asks why he is leaving them. Some scholars believe that Ibrahīm knew that if he turned back to respond to Hājar, he would have seen her and his child’s state and would have lost all willpower to submit to God’s Decree. Internally, he knew God would look over his family, but the immediate reality likely had him convinced that Hājar and Isma’il, alone in this desert, may actually die.

When Hājar realizes Ibrahīm is acting on God’s Decree, the Decree of the Source of all Mercy, she says: “then God will not let us go.” She and Isma’il are left with nothing but a leather jug full of water and a bag of dates.

When the provisions run out and thirst begins to overtake her son, Hājar runs up to the top of a hill to look for some support. After seeing nothing in the distance, she runs back down into the valley and up to the top of another hill. She goes back and forth between the tops of these two hills seven times, desperately searching for any possible soul out there who may be able to help her family.

Hājar then hears something. She runs down into the valley and through a miracle by the Source of Miracles, she sees next to her son a sudden gush of water springing up from the ground. In some narrations, it was the Angel Gabriel (peace be upon him) who struck the ground with his heel, yielding this fountain.

This source of water (Zamzam), nothing less than a Bounty from God, begins flowing incessantly and as Hājar attempts to create a pool of mud to contain it, she becomes overwhelmed by the limitless quantity. Since that day, this water has continued to flow from the ground and is now the source that quenches the thirst of millions of pilgrims from across the world. This valley would soon be where the House of God (the Ka’bah) would be built by Ibrahīm and Isma’il.

Some could argue Hājar was a mad woman for running back and forth frantically. Others can say if she truly trusted God, she would have never been worried and remained in place.

I see a woman who relied upon The Creator and in her reliance upon Him, she fully exerted all of her God-given capabilities. She was aware her Lord fully knew her struggle, recognized her efforts, and would elevate her based on her willingness and ability to act, regardless of the outcome. On the Day of Resurrection, God promises to take into account all that was done for Him, right down to what is equal to the weight of a mustard seed [21:47]. Hājar submitted to God and His Decree and in doing so, acted with a sense of optimism, knowing her striving and toiling would be fully repaid either in this life or the next.

I share all this because this life continues to judge us by the tangible, numerical value we can add. If we cannot produce something that can be displayed under ‘work experience’ or ‘achievements’, we convince ourselves it’s not worth investing in. We rewire our efforts to focus on what we can prove to people of our self-worth.

My mother Hājar reminds me of the value of investing in my faith-based principles and putting forth an effort to improve my soul by actively and secretly fighting my internal demons and difficulties. These are the struggles the world will never know of, but I will continue to battle the diseases within my heart through reflection, prayer and action to gain proximity to my Creator because He is not concerned with what I ultimately become, but rather who I consistently strive to be.

God, in His Infinite Wisdom, has immortalized the story of my mother Hājar so much so that part of my obligation in performing the Hajj (pilgrimage) requires walking in her footsteps. Every Muslim is obligated to perform the sa’ee, the journey Hājar took betwen the two hills, so that we are not only reminded of what it means to rely upon God, but also of the embodiment of a person fully exerting everything God had given her because she knew her struggle to be the best she can be for herself, her family, and Her Creator would never be lost in vain.

I also share all this because I think about the millions of black people since the beginning of time and through events like the trans-Atlantic slave trade whose stories have been forgotten, erased and buried. I think about the impact colonialism has had in wiping clean entire peoples’ histories. I think about racial minorities, the refugees, the undocumented individuals, and others whose struggles in traveling to and existing in places like this country, whose journeys in overcoming difficulty in their homelands and whose greatest sacrifices will never be known.

I do believe The Creator preserved such a powerful narrative of a Black woman who possessed no status, fame or wealth to demonstrate to humanity the noble rank a truly righteous soul, one without any material markers, has in the eyes of The Divine. I believe this is also a lesson that in the same way God retells the story of a person whom this world would have otherwise overlooked or ignored, we too have to be vigilant in expanding our consciousness of the stories that continue to be erased, particularly of oppressed communities across this world.

I think about the nearly 700 undocumented workers, so many of them being parents taken away from their kids, who were mercilessly detained this past week in Mississippi as part of the largest ICE raid in U.S history. Their struggles will likely be forgotten.

I think about the millions of Kashmiris currently under military occupation by a government that seeks to advance its own interests at the expense of human lives. They have set up civilian barricades, arrested elected officials, and cut off an entire people’s ability to communicate with the outside world along with any possibility for an autonomous state. Their struggles will likely be forgotten.

I think about the struggles I still don’t know, now keeping our beloved Hājar particularly in my mind.

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A 1400 YEAR-OLD RELIGION AND ITS 21ST-CENTURY REPRESENTATIVE

Since moving to Ireland in late 2003, Dr Umar Al-Qadri has become a prominent figure in representing the Islamic voice in Ireland. Having received a traditional Islamic education in Pakistan, Al-Qadri went on to obtain a master’s degree in Islamic Sciences. Making frequent appearances in Irish publications like the Irish Times, he also lectures across the country in mosques, community centres and universities about Islam and the the challenges that Muslims face today.

For Al-Qadri, the integration of the Muslim community into wider Irish society is something of a priority. In Ireland, there are now an estimated 70,000 members of the Muslim community, and at home and abroad, Muslims are increasingly facing marginalisation, persecution and criticism. As the spotlight is placed on Muslims the world over, I sit down with Al-Qadri, the Head-Imam of Al-Mustafa Islamic Educational and Cultural Centre Ireland, in Trinity’s Science Gallery café to discuss our Muslim community here and the challenges they face.

Our Muslim community is not immune to the sensationalised and inaccurate representation the religion sometimes receives in the media across the world. Neither too do they avoid the fate of being too often rendered largely invisible within Irish society. Al-Qadri’s response to this is to stress the idea of people all living as one. He stands for equality and mutual respect between groups as something essential for modern nations, an ideology that informs many of his own actions.

Our interview begins with Al-Qadri tracing the origins of Ireland’s Islamic history to one man, Mir Aulad Ali Khan, one of Dublin’s first Muslims, as well as a scholar and professor of religious studies in Trinity in the 1860s. Al-Qadri describes him as very well integrated, and who at the same time maintained his own identity and wore his traditional Muslim clothing. It was only in the 1950s, however, that Muslim students began to come from South Africa to Ireland to study medicine. It was these students who formed the first Muslim community to establish themselves here. This tradition, continuing throughout the 1990s, allowed for a well-educated Muslim population to develop in Ireland. Since then, the numbers have grown from 33,000 in 2003 to upwards of 70,000 now, Al-Qadri tells me. The community has changed too. While it was previously based around the medical and scholarly professions, it now represents a diverse group of people from many walks of life, ranging from taxi drivers to IT professionals. Often, he adds, you cannot tell a Muslim apart from any other Irish person. They often do not have dark skin, while many choose not to wear traditional Muslim dress, he explains, gesturing down towards his sharply tailored suit. He humorously adds that perhaps only the beard would give it away.

Muslims, when they have friends that are consuming alcohol … they will interact together, but they won’t drink themselves and they will not treat the person that drinks alcohol differently. But they will treat someone who is gay differently, and that is something that is not understandable.

Al-Qadri’s early years were spent in the Netherlands, where the he remained until he’d completed secondary school. He highlights this time as a formative period in his own ideological development: “I wouldn’t be the same person I am if I didn’t grow up in the Netherlands … I think my ideas have been shaped by my experience growing up in the Netherlands as a second generation Muslim.” It was there he witnessed first-hand the challenges that many Muslims face across Europe. The years he spent here were during a period of Dutch history characterised by the dominance of right-wing conservatives, who were in finally in government after years of steadily increasing their vote in elections. The party, which he describes as “anti-Muslim and anti-Islam”, pushed Muslims to live in isolation and caused them to be segregated from the greater population. The reason that Al-Qadri believes that these problems arose is because the “Muslim communities that lived in the Netherlands somehow failed to reach out to the other and failed to integrate”. By this he means integration beyond purely language and dress, with the community perhaps not doing enough to counter those who sought to marginalise them.

Motivated by the desire to do something for his religion, Al-Qadri wanted to avoid making the same mistakes in the newly-diverse Ireland’s young Muslim community. In an earlier stage of development and with an educated and professional Muslim population, he perhaps thought he could help Irish Muslims and write a different narrative for the minority group. The way in which to achieve this, he believes, is by reaching out. This, after all, is the teaching of the Prophet Mohammed, he tells me, who “welcomed communities and opened the doors of the Mosque to others”. This is something that Al-Qadri firmly holds to be true.

He believes that Muslims often isolate themselves in an effort to protect their faith and identity, something that is, in fact, damaging for the community. “We are living in a society where people do accept and tolerate other views. We should reach out and not be afraid”, he urges his fellow Muslims. His recent invitation to members of the LGBT community to the mosque’s end of Ramadan meal in June reflected this sentiment of inclusion. “As Muslims we must reach out to others’’, he says, “we must not treat people differently because of their lifestyle or beliefs”. Although such an expression of kindness and support appears radical in relation to the more stereotypical image the religion being strongly doctrinal, Al-Qadri cites the teachings of Islam as the foundation for his argument, where you must treat people as human beings first – something which he says has been lost among many Muslims.

Nonetheless his actions were still somewhat radical, and he came under criticism from the group that he represents for reaching out in this way. Some felt that this gesture was akin to him condoning homosexuality, but in the face of the controversy, he stands by his actions. “Inviting them does not mean that we condone or that we agree with [homosexuality]”, he explains. “It means that despite our disagreement we can still share a meal together”. Although he does not condone the act, he believes that the LGBT community, like Muslims, share similarities. The two minority groups have both been marginalised and should join together against a common injustice. He gives a practical example to support his decision to invite LGBT members to the event, which he hopes that Muslims will be able to appreciate, drawing a comparison between the two Islamic sins of drinking alcohol and homosexuality: “Muslims, when they have friends that are consuming alcohol, they would be okay with it, they will sit down together, they will interact together, but they won’t drink themselves and they will not treat the person that drinks alcohol differently. But they will treat someone who is gay differently, and that is something that is not understandable”. Al-Qadri emphasises that the teachings of Islam are to treat people as humans first, and the success of the meal, which had over over 20 LGBT members alongside some Muslims all enjoying themselves together, stands as testament to that.

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