Mohammed is recovering well.

This is the posting number 02 in the Gorilla’s Guides series of guides to Islam for westerners. It deals with Islam’s defining doctrine: Tawhid.

This is part 01 of a multi-part series providing a very basic introduction to Islam aimed at westerners.

Announcing a series of articles to be posted on The Seminal about Islam and Muslims. The articles are being written by Gorilla’s Guides team members.

Part of a photo essay of three photos showing a maker of Ouds in his workshop.

“Actually it’s a lot of fun to fight. You know it’s a hell of a hoot. It’s fun to shoot some people. I’ll be right up with you. I like brawling.”

When you count all the Christian families who have fled their homes in Mosul in the last few days and not just those who fled to Tal Keef as we have done and as Bishop Emil Shimoun Nona, Chaldean archbishop of Mosul, has done then the scale of the catastrophe engulfing Mosul’s Christians becomes clear.

The self-congratulatory reports in American and British media about how Irak is returning to “normality” ignore some rather uncomfortable facts. The first uncomfortable fact is that Iraki women are less safe now than at any other time during the war, the occupation, or the years before.

Some of the other uncomfortable facts are that a large proportion of Iraki women say that access to basic services such as clean water and basic medical care has become more difficult, and that moreover they have become more and more impoverished.

Did I remember to wish you Happy International Women’s Day?

No? Happy International Women’s Day.

The Gorilla’s Guides team are giving a souvenir of the day to anyone who wants it.