All my life I have been a nomad.

Islam is not a race...Islam is simply a set of beliefs, and it is not 'Islamophobic' to say Islam is incompatible with liberal democracy.

I am grateful to my father for sending me to school, and that we moved from Somalia to Kenya, where I learned English.

Women covering their heads is traditional, but now we're seeing more and more women covering themselves from head to toe. This is said to be for religious reasons but it's actually the conflation of religion and politics - every political movement has its slogans, flags and dress.

In a sense, my grandmother was living in the Iron Age. There was no system of writing among the nomads. Metal artifacts were rare and precious.... The first time she saw a white person my grandmother was in her thirties: she thought this person's skin had burned off.

I think of Canada, first and foremost, in terms of space. The amount of space available is breathtaking.

There is one Islam, unreformed, but three sets of Muslims. Medina, Mecca, and. Dissidents, reformers, whatever you want to call them. The first group are the extremists and fundamentalists, the second the great mass of Muslims who just want to live their lives in peace, and the third are reformers.