There is a Sufi trend, a madhabi Sufi trend, and I don't have any problem with this. What is not acceptable is that, first, some scholars are trying to show to the audience that they are open to other trends. However, when it comes to the retreat or the panels, they don't want to be with some of us because they are scared of being exposed.

The perception in the Arab world now is that we are having secularists against Islamists, and that's it. So the secularists are progressive; the Islamists are reactionary, conservative. This perception is wrong.

Anyone who tries to separate or divorce domestic politics from international politics does not get it, and that might be dangerous for the future of Western Muslims.

I opposed the Fatwa against Salman Rushdie. I read the book and took a critical distance. I did not think The Satanic Verses is a blasphemous book. I did not consider the book as being a great read, but as an intellectual I read, I assess, and I respond. I make a difference between true freedom of expression to which we owe a response and provocation, which we ignore.

Fasting is, first and foremost, an exercise for identifying and managing adversity in all its forms. With faith, in full conscience, fasting calls women and men to an extra degree of self-awareness.

My experience of living with people of diverse religions and cultures taught me that one will never be at peace with the other if one is at war with oneself.

Only in the crucible of self-mastery can freedom be smelted