We are dedicated to spreading the true message of Islam — A message of peace, patience and tolerance.

Click here to WATCH LIVE

Speaker: Shahid Aziz
Topic: The Panama Papers
Venue: UK Mosque (Wembley)
Time: 1.00pm (BST)

Next Broadcast — Friday 15th April 2016

If you miss the live broadcast then you can always click on the link again at any time and re-watch the full broadcast.

Live Friday Prayers — 8th April 2016 was originally published in virtual mosque on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Click here to watch our LIVE BROADCAST

This is, as always, a gathering which is open to all people, Muslim or not, and is a chance for people to come along and join in with our efforts to portray the true meaning of Islam, or just to meet new and interesting people and have a free hot meal.

Venue: UK Mosque (Wembley)
Time: 15:00 (BST)

Live Broadcast: April 2016 Community Meeting was originally published in virtual mosque on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Picture Of The Day was originally published in virtual mosque on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

In the early hours of Sunday 27th March 2016 the clocks went forward an hour as the UK converted to ‘British Summer Time’. This means that the evening will have more daylight, and the mornings less.

This change is done in part due to a European directive that all European countries must implement a common ‘summer time’.

Why are you telling us

But why are we posting this information here on the Virtual Mosque blog? How does this affect us?

Well due to this change the Jum’ah (Friday) Prayers will start thirty minutes later at 1.00pm BST. Therefore our live broadcasts will start airing from around 12.55pm on Fridays instead of 12.25pm so please do make a note of the change otherwise you could end up missing some or all of the Khutba and Prayers.

Time shifts — The UK is on British Summer Time was originally published in virtual mosque on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Laurence Rossignol made the comments on Thursday in an interview with RMC radio and BFM TV, during which she slammed retailers who design products for Muslim women, such as hijabs, arguing that these companies are “promoting the confinement of women’s bodies.”

When the journalist pressed Rossignol, arguing that some women choose to wear such items, the minister retorted: “Of course there are women who choose it. There were American negroes who were in favor of slavery.”

Absolutely shocking comments from the French Minister for family, children and women’s rights. If French members of Parliament are openly making comments like this, then what chance is there of integration in society?

French Minister Trashes Muslim Women With Anti-Black Slur was originally published in virtual mosque on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

I cannot find any words for what happened in Lahore nor for the pain that will last forever for the families who lost their children, their mothers, their wives and their daughters.

Inna lillahi wa inna ilayhi raji’un
We surely belong to Allah and to Him we shall return

Killing a Child is Killing Humanity was originally published in virtual mosque on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

“We are often just reduced to four or five stereotypes,” said Dr. Romana Ramzan, a game design lecturer at Glasgow Caledonian University in the UK. “It’s usually summed up by the clothes we wear. So if you’re a woman, you wear a hijab […] If you’re a man, you have a beard or wear your national dress.” She added that Muslims are also often portrayed as aggressive and violent. “In games, we will be represented as the ‘other’ people who are the ones you have to kill. Usually it’s a slightly dark-skinned character shouting Allahu Akbar, carrying an AK-47. Or he has a camel or a goat.”

Movies and video games often take their inspiration from current culture and news and at this point in history Islam and Muslims are seen as an easily identifiable “bad guy”. The easiest way to represent this “bad guy” is to fall back on stereotypes so that little explanation is needed and the story can quickly move forward. It is a point which is causing some Muslims to demand that changes are made as it reinforces negative images of Muslims. I certainly see the point being made, as shows like Homeland, do reinforce the idea that Muslims are all terrorists, however this is nothing new. For years during and after the Cold War Russians were stereotyped as the typical villain in movies, even as recently as last year Hollywood blockbusters were depicting Russians as the typical “bad guy”. After the World War II the Germans and Japanese become the villains.

So is this a demonisation of “The Muslims” or is this just the lazy way that Hollywood and the media work?

Khan also singled out upcoming titles like The Sun Also Rises (about civilians caught in the Afghan war), Dujanah (the story of a girl living in a Muslim country) and Saudi Girls Revolution (where the main characters are female motorcycle heroes who drive across post-apocalyptic Saudi Arabia) that show a different side of the Muslim world. The last in particular is a game developed by a Saudi prince, which Ismail said could inspire change.

Rather than complaining some people are taking direct action and working on titles which depict Muslims in a different light far removed from the usual stereotypes. More work like this is needed but as the Russians have found out little will change the medias’ ability to fall back on sloppy, lazy stereotypes.

How video games perpetuate Muslim stereotypes was originally published in virtual mosque on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

It is a common belief that groups like ISIS are motivated by their radical theology, a twisted version of Islam and their aim is for this “islam” to be forced on to the Worlds population. Robert Pape, a scientist from the University of Chicago, however believes that this is far too a simplistic view. Having studied every suicide bombing since 1980 (around 4600 in all) he has the data to back up his claims.

What 95 percent of all suicide attacks have in common, since 1980, is not religion, but a specific strategic motivation to respond to a military intervention, often specifically a military occupation, of territory that the terrorists view as their homeland or prize greatly. From Lebanon and the West Bank in the 80s and 90s, to Iraq and Afghanistan, and up through the Paris suicide attacks we’ve just experienced in the last days, military intervention — and specifically when the military intervention is occupying territory — that’s what prompts suicide terrorism more than anything else.

This idea is backed up by multiple reports of captured ISIS fighters who when interviewed had little or no knowledge of Islam. Pape argues, in detail, that our basic misunderstanding of the motives and objectives of groups like ISIS is why to date we have failed to stop them.

You can listen to the complete interview with Robert Pape below;

What Are the Real Motives of Groups Like ISIS was originally published in virtual mosque on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

The Home Office minister for countering extremism attend a meeting this week to see what steps the Woking Borough Council has taken to counter extremism. Our President was invited to this meeting and in the video above we take a brief look at what happened.

Countering extremism was originally published in virtual mosque on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

In his interview with CNN Mr Trump tells the audience that ‘Islam hates them’. When asked is it the religion of Islam that teaches hatred, he did not answer.

So what is the truth? Does Islam hate America? Is Donald Trump right? Let us see what the Holy Quran has to say on the subject.

If you are not able to watch the video above due to bandwidth or restrictions etc then please enjoy the podcast of the speech below;

Does Islam Hate America? was originally published in virtual mosque on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.