2011 Building Bridges Awards

The Islamic Speakers Bureau of Atlanta (ISB) is proud to announce the recipients of the 2011 ISB Awards.

The awards ceremony will take place during our upcoming 2011 Building Bridges Awards Dinner celebrating our 10th year anniversary on October 29, 2011 at 6:30 p.m.

For the past nine years, the ISB has honored individuals and organizations in the metro Atlanta area who have made significant contributions toward interfaith and multicultural understanding.

Recipients of the 2011 ISB Awards

Plemon T. El-Amin is the Imam Emeritus of the Atlanta Masjid of Al-Islam, one of the largest and most progressive Mosques in the U.S. With his leadership, the Atlanta Masjid has developed the Clara Mohammed Elementary School and W. Deen Mohammed School of Atlanta. He has traveled the nation and the world, representing concerns and interests of Muslim Americans in such places as Saudi Arabia, Syria, Jordan, Sudan, Palestine, Israel, Egypt, Morocco, Spain, Turkey, Rome, England, Denmark, Malaysia, Bangladesh, and South Africa.

US Attorney Sally Quillian Yates Sally Quillian Yates is the United States Attorney for the Northern District of Georgia. She was appointed by President Obama and confirmed by the Senate on March 10, 2010, as the first woman to serve as United States Attorney in that district. Prior to being appointed U.S. Attorney, she served as the First Assistant United States Attorney for approximately seven years. Ms. Yates has been with the United States Attorney's office since 1989 and has handled a wide variety of complex public corruption and fraud matters

Brian Knowlton has been the Washington-based correspondent and U.S. editor of the International Herald Tribune since 1995, covering foreign affairs, U.S. politics and other topics. He also works for The New York Times, which owns the Herald Tribune. Before that, he was the Herald Tribune's deputy editorial page editor for several years, based in France.

This year's recipients include U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Georgia the Honorable Sally Quillian Yates, and New York Times correspondent Brian Knowlton. ISB's Lifetime Achievement Award will be presented to Imam Plemon T. El-Amin.

The 2011 gala will feature a networking reception and a silent auction followed by a banquet, an awards ceremony, and a keynote address -- titled "Anti-Shari'ah Laws and Religious Freedom in America"-- from Dr. Azizah al-Hibri, Founder and Chair of KARAMAH: Muslim Women Lawyers for Human Rights who was recently appointed by President Barak Obama to the US Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF).

al-hibiri 2 Dr. Azizah al- Hibri is Founder and Chair of KARAMAH: Muslim Women Lawyers for Human Rights,

a professor at the T.C. Williams School of Law at the University of Richmond, and Founding Editor of Hypatia: a Journal of Feminist Philosophy.

In 1992, Dr. al-Hibri became the first Muslim woman law professor in the United States. Since then, she has written extensively on women's issues, democracy, and human rights from an Islamic perspective. On June 7, 2011, Dr. al-Hibri was appointed by President Barak Obama to the US Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF), an independent, bipartisan U.S. federal government commission dedicated to reviewing the facts and circumstances of violations of religious freedom internationally and to making policy recommendations to the President, the Secretary of State, and Congress.

To learn more about the ISB, please visit our website. For ticket information, please click here. For questions, please email dirisbatl@yahoo.com.

Sincerely,