The use of the word 'Allah'

Look at this headline:

PM's Department to appeal on 'Allah' ruling

2nd January 2010 - Malaysiakini.com

The Prime Minister's Department, with the cooperation of the Home Ministry, will appeal the Kuala Lumpur High Court's decision in allowing the Catholic weekly magazine The Herald, to use the word 'Allah' in its publication.

Its minister, Major-General (Rtd) Jamil Khir Baharom, in advising Muslims and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) to be calm and respect the court's decision, said they should be patient and allow the matter to be resolved through the legal process.

"I'll meet the NGOs soon to hear their views and to discuss further the matter with them," he said in a statement today.

He was responding to the High Court decision on Thursday in allowing the Catholic weekly to use the word 'Allah'.

Judge Lau Bee Lian had ruled that usage of the word was constitutional as long as the periodical was confined to educate the followers of the Christian faith.

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Now, I personally feel that all these nonsense on who has the rights to use the word as bollocks. The PM Department and those narrow minded Malays think and believe that they own the word 'Allah' and usage as such should be uniquely reserved to the Muslims Malays.

Wikipedia defines the word 'Allah' as (link here) :

Allah (Arabic: الله‎, Allāh, Turkish: Allah, is the standard Arabic word for God. While the term is best known in the West for its use by Muslims as a reference to God, it is used by Arabic-speakers of all Abrahamic faiths, including Christians and Jews, in reference to "God". The term was also used by pagan Meccans as a reference to the creator-god, possibly the supreme deity in pre-Islamic Arabia.

The definition is that (according to Wiki) the word 'Allah' is the standard Arabic word for God. and used by Arabic-speakers of all Abrahamic faiths. Now,  for the uninformed, Abrahamic faiths generally refers to the 3 (three) religions namely Judaism, Christianity and Islam, all of which proclaims the prophet Abraham (Ibrahim) as the primary point where the religions evolves.

Now the argument put forth by the religious quarters here in Malaysia is that is 'might' mislead the public. Again, my take of this farcical piece of news is just an attempt of diversion of other more pertinent issues currently happening. Read the newspapers/new sources carefully and you may catch my drift.

Your views?