Wasla

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The waṣla (Arabic وَصْلَة‎ "an instance of connection") or hamzatu l-waṣli (هَمْزَةُ ٱلْوَصْلِ "hamza of connection") is a Arabic diacritic resembling part of the letter ṣād (ص) that is sometimes placed over the letter alif at the beginning of the word (ٱ). The alif with waṣla over it is called the alifu l-waṣli (اَلِفُ ٱلْوَصْلِ) "alif of connection". It indicates that the alif is not pronounced as a glottal stop (written with the letter or diacritic hamza ء), but that the word is connected to the previous word (like liaison in French). The waṣla is usually not written, though this incorrect.^[1][2]

Examples

1. وَٱسْمُ ٱبْنَتِهِ هِنْدُ (wa-smu bnati-hi hindu) — And his daughter's name is Hind.
2. يُرِيدُ أَنْ يُنْكِحَ اِحْدَى ٱبْنَتَيِهِ (yurīdu ʾan yunkiḥa iḥdā bnatayi-hi) — He wants to marry one of his daughters.
3. مَا ٱسْمُكَ (mā smu-ka) — What is your name?"

References

1. Alhonen, Miikka-Markus. "Proposal for encoding the combining diacritic arabic wasla" (PDF). unicode.org. Retrieved 25 March 2014.
2. Price, James M. "Helping Vowels and the Elidable Hamza". Arabic Language Lessons: All The Arabic You Never Learned The First Time Around. Retrieved 25 March 2014.