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This letter
is only found at the end of words and
is called
#al#alifu lmaqSuwrah الألف المقصورة, "the abridgeable alif".
(I've heard some people call it #al#alifu lmaksuwrah الألف المكسورة too,
"the broken alif", but they weren't Arabs).
It is an alif,
and is pronounced
just like the final alif:
usually as a long vowel aa ا,
but as an ن if it stands for an
an ن suffix and
does not stand befor a pause.
Though this letter is an #alif ألف, it misleadingly looks like a ي. The only difference is that the alif lacks the two dots of the yaa# ياء. However, in practice, this doesn't help much, because many people forget to dot their final yaa# ياءs, so when you see a final dotless yaa' you can never be sure if it is true dotless yaa' or a true dotted yaa' missing the dots.
This letter is called in Arabic "abridgeable alif"
because it gets shorter
before a hamzatu lwaSl همزت لوصل 
,
while the final alif in, say,
#ajwaa# أجواء, doesn't get any shorter in the same situation
(instead, its final hamzah takes on a union vowel).
So fataa فتا "a boy" gets shortened
in fata lfawwaal فت لفوال "the bean-seller's boy",
but #ajwaa# أجواء "environments" doesn't get
shortened in #al#ajwaa#u lmaTariyyah ألأجواء لمطرية
"rainy environments".
Copyright (c) 2001-2009
Jordi Mas Trullenque.
email: jordimastrullenque at gmail dot com
http://purl.oclc.org/net/arabe/alifmaksuurah.en.html
Last revised: 2008-04-06
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writing_arabic -> alphabet -> the Broken #alif