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Britain's new preachers of hate
Islam Saturday January 13, 2007 Religion News Blog
In a dilapidated mosque, half a dozen awestruck young men listen to a preacher spell out his vision for Britain.
"King, Queen, House of Commons… if you accept it, you are a part of it," says Dr Ijaz Mian. "If you don't accept it, you have to dismantle it.
"So you being a Muslim, you have to fix a target. There will be no House of Commons. From that White House to this Black House, we know we have to dismantle it.
"Muslims must grow in strength… then take over."
A 10-month undercover investigation into home-grown extremism has revealed hard-line Islamic fundamentalism being preached in British mosques.
Unable to integrate
By its very nature, Islam makes it extremely difficult for Muslims to integrate. Islam means submission, and the Quran makes it clear that Muslims expect non-Muslims to submit to Islam. Western values are not compatible with Islam. As a result, many Muslims form ghettos and engage in other forms of non-integration. Hair-tricker sensitivities that have Muslim extremists respond to real or perceived insults with death threats, violent demonstrations, murder and terrorism, make it difficult or even impossible for non-Muslims to believe the claim that Islam is a 'religion of peace.' Therefore a high birthrate among Muslims, combined with high (legal and illegal) immigration figures, have Europeans and others worried about the Muslims in their midst.
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Some speakers call for girls to be hit if they don't wear Islamic dress and say that they can marry before puberty, others praise the Taliban.
Speaking at the Ahl-e-Hadith mosque, in Derby, Dr Mian tells his listeners: "You are in a situation in which you have to live like a state-within-a-state – until you take over.
"But until this happens, you have to preach, until you become such a force that the people just submit to you."
Dr Mian wants to see religious policemen roaming our streets, modelled on the feared Saudi Arabian force.
He says of their strict implementation of Sharia – or Islamic – law: "They send the police and they say: 'Well, if you don't come for prayer, we will arrest you. But if you still don't, then we have to bring the punishment on you – you will be killed and nobody will pray for you.'"
Dr Mian is just one of many UK preachers who've been taught the wahhabi branch of Islam in Saudi Arabia, then come back here to spread the word.
The radical ideology, which is bitterly opposed to multi-culturalism and integration, is spreading in Britain.
And it's coming from clerics in a country that the British government claims is its main Middle Eastern ally in the fight against terrorism.
At UKIM's Sparkbrook Islamic Centre, in Birmingham – which PM Tony Blair has lauded for its multi-cultural activities – a preacher praised the Taliban.
He gloated over the fate of British Muslim Jabron Hashmi, who joined the British Army and was killed by the Taliban in Afghanistan. "The hero of Islam is the one who separated his head from his shoulders," he says.
A spokesman for UKIM, which runs the mosque, said their mosque had been hired out to another group and the speaker had been talking at that event.
The spokesman added: "We are a nationwide organisation and hold different programmes in our mosques. Anyone can air their views.
"These are his own views, not those of UKIM. We're very concerned about this."
Islam / Islamism
Islamism is a totalitarian ideology adhered to by Muslim extremists (e.g. the Taliban, Wahhabis, Hamas and Osama bin Laden). It is considered to be a distortion of Islam. Many Islamists engage in terrorism in pursuit of their goals.
Adherents of Islam are called "Muslims." The term "Arab" describes an ethnic or cultural identity. Not all Arabs are Muslims, and not all Muslims are Arabs. The terms are not interchangeable.
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Read up on Islam
Read up on Islamism
Research resources on islam
Research resources on islamism
The probe uncovered British preachers being trained in Saudi Arabia and mosques taking money from rich sheikhs. DVDs and tapes of radical speakers, who are linked to Saudi, are available. They attack integration, multiculturalism and even other Muslims who don't follow their extreme brand of Islam. It's a theology which many moderates are deeply concerned about, as they see the traditional, more tolerant beliefs being eroded.
On one DVD, filmed in a mosque run by a national Islamic charity – which claims to be committed to moderation – a speaker said girls should be "forced" to wear the hijab and, shockingly, adds: "If she doesn't wear hijab, we hit her."
Undercover reporters spent four months filming at Green Lane mosque, in Birmingham, an enormous place which caters for thousands of worshippers.
One preacher there said that marrying your daughter off before she reaches puberty is permissible in Islam.
But the main preacher at Green Lane is Abu Usamah, an American convert who studied at Medinah University in Saudi Arabia.
He rails against non- Muslims, telling listeners not to believe in the arrests of alleged terrorists in Britain – as non- Muslims are liars.
Green Lane mosque says it is a centre for "interfaith communication and dialogue", welcoming people of all religions and cultures. But in front of a Muslim-only audience, Abu Usamah says that Jews and Christians were "enemies" to Muslims. He goes on to condemn the kuffaar – infidels or non-believers.
"No one loves the kuffaar, not a single person here loves the kuffaar," he rants. "We hate the kuffaar!"
Although he says he doesn't agree with Osama Bin Laden's violent actions, he says he prefers him to non-Muslims, because Bin Laden is a Muslim. "He's better than a million George Bushs, he's better than a thousand Tony Blairs.
"Allah has not given those people who are kuffaar a way over the believer. They shouldn't be in authority over us," he tells his listeners. "Muslims shouldn't be satisfied with living in anything other than a total Islamic state."
Undercover Mosque
He urges worshippers to discriminate against homosexuals but in a way that ensures they don't get caught. "If I were to call homosexuals perverted, dirty, filthy dogs who should be murdered, that's my freedom of speech, isn't it?" he says. "But they'll say no, I'm not tolerant."
Women, too, are inferior in Abu Usamah's eyes. He tells his audience: "Allah has created the woman – even if she gets a PhD – deficient. Her intellect is incomplete, deficient. She may be suffering from hormones that will make her emotional. It takes two witnesses of a woman to equal the one witness of the man."
Abu Usamah says that he condemns terrorism. But he predicts that an army of Muslims will soon arise to wage jihad – or war – against non-believers.
"They will fight in the cause of Allah. I encourage all of you to be from among them, to begin to cultivate ourselves for the time that is fast approaching – where the tables are going to turn and the Muslims are going to be in the position of being uppermost in strength.
"And when that happens, people won't get killed – unjustly," he threatens.
Green Lane mosque is the headquarters of the Markazi Jamiat Ahl-e-Hadith, a registered British charity which runs more than 40 mosques and branches in the UK.
It's an influential affiliate of the Muslim Council Of Britain, which has praised it as "a national body", "respected among British Muslims for its educational and outreach programmes".
It runs a part-time Islamic school for 200 local children and the mosque has been praised by Lord Nazir Ahmed, Labour's first Muslim peer.
He sat on a highprofile taskforce – set up after the 7/7 attacks – to combat extremism in mosques. He also headed a working group on extremism in mosques and imams.
In 2003, he said of Green Lane mosque: "This is the most amazing place. When I walk in, I feel I am entering the biggest palace on earth." Most of the speakers there have been trained in Saudi universities.
And to underline the point, throughout last year, live satellite links were set up to broadcast talks from the Grand Mufti of Saudi Arabia, the country's most senior Islamic cleric.
In the course of one live session, one worshipper asked the cleric, through a translator, if Muslims should establish good relations and forgiveness between religions.
The Grand Mufti slapped him down. "This is not true. Jews and Christians who do not follow the Prophet Mohammed are kuffaar. They will go to hell."
FOR his part, Abu Usamah later said: "Islam allows for any Muslim to peacefully co-exist here in the UK with non-Muslims, even though the UK is not an Islamic society."
He said he had made it clear that it is a religious duty of all Muslims to obey UK law and the carrying out of Islamic law could only be done in an actual Islamic state.
He added: "Homosexuality is an abomination against Allah and all mankind, and I will never condone it. Even though this is the case, I do not believe in disobeying the law when it comes to the way people deal with homosexuals."
Lord Ahmed told us that Green Lane mosque was one of many mosques he visited. "It would be ludicrous to suggest that by visiting an institution I become responsible for, or aware of, every word spoken at that establishment."
The Markazi Jamiat Ahl-e-Hadith told us that it was "committed to promoting inter-faith dialogue and political harmony in our society".
It said that scholars from many different backgrounds spoke at its mosque and that we had quoted many out of context.
It had not known what each speaker would say beforehand and did not necessarily agree with everything that may have been said.
It said the word kuffaar was a neutral term, and added: "We reject the assertion… that we are influenced by and teach an extreme version of Islam.
"We have no desire or intention to seize power or discriminate against others. We accept the rule of law and we treat our non-Muslim neighbours with respect."
Finally, Dr Mian said that he did not advocate that Islam would be forced upon anyone and said we had not quoted his many speeches condemning terrorism and the killing of innocent people.
Mirror.co.uk, UK
Bobby Pathak
www.mirror.co.uk
This post was last updated: Oct. 20, 2008
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