Our Message of Condolences and Solidarity
to President George W. Bush
after the Barbarian Attack against
the Government and the People of the
United States of America

Text of the message that the Italian Muslim Association and the Cultural Institute of the Italian Islamic Community sent to the President of the United States of America after the criminal aggression of 23 Jumad at-Thani 1422 - September 11, 2001:

The Muslims of Italy ask for a joint international pursue of justice and for the punishment of the culprits. A declaration issued on 28 Jumad at-Thani 1422 - September 16, 2001

In the name of Allah, the Beneficent, the Merciful

May peace, Allah's mercy and His blessings be upon all of you.

September 11, 2001: Our sincerest prayers go out to all who have suffered, and those whose families or friends have suffered. We pray that Allah the Most High may grant patience to all who have lost friends and family in this tragedy. We pray that Allah Ta'ala may guide all of the Children of Adam during these difficult times. And, we pray that all communities in America and world citizens of all faiths find peace and healing from within themselves and their prayers.

Among the mix of emotions and questions, there is a sense of immense human tragedy. Thousands of innocent lives have perished in senseless violence, a sense of anger and frustration Condemning those barbarian criminal who carried out this violence is the easy part. Almost any rational human will consider this act reprehensible. But the bigger question still remains, why is all of this happening? Which demons in human form are benefiting from this carnage?

The word of Allah Ta'ala in the Glorious Qur'an is forcefully clear, and its meaning is:

"...Whosoever kills a human being other than in punishment for manslaughter or for causing corruption in the earth, it shall be as if he had killed all humanity, and whoso saved the life of a human being, it shall be as if he had saved the life of all humanity." (al-Ma'idah, 32)

The events in America on 11th September 2001 cause every thinking person to stop their daily lives and ponder deeply upon the larger questions of life. There are two possible responses to what has occurred. The first comes from reason, the second from fear. If we come from fear we may panic and do things - as individuals and as nations - that could only cause further damage. If we come from reason we will find refuge and strength, even as we provide it to others.

We may seek to pinpoint blame, or to pinpoint cause. Unless we take this time to earnestly reflect on this experience, it will be difficult to resolve the emotions within us. If we let ourselves be guided only by our legitimate emotions, we will miss the most basic human lessons and be blind to the most basic human truths. The message we hear from all sources of truth is clear: in front of this huge tragedy, concerned human being are all One; we are all One, must defend our lives, our honor and our freedom as One, and must punish the culprits as One.

The Prophet Muhammad, Allah's blessings and peace be upon him, said, "All human beings come from Adam, and Adam comes from dust". That is a message the human race has in some cases ignored. Forgetting this truth is the cause of hatred and war, and the way to remember this is simple: through compassion and joint work for the good and the progress of humanity. Cleaning humanity from the raving ideology which made this tragedy possible, punishing the material executors and their accomplishers in a duty according to the Law of Islam, and we sincerely hope will also be felt as a moral duty by the civil nations and by their leaders.

Allah Ta'ala says in the Qur'an what means,

"... If Allah had so willed, He would have made you a single community, but His plan is to test you in what He has given you. So strive as in a race for good deeds. The return of you all is to Allah; it is He that will show you the truth of the matters in which you dispute." (al-Ma'idah, 48)

The present situation offers all of us a precious occasion to strive for good deeds. What the innocent victims are asking from all of the concerned Children of Adam is to contribute, each of us in reason of his possibilities, to clean the contemporary world from the shame of suicide terrorism, to form a joint task force to support right and justice, in order to defeat those who plan the evil, instigate it, and prepare the ideological ground for its diffusion.


May peace, Allah's mercy and His blessings be upon all of you.



Board of Governors, Italian Muslim Association
Direction, Cultural Institute of the Italian Islamic Community
http://amislam.com  
mailto:islam.inst@flashnet.it

Here is the reply we received from the White House:

Thank you for emailing President Bush. Your ideas and comments are very important to him.

Unfortunately, because of the large volume of email received, the President cannot personally respond to each message. However, the White House staff considers and reports citizen ideas and concerns.

Again, thank you for your email. Your interest in the work of President Bush and his administration is appreciated.

Sincerely,

The White House Office of E-Correspondence
president@whitehouse.gov

A scholarly note note in the Weekly Standard (October 29, 2001)

The Weekly Standard,
October 29, 2001

STEPHEN SCHWARTZ gets it all right in "The Varieties of Muslim Experience" (Oct. 15). It is clear that the American public, the media and officialdom have a long way to go on the learning curve about Islam and the Muslim world. To help them along, I would add to the White House guest list Sheikh Prof. Abdul Hadi Palazzi, an Italian Muslim scholar who, like Sheikh Hisham Kabbani, has been fighting against Islamic fundamentalism and promoting interfaith dialogue. Sheikh Palazzi is secretary general of the Italian Muslim Association, director of the Cultural Institute of the Italian Islamic Community, and Muslim co-chairman of the Islam-Israel Fellowship of the Root and Branch Association. This outspoken imam maintains that the Koran supports the Jewish right to the land of Israel, as well as sovereignty over Jerusalem. Furthermore, he accuses pro-terror, anti-American Yasser Arafat and his Palestinian Authority of indoctrinating children to become suicide bombers. Pretty powerful stuff.

Sheikh Kabbani remarked that the extremists have succeeded in "hijacking the mike". It is time to end the free ride for these radical Islamists and their apologists who claim to be the legitimate voice of Islam. Courageous Muslim clerics like Palazzi and Kabbani should be given the podium whenever possible, to inform and to encourage moderate free-thinking Muslims to speak out against the fanatic Islamists of Osama bin Laden.

Ronni Gordon Stillman
Associate scholar, Middle East Forum
Philadelphia, PA

ORTHODOX ISLAMIC PERCEPTIONS OF JIHAD AND MARTYRDOM

Address by Shaykh Professor Abdul Hadi Palazzi at the “International Conference on Countering Suicide Terrorism”, The Institute for Counter-Terrorism, The Interdisciplinary Center, Herzliya, Israel (February 20-23, 2000).


I want to thank the International Policy Institute for Counter-Terrorism for the invitation to speak at this International Conference, in front of this distinguished and highly qualified public.

My main goal is making a distinction between the traditional Islamic concepts of "jihad" and martyrdom and the distortion of those concepts made by radical movements which promote terrorism and claim to do so "in the name of Islam".

This distinction is obviously a more general aspect of a basic dualism, and permits us to understand in details the differences between orthodox and traditional Islam on the one hand -- the religion that was revealed by the Prophet Muhammad and whose main sources are the Qur'an and the Prophetic tradition (Sunnah) -- and the contemporary ideology that is commonly referred to as "Islamic fundamentalism".

As a Muslim scholar, I must first of all remark that I cannot agree with this same definition, so common in the contemporary media. As a matter of fact, I personally never deal with "Islamic fundamentalism" or "Islamic radicalism", but rather with "pseudo-Islamic radicalism". This depends on the fact that "fundamentalism" is not a legitimate form of Islam, but an evident distortion of Islamic values, an attempt to change Islam from a religious tradition into a political, totalitarian ideology.

1) Islam and “Islamism”

Some Muslim scholars, such as my friend and colleague, Dr. Khalid Duran of Temple University of Philadelphia, mark the distinction between orthodox Islamic doctrine and its political counterfeit by calling the former "Islam", and the latter "Islamism".

Dr. Duran writes:

"Whether Islamists like the term fundamentalist or not, their understanding of religion resembles that of fundamentalists in other religions. This is not to say that Islamists are more religious or more genuinely Islamic than other Muslims. A common misunderstanding in the West has it that Islamists are the one hundred percenters among Muslims, and that they are the people of tradition. This is not at all the case. Islamists have a problem with the people of tradition, especially the Sufis (mystics). Islamism is a late 20th century totalitarianism. It follows in the wake of Fascism and Communism, picking up from those and seeking to refine their methods of domination. Islamists mold tradition so as to serve their political ends. This causes them to clash with traditionalist Muslims who resist this manipulation of religion for power politics. Islamism is not a reaction of people feeling a loss of religious meaning, but a reaction to a sense of loss in the political sphere; it is a quest for power, an attempt to conquer the state, not to regain independence for religion, least of all individual faith".

"Like most totalitarian ideologies, Islamism is a utopianism. Islamists seek to dominate by the most advanced technologies; in that sense they are modernists. But their model for an ideal society takes inspiration from an idealized seventh century Arabia and an a-historical view of religion and human development in general. It is an anachronistic mode of thinking in conflict with modern concepts of democracy, pluralism and human rights".

A relevant difference between traditional (or orthodox) Islam and Islamism is in the way of understanding the link between religion and politics.

"Few Muslims would deny that political commitment is part of Islamic ethics, but most disagree with the Islamist insistence that there exists a clearly defined 'Islamic system', different from all other political systems. Islamists refuse to accept a secular state that puts a member of a non-Muslim minority at par with a member of the Muslim majority, and a woman at par with man".
 

2) Prophets and political leadership

According to traditional Islamic theology, prophets are sent among human beings to teach them some necessary truths about the nature of God, about ethics, about those actions and those omissions which cause prosperity in this world and beatitude in the hereafter. It can sometimes happen that those Prophets are called to preach in a milieu where a state and a complex social organization does not exist at all, and this causes them to assume a role of political leadership.

This was, for instance, the role of Moses as a leader of the Children of Israel in the exodus from Egypt, or the position of Muhammad as a governor of the state centered in Medina. Even so, Islamic orthodoxy teaches that this happens per accident, and political leadership is not among the necessary elements of the prophetic mastership. As a matter of fact, the Qur'an uses different titles to describe the Prophet Muhammad, but none of these titles refers to a political function.

The Qur'an says that Muhammad has been sent as an "Admonisher", as a "Warner", as "someone who calls to God", as "a shining light", but it never says that he was sent as a political leader or as a head of State.

Islamists, on the contrary, have a completely opposite attitude. According to their point of view, the diffusion of Islam cannot be separated from the creation of a claimed "Islamic State". The role of Muslim scholars is immediately confused with the role of leaders of a political movement or party.

Islamists continuously repeat that "Islam is both religion and government". This is the basic description of their creed. What they forget to underline is that those words "Islam is both religion and government" ("al-Islam din wa dawlah") are neither found in the Holy Qur'an, Hadith (the sayings of the Prophet Muhammad) or in ancient, authoritative Islamic sources.

As a matter of fact, this slogan ("al-Islam din wa dawlah") was coined by Taqiyyu-d-Din Ibn Taymiyyah, a scholar who lived during the thirteen and fourteenth centuries C.E. and who was condemned to life imprisonment for his numerous heresies.

Those who repeat Ibn Taymiyyah's slogan "Islam is religion and government" are the same ones who, for instance deal with "liberation of Jerusalem from the hands of the Jews". Unfortunately for them, the heretic Ibn Taymiyyah, from whom they take their slogan, is the same one who strongly denies any special role of Jerusalem in Islam.

Ibn Taymiyyah openly writes "there is no Muslim holy place in Jerusalem" but his followers claim to fight for the "liberation of Jerusalem" in the name of Ibn Taymiyyah. This is a clear example of how Islamism is a confused ideology, wherein contradictions are dealt with by silence.
 

3) “Islamism” as a symptom of Western-style secularization

While many Western researchers are inclined to describe Islamism as a form of "resurgence of Islam", Muslim traditional scholars see its appearance as a symptom of secularization, as a reshaping of our religion as a modern, ideological totalitarianism. This is especially evident in the Islamist deformation of the role of "jihad". In the original meaning, "jihad" is not limited to the military field, but generally means "striving hard toward a goal".
 

4) Traditional jihad and its “Islamist” deformation

According to some sayings of the Prophet Muhammad that are contained in the compilation called Sahih al-Bukhari, "The hardship of the pilgrimage is the 'jihad' of a woman", while "The 'jihad' of someone who has old parents is taking care of them". The military 'jihad' was not a form of "expansion of the religion by means of the sword", but a form of defense against religious persecution.

The Qur'anic verses giving permission for military jihad say:

"To those against whom war is made, permission is given [to defend themselves], because they are wronged. And verily God is Most powerful for their aid. [They are] those who have been expelled from their homes in defiance of right [for no cause] except that they say, 'Our Lord is God'. Had not God checked one people by means of another, there would surely have been pulled down monasteries, churches, synagogues and mosques, in which the name of God is commemorated in abundant measure. God will certainly help those who help His cause, for verily God is Full of strength, exalted in Might". [Qur'an, "The Pilgrimage", Sura 22:39-40]

As one can see, military "jihad" is not conceived to expand a certain faith, but to defend the rights of those who are persecuted because of their religion. The verses which describe violation of religious freedom as a justification for self-defense are clear in including not only mosques, but also monasteries, churches and synagogues, among the places where God's name is frequently mentioned, and among the places that are necessary to protect, even by recourse to war.

Apart from this, the legitimate form of military "jihad" is regulated by very strict rules:
 

5) Rules concerning military jihad

1. It must be waged by a regular army which wages war against another army. Terrorist acts against civilian populations are not included in the definition of "jihad". The collection of Prophetic sayings that we have already mentioned, Sahih al-Bukhari, narrates that when the Prophet Muhammad was informed that a certain group of fighters of "jihad" had killed some women, he raised his hands and prayed by saying, "O God, be my witness that my hands are innocent of this crime".

2. The reaction in self-defense must not be exaggerated. The typical example of this is the story of Moses and the Egyptian, as narrated in the Qur'an. To defend an Israelite who was being beaten by an Egyptian, Moses killed an Egyptian. No doubt, the Israelite was a member of the oppressed people, one of those who were persecuted because of their religion and enslaved, while the Egyptian was one of the oppressors. The event could even been described as a legitimate form of "jihad", but the Qur'an does not support this opinion, and condemns Moses' reaction as exaggerated. Moses himself asks forgiveness for his excess.

The Qur'an says: "And he [Moses] entered the city at a time when its inhabitants were in a state of heedlessness; and he found therein two men fighting one of his own religion and the other of his enemies. And he who was of his party sought his help against him who was of his enemies. So Moses struck the latter with his fist, and thereby caused his death. Then Moses said, 'This is Satan's doing, he is indeed an enemy, a manifest misleader'. He said, 'My Lord, I have wronged my soul, so do Thou forgive me'. So He forgave him; for He is Most Forgiving, ever Merciful". [Qur'an, "The Story", Sura 28:15-16]

The Qur'an also says: "And fight in the way of God against those who fight against you, but do not exaggerate. Verily, God does not love those who exaggerate". [Qur'an, "The Cow", Sura 2:190]

3. When the former enemy is ready to stop hostilities and is looking for an opportunity for peace, Muslims must stop fighting and accept to look for a peaceful solution.

The Qur'an says: "And make ready for those who fight you whatever you can of armed force and of mounted pickets at the frontier, whereby you may frighten the enemy of God and your enemy and others besides them whom you know not, but God knows them. And whatever you spend in the way of God, it shall be paid back to you in full, and you shall not be wronged. But if they incline towards peace, incline thou also towards it, and put thy trust in God. Surely, it is He Who is All-Hearing, All-Knowing". [Qur'an, "The Spoils", Sura 8:60-61]

6) Martyrdom

Martyrdom in Islam is the praiseworthy condition of the one who offers his life as a witness for the Truth. "Shahid", the word that we translate in English as "martyr", etymologically means "witness", someone whose existence is a living witnessing, even after his death.

About martyrs, the Qur'an says: "Think not of those who have been slain in the cause of God, as dead. Nay, they are alive in the presence of their Lord, and are granted gifts from Him; jubilant because of that which God has given them of His bounty; and rejoicing for the sake of those who have not yet joined them from behind them, because on them shall come no fear nor shall they grieve. They rejoice at the favour of God and His bounty, and at the fact that God suffers not the reward of the believers to be lost". [Qur'an, "The Imrans", Sura 3:169-170]
 

7) Suicide

As about suicide, it is clearly forbidden by Islamic law, even in the case when someone is committing it for a supposed good cause.

The Qur'an says: "And do not kill yourselves, for God is indeed merciful to you" [Qur'an, "Women", Sura 4:29].

The verse underlines how committing suicide is a direct negation of Divine mercy.

In another verse the Qur'an says: "...And do not throw yourselves into destruction with your own hands". [Qur'an, "The Cow", Sura 2:195]

The evil status in the hereafter of those who commit suicide is described in a saying of the Prophet Muhammad that is contained in Sahih Muslim, another authoritative compilation.

It says: "Whoever kills himself with a knife will be in hell forever stabbing himself in the stomach. Whoever drinks poison and kills himself will drink it eternally in the Hell fire. And whoever kills himself by falling off a mountain will forever fall in the fire of Hell".

In the face of all these evident proofs, one is spontaneously led to ask himself a question: how it is possible for some groups which claim to be "Islamic" and to "represent Islam" to advocate both terrorism against civil populations and suicide terrorism?

8) Wahhabis

This is just one of the fruits of a heretical tendency, based on the deformation and the falsification of many basic elements of Islamic belief. Although those extreme consequences are recent enough, their point of departure must be identified with the beginnings of the Wahhabi heretical movement. Understanding the nature and theoretical apparatus of Wahhabism is essential to the comprehension of the contemporary Islamist radicalism, and also to the conception of possible countermeasures.

In traditional Islam it is clear that military "jihad" and all other forms of material "jihad" only constitute the external aspect of "jihad". The inner dimension of "jihad" is the struggle that every Muslim undertakes to purify his soul from mundane desires, defects and egotism. According to a well-known tradition, after coming back from a military expedition, the Prophet Muhammad said, "We have returned from the lesser 'jihad' to the greater 'jihad'" ["Raja'na min jihad al-asghar ila jihad al-akbar"].

The Prophet Muhammad, God’s blessings and peace be upon him, was asked, "O Messenger of God, what is the greater 'jihad'?" He answered, "It is the 'jihad' against one's soul".

This narration has always been quoted by Sunni scholars when explaining the inner dimension of jihad. Sufis especially have quoted this as an antidote against a limited, physical understanding of the nature of "jihad".

Wahhabis, on the contrary, completely reject this tradition, in the same way that they deny any deeper understanding of the Islamic doctrine. The recently disappeared leader of the Wahhabi sect, Nasir ad-Din al-Albani, recurred to all possible captious arguments to prove that the tradition we cited above is not authentic, and that the "greater jihad" simply does not exist.

On the contrary, we think that meditating on this tradition can contribute very much to understanding the present situation of those who confuse "jihad" with terrorism. Crimes against civil populations can by no means be a legitimate form of "jihad" for the simple reason that they are caused by hate, the most irrational of human passions. Since fighting those anti-human passions is in itself the greater "jihad", refuting those who abuse Islam to legitimate terrorism is also a very important form of the real "jihad".

9) The primitive, violent and anti-intellectual tendencies of Wahhabism

Regarding the origin on the Wahhabi movement, we must remember that the beginning of the eighteenth century of the common era witnessed the emergence of a movement in the Arabian Peninsula that would shatter the spiritual equilibrium of the Islamic world and lead to an explosion of primitive, violent and anti-intellectual tendencies.

The rallying cry of "returning to origins" was the primal scream of a primitivism that destroyed the life giving variety of Islamic religious culture. Multiplicity of opinion was replaced with a monolithic and simple-minded dogmatism.

Eighteenth century Arabia was among the most desolate areas of the Ottoman Empire. Arabia's only claim to fame was the fact that its territory included the two Holy Cities of Mecca and Medina. Ottoman Sultans were satisfied with nominal sovereignty over this region. Power was effectively in the hand of local emirs and tribal chieftains whose loyalty toward the Sultan was dependent on cash payoffs such as exemption from taxation and a share in government revenues.

The City of Mecca was an autonomous district under the authority of the Sharif, the oldest representative of the Hashemite family. As a descendant of the Prophet Muhammad, the Sharif of Mecca was among the first to pledge allegiance when a new Sultan was elected. The Sharif's support was regarded as one of the most important forms of legitimacy for the Ottoman government.

The man who broke the chain of the pluralistic transmission of Islamic teachings was Muhammad Ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab, a descendent of the Banu Tamim tribe, who was born in the Uyaynah village (Najd) in 1699 C.E. Wahhab's father was a learned Hanbali scholar who and sent his son to study Qur'anic exegesis, jurisprudence and mysticism in Mecca, Medina, Baghdad, Basrah and Damascus, as well as in Iran and India.

Ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab's attitude from the beginning was very polemical, and he took active part in scholarly debates. At the age of thirty-two, Ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab returned to Najd and started working as a teacher for Bedouins. He demonstrated proficiency in academic debates and independence in judgment.

Ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab did not follow the principles of any one of the four Sunni schools of Islamic jurisprudence. Rather, he liked to reach his own conclusions and was ready to criticize sages regarded by all Muslim scholars as authoritative.

Ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab became convinced that Islamic society was degenerate and in need of reform. In his opinion, the traditional veneration of Muslim saints was idol-worship. Those involved in it were apostates from Islam. In his analysis of alleged "deviations" and "corruptions" he became more and more extremist. He was finally excommunicated by his former teachers and even by scholars from his own family.

10) Ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab and Ibn Sa'ud

In 1730 C.E. Ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab met Muhammad Ibn Sa'ud, chief thug of a gang of roving raiders whose "profession" was robbing pilgrims and travelers in the desert of Najd. As most Bedouins living in Dar'iyyah were completely illiterate, Ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab had no difficulty in convincing them of his ideas.

Ibn Sa'ud and Ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab made a deal whereby Ibn Sa'ud was proclaimed political leader (emir) and Wahhabr was proclaimed eligious authority (sheikh). The "Sheikh" declared that he was ready to issue a religious decree ("fatwa") whereby non-Wahhabi Muslims were branded "apostates" and "idol-worshippers".

This arrangement gave Ibn Sa'ud the cloak of religious legitimacy he needed to respectably persecute innocent people. His gang was no longer a mob of traveling thugs and his victims were no longer innocent people. Ibn Sa'ud's storm troopers were now "fighters for jihad", authorized to murder "unbelievers", plunder their property and rape their women.

For the first time in the history, "jihad" was proclaimed against Muslims, and even against the Ottoman State, whose Sultan was considered the heir of the prophet Muhammad and the highest Islamic authority. This obviously opened the way for many other cases in which the concept of "jihad" was deformed.

Ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab also ordained missionaries ("wakil") and sent them to preach his heresy in Mecca. However, scholars living in the Holy City already understood how dangerous his doctrine was. Sayyid Ahmad Zayni Dahlan was at that time Chief Mufti of Mecca. He wrote in his book "Al-Futuhat al-Islamiyyah":

"To deceive scholars in Mecca and Medina, those people sent emissaries to Mecca and Medina, but these missionaries were not able to answer questions asked by Sunni scholars. It became evident that they were ignorant heretics. Muftis of the four schools wrote a 'fatwa' that declared them renegades, and this document was distributed throughout the entire Arabian Peninsula. The emir of Mecca, Sharif Mas'ud ibn Sa'id, ordered the Wahhabis imprisoned. Some Wahhabis fled to Dar'iyyah and informed their leader of what was happening".

Another scholar of that period, Muhammad Ibn Sulayman Effendi wrote:

"O Muhammad Ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab, do not slander Muslims! I admonish you for God's sake! Does anyone of them say that there is a Creator besides God? If you have anything to argue against Muslims, please, show them authoritative proofs. It is more correct to call you, a single person, an unbeliever, than to call millions of Muslims unbelievers. God says, 'If anyone contends with the Messenger after guidance has been plainly conveyed to him, and follows a path other than the one followed by Believers, we shall leave him in the path he has chosen, and land him in Hell, quite an evil refuge!' [Qur'an, "Women", Sura 4:114]. This verse points to the results of departing from Ahl as-Sunnah wa al-Jama'ah".


11) Ottoman Sultan orders Egyptian government to crush Wahhabis

When the order from the emir of Mecca reached the Sultan in Istanbul, he ordered Muhammad 'Ali Pashah, governor of Egypt, to move to Najd and to stop the Wahhabi sedition.

Among the Sunni scholars who refuted Wahhabism we can also mention Sayyid Dawud Ibn Sulayman, Mawlana Khalid al-Baghdadi, Sun'Allah al-Halabi al-Makki al-Hanafi, Muhammad Ma'sum as-Sarhindi and Muhammad Ibn Sulayman al-Madani ash-Shafi'i.

ash-Shafi was the Shafi'i Mufti of Medina, who was asked to write a "fatwa" against Muhammad Ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab. This "fatwa" is quoted in the book "Ashadd al-Jihad" (The Stronger Jihad) and declares:

"This man is leading the ignoramuses of the present age to a heretical path. He is trying to extinguish God's light, but God will not permit His light to be extinguished, in spite of the opposition of polytheists, and will illuminate every place with the light of Ahl as-Sunnah".

Although thousands of Muslims were murdered by Wahhabis, the scholars of Ahl as-Sunnah continued to refute Wahhabism in their books. An example is what the Mufti of Mecca, Ahmad Zayni ad-Dahlan al-Makki ash-Shafi'i wrote in a work entitled "Fitnah al-Wahhabiyyah" (The Wahhabi Sedition) stating:

"In 1802 C.E. they [the Wahhabis] marched with large armies to the area of at-Tayf. In Dhu al-Qa'dah of the same year, they laid siege to the area occupied by Muslims, defeated them, and murdered all the people, including men, women, and children. They also looted the Muslims' belongings and possessions. Only a few people escaped their barbarism".

"They even stole gifts from the Noble Grave of the Prophet, took all that was there, and engaged in similar acts of profanation".

"In 1786 C.E. they laid siege to Mecca the Blessed and then surrounded it from all directions to tighten their siege. They blocked the routes to the City and prevented supplies from reaching there. This caused great hardship to the people of Mecca. Food became very expensive and then unavailable. The people resorted to eating dogs".

These events which we have briefly described disfigured the face of the Islamic world. Mecca and Medina, the two Sanctuaries from which Islam spread to the rest of the world, were no longer centers for the transmission of the Sunni heritage of Islamic teachings. They became places where certain aspects of worship according the four schools of Islamic jurisprudence were suppressed and replaced by a primitive and literalist cult that was propagated through violence and coercion.

But the drama did not stop there. Like all other forms of totalitarian ideology, Wahhabism is expansionist by its own nature, and its goal was firstly to take possession of the whole Islamic world, and then to expand its influence beyond those limits.
 

12) Saudi-controlled Mecca becomes international center for a worldwide Wahhabi network

The establishment of a world center for Wahhabi propaganda (the so-called World Islamic League) in Mecca was the final result of a plan whose goal was to replace orthodox Islam with a puritanical so-called "Salafi school". Dogmatic uniformity began to suffocate the humane and enlightened Islamic tradition. The distortion of notions like "jihad" and martyrdom had a central role in the expansionist Wahhabi ideology.

From the second half of the nineteenth century C.E. and onward, Salafis (as Wahhabis define themselves) targeted as their main opponents to be silenced the University of al-Azhar al-Sharif in Egypt and other traditional centers of Sunni teachings. Sunnis have always been alert to sectarian trends in theological interpretation.

13) "Muslim" Brotherhood

The main instrument for the "Wahhabisation" of Arab society was an organization called Ikhwan al-Muslimun (the "Muslim" Brotherhood). The Brotherhood's founder was Hasan al-Bannah, an elementary school teacher from Ismailiyyah who became one of the leaders of pro-British Masonry (United Lodge of England, Mother of the World) in Egypt.

From a religious point of view, al-Bannah was a "reformer" (but not so advanced in his knowledge of Islamic tradition). From a political point of view, he was radically anti-Ottoman. By creating his own sect, al-Bannah's goal was to develop a new ruling class whose ideology would be a form of "modernized" and "westernized" Islam. Obviously, as was the Wahhabi way, he used to describe the fight of his followers against their Sunni Muslim opponents as "jihad".

Since then, leadership within the movement is hereditary. Only members of certain families can hope to get important positions. After World War II, Nasser attempted to outlaw the sect, but this drove the "Muslim" Brotherhood underground.

The Syrian dictator Assad bombed Hama, a Syrian city that was a center of the Brotherhood. Members of the Brotherhood became more secretive than ever. They learned to deny any connection to the organization, and even refuse to acknowledge that the Brotherhood exists at all.

From this point of view, there are similarities between internal Wahhabi power struggles and those of organized crime. Wahhabi leaders are extremely arrogant in imposing their will on legitimate Muslim organizations and communities.

In most cases, so called militant "Islamic fundamentalists" (Wahhabis) are from a religious point of view lay persons with little background in Islamic studies. They are appointed as "imams" of important mosques, especially in democratic countries where there is no "Ministry of Religious Affairs" to check their orientation and where imams having a regular permission to teach ("ijazah shar'i") are the exception.

In most Western countries, members of the Wahhabi sect immigrated as university students and began to set up legal front organizations in different sectors of society.

14) Hamas and the Brotherhood

The Palestinian Hamas is one of the important Ikhwan (Wahhabi "Muslim" Brotherhood) controlled organizations in the Middle East. Hamas leaders are not among the original families of founders. On a worldwide level the Ikhwan (Wahhabi "Muslim" Brotherhood) leadership is as before in the hands of Syrian and Egyptian elements.

For a radical militant who is poor, ignorant and fanatic, his life dream is to throw stones, commit acts of terrorism or murder himself and many innocent people as a suicide bomber.

For a militant with a bit more brains, his life dream is to travel abroad as a student and became a full time professional agitator and propagandist. He will spent his life visiting mosques in the United States, England, France, Germany, Italy, etc., and speak (and it is nothing more than talk) about "jihad for Palestine", "fighting against the Zionist enemy" and other such slogans.

In so doing, the brainier radical will receive a generous, regular salary and money to finance his activities. He will probably also learn how to collect donations, not only from major donors but also from local followers.

Their doctrine is that "people doing social work can keep the money they collect". They start collecting money for poor children in Palestine, for refugees in Kosovo, for Bosnia, and after a week their leaders have new luxury items, which obviously are not declared as a private property.

15) "Islamic Relief " and "Human Appeal International"

The Egyptian branch controls a charitable institution called "Islamic Relief". The Palestinian branch is supported by the United Arab Emirates through Human Appeal International.

Ikhwani (Wahhabi "Muslim" Brotherhood) beliefs were theologically refuted by Sunni scholars of the Ottoman period. After World War II, King Faysal of Saudi Arabia was in need of allies against secular Nasserianism. The Egyptian leader of the Brotherhood, Sayyed Qutb, therefore received unexpected financial support from Faysal for their worldwide activities.

From then on, the vast majority of Ikhwans adopted Wahhabi doctrines. Only an insignificant minority of them are Sunni. Qutb's heir is today Yusuf al-Qaradawi, an Egyptian professor who controls the Ministry of Religious Affairs in Qatar.

The fundraising game exploits conflicts between the Egyptian, Syrian and Palestinian branches of the Brotherhood. As soon as, for example, Saudi Arabia starts increasing its support for one branch, Kuwait and the Emirates finance their internal opponents. Real local leaders never have official positions inside the dependent organizations. Their legal representatives are usually employed as figureheads only.

16) Council for American-Islamic Relations (CAIR)

The Council for American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) is a "Muslim" Brotherhood front organization. It works in the United States as a lobby against radio, television and print media journalists who dare to produce anything about Islam that is at variance with their fundamentalist agenda. CAIR opposes diversity in Islam: they are aggressive and closed minded. Notwithstanding CAIR's evident connection to Hamas, they are regarded by U.S. administrations as legitimate representatives of the Muslim American Community.


17) American Muslim Council (AMC)

Another branch of the "Muslim" Brotherhood, the American Muslim Council (A.M.C.), has a monopoly for the appointment and training of Muslim chaplains in the U.S. Army. While non-fundamentalist Islamic organizations are more or less ignored by the U.S. administration, Muslim American soldiers receive "spiritual assistance" from fundamentalist chaplains.

These are only some of the consequences of the influence of Saudi-American relations.

18) Unheeded Warning from Hisham Kabbani

The leader of the Nazimi-Kabbani organization, the American-Lebanese Hisham Kabbani, recently declared in an open forum with the U.S. State Department:

"We would like to advise our Government, our congressmen, that there is something big going on and people do not understand it. You have many mosques around the United States. It's not an organized government policy to supervise mosques as it is in Muslim countries".

"In Muslim countries, you cannot open a mosque by yourself. That's why you see that in Muslim countries you cannot find extremist ideology. As soon as you find extremist ideology, they kick the extremists out and bring in the traditional Islamic scholars".

"So the most dangerous things are going on in these mosques that have self-appointed leaders throughout the United States. The extremist ideology makes them very active. It was by election that these leaders took over the mosques".

"We can say that they took over eighty percent of the mosques in the United States. There are more than 3,000 mosques in the United States. This means that the ideology of extremism has been spread to eighty percent of the Muslim population, mostly the youth and the new generation".

Kabbani is trying to show Westerners the reality behind the deceptive facade. That over eighty percent of all mosques in the democratic countries are controlled by extremists is a matter of fact, not only in North America, but in most of Western Europe as well.

Local Ikhwani organizations are linked through a single secret world body. Membership in the secret world body requires an oath of strict secrecy.

Therefore, until recently it was impossible to find anything in writing about the organization's international structure or even its existence.

Since 1928 and throughout seventy years of Ikhwani activity, not a single piece of paper was ever signed or published in the name of "The Muslim Brotherhood". Since March 13, 1998, the Californian branch has its own web site explaining the nature of the sect as follows:

"Al-Ikhwan has branches in over 70 countries all over the world. The movement is flexible enough to allow working under the 'Ikhwan' name, under other names, or working according to every country's circumstances".

"However, all Ikhwan groups, in all countries are characterized by the following with respect to their method:

"Political Activism: By putting political programs for 'Islamisizing' government in different countries (after realistic studies), and establishing these programs through the convenient ways which do not conflict with Islam".

"Stressing Physical Health: By forming sports clubs and committing members to regular exercises..."

"Establishing a Sound Economic Infrastructure: By supporting and/or sponsoring any Islamic project and facing its "fiqh" problems. By the way, the only accepted source of money to the Ikhwan is its members' own money".

In the contemporary world, opening a web site and calling its index the "home page of..." is one of the most evident forms of giving publicity to a certain activity. Even so, the tradition of secrecy and the tendency to deny being a member is so deeply rooted that the Home Page of the "Muslim" Brotherhood ends with the following:

"Important Disclaimer: The maintainer of this page is not a member of the Al-Ikhwan party and does not approve or agree with everything they say. This page is for the soul purpose of answering the questions you always had and never knew who to ask. This page has no political purpose of any kind and no connection whatsoever to any organization or institution".

19) "Union of Islamic Communities and Organizations in Italy" (UCOII) and "Union of Muslim Students in Italy (USMI)

In Italy, my country, there are two Ikhwan-controlled organizations: the "Union of Islamic Communities and Organizations in Italy" (UCOII) and the Union of Muslim Students in Italy (USMI)

Although their membership does not exceed one hundred persons, due to a steady flow of foreign funds they are able to control a certain number of mosques in Italy. In the past few years two of their leaders, 'Omar Tariq and Abu Ja'far, were expelled by a decree of the Italian Minister of the Interior at that time, Nicola Mancino. Their presence in Italy was considered to be "dangerous for national security and public order".

20) Misuse of religious freedom

Religious freedom granted by Western governments is having terrible consequences. Radical movements, local branches of those same structures which promote terrorism in Middle East, are taking roots in the countries of immigration. Although they do not represent in their host countries more that 10% of the total Muslim populations in those countries, they are able to control most of mosques in Europe, the United States and Canada.

This situation has many causes. First of all, traditional Muslims do not identify religious identity with membership in an organized group. Radicals, on the contrary, are not a spontaneous movement, but a worldwide organized Network. They work through thousands of different groups, but the secret "Muslim" Brotherhood is always the inner circle behind the stage.


21) "Moderates" versus "Extremists"

From this point of view, the distinction between "moderate" and "extremist" regimes in the Muslim world reveals its inner weakness.

Countries such as Sudan, Iran and Afghanistan are easily identified as radical, totalitarian and enemies of the Western world, but their contribution to the international network of pseudo-Islamic fundamentalism is insignificant.

On the contrary, the powerful structure of the "Muslim" Brotherhood is mainly supported by those countries which are regarded as "moderate" and "friends of the west": Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and the Arab Emirates.

Wahhabi fundamentalism is used as a tool for the preservation of the present equilibrium of the Arab world. Rich oil producing Arab countries fear peace between Israel and Egypt, Jordan or the Palestine Authority very much. A pacified Middle East can create serious problems for the autocratic and feudal systems of those regimes. They know for sure that the diffusion of notions such as human and civil rights, democracy and parity of rights between men and women can represent the end of their unlimited power. This is the reason why these rich, oil producing Arab countries support radicalism as an instrument of de-education and de-culturization.

The more advanced among the Arab countries are aware of this project for the preservation of backwardness. The governments of Tunisia, Morocco, and Jordan are taking measures to limit and to put the activities of the fundamentalist network under control.

Unfortunately, the real risk is that these same Wahhabi groups which are illegal in Tunisia, Morocco and Jordan will become self-appointed official representatives to Western governments of Muslim immigrants to Western countries. As Hisham Kabbani and Khalid Duran are doing in the United States, the Italian Muslim Association is trying to inform European governments about the risks they are facing. While we risk very much in so doing, it seems that until now our cry of alarm is only the voice of one who cries in the desert.

The best means to limit the influence of Saudi and Gulf State backed Wahhabi groups which promote suicide terrorism "in the name of Islam" is countering their influence by supporting the diffusion of the teachings of exponents of traditional, Sunni Islam. In the same way, non-Muslims must avoid becoming victim of the same confusion by believing that real Islam is the one propagandized by the Wahhabis and their fundamentalist network.

22) The Islam-Israel Fellowship of the Root & Branch Association

My friend Dr. Asher Eder, Jewish Co-Founder and Co-chairman of the Islam-Israel Fellowship of the Root & Branch Association, has written a historic essay (originally published in 1969) entitled, "Peace Is Possible between Ishmael and Israel according to the Qur'an" (with a Preface written by myself). This paper is of the maximum importance, and I felt honored in writing its Preface. It helps non-Muslims to understand that the teaching of the Qur'an is something radically different from what is claimed by fundamentalists, and helps Muslims to understand that hate against Israel and against Jews is by no means a part of authentic Islam.

Dr. Eder's paper may be considered a small seed, but we are now realizing how it is giving fruits with the passing of time.

23) Islam Karimov and the contribute of Uzbekistan

The President of Uzbekistan, Islam Karimov, has recently founded a new Islamic International University in Tashkent. Among the main goals of this University there is the graduation of imams and religious leaders in the spirit of the authentic Sunni Muslim tradition, especially trained in refuting fundamentalism and in promoting cooperation between Muslims, Jews and Christian.

This could mean that, for the first time, a Sunni Muslim anti-Wahhabi fundamentalist international coalition will at last be created. In comparison to the worldwide influence of the Saudi and Gulf State funded Wahhabi "Muslim" Brotherhood, the role of such a Sunni Muslim international coalition may be compared to that of David facing Goliath.

24) Never loosing hope

However, we are forbidden to lose hope.

As the Qur'an says: "How oft, by God's will, hath a small force vanquished a big one? Verily, God is with those who steadfastly persevere". [Qur'an, "The Cow", Sura 2:249].

Wa -s-salamu 'alaykum wa rahmat-Ullahi wa barakatuH.