 by Daniel Atzori Islamic finance and Islamic banking, which are among the fastest growing financial industries in the world, are best understood in their political and cultural contexts, and by what formed their theoretical origins. To begin with, Islamic banks are based on a corpus of doctrines called “Islamic economics,” which claims to be based on the Quran, but is actually the creation of the Islamist thinker Abu’l-A’la Mawdudi (1903-1979). Mawdudi is both the father of Islamic economics and (together with Hassan al-Banna, founder of the Muslim Brotherhood) the father of modern political Islam. His crucial contribution to the development of Islamism has been highlighted by Seyyed Vali Reza Nasr in “Mawdudi and the Making of Islamic Revivalism,” while his role in the birth of Islamic economics has been studied by Timur Kuran in “The Genesis of Islamic Economics.” Mawdudi, the founder in 1941 of the Islamist party, Jamaat-e-Islami, in Pakistan, was persuaded that it was necessary for Muslims to bring all aspects of life into the practice of “Islam” and submission to the will of Allah. Therefore, both the spheres of politics and economics could not be autonomous from the Quranic revelation and the Islamic tradition (sunna). In the political field, Mawdudi asserted the need for the establishment of an Islam in which all sovereignty belongs only to Allah; thus, popular sovereignty would a usurpation of his rights. According to Mawdudi, the proclamation of faith, in which the Muslim believer affirms that “there is no God but Allah,” implies that “one should recognise no sovereign, nor accept any government, nor yet obey any law, or that one should refuse to accept the jurisdiction of any court and to carry out the command of anyone” except from Allah. For Mawdudi, the duty of his party, the Jamaat-e-Islami, was to form an army of “Allah’s troopers,” with the goal of establishing an Islamic state where shari’a (Islamic law) could be enforced. The creation of an Islamic state was, however, just the first step: he writes, “Islam does not want to bring about this revolution in one country or a few countries. It wants to spread it to the entire world. Although it is the duty of the ‘Muslim party’ to bring this revolution first to its own nation, its ultimate goal is world revolution.” Mawdudi, studying the French, Russian and National Socialist revolutions, was of the opinion that Islamic revolutions should have learned from them. Like Lenin, Mawdudi affirms the need for a vanguard of Allah’s army; like Trotsky, he calls for exporting the revolution worldwide. The spread of the Islamic revolution also had to follow the example set by the Prophet Muhammad. Mawdudi affirms that: “When every method of persuasion had failed, the Prophet took to the sword. That sword removed evil mischief, the impurities of evil and the filth of the soul. The sword did something more – it removed their blindness so that they could see the light of truth, and also cured them of their arrogance; arrogance which prevents people from accepting the truth, stiff necks and proud heads bowed with humility. As in Arabia and other countries, Islam’s expansion was so fast that within a century a quarter of the world accepted it. This conversion took place because the sword of Islam tore away the veils which had covered men’s hearts.” To purify society from non Islamic influences (“the veils which cover our hearts”), Mawdudi also advocated the restoration of a classic tenet of Islam: the death penalty for apostasy (ridda). Mawdudi further states that such a punishment should not just be reserved for those who consciously refuse Islam, but also for all the non-practising Muslims: “Whenever the death penalty for apostasy is enforced in a new Islamic state, then Muslims are kept within Islam’s fold. But there is a danger that a large number of hypocrites will live alongside them. They will always pose a danger of treason. My solution to the problem is this. That whenever an Islamic revolution takes place, all non-practising Muslims should, within one year, declare their turning away from Islam and get out of Muslim society. After one year all born Muslims will be considered Muslim. All Islamic laws will be enforced upon them. They will be forced to practice all the fara’id and wajibat [duties and obligations] of their religion and, if anyone then wishes to leave Islam, he will be executed.” Advocating the necessity of emancipating knowledge from the influence of the West to give birth to a true Islamic polity, Mawdudi goes on to state: “Islam is the very antithesis of secular Western democracy.” Not only does society have to be purged from non- Islamic contaminations, but also science and knowledge. Islamic society and Islamic culture have to be pure: More at Hudson New York 
 From CAN: The Investigative Project on Terrorism reports that Ashrafuzzaman Khan, a former president and secretary-general of the Islamic Circle of North America, is being investigated by the government. Khan is suspected of lying about his previous activity in a Southeast Asian paramilitary group when he applied to become a U.S. citizen. “According to an online Bangladesh newspaper based in Washington, U.S. officials wrote to Bangladesh’s State Minister for Home Affairs in September requesting files related to Khan’s role in a series of 1971 political murders. The bloodshed came during Bangladesh’s fight for independence,” the report says.
“The targets included university professors and a journalist. Khan is suspected of war crimes and of carrying out some of the killings.” The Islamic Circle of North America has previously been accused of being a branch of Jamaat-e-Islami, a violent extremist group founded by the Muslim Brotherhood in Pakistan. The group expanded its reach into Bangladesh in 1978 under the name Bangladesh Islami Chhatri Sangstha. Joe Kaufman, Chairman of Americans Against Hate, pointed out in an article for FrontPage Magazine in June that BICS and ICNA use the same logo. World Threats
 Why has President Obama begun “reaching out” to Pakistani Islamist parties with ties to the global Muslim Brotherhood?Reuters is reporting that U.S. President Obama has begun “reaching out” to Pakistani Islamist parties including the Jamaat-e-Islami, known to be close to the global Muslim Brotherhood. According to the report: U.S. President Barack Obama has started reaching out to some of Pakistan’s most fervent Islamist and anti-American parties, including one that helped give rise to the Taliban, trying to improve Washington’s image in the nuclear-armed state. Obama’s special envoy, Richard Holbrooke, is initiating dialogue between the United States and religious parties previous administrations had largely shunned, both sides said. “The purpose is to broaden the base of American relations in Pakistan beyond the relatively narrow circle of leaders Washington has previously dealt with,” explained Vali Nasr, senior adviser to Holbrooke…At one of this week’s sessions, Liaqat Baloch, a top member of the religious, right-wing Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) party, told Holbrooke he welcomed the new administration’s public change in tone towards Muslims around the world. Read more ... Source: The Global Muslim Brotherhood Daily Report
 The Obama administration is continuing its outreach efforts to radical groups. On Tuesday in Islamabad, U.S. envoy Richard C. Holbrooke met with Liaqat Baloch, a leader of Pakistan's Islamist Jamaat-i-Islami party. The two had what was billed as a "very useful" 90-minute meeting. Mr. Holbrooke also met with Maulana Fazlur Rehman, a leader of the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam party who is closely tied to the Taliban in Afghanistan. Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari approves of this approach, saying that outreach to Islamist parties is part of "a new era" of seeking reconciliation instead of retrenchment and violence. The new outreach approach has changed the diplomatic process but has yet to have a major impact on policy. Mr. Holbrooke said that his meeting with Mr. Baloch was "the most intellectually sustained debate I've ever had in this country," but the Islamist leader observed that regardless of the change in administration, "there still is no change in the practice." There is a decided gap between rhetoric and reality. Read more ...Source: The Washington TimesH/T: J.R.
 By Joe Kaufman Jamaat-e-Islami, the largest Islamist organization in Pakistan, wants the United States out of its country, so much so that the group created a movement based upon this. The movement is far reaching, and unfortunately for America, it stretches to the U.S. itself. When the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) hit Pakistani shores in 1941, it came with a price. The group had only been around for little over a decade, and already it had established itself as a legitimate threat to governments all over the Middle East. Now, South Asia had to deal with it. Today, Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) continues to cause trouble in the region, aligning itself with extremist elements in al-Qaeda, the Taliban and many other violent factions. It even has its own militant wing, Hizb-ul-Mujahideen (HM), which has committed numerous terrorist attacks against Indian civilians. The group’s former militant wing, al-Badr, was involved in the 1971 Bangladesh massacre, which reportedly took the lives of up to 3,000,000 mostly unarmed citizens. Like most Islamist groups in South Asia, JI likes to hold angry demonstrations, what it calls “political rallies.” The events are usually aimed at at least one of two entities, the sitting government of that particular JI locale (Pakistan, Bangladesh, India, etc.) and/or the United States. Read more ...Source: FPM
 By Joe Kaufman Although they are on opposite sides of the globe, thousands of miles from each other, the Islamic Circle of North America (ICNA) based out of Queens, New York and Bangladesh Islami Chhatri Sangstha (BICS) based in Dhaka, Bangladesh sport an identical logo. Why? Maybe it’s because the groups are part of the same organization, sharing the same hateful ideologies, and possessing the same extremist underpinnings. The proof comes from the groups themselves. In 1941, the Muslim Brotherhood, the fanatic religious/political movement that began in Egypt over a decade earlier, reached the shores of South Asia. Under the name Jamaat-e-Islami (JI), individuals throughout Pakistan and, later, its surrounding areas embraced the organization’s belligerent philosophies. One of these areas was Bangladesh. Bangladesh Islami Chhatri Sangstha or BICS is a JI female student group, which was established at Dhaka University (DU) in 1978. This location and time period is curious, as just seven years prior, a series of massacres took place in Bangladesh, then-East Pakistan, to which DU was a main target and of which JI was a key offender. Read more ... Source: FrontPage MagazineICNA
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 ISLAMIC militants are within striking distance of Tarbela Dam, one of Pakistan's main sources of water and power, an MP warned yesterday as Hillary Clinton accused the Government of "abdicating to the Taliban". The Taliban are within 100km of the Pakistani capital, Islamabad, after seizing control of more towns in the North Western Frontier Province this week, including the provincial administrative headquarters of Buner. Pakistani paramilitary forces have been deployed to protect government buildings and bridges in Buner, a senior official said. The leader of the Jamiat Ulema-I-Islam Islamic party, Maulana Fazlur Rehman, told parliament the Taliban forces could soon be "knocking at the doors of Islamabad". "After occupying Buner, they have reached Kala Dhaka and may also be taking over the water reservoir of the Tarbela Dam," Mr Rehman said. The southern tip of Tarbela - the world's largest earth- and rock-filled dam - is just 50km from Islamabad. The dam provides 30 per cent of the country's hydroelectricity and much of the north's irrigation water. The US has reacted with alarm to the security crisis in its subcontinental ally. US President Barack Obama has dispatched his joint chiefs of staff chairman Mike Mullen to Islamabad for the second time in a fortnight, and has summoned the Pakistan and Afghan presidents to Washington. The march of the Taliban prompted harsh criticism yesterday from the US Secretary of State, Ms Clinton, who told a congressional panel the deteriorating security situation in Pakistan "poses a mortal threat to the security and safety of our country and the world". "The Pakistani Government is basically abdicating to the Taliban and to the extremists," she said. "We cannot underscore the seriousness of the existential threat posed to the state of Pakistan." Ms Clinton called on Pakistanis to speak out "forcefully" against the policies of their Government, which was ceding "more and more territory to the insurgents, to the Taliban, to al-Qa'ida, to the allies that are in this terrorist syndicate". Pakistan's Government agreed in February to impose sharia law in the country's northwestern Swat Valley and the surrounding Malakand region in exchange for a ceasefire with Taliban forces. President Asif Ali Zardari ratified the agreement last week following unanimous parliamentary support. But on Tuesday, hundreds of armed Taliban entered Buner, a district of more than a million people 100km from Islamabad, setting up checkpoints, occupying mosques and ransacking offices of non-government organisations. Regular courts stopped functioning in Buner yesterday after the Peshawar High Court deemed it too dangerous for officials to function. The move coincided with a deadline set by the militants for the Government to abolish the regular courts. A Taliban commander said they would set up sharia courts in Buner - as they have done in Swat - to end a "sense of deprivation", but would not interfere with police work. The Pakistani Government yesterday refused to rule out using force against the Taliban. Source: The Australian
 By Joe Kaufman Since the Mumbai attacks took place, some Muslim leaders have issued claims that all Muslims around the world have condemned what transpired, but this has not been the case. Jamaat-e-Islami, the Muslim Brotherhood of Pakistan, has called the attacks an “international conspiracy.” The group’s leader, Qazi Hussain Ahmad, has laid blame for the attacks on the United States and India. These ignorant and offensive messages are indicative of an organization rooted in hatred and violence. On November 26, 2008, Islamic terrorists laid siege to the city of Mumbai, India, murdering close to 180 individuals and injuring hundreds of others. The horrific event was said to be perpetrated by Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), a Pakistani fundamentalist group with ties to the government of Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency. Pakistan has been a breeding ground for terrorists for decades. A high point in this was reached during the 80s, when Osama bin Laden and his mentor, Abdullah Azzam, brought jihad fighters (mujahideen) from across the world into Pakistani terror training camps with the goal of fighting the Soviets, who had invaded Afghanistan. Read more ...Source: FrontPage Magazine
 Indonesians Protest Muhammad Drawings SURABAYA, Indonesia (AP) - Muslims protested in two Indonesian cities Saturday over drawings in Denmark portraying the Prophet Muhammad, with some calling for the artist to be put to death. "Enough is enough. They have to stop insulting Islam," said Muhammad Djabir, one of about 1,000 protesters in the mostly Muslim country's second-largest city, Surabaya. Others in the crowd outside the Danish consulate shouted "Death sentence for the cartoonist!" The drawing, reprinted in 17 Danish newspapers earlier this month, shows the Prophet Muhammad wearing a bomb-shaped turban and was one of 12 drawings that sparked protests in Muslim countries when they were first published in 2006, including Indonesia. Read more ...Source: APH/T: Jihad WatchPakistani cartoon protesters burn Danish, US flagsPakistani cartoon protesters burn Danish, US flagsKARACHI - Hundreds of angry Muslim youths rallied in major cities in Pakistan on Friday and torched Danish flags to protest against the recent republication of a cartoon of the Prophet Mohammed (pbuh). Witnesses said about 150 supporters of fundamentalist party Jamaat-i-Islami gathered outside a mosque in the port city of Karachi, flying banners demanding Pakistan sever diplomatic ties with Denmark. "We don't need to have diplomatic relations with a country that hurts our religious sentiments," the banners read, as demonstrators burned Danish and US flags and chanted: "Death to the cartoonist." In the capital Islamabad, cries of "Say no to Denmark" rang out as about 300 students from colleges and Islamic schools crowded outside the city’s biggest mosque, witnesses said. They burned an effigy of the Danish cartoonist amid chants of "Crush Denmark" and "We love our Prophet." Read more ...Source: AFP H/T: Jihad Watch
By Joe Kaufman  The history of the United States runs through Philadelphia. It is there that the American Revolution was born. However, a new revolution threatens to take hold of Philly, a Muslim one. It is led by one of Philadelphia's favorite sons, singer/songwriter/producer Kenny Gamble (a.k.a. Luqman Abdul Haqq), who has a master plan to renovate a once great part of the city using taxpayers' money. While on face value his intentions appear to be worthy, Gamble's revitalization plan for Philadelphia has sinister implications, leading to the question: Will Philadelphia remain "the City of Brotherly Love" or will it become a city of Muslim Brotherly hate? The Muslim Brotherhood (MB) or Ikhwan in America exists, in large part, within two immigrant populations. One is the Arab Muslim community, falling under the aegis of the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) and to a smaller extent the Muslim American Society (MAS). The other is the South Asian Muslim community, positioned under the umbrella of the Islamic Circle of North America (ICNA), a subsidiary of Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) in Pakistan. These groups form the core of MB America. Still, there is a third U.S. Muslim population of much less acclaim/notoriety. It is the African American Muslim community, and it consists mainly of converts who fall within a number of categories, many of which overlap, including black power advocates, racial separatists, ex-felons, anti-Semites and hate America firsters. There are two organizations that encompass all of the above: the Nation of Islam (NOI), a black supremacist group that is built upon the hatred of whites and Jews, and the Muslim Alliance in North America (MANA), the African American version of ISNA and ICNA. Read more ...Source: FrontPage Magazine
By Joe Kaufman  Starting December 21st, Rosemont, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago, will play host to two organizations tied to the Muslim Brotherhood (MB), the inspiration for so many of the world’s worst terror groups. The organizations, the Muslim American Society (MAS) and the Islamic Circle of North America (ICNA), have an extremist history of their own. Soon Chicago, December 2007, will become a part of that history, as the Hyatt Regency O’Hare packs in thousands of Muslims that refuse to speak out against those that use their religion as a means to commit violence. Most people in America are unaware of the fact that the Muslim Brotherhood is not just an overseas group – that it’s here in America, as well. Indeed the group has had a presence in the United States starting in the 1950s. MAS was established in 1992, because MB leaders thought that previously created American MB groups were becoming too assimilated into Western society. ICNA was founded in 1971 as an embodiment of MB Pakistan or Jamaat-e-Islami (JI). Both MAS and ICNA use the internet to spread violent forms of bigotry. MAS is currently propagating material via the internet calling for the murder of Jews and the waging of war against non-Muslims, while ICNA runs a website, Why Islam (WI), where WI leaders and members target Jews and discuss the merits of Hamas and Hezbollah. Also, both MAS and ICNA have had individuals involved in their organizations that are serving prison sentences after having been charged with terrorist activity. Randall Todd “Ismail” Royer, the former Communications Director for MAS, was convicted of conspiring with Laskar-e-Taiba (LeT), an Al-Qaeda related group, to attack Americans and Indians overseas. And four members of the ICNA-related ‘Houston Taliban’ were charged with jihad training with firearms for the purpose of joining the Taliban to, as well, attack Americans overseas; so far, three of the four have been found guilty. Furthermore, ICNA has been involved in terror financing. When the Al-Khidmat Foundation (AKF), a Pakistani “charity” run by JI, gave $99 thousand to the head of Hamas, Khaled Mashaal, in August of 2006, ICNA was the group’s top donor. As well, shortly before and shortly after the attacks of 9/11, the Southeast division of ICNA (ICNA-SE) was soliciting funds for Al-Qaeda related groups via the web. None of the above has raised any eyebrows in Chicago, as the city will be opening its arms to MAS and ICNA for their 6th Annual Convention, commencing on December 21st and ending December 25th. Included in the gathering, much like all of the groups’ past conventions, will be a large list of the country’s most outspoken Islamic radicals. This year’s event features: • Jamal Badawi. Badawi was named by the U.S. government as an “Unindicted Co-conspirator” for the Holy Land Foundation (HLF) trial that began in July, which dealt with millions of dollars in fundraising for Hamas. Badawi has authored a book entitled Gender Equity in Islam, in which he justifies the beating of women by their husbands. • Jamal Said. Said is the imam of the Mosque Foundation, located in Bridgeview, Illinois, an Islamic center with ties to Hamas. Said served as the Treasurer of the Al Aqsa Educational Fund, an entity identified by the FBI as a Hamas “charitable” front. Said, like Badawi, was also named as an “Unindicted Co-conspirator” for the HLF trial. • Raed Tayeh. Tayeh is a former Executive Board Member of the Chicago chapter of the Islamic Association for Palestine (IAP), the now defunct American propaganda wing of Hamas. In November 2001, Tayeh was fired from his job as a Congressional aide to then-U.S. Representative Cynthia McKinney, when a letter of his was published by a newspaper accusing Jewish lawmakers of exhibiting inappropriate loyalty to the State of Israel. • Zulfiqar Ali Shah. Shah is the former South Asia Director of KindHearts, an Islamic “charity” that was shut down by the U.S. government in February 2006 for raising millions of dollars for Hamas. In a June 2001 article in Islam Online, Shah is quoted as saying, “If we are unable to stop the Jews now, their next stop is Yathrib (The Prophet's city of Medina), where the Jews used to live until their expulsion by Prophet Muhammad (SAW). That’s the pinnacle of their motives.” While MAS and ICNA are portrayed in the media as “mainstream” and “moderate,” their involvement in extremist activity makes them anything but. They are groups that openly promote violent organizations and propagate hate towards non-Muslims. This is evidenced in the type of speakers they invite to their events; in the way they use the internet to spread radical Islam; and in their members’ direct involvement with terrorist groups. Yet, regardless of this, MAS and ICNA have built up a tremendous following. When the American public asks why Muslims haven't mobilized against the radicals in their community, one only has to look upon the MAS ICNA convention, where thousands of Muslims in attendance will be turning a blind eye to violence in the name of their religion. The theme they are using for this year's event is “Islam Universal Message & Universal Values.” If the Islam that is portrayed by MAS and ICNA - one that is violent and intolerant of others - truly is the religion's universal message and values, then there can be no place for it in our society or anywhere else. However, if the religion of MAS, ICNA and the Muslim Brotherhood is a false expression of Islam, then Muslims of good conscious need to come out from hiding, stand up and say so - loud and clear - so that all in their community, radical and otherwise, hear their voices. “Chicago beware!” Source: FrontPage MagazineH/T: The Intelligence Summit
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Copyright Muslims Against Sharia 2008. All rights reserved.
E-mail: info AT ReformIslam.org
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by Daniel Atzori
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