Recently in Islamic Circle of North America Category

No surprise, except to the incurably blinkered. "ICNA Relief Promotes Jihad Donations," from IPT News, May 2:

The charitable wing of a major American Muslim organization is promoting donations to extremist causes, undercutting a nationwide campaign to improve its image. The website link from the Islamic Circle of North America (ICNA) Relief division hints at deeper connections to extremism and terror, both by the charitable branch and by its parent organization.

ICNA's self-proclaimed goal is "to communicate the message of Islam to the society at large" and "also to initiate change in the social and political spheres [of American society] in light of the principles of the noble Qur'an," according to the group's 2020 Vision program.

"The future of Dawah [proselytizing] in this society is directly linked with the ability of ICNA's membership to communicate the message of Islam to the society at large," it explains. Over time, the group encourages "moving to the next level of Dawah, aimed towards the movers and shakers of the society."

As that program outlines, that goal means more engagement with non-Muslims to promote Islam. ICNA is in the midst of a pro-Sharia campaign, which explains that Islamic law isn't something threatening to American society or order.

A long history of extremism stands in the way. ICNA's magazine, conferences, and ideology have promoted violent jihad and supremacy rhetoric for decades, and continue to emphasize Islam as a civilization alternative to secular society.

The group's 2010 Member's Hand Book illustrated how further acceptance of Islam would lead to an Islamic state in America and then to a global Caliphate. "With this work of propagation of Islam, social reform, and the truth is introduced to a large part of the society. A good part of the society's thinking individuals join the movement. Then it may move to establish an Islamic society, obedient to Allah's commands," the hand book states.

To change beliefs about Islam and to further ICNA's role in promoting it, the 2020 plan emphasizes social justice and charity issues. But the discovery of more extremist content on ICNA Relief's website shows that although the group has initiated a new public image, an ideology of extremism prevails just under the surface.

The charity website links to a chapter about the giving of zakat, obligatory tithing, from Let Us Be Muslim, a text by Islamist preacher Abu Ala Maududi. He was the founder of Jamaat-e-Islami, a South Asian extremist organization that advocates the overthrow of secular governments and their replacement with a worldwide Islamic state.

The section from Let Us Be Muslim, a fundamental text used in many of ICNA's education curricula teaching extremism, promotes giving "Fi-Sabili'llah: in the way of Allah." Maududi defines this in the chapter as "giving help to a struggle for making Islam supreme on earth."

In addition, the terminology of "making Islam supreme" is a constant theme throughout ICNA's indoctrination programs. A 2008 presentation on the ICNA Southern California website explains the "goal of the Islamic Call" as the "extermination of pre-Islamic traditions or Jahaliya [ignorant ways of life]" and "mak[ing] Islam the predominant way of life" on earth.

The link on ICNA Relief's page promotes these sentiments even further, explaining that charity should be spent to further violent causes.

"Thus, we are told, there are two ways we can lead our lives. One is the way of God… To walk on this path, you must generously help your brothers and support Jihad out of whatever resources God in His bounty and wisdom has given you," Maududi wrote in the section ICNA Relief links readers. "The other is the Satanic way: apparently full of benefits, but in reality it leads to ruin. The hallmark of this way of life is worshipping money and amassing wealth at the expense of all other considerations."...

Read it all.

I've been on the road, speaking in Birmingham, Alabama, and haven't had time to comment on the Washington Post piece that Pamela Geller responds to in this article: "Defending Shariah in America," in the American Thinker, March 4. But she says everything that needs to be said about it anyway:

America, apologizing to brutal murderers for disposing of terrorist messages in a quran, is Shariah law in America.

America, Judge Martin dismissing the charges against a Muslim who attacked a Halloween parade goer because his costume was an insult to Muhammad, is the Shariah.

America, mosqueing the workplace is the Shariah.

America, demonizing and marginalizing of pro-freedom voices like mine, like those of my colleagues, is the Shariah.

America, mosqueing the public school is the Shariah in America.

America, mosqueing the neighborhood is the Shariah in America.

The Washington Post on March 2 ran a piece written by Omar Sacirbey for the Religion News Service. Muslims launch campaign to 'understand' Shariah. It began: "Against a backdrop of heartland fears that U.S. Muslims seek to impose Islamic law on American courts, a leading Muslim group will launch a campaign on Monday (March 5) to dispel what it called misconceptions about Shariah."

"Heartland fears" are actually heartland realities: a new study has found that Shariah has already been used as a determining factor in court cases in 23 states.

"Many Americans associate Shariah," says the Post, "with the harsh punishments carried out in a few Muslim countries like Afghanistan and Saudi Arabia, even as U.S. Muslim groups insist they have no desire to introduce Islamic law on themselves or others." It quotes Zahid Bukhari, president of the Muslim Brotherhood-linked Islamic Circle of North America, complaining: "There were all these wrong notions about Shariah."

Here's the thing: "U.S. Muslim groups insist they have no desire to introduce Islamic law on themselves or others," so why should they be blocking efforts to outlaw it? It doesn't make sense. And it's not that "Americans associate Shariah with the harsh punishments carried out in a few Muslim countries like Afghanistan and Saudi Arabia" -- it's that those things are part of every form of Shariah ever known since the beginning of Islam. So are Americans right to associate Shariah with stonings, amputations, clitorectomies, honor killings, death for apostates, the denial of free speech, and the treatment of women like slaves? When has there ever been a Shariah state that didn't feature those things?

Bukhari goes on, as quoted in the Post: "The most worrisome thing, he said, was that the level of hatred toward Shariah had spread from the margins of society to the mainstream. The ICNA campaign has already drawn fire from 'anti-Shariah' groups in the United States."

"The level of hatred toward Shariah." It's "hatred" now to know what Shariah is and has always been in every place it has ever been implemented.

The article says that ICNA is sponsoring the "roughly $3 million dollar campaign" that "will feature billboards in at least 15 U.S. cities, 'Shariah seminars' on 20 college campuses, and town hall-style forums and interfaith events in 25 cities."

This sinister, deceptive taqiyya campaign has 3 million dollars, and we're having trouble scraping together two nickels for our campaign countering it with the truth. If we had 3 million dollars, everyone in America would know the truth about Shariah.

One of the billboards that ICNA has set up above the Holland Tunnel in New York City says, "Shariah is not scary." Shariah is not scary, unless you're an apostate from Islam, or a girl who doesn't want to wear hijab, or a wife who angers her husband, or a Christian who says he doesn't think Muhammad is a prophet, or a Jew who is breathing...

Then the WaPo mentions the resistance: "Even before the campaign was launched, there was already pushback from two groups, the American Freedom Defense Initiative and Stop the Islamization of Nations, both categorized as hate groups by the Southern Poverty Law Center."

Note how the WaPo mentions the SPLC's politicized and manipulative designation, while never mentioning that SPLC characterizes essentially any and every effective group that is not far-Left or Islamic supremacist as a "hate group." Nor does it mention that ICNA is a Muslim Brotherhood group, so designated in a captured internal MB document that says that the Brotherhood in the US is dedicated to "eliminating and destroying Western civilization from within and sabotaging its miserable house."

The article does have the decency to quote me calling the ICNA campaign "a complete whitewash." Er yup.

Then it says: "The two groups have designed a billboard parodying ICNA's Kansas City billboard. 'Shariah: Got Fatwa? Get help!' it says, along with a toll-free number and website, neither of which worked."

The WaPo is lying. They both work.

The deceptions start coming thick and fast in the WaPo article after that: "Geller wrote on her blog that the Quran endorses wife beating and mandates that a woman's testimony is worth half that of a man's. Shariah, she said, mandates the death penalty for apostasy and the subjugation of non-Muslims."

Wife-beating: "Good women are obedient....As for those from whom you fear disobedience, admonish them and send them to beds apart and beat them" (Quran 4:34). Testimony: "Get two witnesses, out of your own men, and if there are not two men, then a man and two women, such as ye choose, for witnesses, so that if one of them errs, the other can remind her" (Qur'an 2:282). Death penalty for apostasy: Muhammad said: "Whoever changed his Islamic religion, then kill him" (Bukhari 9.84.57). Subjugation of non-Muslims: "Fight those who believe not in Allah nor the Last Day, nor hold that forbidden which hath been forbidden by Allah and His Messenger, nor acknowledge the religion of Truth, (even if they are) of the People of the Book, until they pay the Jizya with willing submission, and feel themselves subdued." (Quran 9:29)

But the WaPo tells us not to believe the Quran's plain words: "Muslim scholars counter that Geller and like-minded critics cherry-pick from Islamic scripture or quote it out of context to paint a false picture of Shariah."

Does anyone still fall for this "out of context" line? Can anyone explain a context in which it is OK to say that a man can beat a woman? What context justifies saying apostates from Islam should be killed? What context makes it just fine that non-Muslims should be warred against and subjugated? ...

Read it all.

The Muslim Brotherhood-linked Islamic Circle of North America is beginning a propaganda war to whitewash Sharia, and AFDI/SIOA is countering it.

Pamela Geller has the details here. And here is the text of our forthcoming radio spot in Kansas City:

Subversive groups will tell you that Sharia is just private religious law. They’re lying. Sharia is a political system that contravenes American freedoms in numerous ways. Sharia asserts authority over non-Muslims. It mandates discrimination, harassment, and second-class status for both non-Muslims and women. It denies free speech, which we’re seeing in America increasingly under the guise of “hate speech laws.” How can anyone support Sharia when its undermines our fundamental Constitutional liberties? Look for our billboards on I-70.

This is a bit old, but I just saw it -- and it is worth revisiting for the evidence it provides that yet another "moderate" group is anything but. "Hand Book Shows ICNA's True Goals," from IPT News, December 6 (thanks to Sayyid):

The Islamic Circle of North America (ICNA) is preaching a global Caliphate and Islamic Shari'a law over America to its members, according to the 2010 ICNA Member's Hand Book. This is a very different message than the group's public outreach efforts, and contradicts claims that the organization is a tolerant, mainstream Islamic group.

As the hand book spells out, the organization's ultimate goal is "the Establishment of Islam" as the sole basis of global society and governance. It also encourages members to deceive people in its proselytizing campaign to help fulfill this goal. This aim is one that ICNA has been actively pursuing as the group has set its sights on America's constitutional separation of religion and state.

It's not the first example of radicalism by one of America's largest Muslim organizations. ICNA's magazine has featured interviews with terrorist leaders in Pakistan, called on youth to fight abroad in Kashmir, and honored like-minded extremist organizations like the Muslim Brotherhood and South Asia's Jamaat-e-Islami. Concerns have also been expressed about 5 young members of the group's Virginia mosque, who were arrested and convicted on terrorism charges after attempting to link up with and fight for Pakistani terror groups in December 2009.

As the hand book explains, ICNA doesn't just believe that religion is a private affair. "Establishment of the Religion" extends beyond the individual and family and into the society, state, and world. "These words [Establishment of the Religion] include not only practicing the religion in individual and collective life and propagating its true teaching to others, but also striving to make this Deen [religion] a way of life for all," the hand book reads.

ICNA's charter is even more explicit. It calls for the "establishment of the Islamic system of life" in the world, "whether it pertains to beliefs, rituals and morals or to economic, social or political spheres."

For ICNA, this means being the American branch of a global phenomenon that they refer to as the 'Islamic Movement.' The 2010 Hand Book notes, branches of this movement "are active in various parts of the world to achieve the same objectives. It is our obligation as Muslims to engage in the same noble cause here in North America."...

Read it all.

Islamic Relief USA and the Islamic Circle of North America, both groups tied to the Muslim Brotherhood, which is dedicated in its own words to "eliminating and destroying Western civilization from within," are operating in Haiti -- ostensibly working in relief efforts, but no doubt doing a good bit of dawah on the side. Creeping Sharia has the story (thanks to herr Oyal).

Knock me over with a feather! "Muslim-American Organizations' Anti-Radicalization Effort 'A Sham,'" from the ADL, January 11:

New York, NY, January 11, 2010 ... As the number of American Muslim extremists allegedly involved in terror plots in the U.S. and abroad continues to grow, major Muslim-American organizations have publicly acknowledged the existence of a problem in their community and vowed to tackle it head on.

But the initial effort to root out radicalization - announced by a few of these groups in the wake of the arrests in Pakistan of five Muslim-American students from Virginia for allegedly attempting to join a terrorist group - has proven to be a sham and a cover for anti-Semitism and extremism, according to the Anti-Defamation League (ADL).

The Muslim American Society (MAS) and the Islamic Circle of North America (ICNA) held a major community convention in Chicago in December 2009 where the convention chair called for an Islam "clean and clear of all extremism."

But the convention, which had been specifically identified by MAS and the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) as the venue to begin the effort to combat radicalization, failed to seriously address the problem. In fact, it provided a platform for extremist views, according to ADL. The Chicago convention, which attracted more than 1,000 participants, served as a forum for religious scholars and political activists to rail against Jews, call for the eradication of the state of Israel and accuse the United States government as waging a war against Muslims at home and abroad.

"It is shocking that this conference, identified by some major Muslim-American groups as the venue to start the process of reform at a time of growing attacks and threats by American Muslim extremists, was a sham and nothing more than a cover for the dissemination of hateful anti-American and anti-Israel views and anti-Semitism," said Abraham H. Foxman, ADL National Director. "The fact that it provided a platform for extremist views calls into question the sincerity of the effort to serve as a legitimate counterbalance to radicalization. No legitimate blueprint for change can emerge from a convention permeated by messages conveying hatred of Jews, the denial of Israel's right to exist and the idea that the U.S. is at war with Islam."...

Read it all.

Actually they're -- you guessed it! -- whining about a possible "backlash." This whole article is absurd, however, since Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab did not try to blow up Flight 253 because he was Nigerian, but because he was Muslim and believed it his religious duty to wage war against Infidels. But apparently the Times was tired of writing about fears of a backlash against Muslims when one never materializes, and so they gave a new twist to an old story angle by worrying about a backlash against Nigerians instead. The Muslim angle does come in, but not until late in the story.

"'Shocked' Nigerians in U.S. Express Fears of Guilt by Association After Arrest," by Mary M. Chapman for the New York Times, December 29 (thanks to Bill):

DETROIT -- When news broke on Christmas Day that a young Nigerian man had been arrested in a thwarted terrorist attack aboard a jetliner bound for the airport here, Joseph Ajiri, a Nigerian-born entrepreneur who lives in the suburb of Oak Park, was tucking into steaming servings of foofoo, moi-moi and other traditional Nigerian dishes with about a dozen friends and relatives.

Edwin Dyke, founder of the Nigerian Foundation of Michigan, said, "This isn't like our people."

"We just had some people here for Christmas dinner, then all of a sudden this comes on TV," Mr. Ajiri said. "It was regretful that he was Nigerian, but that didn't make us any more angry. We were all very happy that the explosion didn't take place, that he wasn't successful."...

"We want to tell Homeland Security and the federal government that we are sorry about what happened," Dr. Dyke said, "that this isn't like our people, that we believe this is an isolated incident but that we will keep our ears open."...

Salewa Ola, a Nigerian who founded the Detroit-based United African Community Organization, emphasized that the plane attack was "not what our community stands for."

"We are shocked and embarrassed," Dr. Ola said. "This has given all of us a black eye."

Relatives have said that Mr. Abdulmutallab, who is from a Muslim family, was particularly devout, even as a child.

But that tells us nothing, eh?

Twenty percent of Nigerians living in Michigan are Muslim, Dr. Dyke said. But Kamol Bello, a Detroit resident who is a Nigerian Muslim and has lived in the United States for 20 years, was quick to disassociate the religion from what occurred on Flight 253 on Christmas Day.

"A truly religious person would not do that," Mr. Bello said, adding that Muslims he knew did not think Mr. Abdulmutallab "is Muslim or Christian because no true religion teaches" someone to ignite an explosive aboard a plane.

"That's just crazy ideology," Mr. Bello said.

All right, Mr. Bello. Then how did Abdulmutallab, a devout Muslim since childhood, misunderstand Islam so drastically? And what are you doing to prevent such misunderstandings in the future?

Nothing -- just worrying about a phantom backlash:

Even so, Mr. Ajiri and several other Nigerians living in and around Detroit said they expected prejudicial fallout from the attack and from an incident on the same flight two days later in which a Nigerian man spent a long time in the plane's lavatory, arousing the suspicion of fellow passengers, flight attendants and an air marshal and setting off security alerts as the plane landed. It turned out that the man had simply been ill.

"Profiling? When you look at 9/11 and what happened with the Arabic community, we cannot expect anything different," Mr. Ajiri said. "It is just unfortunate that one individual is going to ruin reputations for the rest of the Nigerians. When we travel now, the system will make us pay, and I don't feel good about it."...

Lekan Oguntoyinbo, a Nigerian who used to live in Detroit and now lives in Columbia, Mo., said Mr. Abdulmutallab's nationality would heighten suspicions of all Nigerians.

"Nigerians have had a horrible reputation with the authorities of this country for importing drugs and for things like Internet fraud," said Mr. Oguntoyinbo, an assistant professor of journalism at Lincoln University in Jefferson City, Mo. "I think this incident on Christmas not only makes us incredibly more suspect, but also positions Nigerians as enemies of the state. When you're trying to blow up a plane, the dynamics of perception change a great deal."...

No kidding, really?

Striking a blow against the trade deficit. In Human Events today:

The five young northern Virginia Muslims arrested in Pakistan for trying to join jihadist groups offer an intriguing example of role reversal. Instead of jihad terrorists training in the Middle East to come to the United States, a la Muhammad Atta and co., this group started out in the U.S. and went over there. Nor are they the only examples of America's brisk new export trade in jihadists -- there are also the Somalis who have been streaming home from Minneapolis to join the jihad in their homeland.

Both Somalia and Pakistan have so many jihadis that they have no need to import more, but in both countries right now jihad is a growth industry.

Among the many lingering questions about this case is that of how these five young men fell in with jihad groups in the first place. The local Muslim community professed anguish and puzzlement about how it could have happened. Ashraf Nubani, an attorney for the mosque the five attended, said of their relatives and fellow worshippers: "There's shock and disbelief in these families and in this mosque." Mahdi Bray of the Falls Church-based Muslim American Society, sounded a plaintive note: "We want to know: What did we miss? We saw these kids every day. In hindsight, what could we have done?"

The five frequented an Islamic Circle of North America (ICNA) mosque in Alexandria, Virginia, where the youth leader, Mustafa Maryam, insisted: "Our group never talked about politics." Essan Talawi, an imam at the mosque, said that "the teachings of this mosque are the Koran, moderation, tolerance and peaceful interaction with our neighbors and other faiths."

They would have us believe that these young men turned to violent jihad at the same time and spontaneously. But there is every reason to think otherwise.

Talawi may have had in mind a very different idea of "moderation, tolerance and peaceful interaction" from the one that generally prevails in the U.S. According to Steven Emerson's Investigative Project, at ICNA's Annual Conference in 2001, ICNA president Zulfiqar Ali Shah led the crowd in a chant of "our way, our way, is jihad, jihad."...

Read it all.

Mahdi Bray, supporter of Hamas and Hizballah, is baffled

Mahdi Bray of the Muslim American Society just can't figure out how these young Muslims turned to jihad violence. The Muslim American Society is the Muslim Brotherhood:

"In recent years, the U.S. Brotherhood operated under the name Muslim American Society, according to documents and interviews. One of the nation's major Islamic groups, it was incorporated in Illinois in 1993 after a contentious debate among Brotherhood members." -- Chicago Tribune, 2004.

The Muslim Brotherhood "must understand that their work in America is a kind of grand Jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within and "sabotaging" its miserable house by their hands and the hands of the believers so that it is eliminated and God's religion is made victorious over all other religions." -- "An Explanatory Memorandum on the General Strategic Goal for the Brotherhood in North America," by Mohamed Akram, May 19, 1991.

The Islamic Circle of North America is also a Brotherhood organization.

Are you starting to get an idea as to how these young men became "radicalized"? So am I.

"At Virginia mosque, a struggle to understand why young men may have held terrorist ambitions," by Bob Drogin and Sebastian Rotella for the Los Angeles Times, December 12 (thanks to all who sent this in):

ALEXANDRIA, Va. - The bungalow-turned-mosque has no sign out front. It sits behind a Firestone tire store and across from a busy Dunkin' Donuts in a working-class neighborhood of modest homes in suburban Virginia.

Members of the unmarked mosque struggled on Friday to understand how and why five well-liked members of an Islamic youth group embarked on a dangerous odyssey from Alexandria to their arrest this week in Pakistan on suspicion of seeking to fight alongside militant groups.

"Those are our children," Essam Tellawi, the imam, said in an emotional sermon to about 30 men and women who attended noontime prayers at the ICNA Center, which is affiliated with the Islamic Circle of North America. He added: "I could never describe the difficulties and hardships that our five families have been afflicted with."

None of the worshippers who gathered on a bitterly cold Friday had an explanation for how the five were radicalized. The young men belonged to a Muslim youth group of 12 to 15 young men that went camping, played basketball and performed community service projects.

"Our group never talked about politics" or waging war, said Mustafa Maryam, the youth group leader, who has known the five since 2006.

He called them "fun loving, career-focused children" who "appeared to have a bright future." He also called them "very goofy" and "laughing kids."...

The mosque plans an internal inquiry to see if the young men were secretly recruited by outsiders, or if they followed firebrand sheiks or extremist videos on websites.

"We want to know: What did we miss?" said Mahdi Bray, head of the Muslim American Society, an Islamic advocacy group based in nearby Falls Church, Va. "We saw these kids every day. In hindsight, what could we have done?"...

Well, Mahdi, for starters, you could institute programs in mosques and Islamic schools teaching against the jihad and Islamic supremacism. Once you've done that, get back to me -- there is more!