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You are here: Home / Archives for Muslim World

Alan Henning: Al-Qaeda appealed to Isis to release British aid worker following kidnap

September 17, 2014 by Nasheman

Representatives of rival groups held summit in Syrian town to decide fate of captive Briton

Representatives of rival groups held summit in Syrian town to decide fate of captive Briton

– by Tom Harper, The Independent

Al-Qaeda appealed to Isis to release the British hostage Alan Henning because it believed he was an innocent aid worker who was genuinely trying to help suffering Muslims, it can be revealed.

In evidence that the depravity exhibited by Isis is now repelling Muslims of all views and backgrounds, even the terrorist group behind the 11 September attacks on the US in 2001 decided that kidnapping the aid-convoy volunteer was a step too far.

Mr Henning, a taxi driver from Eccles, Salford, was so moved by the plight of Muslims in Syria that he decided to miss last Christmas with his wife and two children and travel 4,000 miles to deliver medical equipment to refugees holed up in the town of Al-Dana. A local commander – or emir – of Jabhat al-Nusra, the al-Qaeda affiliate in Syria, visited his then-allies in Isis four days after Mr Henning, 47, was captured. The emir confronted the kidnappers, arguing that their actions were “wrong under Islamic law” and “counter-productive”, according to a journalist who interviewed the man immediately after the encounter.

The world has looked on in disbelief in recent weeks as fighters from Isis, also known as Islamic State, have beheaded three Western journalists and aid workers, including a Briton, David Haines. In a video posted online on Saturday night, Isis warned that Mr Henning would be next.

Today, the Foreign Secretary, Philip Hammond, admitted that special forces were struggling to mount a rescue mission because intelligence chiefs did not know exactly where Mr Henning was being held.

Bilal Abdul Kareem, a US film-maker who has reported extensively from Syria, told The Independent that “anybody of any influence” – including al-Qaeda – had appealed to the Sunni militant group when it seized Mr Henning in December, warning that such a move would backfire. He said: “Four days after he was captured, the emir went to Al-Dana and said: ‘Look, what you are doing is wrong. You have no business what you are doing. You have no right to abduct him. You have no reason to detain him just because he is not Muslim’.”

Alan Henning at a refugee camp on the Syrian-Turkish border

Alan Henning at a refugee camp on the Syrian-Turkish border

Mr Henning was the only non-Muslim in a group of volunteers from a UK-based Islamic charity, which organised a convoy of old ambulances to transport medical supplies to Al-Dana, a few miles from the Turkish border. He was abducted on Boxing Day last year.

Mr Kareem said: “I spoke to the emir from Jabhat al-Nusra after he came back. Initially, he was confident that Henning would be released because that is what Isis was saying. But then Henning was removed from his prison in Al-Dana and never heard of again.”

News of Al-Qaeda’s attempt to save Mr Henning echoes reports that the terror group once led by Osama bin Laden passionately disagrees with the direction taken by Isis, which has quickly taken control of an area the size of Great Britain inside Syria and Iraq.

Professor Peter Neumann, the director of the International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation, based at King’s College London, said: “Al-Qaeda has been critical of Isis in recent months. It understands how its behaviour will be perceived by the Western public. Although the two groups’ underlying ideology is still very similar, Al-Qaeda is much more strategic. For example, it is not opposed to beheadings but realises it makes no sense to carry them out in the way that Isis does because this tactic will lose them a lot of friends.”

Dr Afzal Ashraf, a consultant at the Royal United Services Institute, who holds a doctorate in terrorist ideology, said: “The murders of these innocent Western hostages, and the latest threats made against Alan Henning, just go to show how completely incomprehensible Isis’s strategy is. It is absurd and Al-Qaeda realises such behaviour will turn potential recruits away.”

Philip Hammond, the Foreign Secretary, admitted that special forces were struggling to mount a rescue mission because intelligence chiefs did not know exactly where Mr Henning was being held (AFP)

Philip Hammond, the Foreign Secretary, admitted that special forces were struggling to mount a rescue mission because intelligence chiefs did not know exactly where Mr Henning was being held (AFP)

On his internet blog, Mr Kareem provided more details of the discord among Islamist extremists over the abduction of Mr Henning. “Isis said that he was suspected to be a spy,” he wrote. “The Muslims on the convoy asked for proof as they regarded this as a totally ridiculous claim. Isis cited that they could not believe that a white Christian would want to come to Syria at this time, except that he was a spy.

“The Isis commander then showed them Henning’s passport and said that this was the proof, [saying]: ‘There is a secret chip inside. This is so that the intelligence service can continue tracking him.’ One of the other Muslims from the convoy said: ‘All of the passports from the UK are like that!’, showing him his UK passport.

“The other Muslims on the convoy told them that this man had given up Christmas with his family to come to help save the people that Isis said it was trying to save.”

Later, Mr Kareem claimed that Isis was confronted by rival groups, which implored it to release Mr Henning. “Isis said that he was to remain their prisoner and they would ransom him for something. ‘Why?’ they were asked. They said: ‘We will trade him for someone in the UK prison system.’ The other Muslims told him this was not Islamically correct and they had no charge against him.

“One of the aid workers told them that the people rely on these convoys and actions like these would create problems for their efforts in helping the Syrian people. The Isis commander replied: ‘We don’t need convoys – we have Allah’.”

Meanwhile, Mr Haines’s teenage daughter, Bethany, posted a message on Facebook, saying she had been “touched” by the support she had received from the public following his murder.

She wrote: “Hi, I’m David’s daughter who lives in Perth. I was really touched by the messages of support during this hard time. I know my dad would be really touched and grateful.”

Filed Under: Muslim World Tagged With: Al Qaeda, Alan Henning, Iraq, IS, ISIS, Islamic State, Jabhat al-Nusra, Philip Hammond, Syria

OIC, GCC condemn Iraq mosque massacre

September 16, 2014 by Nasheman

Mos’ab ibn Omayr Mosque massacre

Riyadh/SAUDI PRESS AGENCY: The Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) and Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) have condemned the heinous crime perpetrated by armed militiamen who stormed Mos’ab ibn Omayr Mosque in Diyala Province, Iraq on Friday. The attack caused the death of 73 innocent worshippers; scores of others were severely injured.

The secretary general of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, Iyad Ameen Madani, offered his condolences to the bereaved families of the victims and prayed for the swift recovery of the wounded.

Madani denounced this and similar criminal acts that feed on sectarian strife.

He pointed out that these senseless acts seek to inflame tensions and sow discord among the different components of Iraqi society.

They also threaten the country’s already fragile social peace and harmony at a highly delicate juncture as Iraq scrambles to form a government which the OIC hopes to be all-inclusive, he added.

Madani emphasized that firm measures need to be deployed to confront and hold to account the armed groups and militias that seem determined to unlock sectarian sentiments and fan denominational infighting.

It is not just peaceful coexistence in Iraq that is being jeopardized by the atrocious practices of these armed militias; it is the very future of Iraq that is at stake, he added.

Madani reiterated his appeal to the political leadership in Baghdad and to Iraq’s influential religious figures to work toward a sustainable reconciliation across the different components of Iraqi society.

Madani further reaffirmed the OIC’s readiness to support Iraq by all possible means through this transitional phase in a bid to regain stability and security.

GCC Secretary General Dr. Abdul Latif bin Rashid Al-Zayani called the attack a terrorist crime against all divine religions and on human value s and ethics.
“The heinous crime exposed the moral decadence those militias have reached and how their sectarian approach has driven them to attack worshippers in houses of Allah,” he said.

The GCC chief called for swiftly identifying those responsible for this brutal crime and demanded justice for the innocent victims.

Filed Under: Muslim World Tagged With: Abdul Latif bin Rashid Al-Zayani, Gulf Cooperation Council, Iraq, Iyad Ameen Madani, Massacre, Mos’ab ibn Omayr Mosque, Mosque, Organization of Islamic Cooperation

A plea to ISIS supporters to read the true story of Alan Henning

September 16, 2014 by Nasheman

alan-henning-ISIS

– by Bilal Abdul Kareem

On August 13, 2014 I reported a story about a British aid worker who had been abducted in Dana, Syria. Today that person appeared on ISIS’s beheading video of David Haines. His name is Alan Henning.

Many ISIS supporters called me a liar and threatened me. I believe that many of them did so because they themselves did not want to believe that their leadership is not what they think.

Unlike many out there I believe that many of you who are either in ISIS currently or support them in some way (even emotionally) do so out of a lack of understanding rather than due to a malicious nature.

Please read the untold story of how he was abducted and try to understand the issues relating to it and how it relates to you. While I am not saying that ISIS members are not Muslims (they are, but misguided), however Muslims are a people of honor, courage, and Eemaan (faith). They are not a team of bandits, highway robbers, or crooks.

I changed Alan Henning’s name in the original story to “Murdock” so as to keep his identity hidden. Now as the story has been told in the media there is no need to hide his identity. As you read further you will know why I originally changed his name in my report…

Alan Henning’s story

The convoy cleared the Turkish side of the border and completed the 30 minute drive to Dana. Approximately 2 hours after arrival, ISIS soldiers arrived and detained a large number of those who were on the aid convoy.

A few hours later they were all released, except Murdock (Alan Henning). Initially it was said by ISIS brass that he was being held for a few additional hours to answer some questions and then he would be released. Hours turned to days and Alan Henning didn’t appear.

Those who were on the convoy were angry and confused as to why their companion was not released. Then what they had feared had come to light, they were told that Henning was now their prisoner. They asked why, as he had only been in the country for a few hours and most of that was inside a vehicle traveling to Dana. They said that he was suspected to be a spy.

The Muslims on the convoy asked for proof as they regarded this as a totally ridiculous claim. ISIS cited that they couldn’t believe that a white Christian would want to come to Syria at this time except that he was a spy. The ISIS commander then showed them Henning’s passport and said that this was the proof.

“There is a secret chip inside. This is so that the intelligence service can continue tracking him”. One of the other Muslims from the convoy said: “All of the passports from the UK are like that!”, showing him his UK passport.

Alan Henning is a taxi driver from Manchester. Photograph: Family handout/PA

Alan Henning is a taxi driver from Manchester. Photograph: Family handout/PA

The other Muslims on the convoy told them that this man had given up Christmas with his family to come to help save the people that ISIS “said” they were trying to save – the Syrian people. The commander remained quiet and said that it wasn’t up to him and the decision regarding Henning would have to be made by the Ameer in charge who would be in the next day.

A day or so passed with no word and they inquired again. ISIS said that he was to remain their prisoner and they would ransom him for something. “Why?” they were asked. They said: “We will trade him for someone in the UK prison system. The other Muslims told him this was not Islamically correct and they had no charge against him. One of the aid workers told them that the people rely on these convoys and actions like these would create problems for their efforts in helping the Syrian people.

The ISIS commander replied: “We don’t need convoys, we have Allah”. Religious jurists from other groups came to intercede on Henning’s behalf. Even Al Qaida affiliate Jabhat Al Nusra sent a representative.

I was contacted to see if I could inquire and convince ISIS to release Henning as my travels afforded me a chance to know more than a few ISIS members who rose to positions of authority. A few days later ISIS positions came under attack by the group Jaysh Mujaahideen. Henning was taken from his prison in Dana never to be heard from again.

While speaking to convoy officials I suggested making the abduction public. I suggested that the Henning family should make a public appeal to Abu Bakr Baghdadi himself to release Henning as he only came to help the Syrian people and nothing more.

However, convoy officials mentioned that British authorities thought it would be best to not make the issue public as they felt it would complicate matters. This morning, on the video released by ISIS, marks the first time that Henning has been heard from since that time.

ISIS: What will you do now?

As you can see, this story was written before the release of this video and the events are true. So my question to any ISIS supporters out there is this: What will you do now?

This man came to help poor Syrians. He came on a convoy of other Muslims who respected his zeal to help their Muslim brethren. How is this the treatment that he deserves under Islamic law? Where is your sense of fear of Allah, supporters of Baghdadi?

You may have originally intended to serve Allah but your assistance to this group has led you down a wrong path. There is still plenty of fight left to fight against the likes of Bashar, but furthering the goals of ISIS is not what you came for.

Do not dismiss my words by simply saying that “He is just one person and we have all of these Muslims here dying by the hundreds”. To that I would say we should all stand up for what is right regardless of who it is and what their faith is.

Muslims have been striving and dying to protect innocent Muslims so do not let someone come and tell you that there is only an outcry when non Muslims are at stake. This is a trick. I have seen the likes of Muslim fighters struggling to protect Syrians from being killed, some of those civilians were Muslim and some weren’t. However they didn’t deserve to be killed so the Mujaahideen protected them.

I end this article by asking you, supporters of ISIS, to flood every ISIS member’s email box, Twitter, Facebook etc with condemnations for what is about to take place. Allah will ask you about it. If you are currently in ISIS then I ask you in the name of Allah to be men and confront your Ameer and tell him that this is wrong and it needs to be stopped.

Didn’t Allah say:

“That if anyone killed a person not in retaliation of murder, or to spread corruption in the land – it would be as if he killed all mankind, and if anyone saved a life, it would be as if he saved the life of all mankind.” -5:32

Reflect.

Filed Under: Muslim World Tagged With: Abu Bakr Baghdadi, Alan Henning, David Haines, Iraq, IS, ISIL, ISIS, Islamic State

Arab states to join US to fight against IS

September 12, 2014 by Nasheman

The 10 states and Washington declared their commitment to stand united against threats posed by "terrorism" [AFP]

10 Arab states agree on joining forces against IS. [AFP]

Jeddah: Ten Arab countries, including six Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) member states, have agreed to join the US in the fight against Islamic State fighters, as the US seeks to build an international coalition.

Following a meeting between US Secretary of State John Kerry and his Arab counterparts in Jeddah, the participating countries released a statement on Thursday, saying they would “do their share in the comprehensive fight” against the Islamic State group.

In addition to Saudi Arabia, the other Arab states present were Bahrain, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates. Although Turkey did not join in the statement but said it will participate in the fight against the IS.

In the final statement, the 10 countries and Washington declared their “shared commitment to stand united against the threat posed by all terrorism, including the so-called Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant”.

According to the statement their fight will include “stopping the flow of foreign fighters through neighbouring countries, countering financing of ISIL and other violent extremists, repudiating their hateful ideology, ending impunity and bringing perpetrators to justice”.

It will also include “contributing to humanitarian relief efforts, assisting with the reconstruction and rehabilitation of communities brutalised by ISIL, supporting states that face the most acute ISIL threat”.

Support for IS

Meanwhile, in an interview given to journalist Abdel Bari Atwan, Sheikh Abu Muhammad al-Maqdisi, described as “the most influential living jihadi ideologue” said that, given the choice between supporting US military intervention and the “Islamic state”, he will choose the latter, and also added that he’ll urge others to do the same.

Sheikh al-Maqdisi had denounced the “Islamic state”, on doctrinal grounds, when Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi had declared his ‘Khilafah’, with the supporters of IS going so far, as calling him an “apostate”.

Although the US has the largest striking force in history, however, question remains, given its past debacles in Iraq and Afghanistan, what this new intervention will bring forth. With US troops already on ground in Kurdistan in northern Iraq, many groups, which had earlier fought IS, would be willing to join forces, to fight the Americans, who they have historical loggerheads with.

Many believe if there is one thing, this renewed intervention will achieve, it is more support for IS.

Filed Under: Muslim World Tagged With: Abdel Bari Atwan, Arabs, Iraq, IS, ISIL, Islamic State, John Kerry, Muhammad al-Maqdisi

Ceasefires in which violations never cease: What's next for Israel, Hamas and Gaza?

September 10, 2014 by Nasheman

A Palestinian boy climbs through the rubble of a house after it was hit in an Israeli air strike in Gaza City, Aug. 25, 2014. (Photo: Wissam Nassar / The New York Times)

A Palestinian boy climbs through the rubble of a house after it was hit in an Israeli air strike in Gaza City, Aug. 25, 2014. (Photo: Wissam Nassar / The New York Times)

– by Noam Chomsky

On August 26th, Israel and the Palestinian Authority (PA) both accepted a ceasefire agreement after a 50-day Israeli assault on Gaza that left 2,100 Palestinians dead and vast landscapes of destruction behind. The agreement calls for an end to military action by both Israel and Hamas, as well as an easing of the Israeli siege that has strangled Gaza for many years.

This is, however, just the most recent of a series of ceasefire agreements reached after each of Israel’s periodic escalations of its unremitting assault on Gaza. Throughout this period, the terms of these agreements remain essentially the same. The regular pattern is for Israel, then, to disregard whatever agreement is in place, while Hamas observes it — as Israel has officially recognized — until a sharp increase in Israeli violence elicits a Hamas response, followed by even fiercer brutality. These escalations, which amount to shooting fish in a pond, are called “mowing the lawn” in Israeli parlance. The most recent was more accurately described as “removing the topsoil” by a senior U.S. military officer, appalled by the practices of the self-described “most moral army in the world.”

The first of this series was the Agreement on Movement and Access Between Israel and the Palestinian Authority in November 2005. It called for “a crossing between Gaza and Egypt at Rafah for the export of goods and the transit of people, continuous operation of crossings between Israel and Gaza for the import/export of goods, and the transit of people, reduction of obstacles to movement within the West Bank, bus and truck convoys between the West Bank and Gaza, the building of a seaport in Gaza, [and the] re-opening of the airport in Gaza” that Israeli bombing had demolished.

That agreement was reached shortly after Israel withdrew its settlers and military forces from Gaza. The motive for the disengagement was explained by Dov Weissglass, a confidant of then-Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, who was in charge of negotiating and implementing it. “The significance of the disengagement plan is the freezing of the peace process,” Weissglass informed the Israeli press. “And when you freeze that process, you prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state, and you prevent a discussion on the refugees, the borders, and Jerusalem. Effectively, this whole package called the Palestinian state, with all that it entails, has been removed indefinitely from our agenda. And all this with authority and permission. All with a [U.S.] presidential blessing and the ratification of both houses of Congress.” True enough.

“The disengagement is actually formaldehyde,” Weissglass added. “It supplies the amount of formaldehyde that is necessary so there will not be a political process with the Palestinians.” Israeli hawks also recognized that instead of investing substantial resources in maintaining a few thousand settlers in illegal communities in devastated Gaza, it made more sense to transfer them to illegal subsidized communities in areas of the West Bank that Israel intended to keep.

The disengagement was depicted as a noble effort to pursue peace, but the reality was quite different. Israel never relinquished control of Gaza and is, accordingly, recognized as the occupying power by the United Nations, the U.S., and other states (Israel apart, of course). In their comprehensive history of Israeli settlement in the occupied territories, Israeli scholars Idith Zertal and Akiva Eldar describe what actually happened when that country disengaged: the ruined territory was not released “for even a single day from Israel’s military grip or from the price of the occupation that the inhabitants pay every day.” After the disengagement, “Israel left behind scorched earth, devastated services, and people with neither a present nor a future. The settlements were destroyed in an ungenerous move by an unenlightened occupier, which in fact continues to control the territory and kill and harass its inhabitants by means of its formidable military might.”

Operations Cast Lead and Pillar of Defense

Israel soon had a pretext for violating the November Agreement more severely. In January 2006, the Palestinians committed a serious crime. They voted “the wrong way” in carefully monitored free elections, placing the parliament in the hands of Hamas. Israel and the United States immediately imposed harsh sanctions, telling the world very clearly what they mean by “democracy promotion.” Europe, to its shame, went along as well.

The U.S. and Israel soon began planning a military coup to overthrow the unacceptable elected government, a familiar procedure. When Hamas pre-empted the coup in 2007, the siege of Gaza became far more severe, along with regular Israeli military attacks. Voting the wrong way in a free election was bad enough, but preempting a U.S.-planned military coup proved to be an unpardonable offense.

A new ceasefire agreement was reached in June 2008. It again called for opening the border crossings to “allow the transfer of all goods that were banned and restricted to go into Gaza.” Israel formally agreed to this, but immediately announced that it would not abide by the agreement and open the borders until Hamas released Gilad Shalit, an Israeli soldier held by Hamas.

Israel itself has a long history of kidnapping civilians in Lebanon and on the high seas and holding them for lengthy periods without credible charge, sometimes as hostages. Of course, imprisoning civilians on dubious charges, or none, is a regular practice in the territories Israel controls. But the standard western distinction between people and “unpeople” (in Orwell’s useful phrase) renders all this insignificant.

Israel not only maintained the siege in violation of the June 2008 ceasefire agreement but did so with extreme rigor, even preventing the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, which cares for the huge number of official refugees in Gaza, from replenishing its stocks.

On November 4th, while the media were focused on the U.S. presidential election, Israeli troops entered Gaza and killed half a dozen Hamas militants. That elicited a Hamas missile response and an exchange of fire. (All the deaths were Palestinian.) In late December, Hamas offered to renew the ceasefire. Israel considered the offer, but rejected it, preferring instead to launch Operation Cast Lead, a three-week incursion of the full power of the Israeli military into the Gaza strip, resulting in shocking atrocities well documented by international and Israeli human rights organizations.

On January 8, 2009, while Cast Lead was in full fury, the U.N. Security Council passed a unanimous resolution (with the U.S. abstaining) calling for “an immediate ceasefire leading to a full Israeli withdrawal, unimpeded provision through Gaza of food, fuel, and medical treatment, and intensified international arrangements to prevent arms and ammunition smuggling.”

A new ceasefire agreement was indeed reached, but the terms, similar to the previous ones, were again never observed and broke down completely with the next major mowing-the-lawn episode in November 2012, Operation Pillar of Defense. What happened in the interim can be illustrated by the casualty figures from January 2012 to the launching of that operation: one Israeli was killed by fire from Gaza while 78 Palestinians were killed by Israeli fire.

The first act of Operation Pillar of Defense was the murder of Ahmed Jabari, a high official of the military wing of Hamas. Aluf Benn, editor-in-chief of Israel’s leading newspaper Haaretz, described Jabari as Israel’s “subcontractor” in Gaza, who enforced relative quiet there for more than five years. As always, there was a pretext for the assassination, but the likely reason was provided by Israeli peace activist Gershon Baskin. He had been involved in direct negotiations with Jabari for years and reported that, hours before he was assassinated, Jabari “received the draft of a permanent truce agreement with Israel, which included mechanisms for maintaining the ceasefire in the case of a flare-up between Israel and the factions in the Gaza Strip.”

There is a long record of Israeli actions designed to deter the threat of a diplomatic settlement. After this exercise of mowing the lawn, a ceasefire agreement was reached yet again. Repeating the now-standard terms, it called for a cessation of military action by both sides and the effective ending of the siege of Gaza with Israel “opening the crossings and facilitating the movements of people and transfer of goods, and refraining from restricting residents’ free movements and targeting residents in border areas.”

What happened next was reviewed by Nathan Thrall, senior Middle East analyst of the International Crisis Group. Israeli intelligence recognized that Hamas was observing the terms of the ceasefire. “Israel,” Thrall wrote, “therefore saw little incentive in upholding its end of the deal. In the three months following the ceasefire, its forces made regular incursions into Gaza, strafed Palestinian farmers and those collecting scrap and rubble across the border, and fired at boats, preventing fishermen from accessing the majority of Gaza’s waters.” In other words, the siege never ended. “Crossings were repeatedly shut. So-called buffer zones inside Gaza [from which Palestinians are barred, and which include a third or more of the strip’s limited arable land] were reinstated. Imports declined, exports were blocked, and fewer Gazans were given exit permits to Israel and the West Bank.”

Operation Protective Edge

So matters continued until April 2014, when an important event took place. The two major Palestinian groupings, Gaza-based Hamas and the Fatah-dominated Palestinian Authority in the West Bank signed a unity agreement. Hamas made major concessions. The unity government contained none of its members or allies. In substantial measure, as Nathan Thrall observes, Hamas turned over governance of Gaza to the PA. Several thousand PA security forces were sent there and the PA placed its guards at borders and crossings, with no reciprocal positions for Hamas in the West Bank security apparatus. Finally, the unity government accepted the three conditions that Washington and the European Union had long demanded: non-violence, adherence to past agreements, and the recognition of Israel.

Israel was infuriated. Its government declared at once that it would refuse to deal with the unity government and cancelled negotiations. Its fury mounted when the U.S., along with most of the world, signaled support for the unity government.

There are good reasons why Israel opposes the unification of Palestinians. One is that the Hamas-Fatah conflict has provided a useful pretext for refusing to engage in serious negotiations. How can one negotiate with a divided entity? More significantly, for more than 20 years, Israel has been committed to separating Gaza from the West Bank in violation of the Oslo Accords it signed in 1993, which declare Gaza and the West Bank to be an inseparable territorial unity.

A look at a map explains the rationale. Separated from Gaza, any West Bank enclaves left to Palestinians have no access to the outside world. They are contained by two hostile powers, Israel and Jordan, both close U.S. allies — and contrary to illusions, the U.S. is very far from a neutral “honest broker.”

Furthermore, Israel has been systematically taking over the Jordan Valley, driving out Palestinians, establishing settlements, sinking wells, and otherwise ensuring that the region — about one-third of the West Bank, with much of its arable land — will ultimately be integrated into Israel along with the other regions that country is taking over. Hence remaining Palestinian cantons will be completely imprisoned. Unification with Gaza would interfere with these plans, which trace back to the early days of the occupation and have had steady support from the major political blocs, including figures usually portrayed as doves like former president Shimon Peres, who was one of the architects of settlement deep in the West Bank.

As usual, a pretext was needed to move on to the next escalation. Such an occasion arose when three Israeli boys from the settler community in the West Bank were brutally murdered. The Israeli government evidently quickly realized that they were dead, but pretended otherwise, which provided the opportunity to launch a “rescue operation” — actually a rampage primarily targeting Hamas. The Netanyahu government has claimed from the start that it knew Hamas was responsible, but has made no effort to present evidence.

One of Israel’s leading authorities on Hamas, Shlomi Eldar, reported almost at once that the killers very likely came from a dissident clan in Hebron that has long been a thorn in the side of the Hamas leadership. He added, “I’m sure they didn’t get any green light from the leadership of Hamas, they just thought it was the right time to act.”

The Israeli police have since been searching for and arresting members of the clan, still claiming, without evidence, that they are “Hamas terrorists.” On September 2nd, Haaretz reported that, after very intensive interrogations, the Israeli security services concluded the abduction of the teenagers “was carried out by an independent cell” with no known direct links to Hamas.

The 18-day rampage by the Israeli Defense Forces succeeded in undermining the feared unity government. According to Israeli military sources, its soldiers arrested 419 Palestinians, including 335 affiliated with Hamas, and killed six, while searching thousands of locations and confiscating $350,000. Israel also conducted dozens of attacks in Gaza, killing five Hamas members on July 7th.

Hamas finally reacted with its first rockets in 18 months, Israeli officials reported, providing Israel with the pretext to launch Operation Protective Edge on July 8th. The 50-day assault proved the most extreme exercise in mowing the lawn — so far.

Operation [Still to Be Named]

Israel is in a fine position today to reverse its decades-old policy of separating Gaza from the West Bank in violation of its solemn agreements and to observe a major ceasefire agreement for the first time. At least temporarily, the threat of democracy in neighboring Egypt has been diminished, and the brutal Egyptian military dictatorship of General Abdul Fattah al-Sisi is a welcome ally for Israel in maintaining control over Gaza.

The Palestinian unity government, as noted earlier, is placing the U.S.-trained forces of the Palestinian Authority in control of Gaza’s borders, and governance may be shifting into the hands of the PA, which depends on Israel for its survival, as well as for its finances. Israel might feel that its takeover of Palestinian territory in the West Bank has proceeded so far that there is little to fear from some limited form of autonomy for the enclaves that remain to Palestinians.

There is also some truth to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s observation: “Many elements in the region understand today that, in the struggle in which they are threatened, Israel is not an enemy but a partner.” Akiva Eldar, Israel’s leading diplomatic correspondent, adds, however, that “all those ‘many elements in the region’ also understand that there is no brave and comprehensive diplomatic move on the horizon without an agreement on the establishment of a Palestinian state based on the 1967 borders and a just, agreed-upon solution to the refugee problem.” That is not on Israel’s agenda, he points out, and is in fact in direct conflict with the 1999 electoral program of the governing Likud coalition, never rescinded, which “flatly rejects the establishment of a Palestinian Arab state west of the Jordan river.”

Some knowledgeable Israeli commentators, notably columnist Danny Rubinstein, believe that Israel is poised to reverse course and relax its stranglehold on Gaza.

We’ll see.

The record of these past years suggests otherwise and the first signs are not auspicious. As Operation Protective Edge ended, Israel announced its largest appropriation of West Bank land in 30 years, almost 1,000 acres. Israel Radio reported that the takeover was in response to the killing of the three Jewish teenagers by “Hamas militants.” A Palestinian boy was burned to death in retaliation for the murder, but no Israeli land was handed to Palestinians, nor was there any reaction when an Israeli soldier murdered 10-year-old Khalil Anati on a quiet street in a refugee camp near Hebron on August 10th, while the most moral army in the world was smashing Gaza to bits, and then drove away in his jeep as the child bled to death.

Anati was one the 23 Palestinians (including three children) killed by Israeli occupation forces in the West Bank during the Gaza onslaught, according to U.N. statistics, along with more than 2,000 wounded, 38% by live fire. “None of those killed were endangering soldiers’ lives,” Israeli journalist Gideon Levy reported. To none of this is there any reaction, just as there was no reaction while Israel killed, on average, more than two Palestinian children a week for the past 14 years. Unpeople, after all.

It is commonly claimed on all sides that, if the two-state settlement is dead as a result of Israel’s takeover of Palestinian lands, then the outcome will be one state West of the Jordan. Some Palestinians welcome this outcome, anticipating that they can then conduct a civil rights struggle for equal rights on the model of South Africa under apartheid. Many Israeli commentators warn that the resulting “demographic problem” of more Arab than Jewish births and diminishing Jewish immigration will undermine their hope for a “democratic Jewish state.”

But these widespread beliefs are dubious.

The realistic alternative to a two-state settlement is that Israel will continue to carry forward the plans it has been implementing for years, taking over whatever is of value to it in the West Bank, while avoiding Palestinian population concentrations and removing Palestinians from the areas it is integrating into Israel. That should avoid the dreaded “demographic problem.”

The areas being integrated into Israel include a vastly expanded Greater Jerusalem, the area within the illegal “Separation Wall,” corridors cutting through the regions to the East, and will probably also encompass the Jordan Valley. Gaza will likely remain under its usual harsh siege, separated from the West Bank. And the Syrian Golan Heights — like Jerusalem, annexed in violation of Security Council orders — will quietly become part of Greater Israel. In the meantime, West Bank Palestinians will be contained in unviable cantons, with special accommodation for elites in standard neocolonial style.

These basic policies have been underway since the 1967 conquest, following a principle enunciated by then-Defense Minister Moshe Dayan, one of the Israeli leaders most sympathetic to the Palestinians. He informed his cabinet colleagues that they should tell Palestinian refugees in the West Bank, “We have no solution, you shall continue to live like dogs, and whoever wishes may leave, and we will see where this process leads.”

The suggestion was natural within the overriding conception articulated in 1972 by future president Haim Herzog: “I do not deny the Palestinians a place or stand or opinion on every matter… But certainly I am not prepared to consider them as partners in any respect in a land that has been consecrated in the hands of our nation for thousands of years. For the Jews of this land there cannot be any partner.” Dayan also called for Israel’s “permanent rule” (“memshelet keva”) over the occupied territories. When Netanyahu expresses the same stand today, he is not breaking new ground.

Like other states, Israel pleads “security” as justification for its aggressive and violent actions. But knowledgeable Israelis know better. Their recognition of reality was articulated clearly in 1972 by Air Force Commander (and later president) Ezer Weizmann. He explained that there would be no security problem if Israel were to accept the international call to withdraw from the territories it conquered in 1967, but the country would not then be able to “exist according to the scale, spirit, and quality she now embodies.”

For a century, the Zionist colonization of Palestine has proceeded primarily on the pragmatic principle of the quiet establishment of facts on the ground, which the world was to ultimately come to accept. It has been a highly successful policy. There is every reason to expect it to persist as long as the United States provides the necessary military, economic, diplomatic, and ideological support. For those concerned with the rights of the brutalized Palestinians, there can be no higher priority than working to change U.S. policies, not an idle dream by any means.

Noam Chomsky is Institute Professor emeritus in the Department of Linguistics and Philosophy at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Among his recent books are Hegemony or Survival, Failed States, Power Systems, Occupy, and Hopes and Prospects. His latest book, Masters of Mankind, will be published this week by Haymarket Books, which is also reissuing 12 of his classic books in new editions over the coming year. His work is regularly posted at TomDispatch.com. His website is www.chomsky.info.

Filed Under: Muslim World Tagged With: Gaza, Hamas, Israel, Operations Cast Lead, Palestine

From Goldstone to Schabas… where is the justice for the Palestinians?

September 9, 2014 by Nasheman

Palestine

– by Nizar Al-Sahli

The UN Human Rights Council’s appointment of the Canadian William Schabas to investigate the violations of human rights laws committed by the Israeli occupation during the war on Gaza was preceded, on April 3, 2009, after Operation Cast Lead, by a report by international investigator Richard Goldstone, amounting to over 10,000 pages, more than 30 video tapes, and 1,200 photographs. He concluded that Israel violated Chapter 13 of the International Humanitarian Law, as it destroyed industrial infrastructure, food production units, water installations, schools and factories, as well as targeted civilian homes and using white phosphorus in the bombing of civilians. The occupation forces also violated the Fourth Geneva Convention.

The Goldstone Report formed the beginning of the international justice the Palestinians had always needed, and it was a great shock to them when the Palestinian Authority decided to yield completely to American and Western pressure by submitting a request to the UN Human Rights Council to defer the vote on the recommendations of the report presented by the fact-finding committee headed by Goldstone.

The Israeli occupation authorities are trying to pre-empt the William Schabas committee formed to investigate the “circumstances” and the “aspects” of the Israeli aggression on Gaza in order to abort all attempts at international investigation. In order to guarantee that a William Schabas Report similar to the Goldstone report is not presented, Israel named Joseph Shapira as the State Comptroller in Israel to begin an investigation with both the political and military Israeli officials into the Shujaya and Rafah massacres, thus avoiding and pre-empting the William Schabas report.

On the other hand, we are witnessing real political confusion within the Palestinian Authority, which has continued from the Goldstone Report and carried on to the Schabas Report, while waves of anger are emerging in most of the world’s capitals regarding the occupation’s policy against the Palestinian people. There have also been growing calls for an economic and political boycott of Israel, and this is being responded to by the Arab world and the Palestinians with a sense of indifference and has been reduced to a statement presented on the news ticker during each round of aggression and confrontation.

We are clearly witnessing the failed tactic used to deal with the Israeli aggression, which continues to affect even the smallest aspects of the Palestinians’ daily life. In addition to this, we are witnessing a lack of a clear strategy, meaning a policy based on continual dependence on others is being employed and there is a lack of factors of strength needed to engage in the various confrontations with the occupation, making them miserable policies in terms of form and content. Since the Madrid Conference and until today, we have not learned the lessons of employing such policies as well as from the continuous bartering process that leaves nothing of the Palestinians’ rights.

The policy of uncertainty and confusion bears, in its implications, disastrous results as well as weakness and dependency on the unknown. We base this conclusion on the experience with the Goldstone Report and the disregard of adopting a comprehensive political review of the tactic used by the Palestinian negotiator in his dealings with the occupation, not to mention the shock that hit the Palestinian people when the PA decided not to activate the Goldstone Report.

The Palestinians were also shocked, during the latest round of the aggression on Gaza that the official Arab support shifted from the Palestinians to the Israelis. Therefore, how can we rely on, or hope for, the awaited justice, either from the Goldstone or Schabas Report, as long as there is a flagrant abandonment of responsibility of the Palestinian cause by some of the official Arab governments?

The minimum requirement is a careful reading of the Israeli scene. During the aggression and before it, as well as throughout the pointless negotiations, the Israelis are united over the blood of the Palestinians and they are heading towards the right-wing fascist approaches to all of the “agreements” made. Therefore, today, we are waiting for justice even larger than the justice from the Goldstone or Schabas Reports; we are waiting for the justice of the brave Palestinian leadership, who must give up their crippling pride, equate themselves with the struggles of their people, and pay attention to the beds of strength across Palestine. The fog of transitioning from disagreement to hostility has written off the Palestinian leadership’s history and sacrifices. However, the justice awaited by the Palestinians is, without a doubt, their national unity with their legitimate intellectual and political “differences”.

Translated from Al-Araby Al-Jadeed, 18 August, 2014

Filed Under: Muslim World Tagged With: Gaza, Geneva Convention, Goldstone Report, Israel, Palestine, UNHRC, William Schabas

Former Taliban captive to Baghdadi: ‘Release him and take me’

September 8, 2014 by Nasheman

Aid worker David Haines.

Aid worker David Haines.

– by Yvonne Ridley

We are fast approaching the anniversary of 9/11 … an event which always resonates deeply not least of all because it is also a reminder of the time I was held captive by the Taliban in Afghanistan.

I was working for the Sunday Express newspaper when I was sent to Pakistan to cover the impending war in neighbouring Afghanistan in the wake of the atrocity; unable to wait for the start of the invasion I sneaked in to the country wearing the all-enveloping blue burqa.

After two days travelling in and around the Jalalabad district I was caught by members of what was described as the most evil, brutal regime in the world. However, compared to the Islamic State (ISIS), Mullah Mohammed Omar and his band of turban-wearing, bearded Taliban act like a bunch of choir boys.

Terrifying as it was, throughout my 10 days as a prisoner of the Taliban I was treated with courtesy and respect and, compared to the treatment subsequently meted out to those held in Guantanamo, Bagram and Abu Ghraib I have often reflected: “Thank God I was captured by the most evil, brutal regime in the world and not by the Americans!”

Now it is ISIS putting captives into orange boiler suits and reportedly water-boarding them and carrying out abuse on detainees using methods outlined in the CIA’s own handbook of torture. The sheer terror and revulsion invoked by the executions which followed are beyond words.

Sadly it appears George W Bush’s ill conceived War on Terror has made the world a less safe place especially for ordinary British and American citizens who work overseas in the volatile Middle East as aid workers, medics and journalists.

You can be sure that ISIS would never have emerged in Iraq if Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair had only listened to the people that voted them in to power. The legacy of their “shock and awe” in Iraq can be seen quite clearly today for what it is … a war based on lies over WMD. The war went on to become a spectacular failure causing the deaths of many and the creation of more than one million widows and orphans.

And now Iraq has morphed into a playground of terror for the self-styled caliph, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, and his military council that formulates all the group’s strategic decisions. It was they who must have agreed to sanction the beheading of two American journalists and now a Scottish aid worker is the next one being lined up for execution.

The bloody deaths of James Foley and Stephen Sotloff, have enraged the world and given fuel to the Islamaphobes who try and demonise Islam as a violent, aggressive and barbaric religion. As I, and the majority of Muslims around the world know, this is not the case.

Islam is a religion of peace and the behaviour of the Islamic State towards its enemies and its captives is at odds with what Islam teaches.

I know this to be the case because I studied the religion for two years after my own ordeal as a Taliban captive; subsequently I embraced Islam more than 10 years ago. Today I throw out a challenge to the Caliph and I am doing this on the basis of a verse in the Holy Qur’an from the chapter of an-Nisa, which roughly translated says: “He who intercedes in a good cause shall have a share in its good result, and he who intercedes in an evil cause shall have a share in its burden. Allah watches over everything.”

My personal intervention is with Quranic words and if Bagdahdi is the wise Caliph he promotes himself to be then he will accept my offer and it is this … release David Haines, the Scotsman in your custody, and I will take his place.

Why would I make such an offer? Well I am a person who is known for my word, so it is not an empty gesture or one made lightly, nor on the spur of the moment. As I write this I am in South Africa from where I took part in the recent launch of Cage Africa, a chapter of the London-based NGO Cage UK which is an advocacy group spawned from Guantanamo where around 150 men are still being held today without charge or trial.

So why would I, a Muslim, offer to swap places with a father-of-two who is not of the same Faith? I hear you ask. I am doing this for many reasons. Firstly, as an aid worker we are told he did a great deal to help Muslims during the Bosnia war and has devoted much of his life to helping others without concern over their faith, culture or nationality. This is, indeed, the true spirit of Islam where help is given freely to those in need and now I want to return the same kindness and compassion he showed Muslims.

Secondly, I’ve spent the last two days pondering over the photograph of him and his young child; it reminded me so much of my young daughter Daisy when I was taken into captivity 13 years ago this month by the Taliban. She is 21 and embarking on her final year at Newcastle University, a fine young woman of whom I’m very proud. While we share the unconditional love between mother and daughter, she doesn’t really need me as much as the child in the photograph needs her father.

Although I moved to Scotland barely three years ago this aid worker was brought up in Perth, more than an hour’s drive from my home in the Borders creating an affinity between us although we’ve never met. Finally, I have campaigned for the release of prisoners regularly since I supported Cage in those early days when Guantanamo opened for business. May be in some way I can highlight the injustices victims of the War on Terror are facing by making this exchange.

In many ways there are parallels between David Haines and the Guantanamo detainees … all are being held without trial or charge for nothing more than being swept up in the War on Terror or a by-product of it.

This offer of exchange is being made in the true spirit of Islam, a face of Islam unfortunately obscured all too often by the atrocities being carried out in the name of ISIS.

I don’t consider myself a brave person nor do I want to be a martyr. I enjoy the life I live with my wonderful husband very much but there comes a time when we have to make a stand for our beliefs and this is mine. The Prophet Muhammad once said that the duty of Muslims was to: “Visit the sick, feed the hungry and arrange for the release of the captive.”

I am told that every decision taken by Baghdadi is motivated by Quranic teachings so he should, as a person of knowledge, be well acquainted with the full meaning of Surah an-Nisa’s verse 85 I quoted earlier. It now remains to be seen if he is man enough to take up my offer and release the aid worker, a good person swept up in a conflict not of his making.

I eagerly await his response and beg him, in the meantime, to spare the life of David Haines and show the sort of wisdom and compassion the Taliban showed me.

Filed Under: Muslim World Tagged With: Abu Bakr Baghdadi, Iraq, IS, ISIL, ISIS, Islamic State, Syria, Taliban, Yvonne Ridley

Inside jobs and Israeli stooges: Why is the Muslim World in thrall to conspiracy cheories?

September 7, 2014 by Nasheman

There's a theory out there that the 2010 floods in Pakistan were caused by secret US military technology. Photo: Getty

There’s a theory out there that the 2010 floods in Pakistan were caused by secret US military technology. Photo: Getty

– by Mehdi Hasan

Did you know that Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the leader of Isis, was trained by Mossad and the CIA? Were you aware that his real name isn’t Ibrahim Awwad Ibrahim Ali al-Badri al-Samarrai but Simon Elliot? Or that he’s a Jewish actor who was recruited by the Israelis to play the part of the world’s most wanted terrorist?

If the messages in my email in-box and my Twitter timeline and on my Facebook page are anything to go by, plenty of Muslims are not only willing to believe this nonsensical drivel but are super-keen to share it with their friends. The bizarre claim that NSA documents released by Edward Snowden “prove” the US and Israel are behind al-Baghdadi’s actions has gone viral.

There’s only one problem. “It’s utter BS,” Glenn Greenwald, the investigative journalist who helped break the NSA story, told me. “Snowden never said anything like that and no [NSA] documents suggest it.” Snowden’s lawyer, Ben Wizner, has called the story a hoax.

But millions of Muslims across the globe have a soft spot for such hoaxes. Conspiracy theories are rife in both Muslim-majority countries and Muslim communities here in the west. The events of 9/11 and the subsequent “war on terror” unleashed a vast array of hoaxers, hucksters and fantasists from Birmingham to Beirut.

On a visit to Iraq in 2002, I met a senior Islamic cleric who told me that Jews, not Arabs, had been responsible for the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. He loudly repeated the Middle East’s most popular and pernicious 9/11 conspiracy theory: that 4,000 Jews didn’t turn up for work on 11 September 2001 because they had been forewarned about the attacks.

There is, of course, no evidence for this outlandish and offensive claim. The truth is that more than 200 Jews, including several Israeli citizens, were killed in the attacks on the twin towers. I guess they must have missed the memo from Mossad.

Yet the denialism persists. A Pew poll in 2011, a decade after 9/11, found that a majority of respondents in countries such as Egypt, Jordan and Lebanon refused to believe that the attacks were carried out by Arab members of al-Qaeda. “There is no Muslim public in which even 30 per cent accept that Arabs conducted the attacks,” the Pew researchers noted.

This blindness isn’t peculiar to the Arab world or the Middle East. Consider Pakistan, home to many of the world’s weirdest and wackiest conspiracy theories. Some Pakistanis say the schoolgirl Malala Yousafzai is a CIA agent. Others think that the heavy floods of 2010, which killed 2,000 Pakistanis, were caused by secret US military technology. And two out of three don’t believe Osama Bin Laden was killed by US navy Seals on Pakistani soil on 2 May 2011.

Consider also Nigeria, where there was a polio outbreak in 2003 after local people boycotted the vaccine, claiming it was a western plot to infect Muslims with HIV. Then there is Indonesia, the world’s most populous Muslim-majority country, where leading politicians and journalists blamed the 2002 Bali bombings on US agents.

Why are so many of my fellow Muslims so gullible and so quick to believe bonkers conspiracy theories? How have the pedlars of paranoia amassed such influence within Muslim communities?

First, we should be fair: it’s worth noting that Muslim-majority nations have been on the receiving end of various actual conspiracies. France and Britain did secretly conspire to carve up the Middle East between them with the Sykes-Picot Agreement of 1916. They also conspired to attack Egypt, with Israel’s help, and thereby provoked the Suez crisis of 1956. Oh, and it turned out there weren’t any WMDs in Iraq in 2003 despite what the dossiers claimed.

I once asked the Pakistani politician Imran Khan why his fellow citizens were so keen on conspiracy theories. “They’re lied to all the time by their leaders,” he replied. “If a society is used to listening to lies all the time.. everything becomes a conspiracy.”

The “We’ve been lied to” argument goes only so far. Scepticism may be evidence of a healthy and independent mindset; but conspiracism is a virus that feeds off insecurity and bitterness. As the former Pakistani diplomat Husain Haqqani has admitted, “the contemporary Muslim fascination for conspiracy theories” is a convenient way of “explaining the powerlessness of a community that was at one time the world’s economic, scientific, political and military leader”.

Nor is this about ignorance or illiteracy. Those who promulgate a paranoid, conspiratorial world-view within Muslim communities include the highly educated and highly qualified, the rulers as well as the ruled. A recent conspiracy theory blaming the rise of Islamic State on the US government, based on fabricated quotes from Hillary Clinton’s new memoir, was publicly endorsed by Lebanon’s foreign minister and Egypt’s culture minister.

Where will it end? When will credulous Muslims stop leaning on the conspiracy crutch? We blame sinister outside powers for all our problems – extremism, despotism, corruption and the rest – and paint ourselves as helpless victims rather than indepen­dent agents. After all, why take responsibility for our actions when it’s far easier to point the finger at the CIA/Mossad/the Jews/the Hindus/fill-in-your-villain-of-choice?

As the Egyptian intellectual Abd al-Munim Said once observed, “The biggest problem with conspiracy theories is that they keep us not only from the truth, but also from confronting our faults and problems.” They also make us look like loons. Can we give it a rest, please?

Mehdi Hasan is the political director of the Huffington Post UK and a contributing writer for the New Statesman, where this article is crossposted

Filed Under: Muslim World Tagged With: 9/11, Conspiracy theory, Edward Snowden, Husain Haqqani, Jews, Middle East, Mossad, Muslims, NSA

The alleged Saudi plan to move the Prophet’s tomb, truth or hype?

September 5, 2014 by Nasheman

Masjid-an-Nabwi

Early this week, The Independent, one of UK’s leading national newspaper, published an article citing a supposedly “leading Saudi academic”, who it says has exposed a proposed document by another Saudi academic, who has allegedly called for the removal of the Prophet Muhammad (SAWS)’s “remains to the nearby al-Baqi cemetery, where they would be interred anonymously.”

The 61 -page document by Dr. Ali bin Abdulaziz al-Shabal of the Imam Muhammad ibn Saud Islamic University in Riyadh, is said to have been circulated to the Committee of the Presidency of the Two Mosques, which the paper claims has outlines for destroying chambers around the Prophet (SAWS)’s tomb.

The words in the article reads more like that of a soothsayer than of a reporter, for since its publication, the news has caused an uproar across the Muslim world, with many condemning the supposed proposal.

In Indonesia, Hasyim Muzadi, a former chairman of the country’s largest Islamic organization, Nahdlatul Ulama (NU) has condemned and strongly opposed the alleged relocation idea and said that, “Saudi will be doomed if it goes ahead with the plan.”

Dr. Abdul Ruff writing in India’s MuslimMirror states that, “It is apparent that mischievous devils are slowing taking control of Islamic Holy sites in Saudi Arabia, even as Saudi regime moves faster than even to promote anti-Islamic forces settle down in Western and Israeli terrocracies.”

The writer, whose language is very evidently polarized against the regime in Saudi Arabia goes on to state, without citing any evidence that, “Even the very thought to destroying the tomb of the Holy Prophet Mohammad (SAWS) would not have crossed the minds of ordinary, sincere Muslims. This is state mischief, perhaps took birth either in Washington or London and conveyed ot the king himself who seems to have found the “scholars” to express it openly.”

What is apparent in the above statements, and in the anger which has stirred among many Muslims following this supposed news, is that it is based entirely on an article, which was written by sidelining all journalistic principles, primarily among which is to cite evidence for what is being claimed.

According to Hasib Noor, a student of Islamic Law at the University of al-Madinah al-Munawwarah, Dr. Irfan Al-Alawi, the source of the Independent article, who the paper cites as a “leading Saudi academic”, is in fact based out of Washington D.C.

In his response to the alleged destruction plans, he writes that, “The source mentioned in the article, Dr. Irfan Al-Alawi,  of the Islamic Heritage Research Foundation, represents a polarizing organization called the Center of Islamic Pluralism based out of Washington D.C. The background, connection, and history of the organization and Dr. Irfan Al-Alawi is deserving of an entire separate article.

The timing of this article is something that came to light as research is done by close friends that showed that the Independent regularly posts articles every year that seemingly recycled the same story regarding the destruction of masjid Nabwi, Mecca and/or the Prophet’s ṣallallāhu 'alayhi wa sallam (peace and blessings of Allāh be upon him) tomb. These articles date as far back as least to 2011. Dr. Alawi is consistently used as a source annually on this topic in 2011, 2012, 2013 and now with the most recent one in 2014. One can recognize a clear trend or what some might call agenda.”

About the document and Dr. al-Shabal, he says that, “The article discusses a 61-page document by a “leading Islamic academic Dr Ali ibn AbdulAziz al-Shabal.” The reality is he is not a leading academic, unheard of by the Center of Historical Studies, and someone unknown until the Independent coins him as a “leading Islamic academic” figure.

The document he wrote is a paper that post-doctoral candidates in Saudi Arabian universities write in order to reach the level of adjunct professor. Al-Shabal teaches at imam University. He submitted this paper to the Committee of the Presidency of the Two Masjids in order to establish credibility and at the end of his paper he makes suggestions. He did not submit a proposal to the government; that was never intended—let alone accepted. It is an entry submitted to an academic journal that was taken completely out of context in the Independent article—no, not out of context, seemingly used for an intended purpose.”

Yasir Qadhi, an American Muslim scholar and writer said that, “the paper (by al-Shabal) itself does not actually state that the blessed grave should be touched. No sane Muslim would ever suggest that. Rather, what it suggests is that the masjid itself should be replanned in the new construction so that the blessed grave would be outside of the new masjid boundaries. So, what the author suggested was to change the boundary of the masjid, not that of the grave.”

He added that, “this view is a minority view and has been soundly rejected by mainstream Salafi (referred derisively as Wahabbis by many) and all non-Salafi scholars. Historically, there has never been any serious opposition to the Umayyad inclusion of the blessed grave into the Prophet (SAWS)’s masjid (which occurred in 88 AH), and no major scholar of any madhhab has ever called for the Prophet’s (SAWS) masjid boundaries to be redrawn.”

Commenting on the reaction from the Muslims, Hasib further notes that, “Many are in deep hate mode and have lunged full on attacks… without checking the facts.

When the facts are pointed out to many that the article contains false information, most seem to not care, “the reality is we can’t forget that Saudi did…” or “but in Saudi…” type rhetoric is spreading. Even academics that lay claim to scholastic standard, even journalists, even educators… many are falling prey to the exact intention of the article —the sowing of discord.

For many equating Saudi to not just a government but to an ideology that pigeonhole others is becoming comfortable, again. The “they” and “us” is something that spread through the discussions on social media, no matter which “spectrum” the person belonged to. The standing and representing movements rather than Islam again reared its ugly head.

Many are letting their feelings dictate their rationale—it doesn’t matter if the assertions in the article are false, there is injustice that needs to be spoken against, and criticism that needs to be made.”

The whole episode only goes on to show, how mainstream media breeds on sensationalism, and how easily many Muslims go on to demonize each other, even though only a few weeks ago, many had called for a boycott of many media outlets claiming it to be bankrolled by the Zionists.

Filed Under: Muslim World Tagged With: al-Baqi, al-Shabal, Independent, Irfan al-Alawi, Masjid al-Nabawi, Nahdlatul Ulama, Prophet Muhammad, Saudi Arabia

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