This is a guest post by al-Qanaas al-Masri
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The City Circle, a “moderate” Muslim group headed by Rabia Malik, sent out an email yesterday announcing that in July it will hold an event to celebrate the group’s 10 year anniversary. It says that:
The City Circle has been a unique experiment in creating an indigenous, independent and inclusive space for Muslim and non-Muslim communities to critically debate issues that concern them and to harness professionals’ skills back into helping local communities.
Independent? Really?
For the last two years, many of City Circle’s events have been quietly organised by and co-hosted with the International Institute of Islamic Thought (IIIT), a Saudi-backed, US-based Islamist organisation that also has a branch in London. City Circle has not openly advertised this collaboration and the details of the eleven joint events held between the two organisations to date are only available on the website of the IIIT.
Why has the City Circle been so coy about its links with the IIIT? One reason might be that the IIIT’s US branch is closely linked to the Muslim Brotherhood and, according to the Investigative Project on Terrorism, is presently under federal grand jury investigation on suspicion of supporting terrorism.
An even closer look at the IIIT reveals a number of disturbing details:
- The IIIT’s US leaders are closely tied to the Muslim Brotherhood and Wahhabi organisations. For example, its trustees include Ishaq Farhan who has recently been appointed secretary-general of the Islamic Action Front, the Jordanian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood, while one of its founders, Ahmad Totonji, was the first ever secretary-general of the World Association of Muslim Youth (WAMY). The IIIT’s UK branch meanwhile translates, publishes and distributes books by Qaradawi and others Islamist writers.
- The IIIT has also been named as a “friend” of the Muslim Brotherhood’s US branch by an extremist member of the Muslim Brotherhood who was later convicted of terrorist charges in a US court. In 1991, an internal document by the Muslim Brotherhood’s US branch, titled ‘An Explanatory Memorandum; On the General Strategic Goal for the Group in North America’, described the Brotherhood’s aim in the US as “Civilization-Jihadist Process”:
- “The Ikhwan 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.”
- The author included the IIIT in “a list of our organizations and the organizations of our friends” which he believed would be willing to work towards this. The author of this memo was Abdurahman Alamoudi, a Muslim Brotherhood member who would later be convicted on terrorism charges after admitting accepting nearly $1m from Libya and planning to assassinate the ruler of Saudi Arabia
- Other senior leaders of the IIIT have close links to the genocidal, Muslim Brotherhood-backed dictatorship which has ruled Sudan from 1993 to the present day. Abubaker Al-Shingieti, IIIT’s Regional Director for Europe and North Africa, served as a spokesman for the Sudanese government between 1993-5 and was the presidency’s director of public affairs from 1995-8. During this period, the Sudanese government massacred thousands of Sudanese Christians in a brutal attempt to force them to live under Sharia law while the country also openly sheltered Osama bin Laden and leading jihadists from Egypt’s Islamic Jihad organisation. One can only assume that Al-Shingieti’s main job as a PR man in a dictatorship was to put a positive spin on genocide and fascism.
- The IIIT’s US branch has also donated at least £50,000 towards a number of Islamist front organisations run by Sami al-Arian, a US academic and Islamist activist who in 2006 pleaded guilty to charges of conspiring to provide support to the Palestinian Islamic Jihad group. In addition to giving money to Arian’s front organisations, the IIIT also made quite clear that it supported his cause. A 1992 letter from the then-president of the IIIT, Taha Jaber Al-Alwani to Arian, stated that “the matter of the financial support was never the basis of our relationship, for our relation added to the brotherhood of faith and Islam is an ideological and cultural concordance with the same objective … We deem all of your institutions our own”.
- Prominent US analysts have even linked IIIT employees to al-Qaeda. Matthew Levitt, a senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Polict and former senior counter-terrorism official in the US government, has testified before the US congress that “Tarik Hamdi, an IIIT employee, personally provided bin Laden with the battery for the satellite phone [which] prosecutors at the New York trial of the East Africa Embassy bombers described as “the phone bin Laden and other will use to carry out their war against the United States”.” And, one might add, in al-Qaeda’s war against ordinary Muslims.
Rabia Malik, the head of City Circle, gives every appearance of being an ordinary, reasonable and tolerant person. Why then has she (and the other members of City Circle) allowed the City Circle to hold over ten joint events (the next is scheduled for 19 July) with the IIIT – an organisation which has such multiple ties to the most extreme and intolerant Islamist individuals and groups?
One can only assume either that she does not know very much about IIIT – or that she knows all about them and thinks that they are just fine for City Circle to do business with. But if she – and the other members of City Circle – were unaware of the IIIT’s true nature, then why has City Circle been so shy about revealing its links to the IIIT?
Rabia Malik is also highly regarded by the British government which has repeatedly wooed her organisation and has even paid for her to travel the world as part of their ‘Projecting British Muslims’ programme. One wonders if the British government is aware of the close co-operation between her City Circle and IIIT?
Have the British government’s counter-terrorism’s boffins done their due diligence on City Circle and its extremist connections? Did they decide that City Circle’s connections to IIIT were all fine and dandy? Or should we add this to the (ever lengthening) list of governmental screw-ups?
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YOSSARIAN ADDS: Yahya Birt has raised some objections to this article and we believe he will provide a response to it. We look forward to this and Spittoon will be glad to guest post it as and when he is able to do so.
29 Comments
There is also the involvement of the Yaqoob family. Salma Yaqoob and her brother (I think) cut their teeth on a campaign for the freedom of Abu Hamza’s son and godson, who were arrested while engaging in jihadist training in Yemen. She is now part of the Birmingham Centre Mosque clique.
My impression is that the City Circle has been infiltrated and taken over.
I think that the original moderate leadership has been ousted.
I have been very reluctant to weigh in to this business, because my hope is that the entryists will be chucked out. But that is what I think is going on.
Hmmm interesting because I always had them down as a moderate bunch, I know a number of key members there certainly are moderate. So not sure what to make of this. Isn’t Usama Hassan the chair?
I think that Usama Hassan and Asim Siddique have now been sidelined for being too sensible. It’s a great shame – they are both very sane, upright and moral people. Our community needs more people like them – not less.
I agree Fiyaz – tragic if that’s the case. A bit like MPAC they started off semi-normal only to end up completely raving mad lunatics who blame everything on grand jewish conspiracies. At least Islam Channel and IHRC have been consistently mad.
Great post Cairene Hunter! I’m not convinced by the City Circle or its myriad associates. I’ve been following Abu Muntasir and ‘his’ JIMAS organisation for the best part of 7 years now and am beginning to get a feel for so-called non-violent Salafist Islam. What concerns me most is that, all too often and with very few exceptions, the goal is always the same: Islamising the UK.
There was an interview with Anas at-Tikriti reproduced @IslamOnline yesterday (http://www.islamonline.net/servlet/Satellite?c=ArticleA_C&cid=1245159083541&pagename=Zone-Arabic-News/NWALayout). He’s quite clear about ‘integration’: namely, that civil society must remove the obstacles that push ‘Muslims’ towards isolationism and extremism as well as ‘whispering quietly’ to decision makers in the corridors of power.
He talks about the opportunities for political Islamism in the wake of the European and local elections:
” There is no doubt that with these challenges there are opportunities available to us now because everyone is evaluating themselves, and this is what allows us to occupy new positions, engage in the debate and offer solutions that will be heard.”
There is a British Muslim community (news to the majority of Muslims in the UK, I’ll wager), crying out for an authentic voice:
“As Muslim communities in Britain are diverse…it behoves the British Muslim community today to determine its exact identity and its relationship with the public entity (i.e. Britain) and the cadence of the language used.”
Muslims must Islamise the public discourse to make Islam ‘acceptable’:
The question is to identify the practices that accord with these [Islamic] beliefs and a sense of belonging to this country; it’s a personal challenge to incorporate training and education programmes into kuttaabs/madrasahs, as well as Friday sermons, meetings, social and Islamic centers and the like so that Islam infiltrates the discourse throughout society and would then be appear natural, unconstrained and non-artificial.”
To be honest, in a free society, people like at-Takriti and various other purveyors of Islamism are entitled to their views and we should give them the opportunity to coordinate their activities, found organisations and hold discussions. However, what we should not do is fund them in any way or allow government attempts to use them as power brokers over a fictitious Muslim community to go unchallenged.
Yes, Usama Hasan and Asim Siddiqui have been kicked off as Chair and Director in a plot organised by another trustee, Salma Yaqub’s brother Rashad Yaqub. It seems he has arranged for his friends to take their place. City Circle has been hijacked. In response, Asim tried to become a bit more radical to hold on to his chair. He should have known that “the Islamists and Fellow Travellers will never be satisfied with him until he leaves his religion”!
Hahaha, well said Fist of the North Star!
from Whipps Cross Lad:
To be honest, in a free society, people like at-Takriti and various other purveyors of Islamism are entitled to their views and we should give them the opportunity to coordinate their activities, found organisations and hold discussions. However, what we should not do is fund them in any way or allow government attempts to use them as power brokers over a fictitious Muslim community to go unchallenged.
*stands up and applauds*
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2009/jun/13/queens-birthday-honours-list-dbe-and-cbe
Dr Anas Al-Shaikh Ali, who has been heavily involved in the FCO Projecting British Islam project (see for example http://www.fco.gov.uk/en/fco-in-action/counter-terrorism/counter-terrorism/preventing-extremism/projecting-british-muslims/previous-pbm-visits/pbm-turkey), was awarded an OBE in HRH the Queen’s birthday honours. He is academic advisor to the International Institute of Islamic Thought and director of its translation department. He is also the IIIT’s English publications senior editor.
As regards IIIT, see this well-thumbed Hudson report (pp.22 & 45):
http://www.futureofmuslimworld.com/docLib/20090406_Merley2009Layout5.pdf
yahya birt doesn’t seem to be too impressed with this article:
http://www.pickledpolitics.com/archives/4925#comment-167720
b’shalom
bananabrain
David T
“I think that the original moderate leadership has been ousted.”
This of course means “moderate from the point of view of a Muslim hating rabid zionist apologist for Israel like David T”
I still think city circle are on of The most moderate islamic group around compared to what i have come into contact with. Just because somehow it is affilated with the islamic brotherhood, which to be honest isn’t really what its made out to be. it was once upon a time a rebellious, anti-government movement but now they’re just a name.
Ive been there for a talk on Science and Geometry. Most of the people attending these days are cultured white people looking for an alternative to an all booze up friday night. You should go sometime, talks can be quite interesting.
I think any religious group that offers talks on science (and geometry, to boot!) needs to be steered well clear of until it can be shown that they are not going to get all cranky, Creationist and start showing slide shows of aubergines cut in half to reveal the name of Allah spelled out in pips or claim that their Prophet invented the electron scanning microscope in the 7th Century.
But that is just me.
Carry on.
Yeah, al-Ikhwaan are a spent force made up of gentle, cuddly bears who like nothing better than to get together for the playing of board games, or the discussing of inter-religious peace, or women’s rights, or holding seminars on knowing it is all right to cry and be a man…
Do fuck off.
Yes it is just you.
The talks were from University Professors and Christian ministers and it was based on the Geometry used in buildings of past (especially in the UK). As i said very interesting, you’ll be amazed at what you don’t know .
Fascinating, Layla.
So, they did not discuss their intimate links with the clerical fascist Muslim Brotherhood?
How very odd.
How do you get on in life? Such a hard way of looking at things.
You must find everything odd?
Life is fascinating, i’ll give you that. Just go out and learn and become wiser for it. You may find you die a happier man.
Peace.
The usual pattern emerges. They are nobbled followed by the lies.
Layla
I get on in life by assiduously avoiding religious nutters and those that facilitate them. Now, do go away – I’ve got the ironing to do.
Abu Faris,
what you do is “catch the world in the headlight of your justice..”
You are no different to the religious nutters you claim to be against. See your comments above.
Oh really? Is that so, Layla.
At least I am not in the business of bigging-up organisations that accommodate, support and encourage clerical fascists like the Muslim Brotherhood.
Just simply love your use of the “…and you hang Black people” fallacy, incidentally.
You do! Excellent..
Now put that iron down before you hurt yourself with all that ranting and raving.
Unless you are willing to help with the ironing, Layla – can I suggest you pay attention to what I wrote?
Failing that, bugger off. Do.
Your argument amounts to:
City Circle are just fine and dandy. After all, they once held a meeting about science (with added geometry!) and some vicars attended too.
Well, I never.
And?
And thats what we call bridging communities together.
Stop throwing hate into the world, there is too much of it around already.
Iron my shirt.
“Bridging” which communities?
Personally, I would prefer a piranha infested moat kept between “my” “community” and the Islamists.
And I doubt that “Have you hugged an Islamist today?” campaigns will get us anywhere. (Although Anjem Chaudhry’s reaction might be worth the price of admission.)