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It is now clear US Army Major Nidal Hasan had a series of connections to the Islamist cleric, Anwar al-Awlaki . For those of us who have studied, with increasing concern, the extreme teachings of this cleric, this tragedy is the inevitable consequence of un-checked Islamist radicalisation. This situation has been made all the more distressing by the apparent lack of concern shown by the US Intelligence and Military authorities in taking Awlaki’s influence seriously.

Even before Major Nidal had fired a single bullet in Fort Hood, the US authorities knew about his increasingly vocal radicalisation and that he had attended the Dar al-Hijrah mosque in Virgina at the time Awlaki was its head Imam. Nidal had also been the subject of an FBI investigation after it was discovered that he made communication with Awlaki by email. There was certainly no lack of overt clues.

Inayat Bunglawala is right to say that most Islamic scholars, particularly in Britain, are opponents of the extremist fighting talk that is replete in Awlaki’s sermons. Even within political Islam, Awlaki’s teachings fall within the most extreme, Al Qaeda-aligned territory. Indeed, according to Charles E. Allen, the US Under Secretary for Intelligence and Analysis and Chief Intelligence Officer, Awlaki is the former spiritual leader to three of the 9/11 hijackers. He was also identified by the 9/11 Commission report as having provided advice to two of the 9/11 hijackers, Khaled Almihdar and Nawaf Alhazmi.

What should concern us most, however, is this. Awlaki has a huge internet following amongst Muslims, all over the world. His sermons, delivered in word perfect English and Arabic, are downloaded and shared by vast numbers of people in the Middle East and in the West. On his blog, which has now been taken down, his articles together with the stories of his scrapes with the FBI and his incarceration in Yemen, have earned him the status as the pre-eminent crossover Arabic-speaking theoretician of armed Jihad. 

Most disturbingly of all, Awlaki has been actively promoted by some of the United Kingdom’s most prominent Islamist organisations. Inayat Bunglawala’s description of Awlaki’s relationship with these organisations is an understatement of the seriousness of the problem. There are two points that are central to Bunglawala’s discussion of Awlaki’s connection in the UK. The first is that when Islamic organisations began inviting Awlaki to this country in the late 1990s, Awlaki was then still a mainstream, moderate imam with sensible views and showed “no hint of his later extremism”. The second, that Awlaki only became radicalised due to the US war against Iraq in 2003, and is therefore somehow the product of Western foreign policy. However, under greater scrutiny, neither of these claims stand up, even from the data available in the public domain on Awlaki.

A Washington Post report examined tax records from as early as 1998, which showed that Awlaki served as vice president of a charity (CSSW) founded by his then patron Abdul Majeed al-Zindani, a Yemeni politician who is named as an associate of Al-Qaeda. The CSSW has been described a “front organization to funnel money to terrorists”. The FBI also know that he was paid a visit in 2000 by an associate of Omar Abdel Rahman, known as the blind sheikh, who was convicted in connection with the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. The report also states that in 1999, Awlaki was investigdated by the FBI “when it learnt that he may have been visited by a “procurement agent” for bin Laden”.

In late 2002, Awlaki made a trip back to the USA, where he visited Ali al-Timimi, who was the time was accused by US prosecutors of recruiting Muslims to fight against US troops in Afghanistan. Timimi was convicted in 2005 and is now serving a life sentence for inciting followers to fight with the Taliban against Americans.

Inayat Bunglawala refers to an interview of Awlaki in the National Geographic from 2001, in which Awlaki’s responses are portrayed as reasonable and moderate. But what the interview doesn’t tell us is that in reality Awlaki had already been investigated twice by the FBI for his connections with Al-Qaeda. He was on his best behaviour. When Awlaki conducted another interview with IslamOnline – the website founded by the Muslim Brotherhood’s spiritual leader, Yusuf al-Qaradawi – he suggested that Mossad were behind the 9/11 attacks.

Therefore, by the time Awlaki was first invited to the UK by British Islamic organisations, he was, even by the Islamist standards, no moderate scholar. His actions show that he was a well known activist with a highly confrontational message for the cause of violent Jihad, long before the second Gulf War.

But it is what happened from 2002 onwards that is more important in the UK context. Since that date, Awlaki has been invited to speak in person, or via video link-up, by a large number of private Muslim organisations, university Islamic societies and registered charities which have benefited from government funding. They have promoted him, in spite of or perhaps because of, Awlaki’s track record and his increasingly explicit message exhorting Muslims to support violent Jihad.

Timeline

In June 2003, the Muslim Association of Britain (MAB), referred to as the official arm of the Muslim Brotherhood in the UK, organised a series of meetings with Awalki as guest speaker. 

Later that year, at an event organised by the East London Mosque (ELM) in December 2003, Awlaki addressed Muslims on the subject of terrorism arrests in the UK and urged them to never report on or turn over their fellow Muslims, under any circumstances. Two months prior in October 2003, the Islamic Forum Europe (IFE), an organisation closely associated with the ELM, invited Awlaki to speak at its ‘expoislamia’ event. In January 2009, the same ELM hosted  another event, entitled ‘The End of Time’, with Awlaki this time as delivering a video message. In spite of the fact that Awlaki’s “presence” at the event was reported in the national press, ELM refused to condemn Awlaki’s ideology or even cancel the meeting.

As late as 2005 Inayat Bunglawala and Awlaki were both listed as co- supporter of an organisation called ‘Stop Political Terror’ (SPT) which aimed to protect the civil rights of Muslims charged with extremism. One of individuals that SPT campaigned for was Babar Ahmad, who ran Azzam Publications, a pro-jihad website which, according to his indictment was “used to recruit individuals to be mujahideen and to solicit and raise funds and assistance for jihad”.

Osama Saeed, who now is poised to represent the Scottish National Party (SNP) for Glasgow Central in Parliament, wrote in his blog in 2006:

“Imam Anwar Al-Awlaki was originally hounded in the US because two of the 9/11 bombers happened to pray at his mosque. Many of my Muslim readers will either know him personally or have heard his lectures. He preached nothing but peace, and I pray he will be able to do so again.”

Saeed continues to cling on to the falsehood that Awlaki was a moderate when he praised his message of “nothing but peace” three years ago. He also references the National Geographic interview as proof of Awlaki’s moderateness, the citation of which is fast becoming the favoured get-out route for Islamists who want to justify their support of Awlaki.

Azad Ali is a civil servant in HM Treasury. He is the President of the Civil Service Islamic Society and sits on the council of Liberty. In January 2009, the Mail on Sunday reported Mr Ali’s extreme Islamist views in entries he had written on the IFE’s blog, ‘Between the Lines’ on which he has gushed about his “love” for the “Sheikh”, and then went on to justify Awlaki’s view that American Muslims who voted in elections were people who had “humiliated themselves by voting for candidates who have no serious concern for their issues”.

One of the directors of the MAB, Anas Altikriti, is now with the Cordoba Foundation which sponsored an event this summer in the Kensington and Chelsea Town Hall called ‘Beyond Guantanamo’ that was to feature an online video address by Awlaki.

Cage Prisoners (CP) is a successor organisation to Stop Political Terror, which also campaigns for Muslims who have been detained or imprisoned. They are also the most active supporters of Awlaki in the UK today. The CP website contains an extensive and friendly interview between Awlaki and Moazzam Begg, one of its directors and a former Guantanamo detainee. In August 2009, CP were the organisers of an event in the Kensington and Chelsea Town Hall in which guests were promised the treat of a live video link-up with Awlaki, who the CP regard as an “Inspirational Imam”. In the weeks before the event, CP were informed by the local council that their event could only go ahead if they cancelled the video address by Awlaki. CP complied with this, although they issued a statement on their site which refused to acknowledge Awlaki’s extremist nature.

The notion that Awlaki was previously a moderate imam whose public and personal journey to the extremes of violent Islamism happened relatively recently and long after British organisations endorsed and supported him is a false one. There are a host of organisations and individuals who operate within the Islamist landscape in this country who have, at one point or another, praised or defended Awlaki. I have listed only some of the British organisations which will have been aware of Awlaki’s views. Many of their leaders will have pored over every word and inflection he made in his articles and sermons. They will have been supporters of Awlaki’s rhetoric because of his message of violent Jihad and not in spite of it.

The US authorities are not the only ones who have been slow in responding to their own intelligence on Awlaki. British institutions have been equally lethargic, sometimes even supportive, in responding to organisations and individuals who have embraced and endorsed the ideology of Awlaki in their campaigns, seminars, public meetings and broadcasts. Whereas people who have pointed out the dangerous potential of Awlaki have been allowed to be defamed as Muslim-haters or self-loathing Muslim hypocrites.

Although the leadership of the Awlaki-supporting organisations cannot have mistaken him for a moderate, the same does not necessarily hold true for their rank and file. Ordinary Muslims, turning up at events at which Awlaki was promoted, may well have taken on trust the assertion that he is a religious authority with prodigious qualifications and a sincere and important message. It is these ordinary members who have been imperilled, by being exposed to jihadi theology in its purest form. They have been betrayed by their leadership.

The supporters of these organisations need to think long and hard about how their leadership came to champion Awlaki. We must also give serious consideration to the question on whether the leadership of these organisations should be trusted in the future.

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On his blog, Prospective Parliamentary Candidate for Glasgow Central, Osama Saeed, seems to have taken issue with a pamphlet I wrote last week, which cites his 2006 support for pro al-Qaeda preacher Anwar al-Awlaki. Firstly, this should be put into some kind of perspective: if a PPC who defined himself as a Christian wrote in support of a promoter of the Ku Klux Klan who had extensive links with white supremacist terrorists, it would rightly prompt national outrage. Mr. Saeed will be subject to the same standards as any other potential MP, and he had better get used to it.

Mr. Saeed begins his defence by displaying a striking level of either dishonesty or plain ignorance, though it is unclear which of the two. He claims that “Al-Awlaki’s opinions have swung dramatically since I blogged about him following his incarceration in Yemen back in 2006. Before that he was middle of the road and had a significant following.” Of course, we were well prepared for this predictable response, which has been reiterated by at least two others: the Islamic Forum of Europe, and Inayat Bunglawala (‘friends’ tell him that Awlaki changed after 2003). The claim is demonstrably untrue. There is in fact enough material to write an academic paper on Awlaki’s pre-2006 extremism, but for the purposes of this blog here is a little taster:

Answering questions on Yusuf al-Qaradawi’s IslamOnline website just days after 9/11 Awlaki was very receptive to the idea that Mossad carried out the attacks:

Q: What do you think about the possibility of involvement by Israeli Mossad?

A: Add to that the fact that there has been an uprising in Palestine that was becoming very popular while the popularity of the Israeli response was plummeting. Israel was going through a serious PR crisis. Israel has even hired U.S. public relations firms to try to clean up its reputation and Ariel Sharon’s damaged image.

Also there were lawsuits filed against the war criminal Ariel Sharon in Belgium. That was a serious blow to Israel to have its highest official in such a position.

Now doesn’t the timing of the attacks raise a question mark???

Although it is clear that Awlaki hasn’t quite made his mind up, as later on he also suggests that the FBI set the whole thing up:

The evidence coming out is perplexing. ..It appears that these people were victims rather than hijackers. It seems that the FBI went into the roster of the airplanes and whoever has a Muslim or Arab name became the hijacker by default…It doesn’t make sense at all. There is something peculiar happening??? [sic]

This interview was also spiced up with support for Hamas suicide attacks against civilians:

Islam does not teach people to kill innocents, that and the act of committing suicide are forbidden in the religion. There is no Muslim who advocates killing American civilians. We haven’t heard that before. If you are talking about Palestinians fighting in Israel, these are freedom fighters fighting an illegal occupation.

In 2003, at the East London Mosque Awlaki gave a lecture called ‘Stop Police Terror’, where he told the audience that Muslims should never report on or turn over their fellow Muslims, under any circumstances:

A Muslim is a brother of a Muslim, he does not oppress him, he does not betray him and he does not hand him over…You don’t hand over a Muslim to the enemies…

In 2002, he made a similar speech, this time in Virginia where he presents counter-terrorism raids as an effort to ‘put out the light of Allah’. Again, speaking on the subject of anti-terror operations he tells his audience that:

[...] if you conceal the private sins of your Muslim brother, Allah will conceal yours on the day of judgement

In the lecture, he also claims that Jamil al-Amin, a man who had been convicted that year for the murder of US Sheriff’s deputy, was innocent and that the jury that convicted him was illegitimate because the US is against Islam.

These are two clear examples after 9/11 (but BEFORE 2006) where Awlaki has essentially told his audience not to inform authorities of any suspicious activities involving their fellow Muslims.

Not only had Awlaki made numerous extreme pronouncements before 2006, but he also had a long list of terrorist affiliations:

According to the Washington Post:

Documents filed…in federal court in Alexandria assert that a year after 9/11, Aulaqi returned briefly to Northern Virginia, where he visited a radical Islamic cleric and asked him about recruiting young Muslims for “violent jihad.” That cleric, Ali al-Timimi, is now serving a life sentence for inciting followers to fight with the Taliban against Americans.

The 9/11 Commission Report details the extensive links between Awlaki and two of the 9/11 hijackers, Hani Hanjour and Nawaf Alhazmi as well as his connections with the Holy Land Foundation – a charity which was recently found to be channeling funds to Hamas.

The 2003 joint inquiry into 9/11 by House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence also found further connections between Awlaki and the two 9/11 hijackers, including evidence of closed door meetings between them in 2000. A phone number for Awlaki’s mosque was also found in the German apartment of Hamburg cell member Ramzi bin al-Shibh. The inquiry also found connections between Awlaki and a close associate of Omar Abdul-Rahman, the so-called ‘blind Sheikh’ who was convicted for his part in the 1993 World Trade Centre attacks.

All of this information suggests one of two things: either Saeed had failed to do his research properly when he praised Awlaki in 2006, or he was aware of all of this and still thought Awlaki was a man who should be promoted in the UK. Either way, it doesn’t look too good.

In his blog, Mr. Saeed confidently points out that although I criticise him for referring to Awlaki in the respectful term of ‘Imam’, my co blogger Shiraz Maher recently referred to him as ‘Sheikh’. Although he fails to point out one crucial difference: his blog was in praise of Awlaki, whereas Shiraz Maher makes it quite clear that Awlaki is an odious and dangerous character.

Mr. Saeed also has the audacity to call me an ‘extreme right winger’ with ‘odious politics’ – this coming from a man who has also written in praise of clerical fascist, Yusuf al-Qaradawi, referring to a “a rightwing smear campaign against such eminent scholars as Sheikh al-Qaradawi – a man who has worked hard to reconcile Islam with modern democracy.” Here are Qaradawi’s views on the Holocaust:

Throughout history, Allah has imposed upon the [Jews] people who would punish them for their corruption. The last punishment was carried out by Hitler. By means of all the things he did to them – even though they exaggerated this issue – he managed to put them in their place.

This was divine punishment for them. Allah willing, the next time will be at the hand of the believers.

That is the language of an extreme right winger. Now this has been brought to his attention, will Mr. Saeed also renounce his support for yet another extremist Islamist he has lavished praise on? Incidentally, why did it take a phone call from the Times to coax a denunciation of Awlaki from Saeed? By his own admission he was aware of the vitriolic contents of Awlaki’s blog, and should not have needed a public prodding to clarify his position.

Rather than putting up his hands and acting with a bit of humility, Mr. Saeed has instead decided to respond with insults and lame, baseless excuses – perhaps he would make a good MP after all.

Eye on ‘Gay Muslims’ (I am repelled as I type those scare quotes) is a site written by a chap called Rashid Eldin who tells gay Muslims that there is no place for them in Islam, calls the estimable organisation Imaan‘s ‘Europride‘ event a “parade of perversion” and also recomends lectures by Yasir Qadhi.

Here is Qadhi talking about homosexuality.

It’s a long video and mainly it is concerned with Qadhi’s backwards views on women, but scroll through to 32 minutes where Qadhi starts to reminisce about the good old 80s when it was OK to abuse gays – and how society has “regressed” since then as you can’t attack homosexuality without being thought a homophobe. Funny that.

Anyway, back to Eye on ‘Gay Muslims’ – it also recommends this article by (again) Yasir Qadhi where he is directing advice to a Muslim who thinks they might also be gay.

I advise you to seek counseling, and to go to people who will understand your situation and who can direct you in a more specific manner. I understand as well that if you go to many of the typical imams of the masjids, they would not sympathize with your situation at all and would probably make matters worse for you. I understand that you cannot go to such people. But you will find sympathetic ears to listen to your problem, insha’Allah.

And remember that marriage is a solution, so you should seriously consider it. The Prophet Lut ‘alayhis salam told his people, “These are my daughters, they are more pure for you.” Some scholars say that when he said “daughters”, he is also implying the women of the town and not just his own daughters. So he’s telling the men of his community who were guilty of this crime to go and marry women, for they are better and purer for them. Marriage is a solution, because sensuality and sexuality is something that can be satisfied – rather it should be satisfied – by the opposite gender within the confines of marriage.

Has Qadhi no concept of the damage he will be doing to vulnerable young people who have no choice about their sexuality but whom Qadhi is instructing to enter into loveless shams of marriages? And has he absolutely no consideration for the wife of that marriage whose husband would be unable to love her as a husband should? Potentially, also, his advice will be destroying the lives of any children from that marriage if and when their father decides to stop living a lie and to be honest with the people closest to him.

Eye on ‘Gay Muslims” own Rashid Eldin has also commented on Osama Saeed’s blog recommending Straightway, an organisation which tries to “cure” gay Muslims. The idea that a young person struggling with an important facet of their personality – their sexuality – should be told to suppress it is horrifically bad advice which can only lead to personal and psychological problems in the future.

So, Osama Saeed, will you live up to the SNP’s value statement and reject discrimination and prejudice of all kinds – and that is the party for which you are a parliamentary candidate – by renouncing your endorsement of Eye on ‘Gay Muslims’, or will you continue to stand with a collection of individuals who do not think that homosexuals deserve happy and balanced psychological, emotional and personal lives?