Malicious Slander of Dar-al-Hijrah Promoted by Washington Times

UPDATE: (More updates can be found at Tariq’s blog, where he is up to Update#4). A followup article has been posted on MuslimMatters here.

These inSANE peeople are White Supremacists. This quote from their mission statement on their website:

America is a unique people bound together through a commitment to America’s Judeo-Christian moral foundation and to an enduring faith and trust in G-d and in His Providence. America’s founding, and its greatness was neither accident nor staging ground for some better existence or world state. America was the handiwork of faithful Christians, mostly men, and almost entirely white, who ventured from Europe to create a nation in their image of a country existing as free men under G-d.

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I was forwarded one of the most outrageous hit pieces that I have seen in a long time from the so called “Mapping Sharia in America Project”

First, I will say to all those who may read this and try to paint me as an extremist, that my opposition to terrorism is unequivocal and known and that I have written many times condemning terror and terrorism and those who endorse it. If terrorism were being taught at Dar Al Hijrah, I would be the first to condemn it LOUDLY and clearly.

But I can not and will not endorse smearing and flat out lies against people that are not terrorists nor endorse terrorism. If the aim is to get those who are trying to kill us all, then I am with you. But if the aim is to lie, slander and defame – even those that are working with law enforcement in many cases – then we can not join such an effort.

That said, I contend that this “report” is a COMPLETE fabrication and malicious LIE designed to dehumanize and slander Muslims. To say that this “report” is full of “mistakes” is giving too much credit. It is full of deliberate and malicious lies.

They also know that most who read their “report” will not read any refutation of their outrageous and slanderous piece.

I have taken it piece by piece. The “report” said:

Sporting a beard and Muslim dress, Gaubatz said he went on May 18 to the center, pretending to be an American interested in becoming a convert to Islam. He discovered the center espoused terrorism and jihad against America.

How many people interested in Islam come in “Muslim dress”? I was there on that day and any such person would have been directed to me since Imam Johari was not there that day. THAT DID NOT HAPPEN. I met no such person on that day. This sentence shows that this is clearly written for an audience that has preconceived notions of converts as being so romantic with the idea of becoming Muslim that they come into the door wearing “Muslim dress”. (Ultram HCL) I have been Muslim for 12 years and not once have I seen a person interested in becoming Muslim enter the door wearing “Muslim dress”. Any Muslim reading that statement can see how ridiculous it sounds. Unfortunately a person with no experience in the mosque will not know that, and these people know it.

“They are teaching what they call Jihad Qital, which means physical jihad,” Gaubatz said. “They’re teaching violence and hatred of the United States.”

So a complete stranger walks into a mosque and he is immediately indoctrinated into “jihad” and not the fundamentals of Islam? I have not heard any teaching of violence and hatred against the United States. To the contrary, the problem some who actually DO sympathize with the nutters complain about Dar Al Hijrah’s message of civic involvement, registering to vote and reaching out to neighbors.

Further, Dar Al Hijrah is active in Fairfax County and has many other interfaith partners in the DC metropolitan area.

Gaubatz said that he met the two primary clerics at Dar Al-Hijrah, Imam Shaker Elsayed and Imam Johari Abdulmalik. Both men have been trained in Saudi Arabia. He says another key individual is Yusef Estes, an informal senior leader at the center and an internationally influential Muslim scholar who was trained in Saudi Arabia.

As I mentioned before, Imam Johari was not even present on the Friday they claimed to visit and he nor Shaker Elsayed were “trained” in Saudi Arabia. Neither was Yusef Estes for that matter.

On May 18th 2007, Imam Johari left Washington on Air-Tran heading to Houston that morning and did not return to Virginia until Sunday May 20 th 2007, so he could not have met with Mr. Gaubatz as claimed in this hit piece.

Although, Yusuf Estes lives in the neighborhood, he is not a leader of the Dar Al-Hijrah community – informally or otherwise. He is a former southern Christian pastor and is well known and respected as a lecturer nationally. Why did they even throw his name out there?

“They put me through the process of learning their faith and ideology,” Gaubatz said. “They felt close to me and they gave me literature and CDs. They told me to study. The literature is very Jihad Qital.”

He speaks as if it is like becoming a Mason when he speaks of being “put through the process” and being given a secret mission of some type. Secondly, after just meeting him, they felt “very close” to him? This sounds like something written for a person who has seen Syrianna.

He said that the Islamic center has deep ties to Saudi Arabia and espouses Wahhabism, a virulent and puritanical version of Islam.

“Many members of the mosque provided me literature to study. Most of the literature they gave me was from Saudi Arabia,” he said. “Their literature preaches that America and the West are decadent and evil, and that Muslims have a moral duty to engage in violence against the infidels.”

Just had to throw that out there didn’t they. There are no “deep ties” to Saudi Arabia. As for the literature, I don’t believe this for a second. There is no such literature being given out at Dar Al Hijrah preaching violence against non-Muslims.

“Many members of the mosque” provided him with literature?? There are more than 3,000 people that come to Jumuah on Friday. Even if this fairy tale were true, most of the people would have had no idea that he was even there – especially since he was allegedly in “Muslim dress” – much less spoke to him – as 99.9% have to hurriedly return to work – and do not just have literature on them at all times to give to people.

Why did they not go into the mosque with a hidden camera to prove these outrageous lies? Because if they went to the masjid, the most likely scenario of a person that randomly shows up on Jumuah – especially in a mosque the size of Dar Al Hijrah – is that he will be (sadly) ignored by most of the people especially if he “looks Muslim”

Finally, there is NO literature distributed at Dar Al Hijrah that is anti-American or that advocates violence. This is a malicious and outright lie.

Gaubatz says that Dar Al-Hijrah and other radical Islamic centers in the U.S. are funded by Saudi Arabia, which is the primary sponsor of the Wahhabist brand of Islam.

“The ultimate goal for those at Dar Al-Hijrah is to instill Sharia law in the U.S. and have America adhere to the Islamic faith,” he said. “They want America to be an Islamic state.”

The goal of Dar Al-Hijrah is stated in the Mission and Vision of the masjid as listed on the website. Dar Al Hijrah is NOT funded by Saudi Arabia or any other foreign country. The accounting of the mosque’s income and expenditures are posted on the wall each month for anyone to see.

Gaubatz said that the imams at the center encouraged him to read the works of their “friends”—some of whom have been convicted for terrorism-related activities. According to Gaubatz, one of those “friends” he was encouraged to read is Ali Al-Tamimi, a radical Islamist author, who was convicted of inciting terrorism in connection with the Virginia Jihad Network.

Firstly, anyone want to tell me what books that Ali Al-Timimi has written that someone would have suggested to get his books? To my knowledge Ali Al-Timimi has no books and was NOT an author. Anyone want to point to these books by Ali Al-Timimi? This alone shows how absurd this is. Regardless, Dar Al Hijrah does not distribute any materials by Al Al-Timimi

Secondly, Ali Al-Timimi and others established a seperate center near Dar Al Hijrah because of disagreements he and others had with the Dar Al-Hijrah.

Anyone GENUINELY interested in fighting terrorism will distance themselves from this SLANDEROUS hit piece filled with lies and complete fabrications designed to fool the people. It is really sad that the Washington Times would print something so blatantly false and malicious.

I also hope that Muslims will not read malicious “reports” like this and decide to become suspicious of those who visit our mosques.

These people say that they plan to “visit” all the mosques in the United States. That only means that we can expect more slanderous hit pieces. Their hoped conclusion of their “study” is that the Muslims are all irrational medievalists that can only be dealt with at the bottom of a nuke.

UPDATE: Seems that he did come, but not in a beard and “Muslim Dress” as indicated in the article. These people were treated with nothing but the utmost kindness and no one said anything about terrorism or jihad or anything of that sort. I suppose I should be glad that they spared me from their slander. The Father in the combo “took shahaadah” at Yusef Estes’ hands on that Friday and left after that. I can personally bear witness that there was nothing anti-American said to him by Yusef Estes or anyone around at that time. It was hard to imagine at the time that people with smiles on their faces were those that hate us and wishes that all of us were dead