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On April 30, the Assidiq Islamic Educational Foundation
(AIEF), an Islamic center in Boca Raton, is hosting an
event commemorating the “prophet” Mohammed at the Boca
Marriott Hotel. The featured speaker for the event is
William Baker ,
a man whose anti-Jewish works and statements have won
him accolades throughout the white supremacist movement.
In 1984, Baker
was Chairman of the Populist Party, a Neo-Nazi
organization founded by Holocaust denier Willis Carto.
Baker’s book,
Theft of a Nation, sports a cover depicting a
Jew carrying, on his back, a container holding the state
of Israel, which Baker claims in his book the Jews stole
from the Palestinians. Baker writes: “The entire country
of Palestine has been ‘taken’ by political Zionists, and
it would seem the entire world has believed, supported
and participated in the ‘theft’ of an entire country
from an entire nation.”
Why would the AIEF
choose to bring a notorious anti-Semite like Baker to an
event in an area that houses a very large Jewish
population? A glimpse at the center’s background and
ideology may provide some answers.
The Assidiq
Islamic Educational Foundation incorporated in February
of 2005 and has been in existence for just over a year.
Its founder and Imam, Sayed Mohammad Jawad Al-Qazwini,
only 23 years of age, was born in Iran and moved to
Florida by way of California, where members of his
family operate numerous other Islamic centers.
These centers were
built by his grandfather, Ayatollah Sayid Mortadha Al-Qazwini,
currently the head of the shrine in Karbala, Iraq.
Karbala is the place where Imam Hussein bin Ali, the
revered grandson of the “prophet” Mohammed, is said to
have been murdered by Sunni Muslim rivals. Assidiq is
the third Islamic center to open in the city of Boca
Raton, the other two being the Islamic Center of Boca
Raton and the Assalam Center. Unlike the latter two
centers, Assidiq is a Shi’ite mosque, with a mostly
Iranian and Iraqi influence. But like the other two,
Assidiq brings with it a radical element (see ‘Boca
Raton, City of Terror‘).
On the
Audio Library
section of Assidiq’s website, along with an animated
graphic of dripping blood (apparently
taken from another
site
glorifying the barbaric custom of pounding oneself over
the head with swords until blood flows), there are a
series of (what used to be) downloadable lectures made
by Sayed Mohammad Jawad Al-Qazwini. In one dated
February 12, 2005, titled “The concept of war through an
Islamic perspective,” Al-Qazwini said the following:
“And until today,
people do not seem to be able to forget what happened on
[September 11, 2001]. It’s very hurtful. But who
suffered the most after that attack? Immediately, if you
turned on a TV set, and they started mentioning the
names of those who were involved in the attack, the
Muslims and American Muslims started suffering right
away...The American Muslims were suffering the most, and
they’re still suffering. They’re not comfortable. And
that is because of the lack of understanding of Islam in
this country. Brothers and sisters, this is our
country.”
He continues:
“Thus rule number one, fight for the sake of Allah. Who
must you fight? Those who start the war against you.
Those who establish the war against you. Those who
initiate the war against the Muslims. Then you are
allowed to defend yourself...If you are attacked, you
ought to defend...Permission has been given to those
fighters whom have been forced, have seen injustice,
have seen wrongdoing, have seen oppression and
occupation. Then, they are given the permission to fight
and to defend themselves and let them know that Allah
will assist them to victory.”
Since Al-Qazwini
believes that Muslims—inside and outside America—have
been wronged following the 9/11 attacks, does he also
believe that Muslims should fight “for the sake of
Allah” against America, a country that Al-Qazwini claims
for Muslims?
In the same
speech, Al-Qazwini discusses the issue of martyrdom in
Islam. He uses the terms “shahada” and “shaheed,” which
are also the Arabic words used to describe suicide
bombers in Iraq and the Palestinian territories.
He states:
“Shahada is equivalent to a very very important degree
in Islam. The shaheed is not washed. The body of a
shaheed is not washed. The shaheed is [pure/exempt from
washing]. Thus he is placed in his grave immediately
after he dies, because the shaheed is a purified figure.
Not anybody that dies can be given the title of a
shaheed. The shaheed is chosen by Allah, and the prophet
is chosen by Allah. Those two people. Less not anybody
can go and become a shaheed, brothers and sisters.”
With this
information in mind, it’s no wonder that the Assidiq
Islamic Educational Foundation issued a
disclaimer on its website warning viewers that the
center is not “liable for damages of any kind arising
out of [one’s] use of [the center’s website]” just in
case one would want to go off and start a jihad or
become a shaheed.
One final bit of
information discovered within Al-Qazwini’s February 2005
lecture may very well unveil the real answer as to why
the Nazi sympathizer William Baker was invited to the
center’s upcoming event. In his speech, Al-Qazwini
matter-of-factly states, “Before Islam, there were the
idol worshippers, the Christians and the Jews.”
On the flier
announcing the April 30 AIEF event, which refers to
Baker as an “outstanding figure,” the Mayor of Boca
Raton and the Mayor of Coral Springs were listed as
“Guests of Honor.” Following numerous complaints via
phone and e-mail, both Mayors
expressed their
anger at their titles being used
and have stated that they have no intention of partaking
in the event. Summarily, the Mayors were deleted from
the flier, but
they are still
listed as ‘Guests of Honor’ on Assidiq’s website.
Along the Mayors,
another listed “Guest of Honor” is the Educative
Chairman of CAIR. CAIR is a spin-off of the Islamic
Association of Palestine, which has been identified as a
“front group” for Hamas by Steve Pomerantz, former chief
of the FBI's counterterrorism section.
The fact that AIEF
invited extremists like Baker and CAIR to attend its
upcoming event is no surprise considering some of the
previous guests at the center (including numerous
members of Sayed Mohammad Jawad Al-Qazwini’s family):
In a speech
entitled “Challenges
facing Muslims,”
the Al-Qazwini, uncle of AIEF founder and lead Imam
Sayed Mohammad Jawad Al-Qazwini, tries to explain away
the Qur’anic verse, “O you who believe, do not take the
Jews and Christians as friends.” (Al Ma’idah,
Surah 5:51) He stated: “Qur’an is not saying do not
follow Jews and Christians because they are Jews and
Christians. Qur’an is not anti-Semitic. Qur’an is
anti-evil. Because they were evil. This specific group
of Jews and Christians, who were in Medina at that time,
were evil people. And Allah was telling the Muslims to
avoid them, because they stood against justice and
faith. Stubbornly, they rejected the truth. They did not
let Prophet Muhammad to [sic] propagate the word of
Allah.”
In his 1999 book,
“Invitation
to Islam“
Al-Qazwini wrote: “Since all the Judeo-Christian-Islamic
prophets were sent sequentially, the question arises as
to why Judaism, Christianity, and Islam now exist as
separate religions. The answer is that the followers of
these religions, particularly Judaism and Christianity,
corrupted the original teachings given to them and ended
up making sects of their own rather than following the
pure word of G-d.”
In a December 2004
speech he gave in Detroit at the Islamic Center of
America’s Young Muslim Association about
guidelines on how
to deal with non-Muslims,
Al-Qazwini stated: “The non-Muslims, the ill-thought
people who always attack Islam, the great religion, they
attack it based on certain facts. They attack it based
on certain allegations...[Islam is] a religion that
opens its doors and embrace [sic] others and welcomes
others to join that. And we see that according to the
literature, to Islamic literature, there’s no difference
between this great religion and between Christianity and
Judaism. They all embrace others. [sarcastically]
Well, let’s not speak about Judaism now, but I am
comparing between Islam and Christianity. Both embrace
others.”
In a speech he
gave, dated March 12, 2004, he
discussed how Jews
react to the crucifixion of Jesus Christ.
He stated:
“The Jews want the
world today -- those who made a big issue out of [the
film, The Passion of the Christ] -- they want
someone to come up and say ‘Jesus was not crucified by
the Jews. [sarcastically] It was aliens, who came
from outer space who abducted him, and they crucified
him.’ You cannot deny historic facts. Even though that
we Muslims believe that it wasn’t Jesus who was
crucified...[The Jews] thought that Jesus was in the
business competition with them. If people would follow
him, nobody would go to them. They would go out of
business. That’s why they decided to conspire against
him.”
In an October 2004
speech to mark the
beginning of Ramadhan,
Al-Qazwini described how Judaism and Christianity are
lower forms of humanity than Islam, Judaism being the
lowest. He stated: “Generally, human being [sic] goes
through his or her life through certain stages --
infancy, childhood, adolescence, adulthood -- as when
you start your education, you go to an elementary
school, then you move to high school, then you go to
university, get your degree and find a job. This is how
the entire humanity did. It was, in the beginning,
preventive teachings. And then there was Judaism. And
then, when the humanity advanced, there was
Christianity. And now, when the humanity had advanced
one more step, Islam came to be the universal, the
university.”
In a news article
that came out in The Boston Globe, dated October
23, 2000, it was reported that, during a lecture he was
giving inside a university classroom, Imam Sayed Hassan
Al-Qazwini had “expressed...hostility
towards Jews.”
Provided all of
the above statements, this hostility seems evident in
much of the Al-Qazwini family. It exhibits a pattern of
prejudice and bigotry aimed at those that are not of the
Islamic faith, primarily those that are Jewish.
Coral Springs
Mayor Rhon Ernest-Jones, in the e-mail he sent out
expressing his wishes to cancel his invitation to
Assadiq’s event, said he believed when he had previously
met Imam Mohammad Jawad Al-Qazwini that he took Al-Qazwini
to be “the kind of leader who would seek out the paths
to peace and understanding.” Ernest-Jones isn’t the
first American politician to be fooled by radical
Islamists posing as moderates; and sadly, he won’t be
the last.
Joe
Kaufman is the Chairman of Americans Against Hate and
the host of
The Politics of Terrorism
radio show. Beila Rabinowitz, Director of Militant Islam
Monitor, contributed to this report |