O Muslims of Syria: Be patient, persevere, and direct your efforts towards the establishment of the Khilafah

MONDAY, 16 MAY 2011 18:38

بِسْمِ اللّهِ الرَّحْمَنِ الرَّحِيمِ

Media Office of Hizb ut-Tahrir in Syria

O Muslims of Syria: Be patient, persevere, and direct your efforts towards the establishment of the Khilafah.

The Syrian Regime is witnessing a fearsome downfall.

The Syrian regime has besieged Deraa since the 25th April with tanks, and from there has done the same with other cities in accordance with a plan which seeks to exterminate the uprising against it, by laying siege to the regions of protests, region by region, and cleansing them of the leaders of the protests through the terror of is security agencies. It besieged the region, shelled it with tanks, disconnected water, electricity and communications in order to isolate it, and then stormed in and searched its houses, house by house, arresting everyone under the age of 40, and interrogating them in severe and demeaning ways. They kept the leaders and activists, and let the others go after being content that they had broken their will and made an example of them for others. This is what the Syrian regime has done in Deraa, and it intends to repeat this in Banias, Homs and elsewhere.

The Regime, with all its pillars, intends to deal with this problem with its people in this way. What irritates the regimes is that the people ask for their rights, the most basic of which is that the regime goes. This regime deals with its people with a subjugating and tyrannical will, as if saying to them: I am your past, present and future, which you cannot escape, and anyone who desires otherwise, I will make him pay a high price, not the least of which is his soul. The regime has gone so far as to refuse to give the dead bodies of those they killed unjustly to their families except after forcing them to sign to the fact that their brothers and sons were killed by foreign infiltrators, and after agreeing to protest in favour of the regime. All this is in order to increase the oppression and torture of the people.

This is what the regime is thinking, planning for and implementing, which is causing its problem with the people to persist and get worse. So how should the people whose sons and brothers have been defiled face this regime?

The people, all of them, must resolve to stand united with courage, fortitude, patience and persistence that exceeds the persistence of the regime to suppress them. The regime will come to know that those who are not arrested are no less in their rejection and opposition of it than those who have been killed and arrested. It will come to realise that it is in unable to break their resolve or contain their anger. At the same time, it is upon the people to adhere to strong, peaceful protest, and to call upon their sons in the army (generals and officers) to refuse to fire upon their families, and to organise their strength to take power from the criminal gang in power which protects ‘Israel' and forces them to kill their own families, and to give it to those who would lead the people rightly upon the basis of Islam.

It is imperative that these two sides - the people with the peaceful movement and the army with it armed movement - move together in confronting the regime, on the basis of Islam alone. The oppression from the regime which has reached all the people of Syria, all its sects, including the sect of the regime, and the solution for this is only with Islam, for it is the true deen of Allah سبحانه وتعالى, with which the Muslims are obliged to rule, to establish their lives on its basis, and to manage the affairs of all people, Muslim and non-Muslim, justly, with it.

If the army and people are not one, moving on the basis of Islam, no true change will occur. Rather the result will be like in Tunisia or Egypt, which still has not even cut its supply of gas to the worst of the Ummah's enemies, ‘Israel'. Perhaps the greatest indication of the lack of true change in these lands is that neither of them has supported, neither as a state nor as a people, their neighbor who is between them, the people of Libya they left them at the mercy of Gaddafi whom Bashar resembles in his crimes towards his people.

This wretched regime which is witnessing a fearsome downfall, intends to remain even if upon the corpses of the people. It implements this plan of its week by week in order to contain the coming out of the protesters after each salat al-jumu'a. If its plan succeeds than it continues with it throughout the week, and if it fails it resorts to another plan. As for how the people can know whether the regime has changed it plan or not, they only need to wait for Thursday of every week: if Bashar appears on TV to announce that he intends to rescind the eighth article of the constitution (which states that the Ba'ath party is the sole custodian of the political, social and intellectual life in the land), than this means that they have been forced to resort to this, due to the people's not submitting to the suppression of the regime imposed upon them. If he does not appear this means that it still thinks its plan may succeed and it will continue its repression through its security agencies. This is the state of the wretched regime with its oppressed people.

O Muslims of Syria,

Islam is the solution, and the solution in Islam is not but with the establishment of the Khilafah Rashidah, which will properly implement the laws of Islam upon all the citizens, Muslims and non-Muslims. There is no real change except with this. Any change of mere persons, without a change of the constitution will only be a change of form, with the potential of returning to what it was upon in the past of oppression, suppression and depriving the people of the most basic essentials of life, even if after a while. Any change that does not cut off the hand of the foreigner from intervention in the Muslim lands will keep our lives upon what they are on now, because it is this disbelieving, Capitalist, Western foreigner who established these oppressive regimes, protected them, and exploited the people resources through them. The West is the head of the serpent, and the rulers are it tale.

O Muslims in Syria,

Islam calls out to you, so will you respond to Allah and His Messenger صلى الله عليه وسلم to support his deen by establishing the Khilafah Rashidah, so that al-Sham will be the heart of the abode of the believers as the Messenger صلى الله عليه وسلم informed? Will you not respond to the call of Allah and His Messenger صلى الله عليه وسلم when they call you to that which would give you life? This is what Hizb ut-Tahrir calls you to, so respond to it sincere and truthful call. Allah, the Exalted, says,

يَاأَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ ءَامَنُوا اتَّقُوا اللَّهَ وَكُونُوا مَعَ الصَّادِقِينَ

"O you who believe, be conscious of Allah and be with those who are truthful!" [Tauba, 9:119]

Source: www.khilafah.com

A New Economy for the Muslim World

WEDNESDAY, 18 MAY 2011 18:37 ADNAN KHAN

With the revolutions in the Muslim world in full swing and now spreading from North Africa to the Middle East Western nations are attempting to hijack the Ummah's demand for change and labelling the protests as demands for democracy, freedom and Western values. It should be remembered that those informing us of what the ummah demand are the very same countries that constructed the architecture the ummah is working to remove.

David Fromkin, Professor and expert on Economic History at the University of Chicago explained in his 2009 book ‘A peace to end of peace: the fall of the Ottoman empire and the creation of the modern middle east,' how the West constructed the Middle East: "Massive amounts of the wealth of the old Ottoman Empire were now claimed by the victors. But one must remember that the Islamic empire had tried for centuries to conquer Christian Europe and the power brokers deciding the fate of those defeated people were naturally determined that these countries should never be able to organize and threaten Western interests again. With centuries of mercantilist experience, Britain and France created small, unstable states whose rulers needed their support to stay in power. The development and trade of these states were controlled and they were meant never again to be a threat to the West. These external powers then made contracts with their puppets to buy Arab resources cheaply, making the feudal elite enormously wealthy while leaving most citizens in poverty."

Whilst we are all familiar with problems across the Muslim world, be they economic, social or legal, the Muslim world does not lack the building blocks for economic development and prosperity. British Prime Minister Henry Bannerman in 1906 confirmed that "There are people (the Muslims) who control spacious territories teeming with manifest and hidden resources. They dominate the intersections of world routes. Their lands were the cradles of human civilizations and religions. These people have one faith, one language, one history and the same aspirations. No natural barriers can isolate these people from one another ... if, per chance, this nation were to be unified into one state; it would then take the fate of the world into its hands and would separate Europe from the rest of the world.

Many from the Ummah have braved the brutal crackdown by their rulers and came onto the streets in the hope of a new dawn. The removal of the rulers is the first aspect of this struggle, the second aspect would be the construction of a new order that placed the ummah at the centre rather then a ruling family or foreign power. Central to this is establishing an economic system that changes the current status quo where the majority languish in poverty and the minority treat the regions wealth as their personal wealth. In order to achieve this we would need to ascertain our strengths and advantages, whilst those elements considered necessary but absent would need the development of policies so they can be overcome.

An example of this is China, after a number of failures to develop the nation, beginning in 1979 Chinese technocrats led by reformers created various economic zones to attract foreign technology to deal with the lack of advanced industry. The use of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI), although greatly aided economic activity and job creation, it also allowed for foreign technical and managerial knowledge into China. This is why to this day all foreign companies in China are forced to transfer technical knowledge to China for access to the Chinese domestic market. In this way China has been able to achieve phenomenal economic growth, develop its military and created jobs for millions of its citizens.

Similarly Japan by the turn of the 20th century had managed to develop its industries, however the rapid growth of the economy had made Japan painfully aware of its limited natural resources. Japan overcome such disadvantages through a programme of aggressive territorial expansion through conquering the Korean peninsula and surging deep into China in order to exploit labour and resources. In a similar manner the British Empire conquered foreign territories for export markets and utilised slave labour to overcome small workforce.

These examples show that all nations need some very basic ingredients to emerge as powerful nations and ones that can very quickly establish prosperous standards of living for its people with secure borders. When we look at the Muslim world we find whilst it is blessed with the worlds energy sources - oil and natural gas, this has not been used to develop industry, which would allow it to create millions of jobs and secure its borders. The development of infrastructure, defence industries and energy are fundamental for any nation, the possession of mineral resources would place any nation in a strategic position to develop. The examples of Japan and Britain are examples of societies - rightly or wrongly, who overcame the absence of energy sources in order to develop.

When one looks at the potential of the Muslim world, the Muslim lands do not just posses the key building blocks for a new nation, but over and beyond this reality the Khilafah would emerge a very powerful state due to the many strengths it will inherit that are present in the Muslim lands.

The Muslim Ummah collectively possesses over 700 billion barrels of oil and half of the world's gas. Both the worlds key energy sources. The Ummah globally number 1.6 billion, more importantly over 60% of the Ummah is below the age of 28. The importance of a large population is critical for domestic economic development. The absence of a large pool of labour means a nation cannot be constructed or in many cases would take decades before it was able to become self sufficient. On the emergence of the Khilafah for the defence of its borders the Khaleef will have the capability to deploy armed forces of over 4 million personnel.

The Khilafah would use its immense energy as a tool to bring technology and expertise to the Muslim lands. Rather than making the priority to provide to the international markets as the current rulers do, the Khilafah would make bilateral treaties with energy consumers around the world based on the benefit they can provide to the Muslim lands. Countries such as Japan and Germany could be provided with oil in return for technology.

A cursory glance across the Muslim world shows that the current Muslim nations fall into two camps regarding manufacturing, there are those nations which already have the characteristics of an industrial base, which are the minority of nations and then there is the majority of the Muslim world that lack heavy industry. This can be overcome through expanding manufacturing with the nations that have some industrial base and then linking the nations that do not have much industry with specific types of industry to the nations which have an industrial advantage.

The creation of heavy industry and its supportive industries will bring with it a massive injection of investment from the state and from industrialists. The State will oversee the creation and conversion of many factories which will brings opportunities not heralded before. This will be coupled with private investment from entrepreneurs keen to capitalize on the returns that will be generated. This policy will create jobs for those previously unemployed. The creation of jobs will naturally increase consumption as people will possess greater amounts of income. This in turn will increase demand for goods from the general masses. Such an increase in aggregate demand will push the development of other sectors of the economy such as the consumer goods sector. This demand will push people to supply these goods further creating more jobs and more wealth in the economy

The Islamic economic system when implemented focuses on wealth distribution, Islam views wealth creation as a technical matter, hence where an oil refinery should be constructed, whether manual labour or an automated process using robots should be used to make automobiles are seen as technical issues which can be concluded by understanding their reality. How such cars or a nations wealth should be distributed, should it go to the orphans or aristocracy is something that the reality cannot explain, hence for this area Islam has laid down a system.

Through the application of Islam's economic rules sustainable economic growth can be achieved that all can share in. Islam's taxation policy which focuses on wealth rather than income will leave citizens with much more disposable income. Islam does not have complex rules for taxation and has only seven revenue sources for the state, in this way the rules for taxation are much simpler, cheaper to administer and all citizens know where they stand.

This is just an insight on what Islam offers the Muslim world. There is only reason for why the Ummah remains in its current state and this is due to the rulers over the Muslim lands, who have never had any intention of making the right use of the huge wealth in the Muslim lands. The West have attempted to integrate the Muslim lands into their own domestic markets though policies such as the free market and globalisation and whilst they receive cheap oil and cheap labour the Muslim lands have gained nothing in terms of economic development. Countries such as Egypt went from being self sufficient in agriculture to today being a net importer. The Muslim lands posses all the necessary ingredients to take its own destiny into its own hands, it also possesses a way of life that will guide it in using such resources, it now just needs to fulfil its destiny and throw its rulers into the dustbin of history.

Source: www.khilafah.com

US 'would repeat Bin Laden raid'

SUNDAY, 22 MAY 2011 09:12

BBC News

US President Barack Obama has said he would order a similar operation to that which killed Osama Bin Laden if another militant leader was found in Pakistan.

He said the US was mindful of Pakistani sovereignty but said the US could not allow "active plans to come to fruition without us taking some action".

The killing of Bin Laden by US forces in a Pakistani garrison town on 2 May strained ties between the two allies.

President Obama was speaking to the BBC ahead of a European visit.

Asked what he would do if one of al-Qaeda's top leaders, or the Taliban leader Mullah Omar, was tracked down to a location in Pakistan or another sovereign territory, he said the US would take unilateral action if required.

"Our job is to secure the United States," he told the BBC's Andrew Marr during a wide-ranging interview.

"We are very respectful of the sovereignty of Pakistan. But we cannot allow someone who is actively planning to kill our people or our allies' people.

"We can't allow those kind of active plans to come to fruition without us taking some action."
Tense partnership

Bin Laden, the Saudi-born leader of al-Qaeda, was killed in a raid by US Navy Seal commandos. They stormed the compound where he was living in Abbottabad, a town that is home to Pakistan's main military academy.
Continue reading the main story
Analysis
image of Steve Kingstone Steve Kingstone BBC News, Washington

The interview lays bare the complexities of pursuing a joined-up US foreign policy - complexities which lead the president to indicate that he is willing to order a covert strike on Mullah Omar should the opportunity arise, while conceding that talks with Omar's Taliban are central to any viable settlement in Afghanistan.

The complexities produce a carefully nuanced message to a post-Bin Laden Pakistan, which is part lecture about the need to prioritise the fight with home-grown militants, and part encouragement about co-operation in the future.

The complexities also lead Mr Obama to defend last week's policy shift on the Middle East, which so angered Israel, but also to slap down Palestinian aspirations to achieve statehood through a vote at the UN later this year.

And finally, the complexities see Mr Obama evoke a proud tradition of non-violent protest to encourage demonstrators in Syria while stopping short of calling for the departure of the leader they despise. This is in contrast to Washington's clear regime-change line on Libya.

The discovery that Bin Laden had been living there embarrassed the Pakistani military, and led to renewed suspicions that he had enjoyed protection from some members of the Pakistani security forces.

The Islamabad government strongly denied such suggestions and said the US raid had undermined the country's sovereignty.

A resolution approved by Pakistani MPs earlier this month said the country would "no longer tolerate such actions and a repeat of unilateral measures could have dire consequences for peace and security in the region and the world".

Pakistan has been a major ally in the war against militants in neighbouring Afghanistan.

But US-Pakistani relations have also been strained by drone strikes targeting militants in the border area in recent years.

Reflecting on the raid - which he and his aides followed from the White House - Mr Obama said "that was as long a 40 minutes as I care to experience during my presidency".

He added that the killing of Bin Laden could be a "wake-up call where we start seeing a more effective co-operative relationship" with Pakistan.
Talking to the Taliban

On Afghanistan, Mr Obama said that while the conflict could not be solved militarily, raising troop levels had put the Taliban "back on its heels" in a way that could facilitate the brokering of a political reconciliation.

Click to play

President Obama on whether the Taliban have a future in Afghanistan

"Ultimately it means talking to the Taliban," he said, adding that the "Taliban would have to cut all ties to al-Qaeda, renounce violence and they would have to respect the Afghan constitution".

In a discussion that ranged from the US economy to Middle East peace talks and his family's fondness for the British monarch, Mr Obama:

Restated that the 1967 border between Israel and the Palestinian territories must be the basis for negotiations to set up a future Palestinian state

Praised the popular uprisings across the Middle East, saying that as long as people struggled for democracy non-violently the US would be "strongly supportive of their efforts"

Described America's economy as his "number-one focus" in the run-up to the 2012 presidential election; "My main concern day to day is how do we make sure the American economy is growing," he said

Praised domestic successes on healthcare, education and clean energy
Acknowledged that the US had unfinished business over immigration and the energy bill.

President Obama is due to leave for Europe later on Sunday. He will first visit the Irish Republic, then the UK, France, and Poland.

He is expected to discuss a range of issues, including the upheavals in the Middle east and North Africa, the war in Afghanistan, and the downturn that has forced European governments to adopt austerity measures.

Taliban warns Muslim Kazakhstan on entering Afghan war

SUNDAY, 22 MAY 2011 09:51

Reuters

By Amie Ferris-Rotman

(Reuters) - The Taliban has warned majority Muslim Kazakhstan that its decision to send troops to the NATO-led war in Afghanistan would have severe consequences and was not in its regional interest.

The statement, distributed to media on Saturday, appeared to nod to a growing Islamist tendencies in ex-Soviet Central Asia, where militants enjoy support from the Taliban and have worried Kazakhstan and neighbouring Russia.

The Kazakh parliament decided on May 18 to become the first nation of mainly Muslim, ex-Soviet Central Asia to send troops to join the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) as the war drags into its 10th year.

Though not a member of NATO, Kazakhstan said it would send an unspecified number of soldiers on six-month missions. It has been providing air and ground corridors for the delivery of supplies to Western troops in Afghanistan.

"(Kazakhstan) has focused on protection of American interests instead of taking into account the aspirations of their people and the regional interests," the English-language Taliban statement said.

Kazakhstan is Central Asia's most successful economy and largest oil producer. Seventy percent of its 16.4 million people are Muslim. The vast nation has to date avoided the Islamist violence that has occurred in its ex-Soviet neighbours.

"The Muslim people of Kazakhstan should stand against this wrong policy of their rulers ... This step on the part of Kazakhstan will leave a long-term negative impact on relations between Afghanistan and Kazakhstan and the region," the statement said.

Analysts have warned that Central Asian militants, after years fighting in Afghanistan and Pakistan, are filtering back across the region's porous borders to their homelands, bringing with them ambitions to spread jihad, or holy war.

Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan all border Afghanistan.

Tajikistan's army has been fighting insurgents in the country's mountainous east since an attack on a military convoy killed 28 troops last September, shortly after suicide car bombers attacked a police station in the country's second city.

Several militant Islamist groups have stated their objective of creating a Muslim caliphate incorporating large swathes of Central Asia, a region twice the size of Saudi Arabia.

However, in contrast with poorer republics in Central Asia, analysts have said militant groups were unlikely to garner much support in relatively prosperous Kazakhstan.

Despite the presence of up to 150,000 foreign troops, violence across Afghanistan is at its worst since the 2001 overthrow of the Taliban government by U.S.-backed Afghan forces. Last year both sides suffered record casualties.

(Reporting by Amie Ferris-Rotman; Editing by Alex Richardson)

Source:

VIDEO : O Muslims: For how much longer?

Thursday, February 24th, 2011 | Posted by Syawal

[MUST WATCH]

An outcry to the Muslim Ummah… how much longer can we wait? How much longer can we allow our sisters and mothers to be raped? Our children to be slaughtered? Our resources to be plundered? This documentary is viewed for almost 155, 000 times on Youtube, also known as “Ila Mata” in Malaysian region.

This groundbreaking documentary was initially produced by Hizb ut Tahrir Denmark; then reproduced with editions by Hizb ut Tahrir Malaysia, and has since been translated into many languages. It provides a vivid depiction of the problems that plague the Muslim Ummah in the absence of their shield – the Islamic state.

IFRAME Embed for Youtube

Malay version can be found HERE

Author’s comment : This documentary paints the reality of Muslim oppression like no other, making it a perfect wake up call for the Ummah. A must watch!

Middle East Uprisings – King Abdullah: Khadim of Haramain or Khadim of America?

MAY 21, 2011

www.hizb.org.uk

London, UK, May 13^th 2011 – On Friday 13^th May, hundreds of Muslims from all segments of the community in Whitechapel attended a Seminar organized by Hizb ut-Tahrir Britain, titled ‘Middle East Uprisings – King Abdullah:Khadim of Haramain or Khadim of America?’ The audience included Community leaders, Imams, Professionals and Youth, and the event was well attended with all tickets sold out.

The first speech was delivered by Taji Mustafa (Media Spokesman of Hizb ut-Tahrir Britain), who began by giving a historical background of the Middle East dictators; how they were put in position by the Western colonial powers with the aim of serving them in the decades to come. He showed how this consequently meant that all these dictators were anti Islam and Muslims, and namely Saudi Arabia as she portrays herself as the guardian of the 2 holy sites, and covers her crimes against the Muslims with the ‘sell-out’ rubber stamp of the government scholars. In this sense there is no difference between Gaddafi, Mubarak, Ben Ali, Assad or King Abdullah, hence it is no surprise when they defend and give shelter to each other. Taji Mustafa concluded his speech by exposing the rulers as being the tools used by superpowers like the US and Britain to implement their global war on Islam. He added that this global war on Islam is the same as the campaign in Western societies to suppress Muslims, ridicule, undermine, belittle their values, to promote a Western friendly version of Islam, and to prevent the rise of true Islam in it’s political form – The Khilafah System.

Lecturer in Usul al -Fiqh and ‘Ilm al-Hadith, Kamal Abu Zahra (senior member of Hizb ut-Tahrir Britain), delivered the second speech. He began by refuting the positions/proposals being pushed by various organisations, explaining how the current Saudi model, as well as Western democracy, are not the ideals which Muslims are calling for and are completely contrary to the Islamic texts, the Qur’an and Sunnah. He also stressed that the passive approach by many Muslim leaderships and establishments is part of the British government agenda in distancing the Muslims of UK from the rest of the Ummah, again contrary to Islam. Kamal Abu Zahra concluded by demonstrating how only the Khilafah system will bring real change in the Middle East and achieve the ideals the Muslims are calling for, be it accountable government, freedom from the tyrannical oppression, political participation, unity, etc.

In the question and answer session, chaired by Business Consultant, Nazmul Hoque (senior member of Hizb ut-Tahrir Britain), the focus was on the role of Muslims in the UK in relation to the Middle East uprisings. Both speakers stressed for the Muslims not to fall under the agenda of the British government by being passive, silent, and only being concerned about own individual affairs rather than that of the Ummah. They emphasised that Muslims in UK must support the protests against the dictators by discussing at all levels of their community in whatever capacity they have, and they must promote the Khilafah system as the only solution from Islam which will bring about real change to the dire crisis of the Muslim World.

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