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by Sheila Musaji

The Jamaica Observer reports that Sheikh Abdullah al-Faisal has been arrested in Kenya for allegedly violating his Kenyan visitor’s visa by preaching in a local mosque.

Sheikh Abdullah El-Faisal (aka Trevor William Forest), was born in Jamaica and trained in Islamic studies in Saudi Arabia for seven years.  He went to Britain where he served at the Brixton Mosque where he was ousted in 1993.  He served four years in a British prison for urging his followers to kill non-Muslims, including Americans, Hindus and Jews and was deported from Britain to Jamaica in 2007.  He is the “spiritual advisor” of the Revolution Muslim group in New York.  One of the accused 7/7 bombers was a follower of El-Faisal.  This is the fellow that Yusuf Smith warned about back in 2005.

His followers in the U.S. at Revolution Muslim have posted a “Free Shaykh Abdullah al-Faisal” article.  They also posted a video on their site with the note “Revolutionmuslim were present to protest at the shia rally in NYC on December 2009. Three brothers of revolutionmuslim were arrested by NYPD for few hours for protesting under the charge of disorderly conduct.”  They are actually proud of this terrible action.  It looks from watching the video that there were only three to five of them present in total, so most were arrested.

Yousef al-Khattab (a.k.a. Joseph Leonard Cohen) created Revolution Muslim in 2007.  He is an American born convert from Judaism, who is also an Israeli citizen.  He and another Muslim from Connecticut named Mohammed Ghounem also started a Web site that aims to convert Jews to Islam, called Jews for Allah (JFA).  ADL He is the leader of the Revolution Muslim group.

The Revolution Muslim website says they follow Sheikh Abdullah Al-Faisal.  Their site also says they have participated in protests in front of mosques in NY that they think are too moderate, and at the 2007,  2008, and 2009 Muslim Day Parades.  I had written about another such group in New York, the Islamic Thinkers Society who had disrupted the Muslim day parade, but did not at the time know that Revolution Muslim was also part of this disruption.  Haroon Moghul also wrote about the disruption of the 2008 parade and was confused as to whether the protestors were from ITS or RM or both.  And an interesting post was filed on Talk Islam “The extremist types at ‘Revolution Muslim’ – which I think is the same thing as the ‘Islamic Thinkers Society’ discovered a few weeks ago that their website has been blocked in Saudi Arabia. The RM people produced one long message in response spread over several Youtube clips (here and here). I only listened to the first one, but I think I heard them ‘takfir’ King Abdullah at the end.  One has to appreciate the irony of Saudi Arabia taking action to protect itself from extremists located in America.”

In a video posted on the RM site about a protest at Masjid Taqwa in Brooklyn this past September they are heard shouting “America is the Shaitan” and saying anyone who doesn’t live under Sharia is Kafiroon – capitalism is kufr – obviously the people at the mosque were upset with them.  They also protested outside of the 96th Street Mosque.  The Imam of ths mosque, Shamsi Ali called the police on them.  Good for him for calling the police.

RM also posted on their site approval for Maj. Hasan, the Fort Hood murderer.  It says in part:  “Major Nidal Hasan M.D., An officer and a gentleman was injured while partaking in a preemptive* attack., Get Well Soon Major Nidal, We Love You.” The Revolution Muslim folks listed on their site are:  Yousef Al-Khattab, Amir and Chief Executive Officer; Younus Abdullah Muhammad, Executive Officer for Media and Marketing; Sipa Salar, Executive Officer for Research and Development;  Shaikh Abdullah El-Faisal, Imam and Spiritual Advisor.  The ITS group doesn’t list any names on their site so it is difficult to compare and see if these are the same people or two different groups.  In fact, the ITS group doesn’t even list its scholars, only scholars to be avoided.

They have recently been featured in the press and on a CNN television report.

It is to be hoped that the arrest of el-Faisal, and of most of the Revolution Muslim brothers will cause them to rethink their positions.  It certainly should have put them on the radar screens of law enforcement.  In the meantime, however, the Muslim community needs to remain alert and aware of any such individuals or groups in our midst.

As I have previously noted:

“The vast majority of American Muslims are caught between the Islamophobes and the Muslim extremists.  Both of these groups shout their message, and the traditional, moderate Muslims are unable to get their message out no matter how hard they try.  …

However, because the Islamic Thinkers Society nut jobs are Muslim and making such un-Islamic claims and defaming all of the thousands of Muslims present at the parade as well as the millions of American Muslims we need to speak out loudly and clearly against their extremist views.  Although few in number their extremist statements and misrepresentation of Islam is seriously endangering all the Muslims in America.  We need to be clear that in the words of the Pakistani song denouncing terrorism – Yeh Hum Nahin – This Is Not Us!!!

These are Khawarij (extremists) and what they promote is a perverted version of Islam.  Even if they are few in number, they are dangerous.  If they are truly against democracy and Western values then they should not be in this country.  If they (falsely) believe that the world is divided into dar al harb and dar al Islam and do not recognize dar al ahd (house of treaty) then they should not be in this country.  If they are Muslims and are in this country on a visa or with a green card then they have an obligation under Sharia to honor the laws of this country as they have entered into a binding agreement by accepting the visa or green card.

Since, we have no authority to force them to leave, the least we can do as Muslims is to speak out loudly and clearly and denounce them and their perverted interpretation of Islam.  We need to make it clear to them and to all the Muslims that this will not be tolerated.

I hope that the leadership of all the organizations that were involved in sponsoring this Muslim Day Parade will speak out on this issue and that they make it clear that the Islamic Thinkers Society was not an official part of the parade and that their views are not acceptable.  I also hope that in the future more care is taken to control such a public event so that there are not opportunities for those just looking for some “problem” with Muslims to find such an easy target.  At the very least there should be a committee set up wih individuals ready and able to issue immediate press releases and respond to such events.

If our leadership is not willing to speak up, then ordinary Muslims are going to have to do so more loudly than ever.  It makes no sense for us to allow a handful of extremists to become the focus of those wishing to demonize all Muslims.  How can a handful of extremists gain more publicity than thousands of Muslims at this event?”

These people have the right of free speech, but so do we.  The least we can do is counter such hateful speech with more speech.  If those whose message is negative and hateful have a right to speak their “minds”, then the rest of us also have the right to let them know what we think of their speech.

SEE ALSO:

North American Muslims Determined to Counter Extremism, Violence, and Terrorism, Sheila Musaji http://www.theamericanmuslim.org/tam.php/features/articles/north_american_muslims_determined_to_counter_violence_and_terrorism/0017836