This article was published in Arabic in:2006-08-06

Overview of Bin Laden’s Latest Statement

The statement was published on the Aljazeera web site on April 23, 2006.

 We shall review and comment on sections of it.

Section 1

According to Aljazeera, Bin Laden started his statement by commenting on the cartoons deemed offensive to the prophet Mohammed, stating:  “To all the Muslims, peace be upon you, my speech to you is for you to keep working to defend our prophet and to punish those crusading journalists and apostates who made the awful crime of insulting the Master of earlier and later [people to come], the prophet Mohamed best prayers be upon him”.

Comment 1

What Bin Laden has just said resembles a polytheistic belief: he has made the Prophet Mohamed the master of earlier and later ‘people to come’), while in traditional Islam there is no such master other than Allah. He believes that the prophet Mohamed is a master of all prophets and messengers, which contradicts the Islamic belief that states that ‘there is no god but Allah’, and also confirms that Mohammed, the seal of the prophets, was a follower of the sect of Abraham and ordered to hold on to it. Furthermore we as Muslims are also ordered to follow the sect of Abraham (Albakara 130-135, Al Omram 95, Alnesa 125, Alanam 161, Alnahl 123, Alhajm 78) the right guidance of the earlier prophets (Alanam 90) in a similar fashion as the prophet Mohammed did.

This statement makes Bin Laden a contradictory to Allah, who has forbidden us from prejudicing against the prophets – god has called such individuals ‘infidels’ ( Albakara 136 185 , Al Omran 84 , Alnesaa 150:152 ). In addition,  god has also ordered the Prophet Mohamed to say that he is not distinguished (beda’an) of the prophets and that he is not even aware of what is going to happen for him; he is just a warning for those who follow the Koran (Ahkaf 9).

The comparison between the prophets is the sole right of Allah alone (Albakara 353, Alesraa 55). Allah is the only one who knows how many there are, the ways of their jihad, and how much good is in their deed. He who puts himself in a place to judge and choose the best prophet, has put himself in a rank higher than the prophets themselves and one equal to that of Allah. Such an individual will then be out of line with the Islamic beliefs, especially the one that confirms there is no god but Allah, and Bin Laden himself has broken that crucial rule.

 Section 2

Aljazeera further reports that “He spoke about the prestige of the prophet in the verses and ahadeeth (‘the holy verses’)” and that the holy ahadeeth came to show that the prophet is entitled to our love, our honoring, and following and glorification. Allah has forbidden any harming or insulting of the prophet, something Allah has specifically stated in the holy Koran: “those who harm Allah and the prophet are cursed by Allah in life and the afterlife, and Allah has prepared a despicable torture for them”. Furthermore, Allah has also said, “oh you believers do not raise your voice over the voice of the prophet, and do not talk with him in the way which you speak to each other or your good deeds will be gone while you do not know of it”. It is said in the Sahih Bokhary that the Prophet said “I swear by Allah that he holds my soul in his hands, that to believe in god you will have to love me more than your parents, your sons and the whole people”.

Comment 2

Here Bin Laden cites the verse, “those who harm Allah and the prophet are cursed by Allah in life and the afterlife, and Allah has prepared a despicable torture for them”. Bin Laden falls in that category by the things he says and does, thus harming Allah and his Prophet. To explain, we state that “the people harming the prophet the most are the ones who say things that contradict the Koran to the prophet himself, and fabricate lies that contradict the Islamic religion: that he is equal to the god Allah, although the Prophet himself spent his entire life’s work just to confirm that there is no god but Allah. Imagine spending all of your life fighting corruption only to have other people accuse you of being a gangster, spreading corruption through false acts attributed to you. Can there be any bigger harm? Harming Allah and the Prophet in this way also means the denial of the holy verses of the Koran, which confirm that there is no more injustice to Allah than fabricating lies to Allah (Alanam 21 93 144 157 , Alaaraf 37 , Yones 17 , Hood 18 , Alankabot 68, Alzomor 32); and he who claims that these straying ahadeeth are revelation by Allah are fabricating lies about Allah.

Those who support such claims are harming Allah as well, and that applies to Bin Laden. The funny thing is that they wrong these ahadeeth by attributing them to the prophet through people who have died long before they knew anything about what was said. The sad thing is that they have made these ahadeeth a part of the Islam, thus accusing the Prophet Mohamed that he didn’t complete his mission. They have made it seem that he left part of it to be completed by other people in the second Abbasian era, meaning that Islam has been incomplete until the second Abbasian era and after the later eras of injustices, corruption, dissolution, political tyranny and social injustice.

It is also sad that, in doing so, they attempt disprove the verse which states “today I have completed your religion and concluded my grace upon you and am satisfied with Islam being your religion (Almaeda 3). Islam was finished developing after the completion of the holy Koran, therefore everything that Muslims write is not a part of the Islam, rather it is a part of a human ideology that shows how much the Muslims can be close to or far away from the Islam, and in the end they will answer to Allah in judgment day for fabricating lies to Allah and his prophet, the greatest harm.

Statement 3

Bin Laden continues, “the whole Islamic nation has agreed upon the apostasy and killing of anyone who insults or offends the prophet”. The Sheikh of Islam Ben Taymeyamay god have mercy on his soul: ‘insulting and denying the prophets is the source of all infidelity and the summation of all straying and every infidelity originates from that’. The judge Eyad states that ‘he who assimilates the prophet to insult, contempt him, lower his rank or offend him, is cursing him and should be judged as cursing the prophet’. And the Emam Ahmed may god have mercy on his soul said that ‘he who cursed the prophet should be killed whether if he was a Muslim or infidel’”.

Comment 3

Bin Laden lies when he says that “the Ummah has agreed upon the apostasy and killing he who insults the prophet” because there is no consensus in the ideological belief history of Muslims; they were divided in the origins into Shiites , Sunnis, Sophists, each with different beliefs. Within these, there are even many other sects such as the Moataza, Morgea, Khawareg. In these sects, Abo Alhassan Alashary wrote his book Articles of Muslims and Variation of Those Who Pray, Ibn Hazm wrote Sects and Creeds, Alshohrestani wrote Sects and Beliefs, Malti wrote Altaneeh Walrad, amongst many others. Furthermore, the internal disagreements and differences within in any sect are numerous. In Sunna for example, there are four sub-sects, and in each sub-sect there are further sub-sects. Even in some pages of the same book, you find the author disagrees with the writings of others. In such a diverse climate, it is humorously wrong to say that the Ummah is agreed upon, because this Ummah is only similar in its diversity and disagreement; they have been so since the great sedition (Alfetna Alkobra), and still are. It is even more hilarious that Bin Laden, who became a mufti (a Sheikh who gives fatwas) in that ugly time and speaks of things of which he has no knowledge. He attempts to cite Ben Hanbal, although Ben Hanbal himself has denied the consensus by saying “He who claimed consensus in a thing has lied; how would he know that people had disagreed?” So here even Ben Hanbal has called Bin Laden a liar in his claims that Ummah has reached consensus or has agreed upon killing the apostate. Bin Laden has read some of the ancestral jurisprudence and interpreted it as the consensus of the Ummah, ignoring the fact that the expression Ummah includes all different sects of Muslims dating from the era of the Prophet until the present day - the current radicals are just a very small drop in the large ocean of Islam. He is even ignoring that inside the current Sunni sects certain sheikhs have denied the killing of the apostate. Bin Laden should read the current fatwas that Alazhar has announced after 10 years of the publishing the book Had Elredda, ‘Penality of Apostasy’, that proves there is such thing called Penalty of Apostasy in Islam.

 

Lastly, Bin Laden accuses all but himself with infidelity, including some of the Sunni radicals, Shiites, sophists, and all Muslims (except for the terrorists of course), even after he speaks on the nature of the Ummah in the whole world. So how does he rightfully speak on behalf of the entirety of the Islam nation when he claims that ninety-nine percent of them are infidels?

Section 4

Returning to Aljazeera, we see that it states further that “He [Bin Laden] also attacked all those who tried to offend the prophet, saying ‘Infidels and atheist are denying the religion and insulting our beloved prophet; their case is clear now. The Emam Ben Alkayem ‘may god have mercy on his soul’: when he said that the crime of being an atheist is the worst of crimes and the harm caused by his [the atheist’s] existence among Muslims is the worst of harm, and that he should be killed and his renounce will not be accepted. If you tolerate his renouncement you will be allowing him to stay atheist and as an infidel, as he will pretend to be a Muslim only when he needs to , and will return to the atheism as soon as he can, specially when he knows that he is safe from being killed when he shows his renouncement. He will not fear announcing atheism and denying his religion and offending Allah and his prophet. He already fought Allah and his prophet, and will continue working to spread corruption on the earth. His penalty is to be killed’”.

Comment 4

Here Bin Laden reaffirms the extremist in their radical jurisprudence of killing those who conflict with their opinions, even if the was a Muslim Sunni and believes in ahadeeth, as long as he had an opinion that contradicted with the sheikhs of ancestral radicals. They refer to him as a ‘zendeek’ atheist and give him a status worse than that of the apostate; they say to kill him without a trial or renouncement, and even if he renounces they refuse to accept it. So even though Allah forgives, they do not; Allah accepts renouncements, yet they do not. As Allah states to the prophet regarding forgiveness, “you have nothing to do with it” (Al Omran 128). The extremists’ contradiction demonstrates that they have given themselves numerous rights and thus declared themselves above the prophets.

In discussing the killing of the apostates and what it means, I have said in my book, Penalty of Apostasy: “The reader might think that the ‘zendeek’ is an infidel who doesn’t believe in Allah, his messengers, No, he is a believer in Allah, his messengers and his book; he is a thinker who has an opinion, and his greatest mistake is that his opinions contradict those of big jurists. It contradicts what they think is ‘necessarily known to be part of Islam’, so he deserves to die even if he has renounced; and because he is a thinker with a proofs, the jurists will not allow him to go to a trial that an ordinary apostate should have. The reason is that the ordinary apostate has no proof that jurists will fear. Unlike the ‘zendeek’, he has proofs; they cannot face him and in trial, so there is no need to put him in trial. The best way is to kill him quickly. Sheikh Sayed Sabek says ‘the zendeek is the one who admits and believes in Islam in appearance and deep within’; he is a Muslim by his heart and tongue. Sabek continues by stating that ‘he interprets some of the necessarily known to be part of the religion in a way that contradicts with interpretations of the Sahaba and what the Ummah has agreed upon’. He is a zendeek because he had a new, independent opinion that contradicts with our ancestry. It does not matter if he has proofs, what matters is that his proofs contradict. Sabek also states that ‘as the Islamic law has placed killing as a penalty for apostates in order to restrain them, it has also put the killing as a means of restraining the zendeek and saving the religion from a corrupt opinion that should not be promoted toeveryone who denies seeing Allah in judgment day, grave torture, Naker wa Nakeer questioning, or denies the Serat and judgment.

Sheikh Al Ikhwan, who is known to be more moderate than most, has said, if it was moderate to kill anyone who disagrees with some of your opinions without even discussing them and kill him even if he has renounced, then what defines extremism? It is obvious that Bin Laden walks on the same road as the Ikhwan brothers, but he is much more frank and clear. We fear the time in which Ikhwan would rule Egypt. It has millions who believe in sepulcher, millions who curse religion as a habit of misbehave, and millions who make jokes of sheikhs, and according to Sabek they are all considered either zendeek or apostates. By applying the Sabek ruling, the mass population of Egypt will no longer suffer, whereas Bin Laden and his followers will kill people in the streets without even a trial. The truly awful thing here is that establishing a fatwa which promotes the killing an innocent soul goes far beyond killing itself, because it is a mass order to kill all of the people. These poisoning fatwas will instill a renewed movement to kill innocents everywhere, creating victims in the present as well as the future. It is one of the virtues of the ancestral jurisprudence. What is left now is to ensure that the Ikhwan make the purpose and goal their jihad to establish their state and apply these rulings with our blood or the blood or our children.

Section 5

“Bin Laden discussed Alsahaba and urges to act like them saying, “’I remind youof the deeds of the pure first soldiers of Islam, the dignified Sahaba, to follow their path in stand up for religion, It is right to follow the righteous people. The earlier people have told of the incidence of the poetry of Kaab Ben Alashraf who offended the prophet, and the Prophet said ‘who would get me Kaab ben Alashraf, he harmed Allah and his prophet’ and then Mohamed ben Moslema said ‘me, Prophet, you want me to kill him’, the Prophet said yes. Oh Allah Akbar, how fast they responded to aid Allah and his prophet; Allaho Akabr, how great is their faith, how much knowledge and jurisprudence. The prophet has known that the penalty of anyone who harms Allah and his prophet is killing without hesitation.”

 Comment 5

Here Bin Laden harms the Prophet by telling these fabricated lies mentioned in theSira, which was written two centuries after the death of the Prophet Mohammed, in which they depict the Prophet in accordance with the common image in their era with all the features of conspiracy, betrayal and assassination. Among such lies was the assassination of Kaab ben Alashraf, which the terrorists celebrate and use as a legitimate excuse to assassinate numerous innocents. Bin Laden now enters our era to announce this harm to the prophet and to give the chance for the enemies of Islam to call the seal of the prophets with terrorism and killing of people. Allah has ordered to the seal of the prophets ‘peace be upon them all’ to deal frankly and clearly even with traitors and those who violate agreements, because in Islamic legislation there is no space for making conspiracies even against those who conspire against you (Alanfal 58). Allah ordered the Prophet to go for peace and put his faith in Allah, and even if they were deceiving the prophet with peace, he should not act similar to them and rely on Allah (Alanfal 61,62). So was it truly his legislation to send a gang to assassinate a man, as that lie so boldly states?

Section 6

 

“Bin Laden has compared between Al-sahaba and the ones he called ‘today the beaten Sheikhs who went to the crusaders, not to fight, but to to discuss with them, dissolve the religion. Be aware of them. Yes, their religion contradicts with righteous methodology of the Prophet who thought it was necessary to kill Kaab ben Alashraf, and that everyone who had harmed Allah and his prophet must be killed as well. Yes. killing these people is a thing that Allah likes and so does his prophet. Allah has commanded it and urges the Prophet to do so. Allah said ‘If they violate their pledges after they have sworn to them, and they have denied the religion, fight the Imams of infidelity, and have no faith, might they be stopped’. So by fighting them they cease in assaulting the religion, Ben Elkayem - ‘may god have mercy on his soul’ - said about this verse: ‘everyone who assaults our religion is an imam of infidelity’. Bin Laden continued,  ‘Now let us go to complete this story. Mohamed Ben Mosallama took some of the Sahaba, and proceeded to kill the enemy of Allah, Kaab ben Alashraf. At that time, the Jewish population and the polytheists became fearful, so they came to the Prophet and said ‘Our friend was killed tonight, and he is one of the lords; he was killed for no crime that we know he did’, so the prophet simply replied stating that he had assaulted us with poetry, and anyone who does it again shall deal with our sword’”.

Comment 6

Here Bin Laden tells us his favorite lie about the assassination of Kaab ben Alashraf, promoting it as a legitimate reason for terrorism. He falsely cites the verse “If they violate their pledges after they’ve sworn, and denied the religion, fight the Imams of infidelity, have no faith, might they be stopped.” This is the verse number 12 in Altawba. The verses before it specify the behavior which defines ‘polytheism’ in the terminology of the Koran – we advise the reader to first read these verses of Altawba to know the meaning of ‘polytheism’ according to behavior. We summarize the Koranic facts below:

·        The meaning of infidelity and polytheism is the same; Allah addressed both of these groups in the  same manner (verses 1-6 , 12).

·        The main behavior for polytheism and infidelity is aggression (verse 10), and therefore violation of the peaceful agreement and leads to the declaration war on those who made the peace agreement (8:10).

·        The reason that Altwaba came is to give the aggressor a time limit to renounce and cease the aggression, this inviolable time limit is four months (1-5).

·        Since it is infidelity or behavior polytheism at the source of unjust military aggression against peaceful Muslims, if such individuals renounce and pray and paid zakat, they are no longer aggressors, they now become brothers for peaceful Muslims. Because one who is ‘peaceful’ to Muslims is considered peaceful according to his apparent behaviors, and the polytheism or infidel in the apparent behavior is the aggression (5, 11) and, on the other hand, the terms ‘keep prayers’ and ‘give zakat’ define the straightness in behavior, non-aggression, and stopping injustice as a result of keeping prayers and submissiveness in prayers, since prayer forbids injustice, fornication, etc. (Alonkabot 45). Furthermore, if they kept the peace agreement, you have to respect it in fear of god (7) and, in case of the aggressive war, if the enemy has stopped fighting, you have to save and return him safely to his home once he listens to the words of god in hope that he will find the righteous path (6).

·        If they continue to assault and aggress against the peaceful Muslims and keep violating their agreements, then it is an assault and violation of Islam as the religion of peace. There is no way other than to fight back so that they end their aggression, and if they do, then there no need to fight them. This is the meaning of what Allah said in verse 12 of Altawba: ‘If they violate their pledges after they have sworn, and they have denied the religion, fight the Imams of infidelity, have no faith, might they be stopped’, a notion which is confirmed by many other verses in the ruling of defense (Albakara 190-194 , Alanfal 38-39, Alhag 38-40). So does that Koranic context correlate with what Bin Laden has said in the assassination of peaceful children and civilians, both Muslim and non-Muslim? While contradicting Islam, he attributes this utter and absolute nonsense to Islam and speaks by its name. This is clearly a offense to Allah and the prophet; it is very clear that Bin Laden repeats what these aggressors had been doing to the peaceful Muslims in the age of the Prophet.

 

Section 7

In the review, Bin Laden states ‘It is the ruling of our prophet against anyone who assaults him and derides the religion. Oh you youth of Islam!, follow the command of Allah and the prophet. Kill; do as Mohamed Ben Mosallama and his Sahaba. I swear being in a grave under the land is better than being above the land; these apostates deride and mock our religion and our prophet, so fear god and be grateful and consult anyone of killing these apostates. Keep it low”.

Comment 7

The goal that Bin Laden desires is to kill all of the thinkers who oppose him after the injust accusation of being zendeeks and ‘apostates’, and to keep his war against the West and Judaism alive in all parts of the world, meaning death for all randomly and without prejudice. It is a war that he has created, and deemed it as a jihad attributed to Islam, although Islam is quite distant from such an injustice. He issued his ruling upon us and distributed the statement to all of his devils, both the shown and hidden ones. What he has said here, a list of his devils, was put forth previously by his followers in a statement that specified thirty person by name, and I was honored  that he put me along with my sons and wife on the top of that list. The miserable statement said “We are the defenders of the prophet of Allah, after our discussion and consultation with our brothers and leaders of other Islamic groups in the land of Islam, and after they saw what we have found in the shura council to judge the heads of sedition, apostasy, denial of religion, denial of sunna, etc. After they have strayed from the righteous path and sunna of our prophet, announce their infidelity and their missionary work, left the group of Muslims, stray from the religion to publicly support the Imams of infidelity and those Copts who worship the cross, and attend their conferences and support them against our Sheikhs and scholars, the miserable statement gave us a mere three days to renounce and apologize publicly. They added some human rights, liberal, and democratic activists to the list as well. Since the time limit has ended and none of us have renounced, Bin Laden issued a recommendation to his devils to ‘keep it low’; if the previous statement stated that they had consulted about us, then this one strictly opposes such a notion: “Do not consult anyone about killing these ‘zendeeks’ apostates”.

Later, he spoke of fighting the West, the Jewish population, and Christianity according to a belief that divided the world into two categories: an ‘Islam Category’ under his command, and an ‘infidelity category’ or the land of war ‘under America and the United Nation’s command’. He states that “we will start talking about those who assault the religion, the original infidels. The people of the Islamic Ummah from east to west have condemned this major crime; may god reward those who condemned it as we ask god to accept those who died as martyrs, and we promise Allah to take their revenge against the governments that took their lives”.

 

One simple comment left:

If Bin Laden attributes himself to another religion and not Islam, we would not need to discuss him and his actions. Unfortunately, he attributes himself to Islam, so we have to return to the holy Koran:

·        As a matter of Islamic belief, infidelity or polytheism is the classification of anyone other than Allah, and thus Bin Laden epitomizes polytheism when he equated the prophet to the god Allah, and he also has put himself in a position to judge among the prophets, a matter we have already discussed. Our accusation of his infidelity in accordance with what he himself has said, and that accusation is correlated to what he had said, in that there is not a fatwa to kill, a lie which they call the penalty of apostasy.

·        As a behavior, in which infidelity signals aggression and injustice, and there is no aggression worse that killing the innocent people, then that is what criminals do. The worst criminals are the ones who commit these crimes against innocents and claim that it is his jihad in the name of Allah. Here, he assaults Allah and his Prophet while he assaults the innocent people as well.

·        Bin Laden has fallen into the crime of terrorism, and he has admitted it proudly; he now announces his intentions to kill more innocent people. If the polytheism and infidelity belief is a crime that has no penalty in life, because only Allah can judge and decide on judgment day, but infidelity as a behavior of terrorism is a crime that violates the right to live, and such rights have penalty in Islam. As the crime of Haraba, according to what Allah said, “the penalty of those who fight Allah and his messenger and do corruption in the land is to be killed or crucified, and cut their legs and hands, or be exiled from the land. It is a shame for them in life, and in the afterlife they will have a great torture, but those who renounce before they are powerless know that Allah is merciful (Almaeda 33-34).

·        As a pure personal opinion, I do not like Bin Laden. He served the Americans and fought against communists, and he now retraces to fight the Americans in a low way. He used the open doors of America for extremists and their mosques, their sheikhs and organizations. He used these open doors to let his agents in, and uses the available facilities in American society to prepare for a sudden attack. Bin Laden did not attack a camp or soldiers, he attacked using civilian airplanes with thousands of peaceful innocents on board, killing thousands randomly. In such deed there is no heroism, it is just pure shame. That shame properly defines Bin Laden and all those like him, because he is only capable of killing women, children, old people and un-armed civilians. He cannot fight professional soldiers; and when he did have to fight true soldiers, he ran like a rat into the caves to hide ! What a shame. Furthermore, since he feels no such shame, he sent a message from his hideout threatening to kill us, and his miserable threat reminds me of when Garir said “Alfarazdak claimed to kill Morabaa, kill Morabaa, you will have a long life”.

·        I said in the reply to the previous threat, “It was not that he first threat to me and my family and Koranic brothers, and it won’t be the last. I consider it proof of our success and proof of their failure, astray, cowardice, and low morals. They hide in their holes and then try to threaten the brave guys. They couldn’t refute our proofs by other proofs, so they hide behind veils like women, and send naïve threats. My pen will always be painful to you, you dirty rats, even after I die. My death has been determined by Allah long ago before I was born, and no human power can change that date to force me to die before or after the time I was meant to die. I’m the one who demands your renouncement and apology, or else if you die in your astray, you will end in hell – and what a horrible destiny that is.” That is the answer I give to Bin Laden with my greatest contempt.

 

This article was published in Arabic in these web sites:

.http://www.arabtimes.com/

http://www.metransparent.com/texts/ahmed_sobhi_mansour_reform_of_egypt_constitution.htm

http://www.rezgar.com/debat/show.art.asp?aid=33305

http://www.geocities.com/egyptian_civilization_party_ecp/index.htm

http://www.elaph.com/