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Militant Islam Monitor > Weblog > The Cordoba Initiative,ASMA's Radical Islamist Agenda and the 9/11 Mosque

The Cordoba Initiative,ASMA's Radical Islamist Agenda and the 9/11 Mosque

August 12, 2010

Imam Faisal Abdul Rauf and his wife Daisy Khan are stealth Islamists. The 9/11 Mosque project which they have started would be a victory for Islamist triumphalism. Both of their organisations, The Cordoba Initiative and the ASMA Society have revealed Rauf and Khan's attempts to wage civilisational jihad. Rauf is the founder and Khan is the co founder of ASMA and Rauf is listed as "the founder and visionary" of the Cordoba Initiative. http://www.cordobainitiative.org/?q=content/staff-bios http://www.asmasociety.org/home/p_people.html

The American Society for the Advancement of Muslims announces their Islamist agenda with their name. ASMA promotes jihad through da'wa and the Islamisation of the West by grooming "Muslim Leaders of Tommorrow". At the Saudi backed 2006 MLT conference in Denmark "moderate"Islamists discussions of how to increase Muslim political and social influence was euphemistically termed "bridge building".

The Cordoba /Islamic Dialogue initative is lead by ASMA and headed by the Imam of the New York Al Farah mosque Faisal Abdul Rauf who together with his wife Daisy Khan are trying to put a yuppie face on radical Islam. The message is clear –you can be a Wall Street broker , CEO, and upwardly mobile professional and live according to shari'a while doing da'wa as a ‘Muslim leader of Tommorrow'.

Muslim leadership as the new da'wa signals an alarming trend whereby hardcore Islamists join forces with self proclaimed " moderates" while openly declaring that their common goal is to promote Islam in the West and unite the Umma. ASMA's own mission statement is a template for this "radical moderate" Islamist agenda. http://www.militantislammonitor.org/article/id/2854

According to the AP:

In the past, programs and academic conferences run by two nonprofit groups affiliated with Rauf have received money from The Kingdom Foundation, a charity affiliated with one of the world's richest men, Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal of the Saudi royal family.http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jy51yLVquj_8eubkM53TGM3vh4fAD9HQOOPG0

MIM: The ASMA Society mission statement is a classic da'wa declaration and uses interfaith collaboration as a means to that end.

OUR MISSION:

The American Society for Muslim Advancement (ASMA) is a New-York based nonprofit organization founded in 1997 to elevate the discourse on Islam and foster environments in which Muslims thrive. We are dedicated to strengthening an authentic expression of Islam based on cultural and religious harmony through interfaith collaboration, youth and women's empowerment, and arts and cultural exchange. http://www.asmasociety.org/home/

MIM:Here is what Daisy Khan had to say about the building area chosen for the 9/11 Mosque:

"I think the building came to us, which goes to show that there is a symbolism there, and that there's a divine hand in it. That it's so close to the tragedy, that its close proximity is very symbolic for the fact that we really want to reverse what happened on 9/11....So just to meet the needs of the people's, you know, worship needs, we decided to look for a larger building. And actually, the building found us, because it's been abandoned for the last nine years. Just sort of sitting vacant. It was struck by a plane, a piece of the fuselage fell into the building, and it was shut down since then. And it's been vacant for nine years" http://www.jihadwatch.org/2010/07/daisy-khan-on-islamic-supremacist-mega-mosque-at-ground-zero.html

MIM: ASMA's supporters:

  • Carnegie Corporation of New York
  • Rockefeller Brothers
  • Rockefeller Philanthropy
  • Rockefeller Brothers Fund
  • Global Fund for Women
  • William & Mary Greve Foundation
  • The Sister Fund
  • The Russell Family Foundation
  • Danny Kaye & Sylvia Fine Foundation
  • Graham Charitable Foundation
  • Deak Family Foundation
  • Henry Luce Foundation
  • The Elizabeth Foundation
  • The Ms. Foundation
  • Hunt Alternatives

    http://www.asmasociety.org/home/p_support.html

  • MIM: As William Mayer pointed out in his article "It's Time to Demand Reciprocity in the 9/11 Mosque Debate" putting forth the First Amendment argument for the 9/11 mosque is misleading.

    "In evaluating the arguments by various mosque supporters the question of the First Amendment comes front and center.

    If we are to believe those putting forth this line, Muslims have the inalienable right to build a mosque anywhere they choose in the United States, including Ground Zero, the center of Times Square or next to the Holocaust Museum on Wilshire Blvd in Los Angeles. To this crowd, any limitation upon the place where such a structure can be built is unconstitutional.

    Yes this is an absurd assertion on its face, but it has gained traction among the chattering class and other useful idiots, including dhimmi New York politicians such as Mayor Bloomberg and gubernatorial candidate Andrew Cuomo.

    There is a subtext to the assertion of constitutional pre-emption by the Islamists, what they want is to force a degree of religious freedom in New York and across this country [and by extension the West] nowhere obtainable anywhere in the Muslim world....

    What is largely absent from the discussion regarding shady imam Rauf's grand plan is the inherent nature of the religion he is promoting and is practiced everywhere in the world. Please remember that in his understanding of Islam, Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood are apparently not terrorist entities.

    This brand of Islam is completely intolerant, misogynistic, expansionist and unapologetic.

    Yet we are being told by the imam, CAIR's various thugs and the entire North American Hamas-friendly Muslim directorate [many of them non-native born, yes it does make a difference] that they will build a mosque at Ground Zero - for the sake of peace - [wink wink, nod, nod] despite the pain, strife and religious bigotry that it will undoubtedly foster.

    Of course in the Wahhabist/Salafist birthplace, non-Muslims are not even allowed to enter Mecca, let alone approach Islam's paean to Arabian paganism, the Kaaba. "

    http://www.pipelinenews.org/index.cfm?page=kaaba8.9.10%2Ehtm

    MIM:Imam Faisal Abdul Rauf has refused to condemn Hamas as a terrorist entity and has numerous terrorist ties. An organisation of which he is a key member provided the most funding for the terrorist flotilla which attempted to breach Israel's blockade against help to Hamas. (see below).

    According to Discover the Networks:

    Rauf's book suggests that the "American Constitution and system of governance uphold the core principles of Islamic law" (i.e., sharia). The author concludes, therefore, that the "American political structure is sharia-compliant." In December 2007 Rauf promoted What's Right with Islam at a Malaysia gathering of Hizb ut Tahrir, which seeks to impose sharia on the United States and other countries worldwide.

    In July 2010, journalist Andrew McCarthy revealed that What's Right with Islam was originally published in Malaysia under a different title: A Call to Prayer from the World Trade Center Rubble: Islamic Dawa in the Heart of America Post-9/11. What's Right with Islam was a "special, non-commercial edition" of the book and was produced after the original, with Feisal's cooperation, by the Islamic Society of North America and the International Institute of Islamic Thought. Both of those organizations are American tentacles of the Muslim Brotherhood. ...In a May 7, 2010 sermon he delivered in New York City, Rauf seemed to suggest that the perpetrators of 9/11 may not actually have been Muslims. "Some people say it was Muslims who attacked [the U.S.] on 9/11," he said, before drifting into another topic.

    In a June 2010 interview with newsman Aaron Klein on New York's WABC Radio, Rauf was asked whether he agreed with the State Department's designation of Hamas as a terrorist organization. Rauf replied:

    "I'm not a politician. I try to avoid the issues. The issue of terrorism is a very complex question.... I'm a bridge builder. I define my work as a bridge builder. I do not want to be placed, nor do I accept to be placed in a position of being put in a position where I am the target of one side or another."

    In recent years, Rauf and ASMA have pursued a project known as the Cordoba Initiative, whose mission is to recapture an "atmosphere of interfaith tolerance and respect" in "Muslim-West relations." Funded by numerous countries that are members of the Organization of the Islamic Conference, this Initiative aims to build a 13-story, $100 million mosque/Islamic Center just 600 feet from Ground Zero in lower Manhattan. The proposed name of the structure -- "Cordoba House" -- implies conquest. Indeed, the first Cordoba mosque was built in the Spanish city of Cordoba after the Muslim conquest of Christian Spain in the 8th century AD"....Moreover, Rauf is a key member in the Malaysian-based Perdana Global Peace Organization, the single biggest donor ($366,000 as of June 2010) to the Free Gaza Movement...

    In August 2010, the State Department announced that it would be sending Rauf on a trip through the Middle East to foster "greater understanding" about Islam and Muslim life in the United States. The Washington Times observed:

    "[I]mportant questions are being raised about whether this is simply a taxpayer-funded fundraising jaunt to underwrite his reviled [mosque] project, which is moving ahead in Lower Manhattan. Mr. Rauf is scheduled to go to Saudi Arabia, Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Bahrain and Qatar, the usual stops for Gulf-based fundraising.... [The trip] gives Mr. Rauf not only access but imprimatur to gather up foreign cash. And because Mr. Rauf has refused to reveal how he plans to finance his costly venture, the American public is left with the impression it will be a wholly foreign enterprise."

    http://www.discoverthenetworks.org/individualProfile.asp?indid=2462

    MIM: Rauf's Cordoba Initative includes a "Sharia Index Project" which asks if Muslims should live in a Caliphate. Rauf has stated that the United States is "shari'a compliant" and that the Constitution has many elements of Islamic law.

    "The Shariah Index Project seeks to address the religion-politics relationship question that has racked the Muslim World since the death of the Prophet Muhammad. A contentious issue between religious Islamic political and secular political parties within the Muslim World, and between Muslim and Western nations (for whom Church-State separation is a foundational concept), it evolves around the right balance between institutions of political power and authority and institutions of religious power and authority, and whether the modern nation state Muslims live in should be a secular or religious (i.e. Islamic) State?

    After two years of work, the Sharia Index Project's working team of Sunni and Shi'a legal scholars from Morocco to Indonesia achieved consensus on a final structure on philosophy, methodology, and approach to providing the general public, opinion leaders, and state officials in both the Muslim and Western worlds with an Islamic legal benchmark for measuring "Islamicity" of a state.

    In addition to producing The Shariah Index book, comprised of the essays and deliberations of these scholars, and which provides the Index's theoretical foundation, Cordoba will present the Annual State of the Muslim World Index. This index, which involves a partnership with the Gallup Organization, polls people from 44 Muslim-majority nations (and members of the Organization of Islamic Conference) on how well their nations comply in practice with this Islamic legal benchmark of an Islamic State."
    http://www.cordobainitiative.org/?q=content/shariah-index-project

    MIM: In 2006 the Shariah Project convened its first meeting in Malaysia. Note that the "the Shariah Project sponsored by the ASMA Society in cooperation with the Cordoba Initiative."

    2006 August: The Shariah Project – Initial Meeting in Kuala Lumpur
    Convened in Malaysia by Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, the Shariah Project's initial meeting assembled five distinguished scholars of Islamic holy law from four countries. In addition to Imam Feisal, the group included: Professor Dr. Mahmood Ahmad Ghazi, Pakistan (Chairman of the Shariah Board for the State Bank of Pakistan and former president of International Islamic University); Professor Dr. Mohammad Hashim Kamali, Malaysia (Dean of the International Institute of Islamic Thought & Civilization and Former Interim Chairman, Constitutional Review Committee, Afghanistan); Professor Dr. Tahir Mahmood, India (Founder/Chairman, Amity University Institute for Advanced Legal Studies, New Delhi, and former Dean of the Faculty of Law, Delhi University); Dato' Abdul Hamid Mohamad, Malaysia (Judge, Federal Court of Malaysia … Malaysian Supreme Court). The Shariah Project is sponsored by the ASMA Society in cooperation with the Cordoba Initiative.

    MIM: In 2008 Rauf spoke to the Saudi funded IIIT about his Shariah Index Project. The IIIT pledged their "cooperation and support" for the project.

    Imam Feisal Rauf Speaks at IIIT on Shari'ah Index Project
    Friday, December 19, 2008 :: 2333 Views
    Imam Feisal Abdul RaufImam Feisal Abdul Rauf, founder and President of Cordoba Initiative briefed a select group of scholars and IIIT staff on Friday, December 19, 2008 on the Shari'ah Index Project, a pioneering effort which aims at developing an index based on Maqasid al Shari'ah for the purpose of measuring the performance of Muslim countries in relation to the implementation of Shari'ah. Since its inception in 2006, the Shari'ah Index Project –which is directed out of Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia- has generated the support of many Muslim countries and organizations as well as prominent Muslim scholars and leaders worldwide. The index itself is being developed through the joint efforts of the prominent scholars and social scientists from different parts of the Muslim world. Upon completion, it will be used primarily in Muslim countries through polling of sampled populations via interviews and surveys to be conducted by Gallup USA. The data then will be analyzed and findings and conclusion will be made available to policy makers, the media and the public at large. Accompanying Imam Rauf were Dr. Jasser Auda, member of the Advisory Council of Scholars for the Project and expert on Maqasid, Courtney Erving, the Executive Director, and her assistant Irfana Hashimi. Dr. Abubaker al-Shingeiti, Regional Director of IIIT, welcomed the guests and pledged cooperation and support from IIIT to the Project.
    http://www.iiit.org/NewsEvents/News/tabid/62/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/115/Default.aspx


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