This item is available on the Militant Islam Monitor website, at http://www.militantislammonitor.org/article/id/558

Bilal Philips :Speaker at Reviving the Islamic Spirit confab in Toronto :'Beheadings, stonings, & lashings should be carried out on Fridays'

Muslims charge Homeland Security with 'profiling' after being held at border and questioned about attendence at terrorist event
April 22, 2005

www.revivingtheislamicspirit.com/ convention/s...

MIM: Five Muslims who were held at the border after returning from a Reviving the Islamic Spirit Conference are suing the Department of Homeland Security for profiling .(see article below). The speakers list a at the conference read like a radical Islamist who's who and Bilal Philips presence at the event makes the DHS's case that they had : "credible, ongoing information that these types of conferences have been used and are being used by terrorist organizations to not only transport fraudulent documents but to mask travel by terrorists" . http://www.danielpipes.org/blog/392

Besides being touted by Muslims as a 'leading Islamic scholar' Bilal Philips is also an alleged "unindicted co conspirator" in the 1993 WTC bombings. He was also a student of Gulshair Shukrijumah, the father of wanted dirty bomber plotter Adhan Shukrijumah. Gulshair Shukrijumah translated for the jailed terrorist Omar Abdel Rahman and acted as a character witness on behalf of Clement Rodney Hampton El who was jailed for his part in plotting a 'Day of Terror' which targetted New York City landmarks http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1164071/posts

"The sixth person to sign the guestbook (on Gulshair Shukrijumah's Master Arabic website) was Bilal Philips, someone that has been named as a possible co-conspirator to the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. He wrote, "Mabrook on the website and special salaams to your father [Gulshair] and prayers for his good spiritual and physical health. He was one of my first teachers in Arabic and is a dear friend…" www.militantislammonitor.org/article/id/4

MIM: On his own website Bilal Philips.com responded to the vexing question of whether Friday's was the right day for public executions according to Islamic law and opined that public executions were a key factor in keeping murder rates low in Saudi Arabia ...

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http://www.bilalphilips.com/qa/d_000003.htm

Question on Death ( Mawt )
Answered by Dr. Abu Ameenah Bilal Philips

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MIM: Bilal Philips proclaimed that " the cutting of hands and heads,stoning of people to death, and lashings are only to be held on Fridays". Since public executions of Muslims are limited to once a week, the Islamic Circle of North America, (ICNA), has established the Muslim Alert Network, to fight against media reporting of Islamist atrocities in negative terms.

Indeed nowhere is the claim that "Islam is a mercy for all mankind" better reflected then in the shari'a justice system which only allots one day a week for decapitations, mutililations, stonings, and lashings.

Philips extolled the low crime rate in Saudi society, noting that it had a population equal to New York City but had less murders in a year then NYC has in a week. He stated that "one of the key factors" for this was the Islamist practice of "public executions".

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MIM: Closer to home, the Saudi funded Islamic Circle of North America declaration of goals complements the agenda of the 'Muslim Alert Network' which is dedicated to combatting the "media portrayals of Muslims as violent fanatics".

Goal
The goal of ICNA shall be to seek the pleasure of Allah (SWT) through the struggle of Iqamat-ud-Deen (establishment of the Islamic system of life) as spelled out in the Qur'an and the Sunnah of Prophet Muhammad (pbuh)

Program
To invite mankind to submit to the Creator by using all means of communications.

To motivate Muslims to perform their duty of being witnesses unto mankind by their words and deeds.

To organize those who agree to work for this cause in the discipline of ICNA.

To offer educational and training opportunities to increase Islamic knowledge, to enhance character, and to develop skills for all those who are associated with ICNA.

To oppose immorality and oppression in all forms, and support efforts for civil liberties and socio-economic justice in the society.

To strengthen the bond of humanity by serving all those in need anywhere in the world, with special focus on our neighborhood across North America.

To cooperate with other organizations for the implementation of this program and unity in the ummah.

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Dawah: Inviting Mankind to Submit to the Creator
The top priority of ICNA

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http://www.icna.org/MAN/

What is MAN?

The media portrays Muslims as violent fanatics. A bomb explodes in Oklahoma City and Muslims are immediate suspects. TWA flight explodes in the air and "Islamic Terrorism" is the obvious choice of words for almost every news agency. The lies about Islam make it easy for otherwise reasonable people to convict an entire community of faith without a shred of evidence. History has never before witnessed the promotion of falsehood on such a scale.

Our families, 90% of whom do not visit their Islamic centers, are being bombarded by bigotry and disgust of Islam on one side, and the glorification of sex, violence and perversion on the other.

"Yes, Muslims Do Have the
Same Rights As Other Human Beings!"

In 1987, ICNA decided to face this situation head on by establishing the first ever media monitoring network on behalf of Muslims in North America. Since then, Muslim Alert Network has launched numerous successful campaigns and by the grace of Allah, many other Muslim organizations followed the example set by MAN and have started serving the purpose and goals of a media monitoring network.

We request you to support this work by becoming the regular member of MAN, by reporting any incident of discrimination in your area and by participating in the campaigns launched by MAN.

What you can do during a campaign? Arrange protests in your cities and invite the media. Sign petition on Juma and send copies of petition to White House, State Department and your Congressman and Senator. Write to the media. Call the Radio Talk Shows Send email and participate in discussion forums hosted by different newspapers and news networks. Copy and distribute this Muslim Alert Network letter in your community.

Become A Member of Muslim Alert Network! If you notice any incident of discrimination in your area, please send us email at [email protected]. To support Muslim Alert Network send $10 and your mailing and email address to ICNA166-26 89th Ave Jamaica, NY 11432

April 21, 2005

http://kvoa.com/Global/story.asp?S=3245329

Five American Muslims - including a Park Slope teacher's aide - filed a lawsuit against the federal government yesterday, alleging that their rights were violated.

The three women and two men were part of a larger group of Muslims who had attended an Islamic youth conference, Reviving the Islamic Spirit, with their families in Toronto at the end of December.

On returning to New York, dozens of Muslims were detained for more than six hours by U.S. border officers at the Lewiston-Queenston Bridge border crossing. The Americans were all interrogated, photographed and fingerprinted.

One of the plaintiffs, Sawsan Tabbaa, an orthodontist, was forcibly fingerprinted, the lawsuit alleges.

"The Constitution does not stop at the border," said Christopher Dunn, associate legal director of the New York Civil Liberties Union, one of the lawyers who announced the lawsuit at a Manhattan news conference. "The government has no authority to stop and detain and interrogate people simply because they have gone to a religious conference."

None of the citizens who were detained by U.S. officials were charged or arrested, said Donna Lieberman, executive director of the NYCLU.

Barry Morrissey, a U.S. Customs and Border Protection spokesman, said he had no comment on the lawsuit, which was filed in Brooklyn Federal Court. But in December, a customs spokeswoman, Kristi Clemens, told the Daily News that agents were acting on intelligence that those who attended the conference may have been bringing terrorists back in their cars.

The lawsuit wants a judge to declare that the government's actions were unconstitutional. The victims also are requesting that their fingerprints and other personal data be removed from any federal database.

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http://www.danielpipes.org/article/2557

What steps should Western border agencies take to defend their homelands from harm by Islamists?

In the case of non-citizens, the answer is simple: Don't let Islamists in. Exclude not just potential terrorists but also anyone who supports the totalitarian goals of radical Islam. Just as civilized countries did not welcome fascists in the early 1940s (or communists a decade later), they need not welcome Islamists today.

But what about one's own citizens who cross the border? They could be leaving to fight for the Taliban or returning from a course on terrorism techniques. Or perhaps they studied with enemies of the West who incited them to sabotage or sedition. Clearly, the authorities should take steps to find out more about their activities, especially given the dangerous jihadi culture already in place in many Western countries, including Canada.

This question arose in late December 2004, after a three-day Islamist conference, "Reviving the Islamic Spirit," took place in Toronto. The event, boasting a host of high-profile Islamist speakers such as Bilal Philips, Zaid Shakir, Siraj Wahhaj, and Hamza Yusuf, alarmed the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), America's new border agency.

CBP spokesperson Kristie Clemens explained that her agency had information how events such as the one in Toronto "may be used by terrorist organizations to promote terrorist activities, which includes traveling and fundraising." Clemens later added that the CBP has "credible, ongoing information that these types of conferences have been used and are being used by terrorist organizations to not only transport fraudulent documents but to mask travel by terrorists." Terrorists imagine, she pointed out, that if they travel in a large group, "we're going to be less restrictive and try to expedite the processing."

Her explanation hints at why the CBP decided to detain nearly forty Muslims, many of them U.S. citizens, as they returned to the United States by car from the Toronto conference. The travelers report they spent long hours at the border near Buffalo, N.Y., and none too pleasantly. One woman said she was asked whether the wire in her underwire bra was a weapon. Another, seven months' pregnant, reported that border agents lifted her blouse to make sure she really was pregnant. A third traveler quotes himself asking a border guard, "If I refuse to give my fingerprints, what will you do?" to which he got a terse reply: "You can refuse, but you'll be here until you do."

When Daniel W. Sutherland, officer for civil rights and civil liberties at the Department of Homeland Security, the CBP's parent organization, spoke in Buffalo earlier this month, he discussed the December episode. On principle, however, he neither justified nor condemned CBP's procedures. Rather, he only acknowledged that CBP did an "after-action review" and refined a few points. Sutherland placed the detaining of citizens into a larger context ("There are multiple pieces to that puzzle") and spent most of his time emphasizing the need for his department and Muslim groups to work better together.

He was right to remain discreetly uninformative. The United States finds itself at war with radical Islam not just in Afghanistan but in Buffalo, Boston, Boca Raton, and Baltimore. Controlling the border flow, therefore, has paramount importance. As a law enforcement agency, the CBP in this and other cases (notably that of Tariq Ramadan) should not divulge its exact reasons for excluding foreigners or detaining citizens. To do otherwise would compromise national security.

Which in turn probably explains why, last week, the Council on American-Islamic Relations and the American Civil Liberties Union – two organizations consistently hostile to American self-protection – goaded five of the detained travelers to sue the federal government on the grounds that they "were unlawfully detained, interrogated, fingerprinted, and photographed."

Two of the plaintiffs' demands have lasting implications: that the court declare the CBP had violated the travelers' rights and that it enjoin the CBP from "detaining, interrogating, fingerprinting, and photographing United States citizens who are Muslim because they are returning to the country after having attended religious conferences."

Were the plaintiffs to prevail in this case, attending religious conferences would instantly become the favored method for terrorists and other Islamists to cross the American border without hindrance. Such a malign implication means this lawsuit needs to be tossed out by the courts.

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MIM: Tariq Suweiden another featured speaker at the conference delivered this talk at an ICNA conference -(a group which is linked to Al Qaeda), telling Muslims that :

This item is available on the Militant Islam Monitor website, at http://www.militantislammonitor.org/article/id/558