FAILURE TO DISCLOSE SHARI'A's TRUE NATURE

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Western financial institutions want profits from “Islamic finance” and Middle East markets.

Citibank Online, typical of the industry, calls shari'a finance “Banking in line with Islamic principles.”[1]

Undisclosed: “shari'a-compliance” rests on strict 7th century shari'a doctrine---God's indivisible, immutable laws (immune to change or interpretation, and valid everywhere, always) that require alms, forbid interest---and seek global Islamic supremacy. Shari'a authorities seek to control of all aspects of Muslim and non-Muslim life---and replace Western laws, customs, cultures and civilization,[2]through violent jihad (i.e. Sept. 11, 2001), verbal jihad (i.e. spreading violent ideology) and financial jihad, (“jihad bi-al-mal”), i.e. modern shari'a finance and Islamic charity.[3]“[A]n Islamic organization must serve God…” and advance “the Islamic way of life,” notes Corporate Governance in Islamic Banking. [4]

U.S. institutions' failure to disclose these facts constitutes willful, possibly fraudulent, presentation of shari'a finance. While rooted in sacred Islamic texts, shari'a doctrine is essentially political and conflicts with basic modern rights. The following [5] exemplify shari'a principles:

Sharia on family law:

• Women are eligible for only half of the inheritance of men

• Virgins may be married against their will by a father or grand-father

←• Arab women may not marry non-Arab men

• Women may not leave the house without a husband’s permission

←• Muslim men may marry 4 women, including Christians and Jews; Muslim women may marry Muslims

←• Men may beat insubordinate wives

←Sharia on Jihad and religion:

• Offensive war (military jihad) against non-Muslims is a religious obligation

←• Apostasy from Islam is punishable by death without trial

←• Non-Muslims ruled by Islam must follow shari'a, including discriminatory “dhimmi” taxes and laws.

• Non-Muslims may not receive Muslim charity (“zakat”), but may be bribed to convert to Islam but

←• Lying to infidels during jihad, or to promote Islam, is permissible

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←Sharia on human rights:

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←• Homosexuals and lesbians must be killed

←• Slavery is permitted and legitimate

←• Muslim men have unlimited sexual rights over slave women, even married slaves

←• Female sexual mutilation (cliterectomy) is obligatory

←• Adultery is punished with death by stoning

←• Women's testimony in court is worth half that of men (and is permitted only in property cases)

←• Non-Muslims may not testify in shari'a courts.

Iran, Saudi Arabia and Sudan---three nations ruled strictly by shari'a doctrine---have atrocious human rights records, and not coincidentally, close ties to Islamic terrorism. Iran most actively sponsors jihad terrorism by aiding Hezbollah, HAMAS, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and Al Qaeda. Sudan hosts Al Qaeda, Hezbollah and HAMAS terror-training camps---and pursues jihad genocide in south Sudan and Darfur to impose shari'a. Saudi Arabia spawned Al Qaeda and globally promotes Islamic extremism, as evidenced by 15 of 19 September 11th hijackers.

Yet through global Islamic finance accounting and standards organizations---e.g., Accounting and Auditing Organization for Islamic Financial Institutions (AAOIFI) and Islamic Financial Services Board (IFSB)---their radical shari'a authorities participate in governing shari'a finance worldwide, even in the U.S.[6]

Finally, U.S. institutions do not disclose that Muslim Brotherhood founder Hassan al-Banna concocted shari'a finance in the 1920s to unite Muslims in one global Islamic nation (umma), or that this “invented tradition” empowers Islamic radicals, University of Southern California King Faisal Professor of Islamic Thought, Timur Kuran. writes in Islam and Mammon. “Neither classical nor medieval Islamic civilization featured banks in the modern sense, let alone ‘Islamic’ banks….”[7]Islamic finance promotes shari'a authority, whose purported religious garb makes it potentially more dangerous than Nazism or communism.

[1]

[2] Alyssa A. Lappen, “Congress should outlaw shari'a finance,” Washington Examiner, Jun. 2, 2008, Abul Hasan al Mawardi (d. 1058), Laws of Islamic Governance, p. 71, argues Allah mandates perennial jihad until Islam controls everyone, as in Qur'an 71:27, “Lord, do not leave any of the Kuffar on the earth.” P. 251, Allah also authorized 2nd Caliph Umar Ibn Khattab to confiscate property in three ways---by force, fulfilling a trust to Islam, or ruling with Allah's law; thereby it's just to take anything from unbelievers; Qur'an 57:2, “To Him belongs all dominions of the heavens and earth,” and Qur’an 59:7. Jurisprudence reflects both Qur'an and 20th Century ideology, as in “The Project,”

[3] Rachel Ehrenfeld & Alyssa A. Lappen, “Financial Jihad,” Human Events, Sept. 22, 2005, “Tithing for Terrorists,” National Review, Oct. 12, 2007, and “Financial Jihad= Shari'a Finance=5th Generation Warfare,” from Armed Groups: Studies in National Security, Counterterrorism, and Counterinsurgency, Edited by Jeffrey Norwitz, U.S. Naval War College, June 2008, chapter 28.

[4] Nasser M. Suleiman “Corporate Governance in Islamic Banking,” Al-Bab, viewed Oct. 8, 2007 at as cited in Ehrenfeld & Lappen, “Tithing for Terrorists,” ibid.

[5]From Reliance of The Traveler: The Classic Manual of Sacred Law, the authoritative Sha'afi school compendium of shari'a jurisprudence.

[6]“Introducing DJCSI,” as seen 7/15/2008, IFSB council members, and “AAOIFI Board of Trustees,” as cited by Ehrenfeld & Lappen, “Tithing for Terrorists,” and “5th Generation Warfare,” ibid.; Yusuf T. DeLorenzo, “Shariah boards and modern Islamic finance,” May 2004, as viewed July 16, 2008.

[7] Timur Kuran, Islam and Mammon: The Economic Predicaments of Islamism, Princeton University Press, 2005, pp. x, 13.