Faith, Hate and Charity

One of the Five Pillars of Islam is zakat, which is commonly translated as “charity” or “alms”. Zakat, however, is not analogous to charity as practiced by Christians or Jews — or by the United Way, for that matter.

First of all, zakat cannot be given to non-Muslims; it is to be given to Muslims only, and for very specifically defined reasons. According to Koran 9:60:

There are eight groups of people on whom Zakat should be spent, as mentioned in the Quran… and for Allah’s Cause, […]

Reliance of the Traveller — which is the foremost reference source of the Hanafi school of Islamic jurisprudence — gives us more detail (h8.7):

It is obligatory to distribute one’s zakat among eight categories of recipients, (O: meaning that zakat goes to none besides them), one eighth of the zakat to each category.

And in section h8.17:

The seventh category is those fighting for Allah, meaning people engaged in Islamic military operations for whom no salary has been allotted in the army roster.

The only Muslims not on army rosters who are engaged in military operations — jihad — belong to various terrorist groups. These are the people to whom one-eighth of “charitable” Islamic money is funneled. The Holy Land Foundation was convicted of just such activities in 2008, and there are dozens of other Muslim Brotherhood affiliates that are quietly performing the same function every day, all over the world.

Our British correspondent JP has compiled the following report about his personal experience with the useful idiots who work with Muslim “charities” in the UK.


Faith, Hate and Charity: Calling out the Muslim Council of Britain

by JP

Below is recent email correspondence concerning the validity (or otherwise) of working with organisations in the UK’s charity sector which provide a platform for the Muslim Council of Britain (MCB).

In June I was engaged to carry out research concerning the viability of a new support centre in central London. Last week I was asked to visit another charity, Zacchaeus 2000, and discovered from its website that it appeared to support the work of the MCB. In itself this was not entirely surprising, as many charities and other organisations have links with it, however, given my knowledge of the MCB and its poisonous contribution to British public life, I appeared to have no choice but to raise objections.

Zacchaeus 2000 appeared willing to work with all and sundry in alleviating poverty and I challenged this with the opposing view that charities should discriminate in their choice of partner organisations. It seems such an obvious and common sense approach that I almost hesitate in offering it to a wider readership, but on balance consider it may be useful should others find themselves in a similar position. Given the reach of the Muslim Council of Britain in the UK, and allied organisations in the USA such as CAIR, it would be surprising if this were not the case. For example, there must be countless parents in the UK who have been adversely affected by the MCB’s Books for Schools project — for its most recent launch, which took place in Oxfordshire, see this press release.

Email One — sent 30 June 2010 to the national director of operations for an international charity with a presence in the UK:

Please find below an email sent to the CEO at Zacchaeus 2000. I have not yet received a reply, but perhaps this is for the best as I would undoubtedly be uncomfortable working with an organisation which appears to endorse the work of the Muslim Council of Britain.

I quote from a passage on the z2k website, written by the Chairman, Reverend Paul Nicolson:

“The list also includes Caritas Social Action Network, the Muslim Council of Great Britain, the Children’s and the Pensioners’ Charities and the National Consumer Council.”

I also note that the Reverend Paul Nicolson co-signed a letter to the Guardian concerning child poverty on 19 April 2009 which included the Secretary General of the Muslim Council of Britain as one of the signatories.

Suffice it to say I do not think the interests of the poor or the wider community are served by associating in any way whatsoever with an organisation such as the Muslim Council of Britain, and I would recommend that the [name of charity omitted] proceeds with caution in its future dealings with Zacchaeus 2000 which appears to lack focus in this area.

Email Two sent on 1 July 2010:
- - - - - - - - -

Thank you for taking the trouble to reply at length, and I admit that much of what you say makes sense — particularly the thought that the poor do not care whose hand feeds them — I would have no wish to argue with this particular point.

However, I will not work with an organisation which shares a platform or works with the Muslim Council of Britain — this is my line.

I do not believe the MCB is working for the common good, I support none of their objectives, and, furthermore, consider their prominence and influence in British public life an unfolding disaster: the only valid response in my opinion is a firm rejection of their message, and this includes a refusal to work with organisations with whom they associate in whatever capacity, whether it is poverty alleviation, interfaith work or community cohesion.

[…]

It should come as no surprise that in certain circles the MCB are seen and treated with ridicule, and if one is engaged in a war then moments of mirth do have their value — link to a post issued today, 1 July, which connects them with the Moonies (Universal Peace Federation):

“We’re quite used to link ups between Islamists and neo Nazis and Islamists and Communists. But I really really did not expect this. The Muslim Council of Britain and their main cheerleaders, Bob Lambert’s European Muslim Research Centre, are now in bed with … the Moonies !”

Yet it is my belief that the MCB manages to retain credibility, respectability, call it what you will, precisely because misguided organisations such as Zacchaeus 2000 continue to offer them a platform to carry out work with the poor while ignoring their highly dubious credentials.

The interests of the poor and the wider community are not served in any way whatsoever by this sort of short-termism. In other words if the aim is to build healthy, integrated communities, the members of which lead contented and fulfilling lives free of the scourge of injustice and poverty then you should have a pretty clear idea of who or what the barriers are: it may be greedy bankers, thoughtless FSA regulators, fickle politicians or morally-corrupt community leaders who have been given too much space to spread their poison.

The correspondence reveals, I believe, that it is possible to undertake Counter-Jihad actions should the opportunity arise, and that one outcome of such action is raising the awareness of the target organisations that their allegiances do not go unnoticed.

(Note: The charity sector here receives exceedingly light-touch regulation: the UK’s Charity Commission is notoriously inconsistent when it comes to policing infringements of their rules of conduct, turning a blind eye to Muslim violations yet acting with rigour in pursuit of other miscreants. The High Priestess or Queen of the Quangos [hat-tip: Peter Hitchens], Dame Suzi Leather, appears to have a soft spot for the ugliest type of Islam as might have been apparent from the woeful attempts of the Charity Commission to investigate Interpal.

From The Telegraph, 20 January 2008:

The commission investigated the charity Interpal, which aims to help Palestinians, twice — and cleared it twice. John Ware, the BBC reporter, then looked at Interpal for Panorama. He alleged that Interpal’s donations helped to build up Hamas, an organisation designated “terrorist” by the EU. Interpal claims that all the relevant charities were exclusively concerned with “humanitarian need”. Nevertheless, charitable funds are not supposed to benefit any political movement. Made aware of Mr Ware’s allegations, the commission admitted that its investigations “had not been in depth”, and promised a new one. That was over a year ago. The commission has yet to report its conclusions.

And here is the conclusion of John Ware’s response to the Commission’s report, issued in March 2009 (Ware mentions that the Commission does not appear to have taken into account evidence released at the Holy Land Foundation trial in the UK.):

Bridge building

During the Commission’s inquiry, a home office official is reported to have expressed concern that any adverse finding against Interpal that blocked funds might have a significant effect on community cohesion.

Over the years, Interpal has generated considerable support amongst some MPs, is venerated by virtually every Islamic organisation here and is relied upon by thousands of ordinary Muslim donors wishing to relieve hardship in Gaza and the West Bank.

The Commission is a non ministerial department of government and says it is independent of ministerial influence.

Interpal however appears to be claiming the semi-official imprimatur of government. Even while the charity was under investigation for links to Hamas in 2007, minutes from Interpal trustees say that a “delegation of Interpal Trustees met with officials from the British Embassy in Jordan and together paid a visit to many partner NGOs in the region.”

The minutes also mention a visit to Lebanon in August 2007 in which a “member of the British security agencies” joined them and “included a meeting with the British Ambassador and UNESCWA” — the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for West Asia.

Even so, the fact that a charity banned by several UK allies and under investigation at home was — apparently — given voluntary diplomatic services might now raise a few eyebrows.