In today’s installment, Sayyid Imam begins section three of his rebuttal in which he surveys the rhetorical tricks Zawahiri employs to misguide his readers. Imam continues to portray Zawahiri as the student of Bin Laden, the inverse of the common description of their relationship. To this end, Imam says that Zawahiri has adopted UBL’s obsession with oil. The inversion may be pure invention, but it’s worth thinking about.
Continuing….
In the first section, I demonstrated that Zawahiri is a liar, making him unfit to give religious opinions. In the second section, I showed how he distorts the Sharia to justify mass murder. He should call his book The Justification rather than The Exoneration.
In this third section, I will expose the deceptions Z uses. Z asks around one hundred questions in the Exoneration but does not offer any answer. He does this to confuse the reader, leaving him in a thick fog. Here are some of Z’s deceptions:
1) Z quotes contradictory statements on legal questions.
He does this to give the reader the impression that there is a difference of opinion on an issue and that the reader one can adopt any of the opinions he likes. But God has commanded us to resolve contradictory statements by weighing them with scripture. The statements of religious scholars and the scripture have to be weighed against one another. Anything that contradicts scripture is false. Failing to weigh the statements in order to know right from wrong is forbidden.
2) Another of Z’s deceptions is his statement that he wrote the Exoneration to protect Islam.
How can this be the case when he has made so many jurisprudential errors, which have made him turn his back on scripture and on the statements of scholars, seeking refuge instead with Nasir al-Fahd? He has denied the obligation of fighting the near enemy first. He has adopted the ideas of Bin Laden and become one of those who want to sell oil at its true price, meaning that it is obligatory for Muslims to engage in a jihad against oil.
3) Another of Z’s deceptions is that he claims to have been accused without proof or evidence.
Everything I have said against him I have backed up with scripture or well-known information about Z. As for the private things I disclosed, I know much more than I have revealed.
4) Z has stirred up trouble by saying, “no allegiance to a prisoner.” [This is an allusion to Imam’s imprisonment and to a controversy involving the Umar Abd al-Rahman, “The Blind Sheikh,” that roiled the Islamic Group.]
No one has given their allegiance to me. I haven’t had contact with them [EIJ?] for 15 years. As I already said, Yemeni intel wanted me to set up an opposition party against Egypt and I refused.
5) Z has also stirred up trouble by saying that if my [Sayyid Imam’s] revisions are true, why didn’t I put them forward before I went to prison.
Z contradicts himself on p. 10 of the Exoneration when he acknowledges that I wrote a book criticizing my colleagues 14 years ago, well before I was imprisoned.
I never called my book a revision. Moreover, I’ve said the same things before. When Z published my book, The Compendium, he cut out my criticisms of the Islamic movements. Now when he can’t control what I write, he resorts to stupidity.
Finally, a revision is not a sin if it moves closer to the truth.
6) Another of Z’s deceptions is his claim that the Document ignores the real criminals, America and its allies.
This is a lie. Just as I admonished the Islamic movements, I admonished local rulers in part 14 of the Document and the enemies of Islam in part 15.
Z has completely adopted UBL’s positions, including UBL’s obsession with oil.
If America is a criminal and the cause of Muslims’ woes, why did UBL offer the U.S. a truce and Z offer to negotiate? Did U.S. crimes end? Or did AQ want the truce for its own safety?
When the U.S. did not respond to the demands of AQ for a truce or negotiations, AQ in Algeria bombed foreign interests that killed dozens of Algerians. That is a heavy price to pay for the safety of AQ’s leadership.
They kill Algerians but weep when Jews kill Palestinians. Z censures Hamas for killing some innocent Jewish children with its primitive rockets but says nothing about killing children them on 9/11 or in Afghanistan.
* An important principle: “The crimes of the infidels do not justify a Muslim’s mistakes.”
Z lambastes anyone who criticizes the mujahids for wrongdoing on the grounds that the sins of the U.S. are greater than the sins of the mujahids. Scripture indicates that the infidels’ crimes do not justify silence on the mistakes of Muslims.
Z uses the crimes of America and Israel as cover for AQ’s wrongdoing.
Document (Arabic): 11-25-08-al-masry-al-youm-denudation-part-7
2 Responses
On point 4 (Z saying “no allegiance to a prisoner”), I have a couple of remarks:
1. It’s minor, but I believe you have a mistranslation there. Dr. Fadl doesn’t say “I don’t give my allegiance to anyone,” but rather “No one has given his allegiance to me,” i.e. I’m not anyone’s leader. That makes more sense as well given what follows about him not wanting to be a president or form a party in exile. It also means that when he says he cut off relations with “them,” he’s definitely referring to EIJ, when he stopped being the amir.
2. More interesting to me on this point is that when Z cites the “no allegiance to a prisoner,” he’s using the Gamaa argument instead of the EIJ argument in the controversy over who should have led the combined group. At least as I understand that dispute, EIJ wanted Abbud al-Zumur, which the Gamaa rejected on the grounds that he was a prisoner (la wilaya li-l-asir); meanwhile, the Gamaa wanted Umar Abd al-Rahman, which was rejected by EIJ on the grounds that he’s blind. So previously the EIJ (which presumably included Z at that point?) had no problem giving allegiance to a prisoner.
Khwaga,
1. Good catch. I’ve made the change.
2. You are right about Z’s allusion. Sorry if that didn’t come across in my truncated explanation.