Undercover Mosque

Undercover Mosque: "...and he's left there to bleed to death for 3 days"

Undercover Mosque is a documentary from British Television Channel 4 programme Dispatches which aired on 15 January 2007 in the UK. The film caused a furore in Britain and the world press due to the content of the released footage.

The documentary presents film footage gathered from 12 months of secret investigation into mosques throughout Britain.

Content

Undercover Mosque generated controversy because it contained footage depicting British imams making the following statements:

File:UndercoverMosquekill.jpg

Undercover Mosque: "And as for the Jews, you kill them physically" [2]

• Dr Ijaz Mian on the subject of non-muslim laws: "You cannot accept the rule of the kaffir [non-Muslim], We have to rule ourselves and we have to rule the others"
• Preaches hatred of non-muslims who are repeatedly labeled as Kuffirs.
• Abu Usamah saying of apostates: "Whom ever changes his religion from Al Islam to anything else kill him".
• Abu Usamah speaking on the deficiency of women's minds: "Allah has created the woman, even if she gets a PhD, deficient. Her intellect is incomplete, deficient. She may be suffering from hormones that will make her emotional. It takes two witnesses of a woman to equal the one witness of the man."
• Praises the killer of a British soldier serving in Afghanistan, stating "The hero of Islam is the one who separated his head from his shoulders.”
• Sheikh Al Faisal: "You have to bomb the Indian businesses, and as for the Jews you kill them physically"
• Advocates violent Jihad against the non-muslims and predicting that an army of Muslims will arise against the non-muslims in England.
• Dr Bilal Philips on marriage with pre-pubescent girls: "The prophet Muhammad practically outlined the rules regarding marriage prior to puberty. With his practice, he clarified what is permissible, and that is why we shouldn't have any issues about an older man marrying a younger woman, which is looked down upon by this society today, but we know that Prophet Mohammed practised it, it wasn’t abuse or exploitation, it was marriage"
• Condemns Muslim integration into British society.
• Calls for the overthrow of the British government and democracy. "They will fight in the cause of Allah. I encourage all of you to be from among them, to begin to cultivate ourselves for the time that is fast approaching - where the tables are going to turn and the Muslims are going to be in the position of being uppermost in strength."
• Dr Mian: "You are in a situation in which you have to live like a state within a state, until you take over. But until this happens, you have to preach, until you become such a force that the people they just submit to you, hands up, until you become strong enough to take over"
• Sheikh Al Jibali: "by the age of 10 if she doesn't wear a hijab, we hit her."
• Dr Mian saying of the Saudi religious police: they can imprison people if they do not pray; "if you don't come for prayer, we will arrest you. But if you still don't, then we have to bring the punishment on you - you will be killed"
• Abu Usamah saying that homesexuals should be killed by throwing them off a cliff, stating "throw [the homesexual] off the mountain."

Mosques and Islamic Centers investigated

File:UndercoverMosqueHeroOfIslam.jpg

Undercover Mosque: "The 'hero of Islam' is the one who separated his head from his shoulders"

• Markazi Jamiat Ahl-e-Hadith ,
• UK Islamic Mission
• London Central Mosque and Islamic Cultural Centre in Regent's Park
• Green Lane Mosque, Birmingham
• Ahl-e-Hadith mosque, in Derby
• UKIM's Sparkbrook Islamic Centre, Birmingham

Response

Jewish groups as well as members of the British Conservative and Labour parties have requested an official investigation into the alleged dissemination of hate speech at mosques. Muslim groups such as the Islamic Human Rights Commission (IHRC) have condemned the documentary as "another example of anti-Muslim hostility," stating that it represents the "problems of inherent Islamophobia and racism within the mainstream media." The Muslim Council of Britain criticized it as "heavily hyped," while its Secretary-General, Muhammad Abdul Bari, described it as employing the "dishonest tactic of selectively quoting from some recorded speeches for the purpose of misrepresentation." The Islamic Cultural Center (London), the UK Islamic Mission, and the Markazi Jamiat Ahle-hadith organizations, all of whom feature in the documentary, have issued separate responses. So too has Abu Usamah of Green Lane mosque, alleging that his words were taken out of context. In a press release, the Saudi Arabian Embassy in London denied the charges made by the documentary, labelling them as "false allegations."

The Saltley Gate Peace group, which describes itself as an inter-faith action group based at the Saltley Methodist Church in Birmingham, was reported on Wikinews as having made a press release [3] prior to the airing of the Channel 4 documentary. Wikinews records that press release as having included, amongst others, the following statements:

• That Imam Abu Usaamah, one of the preachers featured in the documentary, is acknowledged by the a significant portion of his congregation and the wider interfaith community "to be a peaceful man and is known to promote peace to his congregation", and that he has denounced terrorism.
• That the Green Lane Mosque is not known to promote extremism and the founders and committee of the mosque have always distanced themselves from such extremism
• That the UK branch of Jamiat Ahl-e-Hadith are based at the Green Lane mosque and Islamic. The statement explains that Jamiat Ahl-e-Hadith is known loosely as 'Salafism', and that this school of thought does not promote extremism. However, it concedes that there may be a minority that feel otherwise. Nonetheless it states that those following the the Salafi methodology strive to follow the earliest traditions so that their Islam is peaceful and pure.

These views were echoed on the BlackBritain website. [4]

The Megaphone desktop tool has also has issued alerts about the australian cleric involved in this case.

Similar programme on BBC

The BBC's Panorama program, aired on 21 August 2005, had previously revealed similar hate speech at various mosques in the UK. [5]

Sheikh Abdul Rahman Al-Sudais, a leading Imam from the great mosque in Mecca, is quoted in that program as having said:

"The worst ... of the enemies of Islam are those... whom he... made monkeys and pigs, the aggressive Jews and oppressive Zionists and those that follow them: the callers of the trinity and the cross worshippers... those influenced by the rottenness of their ideas, and the poison of their cultures the followers of secularism... How can we talk sweetly when the Hindus and the idol worshippers indulge in their overwhelming hatred against our brothers... in Muslim Kashmir..."

The Muslim Council of Britain denounced the program as "deeply unfair". The BBC rejected allegations of institutional or programme bias. [6]

See also

• Sheikh Feiz Mohammad - The head of the Global Islamic Youth Centre in Sydney, Australia.
• Controversies related to Islam and Muslims

Video

• Video of "Undercover Mosque"
• Official video response to C4 Dispatches from imam Abu Usamah

External links

• Channel 4 Undercover Mosque Website
• UK TV uncovers 'Islamic supremacism'
• Undercover Mosque Transcript (PDF)
• Documentary goes undercover in British mosques, finds 'ideology of bigotry'
• Britain's new preachers of hate
• TV 'preachers of hate' escape police action
• The New York Sun: British Muslims Get Their Soapbox Television
• Channel 4 blasted for demonising Muslims - The Muslim Weekly
• Yasir Qadhi talks about 'Dispatches - Undercover Mosques'