Prior Research

On many accounts Shari’a and Violence in American Mosques merely confirms what many had suspected about what was happening in American mosques.  The following sources are useful supplements to the Mapping Shari’a Project:

Saudi Publications on Hate Ideology Invade American Mosques, Center for Religious Freedom/Freedom House, 2005

From the report:

The phenomenon of Saudi hate ideology is worldwide, but its occurrence in the United States has received scant attention. This report begins to probe in detail the content of the Wahhabi ideology that the Saudi government has worked to propagate through books and other publications within our borders. While substantial analysis has been previously published on Saudi Wahhabism in other countries, few specifics have been reported on the content of Wahhabi indoctrination within the United States.

In undertaking this study, we did not attempt a general survey of American mosques. In order to document Saudi influence, the material for this report was gathered from a selection of more than a dozen mosques and Islamic centers in American cities, including Los Angeles, Oakland, Dallas, Houston, Chicago, Washington, and New York. In most cases, these sources are the most prominent and well-established mosques in their areas. They have libraries and publication racks for mosque-goers. Some have full-or part-time schools and, as the 9/11 Commission Report observed, such “Saudi-funded Wahhabi schools are often the only Islamic schools.”

The material collected consists of over 200 books and other publications, many of which titles were available in several mosques. Some 90 percent of the publications are in Arabic, though some are in English, Urdu, Chinese and Tagalog. With one exception, an Urdu-language document, the materials for this study were in Arabic and English. The Center had two independent translators review each Arabic document.

Saudi Publications on Hate Ideology Invade American Mosques
(PDF, 95 pages, 558KB)

Radicalization in the West: The Homegrown Threat, Prepared by Mitchell D. Silber and Arvin Bhatt, Senior Intelligence Analysts, NYPD Intelligence Division

From the report:

Where once we would have defined the initial indicator of the threat at the point where a terrorist or group of terrorists would actually plan an attack, we have now shifted our focus to a much earlier point—a point where we believe the potential terrorist or group of terrorists begin and progress through a process of radicalization. The culmination of this process is a terrorist attack.

Understanding this trend and the radicalization process in the West that drives “unremarkable” people to become terrorists is vital for developing effective counter- strategies and has special importance for the NYPD and the City of New York. As one of the country’s iconic symbols and the target of numerous terrorist plots since the 1990’s, New York City continues to be among the top targets of terrorists worldwide.

Radicalization in the West: The Homegrown Threat
(PDF, 92 pages, 808KB)

Islamic Extremism: A Viable Threat to U.S. National Security, Transcript of a presentation by Shaykh Muhammad Hisham Kabbani at the U.S. Department of State, January 7, 1999

From the transcript:

The most dangerous thing that is going on now in these mosques, that has been sent upon these mosques around the United States — like churches they were established by different organizations and that is ok — but the problem with our communities is the extremist ideology. Because they are very active they took over the mosques; and we can say that they took over more than 80% of the mosques that have been established in the US. And there are more than 3000 mosques in the US.

So it means that the methodology or ideology of extremist has been spread to 80% of the Muslim population, but not all of them agree with it. But mostly the youth and the new generation do because they are students and they don’t think except with their emotions and they are rebellious against their own leaders and government. This is the nature and psychology of human beings. When we are students in university or college we always fight the government, whether they are right or wrong, we have to attack the government. This is how they have been raised.

In this way we see that the extremist ideology, and this is the fourth danger, is beginning to spread very quickly into the universities through the national organizations, associations and clubs that they are establishing around the universities. Most of these clubs — they are Muslim clubs and the biggest is the national one — are being run mostly by the extremist ideology that they do not understand other than to say that America is wrong and they are right. You can find this on the Internet; you can find it everywhere on homepages and websites that they are against the United States. This is where we don’t know how far it goes, and how far it is out of hand. This might affect the whole university system in the United States. Through the universities there will be the most danger. If the nuclear atomic warheads reach these universities, you don’t know what these students are going to do, because their way of thinking is brainwashed, limited and narrow-minded.

Islamic Extremism: A Viable Threat to U.S. National Security
(PDF, 92 pages, 808KB)


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