Ep 256. - Gaza: Are US Muslims Doing Enough? | Dr. Omar Suleiman
I’m here in Dallas with Imam Omar Suleiman, who has been relentlessly advocating for the people of Gaza over the past gruesome 23 months. We sat down to talk in depth about our own complicity, our disposition, and our behavior during what is the most harrowing period in our Ummah’s existence. I ask him: are American Muslims doing enough?
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Transcript - This is an AI generated transcript and may not reflect the actual conversation.
Introduction
0:00
Cuz there's no country that's more complicit in the genocide in Kaza than the United States of America. Heart of the um is being ripped out of its chest. The legs are being cut like we're
0:08
getting chopped down. What does it mean to eat while others are starving? What do we do when in
0:13
the same moment that we're eating our food, you're watching a screen and you're seeing the rib cages of people in starvation. I think about Allah subhana t resurrecting me and if walks up and
0:25
Allah says, "What did you do with him? What did you do for these people? Do I have the answer?" And so yes, extravagance is especially offensive now, though it's always offensive to Allah subhana
0:34
tala. Starvation is an evil weapon of war. An evil weapon of war. Like there are non-Muslims who have
0:40
been protesting for Palestine for decades and they're still there. I'm here in Dallas with Imam
0:45
Omar Sulman who has been relentlessly advocating for the people of Gaza over the past gruesome 23
0:52
months. We sat down to talk in depth about our own complicity, our disposition and behavior during
0:58
what is the most harrowing period in our ummah's existence. What does that teach us today about
1:05
building alliances with non-Muslims specifically here in the US? Someone says these protests don't
1:11
do anything. There is a reason why Israel wants to shut it down. There are more of us than there are of them. Right. Dr. and welcome back to the thinking Muslim for having me. And thank you to
1:27
brother Mahmud Mahmud Ansari for uh giving us this space here in Dallas and alhamdulillah for once
1:32
I'm in your space in Dallas. Yes, alhamdulillah. It's a lot easier. Alhamdulillah. Alhamdulillah. And it's nice to see brothers in the podcast world uh cooperating. This is you know our
1:43
brother Mahmood has taught me some really good lessons about cooperation. mash and so I'm
1:49
really indebted to him uh for for his help. Um uh Shakar today I want to really pick up on a couple
1:57
of conversations we've had uh over the past almost two years of genocide. Uh but I want to pick up on
2:04
on a conversation really about our mindset uh in the midst of this genocide. Like psychologically,
Psychology of Muslims
2:11
how should we as a Muslim um be responding to this genocide? Because once in a while we capture a
2:18
comment made by a person in Gaza or someone who's just left Gaza and they look at the Muslim Ummah
2:26
and they sometimes even make dua against members of the ummah for our complacency how much we're
2:34
ignoring their plight. And that worries me and I think that worries all of us. we're we're very perturbed by by falling on the wrong side of of the dua of the oppressed. So I I want
2:45
to try to clarify this question uh about about our mindset. Now you recently posed a question,
2:53
what does it mean to eat while others are starving? What does it mean to eat while our brothers and sisters in Gaza are starving? Uh can you unpack that moral dilemma for us, please?
3:05
So I think the way that I'd sort of break this down is that there's an element of this that is
3:11
between us and Allah subhana wa ta'ala and there's an element of this that is between us and our brothers and sisters for the sake of Allahhana ta our personal spirituality our personal trajectory
3:21
and how what is happening should define the relationship that we have with our creator and
3:29
then there is what is due upon us by our brothers and sisters Right. And those things are of course
3:35
interconnected. Subhan Allah. I remember um I want to say it was probably 2 months in and
3:43
uh December is a wedding season. So there are a lot of weddings that take place in the winter obviously and there was a question by a few brothers and sisters if they should
3:53
have their weddings when the genocide was starting, right? And so I gave a talk back
3:59
then about the importance of honoring the sunnah of but also honoring our brothers and sisters,
4:06
right? And that there are multiple ways to do this. Avoiding, you know, extravagance, avoiding um certain elements of the weddings that have become common. I mean, things that should be
4:15
avoided anyway because they're haram anyway. Um perhaps instead of wedding favors, you know, every
4:20
uh everyone is told to donate to Raza instead. So have a barcode that says donate to instead um and
4:27
we're forgoing our gifts. But there are multiple ways to think about this to have a mention of to have a dua for I tried to frame it as much as I can and subhan Allah there was a message that
4:36
came to me from a brother uh from who had heard it at the time. He heard that lecture and he said um
4:46
from your right upon us is that we feel joy for you and from our right upon you is that
4:52
you don't forget us in your dua. So that was those were his words. Yes. Your right upon us
4:58
is that we feel happiness for the occasion and our right upon you is that you don't forget us.
5:06
things have obviously only escalated and they become darker and deeper and
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um I think there's a greater sense of guilt with everything that's happening. I was in Jordan over
5:17
the summer and there was a uh that went by and uh the brother wrote on his wedding car forgive
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us oh people of we're just fulfilling the sunnah. So like basically if it wasn't for the being sunna
5:35
we wouldn't have even had it. So we're forgoing all the other elements but we're just doing what we need to do just to to fulfill that sunnah. Yes. I think that that spirit of doing what is
5:47
necessary to function within our life especially as it it pertains to our dean right like should
5:55
we have of course we should have should we should we have certain elements? Yes. to the extent that
6:01
the prophet sallall alaihi wasallam would have commanded us to do so while also operating with the empathy of the prophet sallall alaihi wasallam and with this you know full active empathy right
6:13
that stops us from exceeding the limits both in regards to our relationship with Allah subhana t
6:20
as well as the rights of our brothers and sisters becomes important and there's a lot that's in between those two things like full out living life as if nothing is happening and not living your
6:30
life at all. Now when says may Allah abandon those who abandon us, it's one of the scariest duas that
6:42
can be made and we should all fear being on the wrong side of that dua. You know, subh when when
6:49
I was thinking about this and I was reflecting with some of the people that are close to me
6:56
has this saying that if Allah was to punish all of the inhabitants of the heavens and the earth or all of us,
7:05
he would have punished them and he would not have been a transgressor towards them. There is a context to that. But I was just thinking about this idea like humanity has truly failed.
7:16
Like there is an element of you know subhan Allah as a human race. It's as
7:21
if like we we have descended to exactly what the angels meant when they said
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will you put on the earth those who will cause corruption and spill blood. Like we've reached
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that place to where it almost feels like humanity doesn't deserve to exist. If this can happen to
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humanity doesn't deserve to exist. if if this is where we're at as as as a being, as a species,
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that we can watch this all take place and the whole world, two two billion Muslims, and you
7:55
know, the billions more of non-Muslims can't act to save these people, then do we even deserve to
8:01
exist? And that's where Allah's is perhaps more um than than ours, right? because I think that
8:10
uh if we're being honest with ourselves, we've we've really descended to the lowest of low as a
8:16
human race. Now, to the practical manifestation of this being with our brothers and sisters,
8:22
the prophet sallall alaihi wasallam on a personal level had more pain than any one
8:27
of us. But he still smiled towards his people. The prophet sallall alaihi wasallam also because
8:33
of his rah because of his mercy would have been in tune with you know not just human beings but
8:40
like the prophet sallall alaihi wasallam is walking by and a camel complains to the prophet sallallaihi wasallam a bird complains to the prophet sallall alaihi wasallam and that
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changes his facial expression and he starts admonishing the companions so can you imagine
8:53
a mercy to the worlds right what it would be like for the prophet sallall alaihi wasallam to encounter these images I can't even imagine right how the prophet sallallaihi wasallam would
9:02
admonish this community, right, for for letting this happen. If you're enjoying the episode,
Subscribe to The Thinking Youth
9:07
you're going to love this next clipam. My name is Alam and I'm one of the co-hosts of our brand new project, the Thinking Youth Podcast. And to make our launch successful, we need your
9:16
help. So enjoy the sneak peek of our new episode released with Imam Tom just today. And make sure to support us by subscribing to the Thinking Youth Podcast. How do you navigate the Sunni
9:26
Shia divide and the broader maybe intramuslim divide? Oh, the Shia are always traitors and they've always been this way and they're and you can't trust them for anything. It's like,
9:33
well, not really. It's not that simple. We don't even mention Hussein whatsoever. Why
9:38
don't we talk about this as Sunnis? We are anti- kumbaya. We are anti- kumbaya. Book it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Write it down. What does it say about us that we don't have nearly as
9:48
many conversations within the ummah as we do with like interfaith? Jokingly referred to as like So,
9:55
you're saying we don't have to 100% agree with everybody? Like that sounds pretty crazy. That sounds kind of radical. You don't agree 100% with your wife. So, how are you going to 100%
10:01
agree with anybody? It's like, I won't even take chocolate from an innovator. It's like, come on.
10:08
My favorite, one of my favorite ayat. Exactly. Standing in your values and being confident and knowing your worth is really important. There
10:15
can be a unity of purpose even if we don't unite on much after that.
Peoples rights upon us
10:29
But one of the things that we have to remember is like the prophet sallall alaihi wasallam smiled at people from a place of of towards them and he cried for people at night from a place of
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towards them. Our disposition towards people and how we live our lives on an individual level have
10:47
to encompass everything and everyone that we're interacting with with Allah subhana wa ta'ala's
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sight uh in mind. That means that there are people around us that have rights upon us and
11:00
there are people that are distant from us, distant from us that have rights upon us and we try to harmonize those rights while keeping in mind the ultimate right of Allahh upon us.
11:10
There are times I don't feel like playing with my kids because I'm I just saw someone holding their
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daughter uh in Gaza and I I almost feel like I don't have the right to do this. But then I would
11:24
be wronging them by checking out on my own kids, right? So I I have to I have to put on a brave
11:29
face for my own kids while still thinking about that man that I just saw that was holding his daughter while I'm holding my own daughter and and realizing you know that Allah subhana t will ask
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me about her and Allah will ask me about her and there are certain ways that I have to conduct my
11:46
life to where I'm I'm harmonizing all of that. So I'd say that ex you know sometimes like the
11:53
pendulum you know swings in a certain way to where we need to pull people back. Um, look, right now
12:04
we have to be including the people of Gaza in all of our thoughts and we have to be considering how our smallest actions affect them or our lack of actions affect them and we shouldn't feel like
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there's too much of a price to pay like you know like we were having a conversation we're in the US and Amazon is complicit in the genocide right we everyone lives off of their Amazon Prime here
12:25
so like as a family we're like like how do we actually stop using Amazon though, right? How do we stop how do we make sure we've canceled all of our Microsoft products? How how like we
12:36
should not have this when we're going to the store and we're checking to see if something is on the boycott list or not. Like, oh man, like this is on the boycott list too. Like what does that even
12:44
mean? There has to be an element to where this is second nature. And you know, we we actively want
12:51
to make sure that we are rejecting this. We're doing incar of it. we're we're hating this and
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we're rejecting it as much as we possibly can and not being complacent with any element of our lives
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that potentially harms them. So our tax dollars in the US are being used to kill them. We're in the
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belly of right like we would hope to be al right now the believer in the house of and sometimes
13:19
you don't know if America is real and who's and who's ham but at the end of the day like this is
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complicity it's not complacency it's complicity so fighting the way our tax dollars are being used as
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much as we can doing incar of it with every single bit of our being uh looking towards like on the
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economics level for example like I was like all these halal portfolios. All these companies that invest in halal, uh you're not just trying to stay away from ribba here. You better be trying to stay
13:49
away from genocide, too. If you're investing in in a company that's complicit in the genocide, that to me is, you know, just as severe as if you're investing in a company that is a ribeye company,
13:59
right? Or an alcohol or a gambling company. What's the difference between gambling and genocide, right? So, we have to rethink like, you know, portfolios and and the way that our our companies,
14:08
our own Muslim companies and industries work, right? We have to come to our community and we have to connect every form of communal life to their communal life. And so yes,
14:18
extravagance is especially offensive now though it's always offensive to Allahhana but it's especially offensive right now. And so when I gave the about you know food and in a moment of
14:27
genocide that's what I was talking about that look uh if if the Sahabah if was eating his food years
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later after after was martyed years later decades later and he starts to cry and he says Musab was
14:48
killed and Musab was better than me. Musab didn't get to eat this type of food. He didn't get to live this type of comfort. What do we do when in the same moment that we're eating our food, you're
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watching a screen and you're seeing the rib cages of people in starvation? It's very uncomfortable.
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We should be uncomfortable right now. In fact, it's part of iman to be uncomfortable. If we're not uncomfortable, there's a weakness in our iman. And that discomfort should show in everything that
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we're doing that, you know, look at the end of the day, allahel commands us to be. He commands us to
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exist. He commands us to do certain things despite our pain. But you know the hadith that came to
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mind, I know that this is very long-winded so I apologize. You probably have a lot more questions. When the prophet sallall alaihi wasallam saw is and he had his lips um puckered right ready to
15:42
blow and with that blow death comes to everyone. The words of the prophet sallall alaihi wasallam
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were how can I have an appetite for this world? How can I find happiness anymore after I've seen
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staring at the throne of Allahh waiting for the command to blow like and over and over and over
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again like sometimes I'm sitting with myself and I go I just don't enjoy anything anymore. I truly don't like I don't enjoy anything anymore. But I have to almost like lean into all right my family
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has rights upon me. I still have to smile at this person. I still have to I still have to
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put on a face to do this and but Allah will ask me about what's in here and Allah will ask me about
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my thoughts and Allah will ask me about my actions and um we have to be ready just like on a personal
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level where we simulate what it will be like to stand in front of Allahh on the day of judgment. You know what I think about now? I think about the courtroom. I think about Allah subhana wa
16:44
tala resurrecting me. And if Allah walks up and Allah says, "What did you do with him? What did
16:56
you do for these people?" Do I have the answer? What do I say? So the courtroom that I envision
17:05
on the day of judgment has changed uh because it just includes like I just I think about right away
17:11
that courtroom and I think about who the who the witnesses are, who the testimony is, you know, it's like I never met us like we just communicate. I never met so so many of these people. We never
17:20
met them but we feel attached to them in so many different ways. And everyone that you interact
17:27
with in this world is a part of your story and so they're a part of your afterlife as well. They're the shu of Allah on this on this earth. So they're they're with Allah, but they're also the
17:37
of Allahh. They're going to be asked about us and we're going to be asked about them. And you know,
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I pray that we we have a sufficient answer. But no one of us, just like we we shouldn't
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feel comfortable with our with our interview with Allahh in regards to our own, we shouldn't feel like, oh, you know, I'm protesting. I'm boycotting and I'm not drinking Coke. I'm good. Yeah. you
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know, it's got to be more than that. So, I want to come to the action part in a in a in a bit. Uh,
Muslims are one body
18:05
but I want to stay with it's fascinating. It really it's really evocative what you've that last example of the court courtroom and and being judged by these these witnesses
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um by Allahh and the witnesses who are um uh who you've interacted with. I mean there's this hadith
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about we know and we quote very often about you know if the Muslim is one body and if if
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one part of that body hurts the rest of the part rest of the body responds with sleeplessness and
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fever. Um I've never really uh until Gaza really thought too deeply about the sleeplessness and
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fever part. Like for me it was an intellectual hadith you know that you've got to do something right you got to act but seelessness and fever is is a it's almost like a biological response to a
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uh to a predicament like can you explain what the messenger sallallahu alaihi wasallam was trying to evoke through you know these the example of the body and the seless and fever even before
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getting to that part of the hadith you know the prophet sallallaihi wasallam being having that the the comprehensiveness of speech. He said that the example of the believers
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he gives three actual ways in which the believers are one body. Uh is active love
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in their love for each other. And um you know it's like right like it comes from wood. Wood
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would is like active love. It's not a passive love. It's an active love. It's uh it's it's what's found in a marriage. just what's found in two people who love each other
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for the sake of Allahhana it's what's found in in something that expresses itself in visitation for the sake of Allah checking up on each other for the sake of Allahhanaa then the second one
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is their mercy and mercy here say speaks to forgiveness right so that's forgiving someone
20:02
who harmed you when they seek forgiveness that's um you know the the forgiveness element the the
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mercy element when uh two groups of believers have a fight, whatever it may be. the of course
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um right these are all things like by the way like the way the prophet would speak about us
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as as a community it's the same way he spoke about a marriage right like they're exactly synonymous
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in this regard right so the that's found in a marriage uh the forgiveness element then the
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last one is which is sympathy okay so that's the bare minimum so uh naturally every single
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layer represents a a connection or a deficiency of the one that's above it. So if you have active
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love, then the other two come naturally. Okay? If the active love is not there, do you at least have mercy? And if the mercy is not there, do you at least have sympathy? Right?
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So where even if you don't know this person or you have no connection like that's why you see a person who has no iman but they have fra to an extent to where when they see what's happening in
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they're coming out now and like protesting, right? They're being overtaken by sleeplessness and fever
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because of just the the bare fra and and just humanity of of seeing what's happening. Yeah.
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Okay. So that's the first part of the hadith. Now you come to the last part of hadith. Um
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sleeplessness and fever. These are powerful expressions because sleeplessness what's
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the effect of sleeplessness? What happens when you're sleepless? You're vigilant. You're on the edge. Right? So there's an awareness element. There's an observable external element. Your
21:43
eyes are bloodshot. You're you're thinking about something very clearly. Whereas humma is sort of
21:50
the internal pain. And so there's alertness and um the external and then there is the internal pain,
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right? The fever. A fever as the mentioned, right? You don't see a fever. uh you can tell
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when someone's sweating and you can tell but you don't see the fever itself, right? And that actually represents I think that like a lot of of Muslims who have the fever but they they you know
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it's not it's not so visible. How we take this to our daily lives and how we feel that pain is
22:27
that no matter what we are doing even when we're enjoying a blessing we're saying to ourselves that
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the people of Gaza should have this blessing as well and if the prophet sallall alaihi wasallam
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is saying if one part of the body complains like if you have a toothache you're bothered subhan
22:47
Allah what more fitting example to where we've seen more limbless people in our lives, right,
22:56
in this in this last two years than ever before. People I mean, it's not a toothache anymore. Like
23:02
the arms of the um are being cut off. The heart of the um is being ripped out of its chest. The legs are being cut. Like we're getting chopped down. Right? So if you're not feeling pain now,
23:14
then there is a a serious deficiency of iman. By the way, Subhan Allah, one of the things that that's really important to understand here because we say that it's a
23:22
deficiency of the one that's before it, Muslims should have been engaged with a and before October
23:29
of 2023. One of the problems is that if we're being if we're being truthful as an um we became
23:36
complacent with the sit the status quo is under occupation, Ala is under occupation. Um you know,
23:44
they're constantly expanding their settlements. the ummah became complacent with the status quo.
23:50
the um stopped feeling the pain. And you know to give an example, right? It's not the toothache,
23:56
but let's say it was a finger being cut off and now it's the whole arm being cut off, right? Like the um was not feeling the pain of that at all. And now now it's just that much more
24:05
aggressive. The fever has become more aggressive. The virus has become more aggressive. The pain has become more aggressive to where you can't ignore it anymore. It might be that that's from the mercy
24:14
of Allah subhana t because had allahel found you in that state of complete negligence and right and
24:20
heedlessness you would have been punishable for that just for for your your ignorance and your ignoring heedlessness of of this of the the state of the people of Palestine and before so this
24:31
hadith represents a state of being and empathy in Islam is not just an emotion it's not a passive
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emotion like the prophet sallall alaihi wasallam mentioned And if the only thing I can do is I can
24:46
walk with my brother in his time of need. That's better to me than doing this of mine, right? To
24:54
walk with my brother in need. And so there's this whole like spectrum of can I walk with
24:59
my brother in need even if I can't help him but I can be in solidarity with him to can I walk with
25:05
my brother in need until I can see him all the way through. It's similar to how you have the spectrum of whoever amongst you sees an evil change it with your hand. If you can't change it with your hand,
25:14
then you speak about it with your tongue. And if you can't speak about it with your tongue, then you hate it in your heart. And that's the weakest of iman. The same thing when it comes to
25:22
solidarity. If I can alleviate the suffering, then I'm responsible for that. I'm not allowed to go to
25:27
tier two unless I'm unable to do what's required of me in tier one until all the way at the bottom.
25:33
Can I at least walk with my brother in his time of need and express that solidarity with him? And
25:38
so at the bare minimum, we should be doing that. Our people in Gaza should feel that we feel their
25:43
pain. And it hurts them when they see us negligent of them. It hurts them. It really hurts them to
25:49
say, "Oh, the world's forgotten about us." It hurts them to see Muslims, you know, having
25:55
their parties online and uh celebrating and and acting like everything is is okay. It hurts them,
26:01
you know. Subhan Allah. I was just I was I was talking to one brother in Gaza. He's a journalist.
26:07
And he was so upset that he said, "You know, I went online. I was on Instagram and I saw,
26:15
you know, all these Muslims weighing in on a UFC fight and like really bothered about the result
26:20
and that kind of stuff and like and he's like, "That's what bothers them. This is what they're
26:26
talking about." And he's like, "Some of these were really good brothers." He was upset. He felt like like in pain like this is what's occupying your thoughts right now. This is what's occupying
26:35
your mind. this is what you're talking about. The food and the weddings and the parties and the the
26:40
influencer culture and and all that that stuff is super painful for them to see. Whereas solidarity
26:48
means something because you know what? They share the videos of the protests amongst themselves and
26:53
online. They they share the videos of of people that are in solidarity with them. They want us to
27:00
know what they're going through and to feel what they're going through. And so that's the lowest of iman right now is to hate the evil and to walk with them in solidarity. But many of us belong
27:12
to tiers that are higher than that. We have to we have to act accordingly and before we come to the tiers that are higher than that because I I would imagine most of us many of us should really belong
Psychology of Solidarity
27:22
to those tiers especially those of us in the west who have got the luxury and the ability and the
27:27
resources to do a little bit more than maybe what we're doing at the moment just to stick with this
27:32
solidarity the psychology of solidarity point I think um in a sense are you saying that it's
27:41
it's not just for Um, you know, I get the point. The point you're making is that we don't want to
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harm them. We certainly don't want to be on the wrong side of their dua and we we certainly want to send the message to them that we care and and everything that accompanies that. But there's a
27:56
deeper point about our own self and our own faith and our own iman here. Just under underscore that
28:02
point. You're you're effectively saying that for our own sake, you know, in the eyes of Allahh,
28:08
in our own accountability, you know, we need to we need to even if we don't feel it sometimes,
28:15
we need to tell ourselves and force ourselves sometimes and coers our own ns to feel it. Is
28:21
that the point you're making there? Why do we pray janaza? We pray janaza to seek forgiveness for
28:26
our deceased loved ones. But why do we visit the graveyard? Prophet sallall alaihi wasallam said
28:33
I used to forbid you from visiting the graves, but now I command you to do so because it reminds you of death. So there's the personal reminder and there's the right of the brother
28:43
and the sister upon you that's deceased. Your dua for them counts no matter where you are. But you going there and visiting is good for you to be reminded and good for you to to to
28:54
recalibrate. And so I would fear for the heart of a person who finds it easy to intentionally
29:05
scroll past and not do anything. And I'm not saying like just indulge the pain for the sake
29:11
of it. Take that pain and do something with it. Even if it's a dua that you make for them,
29:18
but do something. And you know like like you know some people have mentioned um donations and stuff like that, right? There's a lot of healthy skepticism, healthy skepticism
29:27
about the organizations working in Gaza, by the way. Okay. Um, if you don't trust any of them,
29:33
and there should be demands for transparency and accountability and making sure like that people are not just raising money using their uh the name and and and by the way, like uh no one
29:43
should be making money off of Gaza. No influencer should be taking an honorarium or whatever it is. Like no one should be making money off of the people and relief organizations should be very
29:50
transparent about how they're getting stuff to but even if that's the case then donate to the gofundmes and stuff like that that you see popping up from these journalists donate to them directly
29:59
right just but engage dua protest engage someone says these protests don't do anything if the only
30:08
thing they do is they they give some some life to the to the hearts of our brothers and sisters to where they feel our solidarity alhamdulill and they do more than that inshall a lot. They're
30:17
part of they're part of a collective effort. There is a reason why Israel wants to shut it down. For sure. Right. Like when people would say would mock BDS and say BDS doesn't do anything. Really? Then
30:27
why do you think Israel has commissioned right what it has to try to shut down the BDS movement
30:32
globally? Cuz it does do something. It has not just reputational risk, but it has long-term
30:39
economic effect on them, right? On the apartheid state. So take that pain and do something with
30:46
it. And sincerity inspires creativity. Sincerity inspires creativity. Allah says,
30:56
"Those who strive in our way, we will guide them to our paths." He comments on that and he says,
31:06
"Whoever acts in accordance with that which they know, Allah will teach them what they don't yet know." We need sinc we need creativity inspired by sincerity that when when you obsess over this
31:18
all the time inshallah you're going to keep on iterating action and allahel will guide and put
31:24
blessing in some of those actions and then collectively it's not going to be one effort that's going to be the difference maker what's keeping the pro palestine movement alive and so
31:35
potent it's the amount of people that are engaging it right now the amount of people the sheer amount
31:41
of people around the world. Like it's like these social media companies when someone says, "What's my post going to do?" What's happening to these social media companies, they can't shadowban
31:50
everybody. And even if they shadowban everybody who's posting pro Palestine content if it's so
31:55
many people posting, it's going to break through. And there are more of us than there are of them,
32:01
right? And it's it's working. Clearly, it's working. That's why they're doing what they're doing to try to shut it down. So it's not going to be one single effort that's going
32:10
to change things. But I do believe that the global collection of sincere efforts for our brothers and
32:17
sisters will culminate in something inshall and at the end of the day we ask Allah for acceptance
32:23
and and that it's not just an excuse for us on the day of judgment but that it's actually
32:28
um a means by which the victory will come for our brothers and sisters inshallah. Muhammad uh in one
32:34
of your talks you drew a parallel between or a parallel with uh the messenger and the boycott
The Prophet’s starvation
32:42
that he faced in Mecca and and the starvation the full starvation that he and the the Sahaba faced
32:49
uh what lessons for the sake of our viewers what lessons did you want to draw from that period
32:55
first and foremost that the prophet sallall alaihi wasallam was there his companions were there um everything that we're going through they've been through and so we should try to
33:04
draw inspiration from them and how they navigated those days as we navigate these days as well. Um,
33:11
some of us are inside the trench, some of us are outside the trench, some of us, as I said are in the palace of some of us are amongst the ranks of Mus Alam and amongst the
33:22
doubters perhaps. Everyone has a role to play and what you find happening you know I even just did
33:30
like a lecture on and miraculously subhan Allah you find Ysef when he put Mecca under siege he
33:38
starved the people to where they only had zam to survive that was a Muslim by the way um that that
33:44
put them under that siege and they only had zam to survive and eventually they couldn't even pick up
33:49
their swords because they were so hungry you know these were this was the Sahabah, right, that went
33:55
through this type of starvation. Starvation is an evil weapon of war, an evil weapon of war. What
34:02
did they sustain themselves with? How did they keep going? That's for the people of Gaza to find
34:08
that inspiration. But what I have to be thinking about is I'm not Benu Hashimu in the valley right
34:14
now. I'm in Mecca, you know, and trying to figure out how to get some camels with some,
34:21
you know, with with some food on them on their backs to get into the valley. I'm trying to
34:27
convince or fight the uh the evil that led to that pact being hung in the Ka that says that
34:34
these people should be starved. Like, I need to be one of those people that's raising the alarm and
34:40
uh doing what I can. If I'm powerful enough to get food through, then I need to do that. If I'm
34:45
uh loud enough to uh perhaps get to a person who can make a difference,
34:50
then I should do so. There's a hadith of I was thinking about this recently. There's a hadith of um I don't know if it's Abu D or Abu Dar I'm pretty sure it's uh Abu Dh
35:06
asked the prophet sallall alaihi wasallam like a series of um you know if I can't do this what should I do if I can't do this what should I do if I can't do this what
35:12
should I do so the prophet mentions things um along the lines of to help
35:18
someone who's oppressed and things of that sort but one of the lines is
35:24
would would mean um enabling someone who's capable to do something. Ah, it's a very interesting line
35:32
in the hadith because it's like he's Abu D is saying to the prophet sallall alaihi wasallam like I can't do this I can't do that I don't have this position I'm not in this position so
35:39
the prophet says well try to educate someone who can do something right try to get in the ear of
35:46
someone try to enable someone who can do something and that's a very powerful idea right like you
35:52
know can I get in the ear and in the heart get to the heart of someone who's more capable than I in some way the point is is that uh you have to find your lane, right? And and to do your part and
36:05
when the starvation is happening, um you need to ask yourself, am I in the trench? Am I guarded by
36:12
those in the trench? Am I outside of the trench? Do I have favor with some of those people that are imposing the siege? Where am I in this entire episode right now? and how do I draw that lesson
36:23
from the of the prophet sallallaihi wasallam and the companions to uh to take what's necessary so that I could do what what's needed in the moment. So she with that example of the the boycott
36:33
um I mean interestingly it was non-Muslims who finally contributed to breaking that boycott
Role of non-Muslims
36:40
against the the Muslims in in Mecca. Um um what does that teach us today about building alliances
36:47
with non-Muslims specifically here in the US? uh because of course you've said you know we're
36:52
in the heart of of their own we're in the place which is where the complicity begins and ends in
36:58
a way right this is the place the country that uh is responsible for this genocide as much as the
37:04
Israeli government who are executing the genocide are responsible so how do uh what is the role that
37:11
non-Muslims play in this um this idea of of of this the actions that we need to pursue to break
37:20
this boycott and genocide. So first of all to use a parallel example you know when Allah says
37:37
Allah talks about people in their order of becoming Muslim and uh mentions that those
37:42
who embraced Islam earlier on and that struggled earlier on are not equal to those who came later
37:47
on. And this is obviously the example of people becoming Muslim. But there is a principle here that those that are earliest uh to a cause are usually the most sincere to it. And as
37:58
a cause becomes more popularized, you're going to see that more people will join that cause.
38:03
Um, I actually think that being pro Palestinian will become so mainstream that it will almost be
38:12
uh costly maybe socially and culturally, not politically, to not be pro Palestinian. And so
38:18
you're going to have all these celebrities like coming on board and all these people that are coming on board, non-Muslims, and they're going to throw they're going to do the bare minimum
38:26
uh in order to absolve themselves of being uh in any way perceived as as being pro- genocide.
38:33
uh they're going to do the bare minimum to curry favor with with those that have kind of been there from the very beginning. Why do I use this example? Because like there are non-Muslims
38:44
who have been protesting for Palestine for decades and they're still there, right? And they're very
38:51
sincere to this cause. Like they've been there through the antifas. They've been there. They
38:57
were the same people on the front lines protesting the ad war. They've been there. It's important for
39:02
us to not forget that contingent first and foremost because just like for us this time
39:09
feels different. Uh for them this time feels very different. And so I've actually noticed,
39:15
subhan Allah, a lot of those people, it's actually incredible. A lot of those people became Muslim
39:20
this time around. And I'm like, what changed for you? You've been protesting for Palestine for 30, 40 years. What changed for you now? Right? And they talk about not just the deeper empathy
39:32
that they feel with with Palestine now that they haven't felt before, but they talk about just the
39:38
stark display of im of faith by the people of Gaza that made them see Philstine in a very different
39:43
way this time. True. So perhaps they were brought to the table by a sincere rejection of and
39:51
oppression and now it's like they have a different eye towards everything that's happening right now.
39:58
So, I just want to appreciate that moment for when it comes to those that have kind of been there from the very beginning. I'm kind of let let me draw out the the protest scene for you.
40:07
Then you have a lot of those that are now coming and that that protest circle is growing. Um Jews,
40:15
Christians, atheists, seculars, um liberals, some conservatives that are starting to show
40:22
up. Okay. All right. We have to appreciate that there are some people that feel deeply ashamed,
40:34
deeply ashamed that they didn't know any better. And so what I'm hearing a lot of now is people that are coming to these protests like I I'm so sorry. I didn't know. I really didn't know
40:43
this was happening. Like I just thought these were two pe two peoples that were fighting for for centuries and uh this is just an extension of that. I didn't know. And we should appreciate like
40:54
that. There there are those that are sincere and that really didn't know like, "Oh Allah,
40:59
forgive my people. They just don't know any better." Yeah. There are those that really did not know any better. And now they're coming around. There are those who want to co-opt or want
41:11
to soften the blow of what will inevitably be the pendulum uh switching to the other side, swinging
41:17
to the other side. And so liberal Zionists that are trying to creep into our protests now as well
41:22
and trying to say like uh you know we reject this and they're making this all about the Netanyahu government. You know that this is all Netanyahu and right-wing uh an extremist right-wing Israeli
41:31
government and that has to be shunned. Like that has no room like I'm sorry like that that ship has
41:37
sailed a long time ago. you know, while you have your sort of wakeup call and and and your rude
41:43
awakening amongst your circles, please don't bring that compromised and compromising nonsense to our
41:49
circles, right? So, there are some that are kind of tack on right now and say that we were always, look, we feel really bad in Netanyahu is horrible. It's like Netanyahu is horrible, but every single
41:58
when have the settlements and the apartheid, when has it not expanded and and been a problem for us, right? When has this colonial project ever been put on hold for any government? Absolutely. So,
42:07
you need to be able to dissect like who's in your audience. Now, there's a particular fascination with the political right, right? You got like right-wing figures that are pushing. They're
42:17
not all the same. They're not all the same. Some of them might be very sincere. Some of
42:24
them might have nefarious motives that we can't accept, right? Um, we have to be smart. We have
42:32
to be cautious with everybody, right? in this regard, but at the same time, we have to think
42:40
at the end of the day, what's going to actually help end this genocide and end this pain, right, for our for our brothers and sisters. So, I think that that's where we just have to do our best to
42:52
be consistent ourselves and then to welcome consistency. And when someone demonstrates sincere ignorance and comes along, alhamdulillah, and when rifts start to find themselves in all
43:02
of these different political parties, right, and all or cultural and social uh, you know,
43:09
uh, ends of society. We're happy those rifts are happening. We're happy that people are questioning
43:15
in every one of those chambers, but we also have to be like a student. At what point do we do we bring someone into our chamber as well? Right? And and that's that's difficult. Um, I'll tell you a
43:26
story if you don't mind. Um, I've never seen more people embrace Islam in the midst of like protests
43:34
and the protest movement than I have this time around. There's a couple that was coming down to Dallas and uh and joining the protests, even the ones that were weren't very well attended. Yeah.
43:46
So, we had a protest in front of Rathon, which is the which is a weapons manufacturer, right?
43:52
The sad twisted irony of it is that you have Muslims that work at these arms manufacturers, right? And then you had these these non-Muslims that were coming out and that were driving,
44:01
you know, from hours away to be a part of these protests, right? So, it was Ramadan going into the
44:07
last 10 nights and we had a protest in front of Rathon and I took I took my phone because I realized like the protest was very poorly attended. So, I just went on Instagram live to
44:15
interview the people that came. It was really eye opening. Um, so I go to interview this couple. Um,
44:23
one of them's wearing a shirt like veterans uh for peace or something like that and he's
44:29
wearing his kafia and I'm like talking to him and he's saying, "Yeah, you know, we drove down from Oklahoma to be a part of this protest today. It's, you know, 2 and a half hour drive to be a part of
44:38
this protest cuz we saw it on social media." And he says, and this is actually on my Instagram live
44:43
now. I became Muslim three months ago. And he said, he said, "Shake, you know, make dua for my wife uh to become Muslim as well." And uh she puts her hands on her face like that and she says,
44:54
"I think I'm ready now." Subhan Allah. All right. So I I I handed the phone to someone else and she
45:03
took shahada and she was wearing a shirt that said, "F you, Israel." I was thinking to myself,
45:11
I've never given shahada to a person wearing the f- word on their shirt. And it wasn't just the F, it was the full exploit, right? And I was like, you know what? Alhamdulillah. Like I was like,
45:20
what? There's something so profound about like this moment. Like, yes, don't write people off.
45:26
Don't write people off. And and there are people that whose whose let's just put it this way,
45:34
Zionist propaganda was so strong and it had people in a spell to where now that that spell is broken,
45:41
people are questioning now everything they've been taught about the Muslim world and everything they've been taught about Islam. So Palestine has opened their eyes to like, wait a minute,
45:51
uh, this genocide is exactly from the same vein as what happened to Iraq. Yeah. How many, you know,
45:59
how many people, hundreds of thousands of people were wiped off the face of the earth in Iraq? And the average American or the average person in the UK can't name a single victim of the Iraq war.
46:08
Wait a minute. We were taught that there's a bunch of there are a bunch of savages out there and they're all out to get us. But now we're seeing that we actually manufacture the machinery of this
46:17
savagery and we pay for it. And so they're they're questioning everything now. And in that process,
46:25
you want to hold someone's hand and you want to walk with them and patiently help
46:31
them unravel everything else that they've been taught wrong about Islam and the Muslim world.
Zionism
46:37
I've um uh communicated with some on the right uh during my visit and uh there seems to be a genuine
46:46
realization that uh Zionism is deeply problematic to America and American life. And uh there was a
46:56
a a man I interviewed recently who said that and I think the interview will come out after
47:01
your one uh James Bell who said that he can't find anyone under the age of 40 within his own
47:06
religious circles who supports Israel and supports Zionism. So there is a shift in that right and
47:12
we've seen that shift very notably in in Tucker Carlson's most recent interviews Candace Owen
47:19
um even Marjgerie Taylor Green you know has gone on record to say this is a genocide and has has said she wants to fight Apac I mean this is unbelievable if you have even have asked me a
47:30
year or two years ago that these people would be saying that I would have been astonished by it but there is a a development for whatever reason and you know we we we need to we need to
47:40
uh uh understand what the reasons are but there is a there is a shift now I don't want to relitigate
47:46
the post 911 uh you know uh American Muslim scene but we did uh embrace possibly or at least build
47:54
these alliances with the left and and potentially you know and and again politics is such we we make
48:00
mistakes and we move on but we may have made some mistakes in regards to the left you said I I got
48:07
a sense of caution from your previous answer that you know we have to be savvy about how we interact
48:13
with these newcomers in the right now who are uh potentially and the left and the left newcomers
48:20
as a whole newcomers as a whole brilliant so as the pro Palestine movement becomes more popular more popular right more acceptable more mainstream in various circles that's what I mean by so spell
48:29
out that savviness like how should we how should we approach uh these people sincere or not from
48:36
different traditions who actually may make a difference like at the time of the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam and boycott you know these non-Muslims who made a difference in in
48:46
uh in removing that boycott how can we you know utilize those resources without maybe diluting
48:53
ourselves in the process you know what the best parallel that I could think of when we look back at the prophet sallall alaihi wasallam's time there are those that objected to the treatment
49:03
of the prophet sallall alaihi wasallam and the Muslims that weren't Muslim on the basis of nobility. Yeah. That this is not the right way to treat people and this is not who we are. We've
49:12
departed. And then there are those that objected on the basis of optics. So like amongst Abu Jahal
49:20
and and others like their discussions were how bad should we make it in public to where we don't want
49:26
people to say like we oppress our own we treat like people like this in a certain way. So some of the folks were like we should not uh intensify our our persecution of the prophet because it's a
49:37
bad look outside of Mecca. It was bad optics. Right now we can't read hearts. We can't read
49:42
hearts. Sometimes the things are very obvious. So you know when someone argues that Israel is
49:51
bad for America from the perspective of it's we're bankrupting our own futures. were uh harming the
50:00
viability of America in the long term. America first, the nativist, right? Like when someone
50:05
argues from that perspective that Israel is bankrupting us and um and and it's uh this
50:12
is bad policy and this is not what we signed up for. I'm happy that that's happening, but that's
50:18
still a morally bankrupt position, right? So, I'm happy that's happening. I want it to continue. I I
50:24
would love for that to continue. Yeah. But that in isolation is still a deeply problematic position,
50:30
right? Because the you know the the destruction of our people and the destruction of human beings
50:38
and the d like what's happening to our people is not enough of an abomination for it to be wrong and for you to argue with passion that this should not be happening right you have
50:47
to attach it to the future of your own kids and America first and what happens. So again, now I
50:55
would use that line of of reasoning and I think it's it's it's good to use this line to say that
51:01
you are killing one set of children and at the expense of the future of your own children to show
51:09
how that all comes together. But I find it like deeply problematic when someone is exclusively
51:16
uh anti-Israel because of what it means for, you know, their own children here in the United
51:22
States or the viability of of of an isolationist nivist um you know, entity here existing in the
51:28
United States. So that that's problematic to me. when it's paired with um the moral position
51:33
which is this is wrong what's happening to these people then I'm much more willing to listen to that person and to consider that person and to to dialogue with that person so even like with
51:42
what's happening right now with in in you know the American rights podcast sphere right if you
51:48
listen carefully to them you'll notice those those you know those differences in their interventions
51:55
right and you'll pick up on them now I'm glad all of it's happening But who I would like want to
52:02
really have deep conversation with and perhaps even um you know welcome right to to work with
52:09
would be someone who speaks with some level of just you know moral consistency about what's hap
52:14
you know like this is such an abomination similar you know Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. talked about
52:19
his own like uh growth when it came to the Vietnam War. Um if if you look at the first
52:27
uh speeches where he was breaking the silence, it was we're sending our kids off to die and fight
52:32
over there while we have so much to do over here. And then he mentions until I could see the barrel
52:38
of the gun from the other side through the eyes of of a child in Vietnam. So you want to bring people
52:45
to that. Everyone deserves da and by extension everyone deserves a conversation. Anyone who's
52:51
sincerely willing to talk and willing to listen, we should be willing to sincerely talk to them and and and you know speak to again their their questioning of everything. But let's just not
53:01
adopt the full platforms of people who still have essentially right morally incomprehensible and
53:10
unacceptable positions. Yeah. um and and you know be happy that that's happening. I'll give you an
53:18
example on the other side. I mentioned the liberal Zionist side, right? And things of that sort like there are conversations that are happening now that would not have happened in certain spaces.
53:31
Um, someone reached out to me about a political prisoner Cordia uh, one of the Palestinian uh,
53:40
prisoners here in the United States who was picked up by ICE said, you know, like I feel this is wrong. I want to do something about it, but I'm not I don't want like if can we
53:49
avoid like talking about like genocide? I'm not yet comfortable with genocide, but I do feel like this is an assault on American civil liberties. And our answer collectively was, if you want to
53:59
go do a press conference in your space and push in your space, it's still a compromised position,
54:04
so be it. Alhamdulillah. But in our space, we're not doing that, right? We're not going to temper
54:13
our moral clarity in order to broaden the tent. We have to maintain our our clarity in this regard
54:21
and the consistency of our message. So, I'm happy that conversations are happening. I'm
54:27
happy that rifts are happening. Um, and that there is sort of this realization that this
54:34
addiction to Israel and this Israel first policy is good for nobody except for Israel, right? I'm
54:41
happy that realization is happening across the entire political landscape. But yeah, I mean, as Muslims, we just got to be a little bit savvy. Listen to the interventions of people. Uh, listen
54:50
to the care and the concern that might be coming out. the the the awakening to a a new perception
54:56
of the Muslim world as a whole. And of course, be willing to have a conversation. I've had I've had
55:01
some of the most America first politicians reach out to me privately and ask to go out for a cup of coffee and talk. Okay. I mean, that's great. Yeah. It's it's it's been eye opening, right? Like
55:11
it's it's really been something. And they want to talk about Gaza. Yeah. About Gaza in particular, right? And and I've had people again on on the left, you know, let's not forget that the pro
55:22
Palestine space is still largely a leftist space, right? And so a lot of mainstream Democrats, if
55:28
you will, right? Centrists are becoming more left. And in that becoming more left, they're becoming more pro Palestinian. There's a whole it's like the Mamani effect, right, in New York that they
55:37
progressives. Yeah. Yeah. Younger progressives. So it's still largely a progressive movement, but the
55:42
progressive contingent is growing faster than the right. I think that the but the the the fact that
55:48
it's happening on the right, especially at a time when the right's in power is perhaps feels more consequential, more surprising, and is something that um offers an opportunity. Right? So I it's
56:00
proportionally it's still largely progressive and some conservatives are coming around in that regard. But and so I suppose my question following on from that is how do we interact and interface
Safeguarding our identity
56:12
with both the left and the right? like what are what are the the principles? I'm not I'm not asking for, you know, a complete blueprint, but how do we make sure that we interact with them
56:22
in a in a way in which we safeguard our faith, safeguard who we are and our identity, but at
56:29
the same time, we know that there is this urgent situation in Gaza. We do need we need as many
56:34
of the people on the right if they're silently expressing doubts about um about Gaza, they need
56:42
to be openly expressing those doubts. Um how do we shape those narratives but at the same time you
56:50
know we don't make the mistakes maybe that we made after 9/11 where we embraced maybe too much of the
56:56
thick ideology of the left possibly or at least our young people did. Yeah. Yeah. And I think that that was it was there. Look, there's no doubt that when you look back at sort of the trajectory of
57:05
the Muslim community post 911, there was a rush an uncritical rush to the embrace of anyone that was
57:12
willing to embrace us. And that embrace largely came from the left if if anything exclusively came
57:17
from the left. Yeah. And in the process of that embrace um you know certain values were inculcated
57:25
into the activist circles of the Muslim community. I don't think the the average Muslim inculcated
57:31
those values but the activist space of the Musl or you know activists in the broadest sense of the word people that wanted to get involved in politics people that wanted to get involved in
57:39
some sort of civic engagement right inculcated certain platforms and values um that are foreign
57:44
to Islam. Um I I would hope that we're different now because our community just seems a lot more
57:50
confident now. I can see that, you know, and and look, to be to be frank, like I was too young to
57:57
have any type of real intervention, you know, in the post 911 world, you know, I was a locally mom
58:05
2006. Um, you know, before the social media era really took off. Um but obviously seeing that turn
58:13
like 2014 2000 to 2018 right which sort of mirrors the Obama effect right in American politics. Um we
58:23
did as a whole as a community go leftward. Um and the right answer to that is not to swing the other
58:33
direction. It's to use uh what we've learned inshall as a community of uh of integrity of
58:43
uh sort of being able to fend for ourselves uh to just take uh morally uh acceptable positions,
58:52
Islamically acceptable positions to have clear platforms and let's engage with others on the basis of the platforms that we draw up. Right? So we have to the moment that you feel uncomfortable
59:04
showing your Islam or or expressing your own views on a subject because of somebody else at the table
59:10
is the moment that you you've lost the plot. So when you have to be ambiguous about who you are,
59:15
where you stand, that's where you've lost the plot. Uh and inshall I hope that again I think
59:20
we're we're in a better position now than we were before. Um but we still have ways to go for sure.
59:26
Uh, Shakra, are American Muslims in your eyes more accountable uh than other Muslims around
American Muslims complicity
59:34
the world in the eyes of Allah subhana wa tala when it comes to Gaza? Yes. Explain that. Give
59:40
us the rationale behind that. Because there's no country that's more complicit in the genocide in Gaza than the United States of America. And even if the democracy is a facade in many ways
59:49
and even if you know our our politicians are bought and paid for by Apac across the board,
59:55
um we still have a responsibility by virtue of our living here and being able to participate to
1:00:03
do the best that we possibly can uh to steer the country in the right direction and to at least
1:00:09
reject with whatever we have. We have our voice and we need to be a bit more forceful with that
1:00:16
voice inshalla. Um, and escalate uh escalate the methods of our protest, escalate the the
1:00:25
uh the discomfort that we put genocidal uh entities or or entities that are participating in
1:00:31
the genocide. Yeah. uh uh in we need to do more to disrupt to obstruct um to build to use the moment
1:00:40
of emotion like this realization that we've fallen so far behind to build some you know new systems that might not show they might not show their value for another 5 10 years but look how quickly
1:00:50
these last two years have passed right so to build institutional power to build real um power to be
1:00:57
able to do do something different inshall as this all pans out. Um, but look, at the end of the day,
1:01:09
there are people that are sitting in jail cells because they went to protest.
1:01:16
Number one, you should not let that fear stop you from going out to protest. Number two,
1:01:22
when someone loses their job, when someone gets put in prison, when someone is uh buried under
1:01:30
the avalanche of of Zionist doxing and media, our community has to stand with those people as well.
1:01:36
So that uh we don't send a message well first of all just because it's the right thing to do.
1:01:41
Again, it's just it's the demand of brotherhood and sisterhood, but that we don't send the message that when you uh shut us down, we will accept it. Um, alhamdulillah we're seeing like look Mahmud
1:01:55
Khalil, you know, he he was in a very vulnerable position when he was at those protests and he knew
1:02:01
that, right? Uh, may Allah bless her and free her. She was in a very vulnerable position when
1:02:08
she put herself in that protest. She went to is an hour and a half away from here. Um and
1:02:18
was is is originally from um you know practicing Muslim woman in New Jersey um with her mother,
1:02:30
a single mother um meaning her mother is a single mother. She went to a protest uh one of the
1:02:37
Colombia protests cuz she felt called to that. She wasn't in any way like a super active person and
1:02:43
ICE abducted her. Um, and just for just for they revoked and and and and abducted her just like
1:02:50
many of the others and she kind of disappeared in the whole ICE detention center system. See, what
1:02:56
happens is is that these ICE detention centers are even worse than the prison system because
1:03:01
there are no legal rights even to like just call a lawyer or to to to get a phone call. like they are
1:03:09
um banished sometimes for you know weeks before anyone can even get in touch with them or even
1:03:16
know what part of the country they're actually in or even if they're still in the country, right? So they're afforded not even the most basic rights that a prisoner is supposed to be afforded. And
1:03:26
they find themselves in buses and you know trucks and uh sort of shipped around the country and you
1:03:33
know they ask the driver where are we going and the guy will just shrug his shoulders. They'll find themselves you know inside concrete walls, no windows and in a jumpsuit and asking questions and
1:03:45
they're not getting answers. Can I call someone? No. Shut up. Sit down. like these are the types of things that are happening. And subh if people knew if people knew what was happening to them, I would
1:03:57
hope I would hope that they would they would do more um to stay engaged with these things. Let's
1:04:03
test to the sincerity too. Like if you claim to care about an issue, what are you doing for your brothers and sisters that are right in your backyard that are imprisoned for caring about that
1:04:11
issue perhaps more than you did? What are you doing for the refugees from Gaza that ended up in your country, ended up in your city? What do you like? How can you claim to care about people
1:04:20
on your screen when you don't care about people in your backyard? And with um I hope by the time this
1:04:28
podcast gets released, she'll be freed. Y um I saw her yesterday um in Prairie Land. Uh she pointed
1:04:39
to a room, let's say it's probably 8 to 10 times this small room that we're sitting in right now.
1:04:47
Uh she said we're 70 women. Some of us are pregnant. Some of them are over 70 years
1:04:53
old. 70 women. Uh three toilets, no doors, no walls, three showers, no doors, no curtain,
1:05:00
no walls. Um roaches, spiders, no bedding for some of us. Um no windows. Uh she was she she told me
1:05:12
she was praying and a snake fell on her while she was praying. I mean husband and it's it's it feels
1:05:25
I'm not just afraid of the people has it testifying against us. Frankly, I'm afraid of these people testifying against us. We got 45 minutes in this direction an hour
1:05:36
and a half in that direction. We have we have to we have a lot of a lot of introspection to do as a community. Yeah, I'll just put it that way. we really have a lot of introspection to
1:05:45
do as a community. So where is the the problem? Where's the challenge here? Because when I meet
America’s organisational level
1:05:52
uh American Muslims, you know, they feel like we all do, you know, around the world,
1:05:58
Muslims are are are moved by Gaza and and are moved by these stories. Um uh they probably
1:06:05
have a lot of resources, many more resources, I would say, than the majority of Muslims in Europe.
1:06:11
American Muslims have mashallah a great deal of resources at their disposal. Um yet there is this
1:06:18
disconnect where on an organizational level possibly we're not bringing out the numbers
1:06:25
repeatedly for demonstrations like in Britain and the comparison is a silly comparison way because we're a small country and you know it's Britain what else have we got to do but you know
1:06:34
in Britain we have got hundreds of thousands that turn up still to these demonstrations even if we
1:06:40
think it's not going to do very much we know that solidarity wise we have to do it and what better
1:06:47
thing what else can we do on a Saturday afternoon but to show that solidarity that exists. I I just
1:06:54
wonder on an organizational level maybe that's where the problem is. Why is it that the great
1:06:59
work that you're doing, you know, mashallah, in the sense of your you're repeating every week in your and everyone is talking about this, it's not necessarily impacting the organizational level
1:07:14
to the degree where you've got numbers who are turning up outside these ice centers and numbers who are going to these demonstrations. Am I being unfair? I may be unfair here, but but that's the
1:07:24
impression I get from my very brief visit to to Dallas. You look at people in Egypt and in
1:07:31
Jordan and you wonder how can they and you realize they're distracted by their own poverty. You know,
1:07:38
I was in Jordan like people are like, look, we can't even eat and drink ourselves. The prices are out of control. The economic um and it's not an excuse, by the way. I'm just saying like what
1:07:48
you'll hear is that the economic situation of the people themselves makes it almost impossible for
1:07:54
them to think about anything but themselves. I think here you have the opposite problem which is people are too well off. They're earning they're living very comfortable lives and so their
1:08:05
concerns represent the concerns of the privileged. um they're they're stuck in the other side of the
1:08:14
the dunya rat race and it's hard for them to actually physically discomfort themselves. Um
1:08:24
like all right, you want me to raise my hand in the messages after Juma for a fundraiser? Okay, I'll do that. Like I can press share on a social media post, but you're asking me to go like stand
1:08:33
in front of an arms company and then like uh you know police are going to show up with their batons and possibly arrest us. You're asking me to put my job on the line because if I if people find
1:08:44
out and then look me up on LinkedIn, then I'm in trouble. So I think people are on the opposite end uh of that concern unfortunately to where they are concerned but the comfort element is strong.
1:08:56
Uh we're very comfortable here. very comfortable, right? Like Muslims are very comfortable. That's
1:09:01
not, by the way, I'm not I'm not suggesting that there aren't many many Muslims that aren't economically well off there. There are many many many Muslims and they're neglected even by,
1:09:11
you know, their own community, right? We're talking about Muslims that are economically disenfranchised here are neglected. They feel neglected as they should by the community that is
1:09:18
privileged and that's building these mega mazes and stuff like that. So the same neglect that causes those privileged Muslims uh to neglect their own here causes them to neglect their
1:09:30
own over there. And it's like I can't like to be moved to actually do these types of things. And
1:09:37
like what do you mean go to a prison? What do you mean like and it's not like what what you have to convey to people is that it's not as hard as you think it is. And you know like Abak one of the
1:09:52
HLFI was in prison. He said, "I just wished how how how I would have loved that someone wrote me a
1:09:58
letter and just wrote on the letter. No one wrote me letters really. My comm wrote me letters in
1:10:05
my community." Like how hard is it? You know, Wik who was one of the prisoners, one of the detainees
1:10:11
that was in the same prison with um alhamdulillah she came out. She organized a letter writing
1:10:17
campaign for for this past weekend. And so they got together in a coffee shop and everyone just wrote a letter and was talking about how like when I get the mail I'm so happy and it lifts
1:10:27
my day and like we're not allowed, you know, pen and paper and coloring books in prison, you know,
1:10:34
except for like these little spaces they give us sometimes, slots they give us like, "Oh, I love
1:10:40
reading every single word." Do you know how people hang on to that stuff? So, I think sometimes it's
1:10:46
just like awakening people to the idea like your little actions actually do count. Um, and it's
1:10:54
hard for for me sometimes to not be too down on the community. First of all, we're all failing,
1:11:00
including me. We all are failing. But like, um, I can look at a protest in front of Dr.
1:11:10
Sadiki's prison of 200 people, which I believe is the largest we've ever had, and say, "Mashallah,
1:11:16
we finally got to 200 people." Whereas usually for afu protest, you're getting 15 to 30 people max.
1:11:22
So I can look at that and say, "Mashallah, I'm so proud of you, my community. You came out 200 people." And I have to say that inside of myself, I have this tension of this should be, you know,
1:11:34
20,000 people. Why is it only 200 people? But I also understand like I have to be I have to
1:11:39
say to those 200 people that made the sacrifice and maybe for the first time pushed themselves out of their comfort zone and went and stood in front of the barbed wire in front of FMC car as
1:11:47
well say you know for coming out on a day that you were fasting let's get more people to come out as
1:11:53
well. I can either like um be really really down about the number relative to what it should be or
1:12:02
I can encourage the small number that's starting to push themselves out of their comfort zone to to
1:12:08
get others along the way. And uh I I I was humbled because I went to visit one of the brothers that
1:12:15
came out. One of the HLF5 members that got out went to visit him. And on the way to visit him,
1:12:20
I was like really upset and I was venting to I was venting to my wife actually about the neglect of
1:12:26
of this brother, right? And you know what I what I came to know like no one visited him. No one
1:12:32
asked about him. No one asked if they could help him with his brand now that he's out. you know, everyone was sort of tweeting about his release and like got a selfie with him when he first
1:12:41
walked out the prison doors. But then once he's home, like just basic questions were not being asked about his well-being and he was too dignified to tell people. And I'm I'm venting to
1:12:50
my wife on the way to go visit him about this. And then when I entered and I sat with him, he's like,
1:12:58
he's like, "This person did this and this person did that and this." It was like he could only name like five people that did anything and it was like the most basic act. And then he said,
1:13:07
"I forgive everybody." He said, "I forgive everyone. I forgive those people. I make an excuse for them that maybe they were too afraid to send me a letter. Maybe they were too afraid to text
1:13:15
me because they know the phones. I make excuses for them." And I'm like, you know, Subhan Allah, if he could still see the good in people after being in prison for two decades, I can still I
1:13:25
can I can force myself to not uh shut it down, I guess, and say that our community is hopeless.
1:13:31
We got to take the few bright spots and we have to expand those bright spots and turn them into uh community behaviors, new community behaviors in regards to how we treat uh the oppressed. I'll
1:13:42
share one more thing with you on this regard. Imm Jamin, this is a proper example of how you should
1:13:48
not dismiss the potential of the community. Imam Jamin was one of the most iconic figures in black
1:13:53
American history. HR Brown led the Black Panther Party, worked with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was
1:13:58
a leader in the student non-violent coordinating committee. He's a legend in American history. He
1:14:04
is a legend in you know in black culture. Most people don't even know HR Brown became
1:14:10
Muslim and became Imam Jam. But like even if you watch like the um Judas and the Black Messiah,
1:14:15
he's he's there. Like the scenes of him are everywhere. Hat Brown at Brown Bound. So,
1:14:21
Imm J disappeared in a post 911 system under false charges similar to Afia Sudiki. He went blind
1:14:29
um in solitary confinement in Tucson, Arizona. And his son asked for people to just come protest in
1:14:36
front of that prison. It was barely a hundred people that came out to Tucson to to protest
1:14:43
in front of the prison. that the prison heard about what had happened and so they rushed his
1:14:48
cataract surgery and alhamdulillah his vision was restored and uh was saying this yesterday
1:14:55
that after the media attention like I started getting like like oh they started treating me better they were afraid they get afraid to treat those prisoners in a certain way once
1:15:04
they know that there's some public outcry over them because they anticipate the bad press that will come you know with that added attention so it actually does change the treatment of those people
1:15:14
on the inside. That's one. But the second thing is we had an event for Imm Jamil Lem and my Maz
1:15:19
Valley Ranch Islamic Center. Subhan Allah. That night, um I don't know if it was the Cowboys or
1:15:27
the Mavs that were playing, uh but it was a major Dallas sporting event. It's not it's not it's not
1:15:34
a crowd that I was expecting, but I mentioned in Salat Jama like look, his son is here. Imm J's son is here. We're launching a documentary uh for his son. We need you guys to come out and be there. It
1:15:46
is till this day the most crowded event we've ever had at the mazjid outside of J. Alhamdulillah.
1:15:54
Alhamdulillah. Alhamdulillah. On top of that, Imam J happened to call his son from prison while the
1:15:59
event was going on and his son Kyrie put Imam J on the speaker and he spoke to our congregation
1:16:07
over the phone from prison. Subhan Allah. Look how poetic that that all was. So we have to
1:16:15
we have to take the bright spots and grow them inshall and and hopefully reverse the repeated
1:16:21
neglect that we've had um of these political prisoners and again of people beyond. Yeah.
1:16:30
I think that's really been a fascinating conversation. A lot of food for thought there. And I I personally believe that when it comes to Gaza, I think
1:16:38
uh Muslims in America have the potential to do far more um from what I've observed. And
1:16:46
I think we have the potential to shape some of these narratives that we haven't yet shaped and and and I think it's in it's in our resource and our ability to do so. And I pray in that
1:16:56
uh your voice and the voice of others that are trying to encourage uh more action and more change inshallah reach we the right people in these communities. Uh but thank you so much
1:17:08
for your I apologize I I spoke a lot chance to ask questions bless you that's the podcast
1:17:17
speaks much longer. So you've Yeah, and that's why I never speak after him in a convention.
1:17:31
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