THURSDAY, MAY 1, 2008
Anyone that cares to learn about what is going on in the world is familiar with active jihad, the “holy war”, conducted with terrorism and directed at the modern world in general and western civilization more specifically. But there is also another form of jihad that is part of the deliberate effort to have Islam replace all concepts of morality and the values held dear by the rest of us. The name of this silent “fifth column” effort is “Sharia Banking”. Unfortunately, Sharia Banking is increasingly accepted by western banking institutions without any real understanding of what the Muslim goal is and what is at stake in the efforts by these institutions to attract more business, profits and money to bail them out of financial messes they brought upon themselves.
Islamic Sharia banking is coming to the United States and other western nations, thanks to global banks such as Citigroup, HSBC, Deutsche Bank, Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs. Great Britain is now pledging to become the Islamic banking center of the world. Clearly the headlong rush by all global banks to enter the world of Islamic banking is well underway. Why do western banks seek to participate in Sharia banking; because it gives them a chance to enter the Islamic banking industry which has over $1.5 trillion available today and is growing at a steady and explosive rate of over 15% per year.
The implications for the west, and especially for the United States, are staggeringly destructive. Islamic banking working through global banks is doing for Islam what it could never do on its own: giving legitimacy to Sharia law and infiltrating it into the fabric of western society.
For those not familiar with Sharia Banking; it is a system which creates and sells services and products that are in strict accordance with Sharia law. Sometimes it is referred to in the Islamic culture as “Sharia finance”. It dictates how the practices of banking, investment, bonds, loans, brokerage, etc, are to be conducted.
To insure compliance and to become “Sharia banking” compliant, banks must hire Sharia experts to review and approve each product and practice of the bank. This is known as “halal”, which has been described as “the Muslim equivalent of kosher in Judaism.” There is a shortage of such Sharia experts so there is competition among banks to find such experts to sit on their boards of directors. By having an “expert” involved in banking decisions, this provides the legitimacy to each banking decision because it is made at the director rather management level. However, most of these Sharia experts” are from the radical Wahhabi school of Islam in Saudi Arabia and elsewhere, and they hold views diametrically opposed to the basic values of Western civilization.
The Center for Security has identified some of the Sharia experts sitting on the boards of U.S. financial institutions. The top twenty “advisors” include many with conflicts of interests and anti-trust issues since they sit on boards of many Islamic banks at the same time. The Center for Security identifies a couple of advisors with ties to money-laundering and terrorism:
Yousuf Quaradawi who is prominent in the Muslim Brotherhood, owns two banks himself and has issued statements in support of Palestinian attacks on Israeli citizens and has issued rulings supporting Hamas and Hezbollah jihad attacks against Israel.
Muhammad Yaqui Usami who is a radical cleric and Sharia court judge in Pakistan. He is on the board of organizations that train thousands of Taliban and jihad foot soldiers. But the most heinous thing is his complicity in the murder and suffering of countless innocent Muslims as apostates because they disagreed with his Islamic mandates.
These are the kinds of people advising U.S. banks on how to conduct their business to assure they are “Sharia compliant”.
There are many differences of Sharia banks from orthodox banking. In Sharia banking interest (deemed “usury” regardless of rate or amount) cannot be charged, and investments must not be associated in any way with gambling, drinking alcohol, eating pork, etc. Very importantly, it calls for alms giving, referred to in Islamic parlance as “zakat”.
Zakat demands a tithe of 2.5 percent of revenue be donated to Islamic charity. If western banks follow this rule, it is certain that a portion of this money will end up in the hands of radical Muslims who are sworn to destroy the United States and replace our government with Sharia law.
For those unfamiliar with it, Sharia law is the legal and judicial system of Islam that is brutally imposed on many Islamic countries in the Middle East. It is the embodiment of the totalitarian ideology practiced by the Taliban, Iranian Mullahs and Saudi Wahhabis.
Sharia law is perpetuated by claiming to have its roots in the Koran, but it is actually for the most part based on rulings and dictates made by Islamic scholars and caliphs over several centuries. Non Muslims know Sharia law’s practices of harsh brutality and punishment as well as the total subjugation of women from newspaper articles describing the many rulings handed down by Sharia courts. These actions have shocked the western world; here are a few examples that have been written in various press accounts:
“The December, 2007 “teddy bear” case in Sudan, where a British teacher was sentenced to 40 lashes and a year in jail for allowing her students to name their teddy bear “Mohammad.” Islamic mobs demonstrated in the streets and called for her execution. The November, 2007 case where a 19 year old gang-rape victim in Saudi Arabia received a sentence of 200 lashes for riding in the car with her rapists. In 2006, a 34 year-old mother who was forcibly raped was ultimately tried and convicted of adultery, and was ordered to be stoned to death. Publication of cartoons in Denmark deemed disrespectful of Mohammad which caused endless demonstrations and mayhem, as well as the killing of many people.”
Islam and Sharia law demands total and unquestioned submission. Its followers are told that Sharia law is given by Allah and that whatever befalls them (good or bad) is “Allah’s will.” To question a judgment under Sharia (right or wrong) is to question Islam itself and will only bring harsh punishment. Curiously, by Islamic thinking if a person receives harsh punishment for something they didn’t do is nonetheless acceptable; the rationale being that Allah could and would have prevented it if that had been his will. This fatalistic approach which is contrary to what all other societies believe allows Islamic rulers to get away with virtually any thing they choose to do.
International bankers have long ago proven themselves to be completely amoral when it comes to money. They financed the Bolshevik Revolution in 1918 just as readily as they financially supported Hitler in the 1930’s. Now they are doing the same for the Islamists that want to destroy western civilization just as the communists and Nazis tried unsuccessfully to do before.
Unfortunately the odds of Islamic success are very different than the earlier threats. For one thing there are about 1.5 billion Muslims in the world and Islam is the fastest growing religion in history. Secondly, the spread of Islam is financed by the oil that is extracted from mid-eastern countries and thirdly, Islam has already infiltrated most of the west, especially in Europe. Now Islam has the combined support and encouragement of the entire global banking community.
There is an unholy alliance between Islam and global banking which may be the final nail in the coffin of western civilization in the historic quest for Islamic global domination. Remember that the next time you hear Islamist mobs chant “Death to America” – and don’t take it so lightly.
POSTED BY VINCENT G. GIOIA AT 7:48 AM
