Mufti of Crimea: Wahhabis conduct their own “jihad” against all mankind

“The fatal activities of the ISIS fanatic terrorists rest upon the works by pseudo-scholars Aḥmad ibn Taymiyyah, Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab, Sayyid Qutb and Taqiuddin al-Nabhani,” Ruslan Saitvaliyev, mufti of Crimea, head of the Taurida Muftiate, has told EADaily. 

“Sayyid Qutb, the Egyptian ideologist of the “Muslim Brotherhood” (“Society of the Muslim Brothers”), was executed in 1966 for plotting the assassination of Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser. Taqiuddin al-Nabhani, the founder and ideologist of the Islamist political party Hizb ut-Tahrir (Party of Liberation), was also an Egyptian. Nabhani was a member of the Muslim Brotherhood, but then he set up his own movement due to some discrepancies. Many people are well aware who Abd al-Wahhab was.  He founded the pseudo-Islamic sectarian ideology that was called Wahhabism,” says Ruslan Saitvaliyev.

He states the ideologies of both “Muslim Brotherhood” and “Hizb ut-Tahrir” say that the world order ideal should be the caliphate – a state observing the Shari'ah laws. “As we can see, the ISIS is the first ever terrorist quasi-state, which has declared itself a caliphate and its leader – a caliph. We see that the ISIS views and actions are based on a centuries-old ideology,” says the mufti of Crimea.

According to Saitvaliyev, the Islamic State is the first organization to seriously and publicly announce its plans to thrall all the foes of the “State”. “They demonstrate the most dreadful examples of atrocity wherever they manage to establish their influence, drowning and burning people or breaking their heads with concrete blocks. Some captives are tied up and fastened to some sort of explosive, while others are forced into a car before it is hit with a rocket-propelled grenade. It is a big mistake to think that only prisoners of war become the ISIS victims. The cruel fanatics put on dead-pan faces and execute dozens of innocent people, including minors. During the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, the ISIS crucified some children, who did not observe fasting. The militants do not spare women either, executing them for the reluctance to have come a sexual intercourse with them. The women in the ISIS captivity are enslaved. Things have come to such a pitch that they have set up “a market for exchange and sale of bedmates,” mufti Saitvaliyev says when enumerating the ISIS crimes.

“It should be noted that history experienced similar slaughterous pages a few centuries before the ISIS establishment. I mean Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab. He publicized his ideas in 1143 anno Hegirae (1730 anno Domini). When he was fifty years old, he came out with open agitation in favor of his own sect. In his pseudo-Islamic creeds, Abd al-Wahhab blamed all the contemporary Muslims for shirk (polytheism). He killed thousands of Muslims to take their property and wealth. He was greedy and keen for gain. When describing Abd al-Wahhab, one of his supporters pointed out “the lack of adherence to religious dogmas, the spirit of arrogance and selfishness, enmity the contemporary scholars and self-assured confidence”, as well as “the lack of respect for even the first four caliphs” and “his own interpretation of the Quran.”

The mufti of Crimea recalls that Abd al-Wahhab's followers think Muslims have been disbelievers and polytheists for the past 1100 years. “Abd al-Wahhab introduced this dogma to permit the murder of Muslims, the robbery of their property and the violence against their wives. They killed the Muslims of Bayda Nasil and Ash-Shuayba villages during their morning prayer in Ramadan. Abd al-Wahhab was teaching the Bedouins how to declare the Muslims polytheists in order to kill them easily. Abd al-Wahhab’s field strength was growing first and foremost because he generously rewarded the soldiers and repaid their debts.  During the attack on Medina in 1805, the massacre of the residents lasted for 3 days. Before seizing Makkah, the Wahhabis blocked all the roads to Makkah and attacked the pilgrims. In Muharram 1220 anno Hegirae (April 1805 anno Domini) the city was blocked, with all the pilgrims and visitors captured and killed. The Wahhabis also attacked the pilgrims in Arafat and headed for Murra Valley to kill all those going to Makkah. As a result, the residents of Ḥijāz were afraid to undertake a Hajj,” Saitvaliyev says.

He notes that following the seizure of Makkah the Wahhabis tried to demolish all the Muslim historical monuments, except the Masjid al-Ḥarām. “They were killing even the infants and the people performing Namaz in the mosque. They promised to grant a pardon to fifty Muslims who were defending the city. But as soon as the Muslims surrendered, they broke their promise and executed them, explaining that no negotiations could be held with polytheists,” says Saitvaliyev. “To purify the Muslim consciousness”, the Wahhabis decided to destroy the depository of Muslim studies, one of the largest and rare Muslim libraries in the world – the Arab library in Makkah. “It was committed to flames. The library housed 60,000 rare books, 40,000 manuscripts, with part of them belonging to the Companions of the Prophet, peace be upon him, and the other part belonged to the rightly guided caliphs and other ashabs - Companions of the Prophet. They included manuscripts written on the skins of gazelles, bones, stones, wood and clay tablets,” the mufti describes.

“In his book “Fitnat al-Wahhabiyyah”, Mufti of Makkah, shaykh Sayyid Ahmad ibn Zayni Dahlan wrote: “When the Wahhabis arrived in the town of Ta'if, they started slaughtering the women, children and elderly people until the blood ran in torrents,” Saitvaliyev quotes the shaykh, Abd al-Wahhab's contemporary as saying. “Hanafite scholar, shaykh Ibn Abidin wrote: “…they (the Wahhabis) suppose that they are the only Muslims and those who oppose their ideology are mushriks (polytheists). This is how they permitted the murder of the followers of the Prophet, peace be upon him, and the Islam scholars,” Saitvaliyev notes.

“One of the novelties of the Wahhabis' sect was to burn people alive. As we can see, the parallels between the ISIS terrorists and Wahhabism headed by Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab are forced upon you”, says the mufti of Crimea. He says the Wahhabis have been conducting their own “jihad” against all mankind since the establishment of Wahhabism, changing their name every time but being committed to their creeds and actions. “The current so-called “Islamic State” is a kind of “ISIS-Wahhabism”. Wherever they appear, the “ISIS-Wahhabis” eventually kill those who are reluctant to join them or to support their wrong beliefs and immoral novelties,” the mufti says.

Saitvaliyev points out that the ISIS includes representatives of not only Wahhabism (pseudo-Salafis) but also the so-called “Muslim Brotherhood” and “Hizb ut-Tahrir” parties. “The internet features numerous video clips, in which Hizb ut-Tahrir members in ISIS and Jabhat al-Nusra urge the youth to join them. Since the very first day of the conflict in Syria, the representatives of Hizb ut-Tahrir and the so-called “Muslim Brotherhood” have been holding rallies in Crimea, brainwashing the youth in the mosques of the peninsula and sending them to the war in the Middle East,” says Saitvaliyev.

“The ISIS deadly evil is deeply rooted in the previous centuries. The fatal activities of these fanatics rest upon the pseudo-scholars' works. Aḥmad ibn Taymiyyah – the earliest ideologist of Wahhabism and the ISIS – lived in the 13th century. Aḥmad ibn Taymiyyah died in a Damascus prison. He had been imprisoned for his preachments, which subverted the Islam concepts and sowed discord among people,” the head of the Taurida Muftiate says toEADaily .