World Threats

From CAN:

The Assembly of Muslim Jurists in America (AMJA) has issued a fatwa that puts Sharia law above democracy, causing some experts to call on the House Homeland Security Committee to subpoena the organization and testify.

On March 28, the organization’s website posted an answer to a question about Islam’s compatibility with democracy. The answer states that according to Islam, the Ummah (Muslim community) “possesses no power except to acknowledge and obey.” The problem with democracy, the AMJA states, is that it “gives free reign to the authority of the Ummah, and puts no ceiling on it.”

“The shari’a, on the other hand, differentiates between the source of the legal system and the source of the political authority. The source of the legal system is the shari’a, while the source of the political authority is the Ummah. Meanwhile democracy makes the Ummah the source of both,” the AMJA website says.

Dr. Andrew G. Bostom, an expert on Islam, wrote in Pajamas Media on March 1 that the AJMA has also issued fatwas permitting the execution of those who leave the religion and adulterers. It also supports marital rape and female genital mutilation. It also speaks out against becoming a citizen of a non-Muslim country.

In 2007, the group released a fatwa banning Muslims from working with law enforcement or counter-terrorism agencies because of the damage they have done to Muslims and because they are “subject to man-made laws, which Islamic law does not recognize, either fully or in part.”

The AJMA has even said it aspires to one day wage “offensive jihad” against the West.

“The Islamic community does not possess the strength to engage in offensive jihad at this time. With our current capabilities, we are aspiring toward defensive jihad, and to improve our position with regards to jurisprudence at this stage. But there is a different discussion for each situation,” one Arabic fatwa states.

Bostom says that the House Homeland Security Committee should have the AJMA clerics testify as part of its hearings on homegrown extremism.

“We believe that publicizing and elaborating the “rationalizations” for such Islamic rulings by these clerics — authoritative representatives of mainstream, institutional Islam — will afford critical insights into the radicalization of American Muslims,” he said.