WikiLeaks: Financial support estimated at $100 million a year was making its way from Gulf Arab states to fund “holy war”; children recruited. Islamic charities from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates financed a network in Pakistan that recruited children as young as eight to wage Jihad. A US diplomatic cable published by WikiLeaks said financial [...]
Osama Bin Laden played host to Taliban leaders and wealthy supporters while he was living in his Abbottabad compound in Pakistan. An Afghan leader of the Taliban said he had visited Bin Laden in the Abbottabad compound. He said other members of Al Qaeda met with Bin Laden too, as did Taliban allies and Arab [...]
Meezan Bank, which was named the “Best Islamic Bank in Pakistan” in 2010, recently held the 17th annual meeting of its Shariah Supervisory Board. That board is chaired by Mufti Taqi Usmani. We’ve decided to commemorate this event with a repeat of our dossier on Usmani, who, keep in mind, is the Shariah finance world’s [...]
Pakistani Shariah Bank To Enter Canada, Ireland and UK
MCB Bank Ltd has planned to extend its branch network within Pakistan and in foreign countries. MCB management has decided to launch its operation in Canada, Ireland and UK to facilitate millions of expatriate Pakistanis and potential foreign investors and businessmen. http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2011%5C04%5C12%5Cstory_12-4-2011_pg5_7 Note that MCB Bank’s Islamic Banking Division’s Shariah advisory is under the control [...]
The governments of Islamist nations work hard to promote the financial jihad, both abroad and within their borders. Pakistan is no exception. State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) has revised the criteria for setting up of branches by Islamic banks. In order to provide incentive to commercial banks for enhancing outreach of Islamic banking services, it [...]
How Counterfeit Money Fuels Jihad in India
India faces an increasing inflow of counterfeit currency, produced primarily in Pakistan, and terrorist and criminal networks use this money to finance their activities in the country according to the US government’s 2011 International Narcotics Control Strategy Report of the State Department. Noting that India is a significant target for terrorist groups, both external and [...]
Relief workers in Pakistan say that Islamist charities affiliated with terrorist groups are competing with international efforts to provide relief to the millions of Pakistanis affected by massive floods. This is a concern, because it is believed that the funding for the infamous Mumbai terrorist attacks by Lashkar-e-Taiba may have come from funds donated for [...]
The folks at Money Jihad have just published a listing of nations and zakat systems. (For new readers, zakat is the system of mandatory tithing in Islam.) You’ll notice several problematic countries with mandatory, government-operated zakat: Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Pakistan, Libya to name four. Keep in mind, however, that government administration neither adds any legitimacy [...]
Government to Automatically Deduct Zakat from Bank Accounts in Pakistan
KARACHI: The government has set Rs29,350 as a lower limit on bank balance for deduction of Zakat on the first day of the holy month of Ramazan. According to banking sources, the Directorate for Zakat has made the above announcement. Zakat will be deductible at the rate of 2.5 percent on any PLS account having [...]
The link below will send you to an interview of an insurance executive in Pakistan. Much of the interview makes Takaful seem like just another form of insurance. But there is a stark warning sign in the preface to the Q&A which should put you on guard: “An independent Shari’ah Advisory Board chaired by Mufti [...]
Here is proof positive that Shariah-Compliant Finance is being driven from powerful Gulf oil interests: even Muslim nations are falling over themselves to get Shariah-Compliant to attract petrodollars. This is exactly what is going on in the West as nations such as the UK and France, and institutions such as Harvard Law School prostitute themselves [...]
The government of Pakistan’s Punjab province has given more than $1 million to institutions run by an Islamic charity that is on a U.N. terrorism blacklist and affiliated with a group the U.S. considers a foreign terrorist organization. http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2010/jun/23/pakistani-province-funds-terrorism-linked-charity/?
Sukuk “Alert”
Official and private entities in Jordan, Indonesia, Abu Dhabi, Malaysia, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Dubai, Luxembourg, Sudan, Pakistan, Kazakhstan, Lebanon, Kuwait, Thailand, Islamic Development Bank and General Electric (GE) all are contemplating or planning Sukuk (Islamic bond) offerings in the near future… http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-06-22/jordan-indonesia-islamic-development-bank-plan-sales-islamic-bond-alert.html
A report published by the London School of Economics asserts that the Pakistani intelligence agency not only funds and trains Taliban fighters in Afghanistan but is officially represented on the movement’s leadership council, giving it significant influence over operations. Research in support of the report strongly suggested support for the Taliban was the “official policy” [...]
Pakistan, one of the world epicenters for Jihad, plans to greatly expand Shariah-Compliant banking in coming years… http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-06-03/pakistan-plans-to-double-islamic-banking-in-3-years-update1-.html
Sauds Continue to be at Center of Terror Financing
A trial under way in Indonesia, the world’s most populous Muslim nation, of a Saudi Arabian accused of financing a militant group illustrates the challenges involved in shutting loopholes exploited by the terrorist factions and their shadowy facilitators on a global scale. Ali Abdullah is charged with providing 54 million rupiah — about $6,000 — to [...]
A plot by Al Qaeda to blow up a sports stadium was foiled when a British-based courier was arrested. The man was held in Chicago as he prepared to board a flight for England carrying cash to buy explosives. The money, ultimately bound for Pakistan, was intercepted after an elaborate sting by FBI agents who had penetrated [...]
Reader Tim alerted us over the weekend to the fact that Muft Taqi Usmani is no longer listed as chief of HSBC’s Shariah Advisory Board. http://www.hsbcamanah.com/amanah/about-amanah/islamic-banking/shariah-supervision Note, however, that Usmani’s son is now listed as a member of this body. The younger Usmani is considered antiseptic enough for Western financial institutions and has no known [...]
Here on SFW, we have profiled a particularly evil Shariah scholar named Taqi Usmani: http://www.shariahfinancewatch.org/blog/2009/05/06/who-controls-shariah-compliant-finance-the-shariah-scholars-of-course/ Among many other things, Usmani is the chief of the Shariah advisory board for HSBC: http://www.shariahfinancewatch.org/blog/2009/02/27/hsbcs-shariah-man/ Usmani is a bad man, an enemy of the West, a Jihadist to the core. In fact, now that his Jihadist philosophy is becoming [...]
Our friends at Money Jihad uncovered a gem of an article about widespread corruption in the zakat system in Pakistan. Perhaps this is how Lashkar-e-Taiba and its political wing are able to fund themselves. Or, more ominously, perhaps Lashkar-e-Taiba is able to get funding DESPITE the corruption…think about that one for a moment… http://moneyjihad.wordpress.com/2010/02/28/zakat-committees-corrupt-to-the-core/
Zakat for Jihad in Pakistan
The good folks over at Money Jihad blog uncovered an important article on zakat fundraising for jihad in Pakistan. This time it’s the two groups held responsible for the Mumbai attacks. These groups and their zakat support are no strangers to SFW readers: http://www.shariahfinancewatch.org/blog/2009/02/03/the-mumbai-terrorists-zakat-and-charities/ Now, just over a year later, these same terrorist groups appear [...]
The Pakistani Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) has uncovered a gang of criminals involved in embezzlement of huge amounts of Zakat money disbursed to Holy Family Hospital (HFH) for treatment of poor patients. http://www.thenews.com.pk/daily_detail.asp?id=222434
10 Sukuk Defaults at Year-End 2009
While it has received virtually zero coverage in the Western financial media, by researching Islamic blogs, we have come across a very interesting piece of information: there were 10 sukuk (Islamic bond) defaults at the end of 2009. We all know about the Dubai sukuk default, but there were evidently several others, including one involving [...]
Malaysian Islamic reinsurer MNRB Retakaful forecasts that revenue from its overseas operations will exceed that of domestic operations in five years. It particularly has its sights set on Indonesia, Brunei, Sri Lanka and Pakistan. Spreading Shariah insurance to these countries is perhaps not as much of a concern since each is already predominantly Islamic, but one [...]
Another Saudi Charity Implicated in Funding Terrorism Continues Operations
The excellent Counterterrorism Blog has vital information today on Al-Haramain, a Saudi charity that has been fingered by the UN and the US Treasury Department for financing terrorism. What have the Saudis done about it? Not a thing…it’s hard to prosecute someone for doing what Shariah says to do I guess… http://counterterrorismblog.org/2009/09/al-haramain_foundation_in_news.php
Cricket is one of the most popular sports in the UK and in many of the former commonwealth nations and other nations which were associated with Great Britain at some point in history. One of these nations is Pakistan. Now, members of a cricket organization are raising money for an Islamic charity to send aid [...]
The US special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan, Mr Richard Holbrooke, says that Taliban militants are receiving more funding from their sympathisers abroad than from Afghanistan’s illegal drug trade. Mr Holbrooke says: “More money is coming from the Gulf than is coming from the drug trade to the Taliban.” Holbrooke thinks the governments in the [...]
Literally making a deal with the devil… http://www.mcclatchydc.com/front/story/67289.html
Shariah-Compliant Finance as a Safe Haven: Myth and Reality
Promoters of Shariah-Compliant Finance routinely violate the trust of investors when they proclaim that investing according to shariah principles has provided a safe haven from the recent and current financial crisis. Could any other sector get away with such lies? The lies emanate from the entire range of shariah practitioners, from individual investors themselves all [...]
Categories

