Soon one of the largest mosques in the world will be constructed adjacent to the site of the 2012 Olympics stadium in London. The mosque, the “London Markaz” will house up to 70,000 Muslim worshipers on a 17-acre site.
There are already around 300 mosques and 500 madrassahs in the London area already, many of them in buildings that were formerly used as churches.
Ironically, the largest evangelical church in Europe, the 12,000 member Kingsway International Christian Centre, is being torn down to make room for the new Olympic stadium.
The Muslims who are building the mosque, a sect called the Tablighi Jamaat (TJ), want it to be a significant landmark that will be visible to the world. The location adjacent to the new stadium was selected because it will be seen alongside the stadium on television.
The sect has not been cooperative with local authorities regarding planning and building permits. It has already constructed temporary facilities on the site without permission from the City of London, and apparently plans to build the mosque with or without permits.
The new mosque will be a break in protocol for the TJ, since it has been an intentionally obscure organization up until now. It was begun back in the 1920’s for the purpose of spreading Islam around the world. Tablighi Jamaat means “prosyletizing group”, but that is an understatement.
Though the TJ touts itself as an apolitical, peaceful branch of Islam, it is well known among intelligence circles and security agencies for its extremist views and terrorist activities.
TJ does not respect the concept of an autocratic state. According to Marc Gaborieau, a French expert on the TJ, “its ultimate objective is nothing short of a “planned conquest of the world” in the spirit of Jihad.”
France has certainly felt the TJ’s presence. A member of the Chechnyan Cabinet said that “It is possible that France may become a Muslim state within my lifetime, due to the great momentum of the Tablighi activity there.”
Tablighi Jamaat has tried to keep its growth as quiet as possible. One Islamic scholar said, “It has thousands of dedicated and disciplined workers who never question any order from higher-ups. What has helped the TJ to expand (without creating alarm in the security agencies) is its deliberate black-out of its activities. It does not interact with the media and does not issue any statements or communiqués…”
Even famous people who have become TJ members have kept the group’s intentions quiet. Many people know that pop singer Cat Stevens converted to an Eastern religion. Now known as Yusaf Islam, Cat Stevens is a TJ Muslim, and so is radical preacher Louis Fara Khan.
The TJ works closely with the Harkat-ul-Mujahideen to recruit members from countries around the world, including the United States, to go to its military training camps in Pakistan and Afghanistan.
The FBI has stated that between 1,000 and 2,000 American TJ members left America to join the Jihad during the 1990’s. Pakistani intelligence shows that around 400 Americans received terrorist training in Pakistan and Afghanistan since 1989. Other sources show that 400 Uzbeks and around 2,000 British nationals have been trained by the TJ since 1998, and around 80 French nationals who were trained by the TJ have become fighters for Al-Quaeda
TJ works closely with Saudi Arabian wealth to spread Islam throughout the world. It has been widely known for some time that the Saudis fund the construction and operation of Wahabi schools around the world.
But they also fund mosques. For example, after the USSR collapsed in 1991, there were no mosques in Chechnya, but now every village in that country has a mosque.
The TJ works in the United State prison system to find recruits to their brand of Islam. One statistic has shown that as many as 30,000 African American prisoners are converted every year.
They have specifically focused on black Americans, and according to the president of the Islamic Research Foundation (headquartered in Louisville, KY, and proponents of TJ “missionary” work), who said that “if all the Afro-American brothers and sisters become Muslims, we can change the political landscape of America” and “make US foreign policy pro-Islamic and Muslim friendly”.
We often hear about specific terrorists, but don’t hear what brand of radical Islam they espouse.
The so-called “American Taliban” John Lindh was a product of a Tablighi missionary, and so were the “Lackawanna Six” and a cell of terrorists in Oregon who planned to bomb a synagogue.
The “shoe-bomber” Richard Reid, the “dirty bomber” Jose Padilla, and Lyman Harris, who planned to bomb the Brooklyn Bridge all had been members of the TJ.
According to Alex Alexiev, VP for research at the Center for Security Policy in Washington DC, “The estimated 15,000 Tablighi missionaries reportedly active in the United States present a serious security problem. At best, they and their proxy groups form a powerful proselytizing movement that preaches extremism and disdain for religious tolerance, democracy, and separation of church and state. At worst, they represent an Islamist fifth column that aids and abets terrorism. Contrary to their benign treatment by scholars and academics, Tablighi Jamaat has more to do with political sedition than religion. US officials should focus on reality rather than rhetoric. Pakistani and Saudi support for Tablighi Jamaat is incompatible with their claims to be key allies in the war on terror. While law enforcement focuses attention on Osama bin Laden, the war on terrorism cannot be won unless al-Qaeda terrorists are understood to be the products of Islamist ideology preached by groups like Tablighi Jamaat. If the West chooses to turn a blind eye to the problem, Tablighi involvement in future terrorist activities at home and abroad is not a matter of conjecture; it is a certainty.”
The real story behind the London Markaz is not the building of the world’s first mega-mosque. The real story is who is building it, and what role they will play in spreading Islam around a world that is still functionally unaware of what awaits them if they are allowed to succeed.