9/11 had just happened and faster than a HT could put a cigarette in his mouth following the start of his weekly Halaqah, the Western media was already pointing the finger of blame towards Usama bin Laden, Muslims... Islaam. "Muslims" like me, who'd spent the majority of their life thinking Islaam was praying 5 times a day (whilst not doing so), boasting about how many times you have read the Qur'aan cover to cover whilst understanding not a word of it, spending late nights on the streets competing in narrating the most horrifying exaggerated jinn stories and using the excuse "it's haraam to fight" when someone tougher comes rude to you during ramadhaan yet if he's a wuss he'd receive the beating of his life alongside plenty of swearing and insults, Muslims like me were increasingly desiring to open our eyes to what the deen of Islaam truly is. The reason for this was the sensing of the sentiments of the people around us, i.e. how the non-Muslims around us had reacted to 9/11 and began to notice us, fear us, recognise us (as Muslims even with our cleanly shaven faces and trendy hair styles) and how the media was beginning to say thing's we thought we'd never hear them saying in Britain about Islaam and Muslims... An interest in Usama bin Laden but more so Islaam was sparked inside of many.From the depths of the hardened gangs to the taps of the nerds keyboards to the thick-book section of the library where the coconut brothers dwelled, everybody was talking about 9/11. Brothers like me where still trying to comprehend what WTC means and how come the two towers were worth even "attacking". Unlike some of my peers however I decided to take a more serious approach in finding answers to the questions everybody seemed to have an opinion for. I spent day and night crawling the web in search for knowledge, understanding and guidence. Praise be to Allaah, an interest for Islaam was sparked inside me.
And it was during these early post-9/11 days that a shaab of the HT stood and announced in the college cafeteria that on the evening of the coming Friday there will be a public talk on the topic of "9/11, what it means and how Muslims should react". I was the only one from my college who attended, except for the shaab who made the announcement. That talk had many local brothers in attendance, good old friends of mine some of them, who were attracted to the talk by it's title and topic; the talk itself was given, to my utter surprise, by a clean shaven 20-something bro who must have thought it’s clever to use street slang at the rate of two-three words per sentence as if somehow it would connect with the audience better. I couldn't help but flinch in disgust on numerous occasions at the arrogant manner in which I felt the speech was given, but I stayed till the end. The end of a HT talk like this is the most precious moment for them, it's when all the normal looking members of the audience --looking all the more normal with their designer clothes, trendy beards and stench of cigarette smoke-- emerge from amidst the chaos to eagle-eye the most vulnerable of youth to approach and discuss with, starting by asking "so what did you think about the talk" and ending with "oh my god you're such a clever, intelligent brother with your wicked views and opinions you DON, give me your mobile phone number so we can meet up during the week and continue talking whilst eating a kebab and taking a long ride in my expensive car, I’ll pay for everything". The first bespectacled 30-something brother that approached me with that request following our short discussion made the hair on my back stand on ends, I can still picture his thick moustache; clearly a brother stuck in admiration of the popular 70s Western culture. Funny how later he became one of the 5 who pursued me though.
Later I was gang-discussed on by a bunch of HTs from every side I turned my neck. That evening I left clutching a bag of books, magazines and leaflets... walking home thinking "what the hell is a Khilafah? and how come I am even more confused about 911".
Hi-jacked by the Hizb
For the next 3 months of my life I was the target of 5 Hizbi brothers who were systematically turn-by-turn victimising me with their da'wah, regarding me as the key that would "open" my hometown to the Hizb and cause many more to join up, if only I would first. Some of the styles and means used to attract me where emotionally charging me up with stories of the Sahaba followed by comments such as "and that is why we need Khilafah". I was honestly interested, inspired and attracted to the HT; they seemed "perfect" especially when portrayed through 5 different angles and perspectives subconsciously helping me to have the all-round impression that this group is "kaining it", "it" being their da'wah of reviving Islaam and "kaining" being the word made famous by the lips of every HT-bot up and down this country. I felt convinced about many things, but looked at myself realistically through a brutally honest analytical eye and concluded that I am a weak Muslim, not praying, not educated, whilst being sinful and neglectful. I felt that I needed to grasp some kind of foundation or achieve a level of conviction or sense of spirituality before being even remotely qualified to be working or associated with a party that is working for something as great and amazing as the return of the Khilafah.
In fact, the very day I was walking to the masjid with the main bro who was trying to get me to join up, I was emptying out my heart to him saying "I just feel so Islaamically weak, I don't know where to start with fixing myself up, I lack in knowledge... etc..." and I distinctly remember how he was really quiet during the whole walk and actually seemed somewhat nervous, which was weird (this is the same guy who made the announcement in college). We arrive at the masjid and suddenly I feel like I am one of those famous-yet-nobodys- heard-of- me celebrity on an episode of THIS IS YOUR LIFE as to my utter surprise, for the first time in 3 months I am presented by all 5 HTs plus one shaab as a bonus at the same place at the same time! Hugs and salaams all round as my smiley dazed face stumbled in to the masjid and performed the most distracted salaat-ul-asr I have ever done, wondering WTF IS GOING ON?
After the salaah we gather in the corner of the masjid. One brother starts the proceedings: "You have a good understanding of what we're about, our aims, our thoughts, our methods" I picture the pile of untouched HT books and freebies collecting dust on my shelf. "So we call you to work alongside us and work to try and re-establish the Khilafah". I smile and kindly reject the offer explaining the same things I explained to the bro who walked me to the masjid. Magically though it somehow seemed like everybody had an answer for my SPECIFIC issue, as if some incredible way they had read my mind, I wonder how?!?!?! *cough* shaab reporting my every word to superiors *cough*
After intense persuasion and pressure from 5 brothers and literally guaranteeing that my Islaam “would be DON” once I am working with the party I went silent and said to myself "I have to be sincere, if I join today my Islaam is SORTED".
I agreed to join the party... immediately following my agreement to the offer one would not be blameworthy for thinking Pakistan had just won the Cricket World Cup upon witnessing the high-fives and joyous faces of these guys following my wavery acceptance, even though one brother was a Bengali. It seems all that mattered is that I said "OK I'll work with the party" rather than the multitude of flaws and cracks in my character that without a doubt would ultimately render me useless to their cause or to become hypocritical as an individual unless immediately given attention and care.
Life as a Hizbi
It wasn't long before I adopted the mentality of my peers and superiors of the HT and realised that everything pales in comparison to striving for the re-emergence of the Khilafah according to the “irrefutable” methodology of Hizb ut-Tahrir, "which is derived from the Seerah of RasoolAllaah (saw) by our mystery scholars so thus it’s irrefutable". Quickly ensued argumentation with each family member, "trigger-happy" da'wah to all my friends and the rushed, ill understood adoption of "Islaamic" opinions derived from the rationalist mind of their king, the hero of HT, the main man, the don, the founder, the father... TAQI'UDDIN AN-NABHANI. I began to spend more time reading articles on "Kcom", HT books, articles and listening to their lectures than anything else (i.e. reading Quraan, sunnah/nafl salaah, etc). If you wanted to discuss the current political situation of the Middle-East then I'd give you answers you'd find credible to questions I am not even able to properly answer. When snookered in a debate with a Salafi brother I'd wrangle myself out by fiercely questioning "BUT WHAT ARE YOU DOING TO BRING THE KHILAFAH BACK HUH??" Only now in retrospect do I understand that the silence met by that question was not due to me "kaining the discussion" but more so due to his likely sympathy towards me for my sorry state.
I was travelling up and down the country to cities I’d never been to before to attend HT lectures I’d heard a hundred times already. This was helping me become well grounded in the HT rhetoric, styles of da’wah alongside proper inspiration to “solidify my concepts”. Not to mention those intense “culturing” car rides to and fro each long off destination which served the purpose of eradicating any alien, false Islaamic ideas that may have crept in to my head during my da’wah to the ummah. GOD FORBID!
Da’wah
I was striving hard in the path of discussion and intellectual talk for the sake of Khilafah. I helped out in organising events, tag-teaming on “contacts”, making leaflets and using my skills to make websites and other calling-to rationalist- Islaam propaganda.
However, my first biggest challenge was to distribute leaflets outside my local masjid. My HT superiors didn’t throw this challenge at me prematurely, wisely waiting to get me feeling cultured enough to not have the audacity to reject this proposal: “After the jama’ah for Jummah is over skip the sunnah salaah run outside to distribute these leaflets”. This act was looked at like a PROOVE YOU’RE DON exercise. I had heard many war stories from the distro battle fields out of the mouths of fellow HTs, such as: “This wahabi came up to me and slapped the leaflets outta my hands and they all fell on the floor, and I go to him YOU C*NT THERE ARE QURAAN SENTANCES ON THEM and he goes REALLY? Then he bent over to pick one up and saw the truth in my words, then he started picking up all the leaflets off the floor!!! HAHAHA” and another one I distinctly remember: “The imam came out and was like STOP DISTRIBUTING AT OUR MASJID and I said IM STANDING ON THE ROAD OUTSIDE YOUR MOSQUE AINT I?!!!! SO YOU CANT TELL ME TO STOP”.
Public distributions lead people in my community to start asking me questions, I was forced in to calling them my “contacts”. After updating my nokia’s address book with their latest mobile phone numbers I embarked on missions of calling them to a local fast food joint to start giving da’wah. I will reserve giving my experiences and stories at another time inshaaAllaah.
HTs love to tell you something they say Nabhani said: “If your not making a mistake in your da’wah then your not doing da’wah”. It’s funny how you can listen to that a thousand times as a HT and think “OMG THAT’S PROPER DEEP” and feel amazed but the moment your mentality is not limited by the HT box and true Islaamic knowledge comes inside you, you realise this is not a principle one should actually apply. But once equipped with this weapon you quickly become confident in the scraps of knowledge gained here and there, to convey these words to a contact fast become routine and robotic. It reaches the stage where your friend who you’d once refer to as Khan is now referred to as “my contact”.
Don’t forget the guy with the biggest contact list is a don but the guy who’s brought the most people in to the HT is the PROPER DON!!!! IT’S ALL ABOUT THE NUMBERS BABY!
First time I saw the HTs smoke
The concepts were solidifying, da’wah opportunities were rife and even I myself could see my character superficially moulding to an improved, Islaamic version -- a stubly Craig David beard, no more socialising with girls, no more rap music glorifying women’s body parts, lots and lots of socialising with HTs. Yep, I did feel more Islaamic. At this stage I was beginning to notice an emptiness inside me that was neglected. From the first day of my first Halaqah I failed not once to bring up the topic of “the existence of Allaah” because this was one rational concept which constantly failed to settle properly in my head. And since I was being told to believe that without rationally understanding this first I won’t be convinced of Allaah’s existence you can imagine how important this topic was to me, but no matter how much I discussed this issue no answer satisfied my intellect. So further and further the neglect of this core issue and the time, devotion and energy being given to da’wah, reading HT literature (“O MUSLIMS!”) and spending all my spare time travelling or being at HT lectures led me to have a huge gaping emptiness and when I would be alone by myself laying in my bed looking at the ceiling, whilst delaying the time of Isha to the point of Tahajjud, I would hate myself and feel like the world’s biggest hypocrite. None of my act’s of worship, be it da’wah or salaah, were done for the right reasons, the knowledge of these issues was never given to me in any way, shape or form through the party -- even my understanding of the importance of intention was completely wrong. This party I was a slave for had neglected to help me on an individual level and officially told me that to learn these issues is my own responsibility and that the HT is only there to work to bring the Khilafah back. This Hizb was expecting to bring the Khilafah back by recruiting knowledgeless, weak in emaan brothers and teaching them the finest details of their opinions of how to apply Shariah laws in the Khilafah but paid no attention to rectifying the Islaamic character and fundamental knowledge of the actual individuals that comprise this group… if only I had asked where in the Sunnah this ingenious idea was derived from.
Often I had wondered why there was a strong smell of smoke coming from the HTs around me. I never gave it much thought. Then... One Saturday, approximately 3 months in to my HT career, we sat parked in a car, the four of us HTs all proud after a tiring session of da’wah in the City Centre stall. I guess too many hours had passed by, or perhaps the tension and temptation was too strong, the craving must have outweighed the intellect in the 3 of them following the intense da’wah. Whatever the reasons may be, this was the first time I realised that my peers/superiors in the party were also suffering from having traits of hypocrisy. The front two first both put a ciggy in their gobs and lit up moaning in ecstasy as they slouched in their seats drifting in to aloofness. “WHAT??!? YOU GUYS SMOKE??” was my instant reaction. I look at the smiling bespectacled 30-something brother perched on the seat next to me in the back of the car, he reached in to his inside pocket only to withdraw his hand offering me a SilkCut Extra Light “YOU SMOKE AS WELL!!!!?!!! !” I said before refusing one.
WAllaahee the icing on the cake was when a well known salafee brother walked past the car and the three of them lowered their ciggy holding hands to hide from him. After he’d walked past one of the HTs sitting in the front said “SH*T, the smoke was rising up and he saw it”.
After this day I soon learned that practically EVERY single HT I know or have met is a smoker, and if not cigarettes then at least sheesha. It wasn’t long until my mushriff changed and I now had a chain-smoker explaining the paragraph I just read out of the book. 2 hours of culturing with the bonus of going home smelling like I just came from a club.
Movies, music and sheesha
I know there are some members/shabaab of the HT who will refuse to believe this, and if they believe it they’ll reassure themselves and one another by saying something like “this cell was poorly cultured” or “this is a glitch in our matrix” (lol) or something else similar. But I have to come clean about the inner-HT culture, the life away from the mushriff’s prying eyes when it’s just the shabaab sitting together with a computer, a pile of DVDs and audio CDs and a fat-ass sheesha with the widest assortment of tobacco flavours. What ensues? Many hours of music, watching movies and idle talk accompanied by the smoking of sheesha. ALL THIS IS CONSIDERED REWARDABLE, because “I am socialising with Muslims”, a concept every HT holds dear in his heart, or shall I say mind.
Because HT has a rationalist ideology (note: NOT AN ISLAAMIC ONE) it is not hard to make something haraam in to halaal and vice versa. All you need to do is re-evaluate a particular action with the HT formula – which is to have minimal knowledge on the issue but the arrogance of an Israeli soldier when it comes to “figuring out” whether something is permissible or not and believing your HT-halaqah-conditioned brain is capable of this. That is why we watched movies and justified it thinking “I am learning life experiences from it, my intention to watch this is not to admire the beauty of the actress or witness some entertaining action”. That is why we listened to music and justified it by saying “although for a normal human these lyrics would put pornographic imagery in the head, it doesn’t for me because I work to bring back Khilafah and thus my Islaam is NEXT LEVEL, instead I listen to this and ridicule Western Culture”. And when it comes to Islaamic rap we’d say and believe “ISLAAMIC RAP IS THE BEST FORM OF DA’WAH FOR THE YOUTH”... yeah, I can really see Muslims kids in their thousands throwing away the thing that attracts them to rap music in the first place (thug, street, crime, gang culture) for HT-INTELLECTUAL-CULTURE, which is being a teenager surrounded by men 10-20 years older, feeling gangster rolling around in a car with a Taji –Shaykh Faisal wannabe- Mustapha lecture playing loud and looking at non-HT Muslims as sell-outs and clueless people while being proud to be a HT gang member. Yeah, it’s really gonna happen. Let’s be brutally honest: HT’s attempt to use rap music was more of a way of making their shabaab listen to “less haraam music” than try to lure Muslim youth in to being better Muslims.
A lot of people may wonder, especially those that have had the privilege of never being a part of the Hizb, about the hardcore extreme obsession and addiction that members and shaabab have with smoking cigarettes and sheesha. Let’s put aside the fact that Nabhani was himself a chain-smoker; this isn’t the reason why to this day HTites blacken their lungs in the current day and age. The SIMPLE reason is that the permissibility of smoking has been rationalised and evaluated as MAKROOH by the anonymous, unknown HT scholars – so according to the HT opinion it’s an action Allaah swt dislikes but since its “not haraam” its okay to smoke. It is worth mentioning the rationale behind this HT fatwa, allow me to paraphrase it – if you want to hear the long winded version go and approach your nearest HT-bot: “If you consume too many dairy products for you it will harm your body, so too many dairy products are haraam. So are you going to tell me drinking too much milk is haraam? NO because drinking a little milk won’t harm you. Just like smoking a little bit wont either.”
To quote a 40-something HT who thought it was “with it” to say this after making an intellectual point in his discussion: “NUFF SAID!!!”.
Marriage obsessions & “potentials” enquiring at events
Once you join the inner-circle of the local HT boys and become considered “one of us” either because you’re a REALLY close contact or you’re on the verge of becoming their shaab or because you already are going through the weekly 2 hour secret-location-take-battery-outta-the-phone halaqah it will at that stage feel as if a veil has been lifted. Fast disappears the intellectual thought provoking ramblings about military coups, da’wah to army generals and how the Khilafah will emerge “this year” and suddenly you are presented with sex-obsessed, die-hard-marriage-wanting brothers disguised in out-line beards and no longer talking with a few poorly pronounced Arabic words per-sentence.
An average HT bro will boast about 10 marriage potentials enquiring about him per year. What is it about every single HT bro thinking that any pretty Islaamic girl who he’s been staring at so hard at an event will fall head-over-heels in love with him, as if he is some kind of ultra-top-“don”-Islaamic guy?? Why do HT bro’s think they will automatically make the PERFECT husband just because his mushriff regularly commends his tricky halaqah questions by starting his reply with “good question...”???
Here’s a fun activity for you, go and approach your local HT Khilafah preacher, listen to him for about 3 minutes without interrupting. He will think he is convincing you of everything and his mind is already thinking of the best way to ask for your mobile phone number. Smile at him and sincerely ask him “wow, you seem to know so much, I bet you get loads of marriage proposals! Do you??” Now enjoy the rainbow of self-admiration facial expressions that will shower his face and if you needed to borrow a large sum of money from a bro now would be a good time to ask and end up getting more than you wanted.
Every HT guy thinks he knows Islaam properly. If there is a lack in his knowledge he’ll think all that is required is progression through the series of books used in the party’s halaqah’s. Thus a lack of Islaamic knowledge is referred to as “lack of understanding the concepts”. Regarding the feeling of KNOWING Islaam in such a great way; this proud, self-admiring characteristic automatically makes each HT bro think that he’s being checked out that at every event where sisters are invited to, as if his imaginary “intellectual deepness” is a characteristic that makes him physically more attractive.
Leaving the HT
I didn’t ever consider leaving the HT until a month before I actually did so. Even when I left I thought I’d one day rejoin after reforming myself Islaamically. The cracks, misunderstandings, confusions, hypocrisy, dead feeling inside... all of these had been continually brushed under the carpet for too long. The sad thing is had you met me during these days my outward appearance, behaviour and impression to you would have been of a brother firmly convinced in the deen, well grounded in the da’wah while having a nice, strong level of imaan and piety. LOL. It wasn’t after I left that two brothers also left and when we talked about it we all seemed to have these exact same problems. A HT is cultured in to thinking everything is about society, society, society -- the emphasis is abnormal and damages the balance of a person not knowledgeable on the deen or following the middle-way away from the extremes. This naturally results in neglect of individual elements that need continuous attention. The hizbi culture helps one nurture a kind of self-invisible arrogance that helps one either: overlook this issue as if it’s not true OR brush it under the carpet for as long as possible OR leave the HT and follow proper Islaam. I went through those 3 stages, as did the 2 brothers who left after me.
I sent an email explaining my decision to leave to all the guys in my cell. One brother called me up the next morning and sympathised with me and found the courage to later leave as well. Another brother tried his best to convince me to stay and is still to this very day with the HT. I stayed strong on my decision and didn’t regret it for even one second. I truly sensed a taste of “liberation”, or what I should call the mercy of Allaah swt, alhamdulilaah.
A few personal thoughts...
During my first week as a HT I met a local salafi brother whom I had long admired for the Islaamic strength in his character and his knowledge and wisdom. I met him outside the masjid after salaat-ul-ishaa and said to him with a smile “I’m with the HT now, I bet you hate that haha” and he replied: “No, they are my brothers I don’t hate the HT. You’ll realise that Islaam is like an ocean, an ocean of knowledge. The deeper you swim the deeper the knowledge gets. I’m glad you’re with the HT when instead you could be with a gang of boys taking drugs and chasing girls.” I think back to his words and feel the hikmah in what he said. It is easy for ex-HT brothers to make fun and ridicule the HT, in most cases rightly so, but it would be an injustice to just make fun and highlight their flaws and just leave it hanging as if this is all that is worth doing. The task is left incomplete like this.
We need to give da’wah to the HT brothers and explain that Islaam is not about emphasising the return of the Khilafah and making this the “mother of all obligations”. The HT needs to realise how shallow, weak and utterly incomplete their ijtihad on the method of establishing the Khilafah is – it’s based more on making the idea sound good than having firm, strong and deeply understood evidences from the Qur’aan and Sunnah. Muslims have to adopt the whole of Islaam and everything that is comprises, putting everything in its correct place. This is a process that takes time, one has to spend time, effort and energy to learn, gain knowledge and be patient. Some can learn fast, some are slow but the HT express halaqah route to trigger-happy-da’wah is not the method of “knowing everything about Islaam” as it falsely makes them feel. Real Islaamic knowledge is not by articulating a thought in a deep way – rather it is found in the Qur’aan and Sunnah. The HT brothers have to be honest with themselves and realise they have a superiority-complex and feel as if they are correct and everybody else is misguided. They look at the Salafees (who they call “wahhaabi” even though they know the term originated by the conspiring kuffaar!) and the Talibaan for example as primitive, back-ward Muslims. There is no humility in the HT culture. You are not humble just by saying or doing things that would make somebody else think you are humble. Genuine humility comes from the inside and is initially towards Allaah swt and through that flows out of you and is apparent as such.
Baring in mind so many flaws in the HT and the brothers who follow them blindly, we have to realise the HT is a group comprising of brothers and sisters who deep down must have an inkling, at the very least, of sincerity or love for Islaam – even if it’s expressed in the desire of wanting to rule the earth by Khilafah! We must give them da’wah and present proper Islaam compared to their rationalised Islaam. Allaah willing we can be able to guide them and bring forth to the ummah da’wah that will alienate the Hizb to the point of extinction inshaaAllaah.
The HTs always say and teach to one another “don’t attack the surface level concept, attack the root concept”. In similar fashion, that is exactly the medicine needed to cure the HT disease; their current root needs to be replaced with a purely Islaamic one. We need to break the box in which the HT’s think inside of, liberate them from the shackles of uncontrolled rationalism. Bring them to the Qur’aan and the Sunnah. Allaah willing.
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