One of the instigators of sedition and misguidance in our time – Habib Ali al-Jifri

Thursday, September 1, 2016

Fadi Qaraqra - Palestinian writer

It is one of Allah Ta’ala’s laws in the universe that truth and falsehood clash, that nature abhors a vacuum, and that any vacuum that occurs is filled by another alternative, whether positive or negative. Since what the enemies of Islam seek is to wage war and besiege what they call "Islamic fundamentalism," it is natural that a vacuum will result in the Islamic world. This prompts the enemies of Islam, in all their various forms, to support and fill this vacuum by creating new groups and ideologies, such as the Qadiani movement, or by adapting existing groups or individuals, such as the Sufi orders during the French occupation, to become an alternative that accepts foreign ambitions and hegemony over the resources of the Islamic nation.

The French Muslim writer Eric Joffre says in his book, "Sufism: The Inner Path of Islam": "The political authorities in the West encourage Sufism and push it to be the antidote against the phenomenon of Islamic movements and various manifestations of Islamic extremism, not only in the West, but even in Islamic countries!"

This was mentioned by Dr. Abdel Wahab El-Messiri in an article entitled (On the American Reading of the Islamic Situation) in Al-Ahram on 8/10/2004 AD: (And what is significant is that the Western world, which is fighting Islam, encourages Sufi movements, and among the most widespread books now in the West are the works of Muhyiddin Ibn Arabi and the poems of Jalaluddin Rumi).

This is not meant to generalize about all Sufis, but rather to highlight that exploiting Sufism to advance the interests of Islam's enemies is a well-established and implemented strategy. This strategy is advocated by the RAND Corporation, supported by the US Department of Defense, or by Putin's criminal Russia, which uses Sufi conferences in Chechnya as a cover to distort the true nature of Islam and its defenders against Russian aggression. This places upon us the duty to expose and denounce these treacherous relationships in defense of Islam, to protect our Arab and Islamic nations, and to safeguard the security of our homelands from those who undermine and dismantle their defenses. Our subject for this episode is one such individual!

The beginning…

Ali bin Abdul Rahman bin Ali bin Muhammad al-Jifri is of Yemeni nationality, but he was born in the Saudi city of Jeddah on April 6, 1971. His father was one of the Yemeni opposition leaders with leftist leanings, and he briefly held the position of Deputy Prime Minister of the Yemeni government in the south. Due to the fall of this government, he fled to Saudi Arabia in 1968. He now heads the League of the Sons of Yemen Party, which supported the Socialist Party in the secession attempt in 1994.

Despite Al-Jifri's upbringing in Saudi Arabia and his father's inclination towards leftism, he studied and learned from several Sufi sheikhs, including Muhammad Al-Alawi Al-Maliki, Abdul Qadir Ahmed Al-Saqqaf, Ahmed Al-Mashhour bin Taha Al-Haddad, and Abu Bakr Al-Attas bin Abdullah Al-Habashi. Then, when he grew up and became famous, he connected with other sheikhs who were considered to be on his path, such as his sheikh in the ijazah, Nazim Al-Haqqani, who resided in Cyprus and who claimed that he spoke with Rasulullah sallallahu ‘alayhi wa sallam, on the phone!

Al-Jifri became famous with the title (Al-Habib), which is a term that became famous in Hadhramaut for those who worked in science and advocacy from among those affiliated with the family of Rasulullah sallallahu ‘alayhi wa sallam.

Al-Jifri gained his excessive fame through the spotlight of (satellite channels) such as: Iqraa Channel, Dream, Al-Mehwar and CBC) , some of which are backed by people with suspicious agendas!

Ali al-Jifri oversees the Tabah Foundation, which he founded in 2005, in the UAE, in the city of Abu Dhabi, where he resides.

Al-Habib al-Jifri sometimes participates in teaching at Dar Al-Mustafa in the Yemeni city of Tarim, which is supervised by his Sheikh, Habib Umar bin Hafeez. It is one of the Sufi lodges where “disciples” receive Sufi knowledge, and students come to it from inside and outside Yemen. Al-Jifri has participations in suspicious Sufi conferences under American sponsorship!!

An insider's perspective (The power of the media; lies do not build glory)!!

Al-Jafri can win the favour of viewers with his good looks and sweet tongue on the one hand, and his ability to mix truth with falsehood in line with the desires of the public. Therefore, Al-Jifri’s call was initially popular among male and female artists!

Al-Jifri is also adept at employing media tricks to manipulate results while feigning neutrality, objectivity, and false integrity. This is evident to anyone who has followed his frequent interviews with the Egyptian journalist Khairy Ramadan, especially with those who hold opposing views, such as his episode with some enthusiastic but unqualified Salafist youth—not of Al-Jifri's calibre. This is a well-known tactic in the world of media and debates, designed to make Al-Jifri appear superior and his opponent defeated. However, in the eyes of reason and knowledge, it does not indicate the validity of the content. Evidence of this is his avoidance of meetings with preachers and students of knowledge under various pretexts, the most famous of which was his request to be debated by senior scholars, knowing full well that they would not pay him any attention. In doing so, he markets himself to the masses as a great scholar who has been refused a meeting by senior scholars!

One of the paradoxes that deserves careful consideration is that Al-Jifri, despite his ability to market his personal image in an engaging way to his television viewers, quickly reveals his true personality, which is completely different from his television persona, in the private gatherings he holds here and there. These gatherings lead him into pitfalls and scandals, including his egregious exaggeration regarding saints and righteous people, such as attributing creation to them, and his falling into falsehood even in matters of religion! Rasulullah sallallahu ‘alayhi wa sallam, said: “Indeed, lying leads to Hellfire!” Examples of Al-Jifri’s lies include:

Al-Jifri claimed that Al-Haythami, in his book “Majma’ Al-Zawa’id”, authenticated a hadith of Abu Ayyub Al-Ansari radiyallahu ‘anhu that he used to prostrate on the grave of Rasulullah sallallahu ‘alayhi wa sallam! He did not believe in his claim.

Extremism according to Habib al-Jifri

Every Muslim with sound judgment is shocked when he hears the false statements made by Al-Jifri, statements that contradict Islamic law, are abhorrent to believing hearts, and rejected by sound minds. Among these statements are:

Al-Jifri said: that the saint can create a child in a woman’s womb without a father.

- Al-Jifri said: If the saint says: Be, then it is.

- Al-Jifri said: that the saints have power over the universe, even in the afterlife, and even in admitting people to Paradise and admitting them to Hell.

O al-Jifri!!! What have you left for your Rabb??!!

Western support and the suspicious role of the Tabah Foundation

Al-Jifri has not disappeared from the political scene, even though he claimed to have outwardly withdrawn from it. Since his emergence until now, he has been immersed in suspicious political activities, including:

1- Aligning with the recommendation of the RAND Corporation report to support Sufi orders:

The report, issued in 2007, called for a new approach to dealing with Muslims as a whole, not just (Islamists), through what it called (resetting Islam) to be compatible with (contemporary reality), and called for entering its infrastructure with the aim of repeating what the West did to destroy the communist experiment .

According to the aforementioned RAND report, the idea of ​​building what it called "Moderate Muslim Networks" was proposed, calling for the classification of "moderate" or the measure of this "moderation" as the person or entity that does not believe in Islamic law, adopts secularism, and embraces traditional religious ideas such as Sufism. It is worth mentioning here that the RAND Corporation is supported by the American military establishment - and its annual budget is approximately $150 million !!

The report clearly states that the moderate current (in the American definition) are: those who visit shrines, Sufis, and those who refuse to abide by Sharia law. The report promotes only two Islamic religious currents: (the traditional religious current), that is, the current of the common man who prays normally and has no other interests, and (the Sufi religious current), which the report describes as the current that accepts praying at graves, on the condition that each of them opposes what the Wahhabi current proposes.

Al-Jifri’s participation in Sufi activities attended by Americans is very evident to those who follow his news and meetings. One of the latest events that demonstrates this is his participation, along with the acting US ambassador to Sudan, in the Sudanese Sufi Conference on April 14, 2016.

Among the things the acting ambassador said was: “These ideas of love, tolerance, patience, and endurance are the ideas and characteristics that the United States sees in Sufism. This information is very strongly present in the United States, therefore the United States respects Sufism and respects Islam in Sudan.” Of course, the Sufi audience following the events of the conference applauded warmly!!!

Therefore, it was not surprising that Al-Jifri commented on the speech of the acting ambassador by saying: “The words of His Excellency the American Ambassador Benjamin Marald, by Allah, these words are beautiful, and I am not surprised that they come from you as an American.” Then he said: “I love the Jews and I hate the occupation of the occupiers among them, and no one should outdo us in this regard.”

Then he said afterwards: “Our love for man is based on the fact that he is a human being. I hate the disbelief of the disbeliever, I hate the sin of the sinner, I hate the deviation of the deviant, I hate the crime of the criminal, but I love him, for in him is light (and I breathed into him of My spirit). We will not back down from this.” This is meaningless talk; does Al-Jifri love Abu Lahab, Pharaoh, and Nimrod because they are “human beings”?

Then Al-Jifri mentioned the RAND report and said: “The RAND report of 2007 stated that the United States would support Sufi trends in order to create a kind of partnership with what it calls moderate Islam. This is in the RAND report, and RAND is a suspicious institution for me because it is an institution that is funded by the American Air Force, from whose planes we suffer. But who said that we are subject to the decision of others?”

If someone comes and extends his hand to me in peace, I will extend my hand to him. If an American, a Russian, or anyone from any country comes and addresses me about my religious beliefs and our shared humanity in a respectful manner, I will sit with him, discuss with him, disagree with him on what we differ about, and say: You are wrong about this, you are an aggressor in this, and you are right about this. (End of his statement.)

The American warm welcome for Al-Jifri was not limited to the Sudan conference; it was preceded by events and will be followed by others, and then Al-Jifri comes out claiming that all of this is just accusations!!!

Al-Jifri participated in several conferences held by Sufis under American auspices, advocating dialogue with the West, in the UAE and Morocco. These conferences were attended by American ambassadors, delegates, and priests. For example, al-Jifri participated in the Sidi Bouchekir conference in Morocco, which was attended by the American David Kieswit, head of the Moroccan-American Committee for Cultural and Educational Cooperation, and several unveiled women. He later participated in a conference in the UAE entitled "15 Centuries of Affection," attended by the American ambassador and a number of priests. He also participated in numerous other conferences under the guise of conducting Islamic-Western dialogues. What is the secret behind this American enthusiasm?

2- Russian sponsorship of Al-Jafri (Taba and affiliates).

It was not surprising that Russia (Putin), with its long history of crimes against Muslims, participated in the war against our brothers in Syria. Nor was it surprising that Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov – the son of former Chechen President Akhmad Kadyrov, who betrayed his country and aided the Russian bear in its war against the mujahideen there – requested Russia and Putin's participation in the aggression against his Syrian Muslim brothers by sending a force from the Chechen army to support Russia in its crimes against the Syrian people under the pretext that the war is only against ISIS!

But the greatest wonder is in those who sell their religion for a worldly offer to participate in Ramzan Kadyrov’s conferences (Sufism is safety) in 2014, and the conference of (People of the Sunnah) in 2016, to give him and Putin an Islamic legitimacy that polishes their images and hides their crimes.

This is the case with Al-Jifri, who was not content with participating in this conference, but also visited the grave of the traitor Ahmed Kadyrov, calling him a martyr and calling those who killed him Kharijites. It is well established in the minds of those following the Chechen issue that the young Chechen president Ramzan Kadyrov is deeply subservient to Putin!

If the goal of these conferences is to contain extremist thought, which every rational person should fight, then no rational person should fight extremism by directly or covertly cooperating with Russian extremism and criminality against our people in Syria, by praising the enemy of our brothers in Syria or by not exposing and denouncing him!

The question is: Is the message Al-Jifri sent at the Sudan conference, by not rejecting the idea of ​​sitting down with the Russians, what is happening now, and what will happen in terms of a conspiracy after he and some figures associated with the Sufi movement sit down with them? Is this exactly what Al-Jifri wanted by submitting to the American and Russian influence? Let time reveal the answer!

3- Suspicious situations

The Tabah Foundation was not content with the previous and subsequent actions that placed it and its supervisor, Habib Al-Jifri, in a circle of suspicion. Rather, they had a series of shameful positions in every sense of the word; and the example clarifies the point: 

For example: Despite the decision of the International Union of Muslim Scholars in 2006 to boycott Denmark as a result of the publication of offensive cartoons of Rasulullah sallallahu ‘alayhi wa sallam, in order to pressure it to apologize, Al-Jifri, Amr Khaled and Tariq Suwaidan violated the decision and went there under the pretext of convincing the Danes not to insult Rasulullah sallallahu ‘alayhi wa sallam .

Among them: Al-Jifri's eagerness to visit the Pope because of his illness, while neglecting to visit many healthy and sick Muslim scholars, and he did not offer condolences to those who died or tweet to their fans!!

On October 6, 2009, Habib Al-Jifri's website published news of his visit to the Pope, describing him as the "Pope of the Arabs." He stated that "many titles are the fruit of stances, and Pope Shenouda has had a stance for over thirty years in preventing Coptic Orthodox Christians from going to Jerusalem under the brutal occupation. This is a type of stance that truly reflects the man's character and affiliation." Ironically, following Shenouda's death, Al-Jifri visited Jerusalem under occupation on April 4, 2012, under the pretext of supporting the Palestinian people. What is this strange contradiction? (It is most hateful to Allah that you say what you do not do.) And was Shenouda better than him according to Al-Jifri's own standards?!

Among them: the conference (Sufism is an authentic approach to reform) which supported the Assad regime, and was held in Cairo (September 24-26, 2011) under the chairmanship of Dr. Ahmed Al-Tayeb, Sheikh of Al-Azhar, and was organized by (The Imam Al-Raed Academy for Sufi Studies and Heritage Sciences in the Muhammadia Clan).

The conference was attended by prominent figures from the Tabah Foundation, including Al-Bouti, and those present declared that what is happening in Syria is not a revolution but a sedition, which confirms that the issue is a general Sufi position and not an individual mistake!!

Among them: the (Support for Jerusalem) conference in Damascus on 4/10/2012 AD, which in reality turned into a festival to support Bashar al-Assad against the Syrian revolution. The most prominent decision of the conference was to establish a union of scholars of the Levant headed by al-Bouti.

In conclusion:

Al-Jifri’s activity, which is based on lying about religion, spreading superstitions, extremism, polytheism, and serving the enemies of Islam in the East and West, is a large and extensive activity that cannot be fully described in one or two articles. The problem lies in the structure of Al-Jifri’s Sufi thinking, which takes into account the concept of “the end justifies the means” in practice, even if he claims otherwise in writing. And the days are pregnant with surprises that will delight us with all that is strange and wonderful.

Adapted, translated and edited from:

https://www.alrased.net/main/articles.aspx?selected_article_no=7506