[Music]
alhamdulillah all praise is due to Allah
and may Allah's peace and blessings we
on the last messenger of
Allah da and Desert
Storm for
me was
the
greatest
experience that I have ever had in the
field of
dawa and I've
traveled to many different countries
around the world and I've been involved
in many different
dawa uh
programs and I've seen cases of many
people uh accepting
Islam in large
numbers
but none can
surpass what I experienced what I
saw in Desert
Storm for those of
you
who being born after Desert Storm or who
were kids at that time the significance
of it
maybe is of little relevance we could
say
to to you
today for the rest of the world at that
point in time
1991 it was a
major incident in the Muslim world it
was a time
where one of the Muslim
Muslim quote unquote Muslim
rulers the ruler of Iraq Saddam
Hussein had invaded
Kuwait and there whole bunch of
political issues behind it really as it
came up afterwards it was with a green
light from the
US setting them up but in any rate they
came in and took
Kuwait
and what was to be expected was that
Saudi Arabia would be
next they had the biggest military
machine amongst all of the Arab states
he had been stockpiling weapons
developing weapons
Etc
and he had what appeared to be something
relatively
Invincible Saudi Arabia
didn't see themselves in a position to
resist if Saddam Hussein decided to come
in
and it turned
to Uncle
Sam and sought
help of course this is what Uncle Sam
wanted as it probably was just a part of
the
plan you know all of these things fall
into place they seem to happen one way
but there are other factors behind the
scenes hidden motives all these other
things happening so it's quite
conceivable that this was planned out
much
earlier
and Saudi
Arabia decided to
permit some half a million American
Americans to
enter on Saudi
soil and
uh remain there until the end of the
operations to stop Saddam
Hussein roll back his war
machine
now there were issues Muslims split up
over that
decision in fact some of the leading
scholars in Saudi Arabia
who supported that
decision some extreme elevant went so
far as to declare them as kufar as
disbelievers because they made this
ruling that it was permissible for
American troops to come into
Saudi Arabia Muslim land to fight
against other Muslims of course that
position is
false it's one thing for you to say it
was an error on their part and another
thing for you to take them out of Islam
because of their
IAD that was an extreme view but in any
case it found supporters
and Muslims were divided into two camps
those who said you know this was durur
what else could they do and those who
said regardless they shouldn't have done
it at any
rate American troops poured into the
Eastern
Province and they set up a base in
damam where they began uh Maneuvers
preparing
for uh attacking the Iraqi War
Machine when they first set up the camps
there in uh
Dam there was a
sergeant by the name of Ali
as he
was
outwardly like those
who so enamored with
America and the West like to hang around
Americans and you know talk to them be
friends with them
Etc he used to go into their uh tents
where they
were stationed and hang out with them
right his English was poor not very good
he was only a
sergeant
but as he befriended them he developed
friendships with
them he then tried to get help to give
dawa to
them so his
initial uh appearance as just just
somebody who you know loves Americans
you know you guys are great this that
and the other but his intention was
da now if you saw him externally you
didn't know what he was doing you'd say
hey look at this
maaf look at him these Americans are in
and look what he's doing and this is why
we have to again be very careful about
how we judge
people you know at any rate this
individual Al Shahi he was familiar with
American culture because in the
military he used to watch you know
American movies and he was smoking and
hanging out right
until his brother he had a brother who
was a practicing serious Muslim you
know he was one way his brother was
another
way then his brother had an
accident a car
accident and he was killed in this car
accident and Aliah when he went and saw
his
brother you know in that state from that
car accident his body burnt and
everything it just struck
him for some people when you see
something like
that if they don't have
a spark of Faith then that sends them
into total rejection of
God because how is it God who is good
and wants people to be good then he does
that to this righteous individual and
look at me I'm corrupt and everything
and I'm
fine there can't be a god there's no
Rhyme or Reason to all of this see
that's one conclusion and this happens
to a lot of people when you talk to
atheists many times you hear that they
there incidents in their lives like this
where they see people who are seemingly
good people and then horrible things
happen to them you say how can't be a
God but a person who has a spark of
Iman when they see that what they see in
it is Death Before Their
Eyes Death Before Their
Eyes because when he saw his brother's
face his face was
calm he could see light in that
brother's face in spite of the fact he
was burnt up and everything as if he
could see a smile in his face you know
it just struck him really deep so deep
he turned his life upside down he gave
up all the stuff that he was doing and
of course in the military you know when
they travel and they go different parts
of the world they get training different
places they're exposed to Western
systems they end up in drugs and all
kinds of
stuff he gave it all
up started to study the Quran and you
know change his
life so when he found that
opportunity
to reach out to the Americans because he
was familiar with American culture you
know he he had learned from the American
movies that he saw you know some of the
sanging phrases what's happening man you
know all this kind of stuff so he had
learned a few of those things and of
course when they' say that to the
Americans they'd laugh you know you know
so they liked
him so he had that opportunity to get
close to
them so once he started that
process of course he could only go so
far because his language wasn't enough
to really get into any kind of deep
discussion with
them so he tracked me down I was living
in
Riyad he tracked me down and invited me
to come
up right and hang out with him with his
friends amongst the
Americans so I went up and we
sat with a group of them that were
curious they wanted to ask some
questions
and get some kind of clarity on what
they saw because initially when they
were coming from America they were under
the impression that they were going to
be flying into the desert they'd be
running into beduins on camels you know
and they came in there get got out the
airport and they saw Kentucky and you
know Big Mac and said what it's a whole
different situation wasn't what they
expected at all so they were quite
curious interested wanted to ask you
know some questions so we started a
course of
discussion and
alhamdulillah from that course a few of
them accepted Islam and others amongst
them who were actually Muslims in the
military who came then we started to
coordinate with them Prov provide
literature for them that they could
start to uh distribute it so those
people who initially went to Saudi
Arabia to fight and kill
Muslims ended up themselves becoming
Muslims and ended up helping Muslims to
helping to protect Muslims from
non-muslims in
basa and that is the wisdom of
Allah that something we see as something
evil those half a million Americans
coming into Saudi Arabia was initially
something evil but from it and this is
the greatness of Allah he can take from
it great
good not to say in the end that I'm
saying it's good yeah bring Americans
into your countries no no no I'm not
saying that right I'm not saying it was
a good thing to bring them you know to
decide to bring them if it were left up
to me I would have said
no we'd fight it out whatever Muslims
want to support us we fight you know but
that was the decision made that was the
fatwa and they followed it decision was
made and in the
end it ended up being something very
positive for Muslims because from that I
started working with the Air Force
Headquarters in Riyad and we set up daa
centers in all of the military bases
across across Saudi Arabia so every
military base you're going to Saudi
Arabia today you'll find a daa center
and some officers who were keen on dawa
will be there they'll have some you know
noncommissioned officers working in
there and they're involved in giving
dawa to the non-muslims that are are
working that are remain in the country
today
so Allah
abbar
Allah has this in store for us this this
is
something which though it was unique for
me it can happen anywhere at any
time if Muslims are ready to do what is
necessary to convey this
message and this is a responsibility
that lies on all of us here
in White
Chapel where Muslims have concentrated
it is very important for us to learn how
to give dawa and to convey The Message
of Islam to the society around
us those people who were involved in
that da effort which produced this great
result they were not specifically
trained dies among them were those who
had knowledge and among them were those
who had limited amounts of knowledge and
that's why the prophet wasam had
said convey whatever you've learned from
me even if it's only a verse from the
Quran so this is a responsibility for
all of us
and this is what I era is all
about this whole program here is to
develop a an organized and systematic
approach to dawa in the UK and
elsewhere that if we want to do it
effectively although on one hand each
and every one of us has the individual
responsibility and we should do it
whatever opportunity presents itself we
should do it but on the other
hand as Allah
said that there should be from amongst
you a
group who would call the people
to righteousness and prohibit the
evil that it should be most effectively
done in an organized
way so I I era is an attempt to give
solid systematic
organization to the process of dawa in
North America and this is why we call on
you you know to give us your your full
support
because if you can't do
it at least help us to do
it you know there are people here who
are ready who are committed but we need
your help we need your support this has
to be a Cooperative effort whether it is
financial whether it's intellectual
using what skills you have to share with
us whether it's is
Dua we need your help and that's what
this whole program is all about and
that's the message which comes from the
dawa in Desert
Storm support
came and we were able to do it
persistence Ali Shahi when he first
began he was told actually by some
officers don't go into these areas stay
away from from the camps of the
Americans but he keep going and they put
him in jail two three times you know and
when they were going to hold him for a
stretch of time he had the word sent to
shik bin baz and she bin baz said let
him out they let him out but he was
persistent with the little knowledge
that he had but the care and the love
for wanted to share The Message of Islam
to others kept
him on the job
and
he is the one person out of all of that
who got the greatest reward imagine that
he one man who didn't even know English
properly ended up being the
Catalyst Catalyst for over 3,000 people
accepting Islam and that number
multiplying itself
over the years to come one man
and this is the example of the good
Sunnah that when you do it you get the
reward of all who follow you so I pray
and ask Allah tal to give you all the
guidance the
hiah to take from this
message a a
lesson a lesson regarding the role that
each and every one of you has to play in
giving the da
and I pray
that he motivates you to give to support
and to promote this effort from Ira from
this Center here
to the whole of London to the whole of
the UK we need to get back the momentum
bring it back through
da
account