Abu Qatada's real name is Umar bin Mahmood Abu Umar the Jordanian and he is known as Abu Qatada the Palestinian (from the point of view of his origin from Palestine).
This individual has a hand in much of the blood that has been shed in the Islamic world - and the Islamic world alone. This individual beautifies his actions in the name of the religion, however he does not do that openly. It is done by indirect means.
He went to the Afghani jihad but only caught its back end and with the ideology of takfir on his table cloth, he sought refuge in London where he found shade, a refuge and place to speak openly. He managed to obtain political asylum, and thus having found his lost haven began in earnest with his tragedies.
It is extremely unfortunate that Britain accommodated him and his likes, preparing for them a repose from which to spread their poison of takfir into the Muslim lands. Indeed, it was from Britain that he mobilised his pashas in the Muslim lands to perform takfir and bombings. In addition to Abu Qatada we have the likes of Muhammad al-Mis'aree, Sa'd al-Faqih and other dissidents whose extremist methodologies are not unknown to the well-informed.
The likes of Abu Qatada are not interested except in killing Muslims whom they deem apostates - that is their primary goal, a matter not well documented in Western academic circles. For the base ideology of these people is that of the Kharijites, those who excommunicate whole Muslim societies on account of the absence of total Shari'ah rule in their lands, and due to their being ruled by rulers they see as corrupt and tyrannical, and due to the presence of major sins in the society. This ideology is the starting point of terrorism carried out by Muslims in the name of Islam. This terrorism is directed first and foremost towards Muslim societies and is not something that emerged primarily in response to non-Muslims or in non-Muslim lands.
Abu Qatada has wreaked more havoc and caused more bloodshed in the Muslim lands, such as Algeria and Saudi Arabia and elsewhere than in the West in its entirety. For he has been taken as a spiritual guide and a political leader to the ignorant fools in the Muslim lands, who are like-minded in their thirst for blood. Unfortunately, the likes of Abu Qatada use highly emotive political issues such as Palestine in order to whip up support and bolster loyalty to themselves - using that to insidiously promote their own barbaric ideologies and tendencies.
Abu Qatada said in his interview with the Hayat newspaper (19th May, 1999):
We do not desire to fight America unless it attacks us, and begins the fight first. This is different to the fight against the apostate regimes in our lands, those against whom jihad is an individual obligation upon every single Muslim.
This is the ideology of takfir, the excommunication of governments, and then by extension whole societies that was given a fresh revival in the works of Sayyid Qutb, the root of all contemporary takfiri and jihadi groups. This then leads to the justification of the killing of innocent men, women and children.
It is important to note that according to these people, Muslims whom they deem apostate are worse than non-Muslims, for this reason, they often express, like Abu Qatada has, that priority should be given in removing them.
In the book titled, "Clearing the Servants From The Barbarity of Abu Qatada Who Calls For the Killing of Women and Children" the author documents from Abu Qatada with direct quotations the following matters:
- His takfir (excommunication) of all of the Muslim rulers (p. 55)
- His excommunication of every individual soldier in the Algerian military (p. 62)
- His revilement of the major scholars of Saudi Arabia (p. 147)
- His fatwa permitting the killing of the preachers and scholars (p. 151)
- His fatwa permitting the killing of women and children in Algeria (p. 205)
- His revilement of some of the companions of Prophet Muhammad (sallallaahu 'alaihi wa sallam), using that in order to commend the Algerian revolution (p. 299)
The condemnation of the Kharijites is well documented in the statements of Prophet Muhammad (sallallahu 'alaihi wa sallam), as is related in the collection of al-Bukhari (no. 6930):
There will appear at the end of time a people who are young in age, of foolish minds and who will speak (with what appears to be) the best speech of creation. Their faith will not go beyond their throats. They will leave the religion as an arrow passes through the game animal. So kill them wherever you come across them, for verily in their killing is a reward on the Day of Judgement for whoever killed them.
And the Prophet (sallallaahu alaihi wasallam), also stated about them that:
They are the worst of creation
And:
If I was to reach them, I would slaughter them like the slaughtering of Aad
And he said of the Kharijites:
They are the dogs of Hellfire.
These are all well-documented and authenticated statements of the Prophet Muhammad (sallallaahu alaihi wa sallam).
Indeed, the likes of Abu Qatada consider the Muslims they excommunicate to be more severe disbelievers and enemies of Allah, than non-Muslims themselves. Abu Qataada stated, whilst boasting and praising his own jamaa'ah (group of followers) that:
... they do not see any difference between the police force of (Yasser) Arafat, under the leadership of Arafat and between the Jewish army and police force, except one: that Araft and his government are more severe in their disbelief than them ...
Refer to the aforementioned book for documentation of this and numerous other statements of Abu Qatada.
This trait is not unique to Abu Qatada, rather it is a trait of all contemporary neo-Kharijites - may Allah disfigure them. This ideology is echoed by Aiman az-Zawahiri. Muntasir az-Zayyat describes in his book "The Path to al-Qaida" some elements of this ideology of az-Zawahiri, stating:
For a long time az-Zawahiri repeated that the only form acceptable for jihad is armed combat, and that it is upon the truthful Muslim to address the internal disbelief - the near enemy - and to address the external disbelief - the distant enemy - thereafter. And az-Zawahiri emphasized his ideology concerning jihad against the near (internal) enemy before the external enemy in a piece that he wrote in the April 1995 issue of "al-Mujahidun" magazine, entitled, "The Path to al-Quds Passes Through Cairo". He said therein, "Al-Quds will not be conquered or settled, except when the battle in Egypt and Algeria is settled, and until Cairo is conquered". The fundamental ideology that beseeched az-Zawahiri was his consideration that the fundamental, foremost enemy was the political structure (in the Muslim lands) because it did not judge by what Allah had revealed.
Abu Qatada played a significant role in the 90s in the killing of countless Algerian, men, women and children, by way of his "spiritual guidance" to those who shared his evil ideology, and his subterfuge continued well into the next decade.
