At the July 19, 2009 Hizb ut-Tahrir America (HTA) conference in Oak Lawn, Illinois at the Oak Lawn Hilton, Responsible for Equality And Liberty (R.E.A.L.) ’s Jeffrey Imm attended the end of the final session “The Rise of Islam” prior to Question and Answer period. When going into the conference, each participant received a package from HTA which included: HTA Conference Agenda, HT glossy pamphlet ” ‘Islamic Reformation’ – Exposing the Battle for Hearts and Minds,” HT flier, and CDs “An Outcry to the Islamic Ummah – For How Much Longer?!” and “The Shield – Islamic Commentary on the State of the Muslims.”
The glossy pamphlet ” ‘Islamic Reformation’ – Exposing the Battle for Hearts and Minds” distributed by the HTA at the Oak Lawn, IL conference was designed to reject the concept of any type of “Islamic reformation” demanding instead the creation of an extremist caliphate. The HTA pamphlet mocked the efforts by Islamic reformer Irshad Manji (page 6), claimed that challenging the Taliban’s rejection of human rights was merely a ploy “to attack Islam” (page 16), mocks “The Fallacy of Western Universalism” (page 21), mocks “allegedly universal values of secularism, freedom, democracy, Human Rights, pluralism, and the rule of law” (page 23), calls for “Shari’ah rule,” demanded separate laws for men and women, and defends the death penalty for “apostates” – who leave Islam (pages 62 and 67).
Regarding the killing of those who seek freedom of religion and choose to leave Islam, the HTA-distributed pamphlet states: “Apostasy is a question of what kind of person would openly and publicly abandon Islam with full knowledge that they will be killed for it, rather than either keeping it to themselves or leave the Khalifah. Hence, the death penalty only applies on those who in Khalifah openly leave Islam, and choose to remain in the state despite knowing the law; this is considered an open attack on the basis of the state which is Islam, essentially it is viewed as treason and a political attack on the Khalifah in order to undermine it.”
Another Hizb ut-Tahrir web site promoting the July 19, 2009 event in Chicago also promotes an online copy of this same pamphlet (page 62) that supports killing those individuals who leave Islam as guilty of “treason and a political attack on the Khilafah”… deserving the “death penalty.”
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Responsible for Equality And Liberty (R.E.A.L.) rejects these views, and supports our universal human rights for all, including freedom of religion. We know that many, many other Muslims in America and around the world also reject such calls for violence and intolerance.
We reject calls for violence against those who seek such freedom, and we reject those who would deny such freedoms.
We urge all to Choose Love, Not Hate – Love Wins.
