Adnan Rajeh – Between June 6th and Rafah Part -1
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AI: Transcript ©
He says,
oh people indeed, the promise of your lord
is the truth.
So do not be fooled by this worldly
life that you live in. Do not be
fooled by the one who goes out and
seeks and hopes to fool you. Indeed,
a shayran is your true enemy, so take
him as such.
Exclusively, he will be calling those who follow
him to a place of punishment.
As we are approaching the 9 month anniversary
of the beginning of these horrible events that
we have been witnessing,
we are also coming very close to the
3rd annual memory
of the horrific events that occurred on South
Courage
on June 6th.
And between these two events,
we we must take a moment
and zoom out for a second
to reassess or to look at our status
and look at this situation and
reflect and contemplate as if as if we
do not do that, if we as human
beings and as Muslims specifically,
lack the ability to contemplate and reflect on
what is happening
throughout our lives, then we will not be
able to make better choices.
We won't make better decisions, and we will
not grow or move forward. And this is
a a fatal
human flaw
where we describe history, meaning we narrate it
as it occurs, but we lack the ability
to actually take any of the lessons that
are required for us
to negate
negate the possibility of these of these events
happening again
or we lose our ability to actually learn
from
from our mistakes.
And the reason that I'm I'm talking about
this specifically today, and it's a PD day
and a lot of my younger brothers and
sisters are here, so I want them to
listen to this.
The human race unfortunately
has this need for an enemy.
The human race, they require there being an
enemy.
It's a requirement that fulfills a sick part
of our instinct.
A part of us that is not healthy
to feed, but it's there.
If you give us an enemy, you give
us some reason
to hate. You you give us a place
for us to channel our hate and to
channel our blame,
And it's just something that is is just
a part of the human experience. And the
stem
is very
specific on the fact that your enemy lies
within.
Like, your enemy is not someone that you
can point at. Your enemy is one that
you cannot see, you cannot taste, you cannot
hear, you cannot touch,
And your enemies actually quite weak. All he
really does is just give you bad thoughts,
and then you're the one who either acts
upon them or doesn't.
Meaning, it brings it down. You know what
the ayah says, indeed your enemy, Sha'il Han
is your enemy. And since you cannot declare
a war on Sha'il Han, as much as
we like to declare war on things, you
can't really declare a war on shaitan. You
can't see him, you can't do much. He's
and he does not really harm you
per se directly. He doesn't really harm you.
He just gives you bad thoughts. He tries
to confuse you. He tries to show you
things to be different than they what they
really what they actually are. He
tries to he tries to elude you, to
misguide you, but at the end at the
end, it's your choice. It's you and it's
me. We're the ones who make the final
decision whether we are going to walk down
a path of evil or not.
The enemy that we seek out and we
want so badly to fight is not really
is not materialistic,
and it's mostly whether we like it or
not ourselves.
And this is what the Quran teaches us.
This is surah that the Quran ends with,
say I say I seek refuge in the
Lord of humanity,
in the King of humanity,
in the deity of humanity,
from the evil that is inflicted
upon the one who whispers
in in in darkness.
Is the one who whispers into the hearts
and
the and the chest of human beings.
From the
from human beings as well.
And they can't harm you, but they can
make you become harmful.
But that's not the narrative that the west
has picked up.
And those who don't understand what Islam is
about, don't take that narrative. They need an
enemy. For the longest time, it was communism.
For the longest time, you weren't around neither
was I. You weren't here. There were the
enemy. All you have to do is watch
movies that were made back in the seventies.
The enemy was always from a communist country.
And then when communism fell, they need another
enemy.
Fortunately, it turned out to be us.
Unfortunately
the choice landed on the Muslims.
For people living in the west specifically that's
how the * it became. We became the
enemy. We became the enemy whether we did
something to deserve it or not. It's not
even the point but that's what we became.
That's how we were viewed, and for the
longest time we were viewed like that. But
then Muslims because of because of the good
the beautiful nature of what Islam is, Muslims
moved. Muslim always I've always done that. Move
from one place to the other. They immigrate,
they go, they integrate, and then we became
We lived amongst them, and it became much
more difficult to call us the enemy when
you were working with us. When you saw
what the values that we stand for were.
But that didn't change the general political political
out view of the establishment that we're a
part of. It didn't change that which puts
puts us in this predicament.
It puts us in this in this predicament
that we find ourselves in where we are
a part of this country. We're a part
of the North, of the North American culture.
We're a part of Europe. We're a part
of the West. We we we work in
their schools and in their hospitals, and we
run for office.
And we're a part of their of the
social fabric. However, they don't
behave that way.
However, 35,000
and counting are dead.
Children and women, the majority of them in
their tents. In their tents, they burned in
their tents in refugee camps. In refugee camps
where they're supposed to be. It's not even
a place that's worth living in. You can't
live there. There's nothing to live on. It's
not life when you're stuck in a refugee
camp. I've been to them. It's not life.
You can't call that life. It's in limbo.
You're just there hoping for one day instead
of being able to get out. There are
people who live there for the majority of
their lives.
You can't call that life and yet they're
being followed there.
So when we stand and we say, how
is that acceptable?
When we when we voice our concerns, why
is this okay? Why are we still supporting
someone who is doing that? Why is that
not being stopped? They have no answer for
us because we are continuously being seen as
the enemy,
at least overseas,
and that has to change. This is something
that we can talk about. The hatred that
fueled the events of June 6th is the
same hatred that's fueling the events in Al
Azhar al Wabash. It's the same hatred
and the indifference
that allowed someone to generate all that hate
that led to June 6th. That indifference, that
political and social indifference that allowed that to
be built up to it.
And lead to the June 6th events is
the same indifference
that's allowing what's happening in Rafah to happen
right now as I speak to you. They
are pulling children and women under rubble. They
are pulling them from a refugee camp, and
they're taking them to hospitals that have no
doctors and have no supplies.
In real time, I could literally get on
this member and put down that
projector and just turn on turn on one
of the live
feet. I could turn on live feet and
show you what's happening in a place where
Muslims are trying just to live, and
and then we ask ourselves that question, why
is that okay?
How is this okay? Why isn't anyone Why
aren't the leaders that represent us saying something
about this?
We pay our taxes. We vote them in.
We seem to be a part of this
community. Why is this we're telling them this
is not okay. We're telling this is unjust.
It's the reason that I explained to you.
This is my this is my theory of
it. I believe that the world the West
still needs an enemy. The West has not
matured enough to the point where they can
understand that you don't need an enemy.
You don't need an enemy to run a
successful country or a successful business or a
successful population. You don't need an enemy.
But they feel like they do.
They continue to use us as enemies.
They continue to use this narrative, and that
is a fact.
It's a fact that you find through media
outlets, find it news, you find it in
movies, you find it everywhere.
And we have become numb to it. We've
accepted it. To a certain degree many of
us are just They just ignore it. We
just don't watch these outlets. We just we
just not a part of that whole group
of people but it's there. It's there. It's
the reason why what we're what's occurring continues
to occur, and the question that I want
to pose for you today
is
are we capable of changing?
Are we capable of changing the public opinion
about Muslims and Islam? And do we care
to change it to begin with?
Do we care to change that to begin
with? Does it matter to us? Do we
want to change it? And should we change
it?
And I've heard and I've asked and I
post this question in different places to listen
to people's answers and unfortunately it's not a
united one.
It's not a united answer. Not everyone thinks
that it's worthwhile
to change that narrative. Not everyone feels that
we should be putting any energy into changing
that narrative. And I argue that that's not
correct.
No. We there's more than one reason to
want to change that narrative. There's more than
one reason to want to actually to care
about how people view this deed. Not just
because of the injustices that are occurring but
because we are ambassadors of the final word
of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala.
We are ambassadors of the Prophet alaihis salatu
wa salam. We carry his legacy.
His legacy was for this word that you
would see on the shelf and for his
way of life to be carried as far
as possible to every human being.
That is what we are obligated with. We
are we are commanded to do that. We
are commanded to make sure that we represent
Islam appropriately and that we carry Islam to
others they can learn it, so they can
embrace it. And if we don't do it
correctly, then we are obligated to go back
to the drawing board and figure out how
to do it well.
With that will come the removal of certain
injustices for sure.
With that, you will be able to change
the public opinion to the point where you
can actually affect an injustice that's happening. But
we have to ask ourselves this question. Is
this something that we're investing time
and energy in or are we not? And
I have to tell you that within the
last couple of weeks, and I'm saying this
because I'm like it's a PD day and
a lot of, school high school students are
here. School school students are here. This Wallahi
the effect that university students have had on
public opinion has been astonishing over the last
couple of weeks. Has been astonishing.
You don't understand the power that you carry
as someone who is young. You think because
you're told by people like me that, you
know, you said to sit and to be
quiet and to listen and that you you
mount way more than you'll ever fully understand.
And you'll only understand it when you're at
my age.
Understand the power that you carry as a
student, as someone who's young, who's passionate, who's
compassionate,
who has the energy and the time
and can afford to actually put their
put themselves in a position where they demand
change. You see, when you when I demand
change, some people look at me with it.
There's always going to be a suspicious eye.
Why am I demanding change? I've been around
a long time. There may be there may
be a catch to it. There's gonna be
a catch somewhere. I must have some other
near some other agenda. But when you demand
change, when when you're ready to decide that
this is wrong, I refuse injustice. I refuse.
I refuse people to be treated like this,
and you voice it out. There's no there's
no accusation
of you doing it for an agenda because
you're coming from a pure position. You're coming
from something that is pure, that is real.
So brothers and sisters, understand that as a
high school student, as a university student, you
carry weight.
Throw it around a little bit.
Throw it around a bit and speak your
mind
and influence the because when you influence the
public opinion, you give us the ability to
actually start shifting the narrative a little bit.
We have to shift this narrative.
This narrative that exists outside of Masajid that
we are not always exposed to. Those of
you who work in certain places know that's
there. Those of you who work in know
what the narrative of Muslims actually is
amongst the general population. If you're working in
the right place, you know what it is.
You've heard it before.
That has to change. We are obligated to
work towards changing that. We have to, and
we have to care how people view us.
Don't compromise anything. No.
I actually am telling you the opposite. You
may change the narrative against Muslims by being
truly Muslim, by following the exact words of
the Quran and the sunnah of the prophet
Not the opposite. Not by selling out on
something. Not by leaving something behind. Not at
all.
But this is something worthy of our of
our attention.
If we see what happened on June 6
3 years ago
changed this city forever. It changed me forever.
I'll never I don't see the world before
it and after. I know COVID, you know,
made more of a splash, but honestly, that
that day is a day that I will
never forget. I will be on my deathbed,
and I'll remember where I was when I
heard the news, when I read, when someone
Mohammed Hamu sent me the message saying, did
you see what happened? I was sitting. I
was in university hospital. I was on the
3rd floor, and I was sitting in the
team 2 room
because I was on call I was sitting
there with my staff and I looked at
it and I read it and I could
not believe what I saw because I knew
these people. Because this is our city. Because
we're a part of this place. Because that's
not behavior that we tolerate. We don't call
for that. We don't accept it. We don't
accept that degree of hatred, that degree of
discrimination. It's completely
unacceptable.
We don't accept it from our own. We
don't accept it from others either.
And it put us in a position where
we felt threatened, where my wife wouldn't go
out and walk alone for a couple of
months afterwards where people were scared.
Imagine the people in Gaza say rafa.
Imagine imagine
hearing that hearing these numbers.
35 and 36 and 37000
people dead. I'm not even talking about the
ones who are wounded and disabled beyond repair.
The trauma that's going to come out of
this place, how is this not important?
How is the world sitting around and discussing
this as if it's a tertiary or secondary
issue, as it is a complex situation?
It's not a complex situation.
It isn't.
Now we can be frustrated about that as
much as we want, and I can get
upset here on the member because of that
being the case, but maybe we step up,
step back for a moment and wonder, well,
how can that change? Because that's what's matters.
That's what matters. At the end, I'm going
to We're all going to age and die
but then you, the younger generation is gonna
have to deal with whatever we leave them.
Whatever world we leave them is what what
they're going to have to deal with. How
do we make sure that when they grow
up, they have a better future and they
can speak that they can represent themselves better
and that this doesn't happen again and that
they're equipped they're equipped appropriately to do so?
That is our obligation, brothers and sisters. There's
nothing else here to do aside from that.
You are outside
of any
any true dictatorship. You're not being oppressed right
now. Do you understand how valuable that is?
You live in safety and you have enough
food on your table. Those are the only
2 blessings that you get to complain about.
You can't complain about anything else. If you
have those two things and your complaints, you
shelf them. Do them alone at night in
sujood to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala not love
them.
And then you focus on your role. What
is your role here as someone who has
safety and has and has provision
aside from making sure that the world is
different when you walk away from it, when
you leave it, and you teach your kid
to have the same mentality, that he grows
up also looking at the world critically and
taking stands that make that make Allah Subhanahu
Wa Ta'ala
satisfied with them. Stand that can be be
proud of of justice, of righteousness,
of fairness, of tolerance,
of truth.
And if we're not focused on that, if
we're not completely and fully focused on that
then I don't know what we're doing.
I don't understand what what we're spending our
time doing.
I believe that anything else is a complete
waste of breath, the waste of oxygen to
be around not focused on what we're here
to do, what we're here to try to
achieve. It may seem far fetched and it
may actually be far fetched,
but it's not more far fetched
than the man
who stood on Jabal al Safa and called
his people and was rejected by his own
family members
with less than 50 people across the world
that listened to him.
We are not it's not more far fetched
than that.
Of him standing on a small mountain somewhere
in the middle of nowhere desert,
with less than 50 peoples that supported him,
most of them were slaves. He speaks to
his family who reject him. His own uncle
curses him out, and he was told that
this message has to reach every corner of
the earth. That is your responsibility.
More far more far fetched than that?
No. No.
There's 2,000,000,000 of us.
We don't need all 2,000,000,000, honestly even though
we hope that all of them turn a
corner at some point in their lives. May
Allah guide us all.
We just need a few pure hearts, few
pure souls
and spirits. Those who are willing
to see reality for what it is and
make a decision in their lives that help
them grow. The prophet alaihis salatu wasallam, he
cared about these. He cared about how people
saw him. He cared about the message that
he carried.
There's a known story in Busayim in this
first part of the Khubba with it for
you to listen to.
Alaihi salatu wa salam was harmed by Abu
Allah ibn Ubay bin Salud more than any
living human being. No one, no one even
came close. They thought Abujahed and Huqtaba were
bad. They didn't see this guy.
This guy came in guns blazing. He did
everything possible to try and and and end
Islam and kill the prophet
alaihis salatu san time and time again. He
went after his reputation, after his family, after
his wealth, after his companions, after his status,
after everything.
He tried time and time again to end
it. And the prophet alaihis salatu wa sallam
tolerated him. And one day, on the way
back from a battle,
he says something so rude that I will
not even repeat on this mimba out of
respect for the prophet alaihis salatu wa sallam.
He says something so rude
and he did something that was harmful
and he withheld
food and water from people who were starving
from army members who were starving. Muslims who
it was a
the the the whole journey turned out to
be to 4 times longer than they had
prepared for, so people were on a tight
budget. And he had a little bit extra
and he refused to share. So the Sahaba
got upset, Omar got upset specifically.
People will never say that Muhammad killed one
of his own companions.
People will never say that I harmed someone
who was with me. Whether they were with
me truly or they were they were with
me superficially, but deep down inside they didn't
care. If on paper he is with me,
people will never say that I harmed one
of them. He will live with us for
as long as as he wants. He's with
us.
We will I will be his the best
companion to him for as long as he's
with us. He cared about these things. He
cared to take care of those who weren't
functional, and he cared also of how Islam
was going to be seen. Do you understand
that all it took all would have all
it would have taken is one slip from
him
for this whole thing to end, for this
whole story not to exist for for for
this microphone and me to disappear,
for it to fade it away, if you
just go back and make them make a
mistake. It's
the second or
the 3rd Surah that was revealed to him
alayhi salatu wa sallam. One of the earliest
of the one of the first five at
the end of it.
And it and it and it they use
is to is to slip, but not to
slip
literally, to slip figuratively,
like to make a to make a mistake,
To do something wrong. The disbelievers are looking
at you and they they are they are
so angry and they're so upset
jealous and envious that they with their eyes,
want are almost forcing you to slip to
slip. Like they're using their eyesight to try
and get you to slip. They just want
you to make one mistake. Just make a
mistake so that we can go around and
say, this is who he is. This is
what he did. He stole. He lied. He
mistreated, he oppressed, he he something just do
something.
They're almost getting to slip with their eyes
with their eyes. That's how angry they were.
But he never did. So what did they
say?
So they said he's mad. Mad is not
a sin.
Madness is not a sin. Right? Insanity is
not a sin but that's all they could
come up with because they couldn't find something
on him. They couldn't find something on him.
I'm going to end this utah with this
with this thought that I wanna share with
you. If you understand what I'm trying to
explain today,
if you understand that's what what's occurring overseas
and what occurred here, it comes from the
same problem.
The same problem that I don't think we've
spent enough time trying to fix, trying to
deal with. There is a front line. There's
a front of fixing that that comes back
to the political aspect of our existence as
Muslims in the western and back home and
the organizational. And I understand that. And I'm
not here to talk about that piece because
of the lack of my ability to do
so. But there's another aspect of this which
is the aspect of education,
the aspect of of advocacy,
the ad the the aspect of the narrative
about us that we do have the ability
to actually steer. We have the ability to
affect and change.
And that comes through the 5 points that
I made around 2 years ago. And I
pointed out that for this community, there are
5 basic
objectives that we have to spend our time
trying to work on. We have to work
on education. Make sure that this younger generation
knows what it is that they stand for.
Make sure they understand Islam as Islam should
be understood.
Not maybe as the way you were taught
it, but as it is, not as you
would like it to be. Make sure they
know because if they know,
if you have knowledge, then ignorance has no
way in. And when ignorance has no way
in, you're immune. They have to know, and
they'll have identity if they do.
You have to invest in mentorship to make
sure that they have role models, people in
front of them that are doing the work
that they can learn from.
Right now, we're not doing a very good
job at that. Aside from a few programs
which is not what I was My actual
goal of mentorship. What I mean by mentorship
is that you step up and then make
sure the person behind you is watching so
they can learn to step up like you.
If you're not stepping up, you have no
one to mentor them. How are they going
to step up? How are they going to
make decisions if they have no one ahead
of them doing it properly?
Mentorship means that you have to actually rise
to the occasion so you can teach those
behind you to rise to the occasion too.
Outreach, we have to put in more efforts
in actually reaching out with Islam to those
who don't have it. This has to be
one of our goals, has to be one
of our
one of our objectives as a community.
We carry this responsibility on the day of
judgment in front of Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala.
If we don't, if we are putting no
effort into spreading Islam to those who don't
have it, it, then we're gonna be asked
about that.
We have to make sure that we have
some degree of financial stability.
We have to have some degree of financial
stability within our community so that we can
actually find the work that needs to be
done. And then 5, I leave it till
the end because I think today is the
most important. What I think all of them
lead up to is advocacy
where we advocate for righteousness and for justice.
We advocate for our rights, and we advocate
for khair and goodness. We advocate for that
which is helpful. We advocate for those who
are being those who don't have a voice.
Those who don't have a voice, they need
someone to be their voice for them. That
that's a pretty good reason to be alive.
That's a pretty good cause to live for
where you are the voice of those who
have no one to speak for them, who
have been forgotten.
And the the the thousands of names that
have been forgotten, they died and
they they died in the darkness quietly.
Died in the darkness quietly with no not
much of a not much of a of
a stir of a stirring of any sort.
Not much noise was made for them. They
just were forgotten.
You know, the poor families. The families from
different from from from very low socioeconomic backgrounds.
The ones who are just you know who
I'm talking about. You've been to the Middle
East, and you you don't need to be
there. You can be
here. You know, the the one the weak
the weak the weak who just are barely
making it, then they die altogether, and they're
buried with no with no nothing to to
recognize their names, and they're forgotten that that
they didn't matter.
Be the voice of that person.
Make sure that the the their blood and
their life was not in vain. Make sure
that they don't disappear into nothingness because we
were too
selfish and too self occupied to care about
it.
As younger brothers and sisters, you need
to wake up earlier than maybe you would
have had to. Sometimes
sometimes,
history requires you to to to wake up
and mature
a little bit earlier than your time.
It's okay. It's nothing wrong with it. Ali
had to do it. At 10 years old,
he had to make that decision and so
did Zubayr and so did Balha. These great
names of our Islamic history, they had to
wait they they had to grow up really
quickly. They had to start
picking up some some of the burden and
carrying some of the responsibility at 101112.
So don't tell me you're too young. Don't
tell me that you don't you don't have
the ability. You do. You just have to
you just have to realize
certain things that maybe I can tell you
people in their fifties sixties have failed to
realize, but you could. And if you do,
then you'll live a life that is different.
And if you live a life that is
different, then the outcome,
you know, 30 or 40 years from today
will be very different as well.
And
and
and and and and speak the positives
and celebrate the achievements and talk about the
great things that are occurring instead of getting
here every week and talking about failures and
shortcomings and pain instead of talking about pain
all the time.
At some point it becomes hard to continuously
talk about pain. This has been the hardest
9 months of giving in my life. I
almost wish that I didn't even start this
place so I didn't have to give the
during this time and just open it after
this is over.
It's hard to get up and talk about
pain every single week.
It's hard for you to hear it. It's
hard for me to talk about it. I
can't ignore it. I can't get up here
and talk about something different. I can't ignore
what's happening.
It's nice. I I'm I'm tempted to every
week, I'm tempted to get up here and
maybe we'll talk about Hajj. Hajj is coming
down, talk about all the nice parts of
Hajj. It's easier for me. This is what's
uplifting. We can walk away feeling a little
bit of a spiritual
high, but it's not the right way to
do it.
There's pain and there's and there's oppression. We
have to talk about them until they are
removed or until we have a plan to
remove them and then we can focus on
the plan and we don't even have a
plan yet. We don't even have a plan
yet.
This has to change. This this is what
has to change. This is this is what
needs to change. We're lucky this is what
needs to change. What needs to change is
that.
Is is our indifference is our indifference and
our lack of plan and our lack of
of of direction. That's what has to change.
If we change that I can guarantee you
things will be different
and our younger the younger generation will feel
much more proud to be Muslim, much more
energetic and energized to be Muslim. They'll want
to come to the Masjid. They'll want to
learn. They'll want to stand for something that
is meaningful. They'll want to do it. You'll
have to be you won't have the problem,
but please come.
Don't be like that and be different and
put down the phone and stop following mister
Beast and listen to the Sheikh what he's
what he's talking about. It'll be easier because
it's just it's it's meaningful.
People who have no causes to live for
have nothing meaningful in their life, they resort
to they resort to nothingness. They resort to
something that's meaningless. They resort to play and
games because there's nothing there's no reason to
be serious. There's no reason to mature. There's
no reason to actually change,
but we do have that opportunity today. A
little bit of
awareness amongst our older generation. A little bit
of awareness amongst our younger generation and you
can make something very special almost like almost
magical.
Almost magical happen.
Why to me the magical part of the
seerah is is the younger
is the younger people.
When you read their stories, to me it's
like magic. I I don't understand it. I
don't understand because I remember being 10 and
11 and 12. I don't understand it. I
don't understand how they were that way. How
someone could be that young.
How how a 11 year old can come
up to,
Abdulhamani bin Auf during the battle of Badr
and tell him where is Abujahed?
He's like what do you want Abujahed?
Said, I was told he he he used
to harm the prophet alaihis salatu wasalam. I
was told not to come home today before
I take him out.
He was so young that he had tied
his sword around his arm because he couldn't
carry it properly.
He couldn't carry it. It was it was
too heavy for him, so he had it
tied on his arm.
Yeah.
A degree of passion and degree of commitment
like that is is magical. It's magical.
I hope that was a benefit to you.