Yasir Qadhi – The Muslim Uprising – The Power of Student Protests
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AI: Transcript ©
So as we speak, this week in particular,
we are seeing a very unique phenomenon
overwhelm this country, and that is
protests
about Palestine,
about Gaza
across over
2 dozen, in fact, 3 dozen campuses,
including many prominent
universities.
There are sit ins where 100, if not
1000 of students
are for the very first time
protesting
our foreign policy,
protesting in particular
their own institution's
investment
in the country of Israel. And in the
last 2, 3 weeks, over a 1000 students
have been arrested, almost a dozen professors have
been arrested, Police have been called in in
multiple campuses.
I was actually at Yale a few days
ago visiting after so many years, more than
a decade, and I managed to speak at
the student protest,
that was taking place. I have never seen
a site like this. In the main square,
in the campus,
there were so many students, 100 of students,
protesting about Yale's investment in, Israel. And
as you're aware,
the protests have become violent in UT Austin,
in a number of places. USC,
which is one of the most prestigious universities
in California,
they banned a hijabi speaker from speaking at
the, at the convocation.
So this entire country is engulfed. You have
people even calling for the National Guard to
be sent in against these, students.
Never before have we seen this public
sentiment expressed in this manner. So today, inshaAllah,
wa ta'ala, as you know, I like to
be relevant as long as along with being
classical, today will be a very, very relevant
discussion. InshaAllah, 3 quick parts. Firstly,
a brief history for our benefit of student
activism and student protests and the impact that
it's had in America. It is important before
you speak about something, you understand it. It
is important before you make a verdict, you
see the past and the historical realities of
what you're talking about. Secondly, a little bit
of Sharia, like, what do we say about
these types of protests? And then thirdly, a
bit of advice for those that are participating
in these, protests. So we begin with a
brief history.
Actually,
the history of student protests,
America in particular,
is one of the most iconic countries when
it comes to student protests.
America has a legacy
of student protests.
And generally speaking,
9 times out of 10, the students were
the one history shows were on the right
side, and what they were protesting was against
something that was wrong. And a few examples
here. Back in the forties fifties,
student protests began
about civil rights, about the equality between
African Americans and between the whites of America.
Students began protesting,
and especially
very,
elite students, Ivy League Colleges and others, about
the discriminatory
policies that if you're white, you get in.
If you're not white, you don't get in.
So multiple universities had protests
about how unfair
the civil rights was at the time. And
as you know, slowly but surely, this provoked
a national
protest, and laws were passed in the sixties
that eventually changed the reality of how things
were in the forties fifties.
Perhaps the most famous example of student protests
in America is the Vietnam War. Over a
1000
universities
participated
in mass protests against the Vietnam War. And
this is, of course, in the late sixties,
early seventies. And of course, the reason was
very personal. America was drafting student drafting,
college age students from 20 to 25. If
you were between the ages of 20 to
25,
randomly, there would be a lottery system,
and your name would be selected, and you
had to show up. You had to go
and fight, and you might possibly die. So
obviously, when the students are getting enlisted, when
the students are getting enrolled, they're not just
gonna sit back and take it. Millions of
students in over a 1000 campuses,
they were protesting
against the government policy. And this actually led
to a massive shift, especially in 1970
in Ohio and Kent State University.
Thousands of students are protesting,
and the president called in the National Guard.
He called in the army to protect against
slogans and against, you know, protesters of the
students. The National Guard was called in. What's
gonna happen when you have thousands of angry
students, and then you have trained riflemen,
trained army? What's gonna happen is common sense.
Eventually, altercations, and then punches, and then this
and that, and eventually, as in every such
protest around the world, they never learn from
history. What's gonna happen? The army opens fire
against their own citizens.
Multiple students were killed. Dozens were wounded. Iconic
pictures of
born then, most of us don't know this,
but those pictures that, were taken, they won
the Pulitzer prize. It changed the entire narrative
where students are lying dead on campus. Their
own army has killed them because they're protesting
against their own army's policies. So this was
a shifting, an entire
narrative change, and people say that it was
the student protest that forced president Nixon to
eventually announce in 2 years after this that,
okay, guys, we're sorry, we're leaving, you know,
Vietnam, and we're just gonna end the entire
war over there. The success of student protest
was astounding in this regard. And of course,
there's multiple other,
protests that took place. For example, in the
19 eighties,
multiple protests took place across,
campuses against South Africa.
Again, I bring up South Africa multiple times
because this is very, very pertinent.
South Africa was the last remaining apartheid country
before the current apartheid regime of Israel. South
Africa was blatant in its apartheid,
and the governments of the western lands had
no problem with apartheid. Our president Ronald Reagan,
UK's prime minister Margaret
Thatcher, they called Nelson Mandela a terrorist, and
they called the organization that was fighting apartheid
terrorist organizations.
But the students mobilized,
and the students said, you cannot have political
and economic ties with South Africa. And students
in Colombia, where right now we have the
epicenter
of the protest taking place about Gaza,
in Columbia,
the very same building that they, took over
today, that same building, they took over 1985,
and they said, we don't want our university
to be involved in investing in South Africa.
Now pause here. And, of course, you know,
eventually,
our governments had to acknowledge that South Africa
is an apartheid regime with great grudging difficulty.
This is on the record, by the way,
that Reagan in particular
was a known racist. And I don't wanna
say things in the masjid here, but he
used very, very vulgar
demeaning
animal terminology
to describe those people, if you get my
drift here. He described them to an animal,
a'udhubillah, if you understand
the reference I'm saying here. This is well
known. His inner feelings, he supported
apartheid. His inner feelings, he grew up in
the forties, in the fifties. He was through
and through, but what are you gonna do
when the public pressure? Right? And this is
where we need to understand. Public pressure changes
policy.
Public pressure changes policies that politicians do not
want changed. So student protests against South Africa
also led to a change eventually
in the global,
in the global reality of South African apartheid.
Now, why why are students in particular protesting
about their universities? Because we need to understand,
in America, frankly, in the globe,
the largest
endowments
belong to universities.
By endowments, alqaaf, they took it from us.
This is well known. I'm not just saying
this. No. They literally took the concept of
waqf from us, and they then took it
to a better level than we had it.
And so the largest endowments in the whole
world that are non government are American
Universities.
Okay? Harvard University, I'm not allowed to praise
it if you know my background, but the
other university,
they have 50
$1,000,000,000 in endowment. My own alma mater Yale
has $40,000,000,000
Imagine, this is larger than the GDP of
many countries.
Harvard has 50. Yale has 40. You keep
on doing the math, you get 100 of
1,000,000,000 of dollars American universities have. What do
they do with that money? A group of
regions, a group of powerful elites, they decide
where to invest. And the fact of the
matter, for reasons that are obvious, but I
cannot be too explicit,
those corporations
that are internal, they put a excessively large
percentage where in Israel. This is a fact.
We all know it, and this is something
you can look up. These institutes,
they
invest 1,000,000,000 of dollars, 1,000,000,000 of dollars. They
invest in occupied territory. They invest in the
infrastructure
of this apartheid regime. So these institutes are
directly
bankrolling
the apartheid regime over there. And so the
students now are seeing what is going on,
and they are incensed, and they're enraged, and
they're saying, we do not want our university
to invest in genocide, to invest in the
apartheid regime. This is why across the country,
100 of 1000 of protests are taking place,
and we thank Allah for that. Now, we
move on to the second point.
What does Islam say? What is the Islamic
verdict on participating
in such activities? Now here, again, we get
to this very, very difficult, very awkward topic,
and I try to avoid controversy as much
as So
I
So I will be a little bit explicit,
but factual. I'm not putting anybody down. I'm
not making fun of anybody astaghfirullah.
I'm merely
describing reality. The reality is the verdict depends
on which strand or which maslaq or which
firqa you belong to. This is the reality.
So if you look up to, for example,
hasanalbanda and sayyidqutub,
the answer will be a certain. If you
look to mawdudi, the answer will be certain
way. If you look up to zakariq and
dahlawi, you will get a certain answer. If
you look up to the aqabr of Deoban,
you find an answer. If you look up
to Sheikh Al Bani, you find a certain
answer. If you look up to the sufiatariqas,
you find a certain answer. Every strand, every
maslak, they have a certain flavor about what
they want to do, and we have a
whole spectrum. We have in this those that
are at the forefront, those that make these
types of protests, some of the, you know,
biggest manifestations of iman and taqwa. They will
say, This is what Islam calls for. They
will say, This is our modern version of
a legitimate, you know, spiritual jihad, not a
physical one. As Fox News is gonna misquote
me, I'm not trying to say physical one,
but the spiritual they're gonna say. And then
you have on the exact opposite side, you
will have people on this spectrum saying, protests
are haram,
protests are bida, protests are against the sunnah.
And then you have those in the middle.
How can anybody in the middle? Many of
these strands, they will neither support nor criticize.
They will simply live their lives, teach their
teachings, and as we speak, I would venture
the majority of masajid of this country are
going to be of this methodology,
neither for nor against. They don't wanna get
involved. This is not a part of what
they think is Islam. I am talking about
protests in the Masjid, and I dare venture
I could be wrong, I hope I'm wrong.
I dare venture this is atypical in this
Even in this country, most people would not
be talking like this. They would just think
that this is not relevant to their Islam.
They're not gonna speak against it. Some people
will speak against it, say it's haram, bida'a.
They say this is against the sunnah. Now
obviously, you know my position, I'm not gonna
mince my words. By the way, for the
record, all of these people I mentioned and
more, and I'm not being politically correct. This
is wallahi my aqeedah.
Every one of them, I believe, insha'allahu ta'ala,
is a good mujaddid. I have no problem
with any of them. I respect and admire
all these mainstream movements, and I genuinely believe
the good in all of their movements far
outweighs the opposite. So I personally have no
problem with any of these strands. And if
you're happy with any of these and more,
I didn't give an exhaustive list, but any
mainstream,
then good for you, Alhamdulillah.
I don't have a problem, and I say
both loudly and clearly, whatever one of these
ones you choose, Allah's not gonna punish you
for the finer details. If you really believe
that protests are against the sunnah, and you
are living a pious life, well then, that's
your ijtihad. This is not an issue of
punishment. This is not an issue of astaghfirullah
haram or bida'ah. It's your position. Let other
people hold their positions. And if you believe
that this is the most important thing to
do after you pray 5 times a day
that you wanna protest, I also think this
is a legitimate position to hold. I think
all of this spectrum is a spectrum of
permissibility.
We shouldn't bring in haram, we shouldn't bring
in bidah. It's something your personal choice. Now,
if you ask me my own interpretation, you
know, by now you've listened to me enough
and whatnot, and I personally am interpretation, you
know by now you've listened to me enough
and whatnot, and I personally am not a
card carrying member of any of these memberships.
I don't have a membership any of them.
I respect all of them, but I don't
have a personal interest in following any one
strand. I have to answer to Allah wa
ta'ala. So me personally, with my humble opinion,
reading the Quran, reading the seerah, looking at
our past scholarship and how they
legislates,
and that the details of activism are left
to the time and place of the people.
I repeat, I believe that the seerah of
the prophet salallahu alaihi wa sallam teaches us
that you don't just worship in the masjid
and then expect Allah to send a miracle.
I believe the seerah from beginning to end
combines between spirituality
and between activism. This is my understanding. I
could be wrong in this regard. But I
have never seen an incident in the sirrah
where the prophet, salallahu alayhi wa sallam, did
not take worldly precautions
something physical. He spoke, he negotiated, he fought,
he did what he needed to be done.
And I personally believe, and this is the
majority opinion, that the technicalities
of how you do that,
Allah did not legislate. It varies from time
to place, and as long as essentially it
is halal and not haram, as long as
you're not doing something blatantly haram, then all
of these paths are permissible. Allah says in
the Quran, Uduru ila sabi rabbikabil hikmati walmawitil
hasanati wajjadilumbilatihi
ahsan. Call to the way of Allah with
wisdom
and
with good preaching, and argue with them in
the best of manners. What is wisdom? Did
Allah define it? No. Because calling with wisdom
varies from time to place to language to
culture. How I will preach to an audience
in North America in 2024
is radically different than how somebody would have
preached to a Hindu audience 200 years ago
in India. Radically different. Both will be maw'ibah
and hikmah if you use what what is
culturally acceptable. The words, the examples, the analogies,
the tactics,
all of this is open. Allah did not
legislate. And this is, in my humble opinion,
one of the problems of some of the
more ultra conservative or some of the more
puritanical, and I don't doubt their intention, but
I do doubt their understanding of sharia. I
don't doubt their sincerity, but I do doubt
their grasp of understanding usool and usool al
firkh. They say to me and others, show
me an evidence that the Prophet sallallahu alaihi
wa sallam protested.
Show me an evidence that he did what
he what what this group is doing.
Firstly, some scholars have tried to bring about
generic, you know, incidents from the seerah that
demonstrate the Sahaba raised their voices, the negotiation
that took place in Hilfalf Il Hilfalfudool, the
process Prophet having alliances with the Yahuudi tribes,
with the constitution of Madinah, you know, Thumama
ibn Athal boycotting the people of Makkah, economic
boycott, and the prophet approved of the economic
boycott, so they say this is BDS and
whatnot. So they try to bring about, but
I personally say this is the wrong methodology.
I don't need to prove the prophet, salallahu
alaihi wasalam did it. You need to prove
it is haram.
I don't need to prove it is halal.
The default is that all tactics are halal.
The most effective tactic is the most halal.
So the whole notion, you only need to
prove a ritual,
rebadat. You need to prove, zuhr is 4aka,
I need to prove it to you. You
need to prove that asr is silent, I
need to prove it to you. As for
how to preach, how to effect change, how
to bring about good, Allah did not legislate
how. So I don't need to prove to
you, rather, you need to prove that there's
a problem in something that we are doing,
something explicit. We're using sharaban kamr. Yeah, that's
haram. We cannot choose it. So now you
prove, generically raising your voice and bringing attention,
and bringing the PR move, how can this
possibly be haram? So in my humble opinion,
not only is this a part of our
religion, I expect Allah to reward those students
and protesters who are doing this with good
intention, and I do believe this is a
part of what we need to do. I
participated
at the, protest a few days ago, and
I just got a phone call yesterday. 1
of the major universities, subhanAllah,
they took our sister's hijab, astaghfirullah, astaghfirullah.
The police, they did this, and they abandoned
whatnot. So they called me, they wanted me
to speak there, so I will be going
there. Unfortunately, I will not be here on
Friday. I was scheduled to give the khutbah,
but I believe that is a priority. They're
holding a few 1,000 people to protest what
the university did, so I'll be going there
to give the khutbah over there. I personally
believe, inshaAllah, if my niyyah is pure, I
will be rewarded for this. This is a
part of what we should do in this
land to effect change. So this is the
second point. 3rd and final point. Somebody will
say, Oh, but there are things that go
on in the protest
that are against Islam. For example, intermixing of
men and women. For example, not every Obviously,
majority of them are not Muslims, so they're
not wearing hijab, obviously. For example, there's gonna
be, you know, left wing groups that might
be, you know, even the LGBT community is
very pro Palestine, whatnot. So there's gonna be
those people over there as well. So they're
gonna say, oh, you are standing with them.
And to respond to this,
to respond to this, I acknowledge
that indeed this is some of the negative,
but
the problem comes.
Why do you want to enforce this purity
only when it comes to protests for a
good cause?
Do you not go shopping?
Do you not go to Kroger's? Do you
not go to buy your grocery? Do you
not go to work
and people are dressed immodestly at work?
Do you not go and the cubicle next
to you is somebody that might be LGBT?
So why is it that when it comes
to a generic good cause, all of a
sudden you become mister Mutaqi 1000%?
And when it comes to your I'm I'm
sorry to be astaghfirullah. I'm sorry to be
sarcastic here, but it really frustrates me. Wallahi,
it frustrates me. I find a double standard.
Where are you living? Which land are you
living in? Open your eyes.
You have to do something.
And in order to come together, you all
come together to pay your taxes to this
country to build the roads. You pay your
taxes to generic healthcare, whatever it might be.
And we're cooperating for some good of the
dee, of the dunya. Can't we cooperate for
some good of the people of Farassein and
Ghazah? I'm not endorsing ba'til. If somebody's there
of of another community,
another faith community, LGBT whatnot. I'm not endorsing,
but the banner is
The banner is not their banner. The banner
is free ghazah. That's the banner. So we're
coming together for a generic good, And you
try your best to, in your own personal
space, to observe Islamic morality. Whoever comes should
try their best to, you know, show what
Islam is. And if you can give private
da'wah, good for you. But in the end
of the day, for you to be
so nitpicky,
so purist and puritanical
over here, In my humble opinion, that type
of obsession
is a type of OCD, I'm being blunt
here, that will hamper, that will prevent any
good. You have to be pragmatic and realistic.
And I wanna conclude on this point, and
that is, and I've said this multiple times,
and especially the youth because I am slightly
aware of what's going on online even though
I've left social media, but I am slightly
aware of what's going on because they get
forwards and people tell me whatnot. I remind
the youth, and in the end, it is
your business and job. But my naseeh to
you, go to our elders and seniors.
Do not take
advice from internet pseudo celebrities that are barely
20 years old and don't have an ounce
of actual wisdom and activism. They sound good.
The slogans might be really
harsh, but they have zero wisdom.
Go to the elders,
speak And I'm not talking about myself. There
are people that have been giving da'wah the
decade I was born, Imam Siraj Waha, Imam
Zayd Shakur, Doctor. Muzamm Sidiqi,
Doctor. Jamal Badawi is still alive, mashallah tabarakatuhl,
89 years old. These are people, they have
been giving dawah in America
since the seventies.
I was born in the seventies. Forget me,
forget all of these shuyuk you think are
liberals, and radicals, and protestant reformation, or whatever.
Go to the seniors. And the seniors, and
I say this bluntly with utmost respect. I'm
not being disrespectful. This
is
an
American problem. We This is an American problem.
We need people who understand the American scenario.
Our leaders are from within. Other scholars from
overseas, I'm not doubting their iman. I'm not
doubting their the hivdasaybu
kari. I'm not doubting they understand aspects of
fiqh, of ibadat, and tahara. But with utmost
love and respect, the CEOs of your companies
have to be living with the company. You
cannot have a CEO that's 5,000 mile away,
has no idea what the company is. Our
leaders of American Muslim community
are people who have lived their lives here.
They have shown their wisdom here. They have
track records here. Go to those senior scholars.
Those are the people you need to look
up to, and there are plenty of them,
Alhamdulillah.
As for going to those that have no
track record, and they sound really nice with
slogans, wallahi learn your history. Slogans will never
solve problems. Slogans are not gonna you have
to show some level of activism. So bottom
line, if you ask me, our religion calls
for a good synthesis
between personal piety and between
activism in the dunya,
and prioritize piety. No doubt about it. But
after that, activism is something open. So from
my side, I make du'a for all of
those students that are active in all those
campuses. Do you know, dear Muslims,
students have lost their their their,
university privilege? They have been expelled from university.
Our sisters, astaghfirullah, I hope you haven't seen
the video if you have. It's so sad.
They were arrested and the police I I
hope they sue their pants off. The police
took their hijabs off to test them for
bombs. In public, in front of everybody, they
took their hijabs off. How can you be
on the sideline? How can you ignore what
is going on? The whole world is now
Alhamdulillah
for ghazah. And now here we are nitpicking.
Oh, somebody to the left of me is
not wearing hijab. Somebody to the right of
me is another faith community. YoukhisubhanAllah,
you don't use this level of puritanical
piety anywhere else. Only when it comes to
fallasihin, you're gonna use it. I'm sorry. This
is not realistic wisdom. This is not
humble request to you,
even if you don't wanna participate,
don't make the people who do any type
of enemies. Don't make it more difficult for
them. They've already many of them have lost
their student privileges. They're no longer they've expelled.
They've been expelled. Many of them have gone
to jail. Some of my own friends gone
to jail. They were released the next day,
but they went to jail because of this
issue. And here we are in our nice
pious masjid talking bad about them. No, wallahi
no. Even if you don't agree, make du'a
and support them generically. I understand there's a
diversity opinion, but this is one of the
ways that the narrative changes. And insha Allah,
I am optimistic. 8 months ago when the
issue happened, I said no matter how bad
it looks, Insha Allah, the tide is changing.
Look now, the tide is changing. Look, we
see it with our eyes.
Tens of thousands of students are now protesting
against their government. Who are these students gonna
be? They will be the politicians of tomorrow.
They will be the CEOs of tomorrow. They
will be the leaders of tomorrow. So let
us support them. Let us raise awareness for
them. Let us do what we can for
them. And InshaAllah,
victory will be ours because truth will always
rise up above falsehood. And insha Allahu ta'ala,
the dhulm, the tyranny, the injustice, the genocide
that is taking place will be the last
time that happens. And we hope that from
the blood of those martyrs, we hope that
from the blood of our Palestinian brothers and
sisters who have lost so many tens of
thousands of lives, that this inspiration around the
world will change the entire course of history
and bi illlahi ta'ala, we will see a
bright future ahead of them. So may Allah
bless all of those students that participate. May
Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala allow us to see
the victory for our brothers and for sisters
in