Tel: 416-505-1613
Email: info@muslimsfacingtomorrow.com
Council for
Muslims Facing Tomorrow
“God is beautiful and he loves beauty”

Press Releases

PRESS RELEASE………….FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE…………………….MAY 16, 2016

Mr. Motiur Rahman Nizami, Chief of Jamaat e Islaami, Bangladesh which is the largest Islamist Political Party, was tried and convicted by the Supreme Court of Bangladesh and the sentence was carried out on 11 May 2016.

Mr. Nizami aided and abetted the genocide carried out by the Pakistan Army in 1971 perpetuating rape and death on an enormous scale.

We, at Muslims Facing Tomorrow condemn Turkey and Pakistan for protesting against  the Justice that was carried out after being proven beyond a reasonable doubt by the Courts.

Turkey has to look at its own human rights record under President Erdogan, as to date it has the highest number of journalists imprisoned. Turkey also has an abysmal record of genocide against the Armenians.

Pakistan is a partner in crime with the Jamaat e Islaami and has the highest number of extra judicial killings by kangaroo courts set up by the Pakistan Army and is still carrying out crimes against humanity in the Province of Baluchistan.

 Contact: Hasan Mahmud, General Secretary

Telephone: 647-622-3511

Email: Hasan@hasanmahmud.com

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Thursday, December 3, 2015

The Muslim reformation has begun! Here is our first call to action. Please go to Change(dot)org to sign the Declaration of the Muslim Reform Movement. We welcome all Muslims and our neighbors who believe, like us, in peace, human rights and secular governance.

PREAMBLE

We are Muslims who live in the 21st century. We stand for a respectful, merciful and inclusive interpretation of Islam. We are in a battle for the soul of Islam, and an Islamic renewal must defeat the ideology of Islamism, or politicized Islam, which seeks to create Islamic states, as well as an Islamic caliphate.
We seek to reclaim the progressive spirit with which Islam was born in the 7th century to fast forward it into the 21st century. We support the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which was adopted by United Nations member states in 1948.

We reject interpretations of Islam that call for any violence, social injustice and politicized Islam. Facing the threat of terrorism, intolerance, and social injustice in the name of Islam, we have reflected on how we can transform our communities based on three principles: peace, human rights and secular governance. We announce the formation of an international initiative: the Muslim Reform Movement.
We have courageous reformers from around the world who have written our Declaration for Muslim Reform, a living document that we will continue to enhance as our journey continues. We invite our fellow Muslims and neighbors to join us.

DECLARATION

A. Peace: National Security, Counterterrorism and Foreign Policy

1. We stand for universal peace, love and compassion. We reject violent jihad. We believe we must target the ideology of violent Islamist extremism in order to liberate individuals from the scourge of oppression and terrorism both in Muslim-majority societies and the West.
2. We stand for the protection of all people of all faiths and non-faith who seek freedom from dictatorships, theocracies and Islamist extremists.
3. We reject bigotry, oppression and violence against all people based on any prejudice, including ethnicity, gender, language, belief, religion, sexual orientation and gender expression.

B. Human Rights: Women’s Rights and Minority Rights

1. We stand for human rights and justice. We support equal rights and dignity for all people, including minorities. We support the United Nations Declaration of Human Rights.
2. We reject tribalism, castes, monarchies and patriarchies and consider all people equal with no birth rights other than human rights. All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. Muslims don’t have an exclusive right to “heaven.”
3. We support equal rights for women, including equal rights to inheritance, witness, work, mobility, personal law, education, and employment. Men and women have equal rights in mosques, boards, leadership and all spheres of society. We reject sexism and misogyny.

C. Secular Governance: Freedom of Speech and Religion

1. We are for secular governance, democracy and liberty. We are against political movements in the name of religion. We separate mosque and state. We are loyal to the nations in which we live. We reject the idea of the Islamic state. There is no need for an Islamic caliphate. We oppose institutionalized sharia. Sharia is manmade.

2. We believe in life, joy, free speech and the beauty all around us. Every individual has the right to publicly express criticism of Islam. Ideas do not have rights. Human beings have rights. We reject blasphemy laws, which are a cover for the restriction of freedom of speech and religion. We affirm every individual’s right to ijtihad, or critical thinking, and seek a revival of ijtihad.

3. We believe in freedom of religion and the right of all people to express and practice their faith, or non-faith, without threat of intimidation, persecution, discrimination or violence. Apostasy is not a crime. Our ummah–our community–is not just Muslims, but all of humanity.

We stand for peace, human rights and secular governance.

Please stand with us!

Affirmed this Third Day of December, Two-Thousand and Fifteen

‪#‎MuslimReform‬
Twitter: @TheMuslimReform
Instagram: @TheMuslimReform
Facebook: Muslim Reform Movement
Email: MuslimReformMovement@gmail.com

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Monday 19 October, 2015

Muslims Facing Tomorrow congratulates the Liberal Party and Mr. Justin Trudeau as the new Prime Minster elect of Canada.
We wish him well and hope he overcomes the challenges ahead including those of radicalization. MFT strongly stands by the democratic process which makes Canada the most vibrant and dynamic country.
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PRESS RELEASE – FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE                                            Monday, 10 August 2015

The recent hacking to death of the Bangladeshi blogger Niladri Chattopadhyay, also known to his readers as Niloy Neel, in Dhaka, Bangladesh, is the fourth in recent months of such brutal killings of secular humanists for being critics of Islamism,.

Niloy Neel, 28-year old, was assaulted in his apartment in middle of the day by some unidentified assailants wielding machetes, and killed in the presence of his wife. Niloy’s murder on Friday, 7 August 2015, was preceded by similar assaults that took the lives of Ananta Bijoy Das in May, Washiqur Rahman in March, and Avijit Roy in February of this year. There were six other Bangladeshi bloggers killed in the previous two years, and most of the killers have not been identified and brought to justice by the police. Another activist Shakil Oronno was attacked thrice and was hospitalized for a long time.

The failure of the Bangladeshi government to aggressively investigate these murders has emboldened the killers. Niloy Neel had earlier approached the police to report death threats he had received from anonymous callers. The police, however, refused to file his complaint and told him instead to leave the country. The audacity of his killers reflect the complacency of the police, while the unwillingness of the government to bring to justice those organizations preaching politics of jihad greatly endangers the secular values enshrined in the Bangladeshi constitution.

Ansar al-Islam, an Islamist organization and branch of Al-Qaeda in the Indian subcontinent (AQIS), claimed responsibility for the killing of Niloy Neel and few others as an enemy of Islam. The voices of those brave individuals in Bangladesh speak out despite threats in defense of freedom of speech, and against Islamism and all forms of religious extremism.

We, at Muslims Facing Tomorrow and our friends in the Coalition of Progressive Canadian Muslim Organizations, are immensely shocked and saddened by the news of the brutal and systematic murder of individuals, such as Niloy Neel and others, by the loathsome, fanatical, and hate-filled Islamists on the loose in Bangladesh. We strongly and categorically condemn such acts, and we call upon the government of Bangladesh to protect its citizens from these murderers who kill in the name of their perverted version of Islam.

As a gesture of assisting in the arrest and trial of the assailants who killed Niloy Neel we, at Muslims Facing Tomorrow, and our friends offer Bangladeshi taka 100,000 to the individual or individuals who assist in identifying the assailants and help bring them to justice.

We are heartened that the UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has strongly condemned the murder of Niloy Neel, and that his office has expressed deep concerns about these “gruesome” crimes and their effect on freedom of thought and freedom of expression in Bangladesh.

We urge the Canadian government and representatives of all political parties in Ottawa to join us in condemning the killings of secularist and freedom-loving bloggers in Bangladesh, and to demand that the government of Bangladesh move aggressively against the killers of these bloggers.

We will continue to hold the government of Bangladesh and the prime minister Sheikh Hasina with her ruling party, the Awami League, responsible for the indifference, or the inability, to protect the voices of secularism, humanism, and reason from the violence of Islamists until we see contrary evidence of the killers of bloggers brought to justice.

On behalf of Muslims Facing Tomorrow,

Raheel Raza
President

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Press Release For Immediate Release February 18, 2015
The Council for Muslims Facing Tomorrow is alarmed with the judgment of the Honourable Mr. Justice Keith M. Boswell of the Federal Court in declaring the requirement of removing face coverings by candidates during the administration of the oath of citizenship is unlawful. Justice Boswell delivered this decision in the case brought by Ms. Zunera Ishaq, a Pakistani national and permanent resident in Canada since October 2008, against the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration. Justice Boswell agreed with Ms. Ishaq that removal of her niqab (full-face covering) would infringe her rights and freedoms protected under paragraph 2(a) and section 15(1) of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
MFT strongly disagrees with this ruling. The claim of Ms. Ishaq, on the grounds of freedom of religion, that she is required to wear niqab because of her faith in Islam and in belonging to the Hanafi school or fiqh within Islam is untrue. Islam makes no such requirement as obligatory on Muslim women, and there is no such ruling made obligatory for Muslim women in Hanafi rites or jurisprudence within Islam. The wearing of full face covering by that small segment of Muslim women, such as Ms. Ishaq, is a custom turned into religious mandate by Muslim extremists in Pakistan, and elsewhere in Muslim majority countries, and such contentious mandate enforced in public by coercion is of recent origin.
MFT would make no objection to Ms. Ishaq’s claim if made on the basis of certain custom in which she was raised and which she adopted, and the Court accordingly found relief for her custom.
Instead for the Court to agree Ms. Ishaq’s rights as a Muslim woman would be infringed gives ironically credence to the argument of those extremist Muslims of certain political persuasion that believers in Islam are under duress in Canada, which is untrue. Moreover, this decision sets precedent for the argument that any imported custom by recently arrived immigrants, which runs counter to Canadian values (such as bigamy, polygamy, female genital mutilation, pedophilia, child marriage, etc.) yet if shown to be religiously mandated would then be protected under paragraph 2(a) and section 15(1) of the Canadian Charter and therefore be openly practiced in Canada irrespective of how contrary or outrageous such practice might be in respect to values and traditions of the majority of Canadians.
MFT supports Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s statement his government will appeal this decision. We hope that good sense among our justices will eventually prevail and this decision of the Federal Court will be struck down.
Contact: – Sohail Raza, phone: 416-505-1613

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For Immediate Release                  February 5, 2015

The Council for Muslims Facing Tomorrow fully supports Prime Minister Stephen Harper and his government’s Bill C-51 the Anti-Terrorism Act 2015.

As noted in our Vision statement on MFT’s website, we recognize the difficulties, threats, and challenges confronting Canada from radical extremist Muslims or Islamists declaring jihad (holy war) against those they consider infidels as well as Muslims who reject their ideology of Islamism. We anti-Islamist Muslims and opposed to Shariah as the basis of Islam, are committed to support our Federal government in Ottawa and to cooperate with security agencies at the federal and provincial levels in their effort to counter Islamists in our midst.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper is right in indicating that freedom and security go together. We respect those who argue that an over-emphasis on security might lead to an infringement of freedom as guaranteed in our Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Hence, we need always to be on guard in protecting our fundamental rights. But Canada is one of the oldest democracies, and its democratic institutions of governance and independent judiciary have evolved to be vigilant in maintaining the proper balance between freedom and security. We, therefore, have confidence in our government and its various oversight committees not to infringe our freedom due to an over-reach in pursuit of security.

As Muslims we have the misfortune of experience on how Islamists have brought ruin to the world of Islam, and how the ideology of Islamism with its dogma of theocracy and the rule of Shariah based on medieval social customs and tribal values have suffocated the lives of Muslims in modern times. Prime Minister Harper has shown an understanding of this terrible reality of the Muslim world; of the toxic nature of Islamist ideology and of the role of mosques in spreading this toxic ideology, which we can confirm given our experience; and the real threat of global “jihadism” that we as Canadians are compelled to confront. The ideology of Islamism and the violence of armed jihad are intimately linked and inseparable, and this is why we in MFT support the robust measures for security set forth in Bill C-51.

 Contact: Sohail Raza: phone 416-505-1613

 


 

 What can Muslims do to reclaim their ‘Beautiful

Religion’? – A full page appeal in the New York

Times by Muslims fighting against Islamism

•  •

What can Muslims do to reclaim their ‘Beautiful Religion’?

NYT Advt by Muslims tall

As people observe beheadings and savagery by ISIS, female genital mutilations and honor killings, the abduction of girls by Boko Haram, the execution of innocents in Iran, the slaughtering and enslaving of Christians in Egypt and Africa and Yazidis in Iraq, rampant anti-Semitism and other crimes against humanity committed by those who claim to represent Islam, many people are understandably asking:

  • What is the true nature of Islam?
  • Is it that although there are many peaceful Muslims, Islam itself is not peaceful?

If Islam is a religion that stands for justice and peaceful coexistence, then the quest for an Islamic state cannot be justified as sanctioned by a just and merciful Creator.

Neither jihadism nor Islamism permit the equality of all humans irrespective of their race or religion and should therefore be rejected. Our denial and our relative silence must stop!

It is the duty of us Muslims to actively and vigorously affirm and promote universal human rights, including gender equality and freedom of conscience.

As our Holy Qu’ran states (4:135):

“Believers! Conduct yourselves with justice, bearing true witness before God, even if it be against yourselves, your parents, or your kin.”

We must engage in and promote reforms where necessary, including an honest and critical reinterpretation of scripture and shariah law used by Islamists to justify violence and oppression.

We must also recognize and loudly proclaim that the quest for any and all “Islamic State(s)” has no place in modern times. Theocracy, particularly, Islamism, is a proven failure. The path to justice and reform is through liberty.

It is also our responsibility to reclaim the faith we love from these monsters, forcefully rejecting and combating all components of their ideology.

If we Muslims believe that “true” Islam, genuinely aligned with the will of the Creator, is fundamentally peaceful, comprehensively merciful and objectively just, then it is our duty to do what is necessary to live and promote an Islam that is based in liberty and worthy of being called a beautiful religion.

We must seek out necessary support from non-Muslim allies in order to be successful in our work.

We the undersigned are Muslims who embrace a pluralistic interpretation of Islam, rejecting all forms of oppression and abuses committed in the name of religion or culture and particularly Islamism.

We are joined by non-Muslim allies who sign here to affirm their commitment as Americans to support those Muslims and all people of conscience who courageously speak out against these abuses and who advance reforms within our community.

  • Sherkoh Abbas, Chair Kurdistan National Assembly of Syria, Washington, D.C.
  • Tarek Fatah, Founder, Muslim Canadian Congress, Toronto, Canada
  • Farid Ghadry, Reform Party of Syria, Washington, D.C.
  • Iftikhar A. Hai, President, United Muslims of America, San Francisco, CA
  • Dr. Tawfik Hamid, International Center for Countering Radicalism, Oakton, CA
  • Husain Haqqani, Former Ambassador of Pakistan to U.S., Washington, D.C.
  • Jamal Hassan, Council for Democracy and Tolerance, Baltimore, MD
  • Sheikh (Dr.) Usama Hassan, Quilliam Foundation, London, UK
  • Farzana Hassan, Director, Muslim Canadian Congress, Toronto, Canada
  • Arif Humayun, President, Circle of Peace, Portland, OR
  • Farahnaz Ispahani, Director, Americans for Pakistan, Washington, D.C.
  • Dr. M. Zuhdi Jasser, American Islamic Forum for Democracy, Phoenix, AZ
  • Naser Khader, Former Member of Danish Parliament, Copenhagen, Denmark
  • Zainab Zain Khan, United Nations Association, Chicago, IL
  • Courtney Lonergan, Arizona Interfaith Movement, Phoenix, AZ
  • Hasan Mahmud, General Secretary, Muslims Facing Tomorrow, Toronto, Canada
  • Salim Mansur, PhD., Professor, University of Western Ontario, London, Canada
  • Maajid Nawaz, Co-Founder and Chairman, Quilliam Foundation, London, UK
  • Raheel Raza, President, Council of Muslims Facing Tomorrow, Toronto, Canada
  • Munir Pervaiz, President, Muslim Canadian Congress, Mississauga, Canada
  • Oubai Shahbandar, Principle, Dragoman Partners, Washington, D.C.
  • Jalal Zuberi, MD, Associate Professor, Morehouse School of Medicine, Atlanta, GA
  • Ahmad Vanya, Fellow, American Islamic Forum for Democracy, San Jose, CA

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MFT Statement on the Killings in the office of a French magazine  Jan 8, 2015

We in Muslims Facing Tomorrow (MFT) join Prime Minister Stephen Harper in sending our deepest condolences to the families of the victims of the Islamist terrorist attack at the office of the Parisian magazine “Charlie Hebdo” that left at least 12 people dead, including two police officers. We share our Prime Minister’s sentiments, as we are similarly angered and saddened, by the murderous rampage of three French-born Muslims mounting their terror campaign in the heart of Paris, France’s capital and one of the great and dearly loved cities of the world.

Those so violently murdered at the office of “Charlie Hebdo” are the latest count of the ever-increasing death toll of non-Muslims and Muslims at the hands of jihadists of Islamism, a fascistic and cruel and blood thirsty ideology that has run amok in our world.

We in MFT have repeatedly warned how Islamism threatens all of us. As Muslims we have experienced from inside how Muslim lands and cultures have been laid waste by this pernicious ideology masquerading as Islam. We have agonized watching how liberal democracies in the West, including our beloved Canada, have sought to accommodate Islamists on the mistaken view that if only their presumed grievances were addressed then they might shed their anger, their resentment, their alienation or whatever it is they harbour against us and become normal members of the civilized world.

Islamists do not want to be part of our civilized world. They are at war with it. They want to replace it with their Sharia-based vision for society. This is what people, and especially the politicians, in the West have to understand instead of being deluded that Islamists can be accommodated. Such an understanding of what the Islamists want is the least we in the West owe in mourning the dead at “Charlie Hebdo” and to the countless numbers of victims of the Islamist war against the civilized world – victims in Peshawar and Mumbai, Bali and Karachi, Jerusalem, Madrid, London, New York, and towns and villages dotted across the Middle East, Central and Southeast Asia, and Africa.

We in MFT recognize and without any apologetics acknowledge there is to be found within Islam and Muslim history reaching back to the earliest years an inherent streak or tendency to violence that has morphed in our time into Islamism. And the vast majority of Muslims who abhor Islamism, who balk at the thought of living in the modern age under the imposition of Sharia (or, in other words, medieval theocratic laws), who sense that unless Islamism is expunged from Islam any hope for the reform of their faith-tradition will remain stillborn, have failed Islam and themselves by not resolutely opposing Islamists.

We in MFT pray for the victims of Islamism and for their families. And we pray that our leaders grow the resolve that in defending liberal democracies in the West they must move all the available resources in defeating Islamists and Islamism.

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Press Release – Nov 20, 2014

REF : “Canadians’ Strategy to Combat ISIS Ideology & Jihadi Recruitment in Canada” 22 Nov 14

The Board of directors of MFT decided not to take part in the above conference since two of the panelists invited are Islamists known for promoting Sharia law in Canada, and misguiding our youth towards radicalization. Any engagement with Islamists is counter-productive, and it would also be a violation of MFT’s charter.  

We are in complete agreement with what the Right Hon. Prime Minister Stephen Harper pointed out, that the “greatest threat to Canada is Islamicism.”

MFT lauds the governments efforts to degrade and defeat the ISIS. Accordingly, MFT organized a rally held at Queens Park on 21 September 2014, and it was attended by community leaders of all faiths and members of parliament.

 
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Press Release on the Tragedy in Jerusalem – Nov 19, 2014

We at MFT offer our deepest condolences to the family and friends of the four Israelis killed and others injured following the frenzied attack at a Jerusalem synagogue by two Palestinian men.

We are as horrified as Israelis and Jews around the world at the barbaric and senseless killing spree inside a house of worship, the Bnei Torah synagogue in Jerusalem, where men had congregated in offering their morning prayers.

Words fail us in expressing our sadness as Islamist and Palestinian terrorism tears asunder the fragile fabric of peace in the holy land, and turn the sacred grounds of Jerusalem into the killing fields for terrorists.

As Israelis mourn the deaths of those fallen in this latest round of evil let loose among them, we join them in the prayers for the dead and stand together with them in their resolve not to compromise with or surrender to those who wish them evil and terrorize them.

We pray may the Lord bless the innocent dead and protect the living; and may the Lord shield the land of Israel and her people today and evermore from the evil of the wicked.


MFT PRESS RELEASE…  FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE      October 22, 2014

The death of the Canadian Forces soldier, the 53-year old Patrice Vincent, is shocking. We join with Prime Minister Stephen Harper and the members of his government in offering our condolences to the family and friends of warrant officer Patrice Vincent who succumbed to the injuries received in the hit-and-run attack on him and another soldier accompanying him at the shopping mall outside of Montreal where this event occurred. We pray for the recovery of the injured soldier whose name has not yet been released to the media.
Martin Rouleau, a 25-year old resident of St. Jean-sur-Richilieu, who carried out this pre-meditated hit-and-run attack resulting in the death of Patrice Vincent, was a recent convert to Islam. Rouleau was known to the security and intelligence agencies and had become, in their words, radicalized.”
We in Muslims Facing Tomorrow (MFT), and our friends and partners among Canadian Muslims who are anti-Islamist, while shocked over the murder of a Canadian soldier are not surprised that an Islamist terrorist strike has occurred on Canadian soil. Let us be clear this murder of a Canadian soldier was an act of jihad, or holy war, declared by al Qaeda prior to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 against the West (Canada was mentioned in that al Qaeda list of enemies). This declaration of jihad has now been repeated by ISIS/ISIL/IS calling upon their members of the fifth column within western democracies to engage in terrorist acts and terrify people.
We are not mistaken by the threats that ISIS and/or al Qaeda, and similar Islamist organizations, pose to Canadians. These organizations have publicized their intent to harm us, and their active members and supporters are in our midst. Martin Rouleau was not simply “radicalized” by some unknown ideology. Rouleau was radicalized by the ideology of political Islam or Islamism that preaches jihad as incumbent on Muslims, that is dedicated to the political objective of establishing Shariah-based state(s) in Muslim majority countries and Shariah-accommodation in western democracies, and devoted to the idea of Caliphate now declared established in areas under control by IS in the Fertile Crescent of the Middle East. We are deeply concerned and fearful for our country’s security and threats to Canadians from Islamists in our midst.
– 30 –
Contact: Sohail Raza: phone 416-505-1613


PRESS RELEASE…. FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE… October 6, 2014

MFT Supports the Prime Minister and the Government on Defeating ISIL

We in Muslims Facing Tomorrow (MFT), with our Canadian Muslim and non-Muslim friends and partners, welcome and greatly support Prime Minister Stephen Harper and his Conservative government’s motion, to “join our allies and partners…in launching air strikes against ISIL”, for debate in the parliament.

ISIL, or ISIS or IS, should have been crushed right at the outset of its appearance in Syria and Iraq. ISIL’s barbarity was in display at its origin. ISIL deliberately engages in barbaric acts to terrify and subdue any and all opposition in its path. The weakness on the part of states in the Fertile Crescent has provided ISIL with time and space to become expansive and control territory, acquire weaponry, recruit extremist Muslims supportive of its ideology from around the world, and pose a clear and present danger across the Middle East.

ISIL’s threat, however, is not limited to the region. ISIL’s success in deploying extremist Muslims recruited from among immigrant Muslim communities in Europe and North America threatens western democracies, including Canada.

We are disappointed with both of the opposition parties unwilling to support the government’s motion. At a time when great seriousness is required to deal with the threat ISIL represents to the people of the Middle East and beyond, we Canadian Muslims are deeply troubled by the lack of sincerity of the opposition parties. Their willingness to play partisan politics with these developments is both divisive to the Muslim community and dangerous for the people of the region, and of the world.

We anti-Islamist Muslims, opposed to violence in the name of Islam and opposed to any allowance made to accommodate Sharia-based or Sharia-friendly legislation in the West, know the terrible and savage nature of ISIL and similar Islamist organizations from the inside given our own experiences. ISIL is evil, and if this evil is not contained and eliminated it will destroy and devastate a whole region, even reaching beyond the Middle East, before it is done with. History provides enough lesson of what happens when evil is not dealt with quickly and in the appropriate way.

This is why we agree with Prime Minister Stephen Harper when he states if ISIL is left “unchecked, this terrorist threat can only grow and grow quickly.”

We support Prime Minister Stephen Harper and his Conservative government unconditionally in the stated mission to degrade and contain ISIL as put forth in the motion before the House.


June 30, 2014

The Council For Muslims Facing Tomorrow, is deeply saddened by the news of the kidnapping and murder of three Israeli teenagers Naftali Fraenkel, Gilad Shaar and Eyal Yifrach.
We send condolences to the families of the murdered youth and share the grief of our Jewish and Israeli brothers and sisters around the world. We are outraged as we condemn the perpetrators of these heinous crimes.


 

Please Join Us!

SEPTEMBER 11, 2013

The National Day of Service Concert

“Paying it Forward”

Presented by The ACTV Foundation
(The Alliance of Canadian Terror Victims)

September 11, 2013 @ 8:00pm
The Bluma Appel Theatre
The St. Lawrence Centre for the Arts

27 Front Street East, Toronto
 

Canadians performing for Canadians.

The Inaugural National Day of Service Concert will be an inspiring event featuring a variety of top Canadian talent, including Robert Pilon, Liona Boyd, Matt Dusk, Holly Carr, Dr. Draw, Bollywood, Cirque, choirs of over 140 voices and surprise celebrity guest appearances celebrating our national pride, remembrance and service while promoting selfless acts emulating the concept of “PAYING IT FORWARD”. It will be a night to remember, one that will set the standard for years to come! Through the performance we will commemorate the resilience of Canadians, the fortitude of those who have been victims and the support and love provided them by their communities.

We will come together to thank and recognize our own Canadian citizens in the line of service.

The concert will be a celebration of our Canadian values through music and words and will include marquee talent from across the country, embracing all cultures, races, languages and religions.

Supported by The Council for Muslims Facing Tomorrow 

Tickets available online (special price for service providers) www.stlc.com/1677.html


 

Algeria shows more work needed to root out Canadian

sources of terrorists: Professor

Rob Benneian, Toronto Sun

 First posted:
TS_TorMuslim05
A panel representing the council of Muslims Facing Tomorrow and the Muslim Canadian Congress discuss local and global jihad on Saturday, April 13, 2013. ( L to R), Salim Mansur and Sanam Malik answer questions from the media. (Veronica Henri/ Toronto Sun/QMI Agency.)

TORONTO – A recent attack in Algeria has shed light on the growing problem of homegrown terrorists in Canada and a Western University professor says he wants to ratchet up the intensity on the issue.

“If people do not stand up to discuss this, we will not be able to shine the spotlight,” said Salim Mansur, an associate professor of political science at the university in London, Ont. “We have to ask difficult questions.”

Mansur was part of a panel organized by The Council of Muslims Facing Tomorrow and the Muslim Canadian Congress to urge the government to take notice of the political radicalization of young Canadian Muslims.

The panel was formed partially in response to the revelation that four young men from London, Ont. took part in the attack on the Tigantourine gas facility Algeria. Approximately 40 hostages were killed in the four-day standoff in January between Algerian special forces and the al-Qaida-led group.

There are close to one million Muslims in Canada, and according to Muslim Canadian Congress secretary general Tahir Gora, they are being taught in mosques and other Islamic centres that western society is sinful.

That attitude needs to stop immediately, he said, adding some Muslim youth groups are affiliated with al-Qaida and work towards radicalizing youth.

“This is quite disturbing for us and we want Islamic centres to denounce this and those Islamic centres who are behind (the attacks) need to stop,” Gora said. “We want the Canadian government to take strong measures in terms of stopping this.”

The four young Canadian men who were involved in the recent attack near In Amenas are just a small part of a much larger problem, Mansur said. They did not wind up in the Algeria by chance — they were trained in Canada and carried out their jihad deep in the Sahara desert, he said.

“The families might not have been aware of it but … the story that has played out is that nobody of any responsibility in London know these kids,” Mansur said. “How did this happen? Somebody knows and are not speaking, somebody has been facilitating it, there has to be a network.”

Those facilitating the development and deployment of the young radicals are right in our own backyard across the country, he said.

“The argument that no one is responsible for what these young people did — as if these young people were misguided, set off one Saturday and ended up in Algeria (is wrong),” he said. “These young boys, and other young boys and young women, legions of them in our city, our colleges, our schools, they go to the mosque and that is where the framework of jihad operation (is built).

“When some kids internalize those languages and want to play out the very thing that is a regular part of their homes and in the mosque, why should we be surprised?”


 

PRESS RELEASE                               For Immediate Release

11 April 2013

 THE LONDON CONNECTION:

KEEP HOMEGROWN ISLAMIST TERRORISM OUT OF CANADA

 

The Council of Muslims Facing Tomorrow and the Muslim Canadian Congress urge the Canadian Government to take strict notice of the political radicalization of young Canadians of Muslim origin in our cities, and the spread of the Muslim Brotherhood/Jamaat-i-Islami agenda through mosques and organizations associated with the global movement of the Brotherhood and the Jamaat in Canada. We have been through this before and apparently we have learned insufficiently from our experience. We are all vulnerable to the global jihad of the Islamists, and its fingerprints undeniably can be found in our country’s backyards.

 

What:             Panel consisting of Raheel Raza, Salim Mansur, Tahir Gora & Sanam Malik will discuss the international and local context of the global jihad, and Canada’s           increasing vulnerability.

When:             Saturday April 13, 2013

Time:              5:30pm

Venue:            Room 1 (one), North York Central Library (2nd floor across from Library)                                       5120 Yonge Street, Toronto, ON M2N 5N9

 

–        30      –


PRESS RELEASE                    For immediate release            

Toronto – January 15, 2013                     

 HIJACKING A TRAGEDY TO PROMOTE HATE

The Council for Muslims Facing Tomorrow strongly condemns the ongoing sectarian strife and systematic slaughter of religious and ethnic minorities in Pakistan. The latest outrage is the targeted massacre of some 93 Shias belonging to the Hazara ethnic group in Quetta, Pakistan, by individuals linked to the Sunni-jihadi militias such as Lashkar e Jhangvi and Sipahi e Sahaba. These notorious Sunni militias are criminal terrorist organizations secretly funded by the intelligence wing of the Pakistani military and at their bidding spreading fear that undermines civilian authorities and threatens electoral politics in a country with a terribly long and tortured history of military rule.

While most reports of the killings in Quetta last week describe the dead as victims of “sectarian violence,” the fact is those involved in committing the massacre of the Hazara Shias are known to intelligence agencies of the Pakistani army, and these agencies consistently turn a blind eye to the violence perpetuated by Sunni-jihadi groups such as Lashkar e Jhangvi or Sipahi e Sahaba.

It is quite obvious that the Pakistani military and its Sunni-jihadi allies have learned nothing from the past, of how top-down machinations of religious-sectarian and ethnic divisions in 1970-71 precipitated the military organized genocide of Bengalis, civil war and eventual dismemberment of the country. Those who refuse to learn from the past and deny history, they are then condemned to keep repeating the horrors of their own making.

At home in Canada, Muslims in general are deeply concerned and worried about such crimes as occurred in Quetta. They have organized protest rallies to express their concerns in public. But sadly, and to the horror of most Canadian Muslims, there are Muslims in the community who shamelessly and without any conscience seek to exploit such tragedies, as the one in Quetta, to advance their own subversive agenda in this country.

Muslims Facing Tomorrow was shocked to see one protest rally organized for January 14 evening in front of the Pakistani Consulate in Toronto is blaming the persecution of Shia Muslims in Pakistan on a “Zionist Plot” (see attached poster).

“It is deeply painful to see how such medieval conspiracy theories persist inside the Muslim community,” said Raheel Raza, President for Muslims Facing Tomorrow. “At a time when the Muslim community faces serious internal issues,” Raza stated, “it is shameful we continue to find some Muslims who place blames on others for Muslim failings. Painful as it is, the time is long past to keep denying we Muslims and no one else are the authors of our own misfortune. Fantasizing over such ridiculous idea that there is a ‘Zionist Plot’ serves only to deepen our self-inflicted misery, to avoid learning any lesson from our past history, and in refusing to be responsible for our present deny any hope for our future.”

 

Quote from press release with the poster “A coalition of various Shia and Sunni mosques and community organizations in Toronto and Ottawa are organizing protest rallies and candlelight vigils at 6:30 p.m. on Monday, January 14 to express their extreme anguish and sorrow at the on-going genocide of Pakistani citizens by a small group of foreign funded terrorists.”

 


November 11, 2012

In Remembrance,  And Lest We Forget…

At the eleventh hour on the eleventh day of the eleventh month people across Canada pause in remembrance to honour the sacrifices of those brave patriots who volunteered for battle to preserve freedom and secure democracy. Many never returned, and many lie in unmarked graves in continents and seas far away from their native homes.

Twice within a generation they sallied forth to battle in the cause of freedom, and twice they succeeded in shielding freedom’s fragile light from being snuffed out by the forces of darkness so that those yet to be born would not be denied freedom as their birthright. And since those wars fought in the last century by the Allied nations with Canada among them, other brave Canadians, men and women, have gone forth to distant places to keep peace where conflicts have raged, to protect the weak and the innocent afflicted by wars or tormented by despots, and some never returned. Lest we forget, we honour them on this day of remembrance wearing poppies signifying blood they shed so that others may live in freedom and with dignity.

And lest we forget, they marched together in company and regiments of brave soldiers from the Allied nations, and though as Christians and Jews, Hindus and Muslims, Sikhs and Parsis, they came from different faith traditions yet they bonded together in the common cause of freedom. They were soldiers facing tomorrow, youthful in age and full of promise; neither did they waver in their duty, nor did they doubt the cause in whose defence they responded knowing full well what sacrifices lay ahead. And as the poet Laurence Binyon wrote in remembering them, “They were staunch to the end against odds uncounted, They fell with their faces to the foe.”

In remembering them, and lest we forget, Muslims Facing Tomorrow respectfully draw inspiration from those soldiers on the beaches of Normandy, in the desert of North Africa, in the jungles of Burma who faced tomorrow with courage and selflessness knowing full well their cause will not be defeated if others coming after them remain equally devoted to protecting freedom as God’s most precious gift to the living.

Raheel Raza
President
Muslims Facing Tomorrow


September 24, 2012

Contact: Raheel Raza

416-505-6052                                                                                                                          info@muslimsfacingtomorrow.com

ANNOUNCING LAUNCH OF MUSLIMS FACING TOMORROW

Between the ugly, thunderous & violent roar of the radical extremists and the wishy washy whimper of the majority, lies THE SILENT VOICE.

www.muslimsfacingtomorrow.com

Our Mission: We are an organization for all Muslims to be an integral part of Canada’s liberal democracy and participate in it as equal proud Canadians.
Our Goal: To empower Canadian Muslims to celebrate Canada’s cultural diversity  and keep Canada safe.                                                                                                                                 Our Activities: We support and organize open and free intellectual discourse; offer religious, historical and practical education; and maintain dialogue with other faiths.

When:             Sunday September 30, 2012

LAUNCH:     5 to 8 pm (for exclusive interviews call 416-505-1613)

Venue:            Auditorium of North York Central Library (2nd floor across from Library)

5120 Yonge Street, Toronto , ON M2N 5N9

Keynote Speaker:

M. Zuhdi Jasser, M.D. is the Founder and President of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy (AIFD).  A devout Muslim, Dr. Jasser founded AIFD in the wake of the 9/11 attacks on the United States as an effort to provide an American Muslim voice advocating for the preservation of the founding principles of the United States Constitution, liberty and freedom, through the separation of mosque and state.  Dr. Jasser is the author of The Battle for the Soul of Islam: An American Muslim Patriot’s Fight to Save His Faith(Simon & Schuster, June 2012). He is featured in four documentaries America at Risk,Islam v Islamists, A Question of Honor and The Third Jihad.    www.aifdemocracy.org

                            


September 10, 2012

The Honourable John Baird

Minister for Foreign Affairs

Ottawa

Sir:

The Council of Muslims Facing Tomorrow supports your decision to close down Canada’s diplomatic relations with the Islamic Republic of Iran.

As Canadian Muslims we are encouraged that our government in Ottawa has taken the right measure in countering the multiple threats emanating out of Tehran.

We come from across the Muslim world and consider ourselves fortunate to be Canadians. We treasure the freedom we found here, and we are grateful for the benefits we enjoy as citizens of a vibrant democracy.

We have watched with great concern and dismay since long before 9/11 the deterioration of Muslim societies under the influence and power of Islamists – those who have twisted Islam as a faith-tradition into a political ideology with a totalitarian mind-set and program.

The Islamic Republic of Iran in the control of Islamist clergy since 1979 is not alone among member states of the Organization of Islamic Co-operation in persecuting dissident Muslims, in oppressing religious minorities, in engaging in acts of terrorism abroad, and in threatening regional and international peace. But Iran stands as the most vocal and belligerent OIC member in opposing the values Canada represents, and we as Canadian Muslims embrace.

We know a significantly large number of Iranians oppose the regime in Tehran. We are concerned about their well-being, and we trust you will keep alert to their concerns and maintain support for them in the difficult days ahead.

Raheel Raza,

President