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Appendix F (1) |
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The Society for the Qur’an
and the Sunnah – Palestine: General Description |
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The Society for the Qur’an and
the Sunnah – Palestine was founded in 1996 and received permission
to operate from the Palestinian Authority in July of the same year.
The license issued by the PA Ministry of the Interior was renewed in
2001 and given the number SQT/912/R (according to the Society’s Website,
www.qwram-smmah.com, which is not always accessible). Its head office
is located in Qalqiliya in the Open University building, and it has
six branch offices located in the districts of Nablus, Bethlehem,
Salfit, Abu-Dis Jerusalem, Jenin and Jinsfut, a village near Tulkarm.
It is identified with the Hamas civilian infrastructure (da’wah)
and serves as a pipeline for the transfer of money to the organization.
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Some of Society’s senior figures are: |
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| a. |
Ibrahim ‘Abd al-Rahim Muhammad Daoud (Sheikh
Bilal Hanoon): chairman, Qalqiliya resident, Director of
the PA-Awqaf office in Qalqiliya and acting director of the activities
of the [Hamas-oriented] “Charity Committee” in that city. He is
known to be a senior Hamas activist as well as a prominent
leader of the Salafiyyon in the region. In the
past he was arrested a number of times by the Israeli security forces.
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| b. |
Khayr al-Din Odeh Farah Dik: vice-chairman,
Qalqiliya resident, known to be a Hamas activist,
arrested in the past by the Israeli security forces. |
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| c |
Khaled ‘Abd al-Jawwad Hamad Aslah Ali:
secretary and known Hamas activist. |
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| d. |
Khalil Khidr Mustafa Khidr: treasurer,
Qalqiliya resident and Islamic Salafist activist. |
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On its Website the Society defines itself as an
Islamic missionary organization working to promote the dissemination of
information about the da’wah infrastructure and as active in the fields
of social issues and welfare. The following details are given: |
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| a. |
Welfare: The Society provides aid
for needy families, holds special events such as feasts to break
the fast during the holy Moslem month of Ramadan (during which Moslems
fast during the daylight hours) and weddings, supports the
families of the shaheeds and helps in restoring buildings
which were destroyed, including those of suicide bombers.
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| b. |
Education: The Society runs two
schools, one for boys and one for girls, and a kindergarten, all
called The Martyrs of al-Aqsa, and an additional school
called al-Noor. It provides scholarships and pays tuition, exempts
needy students from paying fees at its own schools and participates
in special projects such as “a schoolbag for every pupil.” |
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| c |
Health: The Society runs a medical
center called al-Haramein (Note: al-Haramein [“the
two holy sites”] describes the two holiest cities in Islam, Mecca
and Medina, both in Saudi Arabia. Using
the name may be an attempt to make an ideological connection between
the concept of Salafiyyah as propagated in Saudi Arabia
and by the Society in the PA-administered territories.). In addition,
it provides care for the wounded and grants financial aid to the
indigent sick. |
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| d. |
Propagating religion: “The Society
took upon itself to spread the Islamic da’wah according
to Salafist doctrine.” [Information taken from the Society’s Website]
The Society is involved in building mosques in Qalqiliya and in
neighboring villages, establishes and runs centers for Qur’an study,
trains religious leaders (imams, publicists, preachers and speakers)
and distributes copies of the Qur’an to the families of the shaheeds
and the wounded. |
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Special activities: |
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| a. |
The Society supports Palestinians detained
in Israeli prisons by seeing to their needs and paying
lawyers’ fees. |
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| b. |
The Society monitors the condition of the
families of shaheeds and of wounded terrorists,
provides detailed information (the circumstances in which the events
occurred, the nature of the wounds, etc.) to charities
within the PA-administered territories and abroad interested in
providing aid. |
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Da’wah projects: The Society uses
experts in propaganda to spread its da’wah throughout the PA-administered
territories, in the mosques, universities, symposia and meeting halls.
It distributes publications which portray the conduct of the first generation
of Moslems (al-Salaf al-Salih), considered the most virtuous. According
to its Website, it has distributed thousands of “publicity tapes,” apparently
video cassettes, and thousands, and sometimes hundreds of thousands, of
publications. All that is done, according to their Website, to educate
the younger generation of Palestinian Moslems so that Palestine
will be Islamic, and to that end the Salafist da’wah is used. |
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Sources of the Society’s funding: |
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| a. |
To finance its broad scope of projects the Society
needs massive amounts of money, especially for spreading
its extremist Salafist Islamic views in the spirit of the
Salafiyyah. According to its Website it needs financial
aid to pay for copying video cassettes, for printing costs and for
establishing a religious television station. |
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| b. |
The Society for the Qur’an and the Sunnah – Palestine
enjoys financial support provided by charities in the Arab and other
countries worldwide. Some of those charities hold extremist
Islamic views and were outlawed in Israel because they supported
terror: |
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1) Interpal, London (whose activities
have been suspended by the British government); 2) The
Al-Aqsa Institution, German branch;
3) The Al-Aqsa Institution, Dutch branch;
4) The World Assembly of Moslem Youth, Saudi
Arabia (known by its acronym, WAMY).
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Economic projects for self-funding include educational
institutions such as Shuhada’ al-Aqsa and al-Noor; al-Haramein
medical center; a bookstore; beehives;
al-Khayriyyah charitable bakery. |
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