Jemaah Islamiah almost certainly doesn’t believe it is misappropriating these funds in any way. In Islam, zakat — the alms required of every Muslim — can and should be given to further the jihad. So it shouldn’t surprise anyone that there are so many jihad-linked charities.
“Alms for terror: Militants in Indonesia finance extremists with charity,” AFP, June 24, 2021:
JAKARTA (AFP) – Generous Indonesians donating their spare change to the poor and needy are unwittingly helping finance deadly terror attacks and militant training camps, in a scam that has netted big money for extremist groups.
Former radical Khairul Ghazali once spent his days visiting restaurants, convenience stores and supermarkets to drop off charity boxes, wearing an official-looking uniform to avoid suspicion.
Passers-by would slot in coins and crumpled banknotes in the belief that they were helping the impoverished, orphaned children or maybe a Palestinian aid organisation.
But Mr Ghazali’s boxes secretly belonged to Jemaah Islamiah (JI) – the notorious network behind Indonesia’s deadliest terror attack, the 2002 Bali nightclub bombings.
“People can’t tell the difference between these and other charity boxes,” said Mr Ghazali, 56, who now runs an Islamic boarding school and tries to deradicalise former extremists.
“The money collected is usually used to pay for terrorism.”
With little outside funding, hardline Islamist groups depend on the charity box scam to pay for operations across Indonesia, the world’s biggest Muslim-majority nation, which has suffered a series of hotel bombings and other attacks over the years.
North Sumatra police said in March they had seized more than 500 boxes suspected to be funding pipelines for the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) group and radicals linked to Al-Qaeda.
The seizure, weeks before an ISIS-inspired married couple blew themselves up at a church on Good Friday, was the tip of the iceberg.
A JI militant arrested last year admitted that one foundation linked to the notorious terror group was running more than 20,000 boxes nationwide, police said at the time….
rooare says
This sort of thing goes on with so many so called charities that claim to help the poor, orphans and so forth. Before one gives to any charity investigation should be done to determine to the best one can if the charity is legit.
Shawn says
The best Charity a person should only give to is one’s own family.If people only knew how much of their money went to the people in charge of the charities.
gravenimage says
This sort of thing is the least of it with Islam. Then, it often goes to murdering Infidels.
Walter Sieruk says
Receiving money under a false premise is unethical , unconscionable dishonest and despicable.
Still , what other kind of behavior can be expected from the jihadists with their religion of Islam.
gravenimage says
Indonesia: Jihad group finances its activities through charity boxes for the poor and needy
Jemaah Islamiah almost certainly doesn’t believe it is misappropriating these funds in any way. In Islam, zakat — the alms required of every Muslim — can and should be given to further the jihad. So it shouldn’t surprise anyone that there are so many jihad-linked charities.
…………..
This is so true. At first, I believed that Jihadists were misusing these funds–then I came to understand that a core part of “Zakat”–often mistranslated as “charity”–is the funding of Jihad terror.
OLD GUY says
Islam how low can you go? This is a WAR and Islamic leaders will do anything and everything they can to gain dominance over the world. Islam knows no boundary when it comes to gaining POWER.