Zakir Naik: A Growing Global Menace

On March 25, 2023, the jihad preacher Zakir Naik posted a video on his Facebook account about the mass conversion to Islam of 14 women (plus one boy from India and one man from Uganda) during his Oman Convention in the port capital of Muscat. Four of these women were maids, or paid wage slaves, from Sri Lanka working in Oman, and ten women were from the Philippines, who likely have the same economic status as the Sri Lankan women. These forced conversions are typically done to disadvantaged people who convert in order to keep their economic status as wage slaves to continue living in places such as Oman, or Saudi Arabia. This video documents the entire conversion process in English and in Arabic.

Zakir Naik adds his own jihadist dimension to the conversion process, outside of the regular Shahada (which is only one line) by deliberately making the women publicly denounce the core Christian doctrine of the Trinity. From a theological perspective, this additional part of Naik’s hateful conversion ceremony can be seen as a deliberate attempt to undermine the principles of Christianity while asserting the supremacy of Allah. He forces the women to say “Do you believe that Jesus is not God?” at the conclusion of his public interrogation in English. Here, the Islamic supremacist intentions of Zakir Naik are on full display which directly contributed to a frenzy of anti-Christian online hate in Sri Lanka that was a direct influence to the 2019 Easter Bombings. The bombers in Sri Lanka deliberately chose Easter to launch their bloody attacks on Christians.

While considering many of the forced converts are former Christians, especially from the Philippines, Zakir Naik is maliciously forcing the women to commit the sin of blasphemy (particularly regarding the Trinity) which is mentioned by the highest authority in Christianity as an unpardonable sin. Blasphemy as a grave sin must done in front of others in public spaces, so Zakir Naik has deliberately designed the addition to his ceremony because he knows many of the converts were Christians.

The hateful ceremony on display here should be a real eye-opener for all Christians, because this is a core doctrine of Islam, where such a public conversion ceremony in the opposite direction, like a public ceremony targeted against the pillars of Islam (which is really easy to create on theological grounds), would create an uproar of legal action concluding with the strong possibility of death. These forced conversion ceremonies are done frequently in Asia to Buddhists and Hindus, as seen with the Sri Lankan women in the video who can barely speak English but are expected to answer the questions. However, Zakir Naik does not want to coexist, rather he seeks to dominate with forced conversions.

A strange occurrence is noted at this part of the video because there is a marked silence that is a departure from the previous chorus of replies to Naik’s questions here as the converts do not wish to answer the question and upon further inspection the forced converts appear to be all pretending to answer at the same time. This is conclusive proof that these are forced conversions of these women into Zakir Naik’s ideology. This happens again later in the video when the women become silent and pretend to give an answer. One woman is even seen with a fixed toothy smile, albeit rather fake looking and exaggerated, when a few of the other women are answering this question which is in contrast to the other loud answers.

So during the conversion process, Zakir Naik asks the 14 women (and two others) “Is anybody forcing you to accept Islam? Is anybody bribing you to accept Islam? Are you doing it out of your own free will?” there is another large, noticeable drop in the chorus of their response to this question with only one woman on stage answering with a firm “NO!” into the microphone. The conclusion here is that these women are being forced to convert to Islam in an anti-Christian ceremony and are forced to commit an unpardonable act of blasphemy against their former religion.

One must also consider the position of economic servitude of the disadvantaged women in these conversions which cannot be construed as free will, or complete consent. It also looks as if many of the women in the video are deliberately not answering some of these questions as detected in the noticeable lull to these two sets of questions by Naik. It must also be considered that these women were setup on stage by Zakir Naik with his anti-Christian forced conversion where that they were not told of these questions ahead of time when they were being coerced into the conversion process; in other words the women were lied to about the conversion process by Naik ahead of time.

The deliberate silence to Naik’s questions speaks volumes in the video to his forced conversions, where it was like the women were all individually hoping to escape answering his malicious questions at the same time with the expectations of hiding behind the chorus of the crowd while the others answered the questions. They were all trying to escape the consequences of their actions at the same time.

Direct evidence links a massive rise in anti-Christian hate online from Zakir Naik, and others, in Sri Lanka which started around Valentine’s Day in 2019. This was the motivation for the attacks on Easter which were initially planned for a few weeks afterwards. An eyewitness to the bloody aftermath of the Sri Lankan Easter Bombings that targeted Christians in 2019 remarks:

Zakir Naik is wanted in India for numerous charges including financial crimes and for radicalizing Muslims to perpetuate acts of terrorism in India. He fled to Malaysia in 2016 to avoid prison. Zakir Naik’s Peace TV is banned in India, Bangladesh, Canada, Sri Lanka, and the United Kingdom, it is still broadcasting Salafi Wahhabism radicalizing Muslims in the Gulf. [Note: Zakir Naik is not banned in the United States despite his clear links to Islamic terrorism.]

Zakir Naik’s preaching divides Muslims and non-Muslims threatening harmony of multi-religious nations. Zakir Naik said those who propagate the non-Islamic faith and speak Zakir Naik’s preachings incited Indian, Bangladeshi and Sri Lankan Muslims to join terrorist cells, networks and groups. This included several Muslims indoctrinated into jihad by Zakir Nair joining Zahran’s group that staged the Easter Sunday massacre.  Zakir Naik will increase the terrorist threat to Sri Lanka with Sri Lankan non-Muslims converting to Islam and following his influence.

Zakir Naik said those who propagate non-Islamic faith and speak against Islam “should be put to death.” Zakir Naik added, “There is no death penalty for apostates in Islam….until the apostate starts to preach his new religion: then he can be put to death.” Therefore, Zakir Naik seeks total global domination, through the punishment of death, so no other religious belief system can exist.

The Islamic State leader in Sri Lanka, Zahran Hashim, was follower of Zakir Naik. The preachings of Zakir Naik converted several traditional, and local Muslims, to abandon Sufism (a moderate form of Islam) to join Salafi Wahhabism, known as Tawheed. Similarly in neighbouring Maldives, India and Bangladesh where several hundred followers of Zakir Naik joined both Islamic State and al-Qaeda affiliated groups.

The 29-year-old Riyas Aboobacker, alias Abu Dujana, a resident of Kerala’s Palakkad, was a follower of the speeches and videos of Zakir Naik. Riyas Aboobacker was arrested for conspiring to commit a terrorist act as a suicide bomber, the National Investigative Agency (NIA) of India said, which nabbed him in connection with its investigation into the 2016 Islamic State module in Kasargod and Palakkad.

In addition to inspiring some of the attackers that staged the Holey Artisan Bakery attack in Bangladesh, July 2016, Rahil Sheikh who conducted the Mumbai train bombings in 2006 was a member of Zakir Naik’s staff at Islamic Research Foundation (IRF) now banned by India. Both NIA and the Enforcement Directorate (ED) have filed multiple cases against Zakir Naik.

As we can see from his own words, there is no peace between religious communities for a jihad preacher such as Zakir Naik, as there is only Islamic supremacy which is the central theme of his ideology. His endgame of Islamic supremacy is attained only by the attrition of death and murder. He is a direct source in fomenting hateful divisions across the world which is driving his inflamed followers to kill for this toxic ideology. Zakir Naik is a growing global menace leaving a demonstrated trail of blood behind him that has targeted Christians.

Perhaps it is time for the USA, and allies, to reconsider their stance on demonstrated Islamic hate mongers, like Zakir Naik, before there is another terror attack as with the Easter Bombings in Sri Lanka where Christians were easy targets. And further, maybe there should be sanctions against Gulf States that allow such hate preachers as Zakir Naik, including the use of ethical oil to help with such sanctions on the global market? Where are the sanctions and cuts to foreign aid to Malaysia for supporting Zakir Naik’s flight from justice in India?

The global menace of Zakir Naik with his trail of blood across the world is symptomatic of a collapse in Western foreign policy. How many more terror acts and forced conversions will be committed by the zealots following Zakir Naik before there is action on the world stage?