Taseer: Clearly you have a sense of an enemy. What is
the face of this enemy? Is it America?
Butt: At the moment, America.
Taseer: Who else is part of it?
Butt: You have an apparent enemy and a hidden
enemy.
Taseer: The apparent enemy?
Butt: The American enemy. As far as I'm concerned, you
have America spearheading the attack, followed by Britain, France,
the EU, the UN, the World Bank, the IMF…
Taseer: India?
Butt: India.
Taseer: Thailand?
Butt: Thailand, especially after what happened recently.
[Attacks on Muslim rebels in the south of the country]
Taseer: What does it take to join the enemy?
Butt: to support them.
The Japanese only have 500 troops in Iraq; as a result they've
declared war on Islam. China from day one has been testing its
nuclear missiles in the Xinjiang province; it's a Muslim province,
so China is another enemy of Islam. As far as we're concerned, until
an Islamic government makes treaties with these people, the world,
for me, is an enemy. But there will be people who we prioritise, so
I won't start attacking the South American states. I have bigger and
more important enemies to deal
with, those who are having direct influence in the Muslim world,
like America.
Taseer: In your capacity as a teacher and leader, what
is your wish for the British Muslim?
Butt: I would say every Muslim needs to be proud of Islam, without feeling
inferior, and to read a book by
Mohammad Assad, a convert from Germany in the 1930s. As far as I'm
concerned, the British are still ruling the subcontinent, and the
way they're doing that is by the inferiority complex. They instil
this idea that people have to
follow the western design in order for them to progress. It was such a clever ploy
by the British. 100 or 200 years ago, their security services were
much more intelligent than they are today. My advice to Muslims is start to get out of this inferiority complex,
start to realise that Islam is
beautiful, don't be ashamed of it. If someone says jihad, don't be
ashamed; if someone says hijab, don't be ashamed. What Allah says is
good is good, what he says is bad is bad, don't be ashamed of saying
what is good and bad. This is my advice, be proud of being a Muslim,
not only be proud, be loud about that. If you watch a really good
movie, you'll go out and tell the whole world: “That movie was just
so brilliant, you've got to watch
that movie, you've got to see it.”
It’s the same way with Islam. If you believe it is the truth, if you
believe it is the most beautiful way of life, if you believe it is
the divine word of Allah, don't keep it to yourself, tell the whole world about
it and don't be ashamed of it. British Muslims, especially, have
this platform, because something said in London or Britain can reach
the whole world. The Muslims in the middle east don't have that
benefit or the liberty we have. We must take advantage of it.
Taseer: Is military action part of the plan?
Butt: If someone wants to go into military action, I would
encourage them, because Allah says in Surah Taubah, “From the
believers I ask for their wealth and their life and the best among
you are the ones who fight and kill and be killed for me.” This is the
promise that Allah makes. These people are the ones that gain the
supreme success. For me there is nothing bigger if somebody goes out
there and kills for the sake of Allah or is killed for the sake of
Allah.
Taseer: Why suicide bombing?
Butt: There is a difference between suicide and
martyrdom. Suicide is about unhappiness, depression. That's not what
these people are. These people have an urge to be with Allah, to be with the Prophet, live among him,
to be close to him. They are happy before committing
these actions. They are probably at the highest level any human
being can be before doing this. They are the most peaceful and
content. There is a complete and utter difference between martyrdom
operations and suicide operations: with the former, you want to do it not because you are fed up, but
because you are happy to enter the
next step of life, which is the afterlife. With the latter, you are
completely and utterly fed up with life.
Taseer: You've claimed in the past to recruit British people for martyrdom
operations. Who are they?
Butt: The majority of people who, after 9/11, went to Afghanistan like myself were
educated. They understood the reality of this war, and many came
from secure family backgrounds. They had wives, children; they had
no reason to leave. But they had a
call within themselves that was urging them to go forward.
Taseer: What’s the position of the radical Islamic
movement in Britain today? Is it growing or declining?
Butt: I do believe that support is growing. In the
public eye it seems as though only a tiny number of Muslims are
making this noise, but the fact is that only a tiny number have the
courage to speak out. The rest
won't, simply because they're worried about being persecuted by the
government.
Taseer: What about the imams? Are they helping?
Butt: There are many brilliant imams in this country,
and then a lot who are not so brilliant. My main grievance with the
imams is that they are not public enough. Maybe they know better
than me because they're older and more experienced. But I’ll give
you an example: the letter that was sent out publicly by the Muslim
Council of Britain to the mosques
saying that we should be spying on one another. I spoke to ten different imams—from London,
Birmingham and London—in ten different masjids; all ten
disagreed with the letter, but they never publicly said so. The
letter said that you should spy on Muslims and report them if they
were involved in any Islamic activities. Even when the IRA was being
attacked in Britain, many priests had their anonymity protected by
law because they were religious people. They were under no
obligation to inform the police
about any potential terrorist attacks by the IRA. So why the hell
would we as Muslims go around spying on one another?
If the MCB letter had been a private thing then fine, but this
was public and these people need to be corrected publicly. In Islam, for
example, if somebody is a homosexual under an Islamic government,
but practices it within his own home, Islamically he won't be
punishable because he's not coming out with it publicly. So in that
sense homosexuality is fine for him. The moment he comes out
publicly with it, it becomes an issue for the public. My grievance
with these imams is that they aren't saying these things
publicly—why does it take someone like me, who is 24 years old, who
has no Islamic credentials except with the youth I speak to who look up to me? Why are you imams, you people who
have gone through the Islamic disciplines, not coming out and saying
that this is haram? This is completely and utterly
unacceptable in Islam.
Taseer: What about your future?
Butt: I believe I have a bigger and bigger role to play. Yesterday I was talking to five or six senior brothers about our
different roles. I was saying that if I had a passport, I wouldn't
be in this country, and I kept saying to these guys, you've all got passports,
you don't have any problem, why are you not leaving the country? But
then one of the brothers made a very beautiful point. He said,
“Every decade or century Allah makes somebody different, so
initially you had political thinkers like Hassan al-Banna, Maududi,
Sayeed Qutb. But now we have reached the more militant side of
Islam, so you have Osama, Zawahiri, and Emir Khatab and Baseyev in
Chechnya. Throughout time, each will have their own role to play.” And I do believe that I've got
a bigger role to play and when
that time comes, I will make my preparations to play that role.
Taseer: It's martyrdom, isn't it?
Butt: Absolutely. It's something that makes me really
depressed being stuck in this country because I know I'm so far away
from it. I know that if I was to
pass away in my sleep, then I would not have the mercy of Allah upon
me because I have been such a bad person. And I don't see myself in
any way as getting into heaven that easily, except through
martyrdom.
Taseer: Where would you go if you got your passport
back?
Butt: Probably Yemen and Syria initially, because at the
moment I’m wanted in Pakistan for supposed involvement in an
assassination plot on Musharraf,
Taseer: After Yemen and Syria? The enemy that you would
finally confront would be the US, right?
Butt: Yes. Maybe America will be destroyed in my time,
maybe I'll have something completely different to do. But I need to learn Arabic. As an
English/Urdu-speaking person, I can see the beauty of Islam from the
outside, but I really can't have access without Arabic. It's like
having a beautiful house and only being able to see through the windows how beautiful
it is inside. That is how I view Arabic. I believe the Arabic
language will give me that key to
access those things I don't have access to at the moment. Once I learn Arabic,
inshallah, I will get myself militarily trained. It's like
the Jews in Israel: conscription is incumbent upon every male and
female.
Taseer: Why do you see it as something that ends in
death? There are a lot of soldiers who don’t see their fight as
necessarily ending in death.
Butt: Because death for us signifies the next stage of
life. It signifies the beginning of eternal life. That's something
we cannot understand, comprehend or really appreciate. For me, it's
like when you say to a child,
“Don't open the cupboard” and curiosity gets the better of him and
he wants to know what's there.
Only this time it's not curiosity; I'm sure that the next stage of
life is going to far exceed the
pleasure of this life.
Taseer: You're looking forward to death?
Butt: Absolutely. As long as it's done properly. I'm
terrified of dying normally,
growing old, grey.
Taseer: You don't see that as a selfish impulse, to care for nothing but your own
salvation?
Butt: Ultimately, that's everybody's. The mother loves
the child more than anybody. But even she, on the day of reckoning,
will not look at the child; Allah says she will think of herself,
solely of herself. Ultimately, that is what it's about: I'm going
into my grave, you're going into your grave, everyone is ultimately
going into their grave. In this duniya (world), we have as
much as we can want, but ultimately it is for the benefit of your
soul. It is the only point in Islam where an individual is actually
allowed to be selfish.
Taseer: You've asked for martyrdom in Palestine,
Kashmir, Chechnya: what do these causes have in common?
Butt: They're all just causes in which Muslims are being
attacked by a foreign occupier.
Taseer: But why isn't an un-Islamic government just as
much a problem, Pakistan for instance?
Butt: Absolutely. I pray that Allah accepts the man who
made the second attempt on Musharraf’s life a few months ago. He did
it as a martyr. The common thing for everyone around the world is
jihad but the places you talked about—Chechnya, Palestine, Iraq,
Afghanistan—are occupied. Then you've got unoccupied ones: Riyadh,
Bali…
Taseer: What kind of psychological strength or make-up
do you need to be a martyr?
Butt: It takes a hell of a lot. You have to be at peace with yourself and have
that comprehension. It is such a difficult thing to actually do. It's a level I'm not at,
at the moment, without a shadow of doubt. Omar Sheikh [The
LSE-educated killer of Daniel Pearl] is the only British Muslim I've
met who is at that level… I think Mohammad Hanif and Omar Sharif
[the two British Muslims who travelled to Israel as suicide bombers in 2003]
were at that level too. Did you watch the video Hamas released of
them? They looked so happy, and here I am, sitting here depressed,
aggravated, frustrated and I look at them looking so happy and so at
peace with what they're going to
do, that I can only begin to
imagine what kind of piety they are at to be able to say, “Allah here I am. This is what
you've given me and this is what I'm giving back in return.” That's
what the spiritual side of the training is there for, and many of
the camps—which have now been dismantled—concentrated on that
spiritual aspect, on making sure you know why you're doing this.
Like I said, it can't be curiosity: you have to know that you will get to heaven.
Taseer: Do you think killing Daniel Pearl was part of
Omar Sheikh’s fight for Islam?
Butt: Whether he killed Daniel Pearl or not, I don't
know to be honest with you.
Taseer: If he did?
Butt: If he did, I'm sure Islamically he knew what he
was doing.
Taseer: Would you approve of it if he did?
Butt: Absolutely—journalists have always been used as
spies. Even Lawrence of Arabia, who was a spy, was initially a
journalist. I believe Pearl was a spy: he deserved everything he
got.
Taseer: What about Kashmir, have you been involved in
the fight there?
Butt: I have lectured there twice to English students in the
Pakistani-controlled area. I lectured in Islamabad in one of the
hotels, with someone from Kashmir, I can't remember the brother's
name now. He then invited me to
give two separate lectures in English, to English students about how I think
they should be focusing their lives. It was very productive. Kashmir
is a place that has been forgotten by the world media. It's a shame.
Personally I'm not the biggest supporter of the Kashmiri jihad,
because I believe a lot of it is political gaming rather than pure
jihad. I see a lot of innocent lives being wasted for political
motives.
Taseer: For the motives of the Pakistani
government?
Butt: Yes, forcing the Indian government to keep 750,000 troops in such a small
area places it under massive economic pressure.
Taseer: Is Lashkar doing good work?
Butt: I'm not a supporter of Lashkar-e-Toiba, I see them
as very government-backed. I think this is a general problem in the
Pakistani organisations. The minute they start attacking the
government, they fear losing everything they have built up and that
is a weakness in every group I see. For me, the key concept of being
a separatist is that if I ask you to sacrifice your life, your wealth,
your health, then you do. Ultimately, the aim is to achieve what I would say is the goal
for Islam, for example to liberate
Kashmir. I think Kashmir has always been a proxy war for Pakistan,
and they've never really wanted to
liberate it. I even remember speaking to General Zahir Abbassi and Hamid Gul:
both of them said, “Really, if we want to liberate Kashmir, we could do so very
easily.” Lashkar has 200,000 followers, we only allow in 8,000
mujahedin at a time in that area. Why? Because if we sent
everyone in there it would become unoccupied, and India wouldn’t
have the economic burden of having to station 750,000 troops there. It's
really disappointing.
Taseer: Why have the predicted terrorist attacks on the
US and Britain following the Iraq war not happened?
Butt: If someone was to attack Britain, they would be a
completely and utterly loose cannon. It would be someone who wasn't
involved in the network… I mean the jihad network. A bomb in London
would be strategically damaging to
Muslims here. Immigration is lax in Britain—you know as well as I do
that London has more radical Muslims than anywhere in the Muslim
world. A bomb would jeopardise everyone’s position. There has to be a place we can come.
Taseer: So there is general agreement among the
different groups not to attack
Britain for strategic reasons?
Butt: Definitely, there is a central sense that we will
not damage something for a bigger picture, but we will concentrate
on our own areas.
Taseer: Why not more attacks in America?
Butt: America is much more difficult to get into than Britain—it's so far
from the rest of the world.
Taseer: Do you see future attacks there?
Butt: Definitely, I can't see it stopping. As they say,
cut the devil's head off. I believe that the head is America, and
one of the arms is Britain. Cutting the arm off won't have an
effect; cutting the head off will, so that's why I say attacks look
more likely in America.
Taseer: What does it take to get past the various screenings that
you have in your own group?
Butt: It's very hard, especially in Britain, where all
of a sudden you've got the MI5 openly saying they are
recruiting…
Taseer: Trying to
infiltrate the groups?
Butt: Yeah, it's very difficult. For all you know I
could be working for them. Things are working a hell of a lot slower
than they used to I'm of the
philosophy more of Ramzi Yousef: take precautions, but keep them
to a minimum because otherwise
you're not going to get anywhere.
I'm of the opinion that if somebody's a spy, he’s a spy, and he can
only do what Allah has planned for them. So I'm not really going
to be concerned for myself. I will
carry out the very minimum checks.
Taseer: What kind of checks?
Butt: If it's somebody I brought in myself, I would get
to know them and culture them. I
would hope that, even if he were a spy, by the end of his time with
me he would be converted anyway. He'd say, “I can't do this.”
Assuming he is not a spy, I'd make sure I know where he's come from,
who he knows. If he knew nobody, he would start right at the bottom
and we would have to go through
all of the procedures. But if he says I'm affiliated with X, Y and
Z, I could take up references with those people, I'd make sure he'd
done the things he'd claimed to
have done. You always have references in the radical Muslim world,
that’s how it works. You can go to
Pakistan and reference me from such and such a place and they'd say
yeah, we know him. Then I'd go back to the person and ask if he'd gone under
a different name than the one he's giving me, and if there's a slip
halfway down the line, I'd say I'm sorry we can't help you,
inshallah there's somebody else who can.
Taseer: So there are very few who come in clean with no
record?
Butt: No, very few. On Saturday evenings on this very
road, we used to have Islamic
stalls and we would actually recruit people from the stalls, take
their contact details, and start building up a relationship with
them, meeting them, and giving them the necessary Islamic culture
for them to have the Islamic
identity. But I would not push anyone to do anything unless they came to me. I would never tell anyone, “I
think you should do military training.” I will never say that to anybody because it's something that
has to come from the person's
heart.
Taseer: Are there a disproportionate number of
Pakistanis who want to take part
in this sort of thing?
Butt: In Britain, the majority I know are of Pakistani
descent and really are fed up with the British way of life, British
standards; they are even fed up with un-Islamic Pakistani culture
and traditions.
Taseer: Like what?
Butt: This issue of obeying your elders even if they're
wrong, remaining silent at their mistakes. Forcing women to cook and clean and do nothing else.
They're fed up with these stigmas.
Taseer: So would women have a stronger role in an
Islamic society?
Butt: Oh yeah, I believe that women are the forefront of
this war. If our women were correct in their minds, my job would not
be necessary. If our sisters were teaching the children from a very
young age to love jihad, to love Allah, to live for Allah, to die for Allah… I think they have the
biggest the role to play.
Taseer: And it's not the economic conditions of the
Pakistanis that make them well suited.
Butt: Not any more. The majority of the Pakistanis here
are well established, they own their own homes, they're not on
mortgages any more, many have gone to university, they don't have any
problems, The Muslims who have the problems are the Somalis and the
Bangladeshis, these are the economically deprived ones. But the
Pakistanis have really got to
grips with why they came here. Initially it was for economic
reasons. I guess that's why the youth is a lot more responsive. The
elders came here for economic benefit, so they were a lot less
willing to come out publicly with
their opinions, whereas the youth now are more disillusioned with
what's going on around them. They've had everything they needed and
they're rejecting it.
Taseer: You've had your passport revoked, right? What
has the government told you?
Butt: Yeah, the official answer is that I am under
investigation for links to
terrorist activities and organisations and until these are cleared
my passport is being held so that I don’t leave the country. They
told my solicitor that the moment I leave this country I will be
considered a threat to national
security; as a result they bind me to Britain. This is now becoming a
breach of my human rights. I am supposed to be able to travel freely to any country I want.
Taseer: Are you under constant surveillance?
Butt: As far as I understand, yes.
Taseer: Do you think they're watching our interview
now?
Butt: I wouldn't be surprised if they knew about it, but
whether they were watching it, I have no idea. I know my phones are
most likely tapped. That's why I was quite surprised when you rang
me because that number is very private, and only very few
individuals have it. The other numbers keep changing, but that one I
keep.
Taseer: When you were arrested, why couldn't they build
a case?
Butt: They had nothing. The whole basis for my arrest
was probably the information that you gathered off the internet.
That's what made me realise at that point that I'd never been under
observation until that day.
Taseer: Do you feel any guilt about using a country's
freedoms to strike against it? If
you were in any of the Muslim countries, you would be in jail.
Butt: I guess it's the British blood inside me. The
British have been known for centuries to abuse everyone's resources. When they
took over my father's homeland, the subcontinent, they reaped the
resources, they raped the lands, even now the Queen's crown is made
from jewels that don't belong to
Britain. I'll hold my Islamic beliefs. I'm just continuing a trait
of the British people.
Taseer: A tradition of deceit?
Butt: Yes
Taseer: You do see it as deceit?
Butt: Yeah, war is deceit.
Taseer: This is a war isn't it?
Butt: I don't see it any other way.
Taseer: Then how do you feel about a group like
al-Muhajiroun which seems to say
it's a war, but refuses to
recruit?
Butt: It's their get-out-of-jail card. And this was one
of my biggest concerns. I can understand they see war as deceit and
they say it's not the aim behind the organisation and perhaps they
do it behind closed doors, but I say you shouldn't be such big
articulators of the war if you aren't willing to carry it out. This was our big
difference. I'm not saying what they're doing is un-Islamic, but
it's something I was feeling uneasy about as a Muslim. I could do it
no longer, I was feeling hypocritical.
Taseer: If it's a war, you need soldiers, right?
Butt: Yeah. I'm not a soldier. My role is someone who
tries to use the western media
to get our message across. I
remember speaking to one
maulana (master) who I look up to a lot. At that point I was saying, “I
really want to go and fight.” And
he said, “Look, you have access to
many things we don't. Go and utilise it, the war has many different
fronts. We can't come to Britain.
You think we have a lack of mujahedin waiting there? We've
got hundreds and thousands of them. You're from Britain, you can use
the media, you speak their language, you're an educated person, you
have the passport, go there and utilise it. When the time comes for
you to fight, if Allah wants that,
you're going to do that. Don't
worry about it.” So the war has many different fronts, and in the
meantime that selfishness you were originally talking about is
suspended until I get to an age
where I can say: “I've done my best now, I have to think of my individual soul,” and
then, inshallah, I will go and fight.
Taseer: And Omar Sheikh Bakri?
Butt: I have respect for him. He's an aalim
(scholar), and he's much older than me, but I have my differences
with him as well. It came to a
point where I could no longer keep myself affiliated with his group,
not because I disrespect them in any way, but because it would have
been hypocritical to be with them
and hold these views. I need to
break loose because the views I was going to give would not be the views of the
organisation al-Muhajiroun.
Taseer: Was the parting peaceable?
Butt: With any organisation I've been with, the parting
is like a divorce. It's quite messy. But we're Islamic-minded people
and we're still in contact, and I have a lot of respect for them.
They're still more vocal than the majority of the Muslims in this
country.
Taseer: What was the route to Afghanistan?
Butt: Just through Pakistan. It really amazed me that
anyone could do it. You could get anything you like across the
border and at that time with the Pakistani government being very
friendly, it was never guarded as it is today.
Taseer: That fight still continues?
Butt: Yes—the sad thing is that while the world media
focuses on Iraq, a lot is happening in Afghanistan.
Taseer: Are people still going?
Butt: Yes, though not as many from Britain. The doors
have been closed. They need people who are already trained. They
don't have time to start training
people and sending them over.
Taseer: What was your university experience like?
Butt: Until we got there [Wolverhampton], there had
never been any Islamic activity. There was a group of 15 of us and
we all decided to go to the same university and we recruited
another ten to 15 in the next
couple of months and we came out very explosively. We had Islamic
awareness weeks, we demanded a prayer room, washing
facilities.
Taseer: Was it radical?
Butt: It was absolutely radical and I think the
university authorities felt really, really threatened. I even
remember having visits from the so-called community leaders of the
Muslims asking, “What are you doing?” Wolverhampton is only a small
city, but we were sticking posters all over it. It was a really good
experience, we radicalised the university a lot.
Taseer: You were expelled. What for?
Butt: I was accused of getting Muslims to assault a homosexual student. Now I
don't hide my views about homosexuality: in Islam it's forbidden. If
someone wants to do it privately,
go ahead and do it privately, don't come out publicly with it. At
the time, we were the largest society on campus because all the
Muslims had joined us. Our grant was £500 and there was another
society, I think the music society, which had fewer than 100 members
and they had £5,000-6,000. I was really pushing this; I went to the racial equality person. I wasn't
as radical as I am today, but just as active and aggressive. But I
got rejected. I realised that the racial equality board didn't see
Muslims as a race, hence we didn't have equal rights.
Anyway, with the assault case, they eventually got some
“witnesses” to come forward. It
was the most bizarre case—here I was in my final six months of
university. I had spent two and a half years studying for a law and
politics degree, and they were refusing to give not only the names of these
witnesses, but not even their statements.
Taseer: But you didn't do it?
Butt: No, I did not do that at all. If I had done it, I
would have come out openly. I would have acknowledged it. At that
time, I believed more in political Islam, arguing, debating, having
dialogues—this militant side of Islam came later. I was so surprised
by the case. I wanted to say, “How
do I know you haven't just made this whole thing up?” Fair enough,
the witnesses couldn't be present, but at least give us their
statements, their names, just so we know they are not made-up
people. By the time we got the solicitor involved, my year had
collapsed and it would have taken me another two years to graduate. It was enough for me.
Taseer: Did you like being in Pakistan?
Butt: I loved it, I've never had a better two years in
my life. I see Pakistan as the only country having the potential
to lead the Muslims out of the
disarray they are in today. I see Pakistan as that nation.
Taseer: But the government isn't to your taste?
Butt: Obviously the government is the problem. I think
the people are the most amazing I have seen in my life: people who
experience hardship every day, and still have faith that Allah will
give them something. The problem is that you have this very tiny
minority that is always portrayed as the majority of the opinion in
Pakistan.
Taseer: Who rules Pakistan?
Butt: The elite, you know how it is.
Taseer: I know it's a big question, but what's your wish
for the global order, how would you like to see it readjusted?
Butt: I don't see it happening in my lifetime. 1,400
years ago you had a small city-state in Medina, and within ten years
of the Prophet (peace be upon him), Islam had spread to Egypt and all the way into Persia. I
don't see why the rest of the world, the White House, 10 Downing
Street, shouldn't come under the banner of Islam. And this is what
we believe: we are going to set
the foundation for Islam bringing true peace, true security to the world.
Taseer: Will there be a lot of killing?
Butt: I can't see it not happening. Even what I say is
very naïve. I can see Islam bringing peace to humanity for a short period, but man
being what he is, being very rebellious and arrogant, he will
naturally cause rebellion.
Taseer: You've spoken about martyrdom for yourself.
Would you send your children into it?
Butt: It's funny you ask me this because my mother is
arranging for me to get married.
Unlike Pakistani tradition, which doesn't allow you to speak to the girl beforehand, I've made sure
that I've spoken to the sister,
that I've met her, that I'm compatible with her. Obviously I'm not
going to date her or court
her.
Taseer: Have you ever dated anyone?
Butt: No, never in my life. It's one thing I was never
really that interested in. I started practising just about the age
most guys started getting interested in girls. But I've always said
to my mother, I must have someone
like-minded. She must be at least as extreme as me, if not more so.
I've already said to her—the
sister my mother has got me engaged to ??that I expect her to become a martyr before I do and I
expect my children to be exactly
the same. Do you remember the Moscow theatre siege? When you had all
those sisters… when I saw that, I said to my mother: you have to marry me to someone like that, I'm not going
to marry anybody who doesn't have
those kind of views. My mother has found me someone who has just as
strong views as those sisters did. I looked at that and I felt so
ashamed of myself that day, women doing Muslim men's jobs while
we're sitting here and they're carrying out this awesome display of
courage.
Taseer: Have you ever had a moral lapse as far as Islam
is concerned?
Butt: Absolutely, we're human, we all have our lapses.
Yesterday: I told my brothers that I always fear that if I die
tomorrow without dying a martyr, I
would go to hell. I can't see
myself as getting into jannat (heaven) with the actions that
I've done, I've done so little for Islam. There's so much in my
character I would love to improve.
I see myself as a very weak Muslim who can only get better.
Taseer: Have you ever drunk alcohol?
Butt: No, and I've never smoked a cigarette.
Taseer: So what now? Where do you go from here?
Butt: First things first, I fight to the foremost to get my passport back. The quicker I
get that back, the faster I get my plan of action together. Since
leaving al-Mujahiroun, I have formed this group around me and I'm
focused on this. There are about nine of us and we're not willing
to accept anybody else now because
we have the same ideas, the same thoughts. Each one of us may be
playing a different role from the other, but we act collectively
to gain a wider picture. Once I
get my passport back, I definitely see myself becoming a face for
Islam in the future, something Muslims have been lacking for a very
long time. This is not out of pride, or arrogance or ambition.
Rather, I believe I have the ability, and I pray to Allah to give me more ability.
Taseer: Tell me, why did you agree to do this interview?
Butt: Unlike other Muslims I understand the power of the
media. At university I studied a module that showed me how media has
impacted politics. I realised that the media was probably the most
powerful tool, even more powerful than military warfare: using the
media you can change nations, public opinion—you can get your
message out there. Ayman al-Zawahiri actually propagates that: “Yes,
you can be a martyr, but you've only done half your job unless you
get your message out there.” I think this is missing generally in
the Muslim world. The Taleban’s biggest weakness was that they
didn't have any media outlet—when they eventually tried to get a grasp of the media it was too
late. For me, the more we can expose ourselves the better. Even
though what we say may be edited and twisted and taken out of
context, I still believe that Islam twisted is better than no Islam.
As a result of that, even if ten people criticise me, so long as one
agrees with me, that objective is being fulfilled.
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