Since the start of the Israel-Gaza war on 7 October last year, a number of charity initiatives have emerged within the Muslim world under the guise of supporting Gaza in the face of Israel’s military campaign. One of the more interesting examples is the “Wage Jihad With Your Wealth” (Arabic: Jahid bi-Malika) campaign. Based out of northwest Syria, the idea of the campaign, as its name suggests, is that donating money is a form of waging jihad. The campaign has received donations from a variety of ‘muhajirin’ (foreigners who have come to the territories controlled by the insurgents in Syria).
I decided to conduct an interview to learn more about its aims, donations it has received, its position on providing support for Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and the Western university campus protests in support of the Palestinian cause.
Q: When was the campaign established and who leads the campaign? Is it affiliated with a specific faction or institution?
A: Praise be to God the Lord of the Worlds, and I offer prayers and salutations upon our prophet Muhammad and all his family and companions. As for what follows:
May God reward you best for this good interview, and I ask God Almighty to place it in the balances of my good deeds and your goods. I will not go on too long for the dear reader, and so I will begin by answering the first question.
The campaign to provide relief for the people of Gaza began right after the al-Aqsa Flood battle: namely, on 10 October, as the brothers- the mujahidin of the Turkistan Islamic Party in Bilad al-Sham- contributed the campaign’s first sum of $500. The charity from the people of giving- both ansar [local Syrians] and muhajirin in Bilad al-Sham- continued to follow in succession. The campaign’s name ‘Wage Jihad With Your Wealth’ did not arise until the beginning of November, as the work required greater organisation and media arrangements through which one could operate. So the necessities for this were arranged and the campaign was announced in an official statement published on the channel of al-Zubayr al-Ghazi [a Palestinian who was a former member of Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham]. The campaign is independent and not affiliated with any side in the field. The campaign is supervised by a number of the students of ‘Ilm [scholars] in al-Sham and Gaza, and at the head of them is Abu ‘Abd al-Rahman al-Zubayr al-Ghazi.
Q: What are the types of donations that the campaign accepts and from where have most of the donations come?
A: The campaign excepts money donations, whether directly in the form of money or through crypto-currencies. We have no way in the campaign to accept donations in-kind regrettably. With regards to the money, it is sent via crypto-currencies to Gaza and the projects are implemented with the money and then information about these projects is sent to the donors.
Most of the donations have come from mujahidin brothers inside the liberated areas of Syria, as they bring donations from their own money on some occasions, and from the money of their contacts who donate from the outside and are trusted by them, such that these people on the outside send them the money and they hand it to us so we can deliver to the people receiving it, with documentation of the activity that is intended to be implemented.
Likewise donations have reached us via al-Zubayr al-Ghazi’s account from most of the countries of the world both east and west, Arab and non-Arab countries, and from America, Europe, Russia and Ukraine.
Q: How has the campaign used the donations to support Palestine exactly? For example what are the campaign’s most important accomplishments?
A: We praise God who granted for us to be the first side that brought relief to the people of Gaza directly after the war and before any other side began to do so, and likewise the campaign was the first side that made an announcement for donations in al-Sham, and still has its doors open for donors until today, and has collected many sums it has conveyed to Gaza by the grace of God Almighty.
Likewise it is from God’s grace upon us that the campaign until today has continued since the beginning of the war to pursue its aim for which it arose and which it has striven to realise: providing relief to the one in distress, aiding the needy, caring for the families of martyrs, feeding the hungry, clothing those who need clothing, and equipping the mujahidin.
The campaign has reached all areas of the Gaza Strip without exception, whether the besieged north of Gaza or the south and middle of it. The campaign has encompassed all projects from money distribution to clothing, preparing tents, procuring bread and water, distributing gas, providing food and slaughtering animas for meat, furnishing mosques and renovating refugee centres, buying children’s toys, bags and gifts for them, as well as caring for children with sponsorship for orphans and widows.
We currently refrain from mentioning exact statistics about the campaign until the war ends with a good outcome, so that the campaign can be able to continue by the power of God Almighty.
Q: What is your position on the Palestinian factions like Hamas and Palestinian Islamic jihad? For example some say it is not permitted to supported them because they are linked to Iran. What is your position on that?
We believe that the two aforementioned factions are Muslim factions, who have what others besides them have: they make some errors that do not bar supporting them in confronting the criminal Jewish enemy that has transgressed against the religion and honour. Hamas is better than Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and its position on Iran is political, unlike Palestinian Islamic Jihad which has been afflicted by some of the smoke of political and even doctrinal Shi’ism among some of its members, even if they are only few in number.
But overall, the two movements are Sunni Muslim movements, and they have made mistakes that do not prevent supporting them. For God Almighty mandates supporting the Muslim who commits innovation and is confronting the disbeliever who transgresses against the religion and the Muslim’s material world. This is all the more so today as tribulation has spread and overflowed, and there is an attack that has struck with its ropes the Muslim masses in Palestine and Gaza. Surely the Shari’i obligation mandates us to support them, and remember their good deeds. The battle today does not allow us to repeat the mistakes, and go on about repeats. Every situation has something to say about it at the right time and place, and the right thing to say today is that one must provide support, aid and help, just as what we had to say yesterday before the war was advice, criticism and disagreement with them [Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad]. So the one you advised yesterday is the one you are obligated to support today.
Q: At Western universities we see great support for the Palestinian cause, including some Jewish and homosexual students. Do you welcome this support from the Jewish and homosexual students?
A: In the authentic hadith it is said: “God does not thank the one who does not thank the people.” The position of some of the disbelievers in their support for the oppressed Muslims in Palestine is a good and sound position. They are to be thanked for it, and it is part of the natural disposition that God has placed in the soul of every human being in terms of hating oppression and feeling sympathy for the oppressed. God Almighty has distinguished between the oppressor and oppressed among the disbelievers, for He said in Surat al-Mumtahana: “God does not forbid you from being kind and fair to those who have not fought you because of your religion and have not expelled you from our abode. Indeed God loves those who are fair. Instead, God forbids you from being loyal to those who have fought you because of your religion and have expelled you from your abode and supported your expulsion. Those who are loyal to them are the oppressors.” So we rejoice in what they have done and thank them for it. We also say to them: indeed God Almighty’s religion is the most complete religion, and it is the religion that makes those who adhere to it resist the oppressor. So join God’s religion, and learn its issues. Indeed in your hearts is a seed of goodness. We ask God Almighty that it should lead you to this true religion.
Q: Finally, what is the essence of the Palestinian cause? Is it an Islamic cause to liberate the land and the holy sites from the Jews, or is it foremost a national cause?
A: There is no doubt that the cause of Palestine is a great Islamic cause, which has derived its great position from the blessed al-Aqsa Mosque, which is the third greatest mosque in eminence after the two Holy Sites [Mecca and Medina], and is the first qibla of the Muslims [the place to which Muslims initially prayed before turning to Mecca]. And the ongoing conflict there today is foremost a doctrinal religious conflict. For people in every place have seen the cries of takbir [Allahu akbar] that were raised on high in the sky: on 7 October, before it and after. On the other hand, they have witnessed how the criminal disbeliever world has supported the Jews in an open, blatant and hateful Judaeo-Crusader religious war against Islam and its people.
As for the nationalist slogans we hear from our mujahidin and Muslim brothers in Palestine, we interpret according to the true meaning of them, which is love of the homeland by virtue of considering it to be a Muslim land that God ordered us to preserve and made a blessed land. It is also not hidden that among the requirements for jihad is that the enemy should take an inch of the Muslims’ land, so here the man fights in defence of his land, and it is part of the greatest jihad; and it is not for the sake of the land itself, but rather by virtue of considering it to be a land over which the rule of Islam has reigned supreme, and thus it has acquired a sense of sanctity and dignity that requires to spill one’s own blood in order to recover it from the disbelieving occupier.
And God is the One who guarantees success.
