A lawsuit has been filed against the Federal Reserve Board and U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr. over Wall Street bailout money going to American International Group, which is funding Shariah-compliant insurance and products.
WND reported a week ago that AIG has benefited from two major bailout agreements with the U.S. government giving $152.5 billion in taxpayer dollars to the company. Then it confirmed it is stepping up its dealings with Islamic finance offering homeowners insurance that complies with Islam’s religious Shariah laws.
According to an announcement at the time, Risk Specialists Companies, Inc., or RSC, a subsidiary of AIG Commercial Insurance, was introducing its Shariah-compliant Takaful Homeowners Policy to the U.S.
The Shariah-compliant policy is underwritten through RSC member company A.I. Risk Specialists Insurance, Inc., in conjunction with Lexington Insurance Co. and in association with AIG Takaful Enaya.
“Takaful” is based on Quranic principles of “Ta’awon” – or mutual assistance. The term originates from the Arabic word “Kafalah,” meaning “joint guarantee.” Similar to mutual insurance, where policyholders own a stake in the organization, members of a Takaful group pool their resources to help the neediest member, and losses are divided among them.
The lawsuit seeks a court order to stop AIG from using any taxpayer funds distributed as part of the Wall Street bailout, because of its Islamic-based businesses and activities.
“This lawsuit not only raises significant constitutional issues, it also shines a light on serious national security issues that our own government has created by direct financial support and ownership of a business that supports anti-American, radical Islamic activities,” said Richard Thompson, president and chief counsel for the Thomas More Law Center, which is handling the case.
“Make no mistake, there is an internal cultural jihad under way against our great nation, and I fear that many of our political leaders are unwittingly complicit in it,” he said today.
The lawsuit was filed in federal court in Michigan on behalf of Kevin J. Murray, a former Marine infantryman who served two tours of duty in Iraq.
It challenges the “Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008” as being unconstitutional, because of the $40 billion in taxpayer funds used to support the U.S. government’s new majority ownership interest in AIG.
The company’s “Islamic religious activities” are “anti-Christian, anti-Jewish, and anti-American,” the lawsuit says, and violate the U.S. Constitution’s Establishment Clause.
According to the lawsuit, through the use of taxpayer funds, the U.S. government acquired a majority (79.9 percent) ownership interest in AIG, and as part of the bailout, Congress provided money to fund and financially support AIG and its financial activities. AIG, which is now a government-owned company, engages in Shariah-compliant financing, which subjects certain financial activities, including investments, to the dictates of Islamic law and the Islamic religion. This specifically includes any profits or interest obtained through such financial activities.
The lawsuit said an important element of Shariah-compliant financing is a form of obligatory charitable contribution called zakat, which is a religious tax for assisting those that “struggle [jihad] for Allah.” The amount of this tax is up to 20 percent, depending upon the source of the wealth. The zakat religious tax is used to support Islamic “charities,” some of which have ties to terrorist organizations that are hostile to the United States and all other “infidels,” which includes Christians and Jews.
“The Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development, recently convicted for providing material support to Islamic terrorist organizations, is an example of an Islamic “charity” that qualifies for receipt of the zakat,” the lawsuit said.
“Thus, as a direct consequence of the taxpayer funds appropriated and expended to purchase and financially support AIG, the U.S. government is now the owner of a corporation engaged in the business of collecting religious taxes to fund interests adverse to the United States, Christians, Jews, and all other ‘infidels’ under Islamic law,” the lawsuit said.
“This lawsuit is as much about protecting constitutional principles as it is about protecting our national security and preventing another 9/11 – whether it be overt through flying planes into buildings or covert through appropriating taxpayer money to fund an Islamic cultural jihad,” Thompson said.
AIG’s Shariah program was set up with the help of a three-person Shariah Advisory Board, with members from Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, and Pakistan. According to AIG, the role of its Shariah authority “is to review [its] operations, supervise its development of Islamic products, and determine Shariah compliance of these products and [its] investments,” the lawsuit said.
But of particular interest Pakistani Board member, Muhammed Imran Ashraf Usmani, the case said.
“Usmani is the son and devoted disciple of Sheik Mufti Taqi Usmani, the leading authority on Shariah financing who, in 1999, authored a book dedicating an entire chapter on why a Western Muslim must engage in violent jihad against his own country – even if Muslims are given equality and freedom to practice their religion and to proselytize,” the lawsuit said.
Murray was one of those who “answered the call” when Islamic terrorists, “guided by principles of Shariah-mandated jihad against ‘infidels,’ attacked and killed thousands of innocent American civilians,'” the case said.
“Yet today, Murray’s federal tax dollars are being used to advance the very cause of global jihad he and his fellow servicemen were placed in harm’s way to overcome,” the lawsuit said.
“Shariah explicitly demands the murder of infidels like Kevin Murray and the destruction of the United States, which Murray took an oath to defend. Shariah is the same law that is used to justify beheadings, stonings, and amputation for petty crimes in places like Saudi Arabia, Iran, and Sudan, which Americans deplore,” the complaint said.
WND also reported earlier that the U.S. Treasury was teaching a course called “Islamic Finance 101.”
“It is clear,” said Thompson, “oil money is purchasing the sovereignty of the United States and whatever loyalty to America these greedy financial institutions, corporations, and universities have left. It’s up to the American people to take back their country from those who so easily betray its interests.”
Jeffrey Imm of Family Security Matters and the Anti-Jihad League of America has written extensively on the subject, warning that AIG would expand its Shariah products in the U.S. He has even created a petition demanding the Federal Reserve, Securities Exchange Commission and Department of the Treasury require AIG to divest itself of its Shariah businesses.
“The Sharia legal codification is intended to enforce discriminatory and segregationist practices against women and non-Muslims and to suppress the liberties of those living in Islamic theocracies,” Imm writes.”… Sharia is incompatible with democratic values and the inalienable right that ‘all men are created equal.'”
A part of AIG’s government bailout includes its Takaful Sharia-based insurance business, its divisions promoting Sharia finance and Sharia mutual trusts.
“You own it,” Imm declares. “That’s where your tax dollars are going today.”
Imm warns investing in Shariah-compliant businesses is dangerous for the U.S. When the government first considered providing a bailout to AIG it should have first required the company to divest itself of Shariah-based businesses, he wrote.
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