Does Our Treasury Department Want To Be 'Sharia Compliant'?

Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.--President of the Center for Security Policy and a columnist for the Washington Times--writes about the apparent interest of the Treasury Department in aspects of 'Islamic Banking'. In " Sell-off or Sell-out?", Gaffney writes about his Center's effort to educate the Treasury about Shariah-Compliant Finance--

Specifically, we shared with them a detailed legal memorandum written by one our experts – David Yerushalmi, an attorney specializing in securities law who is deeply knowledgeable about the comprehensive theo-political-legal code that authoritative Islam calls Shariah. Mr. Yerushalmi's memo makes a compelling case that there is both civil liability and criminal exposure associated with SCF [Shariah-Compliant Finance].

This is so because, at its core, Shariah is sedition: It explicitly espouses the violent overthrow of all secular governments and constitutions – including those of the United States – in favor of a global Islamic theocracy. The Yerushalmi memo makes clear that Shariah advisors – who play a central role in this industry as it falls to them to determine whether transactions are Shariah-compliant or not – and/or the companies that employ them appear to be involved in one or more of the following: racketeering, anti-trust violations, consumer and securities fraud or material support for terror. [emphasis added]

Imagine--Shariah-Compliant Finance actually makes US economic policy look good.

Gaffney also describes some of the SCF advisors:

In these regards, it might be helpful if, while Secretary Kimmitt is in Qatar, he pays a visit to one of the most prominent of the SCF advisors, Sheik Yusef al-Qaradawi, who serves on, among numerous others, the Shariah advisory board of two Qatari Islamic banks. As my colleague Christopher Holton has pointed out in a recent posting on the Family Security Matters website, Qaradawi has called for the Islamic world to use the present financial crisis to destroy Western capitalism and replace it with "an Islamic economic system."

Inquiring minds among Treasury's experts trying to "learn about Islamic banking" might also be interested to know that, in a 2006 interview with the BBC, Qaradawi also declared that he calls SCF "jihad with money, because Allah has ordered us to fight enemies with our lives and our money."

Read the whole thing.

The Treasury Department may not realize it, but Qaradawi is no Warren Buffet.

Technorati Tag: Islam.