My crazy morning with Bilal Abdul Kareem in Syria

I woke up and picked up my phone, there was a message from Bilal Abdul Kareem in Syria. He wanted me to join him in about an hour’s time on his facebook live show to discuss my article regarding calls to boycott hotels owned by Brunei after the Sultan of Brunei announced the application of some of the aspects of Islamic shariah law.

I thought ‘Oh, man, that’s good’, I also thought ‘Oh man that will wreck my morning plan’. My Sunday had been well planned. I was going to go to Finsbury Park in the morning which I had been really looking forward to for days. I was then going to drop one of my children to  their friend’s wedding. 

Now I had an invitation to appear on Bilal Abdul KAreem's show in about an hour. But isn’t that the kind of thing I wanted after writing this article the night before? Of  course it was. So there was me having a quick argument with myself - in my head. Do you argue with yourself? I’m sure we all do. 

An argument

One half of me said to the other: this shariah bashing issue in the media has been bugging you, you researched and wrote about it, edited it several times, your wife gave it a final edit and feedback and you were determined to publish it last night and alhamdulillah, you managed to do that just before going to bed. 

You wanted it to be read widely so you sent it to several people after posting it online. A few hours later, one of those you sent it to, Bilal Abdul Kareem, wants to have you on his show to talk about the issue - something you didn’t imagine would happen. So what are you waiting for? Argument over. Now to the practicalities of making it happen.

So I replied to Bilal saying I could make the show. We then had an exchange back and forth about what was needed. Oh, I need to sign into skype but can’t remember my password. I haven’t used Skype for a while. 

I need a tripod to hold my phone steady but my tripod is in the Mosque where I give khutbah. I knew I should have listened to the voice in my head which said ‘buy a second cheap tripod, it will come in handy’. I hadn’t listened. Naughty me. So more obstacles had now reared their head. Having said let’s do it, there was no turning back.

Another obstacle?

A quick change of clothes, and I power up the laptop. The first skype password I tried worked and suddenly we’re in business. What I thought would be a wahala (that’s Nigerian slang for palava, which is another way of saying ‘headache’ or ‘a problem’) had suddenly been made easy by Allah (swt).

But he’s in Syria

Another thing that motivated me to try to make this happen was thinking that Bilal Abdul Kareem is on the other side of the world, in Syria, a war zone, yet he’s making all these preparations to cover the issues affecting the Muslim ummah and go live to an audience. And here I was in London and all that was required of me was to get my act together and join him online. I would have access to an audience of people who I may otherwise never come across my article [George Clooney is right: Boycott Brunei-owned hotels. Then?].

How could I drag my feet? Isn’t this what I learnt from my teachers in the hizb from my earliest days of dawah that the one carrying dawah is always trying to reach new audiences? That that is what we remember the Prophet (alayihi salam) and the sahaba did in Makah? How they went to the marketplace, to Safa and Marwa, to people’s homes in order to convey this new message of Islam, a message of hope for mankind - revealed by the Lord of mankind? And isn’t that what we need to follow as we seek to revive this noble ummah today?

Ready to roll

OK, so the technology was up, Skype was fine, the mic check worked OK but the light in the room didn't look great. Aaaarggh. What do I do? I can’t kick my mother-in-law out of the living room. Afterall, she let me marry her daughter :) . So I’m stuck in the room. 

What if I sit here? What if I sit there? Move the clothes on the hanger from over there to there? I adjust things and finally settle on a position. The picture on the laptop’s webcam wasn’t great, would the picture on the phone be better? Oh, no decent tripod here. OK, laptop would have to do. The topic was hot so people are more forgiving of poor quality video if they are really interested in a burning issue.

I look at my article from the previous night and refresh the points in my head. Since this will be a discussion, how long do we have and is it live? These questions swirl in my head and I message Bilal for answers.

Quick research

I go to the BBC website and notice there have been further developments of this story. Now some protesters against Brunei are calling for UK universities to revoke honorary degrees given to the Sultan of Brunei. Other protesters are calling for the sultan to be stripped of two honorary appointments awarded by the Queen: he is an air chief marshal in the Royal Air Force and an admiral of the Royal Navy.

It shows you the strong relations the Brunei royal family has with the UK royal family - and the UK royal spokesman is ducking the issue saying the advice to give such honours lies with the government and the Queen merely acts on the government’s advice. They cleverly passed the ball to the government. 

UK Brunei relations

The truth is that the UK has benefited immensely from the ummah’s wealth that the Sultan of Brunei and others have invested in the UK over many years. Hence the government will be keen to continue having warm relations despite the current furore over shariah law. I then also saw an article where Emily Thornberry, the Labour party’s foreign affairs spokesperson has called for Brunei to be thrown out of the commonwealth. Why Brunei and other former British colonies still seek to be in this colonial club is baffling. I guess that’s what it means to still have a colonised mindset, clinging to your former oppressors.

Going live

As the time to go live approached, the skype call from Bilal Abdul Kareem comes through. I can hear him chatting to the audio and video technical brothers at his side. They are adjusting microphone levels, dealing with sound issues and some of the other things that go into putting on a live show with people across two continents. I put up a facebook post saying I would be live with Bilal Abdul Kareem shortly talking about Clooney’s calls to boycott Brunei.

Then we are live and I quickly share the livestream on my own facebook page so people could join in and comment. He introduces the show and away we go. People have logged in from across the world. In the question and answer session after the interview, someone from Brunei was watching and posted a comment which Bilal Abdul Kareem read out. Twenty four hours earlier, my article had not been finished, and now here I was with an opportunity to reach even someone from Brunei with the points I was trying to make. Alhamdulillah. You can watch the show here. 

Exploring the issues

Why is Brunei implementing aspects of the sharia? Will it go the full way? What about the secular agenda and the ummah’s role in standing up to it? What happens when shariah is partly implemented like in Brunei or Saudi? How the Islamic ummah is the last bulwark against the global secular agenda. How the LGBT issue is being pushed in Muslim schools in Birmingham UK just as Muslims in Brunei are also been told to accept this agenda as well.

How Islam’s issue is not with LGBT per say but with anything outside of marriage between man and woman because guidance from the Creator teaches us that that is the only framework for fulfilling relations in society. These were some of the many issues we covered.

The 30 minutes went by quickly, and then it was a wrap. After we went of air, a quick chat with Bilal Abdul Kareem. He asked what other projects I was working on and I told him we had a confident ‘Muslim campaign’ and some other things. I’m also in the process of setting up a website. We ended by motivating each other to keep doing this work insha’Allah and to call on each other when needed.

Phew. That was one roller coaster morning which turned into a roller coaster afternoon. Now I could go get a bite. 

Visitors from Germany

Interestingly, a few hours ago on Saturday, I had been sitting with brothers who came from Germany to visit us. They were asking me questions about dawah: how to stay motivated, what focus to have, what skills to develop e.t.c.. Asking me questions? Yeh. If brothers are younger than you and you’re no longer seen to be a bacha (that’s urdu for a young boy!), then you will be asked questions. 

I had stressed to the brothers that for the dawah to Islam, we all have talents which Allah (swt) has blessed us with in order to convey the message of Islam. Some people love writing, some love speaking, some are great organisers and can plan amazing events and conferences, and some are great at bringing people together. Some of you are great designers. Yes, even you reading this right now. 

You have some amazing skills and this Deen needs you. This Deen is a collective and in order to educate and motivate our ummah to live by Islam and re-establish it in state and society once again, we all must put time and effort in learning our Deen, and developing those skills that enable us to convey Islam to those around us in the most powerful and convincing way - seeking the pleasure of Allah (swt).

And through some of those deeds, Allah (swt) may enable us to enter His Jannah. Getting better at conveying Islam to revive our ummah needs to be one of the things that we dedicate our lives to.

This morning, despite my initial reservations, I was given an opportunity and a platform to convey Islam to an audience I normally wouldn’t meet - thanks to Bilal Abdul Kareem and his crew in Syria. May Allah accept these efforts from them and us. Ameen

So which skills are you going to improve in order to convey Islam? What are the many ways we can convey Islam? I’d love to hear your comments below.

Taji Mustafa