[Senate Hearing 114-706]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
S. Hrg. 114-706
THE IDEOLOGY OF ISIS
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HEARING
before the
COMMITTEE ON
HOMELAND SECURITY AND GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS
UNITED STATES SENATE
ONE HUNDRED FOURTEENTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
JUNE 21, 2016
__________
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COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY AND GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS
RON JOHNSON, Wisconsin Chairman
JOHN McCAIN, Arizona THOMAS R. CARPER, Delaware
ROB PORTMAN, Ohio CLAIRE McCASKILL, Missouri
RAND PAUL, Kentucky JON TESTER, Montana
JAMES LANKFORD, Oklahoma TAMMY BALDWIN, Wisconsin
MICHAEL B. ENZI, Wyoming HEIDI HEITKAMP, North Dakota
KELLY AYOTTE, New Hampshire CORY A. BOOKER, New Jersey
JONI ERNST, Iowa GARY C. PETERS, Michigan
BEN SASSE, Nebraska
Christopher R. Hixon, Staff Director
David S. Luckey, Director of Homeland Security
Elizabeth E. McWhorter, Senior Professional Staff Member
Gabrielle A. Batkin, Minority Staff Director
John P. Kilvington, Minority Deputy Staff Director
Harlan C. Geer, Minority Senior Professional Staff Member
Eric K. Hanson, Minority U.S. Army Detailee
Laura W. Kilbride, Chief Clerk
Benjamin C. Grazda, Hearing Clerk
C O N T E N T S
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Opening statements:
Page
Senator Johnson.............................................. 1
Senator Carper............................................... 2
Senator Ayotte............................................... 16
Senator Tester............................................... 17
Senator Heitkamp............................................. 19
Senator Peters............................................... 21
Senator Baldwin.............................................. 23
Senator Lankford............................................. 25
Senator Booker............................................... 26
Prepared statements:
Senator Johnson.............................................. 35
Senator Carper............................................... 36
WITNESS
Tuesday, June 21, 2016
Hassan Hassan, Resident Fellow, Tahrir Institute for Middle East
Policy, and Co-Author, ``ISIS: Inside the Army of Terror''..... 4
Tarek Elgawhary, Ph.D., Director Religious Studies Programs,
World Organization for Resource Development and Education...... 6
Subhi Nahas, Chairman of the Board, Spectra Project.............. 8
Nadia Murad, Human Rights Activist............................... 9
Alphabetical List of Witnesses
Elgawhary, Tarek.:
Testimony.................................................... 6
Prepared statement........................................... 74
Hassan, Hassan:
Testimony.................................................... 4
Prepared statement with attachment........................... 38
Murad, Nadia:
Testimony.................................................... 9
Prepared statement........................................... 80
Nahas, Subhi:
Testimony.................................................... 8
Prepared statement........................................... 78
APPENDIX
Responses to post-hearing questions for the Record
Mr. Hassan................................................... 83
Mr. Elgawhary................................................ 85
Mr. Nahas.................................................... 90
Ms. Murad.................................................... 91
THE IDEOLOGY OF ISIS
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TUESDAY, JUNE 21, 2016
U.S. Senate,
Committee on Homeland Security
and Governmental Affairs,
Washington, DC.
The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:04 a.m., in
room SD-342, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Ron Johnson,
Chairman of the Committee, presiding.
Present: Senators Johnson, Portman, Lankford, Ayotte,
Ernst, Carper, McCaskill, Tester, Baldwin, Heitkamp, Booker,
and Peters.
OPENING STATEMENT OF CHAIRMAN JOHNSON
Chairman Johnson. Good morning. This hearing will come to
order.
We do have one witness who parked over at Union Station. He
is making his way over here. I thought we would get going, and
he can join us when he gets here.
I want to thank the witnesses for appearing, for your time,
and for your testimonies.
The mission statement of this Committee--you have heard it,
repeatedly, but I will repeat it again--is to enhance the
economic and national security of America. On the homeland
security side, one of our top four priorities is, certainly,
doing whatever we can to keep our homeland safe--to counter
Islamic terror.
The goal of every hearing, from my standpoint--coming from
a manufacturing background, I solved a lot of problems. The
first step in solving a problem is admitting you have one--
properly identifying it, defining it, but really facing
reality. And so, the goal of every hearing is to lay out a
reality, so that, certainly, the Members of the Committee and
the people in the audience understand what we are dealing with,
in terms of a particular problem.
Today's hearing is our eighth hearing dealing with some
form or component of the threat we face from Islamic terror. It
is a harsh reality. It is one I wish was not true. It is one I
wish we did not have to face. But, we have to.
We are going to be hearing testimonies today that will be
hard to hear. It will be hard to hear, but they are testimonies
that, I think, are incredibly important for us to hear.
So, again, I thank the witnesses for appearing. I would ask
that my written statement be entered into the record,\1\
without objection.
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\1\ The prepared statement of Senator Johnson appears in the
Appendix on page 35.
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It is important for us to understand that Islamic
terrorists declared war on the United States. Quite honestly,
Islamic terrorists declared war on the civilized world. We did
not declare war on them. They declared war on us.
I cannot exactly point to the date, but, certainly, one
that is pretty visible was the first attempt to bring down the
Twin Towers at the World Trade Center. That was on February 26,
1993. And, the fact that we did not face the full reality,
right there and then, I think, eventually led to the fact that
we then faced the tragedy of the attack on September 11, 2001
(9/11), a terrorist attack where almost 3,000 Americans were
slaughtered.
Now, there are two ways to end a war--only two ways: either
one side defeats the other or both sides decide to lay down
their arms. The tragic events of yet another terror attack,
inspired by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), on this
country, in Orlando, Florida, has proven Islamic terrorists are
not laying down their arms. So, the only way we are going to
end this war and the only way we are going to keep our homeland
safe and return peace to the civilized world, is if we defeat
Islamic terrorists--if we defeat ISIS.
Now, on September 10, 2014, President Obama laid out
America's goal, as it relates to ISIS. It is pretty simply
stated: to degrade and, ultimately, defeat them. That was 22
months ago.
In his testimony last week, before the Senate Foreign
Relations Committee (SFRC), Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)
Director John Brennan laid out the reality, as it relates to
our success--or lack thereof--in our war on ISIS. And, he
testified--and this is a quote--that ``ISIS remains a
formidable, resilient, and largely cohesive enemy,'' and that
``our efforts have not reduced [their] terrorism capability and
their global reach.''
Now, that is a depressing reality after 22 months, but it
is a reality we have to face.
Again, I just want to thank the witnesses. Do not hold
back. Lay out the reality. Make sure that, certainly, the
Senators on this dais, as well as the American people,
understand the threat--the enemy we face--and why it is just
crucial that we actually defeat them. I wish they would lay
down their arms. I wish they would declare peace. But, it does
not seem like that is going to happen.
With that, I will turn it over to my Ranking Member,
Senator Carper.
OPENING STATEMENT OF RANKING MEMBER CARPER
Senator Carper. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
First of all, thank you for delaying this hearing for a
week, so that our witnesses could be assembled and we could
have more time to prepare. We welcome each of you. Thank you
for coming and sharing with us your stories and your
perspectives. They are valued, and we are delighted that you
could come.
I want to just follow up, very briefly, on how the fight
against ISIS is going. I went over a map of that part of the
world, today, and the United States--and our coalition forces,
which now number about 60 nations--have recaptured almost 50
percent of the land that ISIS once held in Iraq and in Syria.
Almost 50 percent. I think we are up about 47 percent. ISIS has
also lost 20 percent of the land it once held in Syria. Ramadi
and Tikrit were key victories for the U.S.-backed Iraqi forces.
And, last Friday, Iraqi forces--ground forces--captured the
city center of Fallujah and are now working to clear out the
last few pockets of resistance in that city. And, that is only
about 20 miles to 25 miles west of Baghdad.
As we speak, Kurdish, Iraqi, and Syrian democratic forces,
backed by the U.S. Special Operations Forces (SOF), are making
preparations to retake ISIS's key strongholds in Mosul and
Raqqa. We have killed some 25,000 ISIS fighters and more than
120 key ISIS leaders. We have cut ISIS funds by a third or
more. We have literally destroyed hundreds of millions of
dollars in cash that they were hoarding, and we have reduced,
by a dramatic amount, their ability to realize profits from oil
reserves and resources in that part of the world.
We have, drastically, slowed the flow of foreign recruits
from a high of about 2,000 a month, in 2014, to 200 a month,
today. And, that also goes for young Americans who have sought
to travel and join ISIS. About 1 year ago, every month, about
10 Americans were leaving this country to join ISIS. Today,
that number is one per month. And, at home, the Federal Bureau
of Investigations (FBI) is cracking down on recruits as well.
And, over the past 2 years, the FBI has arrested 88 individuals
on ISIS-related charges.
I was a naval flight officer (NFO) for 23 years--combined
active and reserve duty. I served 5 years in a hot war in
Southeast Asia--I know a little bit about fighting wars--and
another 18 years, right up to the end of the Cold War, as a P-3
Orion aircraft mission commander. And, one of the ways we are
going to win this fight is not by ourselves. There is not an
appetite in this country for putting boots on the ground. But,
there is an appetite for working with the coalition of
countries, throughout the region and around the world, and that
is what we are doing. And, I believe we are making progress. Is
it perfect? Are we where we want to be? Is this where we want
to go? No, it is not. But, I think we are making progress.
The other thing I want to say is that, last Saturday, 9
days ago--10 days ago, my wife and I went up to New York. We
have a son who lives in that area--in the city--and he took us,
for Father's Day and for his mom's birthday, to the 9/11
Memorial Museum, which is located right on the location where
the Twin Towers once stood. I was reminded there, as we saw the
faces and the names and as we heard the voices of the family
members of some of the 3,000 people who died that day--I was
reminded of the way we responded to that tragedy. In this room,
we helped to create the National Commission on Terrorist
Attacks Upon the United States (9/11 Commission). In this room,
we received some 40 recommendations from the bipartisan group--
the 9/11 Commission--presented to us by Tom Kean, former
Governor of New Jersey, and presented to us by Lee Hamilton,
former Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee--co-
chairs of the 9/11 Commission. They presented to us, after
months and months of work, some 40 recommendations that they
came to, unanimously, on what we could do to reduce the
likelihood that these kinds of attacks would occur again. We
adopted, maybe, 80 percent of them--again, almost unanimously,
and then set about implementing them.
The response to that tragedy was bipartisan. It was a
unified approach, and I think, ultimately, it has been
successful. Ultimately, it has been successful. And, when you
compare that response to the response to the tragedy in
Orlando, it could not be more different. It could not be more
different.
My hope, today, is that we are going to have the kind of
conversation, with all of you, that will enable us to better
improve this fight--and this is a fight that we are going to
win--the fight against ISIS. And, we have a lot of allies that
happen to be, not just folks in this country and not just
people who might be Catholic or Protestant, but people of all
faiths, including the Muslim faith. And, together, we are going
to prevail.
Thank you so much. And, Mr. Chairman, I would ask unanimous
consent, if I could, that the rest of my statement be entered
into the record.\1\ Thank you.
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\1\ The prepared statement of Senator Carper appears in the
Appendix on page 36.
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Chairman Johnson. Without objection.
It is the tradition of this Committee to swear in
witnesses, so if you will all rise and raise your right hand.
Do you swear the testimony you will give before this Committee
will be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth,
so help you, God?
Ms. Murad. Yes.
Mr. Nahas. I do.
Mr. Hassan. I do.
Mr. Elgawhary. I do.
Chairman Johnson. Please be seated.
Our first witness is Hassan Hassan. Mr. Hassan is an
associate fellow at the Tahrir Institute for Middle East Policy
(TIMEP). Mr. Hassan co-authored ``ISIS: Inside the Army of
Terror.'' In 2008, he started working in Abu Dhabi in
journalism and research, focusing on Syria, Iraq, and the Gulf
States and studying Islamist, Salafist, and jihadist movements
in the wider region. Mr. Hassan.
TESTIMONY OF HASSAN HASSAN,\2\ RESIDENT FELLOW, TAHRIR
INSTITUTE FOR MIDDLE EAST POLICY, AND CO-AUTHOR, ``ISIS: INSIDE
THE ARMY OF TERROR''
Mr. Hassan. Thank you, Chairman Johnson, Ranking Member
Carper, and Members of the Committee.
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\2\ The prepared statement of Mr. Hassan appears in the Appendix on
page 38.
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By way of introduction, I also want to add that I come from
an ISIS-controlled, area that is still controlled today. I have
also interviewed dozens of ISIS members for my book and for
other research. And, I want to say this: This is not a
sectarian war. The very people that ISIS claims to represent
are victims of its brutality just as much as everyone else.
This is the reality felt on a daily basis. When family and
friends go to the market and see severed heads on pipes, when
ISIS condemns its Sunni opponents--people that they claim to
represent--as apostates--they burn them alive, they stab their
hearts before they shoot them, and when they display their dead
bodies for days in central squares--when it says to its fellow
Sunnis, ``It does not matter if you pray, if you fast on
Ramadan, or if you turn your face toward Mecca and pray, we
will still kill you as long as you do not pledge allegiance to
us.'' Not far from where I come from, in my area, called Deir
Ezzor, ISIS killed 700 Sunni villagers, in a matter of days,
because they dared to stand up against the group.
And, I want to move on to say that, as a belief system,
those who believe in the sort of ISIS ideology are a minority,
not only in the Muslim world but also within the group. During
my research, I found that members come in six categories:
One, longstanding religious radicals who deviate even from
al-Qaeda. For example, they believe that there is no sanctity
of life. Unlike al-Qaeda, which, for example, justifies killing
civilians--but only as collateral damage--ISIS considers
killing civilians, themselves, as the preferred outcome. In
fact, just a month ago--exactly a month ago, the spokesperson
for ISIS said--when he called for sympathizers in the West, in
Europe, and in the United States to launch attacks, he said,
``I receive complaints from people--sympathizers--saying we
could not find military targets and we are afraid to kill
civilians.'' And, he said, ``There is no such thing as innocent
civilians in the West.'' And, in fact, he moved on to say, ``We
prefer that you kill civilians.'' And, he said, ``I do not have
time to justify that,'' basically. He did not even give the
justification during the statement.
And, the second category of people who join ISIS are young
zealots, who are victims of the first category--people who are
between age 12 and 17, people who are drawn to this idea of a
caliphate, and so on and so forth. They are brainwashed. They
are taught Islam in a way that ISIS understands, which distorts
a lot of things. And, because people do not have religious
knowledge, they hear a lot about the events as well as the
traditions that ISIS relates for the first time.
And, there is a third category, which is very important:
people who are drawn to ISIS's political ideology--not
religious one--and this is a major problem, not only within
ISIS, but, I think, in the region--people who are drawn to this
political ideology, not only for ISIS, but for al-Qaeda and for
other Islamist groups, because they think there is political
stagnation in the region and only these groups can actually
shake up the political order in the region.
And, I think Omar Mateen belongs to this category of people
that are only superficially influenced by this organization.
He, obviously, did not follow their way of life, but he was
still animated, probably, by this idea of ISIS.
The other categories are those who are drawn to the group
because of its military success, its model of governance, an
attraction to its brutality, or, simply, they are profiteers.
But, the group--and this is important. The group swims in a sea
of political failures in the region--and that is where we
should focus. It is not a surprise, for example, that ISIS
emerged in Iraq and in Syria, countries that suffered
unimaginable brutality and violence over the past decade, in
the case of Iraq, and half of a decade, in the case of Syria.
The group has built its narrative around the idea of Sunni
victimization. It benefitted from the brutal reality, in both
Iraq and Syria, to say that Sunnis are, systematically, under
attack by Iranian-backed militias or governments in those two
countries, that the two greatest superpowers in the world are
helping both of them, and that there are traitors--apostates,
in other words--in our midst who help them.
It is important--without downplaying the genocidal acts of
ISIS--to highlight that the regime of Bashar al-Assad, in
Damascus, had carried out almost all of the atrocities--
probably, without an exception--that ISIS has committed even
before ISIS arrived in Syria. In 2012, for example, pro-
government militias in Syria stormed villages, slaughtered
children and women, and smashed--using rocks--the heads of
condemned people.
I just want to conclude by saying and emphasizing that ISIS
thrives in this context and should be defeated in this context
in order to stem its international appeal. This can only happen
at the hands of the very people that ISIS claims to represent.
Thank you very much.
Chairman Johnson. Thank you, Mr. Hassan.
Our next witness is Dr. Tarek Elgawhary. Dr. Elgawhary is
Director of Religious Studies Programs for the World
Organization for Resource Development and Education (WORDE).
Dr. Elgawhary also serves as the Chief Executive Officer (CEO)
of the Coexist Corporation and as a trustee of the Coexist
Foundation. He has a Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.) from
Princeton in Islamic law and he studied traditional Islamic
sciences at Al-Azhar Seminary in Cairo, Egypt. Dr. Elgawhary.
TESTIMONY OF TAREK ELGAWHARY, PH.D.,\1\ DIRECTOR, RELIGIOUS
STUDIES PROGRAMS, WORLD ORGANIZATION FOR RESOURCE DEVELOPMENT
AND EDUCATION
Mr. Elgawhary. Senator Johnson, Senator Carper, and other
Members of the Committee, thank you very much for this
opportunity. I would like to make very brief introductory
remarks and, maybe, save the other discussion points for the
question and answer portion.
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\1\ The prepared statement of Mr. Elgawhary appears in the Appendix
on page 74.
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I would like to add to what Senator Johnson said, in the
beginning, that, before ISIS or the Islamic State of Iraq and
the Levant (ISIL) and other related groups declared war on our
homeland, they declared war on Islam. And, this is not only a
threat to our homeland--not only a threat to our national
security, but an existential threat to our religion.
Normative Islam, in both its Sunni and Shia expressions, is
defined by a very robust, interpretive methodology. That is
what you go to seminary to be trained in.
Very briefly, this interpretive methodology requires one to
understand the divine text--to understand the text of the Quran
and to understand the various statements of the prophet. There
are 6,236 verses in the Quran. There are about 60,000 to 70,000
prophetic texts and their different narrations. There are over
100,000 narrations of these prophetic texts.
Understanding the divine text means understanding about a
dozen different sciences, beginning with Arabic grammar,
syntax, morphology, and logic--all of these are different
interpretive tools that we use to understand what the text
actually means in the context in which it was revealed.
The second thing is to understand the context that we live
in now--the current moment--understanding full well that people
change, times change, circumstance change, and location and
place change. How does one fast the month of Ramadan in the
northern latitudes, which the early Muslim generations never
experienced? How do we deal with usury in the light of fiat
currency--currency that is not backed by gold or silver
bullion--and so on and so forth? So then, that further adds the
idea that one needs to understand the current moment that we
live in as well as its complexity and its changing.
And then, the third aspect of this interpretive paradigm
is, how do we link the divine text into the current moment in
which we live--and that, as we were taught, is a talent. Not
everyone is endowed with that type of talent.
Violent and extremist groups, like ISIL, have no
interpretation, whatsoever--nor do they have a fundamental
understanding of Islam. They are unlettered warmongers who
have, in essence, created a parallel religion. Yet, this
parallel religion that they call to is no more Islamic than a
pool with one lemon squeezed in it is lemonade.
And, because of the gross misunderstanding of the primary
text and because of their lack of a robust interpretive
methodology, the good news is, we are able to identify what is
so wrong with their thinking. And, in my work and in my
analysis, I have been able to deduce about a half dozen or so
main concepts that they have, and I have been able to trace
them back to a certain cluster of sources that are used by
every single Islamist extremist group from the middle of the
20th Century until our time, today. And, in that, I am able to
isolate those concepts. We are able to provide a counter-
narrative and deal with it.
Now, I do not have an army at my disposal. I do not own any
weapons, whatsoever. I leave that to law enforcement. What I do
have is, I have my intellect and I have my scholarly training.
And, I can employ that to provide a robust counter-narrative to
inoculate our youth, to protect the next generation, and to
make it absolutely, unequivocally clear that what ISIL
represents and what they stand for has nothing to do with the
religion, whatsoever.
Thank you.
Chairman Johnson. Thank you, Dr. Elgawhary.
Our next witness is Subhi Nahas. Mr. Nahas is an activist
for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) rights, who
fled Syria, in 2012, after receiving threats from soldiers and
jihadists because of his sexual preference. Mr. Nahas fled,
first to Lebanon and then to Turkey, where he applied at the
United Nations (U.N.) for refugee status. He was granted
refugee status after a year and has since moved to the United
States. In August 2015, he testified before the United Nations
Security Council's summit on LGBT rights in Syria. Mr. Nahas.
TESTIMONY OF SUBHI NAHAS,\1\ CHAIRMAN OF THE BOARD, SPECTRA
PROJECT
Mr. Nahas. Chairman Johnson, Ranking Member Carper, and
Members of the Committee, thank you for offering me the honor
and the opportunity to be here, today, to share my story in the
context of the larger events happening around the world--and
here in the United States.
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\1\ The prepared statement of Mr. Nahas appears in the Appendix on
page 78.
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My personal story mirrors the stories of many other LGBT
individuals. One day, I was heading to the university. An
organized group of militants accosted and threatened me, solely
because they perceived me as gay.
In the local mosque, it had been announced that they would
cleanse the city of all ``sodomites.'' ISIS had not yet been
formed, yet militants and the regime targeted all gay men in
the country. I fled from my home country of Syria in 2012.
After living in Lebanon for 6 months, I moved to Turkey.
My history of activism for LGBT rights meant that, even in
Turkey, I once again found myself in danger. Extremist groups,
like al-Qaeda and ISIS, were gaining strength and access there.
Although I was employed for 2 years in a senior position with
Save the Children International, I was still not safe because
of my sexual identity.
A Syrian friend informed me that I had been targeted for
death. My director at Save the Children helped me register with
the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), to
be resettled to a safer country.
Prior to my resettlement, I completed an extremely thorough
screening process, which included testifying, under oath, in
front of an officer from the Department of Homeland Security
(DHS), security checks, medical tests, and a cultural
orientation. After this 10-month process, I was relocated to
San Francisco, California.
In August 2015, a few months after resettlement, I spoke
before members of the U.N. Security Council about the threats
to sexual minorities in the Middle East during a historic event
organized by the United States and Chile. As I stated during
the meeting and to the press, alongside Ambassador Samantha
Power, ISIS is simply one of many threats to the LGBT community
in the Middle East.
Reports from recent refugees of Syria say that ISIS and
other groups actively target gay people. It is enough just to
be perceived as gay by them to be arrested, tortured, or raped.
Then, this perceived gay person can be thrown off of a building
to a cheerful crowd that will stone them to death if they are
not dead.
While ISIS is viewed, in the public eye, as the most
notorious group in Syria and Iraq, it may come as a surprise
that their methodology--when it comes to the treatment of LGBT
people--is very similar to many other groups, including
governments, themselves. We know that many groups, including
ISIS, target and kill gay people in Syria. They just use
different methods to kill.
While good fortune has allowed me to begin a new, much
safer life as a refugee in the United States, the recent event
in Orlando shows that LGBT people still face huge challenges
here. The ``New York Times'' reported on June 16, ``Even before
the shooting rampage at a gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida,
lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people were already the
most likely targets of hate crimes in America, according to an
analysis of data collected by the FBI.''
Put simply, efforts to discredit the poisonous ideology of
ISIS and other extremist groups--while extremely important--are
insufficient to completely erase the threat of anti-LGBT
violence, either here in this country or abroad. Rather, we
must also commit to combating homophobia, xenophobia, and
bigotry in all of its various forms, regardless of the source.
In order to deal with these issues, I recommend two things:
One, through the bridges and the convening power unique to
the United Nations, support actions that promote, not only
human rights for LGBT persons, but also love, inclusion,
tolerance, and equality among religions and communities. This
requires continued U.S. leadership at forums, like the U.N.
Human Rights Council, and supporting funding for U.N.
institutions, like the UNHCR. Statements, such as the one
issued by the U.N. Security Council, on Monday, condemning the
Orlando attack, are critical. This statement, specifically,
denounced, for the first time, violence targeting people ``as a
result of their sexual orientation''--and it received support
from Russia and Egypt. This will make it more difficult for
those countries and others to argue that sexual orientation is
not a recognized international human right.
Two, we need partnerships across communities that can
address the serious negative consequences of ISIS's ideology,
including assisting the communities affected by it. For
example, I have launched the Spectra Project, which assists
LGBT refugees in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region
by providing shelter and education, while also promoting, in
the United States and abroad, a more positive image of LGBT
people.
Thank you again for this opportunity.
Chairman Johnson. Thank you, Mr. Nahas.
Our final witness is Nadia Murad. Ms. Murad is a Yazidi
rights activist and one of the thousands of Yazidi women who
were abducted and enslaved by ISIS. Since her escape, Nadia has
been outspoken about her experiences to draw attention to the
ongoing genocide. Earlier this year, the Iraqi Government
nominated her for the 2016 Nobel Peace Prize.
Ms. Murad. And, I will mention that Murad, coincidentally,
is her interpreter. Thank you.
TESTIMONY OF NADIA MURAD,\1\ HUMAN RIGHTS ACTIVIST
Ms. Murad [Interpreted.] Mr. Chairman and Senators, I am
very grateful and very happy to be testifying among you. And,
thank you for the opportunity.
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\1\ The prepared statement of Ms. Murad appears in the Appendix on
page 80.
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The first thing I would like to tell you is that I was
heartbroken when I witnessed the crimes in Orlando, because,
for the same reason--for no reason, they were killed and they
were abused--just the way I was.
But, I was not surprised by this, because I knew, if ISIS
was not stopped, they would deliver their crimes everywhere.
When I was captured, I was 19 years old. I was one of the
6,000 Yazidi women and children who were taken into captivity.
This happened in August 2014--more than a year and a half
ago, now--and ISIS attacked the Yazidis for one reason: because
they are considered infidels, not ``People of the Book.'' And,
their interpretation is that the men must be killed and the
women and the children must be enslaved.
And, this is what they applied to us. Thousands of men,
women, and children were killed in the first day of the attack
in Sinjar. In the hottest days of the summer, more than 100,000
Yazidis were stranded on the mountain.
It is true that crimes were committed in Iraq and Syria,
but what happened to the Yazidis was different. I was one of
the girls who were enslaved in Mosul. I was one, among the
thousands of women who were taken to Mosul.
The first thing they did, in Mosul, after distributing us
to the fighters, was to take us to the court and have us
convert by putting our hand on the Quran. It is true that I was
raped, sold, and abused, but I was lucky. I wish that everyone,
from the 6,000 women and children, was like me, because girls
at the age of 9 were raped as well.
In only 2 hours, in my village, more than 700 men were
killed. Among them were six of my brothers--and the same day my
mother was killed, too, for no reason except for having a
different religion.
I am not saying that ISIS represents Islam, but ISIS is
using Islam to commit these crimes. And, this needs to stop as
an ideology, first. Many people in the area, they had the
choice to leave when ISIS came, but they were happy to join
ISIS, when they came.
There are many things for me to testify about--to tell you
today--just the time is limited and I do not speak English. I
wish I could tell you more.
I would like you to give me one more minute, if possible.
Chairman Johnson. Honestly, take your time. We want to hear
the story. Take whatever time it takes.
Ms. Murad [Interpreted.] This was committed against the
Yazidis, first--and it is still continuous, now. I delivered
this message to Egypt and to Kuwait, because what is happening
has been happening under the name of Islam.
People there, they had sympathy. And, they said, ``This
does not represent us.'' But, we have not seen Daesh labeled as
an infidel group within Islam--not from any Muslim country.
And, I asked the leader of the Al-Azhar Seminary, in Cairo, to
say that ISIS is an infidel group within Islam--and he has not
committed to it yet.
Many families in Iraq and Syria, when the Yazidi women and
girls were escaping to these houses, they could have helped
them. But, no, they seized them and they gave them back to the
militants.
Daesh will not give up on their weapons unless we force
them to give away their weapons. Before all, the Arab countries
must stop the flow of their citizens into Daesh and prevent
them from joining Daesh. And, we have to prevent the supplies
of weapons and money to them. And, we must prevent their oil
from being sold. And then, we have to fight them, literally,
after that.
The Yazidis and all other religious minorities in Iraq,
they are unable to protect themselves in Iraq and Syria. If a
country as strong as your country cannot protect the citizens
in Orlando, in Belgium, or in France, how can a small minority,
like us, protect ourselves while we are in the heart of the
land where the radicals are?
There are many things for me to ask you, because, for 2
years, we have been waiting--but the list is just too long for
me to ask you.
I know what is going on now with the more than 3,200 Yazidi
women, girls, and children who are still in captivity. When I
was held, for every hour that passed, I was very happy and
grateful for that hour if I was not sold and if I was not
raped. One hour was counted for me--and every hour was counting
for me. I was freed, but I do not enjoy the feeling of the
freedom, because those who committed these crimes have not been
held accountable.
What happened to the Yazidi people was a genocide. Just the
first day, thousands were killed. They forced the displacement
of 80 percent of the Yazidi people, who do not have the joy to
have a tent to live in. And, they are holding more than 1,000
Yazidi children, in Syria, to be trained to have the exact same
ideology that the crimes were committed under. Because of the
children who were, at the age of nine--who did not enjoy their
childhood and became slaves--and for the people who drowned in
the Aegean Sea--and that is also a crime of ISIS, because those
people escaped because of ISIS. Because thousands of our
children also have been prevented from going to school--and
this is all because of them.
Today, I am saying that small religious minorities, such as
the Yazidis, Christians, and other minorities, if they are not
protected, they will be wiped out. We only are seeking peace.
We want to live with dignity wherever we are.
As a little girl, I had a dream. And, that dream was to
open a beauty salon. And, I was prevented from accomplishing
that dream, and that is the exact same story of thousands of
children and people like me, who were prevented from continuing
to pursue their dreams.
Racism should not be practiced against Islam, but these
crimes have been committed in the name of Islam--and Muslims
must be the first ones to resist this. And, I do not like
anyone to attack an entire religion--for example, the family
that liberated me, in Mosul. But, at the same time, this is
being committed under the name of Islam.
There is so much time that is needed for me to tell my
entire story, but now I will stop. And, I will give you the
opportunity to ask any questions.
Chairman Johnson. Thank you, Ms. Murad. Thank you for your
courage in coming forward and testifying.
Let me just ask, did any of your family survive?
Ms. Murad [Interpreted.] Yes, two of my sisters, three of
my brothers, and some of my nephews and nieces. I think people
from my family and my extended family, they were killed or they
are missing.
Chairman Johnson. Could you just tell us how you escaped?
Ms. Murad [Interpreted.] I never believed I would be able
to escape, because--not me or the other girls--because we were
held in areas--it was just vastly occupied by ISIS. The first
couple of days, I tried to escape, because I could not hold on
anymore with the rape that was committed against me and the
insult that was committed against me--I could not take it
anymore. I decided to escape.
I attempted to escape, but I was not successful. I was
taken back, and I became a subject of rape by multiple people--
collective rape.
The second time I attempted to escape, I was successful.
And, a family in Mosul held me, and they made me an Islamic
identity document (ID). And, with that ID, I was able to escape
from Mosul.
Chairman Johnson. You mentioned there were 3,200 additional
Yazidi girls and women being held captive. Are they dispersed
throughout Syria and Iraq at this point in time?
Ms. Murad [Interpreted.] Yes, they are everywhere, because
they are not held in a specific place. What is happening is
that they are being sold--and their places will be changed from
one place to another.
Chairman Johnson. By the way, we are holding the
questioning rounds to 5 minutes, because we have so many
Members attending this.
Again, thank you, Ms. Murad.
I do want to go to Dr. Elgawhary--a real scholar of Islam.
Can you just explain, is there any way for us to understand--
how did adherents of this barbarity--this violence--how did it
get to that point? What happened?
Mr. Elgawhary. So, thank you, Nadia. And, Nadia was saying
that Daesh--they do not represent Islam, but they use Islam--
and she gave some examples. But, they are even using Islam
wrong. So, for example, they told her that she had to go to the
court and she had to swear on the Quran to become a Muslim.
But, that is not how you become a Muslim. You become a Muslim
by testifying, saying the testification of faith. So, even
small, mundane things they do not understand.
I just was so moved by what she said. And, it reminded me
that the prophetic text--the Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon
him--he said, ``Fear the supplication of the oppressed because
there is no veil between that supplication and the Lord.'' And,
he never mentioned that it is a Muslim or not a Muslim. And, he
said, ``I am the protector of the religious''--``I am the
defender of the religious minority on the Day of Judgment
against the Muslim that aggresses against the religious
minority.''
It is a big question that you asked, Senator Johnson, but,
basically, the way I see it is that they are taking certain
concepts--or certain phrases--and adding to it and
appropriating to it new meaning that does not exist. For
example, Nadia mentioned that one of the things they told her
was that Yazidis do not count as the ``People of the Book''--
that they are apostates. But, the concept of the ``People of
the Book,'' in Islamic law, is not proscriptive. It is
descriptive. It describes an organized religion that has a
legal code, that has a book--meaning sort of sacred text--and
so on and so forth. And, as Muslims expanded eastward out of
Arabia, they encountered Yazidis. These are communities that
have existed with Muslims--and co-existed with Muslims--since
the first generation of Islam, up until now.
And, all of the other Dharmic faiths--Hinduism, Buddhism,
Jainism, Shintoism, and Daoism--all of these religions--Muslim
scholars understood these as ``People of the Book,'' because it
is a description. It is not proscriptive. So, these differences
are how they misunderstand certain things.
The basic axis around which this thinking exists is this
concept of takfirism, or declaring people to be apostates. I am
an apostate--according to them--so, therefore, they can aggress
against me. Why am I an apostate? Because I do not agree with
what they agree on, I do not pledge allegiance to them, and so
on and so forth. And, with this tactic, they go on and on and
on.
But, one last thing. Nadia mentioned, when she asked the
sheikh of Al-Azhar, Dr. Ahmed el-Tayeb, in Cairo--why does the
senior leadership of Sunni Islam not declare ISIS as non-
Islamic--because I know this is a common question that I get--
our understanding of organizations like ISIS is that it is even
worse than apostasy, because there is no capital punishment for
apostasy. The Prophet said that these people are khawarij--they
are outliers. And, in all of his mercy, all of his love, and
all of his beautiful teachings, he said, ``Khawarij [foreign
language].'' He said that the khawarij are the ``dogs of
hellfire.'' And, he said, ``[foreign language],'' or ``Glad
tidings to those that fight them and kill them and are killed
in the process of killing them,'' about the khawarij--about the
outliers. So, it is even worse--it is even more of a derogatory
statement--a derogatory label--than being an apostate. And, it
is an obligation on all of us, in the family of Islam, to do
what we can to combat it with whatever tools that we have at
our disposal.
Chairman Johnson. Just one very quick question, for either
you or Mr. Hassan. Of the Muslim population--1.4 billion to 1.6
billion people--what percent of that population adheres to this
barbaric ideology? Do you have any sense of that, whatsoever?
Mr. Hassan. For me?
Chairman Johnson. Whoever has an estimate.
Mr. Hassan. ISIS does not need a lot of numbers. We have
seen this, recently, when they start being--like, when there is
a force that pushes them in a certain area, they can hold
territory with like 200 people. I think they are a small
minority. Even within the Syrian rebel groups, they are still a
smaller group than others. But, I think, because of the sheer
violence and brutality, they deter people--and they use the
word [foreign language] in their literature, which means
deterrence--with extreme violence and brutality. So, when they
kill one person, they make sure that 100 or 1,000 people see
that person being killed.
Chairman Johnson. Senator Carper.
Senator Carper. Thank you. Did you say we have 5 minutes?
Chairman Johnson. Yes, we were trying to keep it at 5
minutes. There are so many people here.
Senator Carper. OK. Again, our thanks to each one of you
for joining us today, and for sharing with us some parts of
your life that are not easily shared. And, we are deeply
grateful to each of you, but especially to you, Nadia. Thank
you.
Here, in the United States, we are, as you probably know,
people of many different religions. We are Protestant, we are
Catholic, we are Jewish, we are Muslim, we are Hindu, we are
Buddhist, and we are other religions as well. And, one of the
reasons why our country was established was because of the
concept and the nature of freedom of religion--people yearning,
not just to be free, but to be free to worship God as they saw
fit.
There are some people who take the Bible--most people in
America are probably Protestant and Catholic--most, but,
certainly, not all--but some people take verses of Scripture
out of the Bible and they twist them into things--in ways that
are not really meant to be done. And, there are people in our
own faith who bastardize our faith--they ``cherry-pick'' our
faith. A great example is, ``An eye for an eye, a tooth for a
tooth.'' People take that as an admonition to go out and wreak
vengeance on people that have wronged them. But, that same
verse of Scripture goes on to say, `` `Revenge is mine,' sayeth
the Lord.'' `` `Revenge is mine,' sayeth the Lord.''
There is another verse in Scripture that says, ``When I was
a stranger in your land, did you take me in? '' And, we have
some people in this country--some political leaders--I do not
know that they have read Matthew 25--whatever their religion
is--but there are some people in this country who have argued
that the United States needs to stop accepting, not just Syrian
refugees, but, in some cases, all Muslim refugees. And, in the
case of the Syrian refugees that they would not allow us to
accept, that included people who are not Muslim. They could be
of different faiths. They could be a Christian or they could be
a Jew--a variety of religions.
And, I would just ask--starting with you, Mr. Elgawhary--I
would start with you and just to ask, what are your opinions
about a ban on, we will say, all Syrian refugees--or even all
Muslim refugees? And, how would such a ban affect the ability,
in this country, to counter ISIS propaganda and ideology? Would
you go first?
Mr. Elgawhary. I am not really trained as a politician,
so----
Senator Carper. Neither are we. [Laughter.]
We are untrained.
Mr. Elgawhary. At the risk of saying or making a political
statement, I mean--I think, as an American, I understand----
Senator Carper. My question is: What are your thoughts
about how a ban on all Syrian refugees--or really all Muslim
refugees--how does that affect our ability as a country to
counter ISIS propaganda and ideology? That is my question.
Mr. Elgawhary. Well, I was going to say that I think, as I
understand our Nation, I think it is un-American not to accept
refugees. And, we have, I think, the legal, political, and,
more importantly, moral authority to take in the people that we
can. And, this is what this ``E Pluribus Unum''--this is what
makes our Nation great. And, I think that, from a social
cohesion standpoint, societies that are more plural are
stronger.
I think that, by bringing in refugees, we will be able to
understand the problem more and see how we can help them more.
But, I think some sort of form of isolationism--or some sort of
rejection--will only increase the problem and make it fester
more.
Senator Carper. Good. Thank you.
Other witnesses, please--same question.
Mr. Hassan. Sure. I can say two things.
The first one is that, I try to keep in touch with people
who left Syria--and they now live in Germany and other
countries. And, I have seen how positive the message that
European countries--and the case of here--only recently here--
that they accepted them--and that was a positive sense. We only
hear good things from refugees. They praise the Germans and how
hospitable they are, and so on and so forth.
And, the second thing that we have to recognize is--I
think, especially for the United States--that the thousands of
Syrian refugees, who left Syria and are in Turkey and Europe or
are in the United States, have been instrumental in the fight
against ISIS. They provide intelligence, information, mapping,
and guidance. And, ISIS operates in these areas that--in
Eastern Syria, Northeastern Syria, and Northwestern Iraq--and
these people have been affected the most by violence--they were
driven out. There is a reason why they were helpful in the
fight against ISIS.
Senator Carper. Thank you.
Anyone else? Mr. Nahas, just very briefly.
Mr. Nahas. OK. From my experience, as a refugee, myself--I
went through the process and I would say that it is very highly
unlikely for the process to let in any terrorists that try to
come. It is a highly intense process that includes security
checks, background checks, a waiting period of at least one
year, and eyewitnesses. They ask you a lot of personal
questions. It is highly unlikely that a terrorist, or a person
who believes in these ideologies, would be able to pass
through.
Senator Carper. All right. Thank you.
Nadia, could you briefly respond to my question? Very
briefly, please.
Ms. Murad [Interpreted.] I would like, first, to say that
every country has the right to protect itself and to protect
its borders and its laws. But, the people who are escaping from
religious discrimination and genocide, they should not face
closed doors before them.
I would just like to say that, if the terrorists want to go
someplace, they can go--regardless of the process. And, some of
them have already immigrated.
Senator Carper. I think we have a moral imperative here. We
face, in this country, a moral imperative to be true to those
words that are written on the Statue of Liberty. We have a
moral imperative where they happen to be--whatever faith, we
have a moral imperative to Matthew 25: When you are a stranger
in our land that we take you in. But, we also have a moral
imperative to the people who live here and want to live in
safety and be able to live to be old and have kids and
grandchildren.
And so, I think our challenge here is to make sure that,
while we need to be true to our faith in allowing people who
are in distress, on the run, and haunted by their memories--we
need to be welcoming to them. We also, at the same time, have
to be mindful of the need to protect our safety. Sometimes they
are in conflict with one another.
The last thing I want to say--and, Dr. Elgawhary, you can
comment on this later, but my understanding is that every
religion--just about every religion, including Islam--has a
Golden Rule: Treat other people the way we want to be treated.
Is that true? And, is that not also true of Islam?
Mr. Elgawhary. Yes, it is.
Senator Carper. My view is, if all of us would sort of
abide by that, since that is part of the fabric of all of our
religions, we would all be a whole lot better off on this
planet.
Thank you.
Chairman Johnson. Thank you, Senator Carper. So, we equally
went over the time.
Now, I think we need to keep it to 5 minutes in order to be
respectful of all of the people here. So, Senator Ayotte.
OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR AYOTTE
Senator Ayotte. I want to thank the Chairman. I want to
thank all of you for being here. In particular, Mr. Nahas and
Ms. Murad, we are so sorry for what you have gone through. And,
your courage in coming forward here, today, is very important,
so that we can hear what you have endured--and it is horrific.
But, I wanted to follow up, Ms. Murad, on the issue that
actually you raised--and I would like to have Dr. Elgawhary
comment on it. And, that is, Doctor, you said that what Daesh
is doing is beyond apostate. You have described it as the
``dogs of hellfire.'' And, I would agree with that description.
But, what I want to understand is--to what Ms. Murad asked,
as we look at how the reaction should be from--for example, I
think she may have identified the Al-Azhar Seminary in Cairo,
which I believe you studied at, and which is a very important
seminary in Islam. Do you believe that leaders in this
seminary, and other leaders in the Muslim world, have described
and called out Daesh in the way that you have described it,
today--as forcefully as they should?
Mr. Elgawhary. Thank you, Senator. So, just a correction.
Those are not my words. I was quoting Prophet Muhammad. Prophet
Muhammad said that the outliers are the dogs of hellfire.
Senator Ayotte. Right, but, I think, to ask--what I want to
understand is--to really answer her question. Do you think that
leaders, in a position to influence, for what Islam truly
stands for, do you think that they have been forceful enough in
calling out--whether you call them ``dogs of hellfire'' or
``apostate''--however, how Daesh is warping--as you have
testified today--your religion?
Mr. Elgawhary. So, I think there is--yes and no. I think
there are definitely those who are very outspoken. One scholar
that comes to mind, who we have worked with, is Shaykh Muhammad
Yaqubi, himself a Syrian refugee, for all intents and
purposes--now living in Morocco. And, he has written a very
extensive fatwa, a nonbinding religious opinion, in English,
against ISIS. And, he actually makes the argument, which is a
valid argument, that Daesh or ISIS are, in fact, outside of the
folds of Islam.
But, if you have ever worked with scholars and academics,
they are a little bit slow on the uptake and not very good in
front of the camera. And, I think that one of the----
Senator Ayotte. We need leaders to----
Mr. Elgawhary. Well, that is one of the problems, I think--
one of the deficiencies--one of the weak points of Al-Azhar is
its communication capacity. In a former life, I actually helped
establish the Office of Communications for the Grand Mufti of
Egypt, between 2003 and 2007, before I went to Princeton--and
that was a coup. I mean, when I asked them, ``How do you deal
with journalism?'', they said, ``Oh, we call the police and we
arrest them.'' I said, ``No, no, no. You have to work with the
media, because, if you do not, what you are trying to say--what
the Mufti is trying to say--is not going to get out there.''
So, I think there is a lot of training that can happen to
help that. But, I agree with you. More needs to be done, and
more voices need to be heard.
Senator Ayotte. Thank you.
Ms. Murad, I wanted to say that I believe that Daesh has
engaged in war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide.
How important do you believe it is--you have put in your
written testimony, today, and you have also told us--how
important is it to formally recognize Daesh's actions as
genocide? And, I mean, with reference to the Yazidis and what
you have told us today about how they are treating the Yazidis.
Ms. Murad [Interpreted.] It is very important for us that
what happened to us be acknowledged as a genocide. On the 16th
of this month--just a few days ago--when the U.N. acknowledged
the genocide--for the Yazidis, who have been hopeless for the
past 2 years, this was the first time they started having some
hope.
I would like these crimes to be legally recognized by you
and I would like to be acknowledged. I would like you to look
into the crimes--the things that I have talked about today and
the things that Daesh has done--not secretly. They, publicly,
have said that they will do it--and they did it. And, I would
like you to look at these crimes and this evidence.
Senator Ayotte. I want to thank all of you for being here.
I would just say that there is a Senate resolution, Resolution
340, which would call this for what it is--a genocide. And, I
hope that we can come together and declare this a genocide. I
would like us, as a Congress, to come together and declare this
for what it is.
Thank you.
Chairman Johnson. Senator Tester.
OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR TESTER
Senator Tester. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to thank
all of you for your testimonies.
Dr. Elgawhary, I came in toward the last half of your
comments, but, one of the things you said, right at the very
end, was--and I just want you to confirm this--that ISIL has
nothing to do with religion. Did I hear you right?
Mr. Elgawhary. ISIS has nothing to do with Islam is what I
believe I said.
Senator Tester. OK. So tell me the difference really
quickly.
Mr. Elgawhary. I began by saying that normative Islam, in
its Sunni and Shia expressions, is defined by an interpretive
methodology.
Senator Tester. OK.
Mr. Elgawhary. And, I walked through a little bit about the
high level of what that is.
Senator Tester. Right.
Mr. Elgawhary. And, that the texts that we have--what we
believe to be divine texts--live in time. And, there is a
discursive tradition in how we interpret these verses and these
injunctions for the moment that we live in. But, ISIS, they
have no--they are unlettered. They are completely unlettered in
the religion and the fundamentals of the religion. Nor do they
have an interpretive methodology. So, what they conclude is
based on their own whims and desires, from what they are
reading prima facie--without understanding the text, itself.
Senator Tester. OK, gotcha. So, I keep coming back to why
these guys exist. There is absolutely a criminal element,
because we saw that in Paris and we saw it in Brussels. The
people belong to ISIL. There are also doctors, engineers, and
other well-educated folks that are a part of it that, quite
frankly, should not be a part of a twisted ideology, such as
this.
Could you tell me what about their ideology appeals to that
broad of a base, from crooks to professionals and everything in
between?
Mr. Elgawhary. I think, maybe, Hassan will know more,
because he has actually interviewed some of them. But, I mean,
intellectually or academically, I think that the first thing I
would point out is that I do not know if they, necessarily,
believe in what ISIS is saying or if they are coerced to
believe in what ISIS is saying, or what they are holding to be
true. I also think that----
Senator Tester. Coerced by force?
Mr. Elgawhary. Yes, coerced by them--by ISIL--and----
Senator Tester. So either you believe this or you are going
to die?
Mr. Elgawhary. Yes, exactly.
Senator Tester. That kind of coercion.
Mr. Elgawhary. As we heard from Nadia, for example--and
from other stories that have come out from ISIL-controlled
areas.
Senator Tester. OK.
Mr. Elgawhary. I also think that there is a spectrum of
extremist thought within Islam.
Senator Tester. OK.
Mr. Elgawhary. And, I think that it can start as something
sort of innocuous, but there is something wrong with that way
of thinking--and it can slide. And, I think that, when they
find somebody that sort of looks like they are from central
casting, they are able to pull them to that side.
Senator Tester. There are a lot of folks in that group, it
appears to me, anyway.
Do you want to comment, very briefly, on that--on what
makes it--or just agree with the doctor, if he is correct?
Mr. Hassan. I mentioned in my testimony, before his, that
the people who believe in the sort of ideology that ISIS
believes in--as in, they really believe in it----
Senator Tester. Right.
Mr. Hassan. There are only two categories: people who are
young zealots or people who are indoctrinated by another
category, which is of longstanding radicals that believe in
takfirism, which is declaring fellow Muslims as infidels--as
apostates--based on specific criteria that they have. They rely
on books like--there are two books that come to mind. I do not
want to get into too much detail there, but there is a book,
for example, that is 1,000 pages of a man who, when he appeared
on TV and he explained his methodology of fatwa, he said that
fatwa should not be done in the same way that Muslim clerics
have done it over the centuries.
Senator Tester. All right.
Mr. Hassan. That I, as a person, can declare you as a
fellow Muslim or as an apostate, based on my impression of
you--if you work with the West against Muslims, if you are an
agent to a certain government, and so on and so forth.
Senator Tester. OK.
Mr. Hassan. So their criteria are very post-modernist in a
way.
Senator Tester. OK. Back to you, Dr. Tarek. So, are there
statements or actions the United States has taken that might
encourage people to be a part of ISIL?
Mr. Hassan. Me?
Senator Tester. No. Dr. Tarek.
Mr. Elgawhary. To be honest, that is a tough question for
me to answer. I think that the rhetoric that comes out of ISIL
sometimes makes us think that, if it were not for the U.S.
invasion in Iraq or if it were not for the U.S. policy of doing
this or the U.S. policy of doing that--but, the fact of the
matter is, one can make that argument for any other country.
One could make that argument for any other regional player in
that region. And, politics is all based on interest--
geopolitical interest--and things like that. So, I do not think
that that is necessarily fair. I think, because America is so
dominant in the world and so out there, it is just an easy
target. And, it is this easy, ``Oh, if America just stopped
doing this, then we would stop doing that.''
But, that is not going to happen. We know that. If we stop
doing whatever they say, they are not going to change.
Senator Tester. All right. Well, my time is up. I want to
thank you all for your testimonies. I will submit questions for
the record, if appropriate, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Johnson. It will be.
Senator Tester. Thank you.
Chairman Johnson. Senator Heitkamp.
OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR HEITKAMP
Senator Heitkamp. Thank you so much, Mr. Chairman. And,
thank you all for such thoughtful comments and for such
thoughtful words as well as for such courage and bravery--
especially our last two witnesses. I think everyone here, who
frequently spends a lot of time on their smart phones during
the testimonies, sat and really listened. And, really, you
moved us all. Thank you so much for your courage and for the
fact that you are survivors--and, as survivors, you are willing
to testify to the horror and to the imperative that we all, as
good people, have to engage.
But, I want to, for a minute, turn to our first two
witnesses and engage in a discussion about the message and the
messengers. Doctor, I was fascinated by the work that you have
done, basically, parsing kind of the perversion and responding
to the perversion of Islam that is being done by these radical
groups. And, obviously, having met with people who have been
radicalized, you have a pretty good sense of what messages we
could deliver that would actually make a difference--especially
in this country, where, now, I think our greatest threat is the
radicalization of young men and women--or American citizens. We
have seen that now twice.
And so, there are two parts of a message. It is the right
message, and then, the right messenger--and I am just going to
make a couple of points. I want both of you to respond to what
you think the right message is and who the right messenger is.
And, I want to know if you are familiar with what the
Department of Homeland Security is doing, today, to try and
provide a countermessage--and to offer any advice to us, as we
review that, in our oversight role. And, that will be the last
question I ask. And, I would ask that you both split up your
time.
Mr. Hassan. Thank you. In terms of messaging, I think it is
different, because it is complicated--because ISIS should be
treated as two organizations in one. There is the local one,
which operates on the ground in Syria, Iraq, and elsewhere--
like, in Libya and elsewhere--and they have their own
messaging, which is usually based on sectarianism. And, there
is the international one, which is very close to al-Qaeda.
They, in fact, are trying to recollect and regather the
dispersed networks of al-Qaeda that were, basically, dispersed
after the terrorist attacks of 9/11 and the campaign against
it. So, they are trying very hard to do that in Europe, in the
United States, and elsewhere--but also in North Africa. So, the
messaging should be different, because they are different
organizations.
On the ground and internationally, there is this danger
that what happens--its appeal on the ground has become an
international appeal. Why? Because it presented itself with
some sort of an idea that everyone is fighting and the enemies
of this organization are the West, Iran, or something else--
that this organization stands for something.
So, the most effective messaging against this is to not
talk too much about only the victims of ISIS outside of the
group that it claims to represent but, rather, what is really
happening on the ground--which is that, on a daily basis, the
group kills fellow Sunnis--people that it claims to represent--
and we do not see that in media.
For example, next to my village, I mentioned that they
killed 700 people. Only the ``Washington Post's'' Liz Sly did
the story about that, and, at the time, it was the single most
horrific massacre. They killed a lot of people, but they killed
700 people in a matter of days. That needs to be the message--
that, look, this is not an organization--not a sectarian
organization--not an organization that represents a sect--or it
is not just Islam versus the West. It is a crazy organization--
an extremist organization that recasts itself in religious
terms that the people of that faith rejected. And, that needs
to be hammered again and again.
Senator Heitkamp. Doctor?
Mr. Elgawhary. As far as messaging, I think there needs to
be an unequivocal counternarrative from Muslim religious
leaders--no wishy-washy stuff and no statements, saying,
``Well, maybe there are five opinions on that.'' Yes or no and
black or white. There is right Islam and there is wrong Islam.
Period.
What I have been trying to do, in our organization--in
WORDE--is, I conduct a monthly traditional class we call
``halaqa.'' And, I try to take one of the concepts that
organizations like ISIL uphold and I try to deconstruct it in a
very detailed way. And, my goal--obviously, the audience is,
primarily, Muslim--but my goal is for young Muslim people to
understand why it is wrong and why there is a perversion in
their thinking--not that I am saying that I am the example, but
I think that kind of effort is what we need more of. And, I
think that the English language is actually very important in
this regard, because a lot of the media that we have been
seeing coming out of ISIL is in English and it appeals. So, I
think that is very important.
As far as recommendations, some of the things that come to
mind--for example, in our home county of Montgomery County in
Maryland, we have noticed a drastic increase in bullying toward
Muslim students in the Montgomery County Public School (MCPS)
system. And, I think that anti-bullying work is very important,
so that our children feel safe in schools, so that they are not
pushed to the side, and so they are not isolated.
Also, in our organization, we work with helping refugees to
resettle. And, I think those type of services are very
important, so that people, like Subhi, Nadia, and others, who
are coming as refugees, have something to plug into--so they
are not left to drift in the wind.
So, those are some of the things--and, sorry, one last
thing. I think that media training for Muslim leaders abroad is
also very important. And, I think there are a lot of good
people--there are a lot of--I cannot remember who we were
talking about, earlier. There are a lot of good leaders that
are making the right argument, but they need to know how--you
cannot write a 40-page legal opinion and expect that to be
trending on Twitter. It is just not going to happen. And, when
I told my teachers that, they were like, ``Well, what we are
seeing is the dumbed down version of what our teachers said.''
I said, ``OK. We have to stop the humility thing and we have to
be smart about how we inject this message into the media,
because there is a certain way that media works.'' So, media
training, I think, is very important--social media, that kind
of thing--for leaders abroad.
Chairman Johnson. Thank you, Senator Heitkamp.
Again, I want to make sure everybody gets to ask questions,
so I will ask everybody to be mindful of the 5-minute limit.
Senator Peters.
OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR PETERS
Senator Peters. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And, thank you to
our witnesses here, today. Ms. Murad and Mr. Nahas, thank you
both for your very compelling testimonies and for your journeys
here, to this country. It is very important, as we discuss
refugees and folks, like yourselves, who have been fleeing
intense persecution and terror, that people see the human faces
of the refugees that are in this country. Your presence here,
today, is important and, hopefully, many people will see that
and be as moved as I know everybody on this panel was moved by
your testimony. So, thank you for your courage to be here,
today.
Dr. Elgawhary, I would like you to respond to what seems to
be somewhat of a debate back and forth that we are hearing, in
the political realm, now, as to whether or not we should call
ISIS ``radical Islam.'' When you hear someone call it ``radical
Islam,'' do you think that is an accurate description of what
we are seeing with ISIS?
Mr. Elgawhary. I seem to be intent on getting all of the
difficult questions.
One of the things they taught us at seminary is that there
is no--I am just trying to translate, in my head, on the fly.
There is nothing wrong with labels, because, a lot of times, we
get stuck on labels: ``Why are you saying this?'' or ``Why are
you calling it that?'' And, I think that labels are only what
their definition is.
When somebody says--I use that term, ``radical Islam,'' and
I know a lot of people in my community get upset. But, what I
mean by it is, people that look Muslim, say they are Muslim,
quote the Quran, and do horrible things. What are we going to
call them? They are terrorists for sure. But, they are very
different than a neo-Nazi group, for example.
I, personally, do not have a problem with that. When people
say that--whether it is Congress, the White House, or in the
media--I understand what is meant.
However, I fear that that can very easily slide into any
form of religiosity from a Muslim is a form of radical Islam.
And, that is, I think, where the fear is--that we limit it to
what it is supposed to define.
Senator Peters. Mr. Hassan.
Mr. Hassan. That is a good question, because, personally,
when I was in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) last year, I was
an advocate of using these terms and on pressing clerics to
speak up against this organization. I remember the late Saudi
king, who died 2 years ago, admonished clerics--the high
clerics--for the first time, in public. And, he said, ``I feel
you are lazy. You are not speaking up against ISIS,'' when it
came out.
But, I think, when I moved to the United Kingdom (U.K.),
last year, I felt that there is a question of the messenger--
who says this term and why. And, it is important to keep this
in mind. ISIS wants to divide--this is the thing that ISIS did
in the Middle East and it is trying to do it elsewhere. It
wants to polarize its enemies and it wants to polarize the
society under its control. And, they want to divide their
enemies. And, they have succeeded, in the Middle East, and they
are, probably, succeeding here by getting people busy talking
about what to call it and what not to call it.
I think what is clear is that this organization, like
Doctor Elgawhary said, has declared war on Islam--this is how
it should be seen. It is a problem within the Islamic world,
and it needs to be dealt with there.
And, here, what can be done is to help Muslims fight this
organization.
Senator Peters. I appreciate that. The issue that we face
here, in the United States, in dealing with this threat, deals
with lone-wolf folks, who may be inspired by what they see in
the ideology. Is it safe to say that the folks that may be
inspired by this are folks who, really, have very little
understanding of Islam? Is there a correlation there? And, does
that have something to do with this recent shooter that was
claiming allegiance, I believe, to ISIS, but also, at some
point, to Hezbollah--and how that may be inconsistent? If you
could kind of address what may be going on in the minds of lone
wolves as well as the things that we should be considering, in
terms of how we respond to this phenomenon?
Mr. Elgawhary. So, I would say that, absolutely, people
that self-radicalize--just like the radicals that we have been
speaking about this morning--they have very little to no
understanding of the religion, whatsoever. And, that is really
the danger. And, part of that is that they have no training--
they have no living teacher that they can sit with or that they
can ask questions to, not allowing this discursive,
interpretive tradition, which I described earlier, to take
place.
So, I think that that is definitely a fear--people that are
surfing online, finding a lecture here, finding a statement
there, cutting and pasting these together, formulating some
kind of a conclusion, and acting on it--I definitely think it
is a problem. And, I think that more instruction--more
religious literacy for Muslims will help, in that regard.
Senator Peters. OK. Thank you.
Chairman Johnson. Senator Baldwin.
OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR BALDWIN
Senator Baldwin. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And, I want to
add my words of appreciation and thanks to our panel. These
were very powerful testimonies. Thank you for being here.
I know the hearing is about the ideology of ISIS--of Daesh.
And yet, it was called in the wake of a horrible tragedy, in
Orlando, that was, at once, a terrorist-inspired attack and
also a hate crime--in this case, against members of the LGBT
community. It was also ``Latin Night'' at the club, and it is
unclear whether that contributed to the targeting of the club
on that particular night.
Mr. Nahas, when you were testifying, you shared with us
that attacks against LGBT Syrians preceded the formation of
ISIL--that it was called for, tolerated by, or perpetrated by
the regime as well as militants that opposed the regime in
Syria--that they, too, perpetrated violence against LGBT
Syrians.
In the United States, violence, bullying, intimidation, and
discrimination against members of the LGBT community has a long
history also. And, in the early days, you could, certainly,
argue that it was sanctioned, at one point in our Nation's
history, by the government also--but things have changed. And,
I want to just draw attention to something you highlighted, in
your testimony, about the U.N. Security Council acting very
recently to recognize that LGBT rights are human rights--a
first in that international forum. You highlighted it as
something that is very important in moving forward.
I guess, I want to ask, in terms of your proposals--your
recommendations to this Committee and to others--how important
is it for governments, for authorities, and for regimes to say
that LGBT rights are human rights? And, how dangerous is the
absence of that--the silence to that?
Mr. Nahas. Thank you, Senator, for this important question.
From my own experience, growing up as a gay man in Syria, I
knew, at an early age, that the government has laws against us
and that my existence was not legal. So, I was not allowed to
say it out loud. I was not allowed to be out in the open. It
was punishable by up to 3 years in prison--this is the least--
and, at worst, you could be persecuted by your own community
members. So, it is very important for us to put the words out
there--to say to governments--and to hold them accountable--to
tell them that LGBT rights are human rights and they are not--
just sexual rights. In my understanding, my community
traditions say that LGBT rights are only sexual rights--they do
not relate at all to human rights. And, to make this message
clear to governments and to communities, it is very important
to at least start to elevate discussions of the problems that I
witnessed, in my country, where LGBT people were being bullied
all of the time, persecuted, harassed in the street, and even
verbally and physically abused. We could not go anywhere. We
could not go to the police and we could not tell our families,
because, if we did, they would have persecuted us more--because
they would always say, ``You have to man up and defend
yourself. This is not an issue that you can talk about.''
So, we need to use international platforms, like the U.N.,
to tell governments that these rights should be properly
addressed. That delivers a very strong message.
Senator Baldwin. Thank you. I wanted to follow up--oh, I am
out of time.
Chairman Johnson. You can ask it as a question for the
record.
Senator Baldwin. So, a question for the record then.
Senator Peters was asking questions about self-radicalization
and lone wolves. And, I think, in the case of Orlando, it is
not clear how deep of an understanding the perpetrator--the
gunman--had with ISIL. He appeared to have online relationships
with various terrorist organizations. But, I guess, I want to
ask an even broader question about self-radicalization,
because, we have seen, in recent instances of mass gun
violence, in the United States, people that are self-
radicalized, but that are inspired by different types of hatred
of minority religions--as we saw in Wisconsin, Mr. Chairman,
when a gunman entered the Sikh temple in Oak Creek and as we
saw in Charleston, South Carolina, which was motivated by
racial hatred.
What can we learn about self-radicalization by studying
those who have been self-radicalized by ISIL to deal with the
self-radicalization of people who hold different types of
hatred?
Chairman Johnson. And, the witnesses can answer that in
their written responses.
Senator Lankford.
OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR LANKFORD
Senator Lankford. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you all
for being here. I appreciate your bravery in coming forward and
your courage to be able to speak out. These are important days,
and we need to be able to hear clear, articulate voices. And, I
thank you for bringing that.
Mr. Hassan, let me ask you, what is the end goal for ISIS?
What do they see on the horizon? They are fighting for what?
And, when will they know they have achieved it?
Mr. Hassan. Well, they say they want a caliphate that
dominates the world. This is their stated mission. I think
their realistic objectives are to control Syria and Iraq, to
expand in the region, and to become this leader of jihad--and
global jihad. That is why they spent so much effort targeting
al-Qaeda. They are more critical of al-Qaeda than, probably,
the other ones, because they see it as their competitor and
their rival.
So, their goal is regional dominance, but, obviously, they
want to expand in the West and elsewhere.
Senator Lankford. So, you talk about the regional
dominance, yet they are trying to motivate people in Western
countries--whether that be in Europe, the United States,
Australia, or wherever it may be--to be able to fight and
attack in those locations as well. So, why try to motivate
people in Australia, in the United States, or in Europe to be
able to fight for them, if the goal is the caliphate there?
Mr. Hassan. Well, I mean, listen to them and how they talk,
reading their books--the books that they say that they read--
the pamphlets and so on, they talk about the war, today. And,
this is important, I think, for the anti-ISIS campaign, today.
Because there is this tendency to think about tactical defeat
as strategic defeat against ISIS, and that is not--though ISIS
presents itself as--it is a long-term project. They talk about
``nikaya,'' which is a war of attrition, as a tactic. So, they
want to exhaust the West and exhaust everyone else. They think,
``10 years ago, we were fighting the Americans--the Americans
were in Iraq and they had the appetite to fight us. Ten years
later, President Obama had little appetite--or less appetite--
to fight us. In 10 years' time, that will be even less.''
They have a core--and that is the most important part of
ISIS--a core that mostly consists of security officials. These
are the most dangerous people. Many of them are former members
of Saddam Hussein's Mukhabarat, or security apparatus. They
shape the organization, in terms of how it operates, how it
works, and how it ensures its survival.
So, I think they have a goal. That core will not go away.
You can defeat the organization--defeat the members who joined
it 2 years and so on. But, they think of their long-term
strategy as a strategy of ``nikaya,'' or a war of attrition.
Senator Lankford. OK. So, if you go back 15 years ago or 10
years ago, the United States was talking--and challenging--and
the West was challenging leadership, in Islam, to call out al-
Qaeda, which was happening, and to say that it was not
consistent. Now, it is a challenge toward ISIS, Al-Nusra Front,
or whoever may be in it--and to say that it does not line up
with theology. We see this springing up in multiple areas
around the world. You used the term that I think is very
familiar to us: ``radical Islam''--is twisting off. But, it is
not just around ISIS. It is around, mostly, ISIS, today, but it
could be Al-Nusra Front, it could be al-Qaeda, and it could be
others. It is a more broad system. So, is it a ``confront
ISIS'' or is it a ``confront a larger set of teachings that is
separate from traditional Islam? ''
Mr. Hassan. Well, that is the difference between defeating
the organization, tactically--you can launch a very effective
military campaign against it and you could defeat it. You can
expel it from Mosul, Raqqa, and Fallujah. But, the
organization's appeal and the spectrum--the broader appeal of
groups like it--like-minded groups, like al-Qaeda and other
Islamist groups that believe in violence as a strategic goal,
rather than violence just because they are pushed to violence.
Senator Lankford. Does the worldwide movement of ISIS
diminish if they do not have a functioning caliphate in Syria
and in Iraq?
Mr. Hassan. It will. But, the fear--I think we have reached
the point, today, where what has happened on the ground in Iraq
and Syria does not so much affect the international appeal of
ISIS. This is, I think, directly because of the fact that the
campaign against ISIS has not been done properly. Using the
wrong forces to fight ISIS, in towns where these organizations
are viewed suspiciously, is a disastrous campaign that even the
Department of State (DOS) officials complained about. They
said, in that letter that they sent--a document saying that--
for example, allowing the People's Protection Units (YPG),
which is an organization affiliated with the Kurdistan Workers'
Party (PKK), in Turkey, which is designated, by the United
States, as a terrorist organization--using that organization to
fight ISIS--another terrorist organization--in Sunni Arab
areas--that is just wrong.
So, I think the campaign, today, is allowing ISIS to
convert territorial losses into legitimacy in that region,
specifically. And, that is why I have been warning time and
again that the campaign is not being done properly. It is only
making ISIS stronger.
Senator Lankford. Thank you.
Chairman Johnson. Senator Booker.
OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR BOOKER
Senator Booker. I think Senator Lankford's line of
questioning is really right on and I would like to pick up
right where he left off.
First of all, you say, in your testimony, that you can
defeat the group in Raqqa, Mosul, and Fallujah, but these
defeats will remain tactical, unless the group is discredited
by the same people it claims to represent. Could you go a
little deeper into that? So, what then, specifically, are you
advising for us to do, as we get these--we are shrinking their
territory, clearly, but it seems like you are saying that we
are giving them more strength, in some ways, by the way that we
are doing it. Can you be a little more specific about what you
are suggesting?
Mr. Hassan. That is a good question. I think we defeated
ISIS. If I want to speak as the other side, ISIS was defeated
in Iraq, in 2006, after the surge. But, ISIS came back and took
Mosul--was defeated from 2006 to 2010. It was a very marginal
organization in Iraq. Sunni Arabs, in the areas that ISIS
operated in, defeated the organization, worked with the
Americans, and policed their areas. That worked.
But then, the policy that followed, in 2010, when the
United States pulled out of Iraq--before Iraq was able to
govern itself--and because there was support--perceived
support--between the--cooperation between the United States and
Iran to work with Maliki, who was a sectarian prime minister--
and work with him, despite the fact that he was weakened and
there was a rival--another Shia rival--who was more moderate
and more tolerant--was supported.
And then, the mistakes that followed that very success--the
success that was between 2006 and 2010--led to circumstances
that enabled ISIS, in 2012, to tell all Sunnis in these areas,
``Look, the only way forward is for us to work together and
reject this government from our area.'' And, they were able to
rally people--mobilize people against this government. And,
that is why they were able to take Mosul in 2014--in the summer
of 2014--took Mosul, forced the Iraqi army to drop its arms and
flee, took massive weaponry--American weaponry--and marched
back into Syria. And, they took Deir Ezzor, fortified Raqqa,
took some of Hasakah, and so on. They became a strong
organization, because of the political failures. And, my fear
is that there is so much focus on the military component,
rather than on the political, social, and religious dimensions
to what is going on there.
Senator Booker. And so, I see your point. And, I also
appreciate that, in your testimony, you discussed how we, in
the West, should be trying to discredit--or have Islamic voices
discredit Daesh. And, maybe, that gets me to your testimony,
which I thought was really wonderful--discussing all of the
ways that they are perverting Islam in the way that they are
waging their war and taking advantage of our political
failures, in terms of how we are gaining territory.
And so, this is not a clash of civilizations. This is about
people perverting Islam and taking advantage of political
realities. And so, I just want to get from you--and, you said
this already, but I want to go one step deeper. For those of us
who focus so much on Countering Violent Extremism (CVE)
efforts, here in the Senate, what are the specific tactics
then, to start to expose ISIL for their perversions and to
discredit them? What are some of the best ways to go about
that?
Mr. Elgawhary. Thank you, Senator. I think I really believe
in the counternarrative. And, that is very important, because,
when I started to do this, less than a year ago, I realized
that there is no very articulate, very clear-cut
counternarrative. And, by counternarrative, I mean, how are we
going to--how does Islam deal with issues of plurality? How do
we deal with issues of democracy, citizenship, and
constitutional nation states? All of these things have been
argued, in the last 200 to 300 years, by Muslim jurists, but
they are unknown to the vast majority of Muslims.
So, a lot of the issues that Daesh--or ISIL, whatever--
claim are the bones that they are picking with modernity,
really, have been dealt with already. It is just the memo has
not been passed around. So, the counternarrative is effective,
because it is steeped in very rigorous, authentic scholarship.
It is based on the primary sources--the Quran and the Sunnah,
which are very important for orthodox Muslims----
Senator Booker. And, Doctor, let me interrupt you there,
because I am being mindful of my time. And, that is helpful,
and I hope you will make yourself available if we have further
questions. I just want to say, in my remaining 10 seconds, to
Mr. Nahas and Ms. Murad, that your testimony was so courageous
and so moving. The outrageous attacks going on against LGBT
people in the Middle East and here in the United States, which,
as you point out in your testimony, are the most common types
of hate crimes we see--I am grateful for your honesty. And,
your courage, Ms. Murad, is really just so profound. And, I am
grateful that you would come here, today, and share your story,
which is so important to hear.
Thank you very much.
Chairman Johnson. Thank you, Senator Booker.
I actually want to kind of pick up on both Senator Lankford
and Senator Booker's lines of questioning, just in terms of
what has been the reality of the situation, in terms of where
ISIS is, right now, in terms of success--or lack of success--
against it. There is a State Department report, called the
Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism (START) Report--
very difficult numbers there. They are very inaccurate. They
are changing all of the time. But, when I looked at it, and I
did a little calculation, globally, the number of people killed
in terrorist attacks, prior to 9/11, was a little under 5,000.
With updated numbers, that has grown five, six, or seven times.
So, this is a real and, from my standpoint, a growing
threat. The news reports show that, outside of Syria, ISIS-
inspired attacks have cost 1,191 lives--in just the last 2
years?--last year. The analogy I have been using, in terms of--
and I realize we have made some progress. We have taken back
some territory. But, they still control territory. And, the
analogy I am, somewhat, using is that of a beehive. You might
have a beehive in your back yard. You can poke it with a stick
and do damage to the hive, but you are also stirring up the
hive.
Is that what we are witnessing? And, what is the danger
there? And, is it not true that we do have to defeat ISIS--we
do have to deny them that territory--we have to deny them that
caliphate? But then, we have a lot of mopping up to do. These
Islamic terror groups, if anything, they are spreading, they
are growing, they are evolving, and they are metastasizing. It
is like a cancer, and we are not winning this battle. Mr.
Hassan.
Mr. Hassan. Well, I come from the perspective that ISIS and
al-Qaeda are growing and there will be other groups that join
them. So, they are on a trajectory of expanding for the next
decade--or even two. And, it is important, I think--at this
moment, ISIS has been rolled back. It has been defeated,
territorially, in Iraq and Syria--like the statistic mentioned
before--50 percent in Iraq--they lost 50 percent of their
territory. In Syria, they lost 20 percent of their territory.
And, in Libya, they are also on the back foot. And, in Libya,
they are struggling to even establish any presence there. Al-
Qaeda is doing very well in Yemen. The same thing in
Afghanistan. They are not doing very well there.
So, their capacity, currently, is limited. However, I think
their ability to inflict damage is strong. They benefit from
the open space, obviously, on the Internet--self-
radicalization--you can become self-radicalized by watching a
video by Anwar al-Awlaki, the American citizen who was killed
in a drone attack in 2011, I think. It is very easy to become
one of them. The radicalization--the sort of radicalization
that leads someone to ISIS is swift and animating, meaning they
can push a person, in a very short time, to do some damage. It
is very hard to predict it, but it is there. It is a danger
that will remain for----
Chairman Johnson. But, a short answer--I mean, the gains we
are rolling up in Syria and Iraq, does that give you much
comfort? Because you are saying this is a long-term project.
You think they are going to be growing in strength over the
next decade or two?
Mr. Hassan. Yes. And, briefly, that is good. The problem is
the other tracks: the political track, the social track, and
the religious track--the political process in Iraq and Syria--
the conflict--is lagging behind. If they are catching up to the
military advances, then ISIS will go away for a while. But, for
now, the problem is the focus on military, while neglecting the
other things.
Chairman Johnson. Dr. Elgawhary, I want to shift a little
bit to the Muslim Brotherhood. I think it is, oftentimes,
reported as, maybe, a more moderate group. Do you have any
thoughts about the Muslim Brotherhood?
Mr. Elgawhary. I have a lot of thoughts about the Muslim
Brotherhood and similar groups. I think that goes back to what
I was trying to say earlier--the concept of a spectrum. And, I
think these Islamist groups--while some of them are on the very
left of the spectrum and while some of them are not,
necessarily, open to violence, there are certain procedural
changes, which, if those took place--if certain boxes were
ticked on the form--violence then would be authorized. I mean,
look at what has happened in Egypt, my home country and the
country of my family.
So, I think that I am always shocked--utterly shocked--at
how engaging our government is with organizations, like the
Muslim Brotherhood, quite frankly. And, when I spoke to people
in the embassy, in Cairo--when I was living there for a while--
and I said, ``Why do you not engage with Muslim leaders?'' And,
they said, ``We do. We engage with so-and-so, so-and-so, and
so-and-so.'' And, they gave me a dropdown list of all of these
Islamist Muslim Brotherhood activists. So, I think there is a
big mismatch and I think, by engaging with them so openly and
so freely, we almost legitimize that approach.
So, I think that it is dangerous. I think it is definitely
on the spectrum. It is not necessitated that it will go from
one end of the spectrum to another, but it is definitely on the
spectrum that I am concerned about.
Chairman Johnson. Senator Carper.
Senator Carper. Thank you. Again, we thank each of you for
being with us today, for spending this time with us, and for
sharing your thoughts with us--and your advice as well.
I want to start with a question. Mr. Hassan, I will start
with you, but then invite other witnesses to respond, too. I
think, in your testimony, you wrote that the United States must
highlight that the war with ISIS is not a sectarian conflict.
That is pretty much what you said, I think. And, you point out
that there are Muslims of both Shia and Sunni Islam joining
Christians, joining Jews, and joining people of all religions
and ethnic backgrounds in fighting ISIS.
With that said, some people here, in the United States, are
trying to paint this battle against ISIS as a broad clash
between the West and Islam. I think our President has made it
clear that he believes this kind of rhetoric is dangerous, it
is patently false, and it plays directly into the hands of
ISIS. And, I would just ask: Do you agree with this?
Mr. Hassan. I agree that this is not a sectarian war and
this is not a war--again--I mean, it is not an ``Islam-versus-
West'' war. In fact, if anything, ISIS is all about Muslims
versus Muslims. This is what the ideology is built on. We can
talk about ideas and ideology, but, practically speaking, the
way that the ideology of ISIS has matured and become kind of
framed was a reaction to the events that happened after the
Iraq War--not the Iraq War, itself, but how, for example,
Sunnis reacted to the presence of Americans on the ground. And,
they started declaring these people as apostates--and asking,
``What is the punishment for these people?'' So, they started
to appropriate events in Islamic history to the context that is
going on here.
So, it was not at all about the West. It is about what is
going on, on the ground, in the Muslim world.
Senator Carper. Thank you.
Dr. Elgawhary, again, the question is: Do you agree that
portraying this war against ISIS as a war against Islam plays
directly into the hands of ISIS--or not?
Mr. Elgawhary. I mean, I sort of agree with what Hassan was
saying. I think, if anything, the victim of ISIL is Islam,
itself. And, they have definitely declared war on our scholars,
our normative tradition, and our Sunni and our Shia sects. And,
that is the biggest tragedy. And, I do not think that--and I
think that our best allies in this are normative Muslims, who
are people like me. I mean, my life is threatened just by being
here, speaking out against this. And, I do not say that
lightly. And, I think that I want to stop that even more,
probably, than you do. I mean, I really want this to end and I
want to know what I can do to push that forward. And, I think,
in that desire, exists the greatest ally we have to counter the
rhetoric and the ideas that are coming out of ISIL.
Senator Carper. All right. Thank you.
Mr. Nahas, the same question, please.
Mr. Nahas. I am sorry. I do not have the capacity to answer
this question.
Senator Carper. All right.
Nadia, do you want to respond to that question, please? Do
you agree that painting this war against ISIS as a war against
Islam plays directly into the hands of ISIS and, inadvertently,
that we are helping ISIS by portraying this as a war against
Islam?
Ms. Murad [Interpreted.] The first thing I did was I went
to Egypt and tried to deliver that message, because, the things
that happened to me, I wanted to go to these countries and to
tell them what happened to me.
I want to prevent the youth from joining the Islamic State.
I went and I told them what crimes were committed, what actions
the took, and what ideology they had. I want to stop the flow
of the youth to them.
Speaking against this is not help for Daesh. You have to
speak against it. Also, minimizing the role of Daesh, or their
power, is not right, because, only as its border, it is more
than 3,000 miles--and they protect it all. Tens of thousands
are fighting for them.
Some of our villages are only 150 people living in a small
village. We have not been able to recapture these villages for
a year and a half. So, how about the big cities? It is not a
small power.
Speaking against ISIS does not mean speaking against Islam
and also does not mean speaking in favor of Sunnis or Shias--
one against another. When we all speak together against this,
then we are united. Then, we can defeat it.
Senator Carper. All right. My time has expired.
Mr. Chairman, you and I are both supporting legislation
that would strengthen the ability of the Department of Homeland
Security to reach out to faith communities--to reach out to
civic groups, parents, and community leaders in order to
prevent ISIS from recruiting Americans, which we believe is the
greatest threat that we face. If I could just have 30 seconds
and ask Dr. Elgawhary, what advice would you give the
Department of Homeland Security, as they put together and
implement this outreach to a broad community--to focus on
reducing the likelihood that people will be radicalized here?
Just give us, maybe, one strong piece of advice for the
Department of Homeland Security.
Mr. Elgawhary. Work with us.
Senator Carper. OK. Thank you.
Chairman Johnson. Thank you, Senator Carper.
I will give all of the witnesses a chance to just have a
closing comment after we go to Senator Booker. But, I do want
to ask Nadia a quick question. Who helped you to escape?
Ms. Murad [Interpreted.] A Muslim family.
Chairman Johnson. That answers your question. Senator
Booker.
Senator Booker. Doctor, Senator Carper asked a pointed
question, to which you said, ``Help us,'' basically, to help
you. But, we are looking at specific efforts that have been
going on to activate lone wolves in the United States as well
as cells in Belgium and France. And, this is part of the war
that, obviously, hits Western countries right where they are--
being preached at--where citizens of those countries and
American citizens are finding the ISIS ideology and the
perversion of Islam so compelling that they are willing to take
up arms against their fellow citizens in Europe or in the
United States of America. And, clearly, we are doing a lot
already, trying to empower local organizations in our
communities, working with mosques, and we have had panels here
where folks have given testimonies about that. We now have
allocated more resources toward that. I have been one of the
people saying CVE efforts should not be law enforcement's
focus. They should be focused on empowering communities and
empowering those networks. If CVE becomes just more police,
more surveillance, and more of that, it is not going to really
help us deal with the core of the problem. And, what I found so
compelling about you is, you pointed out so clearly--in a way
that I learned a lot from your testimony--so clearly that this
is a perversion of Islam. This is not Islam we are fighting
against. This is about people that are using it to fuel hatred,
violence, and, as Hassan Hassan said, tactically, for political
objectives--to control territory and to expand the reach of
their totalitarian ends.
But, my concern is, I still think we need to be doing
more--frankly, a lot more--to counter that narrative. And, I
liked what you said in one of your responses, that another
paper--another 150-page paper is not that effective against the
means that you often see online that often seduce and pull in
sort of vulnerable souls to this kind of terrorist activity.
So, I understand your sort of short answer to a short
question, but I am trying to figure out what the specific
strategies are. And, we are seeing some of them that are
working, where you expose the fact that ISIL is killing far
more Muslims--killing far more Sunnis--than they are killing
people in the West, which really begins to expose this, so that
those young people who might be susceptible to them see them
for who they are--naked before their eyes. And, those are the
kind of strategies that we need to start really investing in
more.
And so, in the 2 minutes I left you, after a 3-minute
preamble, could you go, really, to the core of those things
that, if you were making the investments in the budgets that we
have to oversee--where would you be placing those dollars, more
specifically?
Mr. Elgawhary. We have a very successful model, in
Montgomery County, called ``The Brave Model.'' It is a public-
private partnership. We work with law enforcement. We work with
the County Executive. It is a really good program. It is
getting national recognition. We are trying to export this
model and train other people, in other counties in the country
that need this type of message.
What I do, in this model, is I do a lot of the
counternarrative. I would love to be in a position where I
could train other young Muslim leaders, in this country and our
counterparts in Western Europe, on what these points--I did the
research. I am happy for them to take it. I am happy for them
to say that they did it. Maybe my colleagues will be upset
about that, but I am happy for people just to get the message
out there.
I also mentor people--people that might be on the spectrum,
who are referred to us by law enforcement or the school board--
that might be on the spectrum, but there is no capacity for
local government to deal with them. I sit down with them. I
talk with them. I try to decipher: Is there a problem? Are they
on the spectrum? Is it a mental health issue? Then we try to
refer them out to county-wide programs that will help them.
So, this public-private partnership is working. It is
working in our county. And, I think, if I had some say on the
purse strings, I would like to see us be in a position to train
other counties, first--wherever in the country it is needed the
most--and I would like us to go overseas to Western European
cities, like Brussels or London, and work with our counterparts
over there to train them in this model.
Senator Booker. And, that is a proactive strategy that
often saves a lot of money, in terms of the reaction that we
have to do with law enforcement or, God forbid, something
happening. Today, your testimonies have been testimonies of
courage, which, as you said, people should understand that you
are risking your life by coming here, by speaking truth, and by
laying bare the evil that we are up against. And, for that, I
am deeply grateful.
Chairman Johnson. Thank you, Senator Booker. And, you are
right. I mean, just think of the evil--that people are
threatening somebody speaking the truth--with their lives.
Again, I would like to offer all of the witnesses about a
minute to just make a final comment. And, we will start with
you, Mr. Hassan.
Mr. Hassan. I think we sort of covered most of the ground,
but I want to just emphasize that we all need to show ISIS--
show what it is like on the ground--like what it does to the
people that it claims to represent. We need to emphasize that
these are its victims as much as the others are. And, I think
that needs to be present in the media. It is not one person's
war. It is everyone's war.
Chairman Johnson. Thank you, Mr. Hassan.
By the way, Doctor, you had the harder questions because
you have ``Doctor'' in front of your name. [Laughter.]
Mr. Elgawhary. It is actually at the end of the name.
Senator Johnson and Senator Carper, thank you for the
opportunity to address the Committee and to submit testimony
about something that is much more than work. This is something
very personal. I think of my children when I come here and how
the rhetoric--even though they are young--the political
rhetoric, unfortunately, is something that scares them. And, I
hope that what we are doing here will help build a more
resilient homeland, so that the America that they grow up in
will be better than the America that I grew up in.
Thank you.
Chairman Johnson. Mr. Nahas.
Mr. Nahas. Thank you, Senators, for the opportunity and for
allowing me to speak in front of you. And, every time that I
have a chance to speak and to talk about my experience, I
always think about my counterparts that are still in danger--
that are still under threat, especially, because they are
different and because they do not conform with other people's
expectations. And, I hope that the United States will take a
stand and will be more active in holding governments and other
actors on the ground accountable for their actions--and do
something about this.
Thank you so much.
Chairman Johnson. Thank you. Ms. Murad.
Ms. Murad [Interpreted.] Thank you. And, thank you also to
all of the attendees and witnesses who came here.
I wish that we could all work together and stand up
together to stop this terrorism. I would like also for you to
recognize our genocide and to bring every single one from
ISIS--whether a leader, someone in the middle, or soldiers--to
bring everyone who committed these crimes to justice.
Chairman Johnson. We would love to see that.
Again, thank you very much----
Senator Carper. Mr. Chairman, before we adjourn----
Chairman Johnson. Senator.
Senator Carper. I do not have any more questions, but I,
certainly, would like to thank all of you. And, one of the key
takeaways for me here is, we talk a lot here about the Golden
Rule: Treating other people the way we want to be treated. We
both have children. Our children are out of school and out into
the world. But, in the schools that they went to, there was
bullying. And, in some cases, I remember, as a parent, I was
aware of some bullying that was going on and I was, actually,
going to the school and speaking out against it, trying to make
sure that that did not persist. And, I think we were
successful.
But, I applaud folks of the Islamic faith--I really applaud
those who are speaking up, in some cases, at risk--at real risk
to your own personal safety. I want to make sure you do not pay
any price for that, but that is a matter of real concern.
But, for the kids who are being bullied, because they
happen to have a name like Elgawhary, Hassan, Nahas, or Murad,
I especially am concerned about them--that they, somehow, are
paying a price as well. And, I think, if I were giving them
advice, it would be to be vocal and brave in speaking out
against the kinds of abuses that we see perpetrated by ISIS.
And, I think, maybe, the best protection that they have is to
denounce those kind of activities. And, it may be a hard thing
to ask kids to do, but I think, in the end, they will be safer.
And, I think, ultimately, they will feel better about their own
situation.
Thank you.
Chairman Johnson. Thank you, Senator Carper.
Again, I want to thank all of the witnesses for your
testimonies and for your courage. You, certainly, have, I
think, accomplished our goal of laying out a reality and
helping us understand this better. We have a long way to go in
fully understanding this--the American people do--but you have,
certainly, helped that. So, again, thank you for your
testimonies and your courage.
The hearing record will remain open for 15 days until July
6 at 5 p.m. for the submission of statements and questions for
the record. This hearing is adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 12:04 p.m., the Committee was adjourned.]
A P P E N D I X
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