United States: Taking A Closer Look at Hizb al-Tahrir

The Los Angeles Times reported Aug. 24 that the FBI is looking into the activities of Iyad Hilal, a 56-year-old local Muslim entrepreneur in Orange County, Calif., who is considered the U.S. leader of a transnational radical Islamist group that seeks to re-establish an international caliphate. The FBI, the newspaper reported, is not conducting an "investigation," but wants to learn more about Hilal and his group, the Hizb al-Tahrir (HT), or Party of Liberation. Hilal's name first surfaced in a Fox News report alleging that Hilal had ties to the group responsible for the July 7 London bombings.

That Hilal is associated with HT is accurate, but the nature of his involvement, the status of the group in the United States and the question of whether it is a terrorist group all warrant closer scrutiny. Moreover, what seems incongruous about this inquiry is that HT had a significant, growing presence in the United States during the early 1990s, but its activities did not garner the level of attention the group is now getting from the U.S. government. Now that the group has been reduced to a few members scattered across the United States, with no visible structure or activities, its activities are being scrutinized.

The FBI—at least some field offices—has been aware of HT's presence in the United States since early 1994 at least, though whether that information was shared with the Orange County office is unclear. What is certain is that, in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks, intense debate has taken place in Washington regarding the status of the group—and it has not been placed on the State Department's list of terrorist organizations. In fact, HT and the jihadists have serious political, ideological and sectarian disagreements.

The United Kingdom, home to the world's most vibrant HT branch, said recently it would ban HT because its rhetoric incites violence. Germany and Pakistan also recently banned the group, and it has been banned in the Middle East and Central Asia for quite some time. The group's policy, however, does restrict it to holding study circles, organizing small-scale conventions, and publishing and distributing material. In fact, the group's practice of engaging in radical rhetoric but not acting upon it has caused many young members—who consider it all talk and no action—to leave HT for more militant organizations over the years.

Hilal, a U.S. citizen of Palestinian background, has been in the United States for 20 years. He is involved in the grocery business, but also has written a number of books. Though some media have called him a "philosopher," he appears more of an ideologue. Educated in the Islamic sciences, Hilal obtained a master's degree in Islamic jurisprudence from a Saudi university and has been associated with HT from the days of his youth. He was the HT leader during its heyday in the United States and as such would shuttle between New York and Orange County, where the group had its two main offices. He also oversaw the organizing of conferences in the Chicago area and the group's various publications—most prominently the magazine/journal Khalifornia. Hilal also served as imam of a mosque in New York from around 1991 to about 1995.

By 1995, the group's New York chapter suffered a major setback when many members, and people participating in the group's study circles, left HT over ideological disagreements and Hilal's leadership. In 1997, the global group splintered when certain senior members of the party's politburo in Jordan, under the leadership of Abu Rami, ousted its then worldwide leader Abdel-Qadeem Zalloum. The splinter group eventually foundered as Zalloum succeeded in containing the renegades and maintaining control of a majority of the members and branches.

That split, however, took a toll on various branches of the party, including the one in the United States, which by then had seen many of its leading activists in New York move to join al-Muhajiroun—another, now-defunct offshoot of HT founded in Britain in 1996. Hilal himself, according to sources knowledgeable about HT's internal wrangling, in the beginning had rushed to join the renegade group, but shortly thereafter tried to return to the original faction, where he was rejected.

Following his ouster from the main group, Hilal purportedly began trying to revive HT by bringing together various party members from around the world who remained committed to the group's ideology but had been inactive. While this process was in motion, the Sept. 11 attacks took place—and the ensuing hunt for radical Islamists brought the party under increasing pressure in the United States. It is unclear today whether Hilal ever was able to regain leadership of the organization in the United States, or even whether a true organizational structure exists.

Meanwhile, by the turn of the new millennium, HT had lost the battle of ideas within the U.S. Muslim community. Mainstream Muslim organizations successfully contained HT's growth by rejecting the HT position that Muslims should interact with society but not indulge in democratic politics. HT had lobbied hard against such political activism because it deems such actions as un-Islamic.

It is too soon to say what the FBI inquiry in Orange County will turn up, but so far the bureau appears to be following standard procedure, in which an initial inquiry is opened up to determine whether there is evidence that a law has been violated. If such evidence is uncovered, then an official investigation will be opened.

In the early 1990s, HT successfully exploited freedom of expression to expand its presence in the West. In 2005, the HT argument continues to be that, although its ideas might be radical, its right to express them remains.

© Copyright 2005 Strategic Forecasting Inc.