Alms for Jihad: Profiling Jamaat ud Dawa’s Humanitarian Face Hafiz Abdul Rauf

Alms for Jihad: Profiling Jamaat ud Dawa’s Humanitarian Face Hafiz Abdul Rauf

Animesh Roul

Pakistan based Jamaat-ud Dawa (JuD), the internationally proscribed Islamic socio-political front of the terrorist group Lashkar-e Taiba (LeT), often blends violence with humanitarian activities in order to garner greater legitimacy and wider acceptance within the country as the true defender of Islam.

JuD is presently engaged in the preaching of Islam, political activism, and social work in Pakistan. Being a front organization for LeT, JuD along with all its formations, associates, and top commanders is designated as a terrorist group in UN Security Council Resolution 1267. The U.S. State Department added JuD and one of its charity fronts, Idara Khidmat e Khalaq (IKK), to its Specially Designated Global Terrorist Designation of LeT on April 27, 2006 (State.gov, April 28, 2006). Subsequently, in November 2010, the State Department again expanded LeT’s designation to include another charity front, Falah-i-Insaniat Foundation (FIF), as an alias of LeT and FIF chief Hafiz Abdul Rauf as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist (State.gov, November 24, 2010). Proscriptions on LeT or JuD along with its affiliated charity entities and terror formations, however, largely remain ineffective. These organizations continue to operate despite concerted efforts to impose sanctions or a ban on all that is linked remotely with LeT, JuD, or JuD founder Hafiz Muhammad Saeed. Alarmingly, JuD social charity fronts IKK and FIF, which is headed by a senior commander Abdul Rauf, have flourished with active support from Pakistani state agencies and the Pakistani public in the face of immense international pressure. The financial and logistic support from JuD, especially for the Kashmir jihad, continues unabated through these operational charity fronts.

The Pakistani government placed both JuD and FIF on its watch-list under the UN Security Council resolution, and both face international sanctions. With extensive social welfare programs and ever increasing volunteer networks of the JuD and its welfare arm FIF, however, the organization’s humanitarian face, Abdul Rauf, has carved a niche for the most dreaded terror group of the South Asian region.

The Humanitarian Face of JuD

FIF has been involved in charity works, especially in rescue and rehabilitation, in four areas: health, education, supply of clean drinking water, and rescue operations during disasters and disaster relief. Under the direct supervision of Hafiz Abdul Rauf, the JuD carries out humanitarian activities during natural calamities under the auspices of IKK and FIF. It provided humanitarian services after the 2005 Kashmir earthquake, 2010 floods in Pakistan, the recent floods in Kohistan District, Pakistan (2016), and in the famine and poverty stricken Tharparkar District of Sind Province (Express Tribune, September 1, 2010; devotedtohumanity.com, June 16). The humanitarian aspect of these relief and rescue operations notwithstanding, the main aim of these works is to garner public and government support, recruit fresh volunteers, and ensure a continuous flow of funds in order to stay relevant as an Islamic charity and a political organization in Pakistan.

Hafiz Abdul Rauf’s association with FIF’s parent organizations, JuD and LeT, date back to the late 1990s. He first came to the limelight when he spearheaded emergency relief in Sindh province under JuD’s IKK in August 2003. Through IKK, JuD set up refugee camps in Sindh’s Badin and Golarchi and provided services to around 2,500 people (Daily Times, August 4, 2003). In May 2004, Rauf organized the first Islamic Medical Conference at the Jamia Masjid al-Qudasia, the JuD headquarters in Lahore. JuD’s Al Dawa Medical Mission (AMM) organized this two-day Islamic Medical Conference (Daily Times, May 1, 2004). Rauf claimed that the AMM was spending more than five million Pakistani rupees ($47,700) on running some 60 health clinics around the country.[i] The basic objective of the first Islamic Medical Conference was to extend dawat (an invitation) to the medical community of Pakistan in order to recruit them to join JuD in its mission. Hafiz Abdul Rauf was quoted saying that the participating doctors and medical students can further the mission of AMM by working for just for one hour at any of the Ad-Dawa medical hospitals and dispensaries. JuD has a chain of charity hospitals, dispensaries, and mobile hospitals. Evidence suggests that through Dawa programs led by Abdul Rauf, people from other religions, especially Hindus and Christians, have embraced Islam after receiving dawat from the doctors of the al-Dawah Medical Missions, a core component of JuD and FIF.

Following the 2005 Kashmir earthquake, Abdul Rauf’s and JuD’s camouflage came off when he told media that with “God’s blessing, that the Mujahideen [of Kashmir] remained unhurt in this crisis and the physically fit and trained teams carried out massive rescue jobs before anybody came” (Asia Times, Oct 20, 2005). There were clear indications that the militants trained by JuD, LeT, and other Kashmir-centric militant groups and Islamic charities were engaged in rescue and rehabilitation operations organized by Rauf during and in the aftermath of the devastating earthquakes in October 2005 (Crisis Group, July 24, 2006).

After the banning of IKK, Rauf became the chief of the newly reincarnated FIF as a relief arm of JuD, which again came into prominence during the military operation in Swat valley in 2009 and the July–August 2010 floods.

FIF launched a massive aid program under Rauf for Internally Displaced People (IDPs) during the military operation in Swat (Daily Times, May 14, 2009; The Guardian, May 14, 2009). It offered food, medical care, and transport to villagers fleeing to Mardan district. During the devastating floods of the mid-2010, FIF emerged as a key player in the relief operations in Khyber Pukhtunkhwa, Sindh, Punjab, and Balochistan provinces of Pakistan (Express Tribune, September 1, 2010). Most of the top leaderships of JuD, including Amir Hamza and Yahiya Mujahid, actively participated in the operation in Khyber-Pukhtunkhwa and Punjab provinces along with Abdul Rauf.

According to available reports, the 44-year-old Abdul Rauf is originally from Sialkot, Punjab province, and has spearheaded JuD and FIF’s fundraising activities at various times, holding various official positions within the larger JuD and LeT formations, e.g. Director of Public Service in 2003 and Director of Humanitarian Relief in 2008. He remains the signatory of various bank accounts of these charity organizations, including Bank Alfalah Limited in Gulberg, Lahore, and the United Bank Limited, Model Town Branch, Lahore (Treasury.gov, November 24, 2010).

Like the other leaders of JuD, Hafiz Saeed or Rahman Makki, Rauf entices young minds by addressing Friday prayers and general meetings of volunteers within various mosques and madrasas in Pakistan. He often cites the atrocities and sectarian violence against Muslims elsewhere to attract funds and volunteers into FIF or JuD’s folds.

Rauf has defended FIF as a welfare organization in every media forum and has taken pride in FIF volunteers, whom he describes as first to arrive at every calamity for rescue and relief operations, even before the government agencies. Under the auspices of FIF and JuD, Rauf is in charge of various branches and projects that include health clinics, blood banks, ambulances, water filtration plants, scholarship programs, awareness programs, social programs, community boards, women’s forums, and student groups. He has admitted openly a number of times that FIF has generous foreign and local donors.

Beyond Kashmir

Through FIF, JuD and its leadership nourish the ambition to expand their geographical presence and legitimacy in the Muslim world beyond Kashmir. In the words of Hafiz Abdul Rauf, it is their “religious duty to help oppressed Muslims in the world whether in Gaza or in Myanmar or in Indonesia” (judofficial.com, July 3, 2015). Addressing volunteers in Lahore in 2015, FIF Chairman Hafiz Abdul Rauf said that FIF was engaged in arranging for Sehri and Iftar (the pre-dawn and pre-dusk meals during the Ramadan fast) of 3600 Muslim Rohingya refugees of Myanmar presently sheltered in Indonesian refugee camps (judofficial.com, July 3, 2015).

It is a well-known fact that JuD and FIF are active among the Rohingyas and other Muslim communities of Myanmar under the cover of providing relief and rehabilitation. Rauf and other senior JuD leaders regularly call for “revenge” in the Arakans (Rakhine State, Myanmar) where Rohingyas are said to be oppressed by the Myanmar’s government forces (Mizzima News, July 28, 2015).

While Kashmir remains a priority for FIF and JuD volunteers, Rauf and other leaders often call for alms and succor for victims in Gaza, Syria, and Afghanistan in the name of jihad and charity. Documentary evidence suggests that FIF and JuD organized various fund raising rallies for specific causes in specific locations across Pakistan. Moreover, FIF sends relief packages to all these areas during the holy month of Ramadan or seasonal and health packages at various times of the year. These works often marked by incendiary social media sloganeering such as “Palestinians suffered a lot under the Jewish occupation”, or “Ummah to stand together and fight the enemies of Islam.”

Under Rauf’s direction, FIF despatched relief operations to Madaya, Syria, which had drawn world attention as Syria reels under a civil war. In drought affected areas like Madaya, FIF and JuD volunteers have been active in distributing food items in the relief camps established by the FIF. In addition, FIF is also actively engaged in distributing winter packages to families of Halab, Adlab, Azaaz, Bab e Sham Meerza, and other areas of Syria. [2] [ii]

Conclusions

After LeT carried out the tragic 2008 Mumbai attacks, successive Pakistani governments have been under pressue to ban JuD charity fronts. In November 2015, the Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (PEMRA), the country’s electronic media watchdog, banned all electronic media coverage of LeT and JuD, as well as FIF, under UN Resolution 1267 (Dawn, November 3, 2015).

“People can believe that we are terrorists but we don’t really care… We are only worried about helping people. We have seven medical teams, 100 paramedics, nine doctors, and several engineers. Do you think this is how terrorists work?” Rauf made this comment in a media interview weeks before PEMRA imposed this ban and during FIF’s aid efforts after a magnitude-7.5 earthquake hit northeastern Afghanistan and Pakistan in late October 2015 (NBC News, November 3, 2015).

Through FIF and under the robust leadership of Abdul Rauf, JuD also attempts to garner acceptability in Pakistan’s religiously charged and disenfranchised socio-political environment with its well-networked humanitarian efforts during natural calamities. FIF and JuD propaganda and activities reach remote corners of the country thanks to the use of media tools, horizontal expansion of social services ranging from health care to education, and aid to the affected populace during natural calamities beyond Punjab province, the epicenter of JuD’s power. These successes underscore JuD’s relative triumph in legitimizing violence in the eyes of its unwavering support base, which has been preoccupied with rabid Islamist fervor and anti-India and anti-West paranoia. Thus Abdul Rauf remains the humanitarian face of South Asia’s most dreaded terror group, and does so with élan.

Animesh Roul is the Executive Director of Research at the New Delhi-based Society for the Study of Peace and Conflict (SSPC).

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