Stop the Torture: Free Turkestan

Praise be to Allah (SWT) and Blessings on Prophet Muhammad (SAW)

You are indeed the best community that has ever been brought forth for humanity [for its well-being]: you require [and authorize] the doing of the common good and you disallow [and interdict] the common wrong, and you are committed to Allah. […] Ali ‘Imran, 3:110

While our eyes were, rightly, fixed on Gaza, another genocide was intensifying elsewhere, largely ignored, passed over in silence, and met with no response from much of the Muslim world. This is a persecution so vast, so systematic, and so terrifying that it would seem impossible to believe were it not for mountains of evidence and testimony.

This is the genocide of our Uyghur brothers and sisters in East Turkestan. For years, they have turned to the Ummah hoping to find solidarity and support, only to be met, all too often, with silence and apathy.

Occupied East Turkestan (called "Xinjiang" by the Chinese) is suffering increasingly intense repression from the Chinese regime and, in reality, a state genocide against the Uyghur Muslims who live there. It is the site of the largest mass detention since the Holocaust. We are witnessing the erasure of an entire culture – happening right now.

There are 2-3 million Uyghurs in concentration camps, more than 10,000 mosques destroyed in East Turkestan, and a considerable reduction in the Muslim population since 1955.

Criminalizing Uyghur Muslims

[…] Vehement hatred has already come into the open from out of their mouths, but what their hearts conceal is yet of a more se- rious magnitude. We have indeed made the œyœt [thereof] clear to you, if you would but use your reason. Ali ‘Imraan, 3:118

Everything connected to Islam is criminalized: from the hijab to the beard to prayer. Muslims are herded into mass concentration camps; Muslim women are forced to marry atheist Chinese men; forced organ harvesting is carried out; and historic mosques have been completely destroyed.

Living comfortable, peaceful lives as we do, it is almost impossible for us to imagine the tyranny Uyghur Muslims face daily, minute after minute, second after second. If we could glimpse a single day in the life of a Uyghur Muslim, we would see: no right to pray, no right to fast, no "salam," no Eid celebrations, no Uyghur language, mosques under surveillance, and a ban on naming children "Muhammad." Everything is done to erase Islamic identity.

Halal food, or food labeled halal, is banned in Uyghur areas. People must justify why they don't eat pork, and Uyghur-owned shops are required to sell alcohol and pork. The concept of family privacy for practicing Uyghur Muslims has become a distant dream. Chinese authorities confiscate the land and property of Uyghur Muslims to redistribute to Chinese communists.

The Trap of Inaction

And thus have We willed you to be a central umma∆, so that [with your lifetime experienc- es and assumption of the responsibilities of all prophets] you become attestants to other peo- ples, and the Apostle becomes a witness over you. […] Al Baqarah, 2:143

One of the greatest obstacles preventing us from acting enough is the feeling of helplessness that Shaytan tries to instill in us: "What can we do against an ever-expanding superpower?" But in reality, oppression and injustice rest upon, and feed off, our apathy and despair. Apathy is simply not an option, nor an excuse before Allah.

Our Duty to Act

So the first step in fulfilling our role as Muslims is to recognize that Allah (SWT) has granted us incredible potential to bring about real change. We simply need to be motivated enough to use it, and coordinated enough to use it wisely.

No Muslim should say: "I'm just one person. What can I do?" Why? First, because that ignores our very purpose on this earth: to be tested. We are not in control of the outcome; our responsibility is to rise to the challenge when we witness injustice and oppression in the world.

When an injustice occurs, it is not only a test for those who suffer it, but also for all of us who witness it, and we have a duty to use every means at our disposal to help end that oppression. There is no fourth option for the believer: ignoring a wrong on the grounds that we are unable to change it amounts to abandoning our duty as Muslims.

The fact that we cannot fully solve a problem does not excuse us from working toward its solution. Scholars of Islamic legal theory have summed up this principle in a powerful maxim: what cannot be attained in its entirety should not be abandoned in its entirety.

In other words, a cause may require a thousand things to be set right, whether it's East Turkestan, Palestine, Kashmir, or anywhere else, and we may only have the capacity to handle two or three of them. But we have no right to abandon those two or three simply because we cannot address the rest.

On the Day of Judgment, Allah (SWT) may ask us why we did not act when we saw the horrors committed against our brothers and sisters. He (SWT) may ask us what we did with the voice, wealth, time, relationships, and influence He gave us. And even if we consider our contribution modest, it may prove immense in the eyes of the One who judges us.

So the question is not: can we solve everything? The question is: what can we do?

Du’a

Above all, let us not forget the Uyghurs in our prayers. This is something every one of us can do, and it is the weapon of the believer. It is neither a symbolic gesture nor a last resort. It is one of the greatest means Allah (SWT) has given us.

Allah (SWT) is the Master of all things. He can bring about any change He wills, when He wills, however He wills. But He tests us to see who will turn to Him, who will put the necessary means into action, and who will strive sincerely to please Him.

We have the opportunity to show our Uyghur brothers and sisters that they have not been forgotten. We will not stay silent while they are detained, surveilled, exploited, deprived of their religion, separated from their families, and subjected to unimaginable oppression. We will not look away.

Instead, Insha Allah, we will mobilize in great numbers this week to show our solidarity, moral support, and commitment to this cause. And above all, we must never underestimate the power of sincere action. An action may seem insignificant in the eyes of people, yet be powerful in the eyes of Allah.

Let us not forget: our primary goal is to please Allah (SWT), to fulfill our duty, and to be absolved of blame when we stand before Him. So let us act. Let us speak up. Let us give. Let us boycott. Let us make du'a.

And let us show, through our words and our deeds, that the Ummah has not forgotten the noble people of East Turkestan.