Al-Maghrib Institute
| Non-profit educational | |
| Industry | Education |
| Founded | 2001 |
| Founder | Muhammad Alshareef |
| Headquarters | Houston, Texas, United States, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, London, England, United Kingdom |
|
Area served
|
United States, Canada, United Kingdom |
|
Key people
|
Muhammad Alshareef, Waleed Basyouni, Yasir Qadhi |
| Products | Seminars |
| Website | www |
AlMaghrib Institute is an Islamic studies institute founded in Houston, Texas, by Muhammad AlShareef in 2002. It also has centers in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada; and London, England, United Kingdom. AlMaghrib provides courses on Islam in a six-day, two-weekend intensive seminar format.
Most of AlMaghrib instructors are graduates of the Islamic University of Madinah, which is why the Institute is characterized by analysts as Salafi in ideological orientation. Founder Muhammad AlShareef is committed to avoid labels other than "Islam" and "Muslim".
AlMaghrib's notable instructors include the following Islamic scholars, who are listed on AlMaghrib's website.
AlMaghrib's founders are working toward establishing an M.A. and Ph.D.-granting Islamic seminary with a permanent campus in the United States, featuring teachers as full-time faculty.
AlMaghrib has received public scrutiny due to perceived associations with controversial figures, which has led some to accuse it of advocating a radical ideology, and others to regard this response as wrongfully stigmatizing the Institute for the unrelated criminal activities of individuals.
Recordings by Anwar al-Awlaki, the highest English-speaking cleric in Al-Qaeda, continued to be sold at AlMaghrib events, after AlMaghrib banned these in 2009.
Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, who in December 2009 attempted to detonate plastic explosives on board Northwest Airlines Flight 253 from Amsterdam to Detroit, was found to have taken a class at the AlMaghrib Institute in Houston. Abdulmutallab claimed that al-Awlaki had also been a student at AlMaghrib.
"It's ironic that he came to us," said instructor Yasir Qadhi of AbdulMutallab. Qadhi, of New Haven, Connecticut, has been involved in de-radicalization efforts in the United States and was a leading participant in the U.S. Counter-Radicalization Strategy conference organized by the National Counterterrorism Center in the summer of 2008. Qadhi, the Dean of Academic Affairs at AlMaghrib Institute told CNN, "At some level, we did not convince him of the validity of our views," and "that is cause for regret".
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Wikipedia