Uzbeks who flee to America raise beards and build a caliphate in slums- Lenta.Ru

Фото: Depositphotos

Last week, another terrorist attack shook America: Uzbek Saifullo Saipov at the wheel of a rented pickup truck shouting "Allah Akbar" began to crush pedestrians in the heart of New York, in Manhattan. The police were able to neutralize Saipov, and now the homegrown jihadist is in the hospital, demanding the flag of the Islamic State in the ward and openly declares that he does not repent of his deed. Correspondent "Tapes.ru”, Who worked for several years in Uzbekistan as an employee of a Western human rights organization, and now lives in the United States, understood the reasons for the terrorist attack in New York and analyzed what prompted the Uzbeks to build a caliphate in a country that received them with open arms.

Tashkent hand

“What are you, a Bukhara Jew?”, - the bearded man in the sharovars, wet from the ocean water, addressed me with a shiver in his voice. His wife, wrapped in a niqab, was hiding behind his back at that time and looked at me with frightened eyes. It was on the beach of San Diego in southern California.

The man thought that I was an agent of the Uzbek special services, who had come overseas to hunt down an Islamist who had fled from Bukhara. In fact, I was attracted by the unusual appearance of the company: bearded men in the thirty-degree heat bathed in the ocean, not removing the trousers and T-shirts, and women in niqabs did not even think about being naked. Nearby were palska with green tea and fragrant pilaf.

I explained, and my new acquaintances said that they come from the Uzbek Kokand lying in the Fergana Valley. One of them was imprisoned for “faith” (he read religious literature banned in Uzbekistan), received political asylum in America, and brought all his relatives here.

“In Uzbekistan, we were afraid if our women went to a niqab. Why are there nikab - even just letting go of the beard was dangerous! The security services immediately began to be interested in such a person, ”the Kokand tea-house keeper Alisher, now a butcher, complained to me. According to him, according to Muslim law, he was not allowed to live, not only by the authorities, but also by simple Uzbeks: “They looked at the woman dressed as a Muslim woman as if she were scared! Here in America, nobody cares how you are dressed! ”

Uzbek freemen

These words seemed familiar to me. At the beginning of 2000, I worked as a representative of a Western human rights organization in Central Asia, and a very similar point of view — only about Russia — was expressed to me by local officials. According to them, at that time in Russia there was much more religious freedom than in Central Asia, and migrants from the south felt about the same as their fellow countrymen in the United States today. Then Moscow put an end to this freemen: the Supreme Court recognized many Muslim organizations as extremist, and the “center of Uzbek freedom” moved across the ocean.

Here you can stick to any views, the main thing is not to commit violence and not try to bring your ideas to life by force. Here it is appropriate to recall the organization Hizb-ut Tahrir, which advocates the unification of Muslims of the whole world into a single caliphate.

The views of this party popular in Central Asia are really quite exotic: states such as the USA, Great Britain and Israel were declared “the creature of Shaitan”, and in private conversations with me some “Hizbutovtsy” regretted that Hitler did not succeed in destroying all Jews. However, despite all of its radicalism, Hizb ut-Tahrir rejects violent methods of struggle, therefore, in the “children generated by Satan, the United States” believe that it cannot be prohibited.

It turns out a certain reverse selection, and the Uzbeks of America are much more religious than their remaining at home counterparts. Uzbek, who comes to the United States, immediately encounters unprecedented freedom: he has access to all banned literature at home, he can communicate with representatives of any movements that he has not even heard about in the streets of his native Tashkent or Bukhara.

The leader of the Uzbek Birdamlik opposition movement, Bakhodir Choriyev, who lives in the United States, agrees with this. According to him, in the United States, many Uzbeks "just get drunk on freedom", and they are also influenced by the local extremely conservative community. “If a person does not strictly observe all religious rituals, the local diaspora will simply reject it. They will not communicate with him, they will not help him. There were cases when Uzbeks in the United States opposed the burial of their countrymen in Muslim cemeteries if they did not lead a righteous life, ”Choriyev said.

“The problem is probably related to the fact that in the countries of Central Asia, governments are too zealously persecuting dissidents, pushing “problem” young people out of the region. In the countries where these people come, they are also not welcomed with open arms, leaving them alone with difficulties and at the disposal of extremist networks,” says ethnologist, professor at the European University in St. Petersburg Sergei Abashin.

It is difficult to say which factor most influences the Islamization of the Uzbeks who arrived in the New World, but the fact remains: most of them in the United States are beginning to go to the mosque.

The same happened to Saipov who suppressed people in Manhattan: as Fergana agency reports, before coming to the USA he was quite a secular young man, never went to a mosque, and turned to religion only in secular America.

The current tragedy is not the first case of terrorist activity of Uzbek citizens in the United States.

At the end of 2012, Uzbek refugee Jamshid Mukhtoru was arrested at a US airport. He was going to fly jihad to Afghanistan to kill the soldiers of the country that sheltered him. It is interesting that in Uzbekistan the failed mujahid engaged in human rights activities and did not care for the religion of the religion, he even liked to drink.

Uzbek refugee Jamshid Mukhtorov. Photo: from the personal archive

In the US, he met with religious countrymen who helped him get a high-paying job of a truck driver. Gradually, the views of the immigrant began to change. Jamshid's wife, under his influence, only went out in the nikaba on the street; young children spent the whole day reading the Koran. Almost all the money earned by the newly-minted Muslim postponed for the upcoming fight against the infidels in Afghanistan. In the same year, Uzbek Ulugbek Kodirov was convicted for preparing an attempt on the "enemy of Muslims" Barack Obama.

In 2014, a lawsuit was held in the United States against a refugee from Uzbekistan, Fazliddin Kurbanov, in aiding terrorists. Police found in his apartment ammunition and components of explosives.

It is indicative that Kurbanov, Mukhtor and Chechen terrorists Tsarnaev brothers, who committed the terrorist attack in Boston, received refugee status in the United States. This category of people in America receives benefits, free housing and medical insurance for six months. This fact does not cease to emphasize the right media. For example, a journalist with a TV channel close to the RepublicansFox"Spoke with contempt and hostility about the Tsarnaev family of Chechens:" The government paid them a allowance, treated them for free, paid them English courses. All they spent about a hundred thousand dollars. And they thank us so much? Well, thank you!

The absurdity of the situation is that, according to current American laws, migration officials simply cannot deny potential refugee status to potential terrorists if they were really persecuted in their homeland. True, all asylum seekers must sign papers stating that they are not going to commit terrorist attacks in the US, but such a measure can hardly be considered a serious guarantee of security.

Trump's finest hour

After the current terrorist attack, US President Donald Trump has a new weighty argument in favor of a sharp reduction in the migration flow. Apparently, the American leader will not miss this trump card: he has already accused the Democrats of indirect involvement in the tragedy. Donald Trump recalled that Saipov came to the United States thanks to the green card residence permit lottery, the favorite brainchild of Chuck Schumer, the leader of the Democrats in the Senate.

Photo: frame video twitter / @ realDonaldTrump

Whether the American leader will be able to carry out his plans is, so far, alas, not clear: for sure these initiatives will meet with fierce opposition from the Democrats. Obviously, only one thing: after the New York tragedy, the chances of the American leader to achieve his plans have increased, and he will do everything to make the most of this “success”.