http://www.ocregister.com/ocr/2005/08/2 ... 648363.php

Garden Grove grocer under scrutiny
Man is accused by Fox News figure of leading banned Islamic group.

By GWENDOLYN DRISCOLL, VIK JOLLY and ANN PEPPER
THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER


GARDEN GROVE – An Orange County grocery store owner has been questioned by the FBI in connection with his membership in an Islamic group banned in parts of Europe and the Middle East for its radical views, according to FBI and Islamic Institute of Orange County officials.

Iyad K. Hilal, 56, an amateur writer and philosopher on Islamic themes, earlier this month was accused by a Fox News commentator, John Loftus, of being the head of the California-based faction of Hizb ut- Tahrir, or Party of Liberation, a fragmented group of Muslim scholars and activists in Europe, the Middle East and the U.S.

No charges have been filed against Hilal. The FBI declined to describe its inquiries as a formal investigation.

"We're looking into the matter," said FBI spokeswoman Cathy Viray.

The Fox News allegations sparked media interest into the California group's activities and writings, which espouse, among other things, the incompatibility of Islam and democracy, and the return to the ancient Caliphate political system in Muslim countries.

"They hold a very idealistic, romantic view of how Muslims should live in a Muslim majority country," said Hussam Ayloush, head of the Southern California Council on American Islamic Relations. "They oppose the integration of Muslims into and their participation in the political process here in America."

Ayloush said the U.S. faction of the group was not known to be violent or to support violent groups.

Hilal, who was seen praying and talking with members of the Islamic Society of Orange County on Wednesday, did not return calls. His Garden Grove duplex was shuttered while staff at his small grocery off Cerritos Avenue in Stanton said he had not come to work.

Officials at the Islamic Society of Orange County who talked with him after 1 p.m. prayers said he appeared concerned that the FBI had questioned him and that Fox News had made allegations that he was linked to last month's bombings in London. Hilal told the officials that the FBI had quizzed him about his involvement in any terror attacks.

"He said he never ever was involved. He's rejected even Hamas and PLO methods," said religious director Muzammil Siddiqi.

" 'I have my views, but that doesn't mean I have supported violence,' " Hilal told him, Siddiqi said. "He said, 'Why are they putting this on me? What did I do? Have I committed a crime?' "

Hilal also told officials that he has not been associated with the Hizb ut-Tahrir since a conference about seven years ago in England split the party.

Friends described him as a soft-spoken man with conservative views who had been unsuccessful in attracting more than a few hundred followers during the group's heyday in the early 1990s. Hilal has written several books including "Studies in Usul ul Fiqh," which does not bear a publication date nor a Library of Congress number.

Haitham Bundakji, spokesman of the Islamic Society of Orange County said a fracas erupted in the early 1990s when Hizb ut-Tahrir members were prohibited from distributing their newsletter, "Khalifornia," on the grounds of the Islamic Society Garden Grove complex, which includes a mosque and a religious school.

By 1995, however, the group had declined in popularity and visibility, with Hilal coming infrequently for prayers, Bundakji said.

The California wing of Hizb ut-Tahrir is described as the smallest and weakest of four splinter groups within a political movement that varies in membership size and political rhetoric.

"The party doesn't really have any major influence in the U.S. whatsoever," according to Fawaz Gerges, a professor of Muslim and Arab politics at Sarah Lawrence College in Bronxville, N.Y.

The European and Middle East branches, particularly the British faction of Hizb ut-Tahrir, are said to be larger and more radicalized. The UK faction's former head, Sheikh Omar Bakri Mohammed, called the Sept. 11 hijackers "the magnificent 19" in an interview with The Jamestown Foundation in Washington, D.C., in 2004.

Mohammed fled the country after British Prime Minister Tony Blair proposed banning the U.K. faction of the group after the July 7 bombings in London.

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http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,137087,00.html

GARDEN GROVE, Calif. â€â€