A Syrian youth in a mosque in Riyadh told me that Syrian security figures force detainees to say “there is no God but Bashar [al-Assad].” Glory to God, this is a great slander! I thought the Syrian youth might have been overly-enthusiastic or prejudiced until I saw this for myself on Al-Arabiya and Al-Jazeera. I saw the henchmen of the Syrian regime hitting detainees in the face with their shoes and forcing them to say “there is no God but Bashar.” This brought to mind the Quranic passage “dreadful is the word that cometh out of their mouths. They speak naught but a lie.” [Surat al-Kahf, Verse 5]. For there is no God but Allah, and may fire and destruction rain down upon the Syrian regime! Is there a Muslim on earth who possesses even an atom of faith who could accept such blasphemy?

I call upon the Saudi Council of Senior Scholars, the World Association of Muslim Scholars, the Al-Azhar University, the Muslim World League, the Organization of the Islamic Conference, the World Assembly of Muslim Youth, and other prominent Islamic organizations, as well as prominent Muslim figures and scholars, and indeed anyone who possess faith, a conscience, fear of God, and concern for Islam, to rise up and confront this [Syrian] regime which is an enemy of Islam and Arabism. I call upon all those above to confront the principles and values of the Syrian regime and denounce and condemn them, otherwise you will be held accountable for your silence or God will hold you accountable on Judgment Day. You will also be held accountable before Muslims and history.

What is left for us with regards to dignity if the Syrian regime’s henchmen can beat the elderly and children with shoes, and force them to say that there is no God but Bashar?

Watch this YouTube clip, and then ask yourself did even the Israeli occupiers treat the Arabs they detained in this manner?

What can a Muslim say when watching such incidents taking place in a Muslim country that was the home of many of the Prophet’s Companions and famous Muslim leaders, like Abu Obeida Al-Jarrah, Khalid Ibn al-Waleed, and many others?

What can a Muslim think when watching a regime carrying out such torture and oppression to other sincere Muslims who have taken to the streets demanding dignity, freedom, justice, and equality?

Where are the scholars? Where are the preachers? Where are the intellectuals? Where are the writers and the poets? Where is your condemnation and denunciation of this explicit blasphemy from this evil regime, which didn’t exhibit even a shred of courage or gallantry as it witnessed the Golan Heights being trampled by the boots of the Zionist occupiers?

They [the Syrian regime] have remained indifferent to their own honor and history [with regards to the Israeli occupation of the Golan Heights], remaining silent to the Israeli injustice; the [Israeli] soldiers, airplanes, tanks…and instead arrest, torture, and kill their own citizens.

Can anybody sleep soundly after we have seen traitorous and blasphemous security officers trampling the faces of the Syrian people under their boots, and forcing them to deify a dwarf…an agent of a foreign power who does not know God? I looked through the history of the Crusades and could not find such terrible crimes and heinous villainy being committed, compared to what is being committed today by the Syrian regime against the decent Muslim people of Syria! The [Syrian] people are the heroes, they drove out the Crusaders, and later the French, fighting and bleeding and dying for the sake of the belief that “there is no God but Allah”. However, following this, a division which is abhorrent to Islam occurred in the Levant, challenging the Muslim ummah’s most cherished position, its faith.

Therefore in the name of the Arabs and Muslim, I call upon the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah Bin Abdulaziz – who previously called upon Muslim scholars to defend the true meaning of Islam – to adopt a stance on this issue regarding the Syrian regime’s abuse of the article of faith that “there is no God but Allah.” This is the heart and basis of Islam, the message of the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him), as well as the key to paradise!