By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on 22 June 2021

The fifth speech of the Islamic State’s spokesman, Abu Hamza al-Qurayshi, was released earlier today by Al-Furqan Media under the title, “You Are Most Exalted If You Are [True] Believers” (وأنتم متفوقون إذا كنتم مؤمنين), drawn from Qur’an 3:139.

In the thirty-eight-minute audio statement, Abu Hamza spoke of the Sunni tribesmen in Iraq who have stood against IS, specifically those who have joined al-Hashd al-Shabi, the Iranian militia conglomerate. Abu Hamza calls for the repentance of these tribes before IS reaches them, claiming IS is deliberately holding off murdering them in their homes to give them time, but will soon treat them as it did the Sahwa (Awakening). Abu Hamza is pleased with the progress of IS in Syria, operating from its desert strongholds, and congratulates the various foreign wilayats (provinces), the overseas branches of IS, on their apparent advances, especially in Africa.

It was West Africa that Abu Hamza started the speech with, a focus in IS messaging for some time, and seemed to acknowledge that a faction of Jamaat Ahl al-Sunna Lid Dawa wal-Jihad (JAS or JASDJ), usually called “Boko Haram”, has indeed re-joined the Islamic State’s West Africa Province (ISWAP) in the wake of Abubakar Shekau’s demise, which he also nodded towards, though no names were mentioned.

IS’s Egyptian branch, Wilayat Sinai, was mentioned. In Afghanistan, IS’s Khorasan Province (ISKP) was encouraged to target both the government and the Taliban. The recent car bombing in Sebha is, it seems, intended to be the opening of a new round of offensive operations by the jihadists in Libya after the flare up (and flare out) of a year ago.

By implication of what was said here, IS’s plans for a new “Breaking the Walls” operation to release jihadi prisoners, which Abu Hamza underlined in his last speech, have not gone well. Abu Hamza offered financial rewards from the caliph himself, Amir Muhammad al-Mawla (Abu Ibrahim al-Hashemi al-Qurayshi), for anyone who kills judicial officials or interrogators in Iraq and Syria.

The recent war in Gaza was discussed. HAMAS was—without being directly named—lambasted as a project of the Iranians, which is not untrue. As ever, IS is displeased with an inordinate focus on Palestine. Indeed, Abu Hamza appeared to speak of Palestine as merely part of Syria, which was a common Arab view until comparatively recently. Abu Hamza insisted jihad to destroy Israel was the only legitimate path—that any peace was a betrayal—and that IS had been blocked from this by the Arab States, all puppets of the Jews, in Abu Hamza’s reckoning. Abu Hamza’s harshest words were reserved for the Muslim masses who have complained about the Gulf states and Turkey normalising relations with the Zionist project: these same people have openly cheered for Iran during this recent conflict, despite the Persian Shi’is being (in IS’s estimation) no less enemies of Islam than the Jews, and Iran’s relentless massacre and persecution of Sunnis.

Naturally, Abu Hamza says the State is baqiya (remaining).

*                   *                   *                   *                   *

All praise is due to God. We praise Him, we seek His help and forgiveness, and we seek refuge with God from the evils of our inner selves and from the consequences of our bad deeds. Whomsoever God guides there is none to misguide, and whomsoever God leads astray there is none to guide. I testify that there is no god except God alone, who has no partner, and I testify that Muhammad is His slave and Messenger.

As for what follows:

God says: “Whoever thinks that God will not help him in this life and in the Hereafter—let him turn to heaven, then sever, and see if his cunning eliminates what enrages him” [Qur’an 22:15].

This is news from God, that He will grant victory to His deen [Islam] and His Prophet until the Day of Judgment. It from His wisdom that He made the renewal of His deen at the culmination of every epoch, in spite of the kuffar, and in spite of the malicious.

Yes, let each one of you, O tawaghit and O Crusaders, turn to heaven, then sever and see if your malice will eliminate what enrages you! Or did you think that with your war and deceit you will block out the light of God and stop the Sunna of His Prophet! No by my Lord, it is as if you are collecting water with a sieve. Here you are launching your campaigns of failure, and here are the soldiers of our State ambushing you and your slaves, racing to fight you.

So, die with your rage! Who do you think you are? What are you hoping for?

Die with your rage and renew your regrets for what you have spent in fighting God, His Prophet, and His worshippers the muwahideen [strict monotheists].

Die with your rage and continue your malice, as you are planning and God is planning, and God is the best of planners. Did you think that you can prevent the victory of God and block His worshippers from achieving it?

Die with your rage every time you hear of the raids by the muwahideen.

Die with your rage, for here is the State that you fought and poured on its soldiers the fire of the your rage and malice in Iraq, Syria [Al-Sham], and Khorasan [Afghanistan], and now it has woken you—by God’s grace—with its operations in West and Central Africa. It is the State that you disbelieved in. Yes, it is the Caliphate [Khilafa] that you fought, and it is remaining [baqiya] in spite of you—by God’s permission—whether you wanted to or not. You have been mislead by your arrogance and vanity, thinking that with your might and aggression you will finish it and its soldiers and supporters. Know that the State of Islam [or “Islamic State”] today is not the way you think, and not how you hope and expect.

[Arabic poetry]

Incite and plot, the lions of Caliphate desire to be on top

With their jihad everyone is baffled, and to their steadiness the mountains are watching and listening

Here you are doing everything you can to fight us, and block the path of our Lord, but we have only grown stronger and more determined—by God’s grace—and we do not care about the crowds of kufr and their followers and parties, nor their armies, soldiers, and dogs. So scream and threaten, as by God, we only went out to support the deen of God, who said in the Holy Book: “O you who believe! If you support God, He will support you, and make your foothold firm [i.e. give you victory]” [47:7]. So how will you fight us, and God, with His grace, is supporting us and strengthening our foothold. The past years are enough proof to what we say. We fight and raid with God’s help. As for gaining ground or losing it, that is but a test from our Mighty Lord, and a selection for His good worshippers, “that God may know those who believe, and take martyrs from among you. God does not love the evildoers” [3:140].

May God be with you, O soldiers of the Caliphate! May God be with you, O strangers in these times of loss and disappointment. We specially address the soldiers in West and Central Africa. May God bless you and your jihad, and may He reward you for us and for the Muslims with the best of rewards. You were the best to answer the call and thus victory and support came to you from the Lord of the Heavens. So thank God the Generous, O soldiers of the Caliphate, for His graces that came upon you and healed the hearts of the believers. God says: “If you give thanks [or “are grateful”], I will certainly give you more” [14:7]. So thank God the Generous for His grace, and know, may God grant you success, that we have no power or strength except from God the High and Mighty. Do not be arrogant with what God enabled you. Repudiate your own strength, renew your intentions, fix your inner thoughts, and be humble to those around you. Be an armour for the Muslims and protect them from the oppression of the tawaghit.

And to the Muslim public in West and Central Africa, gather around your State and your Imam and your brothers the mujahideen, and be the best supporters to applying the shari’a of the Lord. Let what happened to your brothers in Iraq and Syria be a lesson that will not repeat itself, after many of them let down and delayed supporting their deen and their State, until the day came when many of them are being tortured in their deen and dignity and in their children and property, after they had lived with honour and grace, safe and secure in the land of the Caliphate. So race towards your State and support it, and terrorize your enemies and those of God. God says: “And prepare against them all the power you can muster, and all the cavalry you can mobilize, to terrify thereby God’s enemies and your enemies, and others besides them whom you do not know, but God knows them. Whatever you spend in God’s way will be repaid to you in full, and you will not be wronged” (Al-Anfal: 60).

Do not hesitate to support your deen and those who carried the flag of tawhid [monotheism], and know that the State is opening its doors to everyone who wishes to do jihad. “O you who believe! Respond to God and to the Messenger when He calls you to what gives you life” [8: 24].

So respond to God and cling to His strong rope. Do not pay attention to the words of those trying to keep you down, and be wary of the malice of the backstabbing munafiqeen [hypocrites, false Muslims]. Seek jihad, as there is no time to make up excuses or plans.

To the honourable leaders in West and Central Africa—may God guide your steps—we deliver to you the greetings and commendations of Shaykh Emir al-Mumineen [Commander of the Faithful] (may God protect him). He advises you at the head of this matter, to fear God and obey Him in what He granted you and enabled you, and to return rights to its people, to restore those rights the tawaghit dared usurp from the oppressed, and not back down, and to keep fighting your enemy, and to take advantage of every opportunity and intensify your raids. The Shaykh also compliments your blessed work in applying what God ordered: “Those who, when We empower them in the land, observe the prayer, and give regular charity, and command what is right, and forbid what is wrong. To God belongs the outcome of events” [22: 41].

We also compliment your work in extracting and burying the fitna [strife] of the Khawarij, and we thank God the Generous that He permitted those who were walking behind them to return to their senses. We ask God to guide them and to make them return to the jama’a [group] of Muslims, leaving behind the paths of loss and seduction, and to gather around the Imam of the Muslims, the Shaykh and Mujahid Abu Ibrahim al-Hashemi (may God protect him). We were glad to receive the news of their bay’a [oath/pledge of allegiance], and we want to let them know that Emir al-Mumineen has accepted it and sends his greetings. He advises them to remain steady on the matter of their deen, and not to be a tool in the hands of followers of whims and heresy. They must fear God, and not back down in their deen, and to do well in fighting the armies of the tawaghit, to compensate for the days they lost following the fitna and shubuhat [doubt; the state between knowing what is halal and haram].

Here we would like to note, that this—by God’s grace—is the biggest proof of the righteousness of the path of the Islamic State and its innocence from the deviations of the Murji’ah [postponers, those who refrain from judging the sincerity of other Muslims’ faith] and the Ghulat [exaggerators, extremists] since the day it started to this day, and that it is on the prophetic methodology—by God’s permission—and it will not add to or deviate from it. This state is—by God’s grace—standing steady like mountains, where neither the wind and storms of fitna and ordeals nor the continuous fighting affected it. It is steady on its path, certain in the victory from God, and it does not bow down to anyone. Truly, its leaders and soldiers sacrificed their blood and made cheapened it for the sake of supporting the deen of God and making His word the highest, as for this deen there are red lines, for it we make our life cheap and our blood to be shed.

We also compliment the blessed work of the soldiers of the Caliphate in Wilayat of Iraq, Syria, Sinai, Khorasan, Somalia, Libya, Pakistan, and Hind.

We specially address the lions of the Caliphate in Iraq Wilaya for what they exerted in Baghdad in its north and south, and Salahuddin, Anbar, Diyala, Kirkuk, Ninawa, and Jazira. May God be with you, O you who refuse oppression, you who bewildered the Rafida [derog. “Shi’is”] and put them in a constant state of alert. They have lost—by God’s grace—their hopes and they have started admitting their incompetence and failure in stopping your blessed operations. The arrogant among them who do not want to confess the hardships they endured by your hands in the past few days, could only launch their campaigns of failure to clear out the deserts.

Know, O Rafidah of Iraq, if what you are trying to achieve were possible, then your American masters would have done it before you. Reduce the pressure on the farmers, and push your army to harvest the crops and till the deserts, instead of wasting your time in chasing the muwahideen with your armoured vehicles. Work for your own, O Rafida and Hashd, and avoid the den and deeds of lions. Due to your bankruptcy, every time you find an old piece of cloth or iron here or there you announce it as a victory on your media channels, prepare meetings for it, and make public statements. How foolish you are! We tell you: go back to your holes, prepare your coffins, and dig your graves. As soon as you announce a new campaign of failure, you then announce entering a state of emergency, then afterwards comes your misery and destruction, and your blood spilling and your heads flying off like rocks. We promise you more, and we will make your filthy blood—by God’s permission—run as rivers once again.

As for you O Tribal Hashd, you who wish to live under the graveyards, was what happened to your predecessors the Sahwat of Iraq not enough? Did you not take from their example? Do you think you are stronger than them or their masters and supporters? Save your advice for yourselves and your predecessors today, before we capture you tomorrow and then start giving out advice and reminders to who will listen and see your known tough fate. Do not fool yourselves that you are safe from our swords. We have delayed breaking into your homes time and time again, hoping that you would repent before we capture you, and before you see us standing over your heads in your beds, when weeping and regretting will not do you any good. Have you not heard what God said in Surat al-Qalam [68:44-45]: “We will proceed gradually [towards their destruction], from where they know not. A respite I [can afford to] grant them [because] my plan is flawless”?

To the lions in the deserts of the Syria Wilaya, may God be with you, words cannot describe you even if we wrote a thousand articles. You brought the Nusayris [Alawis, i.e., the Asad regime] down to the ground, along with their allies and supporters from the Russians and Iran. It is thanks to God that their campaigns have failed and opened upon them nightmares of exhaustion and hell, after they thought they were going after you in a picnic. They stopped daring to move about unless they have air cover from the hell they have seen—and all praise is due to God—or surrounded by tanks.

We also compliment the blessed operations by the lions in Khayr [Deir Ezzor], Baraka [Hasaka], Raqqa, and Halab [Aleppo] in writing history and killing the leaders of the atheists and the Sahwat [Awakening, i.e., anti-IS Syrian rebels]. We invite you, O brave ones, to kill and eliminate the scholars of filth, those who climb on the back of tribes, breaking their promise every time and not fearing God. Destroy them and those behind them. God says: “Those with whom you enter into a covenant, but they violate it at every opportunity, they do not fear God. If you go to war with them, deal with them so as to provide a fearsome example for those who follow them, so that they may take heed [or ‘be deterred’]” [8:57-56].

We invite you, O soldiers of the Caliphate in Raqqa, Khayr, and Baraka, to show us in them killings and destruction and misery. Kill them on the roads, or enter their homes and show them the conduct of our raids. Make them wish to die and not be able to, for they sold their deen and dignity to the atheist Kurds yesterday, and incite to elect a Nusayri taghut today. What is wrong with them? They elect and incite the election of he who killed their children, raped their women, stole their property, and destroyed their cities and villages?! We have not read about anyone in history who is more despicable than them!

To the lions of the Caliphate in the Sinai Wilaya of glory and steadiness, the land of battles and heroism, blessed is your harvest where leaderships have fallen, and barracks have been destroyed, and blood of the Sahwat spilled. Proceed onwards, as the army of Egypt’s Pharoah is no worse than the army of the Rafida in Iraq. They opened upon themselves a long list of exhaustion, for their leaders and captains and vehicles and pockets before their soldiers, whom they prepared for doom without care. We invite you, O lions of the Caliphate in Sinai, to expand and move your blessed operations inside their cities, and to prepare squads for silencers and adhesive bombs, to work on assassinating the heads of their army and intelligence. Draw for these operations a long breath, and do no rush to pick its fruits.

To the lions of the Caliphate in the Khorasan Wilaya, strengthen your will and ruin the livelihood of the Rafidi mushrikeen [idolaters, polytheists] and Taliban murtadeen [apostates]. We also advise you to choose more painful targets at the head of the taghut’s government and its joints. If God enables you to get the head of the snake, the rest of its body will fall apart.

We also compliment the blessed operation by the lions of the Caliphate in Libya. This is the beginning of the spark, so follow through and hit them again and again.

O soldiers of the Caliphate everywhere! Do not feel down or be saddened by the alliance of kufr against you, as you are the superiors, and superiority was never attached to enablement. God says: “Do not falter or grieve, for you will gain superiority if you are true believers” [3: 139]. God did not say if you were enabled, or in control, but He in His Highness said if you are believers. We are superior with our faith, and we are superior by following the orders of our Lord and the guidance of our Prophet.

So congratulations, O strangers, if you held on to your faith, and made efforts to enable your the shari’a of your Lord, as it is only from Him that one can be supported and guided. So be for your state and your deen the best of soldiers, and be like tall mountains, like lions in battle not fearing death. Feel the fear of God, so you can be rewarded with what you did not think you would obtain. Know that if God’s destiny came, just like rain falling from the sky, no one can stop or block it. Be sure and know for certain that every matter is in the hands of God, and victory is only from Him, blessed is He.

O those who fight the State whoever you are, know that this fight has brought you down—by God’s grace—and you will soon stop lying about your fake victories that you’ve been trying to reach over the past years. Your armies here are exhausted and they are dragging your disappointments and regrets behind them. Your hearts are breaking due to our raids and the news that you hear, and this war made you stray, weak, and scared. What are you doing here? What will you spend over there? By God, even if it takes time you will lose. God says: “Tell those who disbelieve, ‘You will soon be vanquished and rounded up into Hell—an evil resting-place’” [3:12].

Imam Ibn al-Qayim (may God have mercy on him) said: “Whoever thought that what is wrong will overcome what is right, he thought wrong of God.”

[Arabic poetry]

What is it with you when the lions are breaking in, seeking the guidance of the Most Merciful to overthrow?!

Will soldiers of taghut and shame scare them ?! If they return, we return to them with destruction

We renew our calls to all the Wilayat without exception, and we specially address the Wilayat of Iraq and Syria, that Shaykh Emir al-Mumineen (may God protect him) has implored you to do everything you can to break down the walls of the prisons, and to free the Muslim prisoners from the murtad and atheist jailers. Do not spare any effort in doing so. Use secrecy and silence to do your work, and do not let anyone know about your plans unless necessary, to execute at the zero hour.

We also implore you, O soldiers of the Caliphate, to tighten your grip on the taghut judges and investigators, to avenge our prisoners. We want you to know that Shaykh Emir al-Mumineen has ordered monetary rewards for everyone who God enables to cut the heads of the taghut judges and investigator butchers. So ask God for support and choose your targets, and pray to Him and ask Him for guidance, then ask and take advice from your brothers. If you intend to act, then depend on God the Great, and if you land in their field, then make it hell on them.

And to your beloved ones the prisoners everywhere: we know that to free you is our duty, and that is it a debt upon our necks as long as we lived. Your brothers have done their best in this. Just know that the whole matter is in the hands of God the Great; if He wants something to happen, He only need say “be”.

O loved ones, be the way we know you, as men who believe in God’s destiny, good or bad. Do not panic or settle down, for the order is God’s order and the judgment is God’s judgment. Be patient and help each other persevere, and ask God for forgiveness and remind each other of God. God says: “If God afflicts you with hardship, none can remove it except He, and if He wills good for you, none can repel His grace. He grants it to whomever among his slaves He wills. He is All-Forgiving, All-Merciful” [10:107].

As for our message to the scum, the Messenger of God said: “The nations will soon summon one another to collaborate against you, just like people inviting others to share a plate of food. Someone said: ‘Will that be because our numbers are small at that time?’ He said: ‘No, you will be many by then, but you will be scum and garbage like foam carried on water, and God will make it so your enemy will no longer fear you, and he will put weakness in your hearts’. Another asked: ‘What weakness [wahn], O Messenger of God?’ He said: ‘To love life, and hate death’.”

Is it not time for you to wake up from your nap and drunkenness? Is it not time for you to realise the truth of what is happening around you? Is it not clear that the nations are collaborating against you? Do you not witness with your own eyes they race to eat and take advantage of you? When they saw silence of the graves from you, they dared more and stopped fearing you, until they led you into loss and misguidance. The Messenger of God said: “When you partake in inah [usurious] transactions, hold on to the tails of cows, become satisfied with [crop] cultivation [or “farming”], and abandon jihad, God will send down humiliation upon and He will not lift it until you return to your deen.”

This is the summary of your illness, and you have no antidote but jihad. You have tried peace for many years, until you became unrivalled experts in peace. What are you waiting for? And what are you hoping for? After every fact we told you years ago revealed itself before you, that the murtad Arab tawaghit are but servants to the Jewish project, and their wizards have lied to you again and again, now here is the army of the taghut of Jordan, and here is the army of the Pharaoh of Egypt, racing to protect the borders of their Jewish masters, just because they heard a couple of youth are planning to head over there. Here are the lies and deceits of their wizards exposed to you, after you thought the tawaghit will support Palestine and avenge its people.

Here you have the right to ask: where are the swarms of airplanes of what they call the “Arab Alliance” in supporting Palestine, the ones that poured the fire of their grudge yesterday on Muslims in Syria and Iraq, claiming that we are agents for the Jews? If that is their war against the agents like they claimed, where is their fight today against the Jews themselves? And why are they not saving the Palestinians from them? Where are the airplanes of the liar of Turkey, who yesterday bombed the cities and villages of northern Aleppo when it was under the rule of the Islamic State?

Do you know when the airplanes of the kuffar of the Arab Alliance will intervene? When you find the soldiers of the Caliphate fighting the Jews in Palestine. Then the orders will come from their masters to defend the Jews. Here are the facts obvious to the blind, but most of them hate the truth. God says: “We certainly brought the truth to you, but most of you hate the truth” [43: 78]. God also says: “Most people will not believe, no matter how keen you are” [12:103].

How strange is the case of some Palestinian scum. How strange you are, for yesterday you were condemning the normalisation of the tawaghit of the Gulf and their followers with the Jews, and today you are showing your normalisation with Safawi Iran blatantly, the one that curses the honour of the greatest Prophet and his Companions. After all of this you ask why were you let down?! And why everyone dared to sell you out and oppress and assault you? By God, who raised the sky without pillars, you will not stand up until you repent and return to your deen. He who seeks glory without Islam will only find humiliation from God. What humiliation is greater than yours? What situation is worse than yours? Your cause now is nothing but cheering and clapping, and hanging images of dead Rafida by the holy house and praying for them, and praising the Rafidi Hashd [al-Shabi] in Iraq who torture the Sunnis.

Here we speak to whoever still has some sense left, or is listening and is a witness—the ones who did not succumb to the fitna of allying with the Rafida and their slaves. We say to them: O people of Palestine, know that rights are not claimed with peace and bowing down, but with jihad and spilling blood. So wake up, and be alert, and realize your situation. Return to your senses. Know that you, O people of Palestine and all of Syria, know that you must curse the Sahwat of shame as long as you remain and your eyes witness destruction. They have delayed the soldiers of the Caliphate from supporting you and fighting the Jews, after they became a hurdle in their path. By God, who are the agents who work for the benefit of the Jews and Crusaders?! Here is the truth of the brothers of Satan clear to you, along with their mercenary groups in Palestine. After all of this, do you still hope for their support? Do not be misled by the rockets they launched, for they were not fired to answer your calls or to lift the oppression you suffer, but to answer the calls of their Persian masters. It is but a policy of enmity between them and the Jews. Otherwise, the oppression and aggression of the Jews is not something that was newly born. Why will these rockets not keep launching then to reclaim your rights and what the Jews took from you and to prevent their evil?

The facts are obvious and the illness is clear. Every honest one among you needs to seek jihad to lift oppression, and to fight the mercenaries of Iran the Ikhwan donkeys, and know that the death that you try to avoid will meet you, by God. So be keen on spending your lives cheaply for the Sake of God while you are in the battlefield, covered in blood, and not spend it in the fields of peace and humiliation.

We renew our calls to the Sahwat of ridda and shame: do not stand between us and the Nusayris, and do not stand between us and the Jews. Was it not enough that you let down the muwahideen? Was it not enough that you made yourselves slaves and shoes for your supporters? O groups of Sahwat, do not stand between us and your masters, so we can free you from their control.

Our message to the backstabbing haters, those who claim that they are on the righteous path: Ibn Abbas (may God be pleased with them) said: The Messenger of God said: “The best of men in trials is he holding tight to his horse, running behind the enemies of God, and terrorizing them and being terrorised by them, or a man isolated in the wild giving God his rights.”

This is a description of the finest of people in times of trials, so what is wrong with you, O you who opened your chest and let loose your tongue and pen, and dared stab and curse and harm the mujahideen? What is wrong with you? At times of trials you only know the jama’a of Muslimin to stab at and disfigure its jihad, and curse its soldiers. Was it not enough that you let them down and sat at home rather than supporting your deen? But for the wrong-doing that you beautified for yourselves and those walking behind you, God says: “What of him whose evil-doing was made so attractive to him that he regards it as good? God leads astray whomever He wills, and He guides whomever He wills. Therefore, do not waste your life in sorrow over them. God is well-aware of what they do” [35:8].

Shaykh al-Islam Ibn Taymiyya (may God have mercy on him) said: “Bid’a [innovation] is preferrable to the devil than sin, because the sinner knows that he sinned so he repents, but the one doing bid’a thinks what he’s doing is a good deed so he doesn’t repent.”

And God said in describing the state of the people of Hell: “‘What drove you into Saqar?’ They will respond … ‘We used to indulge in vain disputes with other vain talkers’” [75: 42, 45].

O you who indulge vanities with those who indulge, and stab at and curse the muwahideen, until you dared and thought you were doing right by stabbing at who proceeded you in the way of jihad by almost two decades, while some of you—at that time—were still breastfeeding. Listen to what God the Great says said in His Holy Book: “That He may ask the sincere about their sincerity” [33:8].

Glory be to God, the sincere will be asked about his sincerity, so how will you be you who lie about us? How will you and what will your question be? How will you answer the Great Lord? Prepare for that question an answer, and rectify yourselves, O poor ones, before the Day of Judgment. Stop your evil from the jihad of the muwahideen. Know your position, for there is great difference between the men of the State who carry the burden of the Ummah, and the males who the Ummah carry their own burden.

[Arabic poetry]

The barks and deeds of dogs do no’ hurt us, as lions only fear the Most Merciful

Soldiers of our State come, and to your enemies be like a volcano

You confused the people of falsehood that they could not stop you, so they tried to plot against you like the devil The fronts of faith are going steady, seeking to reach the heaven of the Most Merciful

Al-Fadil ibn Ayad (may God have mercy on him) said: “Follow the path of righteousness and do not feel lonely because only few follow it. Be wary of the path of falsehood, and do not be deceived by the number of lost. Every time you feel alone, look to those who passed before you, and keep your sight from the others, as they will not help you in front of God, and if they screamed at you in your path, do not turn to them, as the moment you turn, they will take you to their path.”

O God! We ask of Your generosity and grace, to steady our hearts and our feet, and not let our souls leave our bodies except with martyrdom for Your Sake in which you are pleased with us, going forward and not backwards, steady and not alternating, conquering your enemy, and the situation expresses:

[Arabic poetry]

Like the lions of the field the day they meet, like the sharp sword over your necks

Finally, these are some recommendations with which I remind myself and my brothers the mujahideen:

Be wary, O soldiers of the Caliphate. Be very wary of the sin of assumptions and lies. God says: “O you who believe! Shun excessive suspicion, [for] some suspicion is sinful” [49:12].

The Messenger of God said: “Do not make suspicions, as suspicions are lies in speech, and do not spy on each other, and do not boycott each other, and be worshippers of God and brothers.”

Avoid speaking in bad terms about each other. God says: “Would any of you like to eat the flesh of his dead brother? You would detest it. So remain mindful of God. God is Most Relenting, Most Merciful” [49:12].

You can imagine how ugly is this scene, to be over the body of your brother eating from his flesh, while blood is spilling from his mouth. The ugliness of backbiting is the same as this scene, so be wary of it, may God guide you.

Give Sadaqa, even if it is very little. God says: “And donate from what We have provided for you, before death comes to you, and you cry, ‘My Lord, if only You would delay me for a short while, so that I may be charitable, and be one of the righteous’” [63:10].

The one who wishes to delay death asks to be able to give charity and did not mention anything else, and that is for its blessed effect and for what God has saved for those with charitable actions. The Messenger of God said: “Protect yourselves from hell fire even with half a date, and if you couldn’t find then with a kind word”.

Be very wary of oppression. Do not oppress, but be wary of it and warn from it and fear it. The Messenger of God said: “Be wary of oppression, as oppression is layers of darkness on the day of judgement.” Do not oppress yourselves or your brothers or those under your control. We are declaring our innocence to God from every oppression, intentional or unintentional. So race and take initiative and give to everyone who has a right his rights before the Day of Judgment. “And you will certainly be questioned [or “called to account”] about what you used to do” [16:93].

O soldiers of the Caliphate, you must know your position, and the great graces God has granted you that is only for you. Thank Him for His apparent and non-apparent graces, those about which you know and do not know, with a thanks that never leaves your tongues and hearts. By God, only for the grace of guidance is enough if put on one side of a scale, and all life is put on the other, the guidance will be heavier; as this life is non-lasting, and guidance will get you to a heaven that is high and lasting, by God’s permission.

So count your rewards, O soldiers of the Caliphate. We consider that, not only are you rewarded for your jihad and your battles for the Sake of God, but for the muwahideen there are other rewards that come from the mouths of the backbiters and those who speak ill of you and of your intentions, or those who stab at your jihad and at your faith, and disturb your movements and sleep and everything in your lives. Know that you will be rewarded for that—by God’s permission—and it will be taken from them in spite of their noses.

This is a reminder to every Muslim, to everyone who heard what we mentioned of the words of our Lord. The Great Lord says: “Had We sent this Quran down on a mountain, you would have seen it trembling, crumbling in awe of God. These parables We cite for the people, so that they may reflect” [59:21]. By God, do you resemble a single small stone from that mountain that stands and crumbles in fear of God and what was sent down on it?! O you who were made from insignificant fluid, when will you stand and tremble for the orders of God and for fear of the Lord of all creation?!

“So where are you heading? Verily, this [Qur’an] is nothing else than a reminder to all mankind, to everyone who wishes to take the Straight Way. But your wishing will not avail you unless it is willed by God, the Lord of the Worlds” [81:29-26].

O God! Pray upon and bless our Prophet Muhammad and his Companions and followers. All praise is due to God, the Lord of all creation.