Islamists in the United States and Great Britain are mourning the death of Delwar Hossain Sayeedi, the vice-president of the violent South Asian Islamist movement, Jamaat-e-Islami (JI), and a convicted war criminal.
In 2013, Bangladesh’s war crimes tribunal found Delwar Hossain Sayeedi, guilty of crimes against humanity, including genocide, rape, and arson during Bangladesh’s war for independence in 1971.
Sayeedi reportedly died of a heart attack last week nearly ten years after his sentencing to life in prison.
Despite his war crimes conviction, Islamists in the U.S. and Britain have since hailed Sayeedi as a martyr of Islam and an inspiring master of the “deen,” the Islamic way of life.
“A very, very, very special person left the world a few days back. Imam Dilawar Hussein Sayeedi,” said Mohsin Ansari, President of the Islamic Circle of North America (ICNA), a “thinly veiled front group” for JI that operates as a charity organization in the U.S.
Ansari offered his remarks about Sayeedi at a conference of the Muslim Ummah of North America, another JI proxy that promotes the legacy of Sayeedi. Ansari told conference attendees that Sayeedi exemplified the “deen” of Allah and should be followed.
“The Muslim Ummah has lost a great legend,” announced ICNA headquarters in a “Top Story” on its website mourning the passing of Sayeedi. “May Allah accept him as a martyr and fulfill his dream to become a Shaheed. By the Will of Allah their sacrifices will not be forgotten and the quest for justice and Deen continues,” said the statement.
Hassan Akbar runs the New York-based Nafsin Wahida, “an organization dedicated to reinvigorating Islamic Dawah [spreading Islam to the world].” Upon Sayeedi’s death, Akbar honored him in a Facebook post saying, “May Allah forgive Shaykh Delwar Hossain Sayeedi and make his grave a garden from the gardens of paradise, Ameen.”
Meanwhile, British Islamists announced their own praise of the convicted war criminal.
Sayeedi “spent his life speaking the truth, teaching the Qur’ān, and advocating for the rights of Muslims in Bangladesh,” dying as a martyr after being falsely accused, wrote Islam21C, a British internet paper.
“This is a great loss for the Ummah and especially for the Muslims of Bangladesh,” said British extremist preacher, Haitham al-Haddad who once praised Osama bin Laden as a martyr.