All praise is due to Allāh, and may peace and blessings be upon the Messenger of Allāh.

﴿يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا اتَّقُوا اللَّهَ وَقُولُوا قَوْلًا سَدِيدًا﴾

[ الأحزاب: 70]

"O you who believe! Keep your duty to Allah and fear Him, and speak (always) the truth."

﴿يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا كُونُوا قَوَّامِينَ لِلَّهِ شُهَدَاءَ بِالْقِسْطِ ۖ وَلَا يَجْرِمَنَّكُمْ شَنَآنُ قَوْمٍ عَلَىٰ أَلَّا تَعْدِلُوا ۚ اعْدِلُوا هُوَ أَقْرَبُ لِلتَّقْوَىٰ ۖ وَاتَّقُوا اللَّهَ ۚ إِنَّ اللَّهَ خَبِيرٌ بِمَا تَعْمَلُونَ﴾

[ المائدة: 8]

"O you who believe! Stand out firmly for Allah and be just witnesses and let not the enmity and hatred of others make you avoid justice. Be just: that is nearer to piety, and fear Allah. Verily, Allah is Well-Acquainted with what you do."

﴿يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا اتَّقُوا اللَّهَ حَقَّ تُقَاتِهِ وَلَا تَمُوتُنَّ إِلَّا وَأَنتُم مُّسْلِمُونَ﴾

[ آل عمران: 102]

"O you who believe! Fear Allah (by doing all that He has ordered and by abstaining from all that He has forbidden) as He should be feared. [Obey Him, be thankful to Him, and remember Him always], and die not except in a state of Islam (as Muslims) with complete submission to Allah."

Know—may Allāh guide you to the truth—that those who inflict al-ḍarar al-murakkab (compound harm) upon the Salafī Daʿwah are a trial for the people of Īmān. They have built a system based on destroying the reputations of the duʿāt, sowing hatred within Ahl al-Sunnah, exploiting a single private conversation to damage the reputations of their brothers, and deceiving the people of knowledge with false reports.
It is an obligation upon the people of truth to expose them. We do not do this out of personal desire, but to repel their ongoing harm, safeguard the honor of the callers, and ensure the believers are not stung twice from the same hole (lā yuldaghu al-muʾmin min juḥrin wāḥidin marratayn). When the harm is compound—corrupting hearts with hatred and the religion with lies—clarifying their state is a necessity to protect the Ummah from their deception and keep the path of the Salaf clear of the distortions of the deceivers and the deceived.

The Obligation of Clarification

Introduction

Indeed, among the greatest obligations in the religion of Allāh is to establish justice (ʿAdl), to demand evidence (Burhān), and to protect the honor of the innocent from the transgressions of the reckless. We have listened with profound astonishment to the recent un-evidenced warnings issued by Musa Richardson against Shaykh Abu ʿIyad—a caller who has spent over three decades spreading the works of the major scholars of Ahl al-Sunnah.

After carefully weighing Musa’s speech upon the scales of the Sharīʿah, we found it to be utterly devoid of legislative proof. Instead, his warning is built entirely upon the fragile foundations of tale-carrying (Namīmah), hidden reports, and an extreme, reckless methodology that severely resembles the path of the Ḥaddādiyyah.

It is a staggering calamity that an individual who recently championed the disastrous theological blunder that “Social Distancing is an Obligation from Allah in these times, —without a single shred of textual proof—now attempts to mask his own profound deficiency in the Uṣūl (classical foundations) by projecting baseless accusations of infiltration onto others. He now claims, out of sheer foolishness (Safāhah), that Shaykh Abu ʿIyad is a ‘plant’ who desires to destroy the Daʿwah. What absolute absurdity this is! The only reason for such a vindictive attack is that Shaykh Abu ʿIyad defended the truth against the documented lies of ʿArafāt, and clarified the tumultuous affairs of Yemen and Sudan with words strictly backed by established Salafi Shaykhs.

Since the honor of the Salafi callers is not a playground for the emotional rhetoric of tale-carriers, it has become an obligation to dismantle this confusion with absolute justice and clarity.

Musa bases this grand claim—that Abu ʿIyad is a 'plant'—upon what Shaykh al-Bukhārī (ʿAbdullāh bin ʿAbd al-Raḥīm bin Ḥusayn bin Maḥmūd.) allegedly told him five years ago, based on false and venomous information that was fed to him and others by these very individuals themselves.

Musa states:

"Shaykh Abdullah Buhari told me five years ago, he's a plant. Warn the people against him. Subhaanallah. And he was absolutely right. But the reality is, some scholars have insight and they see things."

As Abu Maryam Tariq correctly noted:

“Moosaa Richardson and his accomplice from the US, and Abu Mu’ādh Taqveem from the UK visited Saudi and were complaining about Abu ‘Iyād, and students of knowledge from the UK and US.”

Likewise, from the Maldives were Abu Anas and his party (including Adiyyu and certain students in Madīnah at the time, according to Abu Anas himself), , who were also involved in carrying tales, conveying selective information, and—if not lodging direct complaints—fueling the discord during these affairs.

A brother from the Maldives informed me on 18th Jan 2026:

"Abu Anas, Taqweem, and Musa have a very big hand [major involvement] in this matter… Abu Anas told me as well that he had translated it (meaning, portions of the speech of Shaykh Abu ʿIyad, in order to send it to the Shaykhs in Madīnah, ʿArafāt, ʿAbd al-Ilāh al-Rifāʿī, and Shaykh al-Bukhārī). However, even though I asked him to send that translated message to me, he hasn't sent it even until today. The students studying in Madīnah (MV) also have a hand in this matter."

According to a phone call with Abu Anas last year December, after initially denying and lying to us directly while dodging the issue by claiming he had only conveyed Abu ʿIyād’s speech regarding ʿadwā to Shaykh al-Bukhārī — which I myself had sent to him — it later became apparent that he had also conveyed statements regarding masking and claims connected to “shirk” to ʿArafāt, and which then to Shaykh al-Bukhārī and some speeches send to ʿAbd al-Ilāh al-Rifāʿī. Such behavior reflects cunningness, concealment, contradiction, and tale-carrying — traits that many people likewise criticized in his Shaykh, ʿArafāt.

These individuals, aided by Shihāb of India, went so far as to translate a private voice note that Shaykh Abu ʿIyad had sent to Shihāb's business partner, Naufal. This private correspondence was then handed over to Dr. ʿArafāt and subsequently forwarded to Shaykh al-Bukhārī.

The Shaykh seemingly accepted their deception—just as he had initially accepted the misleading fabrications and portrayals during the earlier Madeenah.com fitnah years ago. This susceptibility to their tale-carrying ultimately led the Shaykh to speak unjustly against Shaykh Abu ʿIyad, shockingly comparing him to the Muʿtazilī innovator ʿAmr bin ʿUbayd and baselessly accusing him of being a "plant" within the Daʿwah.

Through these betrayals of trust and hidden correspondences, one of three realities becomes apparent regarding Shaykh ʿAbdullāh bin ʿAbd al-Raḥīm bin Ḥusayn bin Maḥmūd in this affair:

1. Either he was actively and completely misled by their deceptive tale-carrying;

2. or he still harbored lingering grievances against Maktabah Salafiyyah stemming from the previous Madeenah.com fitnah and saw this as an opportunity to speak against them;

3. or these troublemakers (Fattānūn) surrounding him were fully aware of that past friction and purposefully exploited it to ignite renewed discord between the Shaykhs and the Salafi callers in the West.

Whatever the hidden reality of the hearts may be—and Allāh knows best (Allāhu Aʿlam)—the manifest, legislative reality is that Dr. al-Bukhārī gravely erred in his speech. He committed a severe injustice by equating Shaykh Abu ʿIyad with the Muʿtazilī innovator ʿAmr bin ʿUbayd and by baselessly declaring a caller to the Sunnah to be a 'plant' without a single shred of evidence.

This lack of evidence and reliance on tale-carriers is not an assumption; it is a documented confession. In a meeting on May 2, 2025, a student of knowledge from the Maldives admitted exactly how the fabricated narrative regarding COVID was fed to Shaykh al-Bukhārī. When asked who was involved in sending the question to the Shaykh, the brother explicitly confessed:

"Abu Anas and I were both involved."

When asked why they involved Shaykh Abu ʿIyad and what exactly they told Shaykh al-Bukhārī, he exposed the reality of their tale-carrying, stating:

"Because [Name] was referencing Abu Iyād’s action for his works in social media. Publicly speaking about vaccines and covid... We told the Shaykh that some brothers say, 'Since Abū Iyād is speaking about COVID publicly, we should be allowed to do so as well.'"

Note on names:

Regarding the student of knowledge I mentioned as being involved in sending the question to Shaykh al-Bukhārī, he was someone close to Abu Anas who worked with us in the Daʿwah back then. He now feels deep remorse over how that speech was carried and presented to the Shaykh, and he is no longer with Abu Anas today. Furthermore, the brother I quoted who sent the Telegram text confirming that "Abu Anas, Taqweem, and Musa have a very big hand..." is one of the brothers who was involved with us in the Daʿwah, and he is well known to the mashāyikh and duʿāt in both the UK and the US. For a clear benefit, I chose to leave out their specific names in the text. This reality is already well known among those who were involved in the Daʿwah in the Maldives and does not need to be explicitly named. For now, I keep it as it is to prevent them from twisting the narrative as was attempted recently. However, if someone connected to our Daʿwah or one of the trusted mashāyikh asks me directly, I will readily provide their names.

When they presented this framed, one-sided narrative, Shaykh al-Bukhārī explicitly admitted his lack of knowledge regarding the reality of the situation. The brother stated:

"Shaykh (Bukhari) replied that he didn’t know who Abu Iyād was. So, we explained that he is a caller in the UK. We asked if brothers could speak openly about COVID as Abu Iyād did. Shaykh ʿAbdullāh responded negatively and quoted 4:83. Later, the Shaykh also spoke harshly about Abū Iyād in a dars more than required. (Hafr al-Baatin November 2021)"

This admission is corroborated by Muhammad bin Khalifah, himself, who wrote the following on X:

"I entered upon our Shaykh, the ʿAllāmah ʿAbdullāh al-Bukhārī—may Allāh preserve him—shortly after COVID, and I found him angry regarding a man called (Abu Iyad) Amjad and the division he caused in the Maldives and Indonesia. I did not know him except by his kunyah. I then said to him, 'Our Shaykh, this is a man who has efforts [in the Daʿwah], and they say he is a specialist in these subjects.' I tried to calm the situation out of preservation for the blessed Daʿwah they had built for decades, and because of the love our elders held for them. Then, the Shaykh said—with the wisdom and baṣīrah (insight) of a father:

'If he is an expert in pandemics, then let him write his opinion and his research and send it to those whom Allāh has placed in authority over us, and to the Ministries of Health; he would then have fulfilled his obligation. As for this public agitation (tashwīsh), it can only be from an infiltration (dasīsah).'

The bitter irony of this heavily framed narrative is that Shaykh Abu ʿIyad had already perfectly executed the exact methodology proposed by Shaykh al-Bukhārī on "Giving Advice to the Authorities Through Legislated Routes,". As documented under Doubt No. 5 in his article "Defending the Rulers and Scholars Upon the Necessities of Knowledge and a Response to 21 Doubts Regarding Some Private Voice Notes" , Shaykh Abu ʿIyad composed three highly technical, detailed scientific papers. These comprehensive research documents were actively sent to a contact in the Gulf to be forwarded directly to the respective health ministries and official agencies of each of the Gulf countries. Remarkably, this action was completed in late 2020 and early 2021—nearly a full year before Shaykh al-Bukhārī delivered his harsh public rebuke in November 2021. As further illustrated in that very article, these specific works utilized official government data and mainstream pandemic metrics to guarantee academic evaluation by health specialists. The written research consisted of:

• Covid-19: Following the Science (166 pages).
• PCR and the Misuse of Science (111 pages).
• Covid-19 Vaccine Efficacy (15 pages).

This absolute verification proves that the accusation of "public agitation" or acting as a "plant" is a calculated fabrication by the tale-bearers. Shaykh Abu ʿIyad acted with the utmost sincerity (naṣīḥah) toward the rulers and the health authorities via appropriate, legislated channels. This reality was intentionally hidden from Shaykh al-Bukhārī by the individuals carrying the venomous reports, proving that the Shaykh's warning was entirely built upon a completely manufactured and one-sided baseline.

Furthermore, as Shaykh Abu ʿIyad beautifully stated when refuting this very doubt:

“As for accusing Salafīs of being plants for cautioning against the harmful medications of Ahl al-Kitāb and discussing their fabrications and exaggerations in affairs of medicine for the benefit and the well-being of the Muslims, as scholars have done in the distant and recent past, these are not grounds for accusing people of being plants. Rather, it is slander and oppression.”

This absolutely proves that Shaykh al-Bukhārī did not arrive at his warning through independent verification or ground knowledge. Rather, his stance was entirely constructed upon the framed questions and tale-carrying of Abu Anas and his companions!

The injustice in the Maldives was particularly severe; individuals such as Abu Anas unjustly linked local disputes with the brothers to Shaykh Abu ʿIyad, based purely on their own assumptions. They then compiled these distorted questions and written pieces—framed with malicious intent—and forwarded them directly to Shaykh al-Bukhārī to incite him against a caller he did not even know.

This narrative—that Shaykh Abu ʿIyad was behind "division in the Maldives and Indonesia" —is not merely a misinterpretation; it is a geographic and cultural absurdity. The overwhelming majority of the Salafi community in Indonesia has no knowledge of Shaykh Abu ʿIyad, and even among the duʿāt (preachers) in the region, he is virtually unknown. Furthermore, given that the vast majority of Indonesian Salafis do not speak English, the claim that he caused widespread division in the region is a manifest falsehood that defies common sense.

Salafīs in both Indonesia and the Maldives have testified that they are entirely unaware of any fitnah caused by Shaykh Abu ʿIyad in 2020 or 2021. Among those I have personally spoken to, most have never even heard his name. One must ask: What, then, drove these individuals—who themselves are well-known for stirring discord—to drag Shaykh Abu ʿIyad into this matter and present him to Shaykh ʿAbdullāh al-Bukhārī and ʿArafāt Ḥasan Ṣāliḥ Jaʿfar in such a distorted fashion?

The reality of this affair becomes clear when one examines the movements of ʿArafāt Ḥasan Ṣāliḥ Jaʿfar and his close connections in the Maldives and Indonesia.

Consider the condition of Abu Anas of the Maldives, an individual who appeared desperately eager to gain favor, approval, and superficial "medals" of recognition from Shaykh al-Bukhārī and ʿArafāt. He achieved this through the blameworthy avenues of tale-carrying (namīmah), relaying disputes, and presenting highly selective information to remain securely in their good graces. Among the most astonishing and strange matters recorded against him during previous tribulations (fitan) is that Abu Anas allegedly concealed himself, secretly switching on a recording device to capture the speech of a Shaykh without his permission. He then returned and forwarded this recording to Shaykh al-Bukhārī—all in a relentless pursuit of praise, recognition, and perceived closeness to the scholars during times of discord. From such treacherous behavior, one learns that this individual is willing to stab Salafi callers (duʿāt), scholars (mashāyikh), and even the common people in the back to appease others, pursue his own base desires, and advance his personal standing.

Compounding these blunders with glaring hypocrisy, Abu Anas later went on to circulate religious verdicts (fatāwā) strictly prohibiting the secret recording of people. He notably did this after a brother recorded a conversation with him regarding a severe incident in 2019 that took place in a classroom while he was teaching the female students. During this incident, Abu Anas tightly grabbed and pressed the upper arm (biceps area) of the brother's daughter with one hand, causing her immense pain, in order to forcefully snatch a paper from her palm with his other hand. When confronted, rather than seeking forgiveness from the father, Abu Anas dodged accountability, lied about where he had grabbed her, and harshly threatened to boycott the brother merely for speaking about it. The brother resorted to recording the confrontation out of sheer necessity, as Abu Anas is well known for lying, denying his actions, and twisting his words. Yet, despite zealously spreading fatāwā against secret recordings to protect himself in this personal dispute, Abu Anas utterly failed to act upon those exact same principles when he himself secretly recorded the speech of a Shaykh and forwarded it to others.

The destructive reality of Abu Anas’s backstabbing and manipulation is further corroborated by the testimony of, a student of knowledge from the Maldives who was himself deeply wronged by this individual. In a documented meeting on May 2, 2025, He confirmed to me Abu Anas's treacherous nature, revealing that Abu Anas had interfered in his personal marital affairs, secretly sending questions to the Shaykhs behind his back in order to secure his own position in their "good books."

He explicitly stated regarding Abu Anas:

"I will not sit with Abu Anas in this world except in the presence of the Mashaayikh (Bukhari and Arafat)... I will treat him the same way he treated me—(by wrecking my marriage by trying to send questions to Shaykhs behind my back.) I will also explain to the Shaykhs about him... He wants to stay always in the good books of Shaykhs. Now he is sending people to solve this. This cannot be solved if he does not accept his mistakes."

He said he intends to take the issue of Abu Anas to Shaykhs (Abdullāh al-Bukhārī and Shaykh ʿArafāt.). This established pattern of backstabbing, refusing to admit errors, and using hidden reports to manipulate the Shaykhs is the exact same blueprint he used to fuel the fitnah against Shaykh Abu ʿIyad. Such manifest contradiction is a hallmark of individuals who outwardly portray themselves as callers to Islām and people of principle, while their practical reality entirely opposes what they preach.

Indeed, Imām Muḥammad bin ʿAbd al-Wahhāb (may Allāh have mercy upon him) emphasized in al-Uṣūl al-Sittah the critical importance of distinguishing between true people of knowledge and guidance, and those who merely resemble them outwardly while dismantling their principles in practice. Likewise, many observers have noted identical contradictions in the behavior and methodology of his Shaykh, ʿArafāt, who is similarly criticized for preaching principles he does not practice. It is a known reality that followers naturally inherit the traits, diseases, and mannerisms of those they blindly attach themselves to. Thus, Abu Anas has become known to many as one of the closest aides and right-hand supporters of ʿArafāt in the Maldives, carrying his banner of contradiction.

To further emphasize the reality of his two-faced methodology, a brother residing in the Maldives confirmed this exact trait in April 2025. When questioned regarding Abu Anas’s tendency to speak with multiple faces depending on his audience, the brother replied, affirming this known reality:

"This is known (about Abu Anas), brother. He takes the side of whoever he is with [speaking to please whoever is in front of him]. It is something he does very often / a habitual practice of his." (E meehaku kolhah e meeheh kaaree. Varah hadhaa ehcheh e ee).

SubḥānAllāh! This is the exact description of Dhul Wajhayn (the two-faced person) whom the Messenger of Allāh (ﷺ) severely warned against—the one who comes to these people with one face, and to those people with another face.

« تَجِدُ مِن شَرِّ النَّاسِ يَومَ القيامةِ عِندَ اللهِ ذا الوجهَينِ، الذي يَأتي هؤلاء بوجهٍ، وهؤلاء بوجهٍ.»

"You will find among the worst of the people on the Day of Resurrection in the sight of Allah, the possessor of two faces; the one who comes to these with a face, and to those with a face."

(Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī 6058 and Muslim 2526)

How can the daʿwah and the honor of the Salafi callers be entrusted to the translations and hidden reports of a man whose own community testifies that his two-faced manipulation and tale-carrying (Namīmah) is a frequent, habitual practice?

To thoroughly address these claims and dismantle this trial and confusion spread by ʿArafāt and his group of backstabbing individuals—and unfortunately aided by Shaykh ʿAbdullāh bin ʿAbd al-Raḥīm bin Ḥusayn bin Maḥmūd.—the response has been structured into 10 systematic angles (Wujūh).

Note on the Upcoming Section:

The next part will break down these systematic angles in full detail, beginning with:

• 1st Angle: The History of Tale-Carrying, the Lack of Ground Knowledge with Dr. Bukhari and the Falsehood of Mere "Insight"

Stay tuned for the full breakdown.

And Allāh knows best. May the peace and blessings of Allāh be upon our Prophet Muḥammad, his family, and his companions.