The first is: “Faith will retreat to Medina as a snake retreats to its burrow.” It was narrated by al-Bukhari, Muslim, and others. The second is: “A group from my community will continue to prevail upon the truth until Allah’s command comes to them, while they remain so.” This is an authentic, mass-transmitted hadith, narrated by a number of the Companions. Its documentation has previously been given from several of them under nos. 270, 1108, 1955, and 1956, as well as in Sahih Abi Dawud (1245). In some versions, they are identified as “the people of the west”—that is, Greater Syria. This is explained in a report from Mu‘adh recorded by al-Bukhari and others; and al-Tirmidhi and others narrated it in a report attributed directly to the Prophet with the wording: “If the people of Greater Syria become corrupt, there will be no good in you; and a group from my community will continue...” the hadith.

These hadiths strongly indicate that what matters in a land is its inhabitants, not its walls. Salman al-Farisi, may Allah be pleased with him, plainly expressed this truth when Abu al-Darda’ wrote to him, “Come to the Holy Land.” Salman wrote back to him: “The sacred land does not sanctify anyone; rather, a person is sanctified by his deeds.” (Muwatta’ Malik 2/235).

Therefore, it is fatal ignorance and utter foolishness—if not a lack of religious commitment—for a witless preacher to choose residence under Jewish occupation and declare it obligatory for persecuted Algerians to migrate to Tel Aviv rather than to his own Muslim land—Amman, for example—let alone to Mecca and Medina. This ignores the immorality, depravity, and licentiousness that the Jews have spread throughout Palestine in general, and in Tel Aviv, Haifa, and Jaffa in particular, such that it has spread among many Muslim men and women through proximity and contagion. This is not hidden from those who have lived among them and whom Allah then delivered from them, or from those who occasionally go there to visit their families. No one endowed with any measure of knowledge can fail to see how this choice runs counter to