At annual Hizb ut-Tahrir conference, a call for Jihad

From the Memri blog:

At the annual conference of the Islamist organization Hizb Al-Tahrir in Lebanon, on the subject of jihad, organization member Sheikh Adnan Mizyan said yesterday that in light of the fact that many countries of Muslims are today under occupation [including Iraq]... the Islamic ummah must take jihad measures in order to free them.
Source: Al-Safir, Lebanon, July 20, 2009

In a related news item:

Protesters gathered outside a Chicago-area hotel Sunday as an Islamic extremist group reportedly linked to Al Qaeda held a conference in an attempt to step up Western recruitment efforts.

Roughly 500 members of Hizb ut-Tahrir — a global Sunni network with reported ties to confessed 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and Al Qaeda in Iraq's onetime leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi — met inside a Hilton hotel in Oak Lawn, Ill., to host [a conference called] "The Fall of Capitalism and the Rise of Islam."..

Hizb ut-Tahrir insists it does not advocate or condone jihad [despite the fact that at its annual conference in Lebanon yesterday, one of its members openly declared Jihad against several countries].

But others disagree.

Khalid Sheikh Mohammed is one of the group's most famous alumni, New Statesman journalist Shiv Malik reported, citing intelligence sources...

Malik's report, the public policy institute the Nixon Center and the counter-extremism think tank the Quilliam Foundation agree that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who was the leader of Al Qaeda in Iraq until he was killed in June 2006, also was once a member of Hizb ut-Tahrir...

In his book, "How the Khilafah Was Destroyed," Sheikh Abdul Qadeem Zalloom, the former global leader of Hizb ut-Tahrir, says anyone who rules by a non-Islamic system should "either retract or be killed...

And one of the organization's more recent leaflets, published in March, calls for the declaration of "a state of war against America ."...

But, despite these threats and calls to action, Hizb ut-Tahrir remains off the State Department's terror watch list, and it is free to host the Khilafah Conference and any other event like it...

Hizb ut-Tahrir has been banned in several countries, but is still active in the UK, and apparently, in the US too.

But as others have noted, the State Dept. and Justice Dept. have more important things to worry about - like addressing the grievances of Al Qaeda detainees and protecting the civil liberties of Hizb ut-Tahrir [and other like-minded organizations.........]