Abdullah Yusuf Azzam was born in a village in the North of Palestine named Selat Al Harithia in Genine District in the year 1941. His father's name was Mustafa Azzam who died a year after his son was assassinated. His mother was Zakia Saleh who died one year before the Shaykh was killed. She was buried in Pabi camp. He was brought up in a humble house where he was taught Islam, and was fed with the love of Allah, His Messenger (صلى الله عليه وسلم), those striving in the Way of Allah, the righteous people and the desire for the Hereafter.
Early Years
The Azzam family is a well-known family, one of its members being Shaykh Abdullah Azzam, distinguished as child, who started making Da'wah at an early age. He was already showing signs of excellence and was recognized by his teachers while he was in elementary school. His peers knew him as a pious child. Since he was a small boy he was known for his determination and serious dispositions. Before he had even come of age, he joined the Muslim Brotherhood.
His Education
Shaykh Abdullah Azzam received his early elementary and secondary school education in his village, and continued his education at the agricultural Khadorri College where he obtained a Diploma. Although he was the youngest of his colleagues, he was the brightest and most astute. After he graduated from Khodori College, he worked as a teacher in a village named Adder in the South of Jordan. Later he joined Shariah College in Damascus University where he obtained a B.A. Degree in Shariah in 1966. After the Jews captured the West Bank in 1967, Shaykh Abdullah Azzam decided to migrate to Jordan, because he could not live under the Jewish occupation of Palestine. The sacrilege of the Israeli tanks rolling in the West Bank without any resistance made him more determined to migrate to learn the skills necessary to fight. In the late 1960's he joined the Jihad against the Israeli occupation of Palestine from Jordan.
During that time he received a Masters degree in Shariah from the University of Al-Azhar. In 1970 and after the jihad came to a halt, when the PLO was forced out of Jordan, he assumed a teaching position in the Jordanian University in Amman. In 1971 he was awarded a scholarship to Al-Azhar University in Cairo from which he obtained a Ph.D. Degree in Usul al-Fiqh in 1973. During his stay in Egypt he came to know the family of Sayyid Qutb.
Jihad in Palestine
Shaykh Abdullah Azzam spent a long time participating in the Jihad in Palestine. However, matters there were not to his liking, for the people involved in the Jihad were far removed from Islam. He told of how these people used to spend the nights playing cards and listening to music, under the illusionthat they were performing Jihad to liberate Palestine. Shaykh Abdullah Azzam mentioned that, out of the thousands in the camp he was in, the number of people who offered their Salah in congregation were so few that they could be counted on one hand. He tried to steer them towards Islam, but they resisted his attempts. One day he rhetorically asked one of the 'Mujahideen' what the religion behind the Palestinian revolution was, to which the man replied, quite clearly and bluntly, "This revolution has no religion behind it." This was the last straw. Shaykh Abdullah Azzam left Palestine, and went to Saudi Arabia to teach in the universities there.
Jihad in Afghanistan
When Shaykh Azzam realised that only by means of an organised force would the Ummah ever be able to gain victory, then Jihad and the Gun became his pre-occupation and recreation. "Jihad and the rifle alone: no negotiations, no conferences and no dialogues," he would say. Bypractising what he was preaching, Shaykh Abdullah Azzam was one of the first Arabs to join the Afghan Jihad against the communist USSR.
In 1979, when he learned about the Afghan Jihad, he left his teaching position at King Abdul-Aziz University in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia and went to Islamabad, Pakistan, in order to be able to participate in the Jihad. He moved to Pakistan to be close to the Afghan Jihad, and there he got to know the leaders of the Jihad. During the early time of his stay in Pakistan, he was appointed a lecturer in the International Islamic University in Islamabad. After a while he had to quit the University to devote his full time and energy to the Jihad in Afghanistan.
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Being True With Allah
Non-FictionThe biggest problem facing Islam today is the lack of the sincere and truthful amongst those who are working for Allah, except for those few hidden, pious, and pure people who were made for leading nations, and were made for navigating the ship.
