Protesters Gather Outside Islamic Conference Near Chicago

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 "The Fall of Capitalism and the Rise of Islam."

Hizb ut-Tahrir insists that it does not engage in terrorism. The organization is not recognized by the State Department as a known terror group. Its supporters, however, blasted capitalism while calling for a rise of Islam during Sunday's conference.

"Free market, organization, capitalization — all has failed and brought disaster to America," said one of the group's speakers.

Dozens of protesters outside the hotel — many of whom held American flags — shouted as attendees left the conference late Sunday. No arrests had been made.

"This is America," the protesters said. "If you don't like it in America, go home!"

Despite the charged rhetoric, Hizb ut-Tahrir insists that it condemns terrorism "by all means," spokesman Mohammad Malkawi told reporters Sunday.

"It is not in our dictionary," Malkawi said. "We condemn it by all means … From our perspective, our records are clean on this issue."

Malkawi said the group had "never indulged in recruiting" jihadists.

"Our action is the other way around," he continued. "We do not train them for violence or for jihad … Our objective is to create an Islamic state of khalifah in the Muslim world."

But some terrorism experts say Hizb ut-Tahrir may be even more dangerous than many groups that are on the State Departrment's terror list.

"Hizb ut-Tahrir is one of the oldest, largest indoctrinating organizations for the ideology known as jihadism," Walid Phares, director of the Future of Terrorism Project at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, told FOXNews.com.


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