Condemning Attacks on Non Muslims

Robert Spencer is whining again how Muslims have not (according to him) condemned attacks on non Muslims by radical Muslims. He says the following: "It would be refreshing to see Muslim spokesmen in the West who say they oppose Al-Zawahri to explain why his reasoning is wrong here, and why American civilians killed by Al-Qaeda on 9/11 are indeed innocent and cannot lawfully be killed even on Islamic grounds. But I won't be holding my breath. For one thing, you will notice that the questioner asks him about the legitimacy of killing innocent civilians in a way that makes it clear that he is only angry about Al-Qaeda killing Muslims. Where is the indignation, where is the anger from Muslims when Al-Qaeda kills non-Muslims?"

There are three requests here that I see. I will answer them one by one as briefly as possible.

1. Why is Zawahiri's reasoning wrong?

Because he and his group of fanatics go against the very basic rules of combat laid out in practically every school of fiqh. The Prophet, peace and prayers be upon him, said very clearly that non combatants are not allowed to be harmed. The very wise and erudite Shaikh Muhammad Afifi al-Akiti said in his fatwa that "Imam al-Subki ( may Allâh be pleased with him!) made it unequivocally clear what scholars have understood from this prohibition in which the standard rule of engagement taken from it is that: "[a Muslim soldier] may not kill any women or any child-soldiers unless they are in combat directly, and they can only be killed in self-defence" [al-Nawawi, Majmû', 21:57]."

He added further that "even a novice student of fiqh would be able to see that the first dâbit above concerns already a non-Muslim opponent in the case of a state of war having been validly declared by a Muslim authority against a particular non-Muslim enemy, even when that civilian is a subject or in the care [dhimma] of the hostile non-Muslim state [Dâr al-Harb]. If this is the extent of the limitation to be observed with regards to non-Muslim civilians associated with a declared enemy force, what higher standard will it be in cases if it is not a valid war or when the status of war becomes ambiguous?" Indeed. If Zawahiri had been trained in traditional fiqh he would know this, and he possibly does, but ignores it or is unaware of it and thus commits major crimes that he should be brought to justice for in this life and will most certainly be taken to task for in the next, God willing.

2. Why were American civilians killed by Al-Qaeda on 9/11 innocent and why cannot innocents like them be lawfully killed even on Islamic grounds?

Similar to the above answer, the people killed on 9-11 were innocent according to traditional Islamic jurisprudence because they were not engaged in combat at the time of their deaths, that being the most obvious reason as can be deduced from the extracts of Shaikh al-Akiti's fatwa above. They were civilians who were not engaged in combat and innocents like them, even if they were idolaters (gasp!), cannot be attacked on the same premise. Additionally, even if a state of war existed between the United States and whatever fantasy state al-Qaeda leaders thought they were in charge of those people who were killed on 9-11 could never be considered legitimate targets in any traditional Islamic legal interpretation because they are civilians.

Shaykh al-Akiti is even clearer on this point, saying "as our jurists have succinctly summarized its rule of engagement: a soldier can only attack a female or (if applicable) child soldier (or a male civilian) in self-defence and only when she herself (and not someone else from her army) is engaged in direct combat. (As for male soldiers, it goes without saying that they are considered combatants as soon as they arrive on the battlefield even if they are not in direct combat - provided of course that the remaining conventions of war have been observed throughout, and that all this is during a valid war when there is no ceasefire)."

3. Where is the anger from Muslims when al-Qaeda kills non Muslims?

I cannot speak for every Muslim, obviously, but there is a well documented record of Muslim scholars and Muslim organizations all over the world that have condemned the 9-11 attacks as crimes and un-Islamic and there have been talks given by many prominent Muslims scholars all over the world on how Muslims need to be introspective and deal with the problems of radicalism within our communities. Scholars like Hamza Yusuf, Zaid Shakir, Abdal Hakim Murad, Abdallah bi Bayyah, Habib Ali al-Jifri, and many others have given such talks and their audio and video lectures on these topics of terrorism and extremism are available online.

The organization I work for, CAIR, has been persistent in its condemnations of terrorism perpetrated by such radicals against Muslims and non Muslims. Immediately following the events of 9-11, CAIR issued a strong condemnation of the murderous acts. CAIR continues to condemn Hamas, Hezbollah and anyone else who commits unjust violence in the name of Islam.

I hope you're reading Mr. Spencer. And spare me the "oh, but they don't mean non Muslims" argument or the "oh, but they say it's OK to kill Israelis" argument as well. Shaikh al-Akiti says quite clearly to a question in that fatwa of his that Israeli civilians, even off duty soldiers who are women, are not to be harmed and cannot be harmed. Other Muslims scholars who are not biased and blinded by the Palestinian cause have said the same. You can throw Qaradawi and others out the window because we both know they're blatantly wrong. People like Hamza Yusuf, Zaid Shakir and others have said unequivocally that non Muslims cannot be fought or killed. Unlike Qaradawi these two and the others mentioned above don't have an Ikhwan bias.

I hope to hear from you soon.