The Status of ‘Suicide Attacks’ or ‘Martyrdom Operations’ in the Shariah, Islamic Sharia Laws, NewAgeIslam.com

Islamic Sharia Laws

The Status of ‘Suicide Attacks’ or ‘Martyrdom Operations’ in the Shariah

By Maulana Waris Mazhari

(Translated from Urdu by Yoginder Sikand/Noor Mohammad Sikand)

However, now that fidayeen attacks are no longer confined just to Palestine and directed only at Israelis, but have become a global phenomenon, targeting even Muslim countries and Muslim peoples, as in the case of Pakistan, those who sought to provide legitimacy for such actions are faced with a peculiar dilemma. It is true that, prior to the American aggression against Iraq and Afghanistan, fidayeen attacks by Muslim groups were confined only to Palestine. However, continued American imperialist offensives, including America’s unstinting support to the Israeli occupiers, have driven many Muslim youth to the wall, forcing them to take to such radical steps as suicide bombings in utter desperation. This must be recognized as the basic root of the phenomenon of fidayeen attacks by Muslim groups that has now spread out from Palestine to expand to other lands. Ultimately, the dominant Western powers, particularly America, are to blame for this development, which they berate as inhuman and cruel. The fact of the matter is that these bombings are a result of pent-up feelings of revenge in the face of intolerable oppression. At the same time, it must also be recognized that seeking to right wrongs in this manner has led to these Muslim groups exceeding the bounds of Islam and morality. Hence, it is crucial for Islamic scholars to seriously ponder on the legitimacy of suicide bombings in Islam, especially since Muslim groups who engage in such attacks often do so precisely in the name of Islam and claim that in doing so they are acting according to Islamic commandments.

http://newageislam.com/the-status-of-suicide-attacks-or-martyrdom-operations-in-the-shariah/islamic-sharia-laws/d/2733

The International Union for Muslim Scholars looks East for religious dialogue, Islamic World News, NewAgeIslam.com

Islamic World News

The International Union for Muslim Scholars looks East for religious dialogue

The International Union for Muslim Scholars (IUMS) will hold an international seminar on dialogue between Islam and the major Oriental religions, including Hinduism, Buddhism, Sikhism and Jainism, on February 19 and 20, the renowned Islamic scholar Sheikh Yousuf al-Qaradawi said.

Addressing a press conference, Dr Qaradawi, who is the chairman of the IUMS, said the seminar aimed to promote understanding between Muslims and the followers of the Oriental religions as well as to remove the barriers which, he said, could create misgivings between the two sides.

“Dialogue with the other is a basic principal of Islam that was called for by the Holy Qur’an and the seminar is one step ahead in this regard. According to Islam, all humans are one family that should peacefully co-exist and interact with one another,” he said.

Dr Qaradawi added that the seminar would be part of a process in which the IUMS would reach to followers of Oriental religions, which he said, constitute the majority of the world population.

“We have plans to launch similar dialogue with African religions,” he added.

When asked why he boycotted the recent interfaith dialogue meeting held in Doha between Judaism, Christianity and Islam, the scholar said that the fact that Israel was still occupying Palestine and the current Vatican Pope Benedict’s critical remarks on Islam and Prophet were among the reasons behind the boycott.

The seminar will be held in New Delhi under the aegis of India’s Vice President Mohamed Hamid Ansari, who will open the event.

http://newageislam.com/the-international-union-for-muslim-scholars-looks-east-for-religious-dialogue/islamic-world-news/d/2438

Iran: Where is the Islamic Republic going?, Islam and Politics, NewAgeIslam.com

Islam and Politics

Iran: Where is the Islamic Republic going?

By Houshang Sepehr

September 2009

The character of the movement

Apart from a section of the faction in power, a few cynics and partisans of conspiracy theories, to which some confused leftist groups and personalities have unfortunately been attracted, nobody doubts that the people of Iran, in their overwhelming majority, have strongly and clearly expressed their desire to finish with the present political system. Since the so-called “reformist” faction wasted invaluable time and missed its one occasion, it is the whole Islamic system, and not only the conservatives, which is being challenged.

In Iran nobody believes a word of the government propaganda which proclaims that the protests that followed the announcement of the results of the presidential election were organized from outside Iran. This crisis has all the aspects of a total bankruptcy of the Islamic Republic. For the last thirty years, in order to survive its crises and mask its fall, the regime has constantly invoked foreign threats, real or imaginary.

On the other hand, in the West certain left “analysts” declare that the crowds of demonstrators in the streets of Teheran and other cities come from the best-off layers of the urban middle-class and that Moussavi is their political representative. According to them Ahmadi-Nejad continues to have strong support among the overwhelming majority of the population in poor urban and rural areas. These alleged analysts know nothing about the class structure of Iranian company, nor about the nature of the Islamic Republic, nor what was at stake in this election, nor its consequences for the future of the country, nor the facts concerning the results of the election.

http://newageislam.com/iran--where-is-the-islamic-republic-going?/islam-and-politics/d/1869

No To The Mullahs!, Current affairs, NewAgeIslam.com

Current affairs

No To The Mullahs!

By Syed Akbar Ali

This type of labelling – especially negative labelling – is a favourite tool of the religious fraternity. Name calling and trying to stigmatise people with whom they may not agree is among their tools of the trade. And just like their confusion about who really is an ulema they are also confused by labelling me a ‘liberal’. Just for the record I would like to declare that I am a hardcore, fundamentalist Muslim. And this is what I told the young woman from the University. We have no choice but to return to the hardcore fundamentals of Islam that are carefully preserved in the Quran. The Quran is almost entirely different from what is preached by the religious scholars.

And indeed it is the religious scholars who are the real liberals. Let me explain why. In this book I have reproduced enough comments and provided enough references recording the really mindboggling and unbelievable divergences and differences in the interpretations and implementation of religion that is practiced by the hundreds of shades of religious sects. They all claim to be Islam. I have also recorded in this book the violence, hatred and killing that is still going on in the world between the various sects belonging to the ummah. They are all at odds with each other and hating each other because each sect has very liberally interpreted its own flavour of religion according to its own whims and fancies.

http://newageislam.com/no-to-the-mullahs!-/current-affairs/d/1773

Taliban, Sharia, Jizya: Flaws of traditional Sunni political thought, Islamic Sharia Laws, NewAgeIslam.com

Islamic Sharia Laws

Taliban, Sharia, Jizya: Flaws of traditional Sunni political thought

By Yoginder Sikand

Classical Sunni Muslim political thought, which continues to inspire the bulk of the traditional clerics or ulema, is based on the notion of a pious ruler or amir who rules according to the rules of the shariah. He is to be assisted by a council or shura, consisting of pious men learned in the shariah. However, he is not bound by their advice, for, because of his presumed superiority in terms of piety and knowledge of Islam, he is assumed to know best. It is this fatal assumption that is the Achilles heel of traditional Muslim political theory, for, more often than not, the amir does not turn out to be the saintly personage that he is expected to be. There being no effective check on his powers, by the general public or even by the shura--in contrast to what the Quran would appear to demand -- he very often turns into a dictator, who, as Muslim history amply illustrates, can easily twist Islamic injunctions suitably to legitimize acts of tyranny directed at Muslims as well as others.

http://newageislam.com/taliban,-sharia,-jizya--flaws-of-traditional-sunni-political-thought---/islamic-sharia-laws/d/1385

20 years on, Zia's death still a mystery, Current affairs, NewAgeIslam.com

Current affairs

20 years on, Zia's death still a mystery

Atul Sethi,TNN

17 Aug 2008

So, who killed Zia? A number of people had the motive, says Epstein. For instance, Mir Murtaza Bhutto, the brother of Zia's arch rival Benazir Bhutto had headed a guerrilla group since the past nine years, called Al Zulfikar whose proclaimed mission was to bring down the Zia regime. Murtaza had admitted that he had attempted to assassinate Zia on five previous occasions, even claiming credit for the Pak One explosion, in a call to the BBC soon after the crash — a claim which he eventually retracted after it became known that the U.S. Ambassador was also on board. In any event, with his sister in a position to win elections if Zia could be removed, says Epstein, Murtaza had a definite reason to pursue his mission.

Then, there were the intelligence agencies. According to a report on the technical causes of the crash prepared by the Pakistan Government's Board of Inquiry, explosives found in the wreckage indicated "involvement of a specialist organization well versed with carrying out such tasks and possessing the means and abilities for its execution." Citing this report, journalist and author Robert D Kaplan wrote in The New York Times a year after the crash, that only three organizations active in Pakistan at the time against the Government fitted that description — the KGB, the KGB -created Afghan intelligence group WAD, and the research and analysis wing of Indian intelligence.

http://newageislam.com/20-years-on,-zia-s-death-still-a-mystery/current-affairs/d/572

Pakistan gets cold feet over civilian control of ISI,

Current affairs

Pakistan gets cold feet over civilian control of ISI

By Badar Alam in Lahore

“By mishandling small things like issuing a simple notification, the government has underscored its ineptness,” he said. Farooq added that it is not for the first time a notification has been taken back. “The government notified the bypolls to be postponed till August but revoked the decision after no one had the courage to own it,” he said. Mushahid Hussain Syed, secretary general of the Opposition Pakistan Muslim League ( Qaid- e- Azam), said it displays a wanton disregard for propriety in handling a serious issue involving the country’s premier intelligence agency. “ The ISI has a strategic role. Bringing it under the control of a political party will compromise its sensitive mandate and reduce its efficiency,” Mushahid said. But according to him, there is a pattern to what the government is doing.

http://newageislam.com/pakistan-gets-cold-feet-over-civilian-control-of-isi/current-affairs/d/337