Jihad Against Ignorance (9-11 attacks)

Today is the first post in a series of posts that will handle the issue of the ignorance that controls the minds of a big percentage of non-Muslims in Western countries, and specifically in USA toward Islam.

I'll do my best to be simple and briefed in this series as my friends on BlogOfBlogs gave me their comments about previous posts of being so long to be read at once. Thanks Rory, Thanks Ann.

The name of the series is (Jihad Against ignorance). Please don't be frighten. Don't shut your PC, it will NOT explode.. :P

Unfortunately, the word "Jihad" is misunderstood by wide range of people in the West. They mainly remember an explosive strap, or an attack against innocents when they hear the word "Jihad". Many in the West have a negative perspective against this word. However, I have insisted to name this series as "Jihad" for two reasons..

The first reason is to relate this word to a positive action, which is Understanding a misunderstood religion and Building bridges of peaceful communication based on understanding.

On the other hand, "Jihad" is the exact title that suits the target of this series. The goal of this series is raising the awareness of non-Muslims regarding Islamic religion, its main pillars, its history, and the followers of this great religion. It's not an easy task when 49% of Americans has generally unfavorable views of Islam (Washington Post, Sep 2010). And Islam is generally mentioned in the same context of extremism, bombings and enemies of America. Plus, 63% of Americans either never heard about Islam or have very little knowledge about Islam (Gallup, 2009). In addition, nearly a third of all Americans see mainstream Islam as encouraging violence (Washington Post).

It's not an easy job to change all of this. It's hard to change the view of someone about something from negative into positive. It takes a lot of time to erase the ignorance of a person regarding something he doesn't know about.

So, when "Jihad" according to its basic meaning in Islamic perspective is "struggle or making all efforts".

For that, the title must has been "Jihad". It's a real struggle.

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I was planning to start the series by talking about the "Five Pillars of Islam", but when America is remembering the 9th anniversary of the horrible attacks against the twin towers in New York, USA that caused the killing of 2,977 innocents from over 70 nationalities. And these attacks are -unfortunately- related to Muslims, so a change in the subject was a must.

The subject of today's post is a story that happened 14 centuries ago when Muslims ruled Egypt. It's about a Muslim who hurt a non-Muslim, and how Muslim authorities dealt with him.

Here you're the story..

"

A man from the Copts (Christians living in Egypt) came to Omar ibn al-Khattab (The 2nd Muslim Caliph) in Al-Madinah, and said, "O Commander of the Faithful! I seek refuge in you from oppression." Omar replied, "You have sought refuge where it is to be sought." The Egyptian said, "I was racing the son of `Amr ibn al-`Aas (Muslim Governor of Egypt), and defeated him. Then he began to beat me with a whip saying: "I am the Son of Nobles!""

So Omar wrote to `Amr commanding him to appear before him with his son. So they appeared before him. Omar inquired, "Where is the Egyptian? He is to take the whip and beat him!" Then the Egyptian began to beat the son of `Amr with the whip as `Umar said to him, "Beat the Son of Nobles!"

So he beat him.

Then Omar said to the Egyptian, "Now beat the whip upon `Amr's bald head!" He replied, "O Commander of the Faithful! For it was his son who beat me, and I have evened the score with him."

Upon this Omar said to `Amr, "Since when do you enslave the people when their mothers bore them as free men?" He said, "O Commander of the Faithful! I was unaware of this, and he did not come to me (for justice)."

"

The story need no explanation, but there are 2 points to highlight regarding the anniversary of 9-11 attacks..

*Anyone who contemplate at yesterday's situation -14 centuries ago- will observe how far Islam respected justice -with all it what justice means- towards non-Muslims. Here he is a non-Muslim who was oppressed, and was given his right by the Caliph of Muslims. There is no way then for a question like; Did Islam order Muslims to hurt non-Muslims? It's exactly the contrary.

*This story for Islamic Sharia (Legislation) is not just for fun or nonsense, that's completely wrong. One of the most important sources of Islamic Sharia after Holy Qur'an and Sunnah are the deeds of first Muslims (Sahaba) those who lived with Prophet Muhammad, and witnessed him treating others. So, if we knew that the hero of this story, Omar ibn al-Khattab, lived for 17 years with Prophet Muhammad and witnessed his deeds, we must realize then that the core of this story which is respecting non-Muslims, giving them their rights and not oppressing them is one of the fundamentals of Islamic Sharia.

CONCLUSION:

If first Muslims were punishing those who hurt non-Muslims even from Muslims, how can the ordinary mind accept any claim that Islam allegedly order Muslims to kill non-Muslims! It will be just out of absurdity and deep ignorance of basis of the merciful Islamic Sharia.

Any ordinary Muslim who deeply believes in his religion, and really understand the principles of Islamic religion will strongly denounce 9-11 attacks. Following are examples of Muslim famous organizations or scholars who denounced 9-11 attacks and all attacks against innocents:

*In its fatwa, The Fiqh Council of North America declared at July 28, 2005 that ;

-"All acts of terrorism targeting the civilians are Haram (forbidden) in Islam."

-"It is Haram for a Muslim to cooperate or associate with any individual or group that is involved in any act of terrorism or violence. "

This Fatwa was endorsed by over 344 Muslim organizations, mosques and imams.

Read Fatwa and endorsing Muslim organizations and mosques HERE

*A historical launching of a Fatwa against terrorism happened on March 2, 2010 by Dr Muhammad Tahir-ul-Qadri, the founding leader and patron-in-chief of Minhaj-ul-Quran International in London. The fatwa consists of 600 pages that refute most of the claims used by extremists to justify their crimes. Dr Muhammad Tahir-ul-Qadri said in the press conference that:

-the suicide bombers are out of the pale of Islam.
-those who want to impose the Islamic order on others by means of force belong to the group of Khawarij who, during the Caliphate of Ali, took up arms and initiated rebellion against the Islamic state in the name of enforcing the Divine Order. The terrorists of today also belong to the same breed of Khawarij.

Read an article about the conference HERE

*Sheikh Qardawi, the head of the European Council for Fatwa and Research, an Islamic scholarly entity established in Ireland and the chairman of International Union for Muslim Scholars has denounced the attacks against civilians and encouraged Muslims to donate their bloods for the victims of 9-11 attacks. He said;

-"Our hearts bleed for the attacks that has targeted the WTC, ..."
-"haphazard killing where innocents are killed along with wrongdoers is TOTALLY FORBIDDEN in Islam"

Read an article about the fatwa HERE

Read Fatwa in Arabic HERE

-If we will add names of Muslim preachers we will say; Amr Khaled, Dr Tarek al-Suwaidan, Moez Masoud, etc and many other famous Muslim talkers.

When an extremist commits a crime, we will blame him .. not his faith.

When a driver makes an accident, we will blame the driver .. not the car!!

It's coming .. shall we stop it?

Not so long, I was watching a show of the Muslim preacher and media-man, Tareq Al-Suwaidan. The subject of the show was the relation between Muslims and non-Muslims. He mentioned during his talk a horrible number which means, if it was true, that there is a serious disaster threatening the relation between 4/5 of humans living on this planet and the other 1/5 of humans who integrate them. He said that in one of the surveys made in America, only 2% of the American people heard about Islam from Muslims!!! The rest of them either never heard about Islam, or knew very little information about it from non-Muslim writers or through the Media.

The case is seriously of great importance, and I dare to say, represents high threats!

Some signs of the coming disaster have already showed up..

-In America now some Americans are fighting against building a mosque in New York.

-In Europe many countries like; France, England, Holland, Denmark, Italy and Belgium are fighting against Nikab (Burka) which is generally related to Muslim culture.

-And lately we started to hear about attacks against Muslims based on their religion: an American man in New York on August, 2010 stabbed Ahmed Sherif, a Muslim cab driver, in the throat that caused severe injuries, a German-Russian man killed Marwa El-Sherbini, a Muslim woman, in Gerrmany and attacked her husband violently on July, 2009. And according to its survey, the American organization, Council on American-Islamic Relations has observed a raise of 25% of the attacks against Muslims from 2005 to 2006. And lately the American-Arab Anti Discrimination Committee has warned all those who look as Middle-Easterns or Muslims to be careful to avoid attacks against them.

-And on 30th July, 2010 a church in Gainesville, Florida invited to an "International Burn A Koran Day"!

-Desecration of mosques and Qur'an copies, throwing stones on mosques, drawing crosses on mosques, not allowing Muslim employees to practice their prayers, etc are also included in the list.

Yes, it's extremism, Extremism against Islam and Muslims.

At present we are handling individual actions from extremist persons, but if the "individual" turned to be "collective", then that's the worst nightmare we all fear.

If we would summarize the main reasons of extremism against Islam, we would find the following:

1- As response against extremist actions from extremist Muslims, usually extremism generates extremism.

2- The intended inflation in media of Muslim extremism actions, and ignoring the actions of moderate Muslims and peaceful coexistence experiences.

3- The writings of some biased non-Muslim writers who present a twisted and distorted understanding of Islam.

4- The ignorance of many non-Muslims about Islam. Remember: Only 2% of Americans heard about Islam from Muslims. Plus, the survey on 2009 made by GALLUP who tell that 63% of Americans either never heard about Islam or have very little knowledge about Islam.

I cannot stop western Media from inflating acts of Muslim extremists, nor I can enforce them to tell western peoples about moderate Muslims and wonderful experiences of coexistence among Muslims and non-Muslims. I cannot too stop writers from misguiding western readers.

But I do can decrease the ignorance of some non-Muslims about Islam. I can tell the world about my own religion. That I'm proud to be a follower of it. Maybe, my little efforts will be an obstacle stone in the very steep way of the flood of the violent river of exchanged extremism among 4/5 of the people on this planet and their integrating 1/5.

For all that, starting from the next week I'll begin a series of posts talking about Islam in brief, trying to achieve two goals;

*Increasing the awareness of western non-Muslims regrading the basics of Islamic religion and Muslim traditions.

*Giving those who heard about Islam from biased writers or from media, a chance to hear about Islam from a Muslim.

May Allah help me!

Stay tuned!