Hamas is guilty of terror against its population and must not be supported. This is stated by an Iraq-based Muslim council that issued a fatwa against the militant Islamist Palestinian organization Hamas.
A few weeks ago, the so-called Islamic Fatwa Council, which includes Muslim scholars from Sunni and Shia Islam and is based in the Iraqi city of Najaf, issued a fatwa against the Gaza-based terrorist group Hamas, reports the Jewish News Syndicate news agency, JNS.
The religiously prejudicial statement, in turn, is said to have responded to testimonies from Gaza residents revealed in January through a series of video clips from the US-based peace institute Center for Peace Communications, named “Whispered in Gaza.”
According to the fatwa council, what they call Hamas’ “reign of corruption and terror against Palestinian citizens in Gaza” is against the laws of the Quran and the Prophet Mohammed, which is why they declare it forbidden to both join or fight for Hamas, as well as support or pray for the organization.
The fatwa, which thus clearly challenges Hamas’s claim to represent Islam, has, according to JNS, created a fierce debate within the Muslim world, at the same time challenging other fatwa councils to either uphold the Iraqi council’s verdict or else explain why they do not want to do so.
A couple of weeks after the fatwa was issued, the Iraq-based fatwa council also published a 35-page document that further develops the reasoning behind the decision and, among other things, writes that Hamas has engaged in “DASH-like behavior against both Muslims and Palestinians.”
In total, the fatwa accuses Hamas of 15 different kinds of crimes, everything from stealing international aid money to using child soldiers. And in all cases, evidence is cited from human rights reports, Palestinian opinion polls, and other sources, notes JNS.
At the US pro-Israel think tank, Washington Institute, Palestine expert Ghaith al-Omari believes that the fatwa challenges Hamas’s legitimacy and undermines the organization’s claim to represent Islam.
– It may not immediately affect its rule over Gaza because it maintains this rule by force. But in the long term, such a statement poses a significant challenge to Hamas’ narrative.
Ghaith al-Omari