Posted on 07/08/2007 9:33:49 AM PDT by DogByte6RER
Saudi fatwa against liberals raises fears of violence
Sun Jul 8, 2007 5:56 PM IST
By Andrew Hammond
RIYADH (Reuters) - A religious edict by a prominent Saudi cleric suggesting liberals are not real Muslims has enflamed debate over reforms in the conservative Islamic state, with self-professed liberals fearing they will be attacked.
Saudi Arabia is one of the few countries that rules by strict application of Islamic law, giving clerics a powerful position in society, but Islamists fear that liberal reformers are gaining ground under the rule of King Abdullah.
Responding to an online request for a religious edict, or fatwa, Sheikh Saleh al-Fozan said last month: "Calling oneself a liberal Muslim is a contradiction in terms ... one should repent before God for such ideas in order to be a real Muslim."
The fatwa said that liberal in this context meant "freedom which is not subject to the bounds of sharia (Islamic law) and which rejects sharia laws, especially concerning women…"
"He who wants freedom with only the controls of man-made law has rebelled against the law of God," it said.
Fozan was recently forced to issue a clarification in Saudi newspaper al-Riyadh after Islamists hailed the fatwa as a declaration that liberals are infidels. He said pronouncing someone an infidel was a separate issue in Islamic law.
Such declarations, called takfeer in Arabic, are sensitive because al Qaeda militants fighting U.S.-allied governments in Saudi Arabia, Iraq and elsewhere in the region use the idea to justify their campaign of jihad, or holy war.
"Radicals say 'Sheikh Fozan has issued the fatwa and we should act accordingly', which is a little alarming," said Hamza Mozainy, a well-known critic of the Saudi system, referring to Islamist Web sites that welcomed the fatwa.
Novelist Turki al-Hamad, a long-time target of Saudi Islamists, also said the fatwa could lead to violence.
"Even if his (Fozan) intention is not calling for violence, the implication is violence," Hamad said.
Saudi Arabia's religious establishment has for long focussed its attention on the word "secular", which most Saudi reformers now avoid, but "liberal" has gained currency in its place.
Liberal and Islamist reformers both call for parliamentary elections limiting the desert country's absolute monarchy.
But many liberals also want to see clerical influence rolled back, with, for example, Saudi Arabia's religious police force disbanded and an end to strict gender segregation.
"When they hear 'liberalism' they perceive it as a form of moral corruption. They don't know it's a whole philosophy concerning freedom of the individual," Hamad said.
"These fatwas are a kind of defence mechanism against this spreading idea."
Their heads will be next on the chopping block after these liberal muslims.
The war against Islamofascism must be fought. The fight must be taken to these enemies of freedom.
Awe crap, now we have to watch out for that libtrash as well as ourselves... I'm sick of 'em
This should serve as a wake-up call to Western secular liberals. Their heads will be next on the chopping block after these liberal muslims.You severely underestimate the abysmal stupidity of the Western Liberal. They will be willingly kissing the feet of their executioners all the way to the chopping block. They won't "see the light" until the first couple nanoseconds of lightning pain from the descending ax on their necks.
They are morons. They will assist the Enemy with their dying breaths.
Their efforts to extend the reach of their interpretation of Sharia law to other countries should be resisted much the same as we would reject the extension of Communism, or the German civil code for that matter.
Yes...you do have a good point.
The vast majority of liberals (i.e., Nancy Pelosi, Cindy Sheehan, Michael Moore, MoveOn.org, etc.) are more than willing to bite the (American) hand that feeds them; yet, they are so eager to lick the jackboots of (Islamic, communist, take your pick) totalitarianism.
It’s a bizarre argument for a conservative to make but the argument in favor of liberalism in the mideast is the one I use with liberals. After all, nothing takes the fight out of a population quite like liberalism.
Liberals hold their anti war rallies and invite speakers from hamas and hezbollah who are nothing but killers. They should invite someone like Irshad Manji who is a liberal muslim lesbian but they hate her for telling the truth. Wafa Sultan is a former muslim turned atheist but she tells the truth and liberals hate her for it.
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
“A religious edict by a prominent Saudi cleric suggesting liberals are not real Muslims.....”
Actually, I sorta sympathise with them. I wonder who we can get to pass an edict that liberals aren’t real Americans.
The fatwa is right, true Islam is sharia law and slaying unbelievers.
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