http://news.yahoo.com/islamic-scholars-condemn-expulsion-iraqs-christian-brothers-120656878.html
Islamic scholars condemn expulsion of Iraq’s ‘Christian brothers’
Reuters
July 23, 2014 11:16 AM
DOHA (Reuters) - An influential group of Islamic scholars has denounced the forced expulsion of Christians from northern Iraq by Islamist hardliners, saying it paves the way for fighting between the country’s ethnic and religious groups.
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“The International Union of Muslim Scholars (IUMS) condemns the forced expulsion of the Christian brothers of Iraq from their homes, cities and provinces,” the group said in a statement posted on the website of its leader, the influential cleric Sheikh Youssef al-Qaradawi on Tuesday.
“These are acts that violate Islamic laws, Islamic conscience and leave but a negative image of Islam and Muslims.”
The IUMS, comprising senior Sunni religious scholars from around the world with links to more moderate factions of the Muslim Brotherhood, views the Islamic State, which has taken control of a swathe of northern Iraq, as being too extreme and says its doctrine contradicts the true teachings of Islam.
It has rejected the Islamic State’s declaration of a caliphate in Iraq and Syria as illegal under Muslim law, saying such a development can only be made after enough legitimate representatives of Muslim peoples have pledged their allegiance.
The Islamic State, an al Qaeda offshoot, relayed its ultimatum from mosque loudspeakers and spray painted Christian properties with the letter “N” for Nasrani, or Christian, residents said.
Fleeing Christians described being stopped by gunmen on the outskirts of Mosul and robbed of the goods they carried, suggesting the militants were implementing an order to Christians to leave behind all possessions.
The IUMS urged the Islamic State to allow Christians to return to their homes, saying the forced expulsion amounts to “spreading discord”, a serious crime in traditional Muslim law.
“They (Christians) are native sons of Iraq and not intruders,” it said. “The aim must be to bury discord, unite the ranks and solve Iraq’s problems, rather than thrusting it into matters that would further complicate the situation,” it added.
(Reporting by Sami Aboudi; Editing by Alison Williams)
Islam is at a major crossroads with fast travel and internet contracting the time it takes for anything at all to happen. Fighting between Sunni and Shia and other offshoots that has gone on for more than a millenium is now possible in weeks and months. We had several hundred years of warfare between Catholics and Protestants, with Inquisitions and massacres before our own founding fathers realized that religion should be kept out of our government, and other sensible countries also adopted that point of view.
Is it possible that the dangers are so stark and rapid that Islam could achieve a level of live and let live that took Christianity hundreds of years to accomplish? Not to likely, but to be hoped for.