Issues: ‘Muslim leader issues antiterror fatwa’

March 2, Online

The leader of a global Muslim movement has issued a fatwa, or religious edict, that he calls an absolute condemnation of terrorism.  Muhammad Tahir-ul-Qadri, a former Pakistani lawmaker, says the 600-page fatwa bans suicide bombing “without any excuses, any pretexts, or exceptions”.
Tahir-ul-Qadri has issued similar, shorter decrees, but Tuesday’s event in London is being hosted by the Quilliam Foundation, a government-funded, anti-extremism think tank.
The religious scholar is the founder of Minhaj-ul-Quran, a worldwide movement that promotes a nonpolitical, tolerant Islam. The group has hundreds of thousands of followers around the world, most of them in Pakistan and Pakistanis living in other countries.

Your comments:

Fundamentally, suicide bombing is forbidden in Islam. Still there’re several preconditions when it is allowed: In self defense from an enemy attack, to uphold religious dignity from blasphemy, to conduct goodness, foment wicked maxims and protect humanitarian magnanimity like in Palestine.
Yanuar We
Bogor, West Java
 
Most Muslims, of all sects, except those that have the ideology of taking revenge by killing and terrorizing common people, accept or have an identical fatwa. I wonder why this time this fatwa is drawing so much attention, while similar ones that have been issued by the muftis of Egypt, Saudi Arabia and many others have been ignored!
The problem is that despite the fact the majority of Muslims accept this fatwa, there is still a minority that disagree with it.
They are still a sizeable number. The problem is that they are the ones who would turn a blind eye to this fatwa. However, let us hope the “suppressed Muslims in Palestine, Afghanistan, Iraq and other parts of the world” realize their religion is not calling them to kill innocent people.
Let us hope they get properly educated from the Koran and the hadiths to be descent people, as the fatwa is telling them. Let us hope that they do not turn to violence as a result of their being suppressed for so long, just because they are Muslims. Otherwise, recruits for terrorism will continue, and no fatwa will stop it.
Mohamed
Jakarta

Obviously this fatwa will not have a concrete impact although it’s the correct direction. Indonesia’s Islamic groups must follow suit.
David K
Jakarta

At last there is a fatwa that makes sense to everyone.
Sheldon Archer
Probolonggo, East Java

Let us pray and truly hope this edict will once and for all end this fundamentalist religious doctrine. It has only created fear and suspicion.
RKK
Jakarta

At least this will eradicate the wrong perception towards Islam among the non-Muslims around world. Islam is not a barbarian religion. In fact it is the one that teaches humanity and brotherhood based on the nature of human being.
Nizam
Pekalongan, Central Java