EXHIBITION KILLING
by Amir Taheri
Wall Street Journal
September 30, 2004

Who are we allowed to seize as hostage? Who are we allowed to kill?

For the past few weeks these questions have prompted much debate throughout the Muslim world. The emerging answer to both questions is: Anyone you like!

Triggered by the tragedy at a school in Beslan, southern Russia, last month, the debate has been further fuelled by kidnappings and "exhibition killings" in Iraq. Non-Muslims may find it strange that such practices are debated rather than condemned as despicable crimes. But the fact is that the seizure of hostages and "exhibition killing" go back to the early stages of Islamic history.

In the Arabia of the seventh century, where Islam was born, seizing hostages was practiced by rival tribes, and "exhibition killing" was a weapon of psychological war. The Prophet codified those practices, ending freelance kidnappings and head-chopping. One principle of the new code was that Muslims could not be held hostage by Muslims. Nor could Muslims be subjected to "exhibition killing." Such methods were to be used solely against non-Muslims, and then only in the context of armed conflict.

Seized in combat, a non-Muslim would be treated as a war prisoner, and could win freedom by converting to Islam. He could also be ransomed or exchanged against a Muslim prisoner of war. Non-Muslim women and children captured in war would become the property of their Muslim captors. Female captives could be taken as concubines or given as gifts to Muslims. The children, brought up as Muslims, would enjoy Islamic rights.

Centuries later, the initial code was elaborated by Imam Jaafar Sadeq, a descendant of the Prophet. He made two key rulings. Whoever entered Islam was instantly granted "full guarantee for his blood." And non-Muslims, as long as they paid their poll tax, or jiziyah, to the Islamic authority would be protected.

Recalling this background is important because what we witness in the Muslim world today is disregard of religious tradition in favor of political considerations.

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A survey of Muslim views over the past weeks shows overwhelming, though not unanimous, condemnation of the Beslan massacre. But in all cases the reasons given for the condemnation are political rather than religious. Muslim commentators assert that Russia, having supported "the Palestinian cause," did not deserve such treatment.

Sheik Yussuf al-Qaradawi, a Sunni Muslim scholar based in Qatar, was among the first to condemn the Beslan massacre. At the same time, however, he insists that a similar attack on Israeli schools would be justified because Israeli schoolchildren, if not killed, could grow up to become soldiers. (Sheik Qaradawi also justifies the killing of unborn Israelis because, if born, they could become soldiers.)

That view is shared by Ayatollah Imami Kashani, a cleric working for the Iranian government. He claims that, regardless of what it has done against the people of Chechnya, Russia must not be attacked because it has supported "the greater cause" of Palestine. In other words Chechen Muslims are less worthy of consideration than Palestinian ones. That view is shared by the Organization of the Islamic Conference, a grouping of 57 Muslim countries. Its secretary-general, Abdelouahed Belkeziz, has issued a strong condemnation of Beslan. But he has not said a word about dozens of other terrorists attacks carried out by Islamists across the globe.

Implicit in all this is that killing innocent people in the lands of the "infidel" is justified for as long as the victims are not citizens of states sympathetic to "the Arab cause," whatever it happens to be at any given time. That position was highlighted in the Arab reaction to the kidnapping of two French journalists by Islamists in Iraq last month. Arab League Secretary-General Amr Moussa led the call for their release with these words: "France is a friend of the Arabs; we cannot treat friends this way."

This was echoed by Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah, spiritual leader of Hezbollah, who appealed for the release of the Frenchmen, something he has not done for any of the 140 foreigners who have been kidnapped in Iraq. Yasser Arafat has been more specific. "These journalists support the Palestinian cause and the Iraqi cause," he said in a statement issued in Ramallah. "We need guarantees for the security of friends who support us in battle."

In other words the Frenchmen must be freed because they support the Arabs, not because holding hostages is wrong.

The French authorities have reinforced that sentiment. Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin speaks of the Iraqi insurgency as "la résistance." And Foreign Minister Michel Barnier has announced that France would reject the international conference on Iraq, proposed by the Bush administration, unless "elements opposed to the occupation," meaning the terrorists, are invited.

The OIC Secretary-General Belkeziz has also promised to leave no stone unturned to ensure the release of the French hostages. The same Mr. Belkeziz has said nothing about hostages from some 30 other countries, including some members of his own organization. Nor has he been moved by the cold-blooded murder of 41 hostages, including Muslims, from 11 different nationalities.

Abbasi Madani, a former leader of the Front for Islamic Salvation, has started a hunger strike "in solidarity with our French brethren." This is rich coming from a man whose party and its allies caused the death of some 200,000 people in his native Algeria during the 1990s. Mr. Madani never missed a meal in solidarity with the countless Algerians, including women and children, that his fellow Islamists slaughtered.

Yet even more disturbing is the attitude of Muslim organizations in France and Britain. Both have sent delegations to Iraq to contact the terrorists and ask for the liberation of two French, and one British, hostages. The French delegation, led by Mohamed Bechari, went out of its way to advertise France's "heroic opposition" to the Iraq war in 2003. "I am here to defend France's Arab policy," Mr. Bechari told reporters. "In Iraq as well as in Palestine, France is for the Arabs."

The two British Muslim delegates made their case in a different way by arguing that, although Britain participated in toppling Saddam Hussein, a majority of the British were opposed to the war. Thus British hostage Ken Bigley should be released not because hostage-taking is wrong but because such a move could strengthen anti-war sentiment in Britain.

By refusing to come out with a categorical rejection of terrorism, Muslim leaders and opinion-makers