Fatwa on terror, what the hell.

[al Roumi]

Louis and Fragony, you both have a peculiar perspective on this.

It is Al-Qaida's interpretation of Islam (the Qu'ran & Sura) which legitimises their war. This Fatwa undermines Al-Qaida's interpretation of Islam by providing a theological counter-argument. Whether it has any weight or reach is another matter.

The tactics Al-Qaida uses: terrorism, are the same any small group uses in an asymetric war -or in trying to provoke one. They do not have the resources for conventional warfare, but would more than likely escalate to it if they did have such resources. The overwhelming majority of Muslims are not members or supporters of Al-Qaida, if they were the west would be at war with them all -yet we are not. Despite this, for some reason Frag's has a hard time seeing a difference between a Muslim and a terrorist.

Islam means surrender. A believing Muslim is meant to surrender himself to his religion and live by its precepts and rules, otherwise he is not a Muslim (believer). I know regrettably little about Christianity beyond that gleaned from an upbringing in a broadly christian society (UK), but western society certainly isn't governed or ruled by religious guidance -this is a central pilar of the enlightenment and our current western societies (as Frag's and Louis point out). I have to admit i don't know whether the Bible actually provides a legal framework for societies (beyond the 10 commandments), but this is something the Qu'ran and the Sura provide to Muslims: Sharia law. Hence why Muslims have a desire to live by it...

The Fragony / Wilders point is, and that's the challenge raised here, that:

It is not religion that decides whether it is okay to kill people on their way to work. The law decides, and nobody else. It is not a fatwa that decides it isn't allowed, no more than a fatwa could allow it.

To accept otherwise, would mean an acceptance that theological Islamic dispute decides over your life and death. To embrace this fatwa is to make oneself subservient to Islam, to thank an Islamic scholar for what should be self explanatory in the first place: that you are entitled not to be killed. It relegates your entitlement to life to the hands of Islamic theology.
And in the end, you'll wake up on your knees every morning and thank Allah.

Fragony/Louis, surely you are aware that terrorism, in any form, is not something a government can simply stop or mitigate by passing a law? Laws don't actually stop people murdering, drink driving, stealing or even dropping litter!

I struggle to see how anyone bar a Muslim could embrace this Fatwa Louis. In the context of your post, to think one actually has a say over one's life or death is amusing to say the least. If terrorism is about an individual's beliefs and his justification for killing civilians, to be blind to the personal motivations which lead him to or away from terrorism, be they theological or other, is also rather disengenious, to say the least.