Minister of Islamic Affairs Dr Mohamed Shaheem Ali Saeed has urged Maldivians to refrain from participating in foreign wars.
The appeal comes after reports of at least two Maldivian men being killed in the Syrian civil war during May.
According to an online media group called Bilad Al Sham Media, a 44-year-old Maldivian man died in a suicide attack on May 25 and another was killed two days later in a gun fight against soldiers loyal to Bashar Al Assad.
“[Islam] does not permit shedding another [Muslim] brother’s blood,” Shaheem said noting a high rate of civilian casualties in wars being fought in Muslim countries elsewhere.
Often, wars are being waged between different Muslim factions leading to the death of Muslim women, children, and elderly people and the destruction of mosques and homes, the Islamic Minister said at a press conference today.
“Islamic Jihad is that waged with sincerity, in the name of Allah, in defense of religion and nation, behind a designated Muslim leader, and against enemies of Islam and nation,” he said.
“Hence, rather than destroying oneself in conflicts of an unknown nature, the Islamic Ministry believes it is better to serve one’s own parents, families, and country,” he continued.
“[We] beseech all Maldivian youth and citizens, who love Islam, to refrain from participating in conflicts between one Muslim group and another. It is better to allow the citizens of the country in war to solve their own problems.”
Foreign interference obstructs citizens of a country from achieving their goals and allows governments to claim they are not fighting their own citizens, but foreigners, said Shaheem.
He further said that neither Islamic scholars nor citizens of war torn countries have asked for foreign interference. Instead, they ask foreigners to leave and allow them to solve their internal affairs.
“We must [only] pray for the beloved citizens of those countries under war,” he said before calling on the international community to do more to end bloodshed and conflict in Muslim countries.
‘Good intentions, but the wrong path’
In issuing today’s fatwa, the Islamic Ministry had consulted both local scholars and scholars from Egypt, Tunisia, Iraq, and Saudi Arabia, Shaheem told the press afterwards.
“All [local scholars] of them in general agree people must not go there, to ongoing wars. It is not about deciding if it is a Jihad or not, even if it is Jihad, not to go to foreign countries. When foreigners intervene, it creates even more conflict. Instead of achieving goals, it contributes to greater internal conflict and greater disagreements”
Shaheem said Maldivian militants who go abroad must not be punished, but be rehabilitated and informed of religious teachings.
No Muslim scholar in the Maldives has called on Maldivians to participate in foreign wars, “but there are youth, who get emotional from what they see, of the suffering of Muslims, there are Maldivian youths who want to avenge that,” he said.
Their intention may be good, but the path they have chosen is not the right path, he said.
“I do not believe it is the right way. If it is an Islamic jihad, it is for a very holy purpose, the leader of the struggle has to be clear, their manifesto of what is to happen after the war has to be clear, whether it will give victory for Islam. Only if all of this clear, can one go into war,” he said.
Admitting to growing radicalisation in the Maldives, Shaheem said the media and scholars must help the government in its effort to educate the public.
Radicalisation begins with praying in separate communities, refusing to register marriages at court, and declaring other Muslims infidels, Shaheem said.
In February, the government shut down the Dharumavantha Rasgefaanu mosque to stop unauthorised Friday prayers by a group described as “extremists”
According to local media, the congregation prayed to Allah to weaken and current government and its leaders and prayed for ill-health and calamity to befall senior government officials, the Islamic Ministry and city council.
In May, the US State Department in the 2013 country report on terrorism said the Maldivian government believes that funds are being raised in the country to support terrorism abroad. However, the Maldives Monetary Authority denied the claim in a subsequent press release.
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Islamic or any other minister is in no position to declare/not to declare war on citizens of other nations. That is equivalent to this country declaring war on other sovereign nations with the pretext of jihad. This is not an issue to be debated by the Islamic minister. He simply has to say that this is unlawful; end of the story. The behavior of these so called Islamic scholars reflect the behavior of the Christian church some centuries back.
Really? So, it's holly when the Zionists invade their countries with the help of some corrupt politicians, specially with the help of Saudis.
So it seems Muslims just have to shut up and listen to the continuous western propaganda news channels while they slaughter our brothers, and sisters.
There are 2 types of people fighting in the name of jihad, in these countries. Some are funded by the western powers, brainwashed, and kills innocent people deliberately (ethnic cleansing)
On the other side there are people fighting to defend their country, culture and religion, from the foreign terrorists who are keen in occupying the whole middle east, in favor of one country, that simply became to existence by by occupation.
Junaidh, seems like you're the one who needs to stop listening to extremist propaganda.
Isn’t what they do; fighting for the religion, according to them they are fighting for Allah, so Islamic minster is not saying anything different . Sheik has no education other then Islamic religious education. Islamic literature was fabricated by warmongering Arabs who mainly fought for adventure and power. If you use that literature you will find nothing but violence in the name of religion. If this Shaik has enough education to understand religions and the politics, he should give some civilized narration about Jihadh like contemporary educated Muslims does. Also these Maldivian wanna be Arabs will do all they can do to become Arabs and no one can stop them until their brain can grasp the reality of their existence that dying for their religion will not necessarily give them eternal life in the kingdom of God with provision of all earthly euphoria. Islamic minister should be someone who can understand that the religion is to teach people to behave good in order to go heaven or not get reincarnated. When you have an agenda, and ambition to achieve something by any means it becomes politics. Islam is not strong enough to take the world to 07th century Arabia and using Islam with violence is to destroy Islam and to make Muslims live heads down and disrespected and may be the founder of Muslim world , Mohammed didn’t want this . He was religious man and he was so devoted to religion he wanted his Ummah to be god fearing people but with dignity, today you can’t use violence in order to gain respect so you have to change the concept of Jihaad to something meaningful for today. You can fight to eradicate poverty and ignorance in Muslim nations and fight to unite all Muslim denomination and this will be the best Jihad for Muslims today.
We do not need the Sheikhs to tell us it is wrong!
The mandate of so called Islamic minister should be to teach people ethics. The Maldivians lack ethics due politicization of religion. What is the use of a religion If you can’t create an ethical society. There is no single Maalu Man who sees things from moral and ethical angle. People get money from politicians with the promise of giving vote for them and after taking money they vote against him. First of all it is wrong to sell his vote, and it is even more wrong to cheat. In our language, it is daylight robbery. Such people justify their action by saying that those politicians have easy money without sweat and it is morally and ethically ok to robe them according to them. This is all lack of integrity in understanding ethics; how a wrong thing can be right? Even you robe from a robber isn’t that robbery, if you have sense of ethics, your conscience will never allow to rob even from a robber, you can’t justify the robbing in any way. The robbing is wrong because it is dirty and against human dignity and it is animalistic thing. If you remove ethics from robbery, the robbery itself should be OK, because the robber also do lot of hard work and put his life at risk on stealing and it is very much of very legal earning if you look at from materialistic view.
If you take money from somebody it is your moral duty to do what you have paid for, if you think you can’t do it then an ethical and moral person will not accept that money, because his inner sense can’t accept to cheat someone. This is may be even worse than burglary and looting, at least the burglars and looters work hard putting their life at great risk.
Nothing is wrong in Malu Rajje because it is wrong ethically; everything is wrong because Allah has prohibited and once you repent you are clean and you do everything to make Allah happy, not because those are wrong things and shameful for a human being to do. If Shaikh is part of the government his mandate is to work for the betterment of society, it is not his duty to give fathwa whether Malu people should participate in foreign wars. How an Islamist’s brain can be so corrupted and Islamism can make somebody such ignorant is beyond anyone’s understanding.
The para military group operating in Syria/Iraq called Isis (Islamic State or Iraq and Levant) is also the name of Ancient Goddess in the Middle east and Egypt.
These groups must be more nationalistic / tribal in its core showing a facade of Islam to garner more support.
So, according to Junaidh, the caliphites invading Syria and Iraq, butchering and raping hundreds of thousands of muslims, razing their homes and selling their children to sex slavery in Saudi Arabia is "defending the islamic nations from western imperialism".
RIIIIIIIIIIIIIGHT.