Anti-Jihad Islamic Response
to the attack on America

Bishara, head of Kuwait's National Democratic Movement
Nando Times

By celebrating an attack on America, "we are violating our own cultural edicts," said Bishara, head of Kuwait's National Democratic Movement. "We are not Muslims anymore if we do this. There are norms and rules for fighting your enemy and getting your rights."

Grand Sheik of Al-Azhar Mohammed Sayed Tantawi,
MSNBC Sunday, September 23, 2001

CAIRO, Egypt — Osama bin Laden's campaign against America doesn't fit Islam's definition of jihad, or holy war, a top Egyptian cleric said Sunday, adding that the alleged terror mastermind "doesn't represent Islam."

"Jihad doesn't mean aggression in Islam, it means defending one's soul, land and nation against those who attack them," said Grand Sheik of Al-Azhar Mohammed Sayed Tantawi, considered by many to be the Sunni Muslim world's highest religious authority.

"Bin Laden expresses his personal point of view [of jihad] — he doesn't represent Islam," Tantawi added.

The cleric — who heads Al-Azhar, considered one of the top centers of religious learning in the Sunni Muslim world — reiterated a fatwa, or religious edict, backing suicide attacks on "aggressors," like Israel, but condemned acts like the terrorist strikes against America.

A suicide bomber, who attacks an enemy who is occupying his land or acting aggressively against sacred places or his freedom, is a martyr, "but exploding oneself and killing children, women and men who have nothing to do with war ... is not accepted" by strict Islamic law, Tantawi said.

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