A few "sentences" about reporting

Please, please, please! If you refer to a sentence of death by an Islamic government please refer to it as a Fatwa and not as a sentence. In an article about an Iranian suicide brigade by By Soraya Sarhaddi on Friday, June 11, 2004 she said the suicide squads would be trained for several actions including, “ . . . assassinating author Salmon Rushdie. The late Grand Ayatolla Ruhollah Khomenini sentenced Rudhdie to death in absentia in 1989 on charges that he blasphemed in his novel “The Satanic Verses.”” Khomeini was a Shi'ite Islamic cleric who headed the Government of Iran until his death.

It is my understanding that this ‘sentence’ was actually a fatwa against Salman Rushdie issued February, 1989 by Khomeini. It said, "I inform the proud Muslim people of the world that the author of the Satanic Verses book which is against Islam, the Prophet and the Koran, and all involved in its publication who were aware of its content, are sentenced to death." [Source: http://www.bibletopics.com/biblestudy/98.htm] A fatwa is not the result of a government legal process but is a religious a ruling on a point of Islamic law that is given by a recognized religious authority. Most fatwas deal with resolving interpretations of Islamic law, sharia, sharia law, shariah, shariah law - the code of law derived from the Koran and from the teachings and example of Mohammed.

Examples include questions about medical practices such as transplants that did not exist at Mohammed' time. Such fatwas serve legitimate ecclesiastical purposes but calling for death goes beyond religious needs. I call such fatwas, fatwas of death and I oppose them as being illegal and immoral.

Khomenini's fatwa of death blurs the line between legitimate government actions and religious needs. A religious leader calling for death of enemies was settled in the West by Luther and his arguments should also apply to Islam as it represents itself as a peaceful religion. Fatwas last beyond death of the initiator as Soraya Sarhaddi's article affirms. There is no end to a fatwa and it can only be reversed by the author; in this case dead since This is not the only fatwa of death. Sheikh Usamah Bin-Muhammad Bin-Ladin and his friends issued a fatwa urging Jihad Against Americans on Febuary 23, 1998. In this call for Jihad or holy war he claimed, "The Arabian Peninsula has never--since God made it flat, created its desert, and encircled it with seas--been stormed by any forces like the crusader armies now spreading in it like locusts, consuming its riches and destroying its plantations." He went on to call for moslems (sic), "to kill the Americans and plunder their money wherever and whenever they find it." [Source: http://www.ict.org.il/articles/fatwah.htm]

Laden's quote to kill the Americans and plunder their money wherever and whenever they find it is phrased as in Sura 9 Aya 5 of the koran, "So when the sacred months have passed away, then slay the idolaters wherever you find them, . . . " (the remainder of the Aya is, " . . . and take them captives and besiege them and lie in wait for them in every ambush, then if they repent and keep up prayer and pay the poor-rate, leave their way free to them; surely Allah is Forgiving, Merciful." Sura 9 Aya 5 is often justified as dealing with Jihad and self defense but it is used by men like Laden where there is no attack to defend against. Surely the American presence in Arabia in the last decade was invited to defend against co-religionist Iraq. Fatwas were issued for justifying US troops in Saudi Arabia during the Gulf War [Source: http://www.islamicsupremecouncil.com/eidmilad.htm].

Fatwas of death go on and on. The Nigerian reporter who wrote Mohammed would probably marry a Miss Universe contestant now lives in England to avoid a fatwa of death against her. Fatwas of death have been written against an English author of a play dealing with homosexuality and an Algerian director in Hollywood for a movie against Algerian fundamentalism. A fatwa of death written against Algerian rock music has been related to the murder of an Algerian musician of such music in the south of France. In many countries fatwas of death have been written against unwed mothers. A fatwa of death was written against Jerry Falwell for remarks he made in the U.S. on TV's 60 Minutes program. [Source: http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2002/140/41.0.html 60 Minutes seemed to accept the fatwa as being acceptable]. I do not pretend to have a complete list of such fatwas.

The San Jose Mercury News and other news organizations should always give the source and the active part of the text when referring to fatwas of death. To call it a 'sentence' leads people to believe it is a legal. Rushdie is not Iranian, he is Pakistani, and he lives in England. Rushdie was in absentia, he was seldom if ever present! How a religious leader in Iran can claim jurisdiction for his actions is not in any way legal. Hinting in this report that he was ever present is wrong.