islamic-jihad-legacy-of-forced-conversion-imperialism-slavery

Islamic JihadPROPAGATION OF ISLAM: QURANIC COMMANDS & PROPHETIC MODELThe Meccan period of Prophet Muhammad’s religious mission involved no use of arms except that hismessages were insulting, derogatory and offensive to the religion, customs and ancestors of the people.Nonetheless, Muhammad showed his intent for future violence in some of his statements during this earlyperiod even though his community was very weak. He clearly expressed his intent for future violence in hisstatement (noted already): ‘Men of Quraysh! I will surely repay you for this with interest.’ A number of versesrevealed during the first five years of his prophetic mission threatened the Quraysh with earthly punishments,such as threats of destroying them [Quran 77:16–17]. For example, the Quran [77:18] threatened the Quraysh:‘…thus shall We deal with the guilty.’ But these earthly punishments at this stage were to come from Allah.The Prophet also demonstrated his intent of hostility against the Quraysh when he went to Taif in 619 to finda sanctuary, where he tried to incite enmity amongst Taifites against the Meccans.Muhammad expressed his clearest and decisive intent for violence in the Second Pledge of Akaba,just before his relocation to Medina. In this pledge, he obtained a promise for his protection from his Medinaconverts with their blood. What was the need of this promise? In Arab towns, such as in Mecca and Medina,people from foreign lands used to come freely and set up businesses and even engage in peaceful missionaryactivities. If Muhammad was going to Medina to settle down peacefully, nobody was going to harm him.When he sent his disciple Musab to Medina a year earlier, he actively preached Islam and obtained largenumber of converts; he faced no hostility from the citizens of Medina. Therefore, Muhammad needed thepledge for his protection, because he had already decided to unleash violence: first, against the Quraysh, thenagainst all humanity for establishing Islam—the final, perfected religion of Allah—on the global scale (seenext Chapter).The rule of the game indeed changed completely after his relocation to Medina. The war against theinfidel world, declared by the Prophet through the Second Pledge of Akaba, was soon unleashed. The versesof Jihad, entreating Muhammad and his disciples to take up arms against the Quraysh, soon started pouringdown from Allah. The punishment of the Quraysh will now be meted out by the hands of Muhammad and hisdisciples, not by Allah. And those who die while fighting the infidels will receive Allah’s succor in the nextlife: ‘Thus (are ye commanded): but if it had been Allah’s Will, He could certainly have exacted retributionfrom them (Himself); but (He lets you fight) in order to test you, some with others. But those who are slain inthe Way of Allah, He will never let their deeds be lost’ [Quran 47:4].Prophet Muhammad himself was candid about it, as Narrated by Ibn 'Omar: Allah’s Apostle said: ‘Ihave been ordered (by Allah) to fight against the people until they testify that none has the right to beworshipped but Allah and that Muhammad is Allah’s Apostle, and offer the prayers perfectly and give theobligatory charity, so if they perform that, then they save their lives and property from me except for Islamiclaws and then their reckoning (accounts) will be done by Allah’ [Bukhari 1:24].Within seven months of his relocation to Medina, the Prophet started sending military expeditionsfor raiding and plundering trade-caravans of the Quraysh and the first success came at Nakhla after abouteighteen months. The rest of his mission in Medina, as recounted in the previous chapter, was obviously amonotonous tale of continuous raid, plunder, war, mass eviction, slaughter and enslavement of non-Muslimsuntil he died in 632.By the time Muhammad died, the city of Mecca and Medina was completely denuded of the infidels.The Prophet had already extirpated idolatry from the newly founded Islamic state in Arabia by giving themthe choice between Islam and death in accordance with Quran 9:5. Some residual Jewish and Christiancommunities still existed in some remote parts of the Arab Peninsula; they were expelled by his immediatesuccessors in accordance with his dying wishes. They were, however, tolerated as humiliated and exploiteddhimmi subjects in the conquered Muslim lands outside Arabia.57