| Fadlullah issues a fatwa banning normalization with the enemy "because no one is entitled to give up one inch of Palestine" |
His Eminence, the Religious Authority Sayyed Muhammad Hussein Fadlullah, issued a fatwa banning normalization with the Zionist enemy in any form, regardless of the results of the movement of Arab political regimes. He stressed that Palestine, all of Palestine, within its historical borders, is an Arab Islamic land, and no one enjoys legitimacy to give up one inch of Palestine. He added that the fatwa banning normalization with Israel encompasses every Muslim, and that the illegitimacy of giving up any inch of Palestine is an Islamic rule that is not based on any sectarian bases. He also asserted that the nation is duty-bound to consolidate the cause of Palestine at the cultural, political, media, social, economic, military, and security levels. He stressed that the religious scholars of the nation, starting from Al-Azhar to the Land of the Two Holy Shrines, Al-Najaf, Qom, and other religious Islamic sites, should determine the clear Islamic position vis-à-vis the schemes against the nation, and should ban any attempts to sign a document that offers Palestine for the Jews.
Nowadays, the cause of Palestine is passing through the most dangerous international, regional, and local conspiracy which – for the first time – targets the very core of the cause on the legal and practical levels. This establishes for a period in which the Islamic nation and Arab people are dragged, so they come out of history practically after this nation has become paralyzed and entered into a political coma and turned its victories into defeats, and its countries into occupation sites, and its positions into mere vocal phenomena repeated between empty walls that contain all paralyzed weapon deals that are almost eaten by rust.
Perhaps, among the signs of the nation's paralysis and its political coma, is that silence that governs the situation when it comes to the holy shrines. We do not hereby refer to the silence of the political regimes, because these regimes have excused themselves from the Palestinian cause long time ago, and resigned through the wave of defeatist political positions in the face of the arrogance of the Zionist enemy. Rather, we refer to the silence of the people, which were – until recently – still igniting a storm of anger that did not cool off, when Sharon desecrated Al-Aqsa Mosque by entering to it.
It has become clear that the international trend, also the Arab official one – unfortunately – and even some of the unofficial Arab trends, is that there is no more a Jerusalem for which the Arabs and Muslims call, and there is no right of return for the Palestinians, and no Palestinian State. Rather, there is a mere municipal entity that is run within the framework of the Jewish State and is recognized by other countries as a state, although it is not entitled for geographical communication among its territories. Therefore, according to the official Arab and international logic, and even the Palestinian one, it is normal that the resistance becomes a state of aggression against its people.
We are facing this imminent danger and the critical juncture in the history of the nation, which will be prepared for through the coming United Nations meetings, especially during the convention of the General Assembly during the last third of this month. Based on our religious and responsible Islamic position towards the nation's causes, we stress the following points:
First, Palestine, all of Palestine, within its historical border, is an Arab and Islamic land, and no one is entitled to give up one inch of it, regardless of the political and religious considerations, because in Islam, usurpation is not to be permissible. Empowering the Zionists to occupy the lands of the Muslims is empowering them to dominate the Islamic reality which will only be aggravated by the international reality, through a wave of pressures and feuds which will put more pressures on the nation and kill its body, the weakness and sickness of which has become visible.
Second, any form of normalization with the Zionist enemy is religiously banned, regardless of the results of the movement of the Arab political regimes. The Arab and Muslim people, who read in the Holy Quran the history of these Zionists, should realize that the Zionists did not respect their pledge to God, so how could they maintain a pledge with the people. Their history is filled of killing prophets, torturing them, or targeting their march. There were even a burden on history at some point, and represented a problem for many people in many places in this world. We have previously issued a fatwa banning any commercial relations and dealings with Israel and whoever supports its occupation and empowers it to kill the Palestinians, torture, and displace them.
When we speak about the history of the Jews, we do not intend to punish the present for the deeds of the past, because according to the Holy Quran, those who created history are responsible for it. But we are pointing out that the dealing of their predecessors back in the past is the same current dealing. They adopt the same non-ethical and non-human behaviors, even though their titles and labels and means differ.
Third, we affirm that the fatwa that bans normalization and giving up any inch of Palestine is within the framework of an Islamic religious line; one that does not rest on any sectarian bases. In this regard, we stress that the religious scholars of the nation, starting from Al-Azhar, the Lands of the Two Holy Shrines, Al-Najaf, Qom, and other Islamic religious sites, should move to determine the Islamic position towards the plots prepared against the nation. They should also remove legitimacy from any attempt to sign the document of the Jewish occupation of Palestine, or engage in any form of normalization with the enemy, let alone empowering it to move freely in the Arab airspace and water, and the projects that further weaken the nation.
Fourth, the nation is duty-bound to consolidate the Palestinian cause in the nation's sentiments at the cultural, political, media, social, economic, military, and security levels. It should also benefit from any occasion for Palestine and Jerusalem, and any juncture of its historical juncture, to activate this cause by the most influential and efficient means. The nation should also manifest a strong position in politics and security, against all the plans aimed at finishing off the Palestinian cause.
Finally, we would like to tell the Palestinians, all of them: Throughout your jihadist and resistance history, you have always manifested an honorable and glorious position, even when you were killed, displaced, tortured, and oppressed. Palestine was not only your cause, but rather the cause of all the Islamic and Arab people. The nation is demolished when geography kills its major causes, and when every state feels unconcerned about its fraternal state.
We have always said to the Muslim and Arab peoples that Palestine is the major Arab and Muslim responsibility that one can, in no circumstances, abandon. We ought to stand with the Palestinians and support them until the final victory and liberation. There is no excuse for anybody to do so, even if the regimes chose to adopt the line of defeat and struggle. We all have to remember that within three years the nation was able to achieve two victories, which proves that the nation is able to reach the final victory provided that it trusts Allah and relies on its strong points and unite on the basis of its right which Allah has decreed and which history has affirmed. Allah says: "And to Allah belongs the might and to His Messenger and to the believers."