Culture

Jihad Is Ongoing Until the Day of Judgement

The Hadith of the Messenger of Allah (saw) in which he said: “Jihad is ongoing since Allah sent me until the last generation of my Ummah fight the Dajjal; it is not annulled by the tyranny of the despot or the fairness of the just.”, means the obligation is permanent, i.e. the Jihad against the polytheists is an obligation that continues until the Day of Judgement and is not dependent on the Imam being either tyrant or fair. Hence, Jihad cannot be voided and cannot be relinquished under the pretext of the tyranny or the justness of the rulers. His (saw) saying “the tyranny of the despot or the fairness of the just” is in reference to the Iman. Hence, the terms tyrant and fair act as adjectives to an omitted noun that refers to the Emir or Imam. The duty of Jihad is not dependent on the fairness or the tyranny of the rulers and performing it is not restricted to their fairness. This is the understanding of the scholars from among the generation of Tabi’een and those who came after them; we do not know of any difference of opinion about this topic. The Hadith does not in any way mean that Jihad is devoid of rules or conditions or that is can be performed in any way. It rather has a set of fixed rules and conditions derived from the Shari’ah evidences. It is a duty just like any other and it must be performed according to the evidence and according to its manner. There is no difference between Jihad and the other Shari’ah rules such as Zakat, Salat, the Hudud (penal codes) and the like, all of which have their Shari’ah conditions and causes, which must be observed.

Jihad and the reality of the Muslims Today

Here a question arises: Since Jihad has a set of conditions that must be observed and fulfilled and since one of the conditions is that Jihad in the absence of an Emir is not compulsory, while we witness the reality of the Muslims today that they do not have a Muslim Emir ruling over them; the question is: What should the Muslims do in case their lands are attacked by an aggressor, as is the case today in Palestine, Iraq, Somalia, Afghanistan, Kashmir, Chechnya and other Muslims’ lands? Would the Muslims let their lands be violated and their blood be shed?
 
The answer to this is that the Shari’ah rule related to the Muslims who live in these lands stipulates that they are obliged to repel the enemy in case he attacks their lands and everyone must go forth to fight him and expel him from their lands. If the Kifaya (sufficiency) to repel the enemy is not achieved, the obligation to repel shifts to the Muslims living nearest to these lands and so on, until sufficiency is achieved. If sufficiency is achieved and the Muslims succeed in repelling the enemy from their lands, the rest of the Muslims would be absolved of blame. However, if the enemy succeeded in defeating the Muslims and in dominating and occupying their lands, the obligation of repelling the enemy shifts to the Muslims nearest to them, because the people of the attacked would be under coercion and subjugated, unable to repel the enemy; thus, it is obligatory upon the Muslims to work towards recapturing these lands from the Kuffar irrespective of the sacrifices they may have to make.

However, the recapture of these lands is achieved through the restoration of the Islamic State that will prepare the armies and mobilise the Muslims to liberate the occupied lands. The liberation of the occupied lands is not through the forming of groups that undertake some military actions against the occupying forces. Although this type of fighting is permitted, it does not however achieve the objective of liberating the occupied lands. This is so because the issue is not merely to fight, but to fight for an objective, namely to liberate the lands from the occupation and the dominion of the Kuffar. If the Muslims contended themselves with the fighting undertaken by those groups, they would be letting their brethren down and squandering the faculties of everyone; this may also lead to consolidating the occupying forces in the Muslims’ lands instead of vanquishing them.
 
As for the fact that this type of fighting does not achieve the objective, this is clear from the fact that confronting the occupying states to repel them and to liberate the occupied lands requires a state; in other words it requires a state that will undertake the equipping, training and arming of the armed forces and directing these forces to fight the forces of the occupying state, and organising the military operations that lead to weakening the enemy and expelling him from our lands. Despite of what has arisen in the Muslims lands in terms of liberation movements, be it to fight the old colonialism or the neo-colonialism, these groups never managed to liberate a land occupied by the Kuffar by relying solely on their own resources and capabilities; some of them have rather consolidated the occupation of the Muslims’ lands by the Kufr states. Huge efforts were exhausted in order to undertake this endeavour instead of steering the energies of the Ummah towards establishing the entity that shoulders the responsibility of liberating the occupied Muslims’ lands, thus, it would be a nation fighting another nation, state fighting a state and an army fighting an army, as opposed to individuals and groups facing huge armies, or as opposed to what is referred to nowadays as resistance. In addition to the multiplicity of its groups and the weakness of its armament and training, its survival and continuity requires in most cases the backing of other forces, be it from foreign states or from the existing regimes which are affiliated to Kufr states, in order to maintain continuity and influence. Foreign backing is one of the means used to buy the loyalty of these groups or to exploit them or exert pressure on them. This means the acts of resistance are subject to the volition of the powers that sponsor the liberation movements. This leads to the ruin of not only the Muslims but of their lands as well.
 
On the other hand, no one told the Muslims to keep silent over the occupation of their lands and over the shedding of their blood by their enemies while they remain idle. However, what is the way to salvation? The point at issue is to rally around Islam and to protect it. Defending Islam necessitates defending the lands where Islam is existent. When the Muslim defends and protects the lands, he does so because they are Muslims’ lands, irrespective of whether they were an Islamic household or a Kufr household. Hence, wherever Islam is existent in any land, it is deemed a land for every Muslim. Islam calls for the defence of the Muslims’ lands because they are the lands of Islam and it deems every stretch of the Islamic lands as a frontline of Islam – if the enemy were to transgress it, Jihad becomes obligatory upon every Muslim. This is a concept that forms part of the Islamic Da’wah and is not an instinctive concept. These lands of Islam have been torn apart by the colonial Kafir and the authority of Islam has been removed. The Kafir established his own system over these lands and placed his own watchdogs from among the traitors and agents when the international situation forced him to withdraw his own armies. Therefore, whoever addresses the Ummah with the obligation of Jihad, he must explain the method by which the Ummah engages in Jihad, and not address the Ummah with this collective duty while she is torn to shreds. Hence, the Muslims should nowadays distinguish between what is permissible to do and what effectively fulfils the obligation and yields the desired result, in terms of vanquishing the enemy, expelling him from the occupied Muslims’ lands and salvaging the lands from his claws. The Muslims should also distinguish between what achieves for them the might and the strength and achieves the desired deterrent from the preparation for Jihad: “Against them make ready your strength to the utmost of your power, including steeds of war, to strike terror into (the hearts of) the enemies, of Allah and your enemies.” , and what is a reaction to being invaded by the enemy and having their properties and their honour violated; in the case of the latter it would be easy for the plots and plans of the enemy to be passed with the Muslims realising it. Consequently, the Muslims should tread the only path that Islam has legislated to achieve unity and resist Kufr, namely establishing the Khilafah and undertaking the duty of Jihad. Nothing could unite the Muslims except the banner of Islam, and no one can gather the groupings of the Muslims except the Khalifah of the Muslims; nothing can protect Islam and defend the sanctity of the Muslims except the Jihad to make the word of Allah supreme. Hence, it is imperative to work towards establishing the Khilafah by destroying the existent entities in the lands of Islam and appointing a Khalifah to restore the authority of Islam and to hoist the banner of Islam and lead the Muslims to the battlefields of Jihad, fighting the Kuffar and the hypocrites to make the word of the Kuffar the lowest and the word of Allah the highest. The point at issue is not just a land usurped by the enemy; it is rather a war whose soldiers are the collaborating rulers and whose officers are the Western states as a whole, led by America. The one and only path to engage in this war would be by redressing the situation through the establishment of the Khilafah then by declaring Jihad for the sake of Allah to make His word supreme. This is the one and only path.

Our enemy, the Western Kafir occupies our lands, some politically, some militarily and some by displacing the Muslim people and placing his own people, providing them with all the means to act as an arsenal and a bridgehead for him. So how can such a force be fought through organisations and individuals? It is impossible to expel these enemies – as is the case in Palestine – except through armies that are organised, trained and equipped with what deters the enemy of Allah. This can only be achieved from outside the location that falls under the occupation of the enemy, from lands that are not militarily occupied, even if they were under the political dominion of the enemy. The method to achieve this is to engage in a relentless political struggle with the rulers, because they are the agents of the Kafir West in addition to ruling by other than what Allah has revealed. This political struggle should be coupled with the intellectual struggle against the thoughts of Kufr such as nationalism and capitalism and against those who carry such thoughts from among the aberrant and those who seek to deceive the masses. The method to achieve this is to carry the Islamic Da’wah and to work towards resuming the Islamic way of life. Hence, the situations must be changed by removing the rulers and then engage in a fierce war of liberation.

When the armies of the major powers descended in our lands as is the case today in Iraq and Afghanistan, it was the Muslims’ rulers who assisted them willingly and out of choice in occupying our lands, to prevent us from getting ourselves rid of their dominion. The issue today is not simply the issue of “Israel” or Palestine, nor is it the issue of a foreign influence controlling our lands, but rather the issue of the major powers’ armies occupying our lands in a “legitimate” manner through the United Nations; the Muslims have only one path, namely to reject this occupation and resists these plans before they are implemented. There is no other way to achieve this but by seizing the reins of power from those who wish to drive us towards the abyss. The hope still has its omens and the chance is not lost yet; averting the calamity is still possible. It lies in the removal of the rulers and seizing the leadership of the lands from the collaborators, then declaring the rejection of occupation and the presence of Israel as well as all the other plots; this would be part of the implementation of the suspended Islam once the Islamic State is established.
 
This is Islam and this is the clarity of vision, not the fabricated fatwas of the regimes’ scholars that conform to the general mood that had been generated and spread by the rulers, and for which some of the groups calling sincerely for Jihad had fallen; such fatwas do not salvage the lands and do not fulfil the obligation of Jihad, but often leads the Ummah towards executing the plans of the enemy represented today by the head of Kufr, America, and contributing to her unilateral dominion, thus bringing ruin and devastation rather than salvation and liberation. It is baffling to witness this pattern of events recurring ever since the Khilafah was destroyed up until today and yet the Muslims fail to learn the lesson and realise the unfruitfulness of this individualist approach and do not turn towards the collective sacrifice reflected in an Ummah that has her state, her authority and her will. 

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