News & Comment
With the Loss of the Khilafah, the Muslim Armed Forces have become an Instrument to Kill the Children of the Ummah rather than to Defend them!

News:

On the night of the 2^nd of April, an Afghan air raid struck a gathering of religious scholars, students, and other civilians in Hashemia Madrassa in Afghanistan’s northern province of Kunduz, killing over 100 people, mostly children, according to various witnesses of the attack. Hundreds were gathered in the religious school at the time for a ceremony where children, some as young as 11 or 12, were graduating and receiving awards for the completion of their memorization of the Qur’an. According to health officials in Kunduz, the youngest casualty was just 7 years old. The Afghan Ministry of Defense Spokesman, Mohammad Radmanish, justified the attack on the premise that it was aimed at top Taliban commanders and fighters which he claimed were present in the building at the time, and which some Afghan officials described as a training centre for the armed group. The Afghan airforce, backed by US-led NATO coalition advisers, has increased its aerial raids in the country in recent months against the Taliban. However, many civilians, including children, have been killed in these air strikes. The latest US military strategy in Afghanistan has called for significant investment in Afghanistan’s airforce. Last October, the US’s top military commander in Afghanistan declared that a new fleet of 159 Black Hawk helicopters, flown by Afghan pilots, would help create a “tsunami of air power” against Taliban insurgents. The US has also sent Afghan pilots to the United States and other countries to train them in operating their newly acquired forms of air power.

Comment:

Are the armed forces of the Muslim Ummah not obliged by Allah (swt) to protect the lives of the Believers rather than killing them and their children? Should not the military equipment of the Muslims be used to fight in the cause of the Deen and against the enemies of Islam; those who persecute and slaughter the Ummah? Did Allah (swt) not say,

﴿وَالْمُؤْمِنُونَ وَالْمُؤْمِنَاتُ بَعْضُهُمْ أَوْلِيَاء بَعْضٍ يَأْمُرُونَ بِالْمَعْرُوفِ وَيَنْهَوْنَ عَنِ الْمُنكَرِ وَيُقِيمُونَ الصَّلاَةَ وَيُؤْتُونَ الزَّكَاةَ وَيُطِيعُونَ اللّهَ وَرَسُولَهُ أُوْلَـئِكَ سَيَرْحَمُهُمُ اللّهُ إِنَّ اللّهَ عَزِيزٌ حَكِيمٌ﴾

“The believing men and believing women are Auliya (helpers, friends, supporters, protectors) of one another. They enjoin what is right and forbid what is wrong and establish prayer and give zakah and obey Allah and His Messenger. As for these, Allah will have mercy upon them. Indeed, Allah is Exalted in Might and Wise.”[9: 71]

And did our beloved Prophet (saw) not tell us, «قَتْلُ الْمُؤْمِنِ أَعْظَمُ عِنْدَ اللَّهِ مِنْ زَوَالِ الدُّنْيَا» “Killing a believer is more grievous before Allah than the extinction of the whole world.” [an-Nisa’i]

However, with the loss of the Khilafah state, the guardian of Islam and shield of the Muslims, the Commands of Allah (swt) have been disregarded, and the Armed forces of the Ummah have been transformed into a tool to terrorise and kill the children of the Ummah by the puppet rulers of our lands on behalf of the interests of their Western masters – as we have seen in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen, Syria and Iraq. The misled belief that these child casualties are the unfortunate victims of collateral damage in these wars will not hold up as an excuse in the eyes of Allah (swt).

Meanwhile, the Muslim children and youth of Syria, Palestine, Myanmar, Kashmir and elsewhere are murdered by the enemies of Allah and yet not one Muslim soldier nor one fighter plane from the armies of this Ummah is mobilised to their defence! On the 7^th of April, we witnessed yet again a horrific chemical attack on Douma in Eastern Ghouta, Syria, where dozens were killed; many of them were women and children. We have lost count of the massacres against the believers and the number of attacks where we have seen the bloodied bodies of the babies and children of this Ummah in Al-Sham gasping for breath, suffocating and in anguish from the burns they sustained and from the chemical weapons unleashed upon them by the butcher Assad. And yet today, in the absence of any Islamic leadership, the soldiers of our Muslim lands will undoubtedly continue to be held back by these despicable Muslim regimes from moving to the aid of their brothers and sisters, held back from fulfilling their heavy Islamic obligation from their Rabb of defending the blood of the believers, and liberating them from their oppressors, even though Allah (swt) says,

﴿وَإِنِ اسْتَنصَرُوكُمْ فِي الدِّينِ فَعَلَيْكُمُ النَّصْرُ﴾

“And if they seek help of you for the religion, then you must help”[Surah al-Anfaal 8:72]

How stark a contrast this is to the role and actions of the Muslim army under the Islamic rule of the Khilafah (Caliphate), where they gained the honourable status of being the swords of Allah (swt), the defenders and liberators of the Muslims and the oppressed, and the heroes of the Ummah. In the 8^th century CE for example, when some Muslim women and children were taken prisoner by the Hindu king – Raja Dahir in Sindh, India, the Umayyad Khalifah, Al-Walid ibn Abd al-Malik, immediately sent a strong army, thousands strong, under the leadership of the courageous general, Muhammad ibn Qasim, to rescue them. The Muslim soldiers faced an army several times their size but defeated them, saving the Muslim women and children from their captors and liberating the whole of Sindh from the despotic Hindu rule.

 In this blessed month of Rajab; this month that reminds us of the great victories the Muslims achieved under the rule of Islam, but a month that also marks the catastrophe of the loss of the glorious Khilafah state, as Muslims we should be reminded of the urgent need to re-establish the Khilafah based upon the method of the Prophethood, for the return of this magnificent Islamic leadership will transform the Muslim armed forces back to their true purpose; to be the protectors of their Ummah and its children and fighters for their Deen.

 Written for the Central Media Office of Hizb ut Tahrir by

Dr Nazreen Nawaz

Director of the Women’s Section in The Central Media Office of Hizb ut Tahrir