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Slaughtering Civilians is Beyond the Pale

(Financial Times-UK) Editorial - Britain is currently in the chair of both the Group of Eight advanced economies and the EU. Prime Minister Tony Blair should use these positions to pursue that vital consensus on how to isolate jihadi extremism. Only the jihadis are advocating the slaughter of civilians as a legitimate tactic. This month, Muslim religious leaders including Sheikh Mohammed Sayyed Tantawi of Al Azhar, Sunni Islam's foremost cleric, and Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, the leader of Iraq's Shia, denounced the jihadi practice of declaring other Muslims "apostates" and condemned all attacks on civilians. But this will never be enough while Saudi Arabia's clerical establishment keeps spewing out poisonous bigotry against "infidels," not just at home but through the network of mosques and schools the Wahhabis endow around the world. Not only must the jihadis be isolated from mainstream Islam, but also the sort of totalitarian preaching that feeds and succors them.
2005-07-18 00:00:00
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