veiled4allah: latest on Qaradawi

Scott Martens let me know by email about an Al-Jazeerah interview with Yusuf Qaradawi in which he denies the media reports that he said American civilians in Iraq could or should be targeted:

In a telephone interview with Aljazeera.net, Shaikh al-Qaradawi said his words were taken out of context. "I said that the occupation of any Muslim country should be resisted, I never used the words Americans and civilians."

"Wherever and whenever there is an occupation, there would be a resistance. That is natural," he said.

I noted in my original post that the interpretation that he says attacks on civilians are lawful is not from any direct statement that he made, but rather seems to come out of the fact that he didn't distinguish between soldiers and civilians when he said that all Americans in Iraq were lawful targets, plus the unconfirmed media report cited by Juan Cole having to do with kidnappings.

The Al-Jazeerah report also suggests a more beneficent take on Qaradawi's views about Darfur:

The Qatar-based Shaikh al-Qaradawi headed a delegation to Sudan to start mediation between warring parties in Darfur. He met on Friday with Sudanese interior minister and representative of the president of Sudan Abd al-Rahim Muhammad and held talks about Darfur.

The revered scholar hopes to use his good relations with all parties to try to reach a settlement in the war torn province of Darfur.

If he could genuinely bring about an end to the displacement and killing of civilians in Darfur, that would be a great thing, inshallah.

Finally, Al-Jazeerah says that Qaradawi is working to seek the release of the French hostages in Iraq:

Al-Qaradawi is also involved in efforts to release the two French journalists held in Iraq. "If those kidnappers care about the reputation of Islam then they should free the two French journalists," he said.

Al-Qaradawi said the presence of the French journalists "broke the American monopoly on relaying information and facts (on the situation in Iraq) to the outside world."

He also referred to France's foreign policy in dealing with the Islamic and Arab worlds, which he said could serve as an example to other countries.

The kidnapping of Georges Malbrunot and Christian Chesnot on August 20 by a group called the Islamic Army in Iraq has deeply shocked France which was a fierce opponent of the U.S.-led invasion and has no troops in Iraq.

It's almost like the news stories are about two different men.

I remain troubled by Qaradawi's statements in support of the suicide bombings in Israel, because I believe he's wrong about that, and I'd like to see a bit more clarification of his position on Darfur, but I'm very thankful to read this report and hope that it's true. As I said in my original post, Qaradawi has contributed an awful lot to Muslim discourse in many areas and it would be a shame to have lost that.

Added: Abu Aardvark has a large number of posts about this topic (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6). I recommend everybody interested in this issue to read what he has to say. See also this.

More: On a related note, critics of Qaradawi may want to read the following document issued by the office of the Mayor of London (it's copied from a PDF so the formatting is a bit wonky) which responds to many of the allegations made against Qaradawi in certain quarters. Via Lenin's Tomb.

Added: Abu Aardvark reveals what the real jihadis and radical Islamists think of Qaradawi. Hint: they don't think he's one of them.