Lebanese Sovereignty, and Wilayat Al Fiqh,

[007]

achaaban,

did you forget that hezbollah never used their arms against Lebanese ?

did you forget that as hezbollah said "ma sar darbit kaff" ?

did you forget that they stopped calling for the islamic republic just like the lf also had to stop calling for federalism?

achaaban,

I think you hit the core of the problem, but with people "3am birab7ouna jmileh" that they didnt use their weapons against any lebanese in times of peace("chou 7elweh hinni w using it"). how can you reason? see the syrians knew exactly what they did in the past 15 years when they made hezbollah stronger and stronger. did anyone wonder why hezbollah was the only power that never had any political problems with the syrians? not because they are syrian more than they are lebanese, but because the syrians made them stronger than any other Lebanese group. w unfortunately that means that the other lebanese are left with nothing, not even the intention of hezbollah to reason about having a state, thats why it looks like hezbollah is throwing us more and more towards 1559 and the UN.

Regards,

007

ps: and did you forget ya achaaban that hezbollah is not a militia? you might ask : "how come? every militant group not part of the army is a militia"... well hezbollah is not, just because there is thousands of people who would be willing to go down and hold a demo supporting that claim. bye bye lebanese constitution.

whats in red is edited

[Bodhisattva]

Originally Posted by 007

achaaban,

did you forget that hezbollah never used their arms against Lebanese ?

did you forget that as hezbollah said "ma sar darbit kaff" ?

did you forget that they stopped calling for the islamic republic just like the lf also had to stop calling for federalism?

achaaban,

I think you hit the core of the problem, but with people "3am birab7ouna jmileh" that they didnt use their weapons against any lebanese in times of peace("chou 7elweh hinni w using it"). how can you reason? see the syrians knew exactly what they did in the past 15 years when they made hezbollah stronger and stronger. did anyone wonder why hezbollah was the only power that never had any problems with the syrians? not because they are syrian more than they are lebanese, but because the syrians made them stronger than any other Lebanese group. w unfortunately that means that the other lebanese are left with nothing, not even the intention of hezbollah to reason about having a state, thats why it looks like hezbollah is throwing us more and more towards 1559 and the UN.

Regards,

007

ps: and did you forget ya achaaban that hezbollah is not a militia? you might ask : "how come? every militant group not part of the army is a militia"... well hezbollah is not, just because there is thousands of people who would be willing to go down and hold a demo supporting that claim. bye bye lebanese constitution.

im convinced..

[Motorcity]

Originally Posted by 007

did anyone wonder why hezbollah was the only power that never had any problems with the syrians? .

Other than engaging in a bloody war , with one of the clashes resulting in the Massacre of Fat7allah street in the Basta ta7ta, where more than 150 hizb members were killed in cold blood by the syrians!

I guess that was also a staged act!

~ Be Happy.. But Be Awake...

[achaaban]

Originally Posted by Maher

Even though I agree with a lot of the conclusions of your article, specially in relation to Wilayat Al-Faih (not Wilayat Al-Fiqh), (ولاية الفقيه) and the role fo Iran in determining the agenda and actions of Hizballah, I still have a lot that I disagree with.

But first I would to bring up some points that put the whole article in question.

1st - as mentioned above it is Wilayat Alfaqih, not Wilayat Alfiqh. This issue which might like a small thing, a typo, might actually seem like an indication at the level of familiarity with the subject that you are addressing.

Bear with me I am dyslexic, so was Albert Einstein, he must have had lots of typos, but was very familiar with his topic.

2nd - The relationship between Mohamad Hussien Fadlallah VS Iran and in extension Hizbollah.
While Fadlallah and Hizballah enjoyed very close relationship for most of the eigthies, the term spiritual leader (المرشد الروحي) for Hizbollah was always rejected by Fadlallah himself, it is actually a term coined by so called western (specialists) to describe that relationship. The fact of the matter is that Fadlallah himself rejects the concept of Wilayat Al-Faqih, he considers "AlWali Al-Faqih" to be a political position, just like a president

However Fadlallah's concept of the right system of government in Lebanon is similar to that of the Ottoman Empire's Islamic state that will include various religious minorities in that state in a system of Millat, after all he is a religious leader who is theorizing about the state, which I also believe is very dangerous,

Fadlallah's relations with Iran have suffered greatly because of that and he is very far from being freinds with Hizbollah or Iran for that matter (last year Hizbollah was circulating a video in which a montage was made of many interviews with him, that montage was made to show that he said damaging things in regard to Shiite theology. That episode was mentioned in news papers back then.

I have also heard things like this from some Shiite friends of mine, who are frequent visitors of Lebanon, I will highly appreciate it if you could recommend some local readings on Fadlallah's stance about Lebanon and Iran, I am very interested in the topic.

Thank you for a very thoughtful post, I enjoyed reading your views

[Southern Lebanese]

Hi everybody. I have been reading in this forum for about 4 months and I enjoyed the diversity of opinions and the well-constructive debates. Accordingly, I decided to join you.

First of all, let me agree that achaaban did his research regarding this topic. However, I want to add a number of remarks. The first remark is that achaaban is under-estimating and insulting the level of knowledge of Hizbulla Followers. Moreover, in some of your remarks, you are insulting and attacking the party itself by misrepresenting them. I quote achaaban saying in this thread that:
3- " Hezbollah is a terrorist organization that is mobalized by Iran, and recruites people for a rebellion that was legitimized by Imam Khomeini as a call from God, to kill and massacare the Jews, the Christians and their Collaborators. Thus, a criminal organization that is a member of the Lebanese government.
4- Hezbollah will not reply, non of the followers of this ideology will reply, one important aspect of organizations like Hezbollah, and the Islamists in gereral is that they believe that what they say is the only thing that is right, because their ulama tells them that it is the only correct interpretation of the words of God. For an individual to be able to reason these interpretations is something that is beyond their way of thinking.
5- This is why if you actually talk to a large number of the supporters of Hezbollah, you will realize that they are not aware of this concept, and the whole idea of Wilayat al-Fiqh."

I think the "7osn al zan" is crucial at this stage of lebanon's history that is why I will say that he did not mean that. However, I should that that Hizbullah is not as he portrayed. Achaaban, you said yourself that "As you might well know, that interpretations of ideologies and religion are culturally contingent. This is very obvious in how various cultures have interpreted the Koran as to represent their traditional values and beliefs. ". Your interpretation of Wilayat Al Fakih is in itself related to your cultural environment and how you see them is related to your education and the books you are referring yourself to. As for me, I may have a different one.

In Shii Islam, the difference with Sunni Islam (they are both MUSLIM) is that the possibility of interpretation is still open (Bab El Ejtihad) (I do not how to translate it better: I do not mean and I am not attacking any other sects and religions). To have this, Shia has 7awzat or schools to teach future clerics so they can have the basic knowledge to be able to do these kind of interpretions. These clerics will be developed to helpers of more senior and advanced clerics that made their ways to be maraji3. You can imagine it as a big advisor with his research assistants in a PhD system. Now, there are two major schools of 7awzat. There is the 7awza Natika and the 7awza Samita (the silent school and the spoken school). The main graduate from the 7awza Samita is in Najaf, Iraq. You can state the most prominent marja3 between them is Al Sayyed Al Sistani you all heard about from the news I assume. The mostly prefer to isolate politics from religion and keep themselves mostly related to daily routines of life. The persecution during the Saddam Era made a lot of the graduate of these schools to flee to Kom, Iran. Seeing the success of the Islamic revolution there and the way they used to preach did not help them against political matter, the 7awza Natika in Kom city started to flourish more and more. The wilayat al fakih is based on the 7awza al Natika.

Here, please allow me to correct some of the mistakes achaaban made. He said that "They ( Hizbollah)are part of this Wilayah meaning that they are part of ” Wilaya, or the State that could be ruled by other individuals than the descendents of Ali the twelve Imams.” Wilaya is not a land as described from your stand point. Wilaya is to "Touwali" (follow if I may say it in English) the al fakih that is al imam al mahdi al mountazar (this part you got right achaaban). For that, in a broad sense you can say every shiite shares that concept in a way or another if he is convinced by the return of the 12th Imam and he will follow him. However, the difference arises when saying how to achive that. For Al Khomaini, he mentioned that one should "yis3a" to have al omma al islamiyya (prepare the ground for the return of al mahdi) and have a jury and a representative over-seeing this process from a fok-hi and 3a ka2idi point of view. This representative was "al-khomaini" and now "Khamina2i" with the jury of clerics and I may say that they are still graduate of Kom (still the same concept of "marja3iyye" , if you are complicating it, do not over-complicate it, it is not a mistery). The main conflict here rose with the 7awza samita since when you say omma islamiyya, a whole politic system and state related issue should be considered. Now, Hizbulla follow the wilayat al fakih concept from the 3aka2idi point of view with its relation to "khamina2i" but not to the extent of the government of iran. That is why sayyed hassan is his representative but not the follower of iran. In politics and other related issues, they are free to act within their local communities and decisions in their elected councils. Moreover, when they are "yis3o" to create the state they dream about, they aim not to impose it or "to kill and massacare the Jews, the Christians and their Collaborators" to have their state within their state. They have their preachers, their seminars and their acceptable means to try to promote it. But it will not be imposed if Lebanon is ready for it and for that, they are not and most probably they will not think of having it later (seeing Lebanon). You can think of it as being "the pope" as the spiritual leader and having preachers and hoping that someday, "the kingdom of heaven" will be established.

Now having explained my point of view and a large numbers of people is aware of it ( not as achaaban said that "This is why if you actually talk to a large number of the supporters of Hezbollah, you will realize that they are not aware of this concept, and the whole idea of Wilayat al-Fiqh"), I need to say there is no conflict between the being Lebanese and a follower of Hizbullah even being not a follower of them. They are fellow Lebanese and they need to be treated as such as they need to treat the rest of Lebanon as such. When talking about them, you should understand the whole context of how they had this ideology and how they (I can talk now about shi3at jabal 3amel, the south) were always Lebanese. They gave lot of intellectuals ( they are still like that even if a large portion of them are follower of Hizbulla) and they always felt "mostad3afeen" even though. They did not aim for a lot in the governments and they did not receive lot of support from their own Lebanese governments. A lot of them feel that they were misrepresented (see the ratios of shia as a population and their representation in the cabinet) and Hizbullah after sayyed moussa al sadr (he started 7araket al mostad3afeen not Hizbullah) started to take care of them. That it why they feel with the palestinians (that are suffering now not those who killed since 7araket amal fought them and hizbullah when they mistreated the southerners) and that is why morally they made yawm el kods. I mean it is for them and if they did not make it, it will have been a change of their stance towards the palestinian issue and they will not make it (I understand them). Now, it will be off-topic to continue about continuing to discuss the repercussions of their march so I will keep it till later.

I hope at the end, I helped a little in making you understanding more Hizbullah ideology and I hope that this will let you be closer to dialogue. After all, we all want (including Hizbullah and achaaban and everybody in this forum) the best for Lebanon.

Regards.

[Southern Lebanese]

PS: sorry for the typos, I did not check my grammar mistakes. It is my first reply after all.

[Motorcity]

Thanks for the efforts Southern Lebanese!
I just Hope that others read it with open mindness rather than presumptions!

Welcome to the Forum!

[Maher]

Originally Posted by achaaban

However Fadlallah's concept of the right system of government in Lebanon is similar to that of the Ottoman Empire's Islamic state that will include various religious minorities in that state in a system of Millat, after all he is a religious leader who is theorizing about the state, which I also believe is very dangerous,

I do not argue the fact that Fadlallah's vision entails a system of governance that is religious. But nonetheless, he officially does not believe in Wilayat Al-Faqih.

Fadlallah's preaches an Islamic system of governance with all the bells and whistles that comes with that (sharia law, Dhimmitude, controlled "democracy", etc ....), off-course such a system of governance is undemocratic in nature since it gets it's legitimacy from god or ones interepretaion of God's will, not from the people and heir common interests.

As for his relationship with Iran (and Hizbollah by extension), it sufered greatly after the death of Khomeini and the appointement of Khamenei as "Murshid al-Thawra", Khamenei not being a high scholar "Mujtahid" and not being considered to be close to being one by a lot of higher scholars either, that appointment created a chasm in the Shiite religious establishment. Fadlallah took a vocal stand against Khamenei being promoted as a supreme religious leader as a Wali Faqih, and said that he is at a much higher level of scholarship "Mujtahid" than Khamenei is, and implied that he never published his Resala to become a "Mujtahid Mutlaq" out of respect for Khomeini during his life. That position and his views that Al-Wali Al-Faqih is a political position and that Al-Wali Al-Faqih cannot be considered a religious authority if he was not one independently of the of the position itself (as was Khomeini) put him in direct conflict with Iran and Hizbollah by challenging their basic legitimacy. Actually they started targeting him on a personal level using ideas that he was floating to create rapproachment between Shiites and Sunnites (such as the story of Fatima Alzahraa being pushed behind a door by Omar and having a miscarriage thereafter, he considered the story to be sketchy at best and not to be taken seriously), they used things such as that to attack him personally and to claim that he is not faithfull Shiite etc....

He was considered to be specially dangerous to Iran because of the high esteem he enjoys amongst some of Iran financial elite (the Bazzar) and his close relationship with a lot of scholars, himself being a scholar of Najaf/Iraq and having close blood elationship to many other scholars. He is as well highly regarded by followers of the late Ayatollah Mohamad Baqer Alsader (who was executed by saddam in 1979) who are concentrated in Iraq and the gulf state, therefore he had a big financial source independent of Iran and it's cronies (He is rumored to have suggested to Hassan Nosrallh in 1996 to abandon Iran and he is ready to fully replace their financial support).

Anyways, all of the above does not eliminate the dangerous situations that arise from involvment of religion in state affairs as is clearly displayed in Lebanon every day.

Back to the subject of Hizbollah and Wilayat Al-Faqih, this is a concept that is extremely dangerous, Al-Wali Al-Faqih, whoever that maybe, has supreme control in all matters of life over his followers including the political and military activities of Hizbollah. Therefore, we are dealing with an entity that is bound only but what Al-Wali Al-Faqih decrees.

Such dangerous leanings of Hizbollah were manifested in the earlier stages of their life, specially in the mid to late 80s (the assasinations of Communist cadres, the killing of SSNP regional leadership in Masghara after kidnapping them, the Amal-Hizbollah battles, etc...), what have changed since then is the way the Iranian leadership has been handling the world since then (end of 1st gulf war, better relations with european countries).

[achaaban]

Maher and Southern Lebanese, I apologize for coming late to respond to your very interesting posts, but I have been terribly busy during this week. However, I will be replying to both of you by tomorrow, since I think that you address very interesting topics.

[achaaban]

Southern Lebanese,
I would like to start by saying that I am far from insulting or attacking Hezbollah, I am presenting an intellectual debate where I take the stand of opposition to Hezbollah’s concept of the clergy being the only legitimate authority to legislate in a political body called the state. My main claim is that the ijtihad of the clergy in what you include under “Bab el-Ijtihad” could not and should not be considered as an authoritative opinion within the public life of the state. Since it is the legislation of the few imposed over the many without the consensus of the people, though illegitimate. State legislation could only be achieved by the representatives of the people in a system that is pluralistic and recognizes all the various segments of the state. This system is what is actually called in the Koran the system of shoura, where shoura meaning consultation is a process of legislating and interpreting laws that is founded of the criteria of ijma’a meaning consensus. This system resembles the Western concept of parliamentary legislators who make the law, and the judges in courts who interpret the law. These two entities are thought separated so that justice could be achieved. There should be a consensus between groups who are the constituents of a specific community on accepting the laws that these communities are subject to. A state law is a law that is enforced on all the citizens of a state. This state is composed of multi-religious communities. State laws should be unified for all citizens of the state who are all equal before the law. The state could not have a law each is designed for one confession because then it is not a state that is administering citizens. In Wilayat Al-Fiqh the Jurists are the legislators and the interpreters of the law, thus a system that does not allow for justice to be pursued in an independent judiciary. The whole thing functions under the scrutiny of the self appointed Imams. My claim is that this idea of ijtihad as a group effort, which allows the clergy to legislate and impose their laws over the group that they call the Shiite as in the case of Lebanon, is in direct opposition to the ideas of representative democracy, shoura and ijma’a . My understanding of the word ijtihad from the Koran seems to mean that ijtihad is an act that every individual can do and not only the clergy. Ijtihad is something that is a result of reasoning the Koran and everyone is requested to read it and reason it, so that each one could lead a righteous life. Thus, the Koran is a message for individuals. The clergy’s position of being the only legitimate entity that could reason the Koran is in contradiction with the idea of ijtihad being an individual act that anyone could presume if they wish to. It is also in contradiction to one main premise in the Koran, where each individual will be held accountable for his own actions and his own beliefs, based on the choices that he/she makes in this life. The clergy is playing the role of guidance, however this guidance has a force of law, and it prohibits individuals from reasoning as well as from choosing their right path since they have to adhere to the clergy’s opinion. The clergy thus is an obstacle to the individual’s autonomy and freedom of conscience. The question to be addressed in a state such as the one called Wilayat Al-Faqih is how is the individual accountable for something that was imposed on them by force? I disagree with the position where the clergy assume that they could presume that their reasoning is actually authoritative and is to be imposed on individuals with the force of law as Shari’a law. This Shari’a law could not be questioned according to the clergy and it is a law that is in essence premised on the application of the opinion of the few over the many, even if the majority of the people who it should apply to disagree with the imposed law. Thus, this imposed law is in direct contradiction with shoura and ijma’ which is the synonym of representative democracy. The only legitimate system of governance according to the Koran is the one that represents consensus, and the consensus is applicable to all the communities regardless to which prophet from the prophets of God they follow.

Now, I would like to address your comments by looking at two subtopics that you have addressed in your post. The First is my categorization of Hezbollah as a terrorist organization, and the second is the religious fundamentalism that Hezbollah adheres to. This brings us into a position, where it becomes a necessity to define religious fundamentalism and terrorism or radical religious movements as two concepts that are vitally distinct from each other. I will be trying to do that by analyzing two forms of religious fundamentalism for the purpose of comparison, these are Jewish fundamentalism and Islamic fundamentalism, and two violent and radical off springs of these religious fundamentalists movements and focus on Jewish and Islamic terrorism, by comparing Meir David Kahane and Gush Emunim to Hezbollah and Islamic Jihad. Then I will be looking at your argument of Wilayat al-Faqih, based on a few premises that you present and I find as problematic.

Jewish Fundamentalism and Islamic Fundamentalism:

Jewish Religious groups are divided into two distinctly different groups the more extreme group called the Haerdime, and the members who are more religiously moderate are called the religious national Jews. The Haredim(ultra Orthodox) which is derived from the word hard meaning God fearing, evolved during the nineteenth centaury with the Jews in Diaspora, in opposition to modernization, and the rising number of secular Jews. In Israel these groups are divided into the Shas, the party of oriental Haredim the Mezrahis, and Yahadut ha’Torah( Judaism of the law) that is the party of the Ashkenazi Haredim. The Haredim want Israel to be ruled by Jewish Law, and they reject secularism and the separation of the state and religion. They disagree with Zionism on certain principles, the most important is related to a Talmudic passage where God is said to have imposed on the Jews, three oaths two of which contradict Zionism, 1) The Jews should not rebel against non-Jews, 2) The Jews as a group should not massively immigrate to Palestine before the coming of the Messaiah.

Muslim fundamentalism emerged during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centaury as an intellectual movement calling for the revival of Islam. The modernists were led by Iranian Shiite Jamal el-Din Al-Afghani (1849-1905) and Rashid Rida (1865-1935), and Mohamed Abduh, (1849-1905). Abduh for example had strong opinions about the rights of women, as he argued on banning polygamy, as an act of justice. AL-Afghani’s work emphasized on pan-Islam, Al-Afghani called for the regeneration of Islam and the return to the original text, following the steps of Afghani, Rida developed an intellectual reformist group that was called the Salaf el-Saleh,, who somehow resemble in their belief of the return to original texts of the Koran the Ultra Orthodox Jews. The Haredim, could be easily called the Jewish Salaf, they wear traditional old cloths and the black hat and refuse to adjust to the forces of European modernity. These two groups are not necessarily violent and they are mostly religious fundamentalist groups that call for the utilization of religious law based on the original texts and their interpretations. In Judaism the interpretations of the Torah is called the Talmud, and in the Muslim faith, there are four schools of interpretations for Sunni Muslims and one for the Shiites. This difference in the application and the interpretation of the Koran between the Sunnis and the Shiites makes them fundamentally distinct from each other, since the application of the interpreted Koran adheres to different rules, laws and regulations, and different outcomes of legislation. It will be correct to say theoretically that Shiites and Sunnis are two different religions because they adhere to two fundamentally different schools of law and politics that they somehow give the status of divinity to. They are however both an offshoot of Mohamed’s message the Koran. In the same way there are all these other sects that exist in the Middle East which are offshoots of Mohamed’s message: the Baha’is, who are twelver Shiites, believe that the Bab is the twelfth Imam the awaited Mehdi, and Bahaullah is a messenger from God, they believe in the Koran and Mohamed. The Druze, who were Shiites during the Ismaili Fatimide Dynasty, and believes that Al-Hakim was a reincarnation of God, the Sunnis and the Alawites are as well off, shoots of Mohamed’s message.

Of the Israeli Jewish fundamentalists groups who adhere to violence is the radical ultranationalist right, the religious group Gush Emunim, which was an Israeli political movement that sprang out of the conquests of the Six Days War. It encouraged settlements of land, which they believe that God has allotted for the Jews. Yigal Amir’s Assassination of Yitzhak Rabin, was a result of a process of delegitimization of the Israeli government by the group Gush Emunim in response to the Oslo Accords, in which the government agreed to the principle of territorial compromise with the Palestinians. Amir acted alone based on his belief that this was a call from God. The assassination was actually a result of what could be called in the terminology of the Islamic fundamentalists a fatwa. The heads of Yesha’s rabbinical council decided to put the Israeli government on trial, where they issued a “fatwa” legitimizing the killing of Rabin based on a religious law called din rodef and din moser. A moser and a rodef according to the Halacha are the worst kind of Jews. A moser is a Jew who will provide information to the gentiles about the Jews or giving away sacred Jewish property, which in this case is the biblical land of Israel, accordingly Jews are obliged to kill a moser. A moser in Hezbollah’s terminology could easily be called a collaborator. Rabin was assassinated based on the religious “fatwa” that legitimized his assassination by the radical right Jews. Gush Emunim condemned the assassination as an individual act and that is why it had avoided a ban from Israel’s political life. Conversely, the Kach Party of Meir David Kahane, who was a Rabbi and a member of the Israeli Kenesset and founder of the Jewish Defense League in the United States, was banned from participating in the Israeli government and his group is categorized as a terrorist organization by both Israel the United States and Canada. Goldstein and based on a religious call that was endorsed by the political religious movement committed the Hebron massacre, as a reaction to the Oslo Accords 1993. The massacre was not political-military revenge; Goldstein was engaged in kidush hashem, as sanctification of God’s name.
Radical Islamic fundamentalism, started as an intellectual movement in Egypt, and as a revolutionary radical movement in Iran. In Egypt Hassan Al-Banna founded the Organization of the Muslim Brotherhood, which preached a political version of Islam, that promoted Islam religiously, economically, socially and culturally as the only alternative of westernization. The movement started as a response to Arab nationalism, where unity between Muslims was not based on national origin but based on Islam. The Assassination of Hassan Al-Banna during the era of the monarchy, and the later execution of Saed Qutb his disciple by Nassir made the movement go underground and were the primary causes of its radicalization. The movement was radicalized during the 70’s and adopted a militant approach with its militant off spring Islamic Jihad, which emerged after the Camp David Accords between Egypt and Israel. The assassination of Anwar Sadat was the culmination of this radical movement delegitimization of the Egyptian state and the peace with the Jews as enemies of Islam. The assassination according to the radical Islamists could also be called a din moser, since Sadat was the moser of the Muslims and killing him was a religious call. Khomeini and the Iranian Revolution represent the Shiite version of the same radical ideology that adopts Jihad, hostage taking, airplane hijacking and murdering civilians as a religiously justified militant act to achieve a political claim. In Iran, the Islamic State that is run by the Jurists of Islam is what actually stands for Wilayat Al-Faqih, a Wilaya that supports the radical approach of militants to achieve political positions under the pretext of Jihad, thus a call of God. Consequently, Iran supports rebels, who are in opposition for states, and it is primarily in opposition to peace with Israel, not based on the principle of Iranian and Israeli, but based on the idea of a Muslim war against the Jews. This Wilaya, and here I would like to repeat myself, adheres to a revolutionary course of action that rejects the idea of nation-state, and civil legislators and the separation of state and religion; only the jurists who are the clergy are acceptable legislators in Wilayat Al-Faqih.

Radical Islam as well as radical Judaism reject the idea of peace, and legalize violent actions against individuals and groups who initiate peace between Muslims and Jews and vice versa. This rejection to peace is stemming directly from one’s perception that the other’s religion is inferior to his own, which consequently legitimize the killings of civilians by each of these radical religious fundamentalists or terrorists of the other religion, by claiming that it is an act directed by God. This premise was central to my argument in the article above. Hezbollah within this context falls under the category of radical Islamists who adhere to violence against the Jews- the Zionists, whatever you prefer to call them- as a method for achieving a political objective prescribed by Wilayat Al-Faqih over all Muslims wherever they reside.

In your post you presume that I am considering that Wilayat Al-Faqih is related to land, which I actually never implied when I have discussed this Wilaya. Since this Wilaya is a call for creating a universal concept of Islam, which clearly is a claim to Muslims as a people who live in any state, the Muslims within this context resemble the nation or an umma who are the constituents of the Wilaya. The Muslim constituent status is determined by the Jurists and not by God, thus it denies the Jews and the Christians the status of being Muslims or monotheists. The Muslims who disagree with such a Wilaya are still considered to be constituents against their will, with the enforcement of the jurists made law upon these constituents by force, such as the enforcement of Hejab on all women in Iran.

My conclusion to such assumption is that the concept of a Wilaya of Muslims of an Islamic umma or nation is in itself contradictory with the idea of universal Islam since Muslims are not a nation, or constituents of a state that exist on Earth. Wilayat Al-Faqih simply makes a claim of the existence of an Islamic nation that is ruled by some man made laws on Earth. ilayat Al-Faqih is a concept of transforming the “lands”, where Muslims live into a Wilaya where the jurists of Islam are the deputies of the Imam Mahdi on Earth, which in itself is an academic and was put forward by Khomeini. Thus, could not have the force of law or enforcement on Muslims, just because Khomeini and his followers have decided to do so.
Here, we could discuss why do I consider Hezbollah as a terrorist organization and it is precisely relevant to this point that you are bringing about Wilayat Al-Faqih and its rejection of existing boundaries of States, which you call land. Hezbollah has more than one position and related to more than one situation within Lebanon, and the Middle East. Hezbollah the liberator of the south, if you wish to call them that, is one thing and Hezbollah as the liberator of Palestine is another thing. Because, Wilayat Al-Faqih does not have land or a geographic boundary that they consider as the area that they are legitimately allowed to operate within, they become a Wilaya that functions outside the parameters of the law of existing states. I will try to explain this concept in simple terms. The idea of state jurisdiction over a group of people implies that a state has jurisdiction over subjects who reside over its territory; those subjects must adhere to the rule of law of the sate over a specified piece of land. The idea of an Islamic law that is determined by the Jurists on a Wilaya that has jurisdiction over the whole universe, means that the followers of this ideology presume a divine duty to interfere in areas that are ruled by other states and other laws, such as the attacks over the State of Israel as a call from God. Hezbollah does support HAMAS as a legitimate resistance movement and does legalize the suicide bomber’s attacks against Israeli civilians inside the state of Israel. The Shiite radical fundamentalists’ concept of Jihad is strictly related to an act of war that is prescribed by God. The majority of the Muslim people who are non-radical do understand Jihad to mean strife in the path of God, and thus Jihad is not an act of violence. If you look at the Koran itself you will recognize that “Kital”, which means fight in war, is addressed within different contexts than Jihad, which is strife. Jihad as in strife in the path of God is an obligation on all Muslims Jews and Christens. The Koran stresses that all people should strife in the path of God. It is quite disingenuous to interpret Jihad to mean fight, or a war, because such an interpretation in the light of the fact that it is addressed to all believers, and the radicals justification of suicide bombers as an act of jihad , simply means that Christians Muslims and Jews should strap themselves with explosives and attack each other’s civilians as an order by God to all the people of the book which is actually insane. Thus, the Islamic radical fundamentalists, who are as well terrorists, are a group of Militant Muslims, who interpret the word Jihad in the Koran to mean a war against the Jews and the Christians. This war is manifested in the Terrorist organizations of legitimizing the killings of civilian women and children of Jews, as in HAMAS suicide bombers activities in restaurants and buses. Hezbollah’ provides financial and ideological support for this organization.

The political nature of this Wilaya where the Jurists are the authority is the main obstacle to the concept of democracy and the whole idea of people’s right to self-determination. Radical Islamic fundamentalism of Khomeini calls for Jihad as a pillar of Islam, where Jihad is interpreted to mean a war that is aimed at the achievement of such a Wilaya, that has no land which is a forms of a meta-state that exists above the existing states and state system, based on the unity of the Jurists universally as the legislators of that state. Then here we are talking about who has the power to legislate in the real state on the land, on Earth where people live. In Wilayat Al-Faqih it is this self imposed marje3.