National Imam of the Shia Muslim Community condemns terrorist attacks in Iran

The National Imam of the Shia Muslim Community of the Republic, His Eminence Sheikh Abubakar Ahmad Kamaludeen has strongly condemned the terrorists’ attacks on Wednesday, October 26, 2022, in the two provinces of Shiraz and Yasuj of the Islamic Republic of Iran that reportedly claimed 15 lives including women, children, wounded over forty people and destroyed several properties. As the people of the Islamic Republic of Iran bid farewell to the victims of the terrorist attacks on the two worshipping centers, “we express our sincere condolences to the Islamic Republic of Iran and pray for Almighty Allah to grant the souls of the Martyrs eternal repose. Releasing a statement through its affiliated Amaq news agency, the ISIS criminal gang popularly known as the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (-ISIS-ISIL) has claimed responsibility for the act. Islam is a Peaceful Belief System The religion of Islam in its overall logic is peaceful and non-threatening. To discover the reality, it was the inner core of Muslim scientists like Ibn Sina, Ibn Yunus, Mulla Sadra, Averos, etc that produced, developed, and contributed tremendously to the development of human civilization. However, religion has been interpreted as an instrument for intolerance, hate, cruelty, murder, and destruction. We have seen many places like Raqqa, Timbuktu, Carbo Delgado, Mosul, Chibok, Kompienga, etc., where religion destroys the God-given rational faculty of the human being. In the Ghanaian setting, for instance, we have witnessed promising youth like Nazir Alema, Abu Dujana, etc. They have been brainwashed by the ideology of renegades and suicide bombers like Boko Haram, ISIS, and al-Qaeda to think that knowledge and achievement endowed unto them by Allah were instead being established in them by the Devil to distance both the individual and the society from Allah and eternal residence. This ideology is by far the virtual womb that incubated the existence of the murderous extremists' groups that we encounter everywhere around the world like Boko Haram, ISIS, al-Qaeda, ISWAP, AQIM, the Salafis in Burkina Faso, etc. A belief system that sees it reasonable or jurisprudentially permissible to hate, condemn, radicalize, destroy and murder must be placed on the check as it has become a huge obstacle to human civilization. The humanity of Ghana and other parts of the world must take a serious lesson and stronger stance against such ideology that manufactures hate, intolerance, violence, and murder. Apart from destroying human civilization as a fundamental goal, ISIS and its affiliates like Boko Haram, and ISWAP, do not share one nationality, language, or color. However, they share a strong spirit of togetherness through the ideology of hate, violence, and extremism. Establishment of an Architect of Counter-Terrorism Cooperation There is also the need for strong cooperation between the security services, Parliament, the judiciary, and other key stakeholders in our quest to prevent the scourge of violent extremism in the country. Our security apparatus must avoid complacency, as terrorists always take advantage of the unvigilant nature of the security system of the state to carry out attacks. To avoid constraining civil liberties, we must also adopt measures to prevent suspected terrorists from entering the country. Laws may be passed to prohibit the raising of funds for suspected extremist groups, prevent citizens from traveling abroad to join terrorist groups and laws that could also prevent terrorists from returning home to carry violent attacks. The Holy Qur'an has placed both the human soul and the environment as an important necessity. It is absolutely a crime of the highest magnitude to take the life of a human being or cause chaos in the human environment as the Holy Qur`an states: “…. whoever kills a human being for other than murder or chaos upon the land, it shall be as if he had killed all mankind, and whoever saves the life of a single human being, it shall be as if he had saved the life of all mankind..” 5:32 “….and do not create mischief in the land, for Allah loves not those who create mischief." Qur`an 28:77 While we are strongly of the conviction that the Islamic Republic of Iran will emerge victorious in this trying moment. We use this medium to join the international community, to condole and console the Islamic Republic of Iran against the cowardly attacks by the enemies of religion and humanity.