I recently came across an extremely significant Islamic document that severely criticizes Turks for using religion as a cover to
killing Armenian Christians.This rarely seen document is a
Fatwa or religious decree issued in May 1909 by Grand Sheikh Salim al-Bishri of Egypt, condemning Turkish Muslims for massacring 30,000 Armenians in Adana, a major city inthe Ottoman Empire.Sheikh al-Bishri of Al-Azhar Mosque, leader of the
Muslim world’s preeminent center of Islamic studies in Cairo, issued this Fatwa in order to counter the decree issued in April 1909 by a Turkish Mufti (religious leader), urging Turks to kill Armenians because “they were against Muslims and God.”Upon seeing a passing reference to the Egyptian fatwa on the internet, I contacted Prof. M
ohammed Rifaat al-Emam, an expert on Armenian history, whom I had met during a recent visit to Cairo. Dr.al-Emam kindly sent me the original Arabic text of this important religious document, excerpts of which are presented below in English translation for the first time:“We have seen in local newspapers agonizing news and vile reports about Muslims of some Anatolian
provinces of the Ottoman Empire attacking Christians and killing them brutally. We could not believe these reports and hoped that they were false, because Islam forbids aggression, oppression, bloodshed, and harming human beings — Muslims, Christians and Jews alike.
This document makes it amply clear that the Armenian massacres of 1909 and the subsequent Genocide of 1915 were not the result of religious conflict between Muslim Turks and Christian Armenians. The Grand Sheikh of Al-Azhar rightly condemnedthe Turks for the mass murder of Armenians, which was committed for racist Pan-Turkic — not Pan-Islamic — reasons, along with the intent ofcapturing Armenian lands and properties. The various Fatwas issued by Turkish Muftis (clerics) were intended to provoke fanatical Turkish mobs to attack and massacre innocent Armenians.
Sheikh al-Bishri’s 1909 Fatwa was further reinforced by the decree issued in 1917 by Al-Husayn Ibn Ali, the Sharif of Mecca, ordering all Muslims to defend Armenians and “provide everything they might need … because they are the Protected People of the Muslims about whom the Prophet Muhammad said: ‘Whoever takes from them even a rope, I will be his adversary on the day of Judgment.’”
In 2009, when Turkish Prime Minister Rejeb Erdogan stated that “Muslims don’t commit genocide,” he was only partly right. He should have said: “Good Muslims don’t commit genocide.” The leaders of the Young TurkParty who masterminded the Armenian Genocide in 1915 were not faithful Muslims, judging by the teachings of the Quran — the Holy Book of Islam. They were simply criminals who used Islam as a convenient cover to carry out mass murder. The compassionate Fatwa of the Grand Sheikh of Al-Azhar still rings true today as the Muslim world celebrates the end of Ramadhan.
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