Texas Synagogue Hostage Crisis: Jew-Hatred ands Hostage-Taking are Sanctioned in Islam

My latest in PJ Media:

Congregation Beth Israel Synagogue in Colleyville, Texas, was in the middle of Shabbat services that were being livestreamed on Facebook, when a gunman burst in and took hostages. As of this writing, the situation is ongoing, but some details have already emerged.

Amichai Stein of Kan, the Israeli Public Broadcasting Corporation, reports that “The gunman says he is muslim and holding atleast 6 people says ‘he will kill people if anyone gets close to the synagogue.’” Before the livestream from the synagogue was cut off, the gunman could be heard ranting in a foreign language that, according to journalist and trial attorney Marina Medvin, turned out to be Arabic. Medvin noted that the gunman said, “Are you listening? I am going to die. So don’t cry for me…”

Newsmax national correspondent Logan Ratick tweeted that “ABC is reporting one suspect has taken the rabbi and three others hostage at a synagogue in Colleyville, TX. The hostage-taker is claiming to be armed and says his sister is Aafia Siddiqui, who was convicted in New York of trying to kill US military personnel (she’s incarcerated).”

Related: Kentucky Fried Jihad

The family connections don’t stop there. According to terrorism expert Paul Sperry of The New York Post, Aafia Siddiqui is “an MIT scientist-turned-al Qaeda agent, who in 2010 was sentenced to 86 years in prison for planning a New York chemical attack. Known as ‘Lady al Qaeda,’ she is related to 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheik Mohammed. ISIS has tried to trade her release for journalist hostages.”

Why would Aafia Siddiqui’s brother choose a synagogue for his hostage-taking? Actually, a synagogue would be the most likely target for such a person, because of the deeply rooted anti-Semitism of the Qur’an. According to the Qur’an, Jews are called the strongest of all people in enmity toward the Muslims (5:82); they fabricate things and falsely ascribe them to Allah (2:79; 3:75, 3:181); they disobey Allah and never observe his commands (5:13), and Muslims should wage war against them and subjugate them under Islamic hegemony (9:29), among many other slanders.

Meanwhile, the abduction of infidels as hostages is sanctioned in Islamic law and subject to particular rules. The renowned Islamic scholar al-Mawardi succinctly explained Islamic law for hostages: “As for the captives, the amir [ruler] has the choice of taking the most beneficial action of four possibilities: the first to put them to death by cutting their necks; the second, to enslave them and apply the laws of slavery regarding their sale and manumission; the third, to ransom them in exchange for goods or prisoners; and fourth, to show favor to them and pardon them. Allah, may he be exalted, says, ‘When you encounter those [infidels] who deny [the Truth=Islam] then strike [their] necks’ (Qur’an sura 47, verse 4).”

There is more. Read the rest here.