Qatar's Muslim 'Scholars' Call For Death And Destruction
by Khaled Abu Toameh • April 7, 2025 at 5:00 am
The last thing the Palestinians need are more calls from Qatar-based extremist for terrorism and jihad. If these Muslim "scholars" really want to help their Palestinian brothers, they should be calling on Hamas to release all the Israeli hostages they kidnapped, then to disarm, and then to stop pursuing the disastrous path of terrorism and jihad.
The "scholars" leading the IUMS live safely in Qatar, not in the Gaza Strip, and they are therefore not directly affected by the war that Hamas launched.
That such a call by an influential Islamic group comes from an organization based in Doha illustrates why Qatar cannot be trusted as an honest mediator in the Hamas-Israel war....
Since then, Qatar's royal family -- who amusingly seem to imagine that they are doing the US a favor by hosting the largest US Air Force base in the Middle East -- have smoothly persuaded the Americans and other Westerners that they are neutral, trustworthy mediators in the Hamas-Israel war. In reality, they are doing their utmost to protect their long-term client, Hamas, and keep it in power, just as they protected their other client, the Taliban, in Afghanistan to make sure it remained in power. If the US were to transfer its air base to a real ally, such as the United Arab Emirates, Qatar would probably not survive a week.
It is time for the US to understand that Qatar continues to serve as a base and platform for jihad and Islamist terrorism. Qatar is not an ally in the war on terrorism. Qatar is the predominant sponsor and leading voice that promotes Islamist terrorism. Qatar is also, perilously, the towering donor to universities in America.
To American voters, it must look as if Qatar's sham-negotiations to keep Hamas in power are being conducted by US President Donald J. Trump's envoys primarily with an eye to avoid disrupting any future real estate deals with the emirate, rather than actually to stop the Hamas-Israel war and free the hostages.
At the very least, the US might threaten to withdraw its military assets from Qatar's Al-Udeid Air Base, just to put the most minimal pressure on the Doha to stop supporting the Muslim Brotherhood and other questionable Islamist organizations. The US might also designate the Muslim Brotherhood and IUMS as Foreign Terrorist Organizations.
While Palestinians in the Gaza Strip are facing death and destruction as a result of the October 7, 2023 Hamas-led attack on Israel, the Qatar-based International Union of Muslim Scholars (IUMS), an association of extremist Islamic theologians affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood, has issued a fatwa (Islamic ruling) calling for jihad (holy war) against Israel.
The IUMS, a largely Sunni group founded in 2004, consists of some 95,000 Muslim "scholars" globally and 67 Islamic organizations. It included among its members the late Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, killed by Israel in an explosion last year in Iran.
These Muslim "scholars" also called for "urgent, widespread action by Muslim countries and peoples, including military action [against Israel]."
