fatwa

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After 25 Years, Charges Filed in Satanic Verses Shooting

Norway makes the move ahead of deadline so investigation can continue

(Newser) - Police in Norway just made a move to keep alive the investigation into a 25-year-old shooting that captured the world's attention, reports Reuters . Back in 1993, the man who published Salman Rushdie's The Satanic Verses in Norway was shot three times outside his home. William Nygaard survived, but...

Suicide Bomber Hits Kabul Meeting of Top Clerics
Suicide Bomber Hits
Gathering of Top Clerics
UPDATED
Jun 4, 2018 12:44 AM CDT

Suicide Bomber Hits Gathering of Top Clerics

At least 7 killed in Kabul attack

(Newser) - A suicide bombing targeted a gathering of Afghanistan's top clerics on Monday in Kabul, killing at least seven people and wounding nine, police say. Shortly before the attack, the clerics had issued a fatwa against suicide bombings and urged peace talks to end the Afghan war. Ghafor Aziz, police...

Saudis Renew Fatwa Against Pokemon

'Un-Islamic' game not welcome in kingdom

(Newser) - It didn't take a Pikachu poking his head up at the Kaaba for Saudi religious authorities to denounce Pokemon. The country's top religious authority has renewed a 2001 ban on the "un-Islamic" game, though it made no mention of the Pokemon Go augmented-reality game currently conquering the...

Latest Saudi Fatwa: Don't Rip Off WiFi

No problem using it in public parks or malls, though

(Newser) - Twenty-first-century fatwas have become way more technologically advanced than edicts of old against the likes of Salman Rushdie and other supposed infidels. To wit: A Saudi scholar has issued a ruling warning against the pilfering of WiFi, the Sydney Morning Herald reports. "Taking advantage of the WiFi service illegally...

Nobel Panel Slams Fatwa on Rushdie—27 Years Later

Panel condemns 'flagrant breaches of international law'

(Newser) - Better late than never? The Swedish Academy, which selects the winners of the Nobel Prize in literature, has condemned an Iranian death warrant against British writer Salman Rushdie, 27 years after it was pronounced. Two members quit the academy in 1989 after it refused to condemn Ayatollah Ruholla Khomeini's...

Iran's Media Raises $600K for Renewed Rushdie Fatwa

'It will never lose its power,' Iran official says of death edict

(Newser) - Since 1989, Salman Rushdie has had to live a mostly underground life after Iran's then-supreme leader called for his assassination over the novel The Satanic Verses. Now that fatwa, which is occasionally paraded out by the country's religious leaders, has been reupped yet again, and this time 40...

ISIS Fatwa: 'Be Kind' to Your Sex Slaves

Ruling from special committee lays out mandates in excruciating detail

(Newser) - The "treasure trove" of ISIS intelligence nabbed in a May raid in Syria by US Special Operations Forces included one especially detailed document that's now being published for the first time after a Reuters review. "One of the inevitable consequences of the jihad of establishment is that...

ISIS Justifies Organ Harvesting From Living Prisoners

Even if it kills the captive

(Newser) - The Islamic State may be harvesting organs from living prisoners for profit, according to a Reuters exclusive. The news company obtained a copy of Fatwa Number 68 , which provides a religious justification for organ harvesting. "The apostate's life and organs don't have to be respected and may...

Saudi Cleric: Snowmen Are Sinful

He forbids 'un-Islamic' fun after rare snowfall

(Newser) - After a fierce winter storm blanketed much of the Middle East—including northern Saudi Arabia—with snow last week, a prominent Saudi cleric issued a ruling banning people from making snowmen, calling them un-Islamic. Sheikh Mohammed Saleh al-Munajjid said "it is not permitted to make a statue out of...

UN Official: ISIS Demanding Female Genital Mutilation

Militant Sunni group issues fatwa, official says

(Newser) - A UN official in Iraq shared disturbing news with reporters today: ISIS militants have issued a religious edict declaring that all women in or around Mosul must undergo female genital mutilation, reports Reuters . The fatwa from the Sunni insurgents, who overtook the northern Iraqi city in June, applies to females...

Clerics: Desperate Syrians May Eat Dogs

Damascus suburbs being starved out

(Newser) - The days of dogs and cats living in Damascus or its hard-hit suburbs might be numbered, at least according to local clerics. With reports surfacing of regime loyalists using starvation tactics against rebel-held areas like Muadhamiya, Syrian clerics have issued a fatwa telling the faithful that is OK to eat...

Islamists Call for Execution of Young Tweeter

Hamza Kashgari, 23, tweeted that he wants to talk to Mohammed as a 'friend'

(Newser) - Islamists are calling for the execution of a young Saudi Arabian who tweeted last week about the Prophet Mohammed. "I have loved the rebel in you, you’ve always been a source of inspiration to me," Hamza Kashgari, 23, wrote in a tweet addressed to Mohammed. But "...

14-Year-Old Beaten to Death for Adultery Was Raped
14-Year-Old Beaten to Death for Adultery Was Raped
says her family
Apr 1, 2011 3:19 PM CDT

14-Year-Old Beaten to Death for Adultery Was Raped

Doctor listed Hena Akhter’s death as a 'suicide'

(Newser) - The family of a 14-year-old girl who was beaten to death in Bangladesh says she didn’t commit adultery—she was raped. Hena Akhter’s family talked to CNN this week, and offered a heartbreaking story of the girl’s death. In their telling, Akhter’s much older cousin, Mahbub...

Bangladeshi Girl, 14, Dies After 100 Lash Punishment

She was spotted talking to married man

(Newser) - A 14-year-old Bangladeshi girl has died after a sentence of 100 cane lashings imposed when a village woman accused the teen of talking to her husband. "What sort of justice is this? My daughter has been beaten to death," sobbed the girl's father. Some media reports said the...

Sheik Issues Fatwa Against Terrorists

Suicide bombers are hell-bound, warns Islamic scholar

(Newser) - An influential Islamic scholar has issued a sweeping and unreserved condemnation of terrorism in all its forms as un-Islamic. "Terrorism is terrorism, violence is violence and it has no place in Islamic teaching and no justification can be provided for it," Sheik Tahir ul-Qadri wrote in his 600-page...

Muslims Issue Fatwa Against Airport Scanners

Machines violate rules on modesty

(Newser) - Body scanners at airports violate Islamic rules on modesty and Muslim-American groups have barred the faithful from using them. “It is a violation of clear Islamic teachings that men or women be seen naked by other men and women," an influential Muslim council said in a fatwa forbidding...

Ian McEwan: I Sheltered Rushdie After 1989 Fatwa

Novelist reveals how he protected his friend

(Newser) - Twenty years after the Iranian leadership declared a death sentence on Salman Rushdie, fellow novelist Ian McEwan reveals that he sheltered the writer in a house in the English countryside. In a long profile of McEwan in the New Yorker, the novelist describes how the pair listened to news of...

Fatwa Against Rushdie Set Off Self-Censorship
Fatwa Against Rushdie Set Off Self-Censorship
OPINION
Jan 5, 2009 4:27 PM CST

Fatwa Against Rushdie Set Off Self-Censorship

Edict brought Muslim culture war to the West: Hitchens

(Newser) - When Ayatollah Khomeini issued a fatwa against Salman Rushdie, Christopher Hitchens knew what it meant: "This was not just a warning of what was to come,” he writes in Vanity Fair, “it was the warning.” A global culture war, between Muslim fundamentalists and everyone else, had...

Fatwa Bans Yoga for Muslims in Malaysia

(Newser) - Islamic authorities in Malaysia issued a fatwa today against Muslims practicing yoga, BBC reports. The chair of Malaysia's National Fatwa Council said Hindu elements are essential to yoga and could destroy a Muslim's faith. "We are of the view that yoga combines physical exercise, religious elements, chanting and worshipping...

Zardari Slapped With Fatwa for Flirting With Palin

Pakistani feminists also angry at president for 'shameful' behavior

(Newser) - Asif Ali Zardari’s overly-friendly interaction with Sarah Palin earned Pakistan’s president a fatwa from a conservative mosque for salacious behavior, not to mention the scorn of feminists who accuse him of objectifying the US vice-presidential candidate, the Christian Science Monitor reports. At the UN last week, Zardari told...

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