Answer
In the Name of Allah, Most Gracious, Most Merciful.
All praise and thanks are due to Allah, and peace and blessings be upon His Messenger.
In this fatwa:
1- All Muslims constitute one body, and hence they should all support one another, especially during difficult times.
2- At these critical times, not only Black-American Muslims, but also all Muslims and other members of humanity from around the world, should demonstrate solidarity with the Palestinians, who are in dire circumstances due to the economic blockade imposed on them.
3- Islam considers all people to be members of one family. All members of the human race are traced back to one father (Adam) and one mother (Eve).
4- Islam lays emphasis on the very principle of equality between all people regardless of their faith, race, or geographical boundaries. Islam makes it clear that all people are as equal as the teeth of a comb.
5- Thus, supporting Palestinians is not the duty of only Black-American Muslims, but it is a general duty that transcends American Muslims and applies to all Muslims outside the Palestinian territories.
Responding to the question, Dr. Sano Koutoub Moustapha, a professor in the principles of fiqh at the International Islamic University in Malaysia, states:
Indeed, Islam doesn’t recognize any forms of racism or sectarianism, nor does it recognize any sort of treatment based on ethnicity or countries. Muslims are all brothers and sisters. They don’t look down upon each other.
The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) is reported to have declared, “O people! Your Lord is One, your father is one. You are all sons of Adam and Adam is created from dust” (Al-Bukhari)
With their mutual love and compassion, Muslims are like a single body, so that whenever a part of that body suffers, the whole body will share the suffering and agony.
The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) is reported to have said, “The solidarity of Muslims in their mutual love, mercy and sympathy, is that of a body; if an organ aches, the whole body sympathizes with it with sleeplessness and fever” (Al-Bukhari and Muslim)
I appeal to you and all beloved Black-Americans to uphold the Islamic brotherhood and put it above all other forms of relationships.
One should consider the Palestinian situation as a pain in a part of the body. Therefore, the whole body, the Ummah, must feel the suffering and work harder in order to put an end to the pain and suffering of the entire body.
All Muslims, as well as governments, owe Palestinian people a lot. They should lend them many forms of help and assistance against the oppressors, occupants, and aggressors. The least you can do is to include them in your daily prayers.
Almighty Allah knows best.
Editor’s note: This fatwa is from Ask the Scholar’s archive and was originally published at an earlier date.