IMAGES of jihadists sanctifying God with their bloodshed are so rife on the internet and in the media that for many detractors of Islam the religion and indiscriminate violence have come to seem synonymous. Inspire, al-Qaeda’s e-magazine, offers would-be lone wolves instructions on how to assemble grenades from bits of plumbing pipe and Christmas fairy-lights. Dabiq, the official journal of Islamic State (IS), praises jihadists for “honouring the Prophet” by killing “French mushrikīn (pagans) gathered for a music concert” and hundreds of other crusader-types. If Muslims are also killed in the process, they are merely “legitimate collateral damage”, insists Abu Qatada Al-Filistini, a mentor to contemporary jihadists; provided they have not lived reprobate lives, they will be fast-tracked to heaven. But what has Islam traditionally had to say about killing civilians?
