By Ismail Royer

If anyone had any doubt that ISIS are from the khawarij sect, and not “Sunni extremists,” much less the Muslims’ champions, read no further than the latest edition of Rumiyya, ISIS’s filthy Satan-glorifying propaganda rag.

In an interview, the “amir” of ISIS’s imaginary “wilaya,” or province, in Egypt complains of “the absence of the reality of tawhid [monotheism] among a large section of the population.” What is the reason for this dearth of monotheism in this large section of the Egyptian people? They “show[] enmity to the believers who fight so that rule is entirely for Allah.” In other words, most Egyptians are kafirs because they dislike ISIS.

The “amir” goes on to say that “showing enmity to the mujahidin,” that is, ISIS, “under the pretext” of opposing terrorism, is a clear “act of apostasy from the religion of Islam.”

ISIS’s takfir of those who dislike them is nothing new. But the group now makes clear that, if you’re a Muslim who disagrees with their terrorist attacks on churches, you’re an apostate. That’s because, according to the so-called amir, “disassociation from these operations…takes one out of the religion. Whoever has done any of that becomes an apostate from the religion of Islam…”

If one who distances himself from the destruction of churches is an apostate, then ISIS would consider Umar ibn Al-Khattab, the great companion of the Prophet Muhammad , an apostate. When he was the caliph after the death of the prophet, Umar guaranteed that the churches of the Christians of Jerusalem would not be harmed. ISIS’s hatred for the methodology of this great companion of the Prophet is not surprising, however; after all, the khawarij murdered Ali, the cousin of the Prophet and the fourth rightly-guided caliph.

The disgusting treachery committed by those who destroy the houses of worship of Christians in Muslim lands stands in stark contrast to the way real Sunni Muslims behave. Below is a photograph I took in 1995 of a Serbian Orthodox church in Sarajevo, at the height of the Bosnian war. The Muslims left this church untouched, at a time when Bosnian Muslims were the subject of the most heinous genocide in Europe since World War II.

Moreover, in the latest Rumiyya ISIS reports that is pleased when the Egyptian security forces react to their terrorist bombings with “cruelty and transgression, by way of killing, detainment, and abuse” of the public. Indeed, “this cruelty has a positive outcome” as far as ISIS is concerned, in that it “makes some people even more fed up and increases their hatred for the Christians” and the government. This is in line with the strategy of Al Qaeda and ISIS to manipulate the Muslim masses into supporting them by deliberately provoking violent retaliation by the military and security forces of Muslim and Western countries.

Not to worry, though: the “amir” reports that despite the cruelty and abuse suffered by the general public, “no harm came” to the terrorists themselves, who managed to elude the crackdown.

For my part, I ask Allah that in the future, harm be deflected from the Muslim and Christian people of Egypt, and instead fall upon the heads of these renegade ISIS followers of Satan. If this makes me an apostate in ISIS’s eyes, then I’m in good company, as the khawarij said the same thing of the Prophet’s companions.

May Allah remove this disease from the body of the Muslim nation.