A Study of Jihadi Salafism in How It Treats Prisoners of War

The jihadist Salafism is a group that sees armed jihad as the only way to spread Islam. In advancing their thinking, they resort to every despicable act against their opponents interpreting jihad as an armed fight against the enemy, allowing decapitation of their opponents and captives. To legitimize their brutalities, they make reference to certain verses such as the verse 4 of Chapter Muhammad, verse 12 of Chapter al-Anfal and verse 67 of al-Anfal.  As well, they make use of narrations such as "I have been commissioned to chop off the necks", the Prophet's promise to behead the pagans of Quraish. Add to that the Second Caliph's permission in decapitating Dhul Khuwaysarah, and the Prophet's practice of beheading the captives of the Battle of Badr. However, a closer look into these arguments revealed the fact that the aforesaid verses do not in any way signify permissibility of decapitation, and that the narrations are also poor and disconnected, not to mention the fact that they have not been transmitted in reliable Sunni sources. In addition, Islam's pure teachings have strongly forbidden any conducts which may present Islam as a religion of violence. Relying on library and internet resources to analyze and describe takfiri Salafism in treating prisoners of war, this study seeks to criticize jihadist Salafis' views on this subject.