Evidence of meeting #43 for Foreign Affairs and International Development in the 41st Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was islam.
A recording is available from Parliament.
12:50 p.m.
Conservative
David Anderson Conservative Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK
May I ask our deputy, who's joined us today, to respond to that question as well? And I think Mr. Mansur also wants to.
12:55 p.m.
Former Deputy of the Iraqi Parliament, As an Individual
What is the question exactly? Please repeat the question.
12:55 p.m.
Conservative
David Anderson Conservative Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK
It was a fairly lengthy question.
When I speak to people in our country who say that they are moderate, they insist that there are some fundamentals of Islam that revolve around things such as jihad, the implementation of sharia law, and dhimmi taxes, and if they're going to be faithful to their scriptures, they need to see those as non-negotiable. Mr. Fatah has just said that is not, in fact, his opinion at all, that jihad is not a part of the original Muhammad code. Maybe I should let Mr. Fatah sum that up.
But I'm just wondering about your opinion on those issues.
12:55 p.m.
Former Deputy of the Iraqi Parliament, As an Individual
There's more than one interpretation for Islam; Islam is open to multiple interpretations. What is well known, whether we're talking about Sunnis or Shiites, according to my understanding as a specialist in Islamic law, is that there is contradiction between Islamic law and the modern state—the Islamic state as explained by jurisprudence experts, not as in the Koran, because there's a difference between what is said in the Koran and what was written by jurisprudence hundreds of years ago that continues to be applicable today. What's in the Islamic law and the jurisprudence that is believed by Sunnis and Shiites is in full contradiction with the state.
The state is a modern legal concept that was done by French jurists before or after the French Revolution. As for the Islamic law, there is no such thing as a legal entity called the state. Whoever wants to apply Islamic law would have to go against all the states in the world, all the countries in the world. I will use one simple point. Those people who collect donations in mosques in Canada and elsewhere are not collecting donations as a social activity, rather, they're doing it based on a fatwa, an Islamic legal opinion.
You, as an MP in the Parliament of Canada, are responsible for enacting laws, but there are parliaments that.... In Islam there's only the mufti who would issue the Islamic fatwa, or verdict, which is stronger than all parliaments. That person who collects funding and donations in Toronto receives the green light from Qom, or Riyadh, or Doha to do that.
12:55 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Dean Allison
We're out of time. Thank you very much.
Thank you very much to our witnesses who were here today. I know we could probably go on, but we are limited by our time.
I want to thank Ayad Jamal Aldin. Thank you very much for joining us.
And to our two witnesses here, Mr. Fatah and Mr. Mansur, thank you very much.
With that, the meeting's adjourned.