News:

A recent report in the Makkah Daily Newspaper published quotes from Makkah's Police Chief, Major General Assaf Al-Qurshi regarding the tightening of marriage regulations by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) between Saudi men and non-Saudi nationals. Al-Qurshi stated that from now on Saudi men applying to marry those from other countries should be over 25 and require consent from the government. He also said that divorced men seeking such marriages would not be allowed to apply within six months of their divorce. Most notably the Police Chief stated that the KSA has banned its citizens from marrying expats from four specific countries - Pakistan, Bangladesh, Chad, and Burma. The move is clearly aimed at discouraging Saudi men from marrying those of different nationalities.

Comment:

The Kufr Saudi regime has once again displayed its flagrant disregard for the tenets of Islam, sanctifying its corrupt national interests over the Commands of Allah (swt). Through announcing these new racist, absurd marriage regulations which blatantly contradict the Shariah, the Saudi government has further exposed its lie of being a representative voice for Islam and its charade of implementing Islamic law. Since when did Islam place a minimum age limit for marriage of 25? Since when did the Shariah state that the government is the ‘Wali Amr' for Muslim men whose consent must be sought for their marriage? Since when did the Qur'an and Sunnah prescribe an ‘Iddah period' of 6 months for divorced men? And since when did our Deen prohibit marriage to specific nationalities?!!

This is a state that has destroyed many Islamic historical sites within its land upon the basis of what it terms - preventing bid'ah (or innovation) in the Deen. Yet it bears no qualms about legislating laws which are flagrant violations of Islam, or basing its entire rule on Kufr. Indeed the very existence of this oppressive monarchical system is an act of ‘bid'ah'!

These corrupt marriage restrictions stem from the rotten concept of ‘Nationalism' that Islam sought to eradicate from the minds and hearts of the Muslims, calling them rather to unite as one brotherhood, under one system and one ruler. However the Saudi regime was born upon the premise of this rotten ideal and since its inception has been trying to instill and strengthen it within its citizens, in an attempt to try and take them back to the times of Jahilyyah. The Prophet (saw) said regarding ‘Assabiya' (tribalism or nationalism), «دعوها فإنها منتنة » "Leave it. It is Rotten."

He (saw) also said,

«يا أيها الناس إن الله قد أذهب عنكم عبية الجاهلية وتعاظمها بآبائها، فالناس رجلان بر تقي كريم على الله وفاجر شقي هين على الله أنتم بنو آدم وآدم من تراب من تراب، ليدعن رجال فخرهم بأقوامٍ إنما هم فحم من فحم جهنم أو ليكونن أهون على الله من الجعلان التي تدفع بأنفها النتن»

"Undoubtedly Allah has removed from you the pride of arrogance of the age of Jahilliyah (ignorance) and the glorification of ancestors. Now people are of two kinds. Either believers who are aware or transgressors who do wrong. You are all the children of Adam and Adam was made of clay. People should give up their pride in nations because that is a coal from the coals of Hell-fire. If they do not give this up Allah (swt) will consider them lower than the lowly worm which pushes itself through dung."

This is the same divisive and poisonous nationalism that causes the governments of Saudi, Egypt, Turkey, Jordan and others across the Muslim world to stand idle, immobilizing their armies while Muslims in Palestine, Syria, Myanmar, Central Africa and other lands are massacred by the enemies of Islam. It's the same rotten concept that drives statements and fatwas from government scholars of the likes of Saudi's Grand Mufti, Abdul Aziz Al Ash-Sheikh, who said that demonstrations in solidarity with Palestinians, "are just useless demagogic actions." Therefore, if the KSA wants to reject that which is truly ‘foreign', it needs to start by rejecting the ‘foreign' Western imposed concept of the ‘Nation-state' that is alien to Islam and has no place within our Muslim lands. And if King Abdullah wants to ban marriages with true ‘foreigners', it's the one that he and his regime has with their Western masters that should be the first to go!

These latest Saudi marriage regulations simply provide further proof that the rule of this regime does not hold a speck of resemblance to true Islamic governance. Hence it urgently needs to be uprooted along with all the current governments in the Muslim world and replaced with the Khilafah "Caliphate" system that alone will implement the Islamic laws comprehensively and correctly upon our lands, including eradicating the concept of nationalism that has poisoned our lands for too long.

Written for The Central Media Office of Hizb ut Tahrir by

Dr. Nazreen Nawaz

Member of the Central Media Office of Hizb ut Tahrir