On Nov. 4, 2022, Khaled Abu Toameh, an Arab journalist, tweeted: “The mayor of Hebron [a Palestinian city] offered 20 shekels to anyone who kills a dog in his city. Palestinians took to the streets, torturing and killing dozens of dogs.” The tweet was accompanied by a picture of what appeared to be Palestinians beating or striking to death a dog with sticks.
Such barbaric behavior for what is otherwise considered in the USA as “man’s best friend” is not uncommon in the Muslim world.
Thus, on July 26, 2022, another similar tweet appeared: “The savage rulers of the Islamic Republic of Iran decided to raid a dog shelter in the desert and kill all of the 300 dogs being taken care of by volunteers. Only a few dogs survived. The entire shelter turned into a bloodbath.”
According to another tweet that appeared one day later, the bloodbath was even worse: “The ruthless regime in Iran has raided a dog shelter and killed more than 1,700 stray dogs protected by volunteers. Very few dogs survived. This volunteer woman in tears holds a dead dog and says ‘This was the most vulnerable & obedient one.’”
And a few days before that, in Qatar, on July 10, 2022:
A group of armed men stormed a secure facility in Qatar used to feed and shelter stray dogs, killing 29 of them and injuring others over claims that one of them had bitten one of the men’s children.… [T]he unidentified gunmen threatened security guards with weapons before entering a secure factory area, where the stray dogs are looked by the community. The assailants are then thought to have shot 29 dogs, including puppies, leaving others badly injured…. [A] source described the incident as “horrific” with people running for cover as the group of men shot at the defenceless animals. The source added that after the shootings, a number of animals have still not been found, and locals fear they are hiding, possibly with terrible injuries…. [T]he animals posed no threat to anyone and were well looked after. One puppy is fighting to survive under a vet’s care.
One can go on and on with similar stories — in August 2021, the Taliban prevented the rescue of 173 dogs and cats, preferring to see them “bake to death in their travel crates” — but the point should be clear.
To be sure, not all Muslims are inhumane to dogs. The Animal and Environment Association in Bethlehem, for example, the only animal shelter in the West Bank, issued a statement condemning the mayor of Hebron’s recent “bloody campaign,” which “resulted in killing many dogs, [by] shooting, hanging, abusing, running over them by cars. What happened today is beyond humanity and ethics,” the association continued, before adding, “No religion would accept such barbaric actions toward innocent animals.”
Here we come to it: Is this true? Does no religion — including the one in question, Islam — “accept such barbaric actions toward innocent animals”? … Keep reading.
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