Comparative Study of Categories Protected During Armed Conflict in Islamic Law and International Humanitarian Law

Abstract

Islam has emerged in the Arabian Peninsula as a universal human religion that advocates virtue, humanity, and compassion. Isalm has established detailed rules for protecting civilians and civilian targets during armed conflicts. The Islamic Shari'a rules recommended compassion for enemies, not over-killing them, and refraining from any act contrary to the provisions of the Islamic Shari'a. Islamic Shari'a, through its sources, such as the Holy Quran and the Prophet's Sunna, has established rules protecting the victims of war to decide on humanitarian provisions that are already considered for all humanitarian principles relating to the protection of victims of armed conflict and civilians who are not involved in such conflicts, i.e., non-combatants in general. Since the end of the nineteenth century and during the twentieth century, after World and regional wars have caused terrible humanitarian disasters from killing, displacement, torture, and other inhumane treatment, the world's peoples and States have been alerted to the need to establish rules protecting specific groups during armed conflicts, culminating in the international conventions, most notably the Hague Conventions 1899-1907, the four Geneva Conven Conventions of 1949 and the two Protocols 1977 annexed to it. This paper addresses “the categories Protected during armed conflicts in the Islamic Shari'a and those protected in international humanitarian law by reviewing what has been recognized in the Islamic Shari'a for the protection of specific categories during armed conflict and what has been dealt with in the international conventions.