Qaradawi has repeatedly called for the boycott of British Marks and Spencer retail stores

LONDON, January 22 (IslamOnline  & News Agencies) - A leading Islamic scholar warned Britain Tuesday, January 21, that it faces a trade boycott from the Arab world if it backs a possible U.S.-led war against Iraq.

Sheikh Yusuf Al-Qaradawi said there were many people in the Muslim world who are pressing for the imposition of sanctions against British products, just as American and Israeli products are boycotted, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reported.

“The majority of scholars have so far refuted this, but if Britain goes to war with Iraq, Britain would have to be boycotted too,” Qaradawi told a conference in northwest London organized by the Muslim Association of Britain.

Qaradawi presents a weekly discussion program on the Qatar-based Al-Jazeera satellite channel.

“A war of aggression is about to be waged against Iraq. This war will bring nothing but destruction, this war will bring nothing but death. It has no justification or reasonable excuse,” he said.

Qaradawi, who is also the president of the European Council for Fatwa and Research, has already issued several fatwas (religious decrees) on Muslims to boycott all Israeli and American goods leading to a drop in trade with those countries in the Islamic world.

Qaradawi said that the means to support Palestine Muslim brethren is a complete boycott of the enemies’ goods.

“Each riyal, dirham …etc. used to buy their [U.S., Israeli] goods eventually becomes a bullet fired at the hearts of a brother or a child in Palestine,” he said. “For this reason, it is an obligation not to help them. To buy their goods is to support tyranny, oppression and aggression. Buying goods from them will strengthen them; our duty is to make them as weak as we can.”

“American goods, exactly like ‘Israeli’ goods, are forbidden. It is also forbidden to advertise these goods,” Al-Qaradawi added. “America today is a second Israel. It totally supports the Zionist entity. The usurper could not do this without the support of America.

“Israel’s unjustifiable destruction and vandalism of everything has been using American money, American weapons, and the American veto. America has done this for decades without suffering the consequences of any punishment or protests about their oppressive and prejudiced position from the Islamic world.”

Al-Qaradawi added that the time has come for the Islamic Ummah (people) to say “No” to America, “No” to its companies, and “No” to its goods, which swamp our markets.

If the consumer buying Jewish or American goods is committing a major sin, surely the merchant selling these goods and acting as an agent is the greatest sinner, he added. Even if the company works under a different name, they know they are deceiving people.

He said the war was about oil, not Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction.

“The U.S. wants to impose its control of oil fields all over the world and embroil others. Amongst others those mostly likely to be embroiled is the British.”

He said Britain should adopt an “independent policy” in line with public opinion against the war, saying it would be a conflict where the strong would devour the weak and called on the British government to avert a war by pulling out of any armed conflict.

“Unfortunately if the British authorities don’t respond to public opinion, and follow America, that will lead to placing Britain within the list of enemies,” he added.

Another prominent scholar in Syria, Dr. Mohammad Saeed Al-Bouti said in July 2002 that it is not permissible to purchase American products manufactured in the Arab and Islamic world as long as part of its profits goes to the mother American company.

Al-Bouti who is also the head of the Beliefs and Religions Department in Islamic Law (Shariaa) School, Damascus University, received a question about “the Islamic ruling on purchasing American products manufactured locally, even if most of the profit goes to the local owners.”

In his fatwa, Al-Bouti said: “The American products which must be boycotted are those whose revenues go to the U.S. such as American cigarettes and restaurants. There are too many of these companies in our countries.”

There have been recent reports on businesses selling American brand names, products and services in the Middle East fear that a U.S.-led war in Iraq would trigger an even stronger Arab boycott campaign against them.

Organizers of the 25-month campaign told AFP they were preparing to revive the boycott to protest not only against war in Iraq but also an escalation of Israeli military aggression against the Palestinians.

A mass boycott drive was launched after the Palestinian uprising erupted in September 2000, and was intensified when Israel reoccupied the West Bank at the end of March 2001 before it lost steam three months later, businessmen said. A third wave could be even stronger, they fear.

“The coming wave is going to be a tsunami wave, a catastrophe,” warned Mahmoud El-Kaissouni, an executive with an Egyptian industry association representing 22 fast food chains, December 2002.

Sales at more than 550 fast food restaurants in Egypt dropped by around 20 percent in April 2002 and plunged by 65 percent at the end of June before returning to normal in October and November, said Kaissouni.

People like Kaissouni have fought back in the media, saying the boycott is mainly missing the intended target and hitting Arab businesses, as many U.S. franchises are Arab-owned and many products are made regionally under license. He urged the Egyptian government to help wage a counter-campaign.

Though the boycott hit fast food franchises in Egypt and other Arab countries hardest, it also undercut sales of soft drinks, as well as a range of supermarket and pharmaceutical products in the region, industry sources said.

In Jordan, Lebanon, and Syria, some private hospitals stopped buying products from Bristol-Myers Squibb (BMS), but most have since resumed purchases, said Mustafa Hassan, BMS vice president for sales and marketing in the Middle East.

Hassan said the pharmacists’ syndicate in Egypt had agreed verbally with pharmaceutical firms not to boycott U.S. brand names made under license in Egypt, which account for 91 percent of the Egyptian market.

However, he said a few pharmacists earlier this year refused to prescribe even Egyptian-made products and he expected them to lead a new boycott wave if there is a U.S.-led war in Iraq.