By Farhat Ali Mir
On the night of June 21, 2025, the world witnessed a grim repetition of injustice cloaked in legality: three unprovoked missile strikes by the United States of America on Iranian military sites, with public applause from Israel. This was no isolated event—it was the consequence of a decades-long narrative, carefully manufactured and disseminated by Western and Zionist intellectuals, in which the defensive capability of Muslim nations is cast as a global threat, and their right to dignity and sovereignty continually undermined.
This piece is not a defense of any one country. It is a call for truth, justice, and universal human dignity. It is a challenge to the prevailing hypocrisy of global power structures, and a reminder that peace without fairness is tyranny in disguise.
Misusing the Quran: A Weaponized Interpretation
Among the most insidious tools of this geopolitical double standard is the intellectual misinterpretation of Islamic texts. One prominent instance comes from legal scholar James J. Busuttil—my teacher and research supervisor at the International Institute of Social Sciences, The Hague, Netherlands, during my studies of international law in 2000. In his writings, including the book The Freedom to Do God’s Will (2002), he cited the Qur’an (Surah Al-Baqarah 2:191):
“And slay them wherever you find them… for oppression is worse than killing.”
He falsely claimed this verse encourages Muslims to justify unprovoked violence and terrorism, emphasizing that the arsenal in Muslim nations’ hands is a threat to non-Muslims. On this basis, he argued that Islamic states possessing weapons pose a danger to global peace.
This interpretation is false, malicious, and misleading.
Islamic scholarship and every classical tafsir clarify that this verse was revealed in a specific context—self-defense, when Muslims were being persecuted, expelled, and threatened with extinction in 7th-century Makkah and Madinah. The Qur’an consistently promotes restraint, compassion, and proportional response. The very next verse (2:192) explicitly says:
“But if they cease, then Allah is Oft-Forgiving, Most Merciful.”
The real danger lies not in the verse, but in its selective misreading, where oppressed people’s right to resist and defend is criminalized, and oppressors are hailed as “guardians of order”.
Forgotten Rights: International Law and Double Standards
Even a nuanced understanding of international law is conveniently ignored. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948) proclaims in Article 1:
“All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.”
And in Article 28:
“Everyone is entitled to a social and international order in which the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration can be fully realized.”
Article 51 of the UN Charter also recognizes:
“The inherent right of individual or collective self-defense if an armed attack occurs against a Member of the United Nations.”
Then why are nuclear powers like Israel, the U.S., and others permitted to stockpile weapons, while countries like Iran, Pakistan, and Turkey are warned, sanctioned, or attacked?
The Death of the United Nations?
The United Nations, once envisioned as a moral forum for peace and equity, now appears defunct—paralyzed by vetoes, silenced by diplomacy, and hijacked by a handful of powers. No resolution. No condemnation. No investigation into the attack on Iran.
Yet when a Muslim state speaks of defense, the global outcry is immediate. Legal sanctions follow. Think tanks ring alarm bells.
This is the crisis of the post-WWII order: it protects the strong, criminalizes the weak, invokes morality only when convenient, and uses human rights more as a sword than a shield.
The Moral Responsibility of Major Powers
The world does not belong to one bloc or one region. Humanity is not stratified into those who deserve dignity and those who do not. It is imperative that major powers remember their moral and ethical duty—not only under law but under conscience.
Every nation has the right to protect its people, culture, and sovereignty. Every people has the right to be free from foreign aggression and ideological demonization.
Peace is not the absence of weapons—it is the presence of justice.
As long as missiles are launched by self-righteous powers, while victims are asked to show restraint, we are not advancing peace—we are institutionalizing war.
Where Are the Muslim Nations?
Regrettably, the Muslim world remains fragmented, reactive, and voiceless in global diplomacy. Despite commanding nearly 2 billion people, 56 sovereign states, and immense economic and strategic potential, the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) and other bodies have failed to formulate a united defense narrative, a collective foreign policy, or even a moral framework to counter these double standards.
Why?
-
Dependency on Western arms?
-
Fear of diplomatic isolation?
-
Absence of internal trust and unity?
Whatever the reasons, the consequence is tragic silence—when truth must roar, it only whispers.
The Road Ahead
-
Justice-Based Global Security: Reclaim the narrative. Islamic texts must be interpreted by authentic scholars—not cherry-picked by foreign analysts with political agendas.
-
Defend Legitimate Defense: Muslim nations must assert their right to defensive strength—not as a threat, but as a guarantor of survival.
-
Revive Multilateralism: The UN must be restructured to reflect equality among nations—or alternative global forums must emerge.
-
Build Strategic Alliances: Muslim and marginalized nations must develop joint technological, defense, and economic platforms to reduce dependency and increase leverage.
-
Promote Shared Humanism: Let the Muslim world lead in advancing justice-based peace, grounded in mutual respect, interdependence, and truth—not subjugation and fear.
Final Word: Peace Is a Right, Not a Privilege
The world cannot sustain peace by silencing the weak and rewarding the powerful.
It cannot teach nonviolence while practicing preemptive wars.
It cannot claim to uphold human rights while selectively trampling them under the shadow of nuclear arsenals and misused scriptures.
If we see a future for all humanity—Muslim, Christian, Jewish, secular and beyond—then we must speak, act, and legislate from a place of truth, humility, and mutual dignity.
We must remember the lesson of humanity and equality among nations because, as the truth reminds us:
There is no “nobody” in this mortal world.
