The former minister and president of the Druze party al-Tawhid, Wi'am Wahab. (Credit: Photo taken from his X account.)
BEIRUT — A judicial complaint was filed on Monday against Wiam Wahab, a former minister and leader of the Druze al-Tawhid party, accusing him of inciting sectarian strife and showing contempt for religious symbols.
The complaint was submitted by lawyer Nohad Salma and his colleague Rafaat Yehia on behalf of Kifah al-Qassar, a member of Lebanon’s Islamic Higher Sharia Council. It accuses Wahab of making inflammatory remarks on social media targeting a prominent Sunni Islamic figure, Imam Ibn Taymiyya, a 13th-century theologian and scholar from the Mamluk period.
The petition denounces what it describes as “insults and inciting statements against a symbol of Sunni Islamic thought.” In a social media post last Thursday, Wahab wrote: “May God’s curse be on Ibn Taymiyya and those who rely on him to sow discord within the nation today!”
Wahab’s remarks came amid heightened tensions following deadly clashes in late April near Damascus between Druze fighters and groups aligned with Syria’s Sunni Islamist-dominated central government. The violence was reportedly triggered by the exchange of blasphemous messages on social media targeting both Sunni and Druze sects.
Tripoli protests and Sunni clerical backlash follow Wahab’s remarks
In a recent televised appearance, Wahab referenced historical fatwas (Islamic legal rulings) that declared the Druze community to be infidels. He cited Ibn Taymiyya as having said that "a Druze does not become Muslim even if he repeats a thousand times ‘La Ilaha illa Allah’ [there is no God but God]," a statement that is at the core of becoming a Muslim.
His comments sparked a wave of anger, including a street protest last Friday in Tripoli, the predominantly Sunni city in northern Lebanon, and widespread condemnation on social media.
A statement circulated by Sunni activists and attributed to clerics called on Dar al-Fatwa — Lebanon’s top Sunni religious authority — and Grand Mufti Abdellatif Derian to demand a public apology from Wahab and to pursue legal action. The statement said such steps were necessary “to refute the defamation against the scholar Ibn Taymiyya and to defend the dignity of Sunnis and their sheikhs in Lebanon and the Muslim world.”
In response to the legal action initiated against Wahab, al-Tawhid party issued a statement on Monday accusing “extremist Salafist currents” of orchestrating the campaign. The statement argued that Ibn Taymiyya had himself declared “millions of people apostates and called for their execution.”
“The true Islam — as we know it and as we were raised in it — is built on justice, mercy and tolerance,” the party said. “It does not embrace takfirism [excommunication], nor does it permit attacks on others’ beliefs or their religious scholars.”
Contacted by L'Orient Today, Wahab could not be reached for comment.
