Does Islam Support The Two-State Solution For Palestine?
Answered by Shaykh Irshaad Sedick
Question
What is the Islamic stance on the two-state solution for Palestine, and how should we view it given the suffering and the sanctity of Masjid al-Aqsa?
Answer
In the Name of Allah, the Most Merciful and Compassionate.
May Allah alleviate our difficulties and guide us to what pleases Him. Amin.
Islam does not legislate a single political form; it demands ends of justice and the removal of oppression. Therefore, Palestinians themselves must determine their just political future, because this is a land with a people who were forced out; imposed frameworks that perpetuate dispossession fail both Islamic and universal ethical standards.
Forced Displacement and Just Outcomes
Islam takes expulsion from one’s home and land with utmost seriousness, condemning it as manifest injustice. Among the many verses:
- “Permission (to fight) has been granted to those who are being fought because they have been wronged, indeed, Allah is capable of giving them victory, those who were driven from their homes without right, only because they said, ‘Our Lord is Allah’. If Allah did not repel some people by means of others, monasteries, churches, synagogues, and mosques, wherein the name of Allah is much mentioned, would surely have been demolished.” [Quran, 22:39-40]
- “And (remember) when We took your covenant: you shall not shed one another’s blood nor expel one another from your homes… Yet you are those who expel a group of your own from their homes…” [Quran, 2:84-85]
- “Allah does not forbid you from being kind and just to those who did not fight you because of your religion and did not drive you out of your homes; Allah only forbids you from befriending those who fought you on account of your religion and drove you out of your homes…” [Quran, 60:8-9]
- “So their Lord answered them: I will never let the work of any of you go to waste… those who were driven out from their homes and harmed in My way…” [Quran, 3:195]
These and related passages (e.g., [Quran, 14:13], [Quran, 17:76]) ground a clear moral standard: expelling populations, especially the vulnerable and faithful, from their homes is an egregious wrong.
Assessing “Solutions”
On this basis, any “solution” that entrenches displacement, confines people to fragments of their original homeland, or leaves them under domination and ongoing harm is not a solution in Sacred Law terms, because it preserves oppression rather than removing it. The Law ties legitimacy to justice, rights restoration, safety, equal dignity, and unimpeded worship, especially at al-Aqsa.
From a comparative perspective, if one invokes “Western democratic” standards, one-person/one-vote in a single polity (as in South Africa’s transition) is often presented as the minimal democratic benchmark.
Yet, Islam does not legislate a single political form; it demands ends of justice and the removal of oppression. Therefore, Palestinians themselves must determine their just political future, because this is a land with a people who were forced out; imposed frameworks that perpetuate dispossession fail both Islamic and universal ethical standards.
Scholarly Touchstone
Classical governance works stress that the ruler’s charge is lifting harm and securing public welfare (maslaha), and that truces or settlements are only valid to the extent they prevent injustice and protect rights (see: Mawardi, al-Ahkam al-Sultaniyya; Shatibi, al-Muwafaqat on dar al-mafasid and jalb al-masalih).
Practical Guidance
- Center the wronged: Advocate for return, restitution, equal protection, and unimpeded access to al-Aqsa, not cosmetic arrangements that preserve harm.
- Measure plans by justice: Support only those proposals that end displacement and domination and secure full civil, political, and religious rights.
- Champion self-determination: Affirm that the people most affected must freely determine their solution; this is a matter of rights, not external convenience.
- Act with ihsan: Make du‘a (including Qunut Nazila), support credible relief and legal advocacy, reject sectarianism, and maintain principled, verifiable discourse.
I pray that Allah restores rights to their people, protects al-Aqsa, and makes us witnesses to justice who neither despair nor compromise on truth.
And Allah knows best.
[Shaykh] Irshaad Sedick
Checked and Approved by Shaykh Faraz Rabbani
Shaykh Irshaad Sedick was raised in South Africa in a traditional Muslim family. He graduated from Dar al-Ulum al-Arabiyyah al-Islamiyyah in Strand, Western Cape, under the guidance of the late world-renowned scholar Shaykh Taha Karaan (Allah have mercy on him), where he taught.
Shaykh Irshaad received Ijaza from many luminaries of the Islamic world, including Shaykh Taha Karaan, Shaykh Muhammad Awama, Shaykh Muhammad Hasan Hitu, and Mawlana Abdul Hafeez Makki, among others.
He is the author of the text “The Musnad of Ahmad ibn Hanbal: A Hujjah or not?” He has been the Director of the Discover Islam Centre, and for six years, he has been the Khatib of Masjid Ar-Rashideen, Mowbray, Cape Town.
Shaykh Irshaad has fifteen years of teaching experience at some of the leading Islamic institutes in Cape Town. He is currently building an Islamic podcast, education, and media platform called ‘Isnad Academy’ and has completed his Master’s degree in the study of Islam at the University of Johannesburg. He has a keen interest in healthy Prophetic living and fitness.
