Smokers Flee From ISIS – Terrorist Organization Beheads Cigarette Users
The Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) seems to have shown they are more ruthless now than when they first came on the scene back in 2014. The Inquisitr reported news that supports said statement, starting with the worldwide distribution of a captured Jordanian pilot’s horrific execution, conjured up by the sick ideas of their followers through social media. Such a vicious public display has forced the King of Jordan to retaliate, first with the execution of a high-terror prisoner deemed important to ISIS, followed by relentless bombings of ISIS-owned city, Raqqa. However, some experts believe that ISIS has played the King of Jordan into acting emotionally thus sprouting conspiracies that the terrorist organization is playing situations to their overall plan.
Now, ISIS has incorporated such an increase of ruthlessness towards their view of Sharia law. Case and point, reports are coming in of ISIS beheading people who smoke cigarettes.
According to an article by International Business Times, ISIS has imposed a strict ban on alcohol, cursing, and other acts considered to be deemed sinful, which they call “haram.” However, the one sin that seems to be most offensive to ISIS is smoking. This seems to be enforced by a disgusting display of a severed head found with a cigarette in his mouth. A note attached to the nearby corpse read in Arabic the following as reported by Los Angeles Times.
“This is not permissible, Sheikh.”
The single detail that stands out about the severed head is the fact it belonged to one of ISIS’ own. From an account by the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a pro-opposition monitoring group, the body and head belonged to an ISIS official, a deputy police chief.
Under Islam, cigarettes are permissible for use. Yet, ISIS’ severe interpretation of Sharia Law declares smoking to be a “slow suicide” therefore making it forbidden in ISIS-controlled areas. Such radical restrictions were enforced last year after overtaking large areas in the Deir Elzur province in east Syria, just adjacent to Raqqa. The restrictions include full-face veils for women, no music, and the banning of all smoking paraphernalia which includes hookah pipes as well as cigarettes. An ISIS preaching office has provided a statement pertaining to smoking in which it reads the following.
“Every smoker should be aware that with every cigarette he smokes in a state of trance and vanity is disobeying god. Three days following the issuance of the statement, selling tobacco and shisha will be strictly prohibited and those who insist on selling them will bring injustice upon themselves and upon other people. All tobacco quantities will be burned and the seller will be punished according to Sharia.”
Since then, ISIS has burned millions of cigarette packs in Iraq and Syria in accordance to the smoking ban. ISIS even seized marijuana fields and posted videos of them dousing the plants in gasoline and setting them ablaze. As for punishments, the minimum penalty is forty lashes with a whip. Repeated offenses can be as severe as prison time or execution.
[Image via Youtube Video Screencapture/VICE News]
