What is the ruling on one who fights to defend the homeland?
Machine translationRead the Arabic original
The questioner : He died in a battle, meaning, defending the homeland. Do we pray over him? We say: it is a matter of defense.
The Shaykh : Yes, this depends on the intention. If he fought so that the word of Allah would be supreme, then he is in the path of Allah.
The questioner : We pray over him.
The Shaykh : If he did not pray over him, the default, if Allah wills, is that his intention was good. The default, and Allah knows best. This is a matter that returns to the current events; this is a matter that returns to the authorities. We do not know if they know something, or if they are able to assess the matter.
The Shaykh : Yes, this depends on the intention. If he fought so that the word of Allah would be supreme, then he is in the path of Allah.
The questioner : We pray over him.
The Shaykh : If he did not pray over him, the default, if Allah wills, is that his intention was good. The default, and Allah knows best. This is a matter that returns to the current events; this is a matter that returns to the authorities. We do not know if they know something, or if they are able to assess the matter.
Source
قناة «فضيلة الشيخ محمد بن صالح العثيمين»، 3219 - 4600 ما حكم من قاتل للدفاع عن الوطن؟ ابن عثيمين — youtube.com
The Arabic text is a machine transcription of the audio recording.