The ruling on wearing a garment down to the ankles and differing from the dress of the people of one's country

Question:
Honorable Shaykh, is the thawb (long robe) now equivalent to the izar (lower garment) of the past? Because some of the young men make the thawb half-fixed, and the thawb is four [cubits] long or otherwise, so it reaches the ankles. And if you advise him, he says, "This is the Sunnah."

Answer:
My Muslim brothers, a Muslim wears like the people of his country, as long as the dress of the people of his country is not contrary to the Sunnah. So if the people of the country wear down to the ankles, you wear like them, and you do not shorten the thawb above the ankles. Because if you shorten the thawb above the ankles, you differ from the people of the country, and what happens? It leads to questioning, answers, and people looking at you, and it becomes a cause of notoriety. So as long as the people of the country are in agreement with the Sunnah, wearing down to the ankles, they wear down to the ankles.
This is what is required, and do not differ from the people of your country, because this causes you problems, as happened recently with the people who shorten their garments, and they faced surveillance and questioning, and why they do such things, and there are accusations that they belong to something. A person, praise be to Allah, conceals himself with the cover of Allah and leaves the deviations and anomalies. But if the people of the country differ from the Sunnah and lower their garments below the ankles, it is not permissible to conform to them in sin. But wearing down to the ankles is a Sunnah. Yes.