about meat coming from Western countries (it is said about it: it is slaughtered in the Islamic manner).

The questioner : ... and they spread this claim supported by evidence, and on television they tell you to be at ease, meaning, eat with peace of mind. So what is your opinion on this matter?

The Shaykh : I say: eat if you are reassured by these claims. Has it not reached you that the Minister of Awqaf published in some newspapers that it was revealed that the news that it is slaughtered in the Islamic manner is not true? Did you read this or not?

The questioner: No.

The Shaykh : I read this... and this is proof that the issue is not an issue of halal and haram; the issue is how things are handled and facilitated. I said a word in a session we were in near Zarqa. We said, by Allah, the matter of Bulgarian meat is strange. How many years have we been afflicted with this meat? For years, and Muslims are still asking: is it halal or haram? ... So I said a word on this occasion: if it were established with certainty that Bulgarian meat is slaughtered in the Islamic manner first, and that Muslims are the ones slaughtering it as they claim second, then it is obligatory to boycott this meat because the Bulgarians slaughter our Muslim brothers like sheep. But this is proof of the division of Muslims, from hundreds of proofs, unfortunately, and that the news of the report of the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) has not been realized: to the end of the well-known hadith: So our Muslim brothers are being slaughtered in Bulgaria, and we are still asking: what is the ruling on eating Bulgarian meat? Suppose this meat is slaughtered in the Islamic manner, but how do you import this meat from countries where Muslims are being killed, for no reason other than that they are Muslims, and they are forced to change their Islamic names to foreign, Western, disbelieving names? So if the matter were concluded to be halal, it would not be permissible to import this meat. But today, they do not look at these perspectives that require the Islamic world to be one block. And this obligation entails rulings behind it. One of these rulings is boycotting this meat and boycotting all goods that come from those who slaughter Muslims. This is what I actually said there, and I have become repeating it, because it has become a rejected, dismissed topic to repeat speech in such matters. And perhaps you have heard the mockery that Muslims have reached because of, if the expression is correct, their being deceived by such news. Some fish merchants wrote on their packages: "slaughtered in the Islamic manner." Has this mockery reached you, without a doubt? What does this mean? It means it is promoting goods, promoting goods. And some of them told me that there is a Lebanese merchant who shipped a refrigerator of the refrigerators you know, all chicken meat, and it reached the Saudi border. They said: you have no proof that this was slaughtered in the Islamic manner. He returned and quickly brought a certificate that this was slaughtered in the Islamic manner, and it entered the country as it was. Meaning, Muslims have become deceived, they have become a laughingstock for disbelievers and polytheists. And so they give us signs saying "slaughtered in the Islamic manner," even for fish.

The questioner : ... So naturally, he tried to visit the slaughterhouse several times. Naturally, they prevented him. One day he went to buy rice from the supermarket, and it was written on the bag of rice: "slaughtered in the Islamic manner."

The Shaykh : This is also a problem. And then I was given the opportunity to visit Spain, about twenty years ago, maybe more. We entered the markets to walk around. I entered the market, we passed a shop, not big enough to call a supermarket, but it displayed ready-to-cook chicken with no trace of slaughter at all. This is the nature of Europeans, meaning, because they see that there is blood, and spilling this blood reduces the weight, and it is sold for money, and they are worshippers of money. For this reason, they prefer to kill rather than slaughter. So I saw this with my own eyes, and even if this is a limited observation and cannot be generalized to all countries, reports have been consistently coming from all sides, almost, that they kill and do not slaughter.