Islam forbids the killing of innocents

In the Qur'an, Allah reveals that it is a great sin to kill an innocent person, and anyone who does so will suffer great torment in the hereafter:

… If someone kills another person—unless it is in retaliation for someone else or for causing corruption in the earth—it is as if he had murdered all mankind. And if anyone gives life to another person, it is as if he had given life to all mankind. Our Messengers came to them with Clear Signs, but even after that, many of them committed outrages in the earth." (Surat al-Ma'ida: 32)

Terrorism targets the innocent, although Allah forbids the killing of even one innocent person.

This verse equates the killing of one innocent person to slaughtering all of humanity! In another verse Allah expresses the importance that the faithful attach to life:

Those who do not appeal to any other deity besides God [alone]; nor kill any soul whom God has forbidden [them to] except with the right to do so; nor fornicate. Anyone who does so will incur a penalty. (Surat al-Furqan: 68)

In yet another verse, Allah issues the following commandment:

Say: "Come, and I will recite to you what your Lord has forbidden for you": that you do not associate anything with Him; that you are good to your parents; that you do not kill your children because of poverty—We will provide for you and them; that you do not approach indecency – outward or inward; that you do not kill any person Allah has made inviolate – except with the right to do so. That is what He instructs you to do, so that hopefully, you will use your intellect. (Surat al-An'am: 151)

Any Muslim who believes in Allah with a sincere heart who scrupulously abides by His holy verses and fears suffering in the hereafter will avoid harming even one other person. He knows that the Lord of Infinite Justice will suitably reward him for all his deeds. In one of the hadiths, our Prophet (may Allah bless him and grant him peace) listed the kinds of people who are not pleasing to Allah:

"Those who act cruelly and unjustly in the sacred lands, those who yearn for the ways of the ignorant, and those who wrongly shed human blood."13