Islam places great importance on the good treatment of all people, Muslims and non-Muslims. Muslims are commanded to maintain peaceful ties with those who extend their hand with peace to them. In addition, a Muslim is commanded, while in the battlefield, to distinguish between those who are really fighting him and others who are not engaged in fighting like media persons, doctors and nurses. Almighty Allah says: (O you who believe! When you go forward (to fight) in the way of Allah, be careful to discriminate, and say not unto one who offers you peace: “You are not a believer.) (An-Nisaa‘ 4: 94)
Tackling this issue, the prominent Muslim scholar Dr. TahaJaber Al-`Alawani, president of the Graduate School of Islamic and Social Sciences and former president of the Fiqh Council of North America, states:
As for non-combatants like doctors, nurses and media persons who work for the oppressed and for the relief of victims and the needy, they should be treated with the utmost respect and care, i.e., it is not allowed to kill them. Indeed, they should be respected for their efforts.
However, if people engage themselves in frightening or helping to kill innocent people and the oppressed, then they are to be considered combatants.
Also, Sheikh Mohamed El–Moctar El-Shinqiti, Director of the Islamic Center of South Plains, Lubbock, Texas, adds: One of the rules of conduct of Jihad in Islam that the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) highly stressed is “Do not kill a woman, a child, an old man, or a monk in his monastery; do not cut down trees.” In another version of the hadith he is reported to have said, “…do not kill traders or farmers.”
All of these hadiths mean that it is strictly forbidden to target non-combatants by killing or kidnapping or taking them as hostages, or inflicting any kind of harm on them.
On the other hand, there are other rules on how to deal with combatants and warring people. If a Muslim is defending himself or his homeland, he is supposed to be a noble fighter, and that includes fighting with courage and mercy at the same time, and preserving the rights of prisoners of war.
It stands without doubt that these rules of conduct have been recorded in history as noble characteristics of Muslims. In his book Arab Civilization, the French scholar Gustav Lebon said that history never witnessed merciful conquerors but Muslims.
Today, the image of Islam and Muslims has been tarnished especially with the globalization of media. Every Muslim should be responsible for every action, and he has to realize the consequences of his action on the image of Islam and the Muslims before the whole world.