ABSTRACT
As President Bush launched his opening address to the Middle East Peace Conference in Madrid on an optimistic note, responses of a very different nature issued from parts of the Muslim world. In Tehran, for example, Ayatollah All Khamenei denounced the talks as treason, while Hojatul-Islam Ali Akbar Mohteshami declared that all participants in the Conference must face the death penalty for 'waging war against God and Islam'. In Beirut, the late head of Hizbollah Abbas Musawi announced that Madrid amounted to a 'conference to liquidate the Palestinian people'. 1 In Jerusalem the Conference of Palestinian ʿUlamā issued a fatwa announcing that Islam prohibits participation in Madrid 2 In towns and refugee camps throughout the Occupied Territories supporters of the Islamic Resistance Movement (ḤAMĀS) raised black flags, and called for a strike to mark opposition to the talks as a sellout. 3
