Sharia law for Libya?

Mustafa Abdel Ja­lil, Libya’s interim leader, declared Sunday that post-Gaddafi Libya will be run as an Islamic state with legislation based on sharia law.

According to The Washington Post reporter Mary Beth Sheridan, Jalil declared to a crowd in Benghazi, “’We are an Islamic state,’ and pledged to get rid of regulations that didn’t conform to Islamic law.”

Among the Islamic changes Jalil mentioned in his speech

— ”Libya’s new constitution “will not disallow polygamy’” (FP.com)

— “The interest [on loans] will be ruled out,” in accordance with Islamic prohibition on charging interest.

Sharia law, as Post religion reporter Michelle Boorstein wrote in 2010, in recent months has become “shorthand for extremism” among critics of Islam in the United States. For Muslims, it is a code of conduct for daily life, similar to Jewish law, but concern over its role in politics have shadowed the Arab Spring.

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