He also reprimanded Usāmah ibn Zayd when the latter killed a man who had already professed Islam, after Usāmah pleaded, “He only uttered it out of fear of the sword.” (1)

However, there is a clear difference between the Prophet—or anyone else—coercing people until they enter Islam and his fighting them merely to repel their wrongdoing and aggression against the religion. Once they accepted Islam, they became members of the faith community, and it was no longer lawful to kill them.

Indeed, anyone he knew would not oppress the religion and its adherents he would not fight, whether that person was from the People of the Book or otherwise.

He then cited the incident of Khuzaʿah, the expedition of Ibn al-Ḥaḍramī, the affair of Badr, the campaigns against Banū al-Naḍīr and Qurayẓah, and other similar cases, and concluded: