Tenth Reflection
It is legally permissible to conclude a truce with the unbelievers when the Muslims are unable to fight them; indeed, it remains allowed even if it entails some disadvantage to the Muslims, as will be shown.

Such an armistice may be either open-ended or limited to a fixed term whenever the Muslims are incapable of confronting the enemy in battle, or whenever the ruler considers it to bring a decisive benefit to Islam and the Muslims.

Shaykh al-Islam (1), may Allah have mercy on him, said: “A truce with an unbeliever and the security it affords are permissible only in a situation of incapacity or when a hoped-for benefit justifies it.”

Ibn al-Qayyim (2), may Allah have mercy on him, said: “Making peace with the polytheists by conceding something that carries a degree of detriment for the Muslims is permissible for an overriding benefit and to ward off a greater evil, for one repels the greater of two harms by bearing the lesser.”