Overview

• At least 26 tourists were killed in a terror attack in Pahalgam, Kashmir, on April 22, 2025, after being forced to recite the Kalma, the Islamic declaration of faith.
• Victims who could not recite the Kalma were identified as non-Muslims and executed, according to eyewitness accounts and family testimonies.
• The Kalma, a core tenet of Islam affirming faith in Allah and Muhammad's prophethood, is meant to be a free expression of belief, with the Quran forbidding compulsion in religion.
• The attack echoes a 2014 incident in Kenya where Al-Shabaab militants used a similar method to target and kill non-Muslims.
• Religious scholars and community leaders have condemned the manipulation of the Kalma for violence, calling it a distortion of Islamic principles.