Surah Al-Anfaal (8) — Ayah 55

In the above verse, when the characteristic of all disbelievers was described as being wrongdoers, here some specific mischiefs of the disbelievers are mentioned. The meaning of {’’ وَ هُمْ لَا يَتَّقُوْنَ ‘‘} is that they do not fear Allah, or they do not fear the consequences of their breach of promise. By this are meant specifically the Jews of Madinah, with whom, upon arriving in Madinah, the Prophet (peace be upon him) made a pact to live as good neighbors and to cooperate mutually. However, the growing strength of Islam was never acceptable to them, so sometimes they would try to incite the pre-Islamic tribal partisanship between Aws and Khazraj to make them fight each other, and sometimes they would repeatedly violate the pact by helping the enemies of Islam with weapons. And when they were confronted, they would say that they had forgotten the agreement, but as soon as they got the chance, they would again do something against the pact. To the extent that, even with this agreement in place, their leader Ka'b bin Ashraf (who was extremely enraged by the defeat of the Quraysh at Badr) went to Makkah and, by reciting provocative elegies for the slain disbelievers of Badr, kept inciting the youth of Quraysh to take revenge on the Muslims. Such people are those whom {’’شَرَّ الدَّوَآبِّ ‘‘} (the worst of animals) has been called. (Ibn Kathir) Here, instead of calling them {’’ شَرَّ النَّاسِ‘‘} (the worst of all people), they are called {’’ شَرَّ الدَّوَآبِّ ‘‘}, although {’’ الدَّوَآبِّ ‘‘} can also include humans, because they too walk about, but generally this word is used for animals rather than humans, as if, due to disbelief, these people have been deprived of the honor of humanity. See Surah Bayyinah (6), Surah A'raf (179), and Surah Furqan (44).