Did Muhammad Practice Beheading?

Payman Saqib wrote:

Really? For brevity I only cite a few cases.  

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In the year 625 A.D. after suffering several raids, lootings and killings by the Muslims, the various tribes of Bani Layhan gathered around their chief Sofyan ibn Khalid discussing what to do about the continuous problems that they faced. Muhammad’s spies informed him of this gathering and he dispatched Abdullah ibn Oneis, with instructions to assassinate Sofyan. Abdullah went forth alone, and joining himself as a volunteer to Sofyan, fell upon him unaware while no one was near, cut off his head, and carried it with him. He eluded pursuit, and reaching Medina in safety, presented himself before Muhammad  in the Mosque. The Prophet welcomed him, and asked the issue of his adventure. Abdullah replied by displaying the head of his victim. Muhammad was so highly gratified at the success, that he presented the assassin with his staff: - This;" said he, "shall be a token betwixt you and me on the day of resurrection. Verily few on that day shall have anything to lean upon."

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After Muhammad raided the fortress of Kheibar and the unarmed population were taken by surprise, Muslim fighters killed many of the citizens until they surrendered. Muhammad allowed them to leave the country, but that they should give up all their property to the conqueror. With the rest, came forth Kinana, chief of the Jews of Kheibar, and his cousin. Muhammad accused them both of keeping back, in contravention of the compact, a portion of their riches, especially the treasures of the Bani Nadhir, which Kinana had obtained as a marriage portion with his wife, Safiyah the daughter of the chief of that tribe. "Where are the vessels of gold," he asked," which you used to lend to the people of Mecca?" They protested that they no longer possessed them. "if you conceal anything from me," continued Muhammad, "and I should gain knowledge of it, then your lives and the lives of your families shall be at my disposal." They answered that it should be so. A traitorous Jew, having divulged to Muhammad the place in which a part of their wealth was deposited, he sent and fetched it. On the discovery of this attempt at imposition, Kinana was subjected to cruel torture, -- "fire being placed upon his breast till his breath had almost departed," -in the hope that he would confess where the rest of his treasures were concealed. Muhammad then gave command, and the heads of the two chiefs were severed from their bodies.”

On that very night Muhammad took the 17 year old Safiyah the bride of Kinana to his tent and claimed her as his wife.

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But the most gruesome scene of beheading is that of the Bani Qurayza. Muhammad besieged their fortress cutting the water to them and after they surrendered, he ordered that all the men and boys passed their puberty to be beheaded.

The men were penned up in a closed yard, while graves or trenches were being dug for them in the chief marketplace of the city. When these were ready, Muhammad, himself a spectator of the tragedy, gave command that the captives should be brought forth in companies of five or six at a time. Each company was made to sit down by the brink of the trench destined for its grave, and there beheaded. Party by party they were thus led out, and butchered in cold blood, till the whole were slain. Zoheir, an aged Jew, who had saved some of Muhammad’s allies of the Bani Aws in the battle of Boath, Thabit interceded and procured a pardon, including the restoration of his family and his property. "But what hath become of all our chiefs, - of Kab, of Huwey, of Ozzal ibn Samuel?" asked the old man. As one after another he named the leading chiefs of his tribe, he received to each inquiry the same reply; - they had all been slain already. - "Then of what use is life to me any longer? Slay me also, that I may go and join those that have preceded me." When this was told to Muhammad, he said, "Yea, he shall join them, in the fire of Hell?" and he too was beheaded [Ibn Hisham p. 301]

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