I don’t know, I’m not convinced..

Let those who know speak! And let those who don’t know stay silent!

On a tangential note, usually I find americans really accommodating of different cultures and beliefs, especially if they are told up front, but discretely, about it. We have in religions alone orthodox jews, amish, sikh, mormons, buddhists — you name it. And communities who live around them learn their ways and in general respect them.

I guess in the above situation, to sort of explain to the organizers and let the person know your preference about not shaking hands or touching the opposite gender. Americans are pretty cool and would accommodate that.

I’ve actually found Americans get embarrassed and insulted when they discover these things later and say “Why didn’t you tell me!” They feel like they were not trusted enough, and that you intentionally let them make a faux pas. This embarrasses them even more. On the flip side, we all know american non-muslims who are genuinely so pleased when they go around saying “assalaamu alaikum” to their muslim colleagues and neighbors. Americans are an open people, and I think they like to be given the benefit of the doubt.

And I would just like to add that I think that what Sh. Bin Bayyah says about the hardship makes sense. There are fragile situations in which it is more wise to shake the opposite genders hand. We need to also understand that it will most likely be someone who is not Muslims and does not know of the rules of Islam who initiates the shaking of the hand. What I believe is that if there is no realistic possibility of fully explaining why one did not shake their hand, they should simply shake it. For example, when one wins an award, they often shake hands with the sponsors of the award who could very possibly be non-Mahram non-Muslims. You probably never have talked to them before and probably will have minimal if any talk after, certainly not enough to explain why you couldn’t shake their hand (not shaking someones hand could be seen as you degrading them in the US and other countries). We have to look at the logic behind rules in Islam. The principal object is to prevent desire, and a handshake hardly furnishes desire.

In addition to the logical comments of brother Laith, I ask, is there any scholar from the past and who was an authority of some nature at least, say that its allowed to touch a non-Mahram of the opposite gender?
If not, then we have a new opinion of Sheikh Qaradawi and it means that everyone else in the past was wrong. How is that possible, especially since the situation of touching the opposite gender is not new? Wouldn’t that mean that the Salaf didn’t allow the touching of women too(all the classical positions of the madhabs I found don’t allow it)? Isn’t the opinion of allowing it a bid’a(a bad one for those who believe in differentiation)?
Aren’t there Hadiths about Allah protecting the Ummah from agreeing upon error?

Of course thats assuming no scholar held the opinion in the past(Sheikh Ramadan Buti said he heard of no difference of opinion in the past over this) and to date I haven’t seen a single quote from the past scholars.

I personally accept the discussion being put for by sh QArdarwi on this subject . But the contention I have to sh bin bayyah’s explanation seems to justify commuting an impermissible act for the sake of not causing offense. We could justify a lot of impermissble acts by this justification .

Also is there any shara justification to permit abandoning a hukm for
The sake of not causig offense ? Similarly the haaja isn’t a justification of commuting a haram sh bin bayyah wrote a detailed discussion on the diference between haaja and dharoora and some use principles of dharoora on matters which are haaja.

Finally I also believe it’s an inacurate understanding of he reality particularly living in the west.