IS based on 7th century Islamic teaching, not representative of Muslims, says academic

Academics and Australia's Islamic Community have expressed a range of responses to the atrocities in France with many pointing out that the group is not representative of Islam in most parts of the world.

Turkish soldiers engaging IS fighters after coming under fire along the Syrian border. (AAP) Source: AAP

Dr Denis Dragovic has lived in several war zones and authored a book on religion and conflict, and said IS draws on a particular seventh century element of Islamic teaching, and that any response ought to take this into consideration.

“We need to understand what aspects of their Islamic theology they're drawing upon - it's not an army in of itself that needs to be eliminated - it's what people - civilians themselves believe in and you can't eliminate individuals beliefs so we have to tackle it differently,” Dr Dragovic said.

He is critical of direct military action, and favours a version of partitioning over traditional military responses, in an attempt to isolate and strangle the group.

“Help them to wither from within (so) that they collapse internally from the uprising of other groups,” he said.

While some have launched scathing criticism at the terror group IS, the county's most senior Muslim cleric did not directly condemn the attacks.

Australia's Grand Mufti Dr Ibrahim Abu Mohammed focused instead on what he labelled causative factors such as racism, Islamophobia and "duplicitous" foreign policy.

In a statement, he said ‘These recent incidents highlight the fact that current strategies to deal with the threat of terrorism are not working.”

Muslim community spokesman Dr Jamal Rifi directly criticised the terror group and said the attacks were not about Islam itself.

“They have nothing to do with Islam - as a matter of fact they are the enemy of Islam and they have killed more Muslims than non-Muslim civilians,” Mr Rifi said.