۞ ART THOU NOT aware of how those who would always dissemble [their real feelings] speak to their truth-denying brethren from among the followers of earlier revelation: "If you are driven away, we shall most certainly go forth with you, and shall never pay heed to anyone against you; and if war is waged against you, we shall most certainly come to your succour." But God bears witness that they are most flagrantly lying: 11 If they were to be expelled, they would not go with them. If they were to be attacked they would not help them. Even if they were to help them, they would run away from the battle and leave them helpless. 12 Surely they have greater fear of you in their hearts than of God, because they do not understand. 13 They will never fight against you as a body (in an open battlefield); and if they fight against you they will fight only in fortified townships or from behind walls. Intense is their hostility to one another. You reckon them united while their hearts are divided. That is because they are a people devoid of reason. 14 [Theirs is] like the example of those shortly before them: they tasted the bad consequence of their affair, and they will have a painful punishment. 15 Their parable is that of Satan when he says to man: “Disbelieve,” but when he disbelieves, he says: “I am quit of you. Verily I fear Allah, the Lord of the Universe.” 16 The fate of both of them will be hell fire wherein they will live forever. Thus will be the recompense for the unjust. 17