They would likely have killed him if they had found him. The death penalty for apostasy is part of Islamic law. It’s based on the Qur’an: “They wish you would disbelieve as they disbelieved so you would be alike. So do not take from among them allies until they emigrate for the cause of Allah. But if they turn away, then seize them and kill them wherever you find them and take not from among them any ally or helper.” (Qur’an 4:89)
A hadith depicts Muhammad saying: “Whoever changed his Islamic religion, then kill him” (Bukhari 9.84.57). The death penalty for apostasy is part of Islamic law according to all the schools of Islamic jurisprudence.
This is still the position of all the schools of Islamic jurisprudence, both Sunni and Shi’ite. Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi, the most renowned and prominent Muslim cleric in the world, has stated: “The Muslim jurists are unanimous that apostates must be punished, yet they differ as to determining the kind of punishment to be inflicted upon them. The majority of them, including the four main schools of jurisprudence (Hanafi, Maliki, Shafi’i, and Hanbali) as well as the other four schools of jurisprudence (the four Shiite schools of Az-Zaidiyyah, Al-Ithna-‘ashriyyah, Al-Ja’fariyyah, and Az-Zaheriyyah) agree that apostates must be executed.”
Qaradawi also once famously said: “If they had gotten rid of the apostasy punishment, Islam wouldn’t exist today.”
“Newly Christian Families Driven from Homes in Uganda,” Morning Star News, December 30, 2021:
…In Pallisa District, also in eastern Uganda, residents of predominantly Muslim Omesula village, Nagule Parish, Putiputi Sub-County on Dec. 12 invaded 40-year-old Umar Opoloto’s banana plantation after learning of his conversion to Christianity, he said.
Opoloto and his family had put their faith in Christ the previous day, he said. After listening to an evangelist at an open-air event on Dec. 10, Opoloto invited him to dinner at his house on Dec. 11, he said.
“I was touched with the preaching of the pastor because he was using the Koran and Bible, yet some of our sheikhs had talked bad of Jesus as a lower prophet than Muhammad,” Opoloto told Morning Star News by phone. “I wanted to know the truth of what he was preaching, so I invited the pastor for supper at my house. That very evening, I and my entire household gave our lives to Christ as Lord and Savior.”
Area Muslims called for mosque prayers at 10 a.m. on Dec. 12, a Sunday, a very unusual time to do so, said a neighbor whose name is withheld for security reasons.
“Thereafter I saw a huge number of Muslims chanting his name, ‘Umar, Umar, Umar,’” the neighbor said. “I then rang him to alert him so as to save his family.”
Opoloto managed to escape before angry Muslims broke into his home with machetes, sticks and stones, the neighbor said.
“They broke into the house but could not find anyone inside,” he said. “They destroyed some of the property then went ahead and started destroying his cassava, banana plantation and livestock, shouting the name of Umar, saying he has blasphemed Islam and the Islamic community.”…
Uganda’s constitution and other laws provide for religious freedom, including the right to propagate one’s faith and convert from one faith to another. Muslims make up no more than 12 percent of Uganda’s population, with high concentrations in eastern areas of the country.
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