They turned a blind eye for fear of (in-)fighting. What happened next?

Allah the Almighty said in His Noble Book:

﴿وَإِذْ قَالَ مُوسَىٰ لِقَوْمِهِۦ يَـٰقَوْمِ إِنَّكُمْ ظَلَمْتُمْ أَنفُسَكُم بِٱتِّخَاذِكُمُ ٱلْعِجْلَ فَتُوبُوٓا۟ إِلَىٰ بَارِئِكُمْ فَٱقْتُلُوٓا۟ أَنفُسَكُمْ ذَٰلِكُمْ خَيْرٌ لَّكُمْ عِندَ بَارِئِكُمْ فَتَابَ عَلَيْكُمْ ۚ إِنَّهُۥ هُوَ ٱلتَّوَّابُ ٱلرَّحِيمُ ﴿٥٤﴾ ﴾

And [remember] when Moses said to his people, ‘O my people! Surely you have wronged yourselves by worshipping the calf, so turn in repentance to your Creator and execute yourselves. That is best for you in the sight of your Creator.’ Then He accepted your repentance. Surely He is the Accepter of Repentance, Most Merciful.

— Surat-Al-Baqarah, verse 54

In the Tafsir of At-Tabari, he [Abu Jaafar] says:

“Ibn Jurayj said, and Ibn Abbas said: Their dead reached seventy thousand, then Allah, the Almighty, lifted the command of killing from them, and accepted their repentance.

Ibn Jurayj said: They stood in two rows [facing each other] and fought among themselves, so Allah made the killing of those who were killed a martyrdom, and it was a repentance for those who remained. And their killing each other was because Allah knew that some of them knew that calf worship was wrong, and nothing prevented them from denouncing them except the fear of (in-)fighting, and that is why He ordered that they kill each other.”

Contemplate that last part, and how it’s a great lesson and a warning for us all!

A group of the Children of Israel worshipped the calf, and there was a group that did not worship it and realized that its worship was a sin, but they remained silent about denouncing those who worshipped the calf for fear of division, and fighting!

So what is the ruling of Allah, the Almighty? He ruled that those who did not worship the calf would kill the ones who did. So whoever worshipped the calf would crawl and the one who did not worship the calf would kill him. If he moved or resisted, he would be cursed and his repentance would not be accepted. So the man killed his father, brother, son, uncle, cousin and neighbor. The women and children ran towards Moses (peace be upon him) crying, asking him to call upon his Lord the Most High to forgive them, so Moses and Aaron (peace be upon them) supplicated to Allah the Almighty that the Children of Israel had perished, so Allah lifted the command of killing from them, and more than seventy thousand of them had been killed!

This is reoccurring in our Ummah, with many seeing the spread of Shirk and the denial of Allah’s attributes and other innovations and heresies, and many of those who know full well the wickedness of these things remain silent, sometimes for fear of dividing the Ummah, sometimes for fear of the masses, and sometimes for fear of turning away from what is called the “issues of the Ummah”!

So what happened? The nation and its masses have never been divided as they are in our time, and its enemies have never been as powerful as they are in our time! This is a lesson and a warning for us.

In the hadith of Ghuthaa Al-Sayl (“the scum of a torrent”) of the Noble Prophet (peace & blessings be upon him), it was mentioned that weakness comes from “the love of this world.” Is there a greater love for this world than letting the polytheist die in his polytheism, the one who denies Allah’s Attributes die in his denial, and the innovator die in his innovation without calling and advising them, only hoping that they will unite with you on a [worldly] project?