And when he informed about what they attained in this world and what will befall them in the Hereafter, he explained it by saying: ﴿That﴾ meaning the [great] matter that He did to them of expulsion and its preliminaries [in this world], and He will do it to them in the Hereafter ﴿because they﴾. And when they had combined in this matter with what they were upon of apparent disbelief and hidden disbelief by what they intended of casting the stone and other harm as a plot from them, he included in his saying: ﴿They oppose Allah﴾ meaning the Most High King who has complete encompassing, so they were in a faction other than His faction by becoming in the faction of the enemies who are warring after they were in the faction of the peaceful ones.

And when the Messenger of Allah ﷺ dealt with their concealment of what they intended to do to him by concealing it for his salvation from them by returning to the noble city and leaving his companions, may Allah be pleased with them, with them, he said: ﴿And His Messenger﴾ whose veneration is from His veneration. And when he informed about his action and its cause, he emphasized it to affirm its content and to indicate that He will do to others who were upon their matter greater than their action, and he said: ﴿And whoever opposes Allah﴾ meaning he causes in secret opposition to the Most High King who has no equal in the present, past, or future, whether he concealed along with it another opposition or not, and he left the inclusion as it is because they did not show enmity, but rather what they did was a plot and secrecy, and that is lighter than open hostility. And he indicated in Al-Anfal to the strength of [the matter of] the open ones as has passed, and he did not repeat the mention of the Messenger to magnify him by implying that his opposition is an opposition to Allah without any duality at all, and as a reference that they exaggerated in concealing their opposition to him, so nothing appeared upon it except Allah, and there was no interaction from them in that between them and the Messenger ﷺ for he did not plot against them, but rather he confronted them when Allah informed him of their plotting against him contrary to what has preceded from Al-Anfal, for the situation necessitated there the mention that they plotted against him as Allah, the Exalted, said: ﴿And when those who disbelieved plotted against you﴾ [Al-Anfal: 30] the verse, and he ﷺ concealed the matter of his migration and devised a plan for his salvation from their plotting according to what Allah commanded him, so the interaction occurred in the alignment of each of the two groups to a faction other than the other secretly. ﴿Indeed, Allah﴾ meaning the one who encompasses all greatness will intensify His punishment for him because He is ﴿Severe in punishment﴾. And that is as He did with Banu Qurayzah after this when they broke their covenant and revealed their opposition in the Battle of the Confederates, and as the people of Khaybar did, for they were plotting and concealing in the first when it was conquered and in the second when they were expelled from it. So He equated between the secretive and the open ones in punishment, and it is more severe for the open ones as is clear.