Terrorism and Fundamentalist Islam
By Saroj Shabaj
Midst of massive western literary and media campaign against Islam and Muslims one-eyed to correlate its theology, schools of jurisprudence, culture and Islamic way of life with 'fascism' and 'terror'; last January, 2008 issue of 'Foreign Policy' magazine published an article titled "A World Without Islam"1 authored by a former CIA personnel Graham E. Fuller. That article argued, "What if Islam had never existed? To some, it's a comforting thought: No clash of civilizations, no holy wars, no terrorists. Would Christianity have taken over the world? Would the Middle East be a peaceful beacon of democracy? Would 9/11 have happened? In fact, remove Islam from the path of history, and the world ends up exactly where it is today."
In support of his thesis, Graham E. Fuller gave quite a good deal of explanation citing numerous examples from historical facts and depicted in detail the current scenario of the whole World to study the underlying reason behind the ongoing conflicts and global restlessness threatening peace. The conclusion he made; it is not the religion of Islam per se which is being depicted and hyped up by the legion of Western intellectuals and the media, to be the root cause but the actual cause of proliferation of the terror activities and pockets of conflicts worldwide are seen as result of the inevitable confrontation between formidably advancing powerful force of Euro-American imperialism up against comparatively weaker forces of nationalisms - ethnic or religious. If Islam exists or had not existed at all, the ultimate consequential scenario of the restless World would have been the same, as overviewed today.
Interestingly, nearly after about seven months from the publication of the article of Graham E. Fuller, in two recent issues of a Bangla national daily newspaper 'Ittefaq', an article titled "World without Islam (Islam-bihin Bishwa)" was published in Bangla on 172 & 193 July 2008, in two parts. The author of that article is Professor Emajuddin Ahmed. In his article, Professor Emajuddin not only elaborately reproduced complete translated version of the paper of Graham E. Fuller but with that subtly added his own words, sentences and paragraphs here and there, ultimately not failing to mean and highlight his own views that the 'acts of terrorism' committed by the Islamists was consequential and justified in view of the past and present acts of depredations perpetrated by the imperialist forces across the World.
Professor Emajuddin writes, "Most mentionable is: Islamic civilization has established a tone of unity, consciousness of harmony, unadulterated sense of confidence within the whole of the Muslim World. This sense of unity is a kind of safeguard against Western aggression. If not, it is possible for a lone human habitation to repel this act of aggression, sometimes united voice is raised – at times come bellowing words. If not, it is confronted in a face to face battle; it is responded through acts of terror, even being suicidal, aiming to diminish the acts of aggression -- those are the acts which are branded by the West as 'terrorism'." The raison de'tre of ongoing global campaign of 'War against Terror' -- bedrock of national security and foreign policy strategy declared by the West.
It is quite unfortunate, where Graham E. Fuller attempts correctly or incorrectly to detach the religion of Islam from the underlying reasons behind acts of 'terrorism', which may be largely an acceptable view considering the reality of diverse practice, culture and way of life within the Muslim societies across the globe. But on the other hand, surprisingly, in his article Professor Emajuddin observes gracious role of Islam acting as a cohesive force of 'nationalism', a rallying and unifying force of humankind worldwide up against western imperialist aggression with a view where the acts of 'terror' and 'suicide' becomes consequential and justified method of attack, a 'successful' and acceptable tactic applied through the ongoing movements, struggles and war of resistance against imperialism.
Professor Emajuddin had been the Vice Chancellor of a Public University in Bangladesh. Now he is working as Vice Chancellor of a large Private University in Dhaka. A number of teachers and students regard him with high esteem. He must be having a number of young students among them who are appreciating his goodness and esteem as a teacher– even some among them may be his followers and disciples for the subject of Political Science he would teach. When tender aged young minds are inherently protesting and romantic juveniles, they become very easily attracted, susceptible and eventually vulnerable, sinking into the colossal depth of extremism impregnated with extremist ideologies. As such, when Professor Emajuddin do not distonguish and critique the views and ideology, the digressive and deplorable acts of terror perpetrated by the fundamentalist fanatic Islamists, as well as, do not raise question as to some of these acts may well be correlated as clandestine acts of agent provocateurs but in blanket acknowledges all acts of terror and extremism furthered in the name of Islam as consequential and inclusive in the worldwide camp of resistance against imperialist aggression, it is a cause of great concern.
One should not forget the 9/11 mass murder of thousands of innocent civilians -- Christian, Muslim, Jew, Hindu and Buddhists of diverse nationalities – died in the Twin Tower of New York. The suicide act of terror which was alleged to be designed, mined and engineered by Osama Bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri, the leaders of two outfits of 'Islamic terrorist' organizations, namely Al-Quaeda and Islamic Jihad, that drew severe adverse reaction across the World. Condemnations came from Muslim, Christian, Hindu, Buddhists –people and nations of all colour and shades of humankind. In one of his regular column published in "The Daily Star" Brig Gen Shahedul Anam Khan ndc, psc (Retd) rightly points out, "Reportedly4, as early as the evening of 9/11 Bush had told his advisors that he saw the attacks as a chance to do what he had decided he would, long before his administration came to power. And Donald Rumsfield, who was yet to be appointed the defense secretary told his boss that he, believed that the US military power was needed 'to help discipline the World.' This was a chance for the US to embark on that road to new imperialism -- and the World was to be disciplined under a strategy that came to be known as Bush doctrine."
We all know now that the existence of WMD theory improvised by US administration prior to invasion of Iraq was proved to be blatant lie through later investigations carried out by relevant International and US authorities. Also, a group called "Scholars for 9/11Truth" , a non-partisan association of faculty, students, and scholars, in fields as diverse as history, science, military affairs, psychology, and philosophy, are engaged in meticulous work of research dedicated to exposing falsehoods and to reveal truths behind 9/11. This organization is established by Professor of Philosophy James H. Fetzer and Professor of Physics Steven E. Jones – the movement's foremost expert on the collapse of the Twin Towers. While the research is yet to ascertain whether the attack on Twin Tower of NY on September 11, 2001 was an 'Inside Job'5, involvement of al-Quaeda, ISI, Agents of Saudi Intelligence and probably Mossad was allegedly established beyond doubt in FBI agent Colleen Rowley's book [Griffin, David Ray (2004): The New Pearl Harbour – Disturbing Questions about the Bush Administration and 9/11, Ariss Publishing, 109-110].
2.
Leaving aside circumlocution coming straight to the point let it be made clear that, I do not have the academic competence, intellectual scholarship or professional expertise of a political strategist to undertake a specialist analysis, opine and comment on the important topic stated in the title of this article. However, I feel those attributes of specialization is no more essential today to speak with simple understanding as an ordinary citizen of Bangladesh or as an individual inhabitant of the World emerged in this century as a global village – where the burning issues and incidents relating to the topic of this article greatly influence our day to day life and livelihood, our future and the future of our children.
We may have more than one opinion regarding definition and identification of 'terrorism' or 'Islamic terrorism' vis-Ã -vis West's real motivation behind the strategy and tactic of the ongoing 'War on Terror'. But, it is needless to mention that, perceiving a hypothetical situation of peace in a 'World without Islam" putting burden of all evils on the shoulder of 'Islamic Theology' or 'Schools of Jurisprudence' with expedient pick and chose method of own theoretical interpretation is underestimating and ludicrous. Because, Islam is not a system that involves matter and machine, Islam is a culture and way of life of billions in its diverse form of practice. When to view Muslims as culture-bearing there is no reason as such to view them as social beings and hence as transformative beings. It is evident, throughout the history of progress of Islamic Civilization, the Muslims have had demonstrated the capacity for change for progress and for the creation of universal moral and political forms through reason and dialogue.
Needless to say, the 'New Imperialist' massive media and military campaign spreading all over the World aimed at intimidating into dissolution of the stands of Islamic Civilization, peaceful practice of Islamic way of Life just through application of shear strength, side by side with the political ambition of 'orthodox fanatic Islamists' and their individual, collective or collusive acts of 'extremism' and 'terror' taking on radical view of Islam, all are equally mindless. None of these can coerce the humankind to deviate from the unity and consensus founded on the ideals of common bondage of humanity and peace – can deviate humankind from the attributes of ongoing nationalist struggles moving forward to establish multicultural secular democratic societies free from social discrimination and economic disparity. It is negligent study of political science to mix up struggles of national independence and sovereignty with the acts of terror, intimidation, coercion and bigotry directed to force upon tribal minded feudal ideologies of orthodox and radical view in the name of Islam resembling the pre-Islamic Arab era of Jahiliyat or the Kharijites (a faction emerged during the initial days of Islam).
3.
In the history of human civilization, we have found, deviating from mainstream philosophies, ideologies and religion humankind perceived for advancement of society, side by side of the legions of peace and progress, always existed a column of violence, extremism and terror, armed with 'fundamentalism', 'conservatism', 'orthodoxy' and 'extremism' falsely claiming to be the true and authoritative followers of the respective ideals. These evil forces have always resisted ideas of change and dynamism, resisted ideas of reforms and revolution. Like crime existed in the society; violence, extremism, terrorism and tyranny existed. Lust for absolute power, insatiable greed of accumulation of wealth and resources, status quo of exploitation, oppression and disempowerment, are the common objective and motivation of these forces of crime, violence, extremism and terror.
In the modern World, M. K. Gandhi and Nelson Mandela have shown to this World that even through the path of non-violent non-cooperation movement the most tyrannical enemies of colonialism, imperialism and apartheid can be defeated. But, if violence, war and terror are necessary, people of the World may have stake in it if the victory may ensure fundamental values of humanity, rights and freedom for all and equality. Has inherent promise in these struggles to build a progressive society free from that viewed by the fundamentalist Islamists' culture of conservatism, radicalism, orthodoxy, patriarchy and bigotry.
The World is aware that Osama Bin Laden and Mullah Omar received unequivocal support from the West in their ideological and military campaign to repel and evict the occupational Soviet Army from the land of Afghanistan. After the eviction, the Taliban Government of Mullah Omar got six years uninterrupted and undisturbed to show to the World the kind of 'Islamic' society they could establish freely in Afghanistan. Only two Muslim states, Saudi Arabia ruled under Kingship and Pakistan with large part of their history of Military dictatorship had recognized the Government of Mullah Omar and Osama Bin Laden. Others including rest of the Muslim countries of the whole world even did not consider to extend diplomatic recognition to that Government. When we discuss and recognize post 9/11 sufferings of the Afghan people, sometimes some of us forget to retract the sufferings of the Afghan people under fundamentalist Taliban rule who miserably failed to improve the lot of the people living in a feuding tribal society of Afghanistan and to transform it into a modern nation state.
When we like to commit ourselves against invasion of Afghanistan by the western allies, at the same time it is necessary for us to brainstorm as to identify what went wrong with the Taliban ideology. Because, when back in 6th Century AD, Prophet Mohammed took Islam to cut across the Jahiliyat of tribal society to progress from a small city state to a nation state of Arabia, why the Taliban failed to free the Afghan people from tribal conservatism, patriarchy and feuds but to impress their minds with true mission and vision of a nation state. Because, that failure has gave many an ample opportunity, to identify it as shortcomings in the core teachings of Islam. But we know it right, that the Taliban ideology indeed deviated from the core values of universal humanism as such very easily took Afghanistan into the path back to the days of Jahiliyat (pre-Islamic) – uncivilized autocratic rule of terror and tyranny plagued with ideas infested with social discrimination, patriarchy, conservatism, bigotry and extremism.
4.
Turning pages of Islamic History backward, one shall find that all throughout and right from onset of Islam it was infested with schism and sectarianism. These internal feuds saw streams of blood flowing in all sides. Two of the Khalifas (nominated by a committee of leading tribal factions after death of the Prophet) elected through consensus were assassinated by the Kharijites, who believed that the pursuit of truth was done through the use of the sword; they embarked upon endless campaigns of blood bath, because, with regard to the question of who should lead the community of Muslims, the Kharijites claimed that the community could only be led by those who were pious and righteous. It was deemed acceptable to overthrow a ruler forced by the blade of the sword whose conduct according to them fell short of these ideals. Without giving elaborate detail of history of these internal feuds, I wish to conclude: like general history of humankind, the Islamic history also witnessed and evolved through constant struggle of goodness and evil. Also, as the character of a culture changes as a result of the choices of its members, with the spread of Islam across various ethnic cultures from Europe to East Asia, preservation of original Arab culture in Islamic way of life continued to claim its authority and authenticity giving rise to a secondary cause of internal contradiction.
Islamic Civilization or the Muslim World as we see it today is not a case of homogenous culture anymore. Not only, the Muslim World witnessed; broad sects, factions and divisions in matters of concept and belief evolved through centuries in the Arab World itself and in the World, also diverse ethnic identities of Muslims across the World reshaped Islamic values and cultures, the forms of practice and way of life.
The orthodox Islamists who are mainly identified as fundamentalists resorting to terrorist activities in Muslim or multicultural societies wishes to further their claim of authority and authenticity of Islamic way of life rigidly based on one of their chosen version of original Arab tradition (Sunnah) of the Prophet Muhammad from available six such major collections of Sunni sect and four such major collections of Shia sect alongside the most orthodox School of Jurisprudence (Sharia) formulated by one of the four original (Mujtahid) Jurist (Imam) of Sunni sect and his organic followers of Islamic Jurists.
The version of Prophetic tradition i.e. Sunnah which they claim to be authentic out of six such major sets of collection was originally collected by Muhammad ibn Ismail al-Bukhari (810-870 AD) , later edited, reformed and enriched by Ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab (1703-92), who was also a Jurist of Hanbali School of Jurisprudence founded by Ahmad b. Hanbal (d.855). The main characteristics of Hanbali School of Jurisprudence as opposed to other major Islamic Schools of Jurisprudence is rejection of Qias (analogy) and Ijma (consensus) but to consider rigidly, literally and narrowly only the decrees of Quoran and the Hadith (collections of traditions of Prophet Muhammad), as source and doctrine of Sharia (Islamic School of Jurisprudence). They show extreme intolerance to other versions of Hadith or Schools of Jurisprudence also to Sufi Islam founded originally by Hasan al-Basri (642-728), or all of the local transformation and followings of syncretic and mystic version of Sufi Islam which drew in people of diverse ethnicities and religion into these cultures.
Although Hanbali scholars such as Ibn Taymiyya (d.1328) and Ibn Qayyim al-Jouzia (d.1350) did display more tolerance to other views than their predecessors and were instrumental in making the teachings of Hanbali more generally accessible until Ibn 'Abd al-Wahhab (1703-92) emerged in the middle of the 18th century in Arabia with resurrection of rigidity both in his religious and political movement responding to the decline of the Ottoman empire and the increasing strength of Shia in Iran.
In 1902 Abd al-Aziz Ibn Sa'ud, who was from the Sa'udi family and a follower of the Bedouin faith of the Wahhabiyyah (the political and religious doctrine of Ibn 'Abd al-Wahab), took Riyadh, an event which led to his gradual conquest of the interior of the Arabian Peninsula. In 1927, Sa'ud signed a treaty with the British (who at that time were controlling parts of the Arabian Peninsula) which gave him full independence in exchange for his recognition of British suzerainty over the Gulf sheikdoms. Finally in 1932 he named his state the kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Wahhabiyyah then became the official doctrine of the state. Today the Saudi state remains firmly rooted in the Wahhabi version of Sharia.
Looking at the history, interestingly, it is observed that the orthodox and extremist ideologues of Islam received enormous patronization from the colonial and imperialist West. The motive of the nexus is to confront physically and ideologically, the emergence and strengthening of the progressive nationalist democratic forces in the post-colonial developing and underdeveloped nation states. Our experience of liberation war in 1971 is one of the vivid examples of this fact.
5.
Tipu Sultan writes in the 21st July issue of a Bangladeshi national daily, 'Prothom Alo': "During6 last decade, more than 40 bomb-grenade attacks were carried out. Various terrorist organizations active in the name of religion are involved in these attacks. Evidence of mutual cooperation among these organizations active under different names is found. Even they are found to cooperate with each other in the attacks and destruction."
If we try to draw a profile of the victims of the attacks carried out by different Islamic terrorist organizations active in Bangladesh from the cultural function of the Udichi, in 1999 till today, we shall find that, victims are progressive nationalist democratic political and cultural organizations or individuals, the Islamic Sufi shrines, prayer places of other minority religious groups, etc. In 2005, through the attack and assassination of Judges of lower courts and series blast of bombs in places of 464 Upazillas (Sub-districts), covering ninety nine percent area of Bangladesh, these terrorist organizations enormously expanded their area of attack challenging the judiciary and the law enforcing agencies of the state. These terrorists divulged quite detail information in these regards during the open trial conducted in the courts of Bangladesh in 2007-08.
It is reported that, the leaders of the Islamic terrorist organizations active in Bangladesh were trained in Afghanistan. Besides they have contacts with terrorist organizations in Pakistan and Kashmir. Leading personalities of these terrorist organizations commenced their organizational activity in Bangladesh from 1989 after their return from Afghanistan.
From the inception, the fundamentalist Islamist organizations enjoyed support and patronization from the Western allies. During the liberation war in 1971, they were involved and collaborated with the Pakistani Army to carry out rape, arson and genocide. Now they are attacking innocent civilians in cultural functions or political rallies of the organizations and individuals who are of nationalist and anti-imperialist characters. I wonder how Professor Emajuddin can find the terror activities being carried out in the name of Islam are part of anti-imperialist resistance.
Clearly, Professor Emajuddin has mixed up terrorist activities being carried out in the name of 'Islam' with the terror activities carried out against 'foreign occupation'. In the world, more non-Muslims than Muslims were on the street rallying in protest against war of invasion of Iraq or Israeli occupation of lands atrocities carried out in Palestine. From countries of the West including USA and UK up to the countries of the East, humanity has brought people together in greater anti-imperialist unity irrespective of caste, creed, gender, religion and ethnicity. These are the nationalist progressive democratic forces whose moral and ethical position is the bondage of universal message of humanity. They carry the inherent pledge to establish tolerant society recognizing commonalities of diverse cultures. They carry the promise of non-discrimination and freedom from economic exploitation and inequality.
The Islamist terror organizations who are furthering their activities of terror in the name of religion on the other hand are just agent provocateurs active in destabilizing the unity of the anti-imperialist struggles. Active in various names but they all are active in the name of Islam bearing common ideology of orthodox, radical and extremist version of Islam. In the present World context of political strategies, they may be quite seen as fifth columnists of the western new-imperialism.
The way Professor Emajuddin or Graham E. Fuller depicted the current World scenario vis-Ã -vis terrorism and the war against terrorism, the underlying cause of the conflicts and confrontation, missing a number of dimensions of it, particularly failing to distinguish rise of Islamic fundamentalism, the acts of violence and terror being perpetrated by them in the name of religion and their past and present relation with imperialist agents, may be quite so considered as a serious case of dereliction of responsibility. Particularly, their view about the various forces of anti-imperialist resistance without distinguishing them from the 'terrorist' organizations active to further their radical and orthodox socio-political agenda misusing the name of religion is monochromatic. It was necessary to analyze the ideological inspirations behind the struggles and movements, the war or terror of resistance being waged by the organizations worldwide against imperialism with that of non-state terror organizations having agenda of furthering fundamentalist Islam or similar radical ideology in the World. Without having intricately done that, to present an incomplete, biased and flawed thesis with intention or ignorance may be quite seriously misguiding.
1. A World without Islam, by Graham E. Fuller
http://www.asam.org.tr/fpr/fullerwwi.pdf
2. Islam-bihin Biswa (Part-1), by Professor Emajuddin Ahmed
http://www.ittefaq.com/content/2008/07/17/print0037.htm
3. Islam-bihin Biswa (Part-2), by Professor Emajuddin Ahmed
http://www.ittefaq.com/content/2008/07/19/print0417.htm
4. Pax Americana, by Brig Gen Shahedul Anam Khan ndc, psc (Retd)
http://www.thedailystar.net/story.php?nid=47078
5. Was 9/11 an inside job? By Kim Bredesen
http://www.eurozine.com/articles/2006-07-21-bredesen-en.html
6. Sob Jongi Gosthi Ek Sutre Gatha, by Tipu Sultan
http://www.prothom-alo.com/archive/news_details_home.php?dt=2008-07-
21&issue_id=990&nid=MTc1Nzg=
