Understanding Islam and the Politics of Jihad

Introduction

In the last two decades the political identity of Islam has become very prominent  and has been equated with fundamentalism and terrorism. It is a clear case of globalization of stereotypes and prejudices towards the Muslims. What I would like to argue is that there is a certain geo-politics without which understanding the Muslim identity as such is difficult. In the matrix of the geo-politics I would argue to locate the contemporary attitudes towards Muslims. There is a strong “otherness” constructed through media representations and war discourses. In an international matrix we have to consider 3 landmarks.

a)      Middle east crisis post the creation of Israel.

b)      Later cold war after Vietnam with special reference to Afghanistan.

c)      The post 9/11 scenario of world politics.

In between the creation of Pakistan will also be mentioned and necessary focus would be given.

The constructed Muslim identity

Mahmood Mamdani, the author of “Good Muslim, Bad Muslim: Islam, the USA and the Global war against terror”, attributes the distinction of Good Muslim, bad Muslim to George W. Bush. He says Bush moved to distinguish between “good Muslims” and “bad Muslims”. From this point of view, “bad Muslims” were clearly responsible for terrorism. He said that there are Good Muslims who were anxious to clear their names and consciences of this horrible crime. What underlies this is, unless proved to be “good” every Muslim was presumed to be “bad”. So all Muslims were now under obligation to prove their credentials by joining in a war against “bad Muslims”. So Mamdani contends that judgment of “good” and “bad” refer to Muslim political identities, not to cultural or religious ones.[1

Now we have to trace the root of political Islam that has roots in the colonial context, clubbed along in the process of Decolonization. The creation of Israel in 1948 is the root of the emergence of political Islam. The politics after World War II has to be also kept in mind.

Arabs and the creation of Israel:

The Arab countries went to have unity among each other that could be carried much further into some sort of political and economic union, like the European community. As early as 1931 an Islamic conference in Jerusalem put out this announcement: ‘The Arab lands are a complete and indivisible whole, all efforts are to be directed towards their complete independence, in their entirety and unified. For this Arab league was founded in 1945.

In such a context of building. Arab unity, the creation of Israel took place. We need to survey the reason of such an eventuality. The origin of the problem went back almost 2000 years to 71 C.E., when most of the Jews were driven out of Palestine, which was then their homeland, by the Romans. There were some Jews who remained. In 1897 some Jews living in Europe founded the World Zionist Organization at Basle in Switzerland. Zionists were people who believed that Jews ought to be able to go back to Palestine and have what they called a “National Homeland”, or a Jewish state. Jews had recently suffered persecution in Russia, France and Germany, and a Jewish state would provide a safe refuge for Jews. Britain became involved in 1917 when the Foreign Minister, Arthur Balfour, announced that Britain supported the idea of a Jewish national home called the “Balfour Declaration”. After 1919, when Palestine became a British Mandate, large number of Jews began to arrive in Palestine and the Arabs protested to this. But Nazi Persecution of Jews in Germany after 1933 caused a flood of refugees and by 1940, about half the population of Palestine was Jewish. In 1937 the British Peel commission proposed dividing Palestine into 2 separate states, one Arab and one Jewish, but the Arabs rejected the idea. The World War II made matters worse. There was an exodus of Jews from Europe and in 1945 the U.S.A pressed Britain to allow 1,00,000 Jews into Palestine, but the British refused. So Jews started a terrorist campaign and the most spectacular event was the blowing up of the King David Hotel in Jerusalem, which the British were using as headquarters. 91 people were killed and many were injured. British pressurized, asked the United Nations to deal with the issue and in November 1947 the U.N. voted to divide Palestine, setting aside roughly half of it to form an independent Jewish state. In 15 May 1948 Ben Gurion, Jewish leader declared the independence of the new state of Israel. It was immediately attacked by Arab states like Egypt, Syria, Jordan, Iraq and Lebanon.[2]

War of 1948

Creation of Israel brought on a war which most people expected the Arabs to win easily but Israelis defeated them and even captured more of Palestine than the UN partition had given them. They ended up with about 3 quarters of Palestine plus the Egyptian part of Eilat. Israel fought with desperation and the Arabs on the contrary were divided and poorly equipped. King Abdullah of Jordan was more interested in seizing the area of Palestine, west of the River Jordan which is known as west bank, so that he could make it part of his own state. The most tragic outcome of the war was that the Palestinian Arabs became the innocent victims who found themselves without a state or a homeland. Some lived in the Jewish state, some lived in the land seized by Jordan and some fled into Egypt, Lebanon, Jordan R Syria, living in refugee camps. Jerusalem was divided between Israel and Jordan. Arabs did not recognize Israel and they regarded this war as the first round in struggle to destroy Israel and liberate Palestine.

Suez war of 1956:- 

This was due to emergence of Col. Abdul Gammal Nasser, who became the President of Egypt who was a strong proponent of Arab unity. Britain and France was insecure as Nasser Nationalized the Suez Canal and many British and French, stock holders lost employment which would be compensated. Except Israel, all nations’ ships were allowed to pass through it. Britain, France and Israel decided to take on Egypt. Israel invaded Egypt on 29^th October 1956, capturing the Sinai Peninsula. Britain and France also attacked Egypt which created a huge outcry and USA fearing the Arabs drawing closer to U.S.S.R. refused to support Britain and France and U.S.A. and U.S.S.R agreed on a ceasefire where UN peace keeping force was sent. After this war Arabs and Nasser grew strong. Israel also succeeded in their goals but Britain and France were humiliated.

Six Days War of 1967:- 

In 1967 the Arab states joined together again in a determined attempt to destroy Israel. The lead was taken by Iraq, Syria and Egypt. From 1963 Iraq influenced by Baath party in Syria, believed in Arab Independence. Syria was ruled by Baath Party from 1966 and supported al Fatah, the Palestine Liberation Movement. In this while Nasser became hugely popular for his policies and leadership and he grew in confidence with the support of Iraq and Syria and decided time was ripe for attach, so he began to move troops up to the frontier in Sinai and closed the Gulf of Aqaba. Jordan and Lebanon massed troops around the border and Algeria joined them. Israel’s situation was hopeless. Israelis took initiative and launched a series of devastating air strikes which destroyed most of the Egyptian Air Force. Israeli troops moved with remarkable speed capturing the Gaza Strip, whole of Sinai from Egypt and Golan heights from Syria. With this Israeli victory, the Palestinians were again in Jewish state of Israel, living as refugees. The identity of Jews V/s Muslim/ Arabs became even more political and strong around the cause of liberation of Palestine.

Yom Kippur War of 1973:- 

The Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) under its leader Yasser Arafat brought pressure on Arab states to act. They hijacked a plane from Jordan and blew it up. Its climax came when the P.L.O murdered the 9 Israeli team in 1972 Munich Olympics. Anwar Sadat who succeeded Nasser to become president of Egypt, along with Syria deiced to attack Israel so that Americans would intervene. So they attacked Israel on the feast of Yom Kippur, hoping to catch the Israelis off guard. After some early Arab successes, Israelis using American weapons, were able to turn the tables. They could keep the 1967 area and even crossed the Suez Canal into Egypt. The US intervened. The Palestine cause seemed far from being achieved.

Two significant events after that were Camp David a peace accord between Egypt and Israel, 1978-79 mediated by Jimmy Carter, President of USA. It was signed between Anwar Sadat of Egypt and Menachem Begin of Israel. After this Sadat was assassinated for betraying the Muslim, Palestininian and Arab cause.

The second significant event was Oslo Accord signed between Israel and PLO brokered by US President Bill Clinton. It was signed between President of Israel Yitzak Rabin and PLO president Yasser Arafat. This was a landmark, but PLO became unpopular and Hamas became representative of Palestine identity and cause.[3] 

 What is interesting according to Mahmood Mamdani is that the PLO was secular in comparison, and Hamas was promoted by Israel to defeat PLO. Hamas was highly religious in its identity. Now Israel refuses to recognize the government led by Hamas. There are many aspects of the Middle East Crisis that led to the development of political identity of Islam, which the author cannot include in this paper.[4]  As Afsal Devji says that in the political identity construction of fundamentalist and terrorist groups the unseen and the in accessible Palestine homeland functioned as an almost mythical cause. So the middle east crisis becomes very important in the politicization of the Muslim identity.[5]

Makers of Muslim Political Identity

Before we dwell upon Cold War and Russian Invasion of Afghanistan, we need to understand a very interesting aspect of political Islam in respect to partition of India. Mahmood Mamdani says that while the political Christianity in the United States was work of fundamentalist religious clergy, the development of political Islam has been the work of non-clerical political intellectuals such as Muhammad Iqbal and Mohammad Ali Jinnah in colonial India, and Abul Mawdudi, Sayyid Qutb, and Ali Shariati in post colonial Pakistan,  Egypt and Iran respectively. The glaring exception was Ayatollah Ruhollah Kohomeini. After the Islamic Revolution that over threw the US backed Monarch of Iran, Shah Reza Pahlavi, Ayatollah made clerical power have constitutional sanction. Apart from that the pioneers of political Islam were not the religious Ulama but political intellectuals with an exclusive worldly concern. This is the reason why it makes more sense to speak of political Islam – the preferred designation in the Arab world for this movement than the Islamic fundamentalism the term most often used in post 9/11 America.

As Jinnah is active in the debate let us observe him in brief. The split between religious ulama and political intellectuals was evident as early as the anticolonial movement, i.e. the Partition of India. The intellectuals, i.e., Mohammad Jinnah, not the Ulama, pioneered the development of Islamist political movements, ultimately championing a call for a separate homeland for Indian Muslims, i..e. Pakistan. The conservative Ulama remained inside the secular Indian National Congress, modernist secular intellectuals called for on Islamic polity, at first autonomous, then independent. The secular Muslim intellectuals came to insist that Islam had become a political identity.[6]

A background to Jihad:- Locating in the Mileu of post Vietnam cold war and US – USSR conflict in Afghanistan.

For locting Jihad in the politics of cold war and Invasion of Afganistan by the Soviets, I subscribe to the theory of Mahmood Mamdani in his book ‘good Muslim, Bad Muslim’. He says that after the debacle of Vietnam war, the official America with the help of CIA and FBI fostered proxy wars in Laos, Africa and Latin America. This was by using insurgents and ariel bombings to further cold war politics as the Anti-war sentiment was at the peak, the US congress opposed all wars and no funding was sanctioned. So proxy wars along with nexus with Drug Mafia brought the politics of aiding right wing dictators accompanied by series of Coup de tat in Soviet favored countries by the U.S.A. Rebel groups like Unita in Angola, Renamo in Mozambique and Contras in Nicargua were fostered by the CIA. It is always believed that 24 December 1979 that Soviets invaded Afghanistan and then CIA aided Mujahidin started its operation in 1980. But it was 3 July, 1979 Jimmy Carter, President of USA signed the first directive for secret aid to the opponents of Pro-Soviet regime in Kabul. But this nexus thrived during Ronald Ragan’s presidency starting in 1980. There was a sustained co-operation between CIA and Pakistan’s ISI. Both intelligence agencies came to share a dual objective: militarily to provide maximum fire power to the Mjuahideen and, politically, to recruit the most radically anti-communist Islamists to counter Soviet forces. The combined result was to flood the region not only with all kinds of weapons but also with the most radical Islamist recruits. They flocked to ISI- run training camps in Pakistan, where  they were ideologically charged with the spark of holy war and trained in guerilla tactics, sabotage and bombings. The Islamist recruit came all over the world, not only from Muslim- Majority countries such as Algeria, Saudi Arabia, Egypt etc but also such Muslim minority countries as the United States and Britain. This is the setting in which the United States organized the Afghan Jihad and that informed its central objective, to unite a billion Muslims world wide in holy war, a crusade against the Soviet Union, on the soil of Afghanistan. A secondary objective was to turn a doctrinal difference between two Islamic sects the Minority Shia and the majority Sunni- into a political divide and thereby to contain the influence of Iranian Revolution as a Shia Affair. So in a way Afghan Jihad was an American Jihad. Right wing Islamism was introduced in Afghan Jihad. The right wing Islamism wad divided. The Reagen administration should be thanked for uniting varied schools in the name of liberation that created an “infrastructure of terror” that used Islamic symbols to tap into Islamic networks and communities. They did not bank on Afghan nationalism, but was cast as an international Jihad, where CIA looked for volunteers from Muslim populations all over the globe. The CIA looked for a Saudi Prince to lead this crusade but was unable to find one. It settled for the next best, the son of an, illustrious family closely connected to Saudi Royal House. He is none other than Osama Bin Laden. As Arundati Roy in her book “ordinary Man’s guide to the Empire” notes that Osama Bin Laden has a distinction of being created by CIA and to appear on the wanted list of F.B.I. After the Soviets were forced to leave Afghanistan in 1989, a meeting was held by Osama Bin Laden to decide the future of Jihad. This meeting was held in town of Khost. It was here the decision to wage Jihad beyond the borders of Afghanistan was taken and that organization to be formed was al- Qaeda, “The Base”.[7]

The Taliban:- 

If the assortment of majhideen group were the ideological products of cold war – the Taliban arose from the agony and the ashes of the war against the Soviet Union. The Taliban was a movement born across the border in Pakistan at a time when the entire population of Afghanistan had been displaced, not once but many times, and no educated class to speak was left in the country. A Talib was a student in the religious school, and the movement of students, Taliban was born of Warefare stretching across decades, of children born in cross border refugee camps of male orphans having company of boys in madrassahs, who were to ironically defend people from the lust and looting of Mujahideen Guerrillas. The promise that made the Taliban popular and brought it to power in 1995 is that it would establish law and order. The Taliban is backed by Deobandi Islam that is a Pakistani Import. Tailban is the result of an encounter of a pre-modern people with modern imperial power.[8] 

Events post 9/11:- 

The collusion of the Boeings against the Twin Towers his etched in history. This is also due to the impact created by unabated visual displays. It is ironical to say the least that the partners of Afgan Jihad turned against its own creators. Even today to bear an identifiable Muslim name, or to have beard or head dress would raise suspicion and racial profiling. The category of Islamic terrorism is artificial. Islamic Terrorism is thus offered as both description and explanation of the events of 9/11. It is no longer market (capitalism) nor the state (democracy) but culture (modernity) that is said to be the dividing line between those in favour of a peaceful, civic existence, and these inclined to terror. Artificial distinction are made of those who are modern and pre-modern. Muslims are portrayed as premoderns and also Anti-moderns. If we contrast earlier depictions of Africans with contemporary talk about Muslims, interesting insights can be mined. During the cold war, Africans were stigmatized as pre-modern not capable of modernity. But with the end of cold war, Islam and the middle east have displaced Africa as the hard pre-moderns, who oppose modernity in a rapidly globalizing world. In such a background Samuel Huntington’s ‘Clash of civilization’ theory has to be placed. He compartmentalized the Nation states and people into civilizations and said that conflicts of global politics will occur between different civilizations. Huntington cast Islam in the role of an enemy civilization. So from this point of view Muslims could only be bad.[9] Amartya Sen says that such monolithic formulation of identity is naïve. It assumes that civilization must be antagonistic, the civilizations to which people belong are antagonistic to each other. The assumption of classifying people according to civilization is faulty. The assumption of seeing people exclusively or primarily, in terms of religion based on civilization is a pervasively intrusive phenomenon in social analysis, refusing to see other richer ways of seeing people or recognizing other aspects of identities. He says that word ‘Islamic Terrorism’, where every man who follows Islam is fitted into one proto-type because there is an over dependence on the religious identity which suppresses other identities.[10]     These debates are of high value especially in the post 9/11 context.

Understanding Jihad and Islamic Fundamentalism

As we traced the root of Jihad, we have to understand that this also has to be understood in the context of Geo- Politics. After the disintegration of USSR, post-cold war Islam became the ‘other’. Before 9/11 US counseled other countries to reconcile with terrorism, but after 9/11 it declared ‘war on terrorism’ which is similar to Ronald Reagan’s ‘War on terror’ and the ‘war against the Evil Empire’ (Soviet).The Bush Government was a direct descendant of Reagan legacy in a post cold war context. The invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq in the pretext of 9/11 gave wings to imperial designs.[11] In such a context Jihad needs to be understood. The Jihad has replaced what used to be called fundamentalism at the edge of Muslim militancy. Islamic fundamentalism was part and parcel of Cold War politics and was concerned with the founding through revolution of an ideological state, fashioned in many respects on the communist model that was so popular in Africa and Asia following the World War II. Mawdudi and Jamaat- I Islami were Vanguards of Islamic fundamentalism the motivation to produce a utoplan society. That sort of fundamentalism enjoyed only one success i.e. the Islamic Republic of Iran. But this trend broke down with the end of cold war and beginning of globalization. So here the distinction between Islamic fundamentalism and Jihad becomes sharp according to Faisal Devji. Jihad is not concerned with political parties, revolutions or the founding of ideological states. In Jihad particular sites of struggles are themselves unimportant, their territories being subordinated to a larger and even metaphysical struggle for which they have become merely instrumental. It ends by de-territorializing Islam altogether, since it is not one country or another that is important, but instead Islam itself as a global entity. So Al- Zawahiri describes the importance of invoking the Palestinian struggle solely in terms of a way t gain the support of Arabs and Muslims. Here we see subordination of  local in favour of the global. Jihad is based on failure rather than success of local struggles. Some commentators say that after the fall of Soviet Union and end of cold war, Jihad took the role to challenge US hegemony.

Two factors make the Jihad into a global movement: The failure of local struggles and the inability to control a global landscape of operations by the politics of intentionality. These factors point to a radical individuation of Islam that is as divorced from modes of collective solidarity and action based on some common history of needs, interests or ideas. What is interesting is that after 9/11 a host of clerics and fundamentalists who included leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood, Hamas and Jamaal – e Islami denounced the attack on the Twin towers. Their protest does not show solidarity with the dead or opposition to a Muslim practice or violence against civilians. Their protest recognizes the Jihad’s radical novelty on grounds of Jihad’s globalization beyond a politics of causes and intentions that is organized around shared and therefore very particular histories of needs, interests or ideas. Jihad subverts traditional hierarchy of Islam and displaces hegemony. So whatever the future of this struggle, the Jihad is a product of globalization and modernity and has stolen the radical edge from fundamentalism. So in comparison to Al- Queda or other Mujahid groups, revolutionary groups like Muslim Brotherhood, Jamaat – Islami and Hamas look pale.[12]

Ijthihad:- 

Ijthihad is hermeneutics is Islam or legal interpretation of Sharla. Ijthihad refers to the institutionalized practice of interpretation of Sharia to take into account changing historical circumstances and, therefore different points of view. It makes for a substantial body of law constantly changing in response to changing conditions. The attitude to war Ijthihad is the single most important issue that divides society centred Islamists from state-central Islamists. Whereas society centred Islamists consist that the practice of Ijthihad be central to modern Islamic society, state centred Islamists are determined the “gates of Ijtihad’ remain forever closed. Mandai argues that the theoretical roots of Islamist political terror lie in the state centred, not the society centred movement.[13]  

Political Islam from the Indian Perspective

The International Discourses of stereotyping the Islamic identity has its ramifications in India as well. We have to bear in mind that the Partition of India the scars of migration that was inflicted on people the Kashmir problem the Demolition of Ayodhya, in 1992, the Bombay riots in 1993, Gujarat riots in 2002, have strengthened the overemphasis on the political identity of Islam. The recent Sachar report shows the consistent ‘ghettoziation’ and marginalization of the Muslim community. Especially after Gujarat riots 2002, the Muslim community feels even more alienated. The consistent stereotype of a Muslim is his anti-patriotic stance. This is taken as a given, with the over-emphasis of identity in relation to the idea of a nation state. The Muslim has to exhibit extra- ordinary patriotism or tolerance towards other fellow Indians to be accepted as a citizen itself. The logic of Good Muslim, bad Muslim works even in the Indian milieu. After the Shah Bano case, the Debate for Uniform Civil Code led to the construction of ‘otherness’ of the Muslim community.    

The Movie Mumbai Meri Jaan’ reflects beautifully the stereotype of how Muslims in Urban spaces, with their head gear and outfit are perceived as terrorists or criminals. They are also perceived as premodern. These are the products of the political identity construction that may also be appropriated by some sections of the Muslim community. Amartya Sen critiques such monolithic understanding of identity. He says that well intentioned Film-makers, Novelists, activists and artists counter stereotypes regarding Muslims by portraying them as peace loving and nation loving people. But they also subscribe to the same monolithic understanding of identity of over emphasis on the political religious identity. The understanding of multiple identities needs to be reinforced.

Conclusion

As theological students we are not insular to stereotypes regarding Muslims. We have to be aware of our prejudices and comprehend the process of political construction of Islamic identity. It is not given or essential. It is imperative that we doubt every prevalent discourses on Islam. We have to engage with its hermeneutically as a faith tradition and not from a comparative study perspective. Dialogical engagement with Islam, its literature, scholars and community at large is very important.   

  

Bibliography

Chomsky, Noam. Middle East Illusions: Peace, Security and Terror. New Delhi: Penguin Books, 2006.

Devji, Faisal. Landscapes of Jihad: Military, Morality, Modernity. London: Foundation Books, 2005.

Lowe, Martin. Mastering Modern World History. New Delhi. Mac Millan India Ltd, 1997.

Mamdani, Mahmood. Good Muslim, Bad Muslim: Islam, the USA and the Global War Against Terror. New Delhi: Permanent Black, 2005.

Sen, Amartya. Identity and Violence: Illusion of Destiny. New Delhi: Penguin Books, 2006.

Submitted to: Rev. Dr. M.M. Abraham

Submitted by: Merin Mathew

Submitted on: 10/09/2009

                                     

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[1] Mahmood Mamdani, Good Muslim, Bad Muslim. Islam, the USA, and the Global War Against Terror. (New Delhi: Permanent Black, 2005), 15, 16.

[2] Norman Lowe, Mastering Modern World History (New Delhi: Macmillan India Ltd, 1997) 223, 226-228.

[3] Ibid., 228-238.

[4] Mamdani, op.cit., 216.

[5] Faisal Devji, Landscapes of the Jihad: Militancy, Morality, Modernity (London: Foundation Books, 2005), 2,3.

[6] Mumdani, op.cit., 46-48.

[7] Mamdani, op.cit., 63-159.

[8] Mamdani, op.cit., 160-172.

[9] Ibid., 19-21.

[10] Amartye Sen, Identity and  Violence: Illusion of Destiny (New Delhi: Penguin Books, 2006), 40-42, 75-79.

[11] Noam Chomsky, Middle East Illusions: Peace, Security and Terror (New Delhi: Penguin Books, 2003), 235, 6.

[12] Devji, op.cit., 26-32.

[13] Mamdani, op.cit., 60, 61.