Transcript Islamism - Adams State University

Islamism
Origins, Motivations,
Manifestations
Islamism
• Controversial term—devotees say theirs in
the true Islam
• Outsiders define it as: a belief that the
Sharia should be the basis for law,
political, and governmental organization.
• Western ideas are corrupt and ought to be
resisted.
Origins
• Long term Origins:
1. Failure of Muslim States—weakness of Ottoman Empire
2. Wahhabi movement. Arabia, led by Muhammad Ibn
'Abd al-Wahhab (1703-92)—source of Muslim
difficulties was improper practice of Islam.
• More Recent Origins: 1800-1950
1. Encroachment of the West: capital, financial systems, European
immigrants.
2. Western colonial control; economic dependence
3. Widespread social dislocation.
4. Efforts to adapt Western ideas, structures, and technology.
5. World War I and After—Arab Nationalism, Oil
Exploration, Arab Socialism—led to authoritarian
states (Saudi Arabia, Nasser’s Egypt, Pahlavi’s Iran)
that were seen as hostile to “true” Islam and, often,
had western Support.
Proponents
• Sayyid Qutb (1906-1966)
1. Egyptian scholar and critic—he also
attended college briefly at Greeley—
leader of Muslim Brotherhood
2. Social Justice in Islam (1949)
3. Critical of Western music and sensuality
4. Imprisoned by Nasser for ten years
5. Works inspired QTUBISM
Qutb
• World of Islam has ceased to exist
because nowhere is the sharia the law.
• The existence of government is evil—
Muslims should submit to the sharia—and
not to other men.
• A vanguard of the devout should wage
jihad to reintroduce true Islam.
Qutb
Sayyid Abul Ala al-Maududi
(1903-1979)
• Founded Jamaat-e-Islami, the Islamist political party for
India and Pakistan in 1940
• Worked to create Islamist state in Pakistan after 1947
(sentenced to death—sentenced commuted because
government feared his martyrdom)
• Perhaps the most widely read Muslim writer today
• Favors the seizing of power within a state and
transforming it to adhere to Sharia.
Islam wishes to destroy all States and governments
anywhere on the face of the earth which are
opposed to the ideology and programme of Islam
regardless of the country or the Nation which rules
it. The purpose of Islam is to set up a State on the
basis of its own ideology and programme,
regardless of which Nation assumes the role of the
standard bearer of Islam or the rule of which nation
is undermined in the process of the establishment
of an ideological Islamic State. It must be evident to
you from this discussion that the objective of
Islamic 'Jihad' is to eliminate the rule of an unIslamic system and establish in its stead an Islamic
system of State rule. Islam does not intend to
confine this revolution to a single State or a few
countries; the aim of Islam is to bring about a
universal revolution. --Maududi
Events in the Middle East
• Creation of Israel
• Failure to defeat Israel in three major wars—
1956, 1967, and 1973
• Illustrated to Islamists the illegitimacy of secular,
pan-Arab states and the bankruptcy of Arab
Socialism.
• Islamic Revolution among Shia in Iran in 1979—
showed that Islamism could humble the “great
Satan.”
• Iran exports Islamist revolution--Lebanon:
Hizbollah (Party of God); Palestine: Hamas
(“fervor”) (won 2006 Palestinian election)
Grand Ayatollah
Seyyed
Ruhollah
Khomeini –19031989—Brought
Islamist
Revolution to Iran
Soviet Invasion of Afghanistan-1979
• U. S. supported the Mujahideen with arms
• Soviets left in 1989
• Marxist government in Afghanistan
collapsed in 1992.
• That poor Muslims could topple a
superpower emboldened Islamists
• U. S. aid kept covert because of Cold War
• Taliban assumed power—imposed
Sharia—ousted by U. S. in 2002.
Al-Qa’eda
• Founded by Osama bin Laden in 1989, as
Soviets left Afghanistan
• Goals are to create a pan-Islamic
movement
• Eliminate foreign influence from Muslim
lands, both for its moral bankruptcy and for
its support of repressive regimes.
• Eliminate Israel
• Create a new Caliphate under Sharia
Osama bin Laden—
1957-2011
Founded Al Qa’eda--
For over seven years the United States has been
occupying the lands of Islam in the holiest of places,
the Arabian Peninsula, plundering its riches, dictating
to its rulers, humiliating its people, terrorizing its
neighbors, and turning its bases in the Peninsula into
a spearhead through which to fight the neighboring
Muslim peoples. We -- with God's help -- call on every
Muslim who believes in God and wishes to be
rewarded to comply with God's order to kill the
Americans and plunder their money wherever and
whenever they find it. We also call on Muslim ulema,
leaders, youths, and soldiers to launch the raid on
Satan's U.S. troops and the devil's supporters allying
with them, and to displace those who are behind them
so that they may learn a lesson. –Fatwa of Osama
(1998)
Islamism
• Threatens secular states—Egypt, Sudan,
Saudi Arabia, and even Turkey.
• Home grown Islamists have had success
in terrorism in Spain, and England.
• Islamism may be attractive to the young in
Western Europe’s large cities.
• Islamist movement have had success in
striking the United States (9-11)
March 11, 2004—
Madrid train
bombings—killed
191 and wounded
2050
September 11,
2001—World
Trade Center
Destroyed,
Pentagon Attacked,
Flight 93
Crashed.
19 hijackers, 2,973
confirmed dead,
another 24 are
missing and
presumed dead
The July 7, 2005 bombings of the London transit
system killed 52 and injured 700. The alleged
bombers—Mohammed Sidique Khan, Shehzad
Tanweer, Germaine Linday, and Hasib Hussain—
were all native Englanders
For the non-Muslims in Britain, you may wonder what you have done to
deserve this. You are those who have voted in your government who in turn
have and still continue to this day continue to oppress our mothers and
children, brothers and sisters from the east to the west in Palestine,
Afghanistan, Iraq and Chechnya. Your government has openly supported
the genocide of more than 150,000 innocent Muslims in Fallujah.
We are 100 per cent committed to the cause of Islam. We love death the
way you love life. I tell all you British citizens to stop your support to your
lying British government and to the so-called war on terror. And ask
yourselves: why would thousands of men be ready to give their lives for the
cause of Muslims?
What you have witnessed now is only the beginning of a series of attacks
which will intensify and continue to until you pull all your troops out of
Afghanistan and Iraq. Until you stop all financial and military support to the
US and Israel and until you release all Muslim prisoners from Belmarsh and
your other concentration camps. And know that if you fail to comply with
this then know that this war will never stop and that we are willing to give
our lives 100 times over for the cause of Islam. You will never experience
peace until our children in Palestine, our mothers and sisters in Kashmir,
and our brothers in Afghanistan and Iraq feel peace.—Shezad Tanweer July
6, 2006
Responses
• Accept the Truth of Islam
Daniel Pipes suggests the following for the U. S.
• Support states that contain Islamists and encourage them to do so.
Keeping Islamists out of power is in their interest and in ours.
• Pressure those states that are already Islamist to reduce their
aggressiveness toward their own populations and toward the
outside world.
• Celebrate and support those brave souls who stand up to the
Islamists.
• Label the Islamist groups that engage in terrorism as such.
• Do not work cooperate with Islamists, thereby encouraging them.
Dialogue with Islamists tends to enhance their stature.
• Be very careful about pushing for elections
Western Responses
• Multilateral action—Gulf War I
• Unilateral action—Gulf War II
• Economic Sanctions—problem of
effective compliance.
• Engagement—PLO and Israel
• Quarantine—(enforcement of
secular rules in Europe)
Challenges
• How does a state challenge an movement
that is not directly correlated with a state?
• How do modern/secular states engage a
movement that considers modernism and
secularism as “Satans?”
• Current challenge of ISIS
• Whither Israel?