View Full Version : Flying Blind in the War on Terror (part 1)
The following is an interesting editorial lambasting our political leadership for their apparent failure in honestly addressing the Jihadi threat:
http://www.americanthinker.com/2008/04/flying_blind_in_the_war_on_ter.html
April 30, 2008
Flying Blind in the War on Terror
By Patrick Poole
Imagine that following the bombing of Peal Harbor in December 1941, that FDR had prohibiting the use of the terms "Nazi" or "Japanese Imperialism" due to pressure brought to bear by German and Japanese-American lobbying groups. Or at the height of the Cold War that the US government had determined to ban the use of "Soviet" or "communism" for fear of offending the sensibilities of Russian-Americans or European socialists.
Yet that is precisely what has happened following the revelation last week by the Associated Press that the State Department and the Department of Homeland Security has issued guidelines banning the use of "jihad", "mujahedeen" and other Islamic terminology with reference to Islamic terrorism. This move lays bare the ideological prison house of political correctness in which our top policymaker's reside. The strictures are so ridiculous that even President Bush can't help himself in violating the guidelines.
No one can claim in defense of this move that it has been rooted in years of serious study and assessment of the issue at the highest levels of government. If so, where might these studies and assessments be found? What series of government publications outlines the strategic threat doctrine of our enemy in the War on Terror, similar to that prepared on Soviet doctrine in the early years of the Cold War? What comprehensive doctrinal assessment may our military and political leaders consult to inform themselves on the tactics and strategy of our enemy? Such does not exist, and the adoption of the government's new "lexicon" is an admission that such a strategic threat assessment of our enemy will not be done. This new effort means that in essence we have chosen to fly blind in the Global War on Terror (GWOT).
The categorical failure of our political leadership nearly seven years after 9/11 to engage in even the slightest effort to assess exactly who the enemy is and how they propose to attack and defeat us borders on treason. What could possibly represent the complete abdication of responsibility by our political leaders than deliberately avoiding addressing this pressing, and for our men and women in uniform a life-and-death, issue?
So on what basis have our public officials made this recent decision? This new effort is being driven by politics, not public safety, as demonstrated by the fact that such pandering measures adopted by the British government which the State Department guidelines appear modeled after have completely failed to abate the terrorist threat there. And it reveals that our national security policy is being determined more by public affairs officials driven by political correctness than sober reflection by our nation's intelligence, military and law enforcement personnel.
It has already been observed that the Islamic organizations identified by the Justice Department as being directly tied to terrorism (Council on American-Islamic Relations, Islamic Society of North American, Muslim American Society, the Institute for International Islamic Thought, et al.) are the same ones who have been openly promoting the adoption of this new "lexicon". I would note that last September I provided a critical analysis of this "Truespeak" lexicon here at The American Thinker, observing that the sources of Islamic law relied upon do not match how the new policy's advocates have represented them.
The government does not have a very good track record in identifying Islamic extremists in its outreach efforts since the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. Just one example is the relationship that the government forged with supposed "moderate" Abdurahman Alamoudi, as noted last week by columnist Diana West, who the Pentagon tasked to establish the military's Islamic chaplains corps. Today, Alamoudi sits in a federal prison serving a 23 year sentence following his conviction on terror-related charges and for conspiring with Libyan intelligence to assassinate the Saudi Crown Prince.
Another example would be the series of White House meetings Palestinian Islamic Jihad leader Sami Al-Arian held with Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush before heading to prison on terrorism support charges. Al-Arian also hobnobbed with Hillary Clinton, Al Gore and Karl Rove.
There are any number of similar embarrassing incidents that could be cited here, but suffice it to say that the US government cannot point to a single success when it comes to identifying Islamic extremists in the past quarter-century.
To fully understand the gravity of the problem posed by the government's new "lexicon", consider that nearly 30 years after the Islamic revolution in Iran that religion might play a role in the rise of Islamic terrorism is itself a controversial proposition in government circles. Noting such a connection between elements of Islam and Islamic terrorism cost Pentagon J2 analyst Stephen Coughlin his job earlier this year. And yet Coughlin's groundbreaking study, "To Our Great Detriment: Ignoring What Extremists Say About Jihad", which poses a direct challenge to those who would exclude religious considerations in discussing Islamic terrorism, has not been addressed or critiqued by any of those promoting the government's guidelines.
There are two false assumptions that seem to underlie this new effort. One is narrowly limiting the enemy in the GWOT to Al-Qaeda alone. But this excludes many terrorist organizations, some of whom have openly allied with Al-Qaeda, that have already committed terrorist acts against Western targets and non-compliant Muslims in Asia, the Middle East, Northern Africa and Europe. It also fails to account for the radicalization process that is essential for the growth of Islamic terrorism, as noted in a study last summer by the New York Policy Department's intelligence unit, "Radicalization in the West: The Homegrown Threat".
Another misguided assumption is the belief that through engagement and appeasement, we can make Islamic radicals "our extremists". One might think that this policy -- tried and found wanting in our efforts to leverage the "Arab Afghans" that became Al-Qaeda in order to tie up the Soviet Union in Afghanistan -- would be thoroughly discounted. But in fact, following my recent exposure of the American Muslims for Constructive Engagement strategic partnership between a prominent government-funded defense and intelligence think tank and several extremist organizations, one of the top officials involved in the effort defended the alliance on claiming that such engagement would affect the moderation of Islamic extremists (my rejoinder can be found here).
So what is to be done?
At this point it must be admitted that in the absence of any assessment of the strategic threat posed by Islamic terrorism and identification of exactly who and what the threat is, any Islamic outreach efforts are not only premature but potentially damaging to our national security. While some claim that such outreach is necessary, virtually no consideration has been given to what exactly Islamic extremists might be able to gain through such efforts. And in light of the appalling past record of the US government in this regard, no action is infinitely preferable to flawed action. But if such outreach is conducted, it should occur with the full knowledge and approval of counterterrorism officials -- something that has not been done in the past.
We also must utilize existing tools to address existing terrorist support organizations already operating inside the US. Trial exhibits offered by the Justice Department in the Holy Land Foundation trial revealed the intent of Muslim Brotherhood affiliated groups to wage a "civilizational-jihadist process", intending to wage a campaign of cultural warfare against the US from within:
The Ikhwan [Muslim Brotherhood] must understand that their work in America is a kind of grand jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within and sabotaging its miserable house by their hands and the hands of the believers so that it is eliminated and God's religion is made victorious over all other religions.
As noted by my friend and colleague Army LTC Joseph Myers here at American Thinker following these revelations, he concluded that existing Defense Department regulations and guidelines, these groups should be listed as hostile foreign agents and threat organizations:
...In its own documents, the Ikhwan in America has defined itself as a hostile threat to the American constitutional order. It has identified itself as a "foreign agent" of the greater global jihad, and exists as part of the transnational "Ikhwan Movement." The Holy Land Foundation trial has established evidence of material support to terrorism by Brotherhood entities and ties to international terrorism, namely Hamas and likely other jihad terrorist organizations in the Middle East. Therefore, the Muslim Brotherhood in America meets all three criteria of DoD Directive 5240.1-R.
The irony of this situation is, of course, that any discussion of the Muslim Brotherhood's "grand jihad" is prohibited by the government's new guidelines.
Additionally, congressional leadership on these issues is sorely needed. While Rep. Sue Myrick (R-NC) recently unveiled her 10-point plan to begin addressing the domestic terrorist threat entitled, "Wake Up America", these tactical efforts do not mention the larger strategic issues of assessing and identifying the doctrinal foundations of Islamic terrorism and the process of radicalization that it relies upon. Her plan, however, is a welcome alternative to the current policy of congressional negligence with reference to the domestic terror threat. A proactive Congress asking administration officials hard questions will be requisite to turn back the ill-considered State Department and Homeland Security's new policy.
But the key component needed for any future government policies regarding terrorism must be the long overdue assessment of our enemy's strategy and ideology. The present guidelines effectively prohibit any such analysis. Until such a comprehensive study by our intelligence, military and law enforcement communities is complete, we are left flying blind in the war on terror. As we should have learned on 9/11 at the cost of lives of three thousand innocent civilians, the enemy's vision is not likewise obscured.
Patrick Poole is an occasional contributor to American Thinker, and is a consultant to the military and law enforcement on anti-terrorism issues and an expert in the operations and ideology of the Muslim Brotherhood in the West.
x-factor
05-04-2008, 09:30
I can't speak to the policy as a whole (this is the first I've heard of it), but I think the article might be confused about why the words jihad and mujahideen were prohibited. Its not necessarily for the politically correct reasons the article assumes. Its a question of knowing the culture you're trying to win hearts and minds in.
"Jihad" and "mujahideen" have very positive connotations in the Arabic language. Every time we use those terms for public statements we just confuse the audience by identifying the enemy as the good guys. Does it do us any good in the GWOT for the President to stand up and say:
"We will hunt down these holy warriors. We must put an end to their striving in the name of God and the threat they pose to the American way of life."
Thats what comes through to Muslim audiences when you use those terms. You sound like a confused cartoon villain pretending he's the good guy.
Call them criminals, call them extremists. Better yet, call them a cult, call them assassins, call them takfiris. But why would you want to call them what they want to be called? What they're dying to be called? Why reinforce their message to the Muslim world by painting them with heroic words?
I can't speak to the policy as a whole (this is the first I've heard of it), but I think the article might be confused about why the words jihad and mujahideen were prohibited. Its not necessarily for the politically correct reasons the article assumes. Its a question of knowing the culture you're trying to win hearts and minds in.
"Jihad" and "mujahideen" have very positive connotations in the Arabic language. Every time we use those terms for public statements we just confuse the audience by identifying the enemy as the good guys. Does it do us any good in the GWOT for the President to stand up and say:
"We will hunt down these holy warriors. We must put an end to their striving in the name of God and the threat they pose to the American way of life."
Thats what comes through to Muslim audiences when you use those terms. You sound like a confused cartoon villain pretending he's the good guy.
Call them criminals, call them extremists. Better yet, call them a cult, call them assassins, call them takfiris. But why would you want to call them what they want to be called? What they're dying to be called? Why reinforce their message to the Muslim world by painting them with heroic words?
Excellent point, IMHO.
....Thats what comes through to Muslim audiences when you use those terms. You sound like a confused cartoon villain pretending he's the good guy......
I disagree with your post.
The problem with Muslims and Isalm is that they believe. They believe that Isalm is the one true religion.
Islam is not stuck in the 8th Century. It is just like Cristianity in the 16th Century. It is spreading "The Word of God by the sword or the Immam."
Anything we do is seen as "Wrong". Right now the 99.9% of Muslims who are not doing anything violent are just sitting it out because "They believe."
Nothing will change until Islam cleans itself or they win.
Right now all we can do is fight a holding action until they win or the west understands and gets serious.
Islam is not stuck in the 8th Century. It is just like Cristianity in the 16th Century. It is spreading "The Word of God by the sword or the Immam."One word can describe the difference....TOLERANCE!
Stay safe.
Peregrino
05-04-2008, 13:06
I have to weigh in with X-factor on this one. When fighting hearts and minds, vocabulary defines the battlefield. Islam does have a lot of words to describe the terrorists in terms favorable to us, we just never see them or use them because we've allowed the Islamists to determine how the Islamic world views the actions of their "martyrs" (see how easy it is to influence perceptions by word choice? - we get pissed, they dance in the streets celebrating another "no nuts" getting his virgins). I remember seeing a "vocabulary sheet" a few years ago that listed the correct words/phrases we need to use. Unfortunately it never got the exposure it needed to become mainstream. That is something I blame on the current administration. Now it appears another poorly explained policy is once again "failing to communicate". If I can find the article, I'll post it. No promises though, I haven't seen it in years.
Jack Moroney (RIP)
05-04-2008, 13:16
Nothing will change until Islam cleans itself or they win.
.
I agree. Islam, first and foremost, is at war with itself. While one billion muslims present a target rich environment for co-option by the fundamentalists it demands a multifaceted, multiagency, international strategy to cull the wheat from the chaff by the non-islamic and non-fundamentalist islamic world working in a culture that non-muslims do not understand.
I"Jihad" and "mujahideen" have very positive connotations in the Arabic language. Every time we use those terms for public statements we just confuse the audience by identifying the enemy as the good guys. Does it do us any good in the GWOT for the President to stand up and say:
"We will hunt down these holy warriors. We must put an end to their striving in the name of God and the threat they pose to the American way of life."
Amazing. I had no idea.
Thank you, X-factor.
The problem with Muslims and Isalm is that they believe. They believe that Isalm is the one true religion.
I understand where you're coming from, but think that this is a dangerous over-generalization. Public opinion research on the "Muslim street" worldwide shows one thing consistently - a deep split over when the ends justify the means. Most Muslims (and the percentage does not vary much by region) do not believe in using violence against civilians to achieve sociopolitical goals. The percentage "against" drops when the researcher mentions a specific enemy such as Israel, but the the important point is that we in the West still share some important values with the great majority of Muslims.
I do, however, agree with your point that we are fighting a delaying action while Islam sorts itself out. American fighting men and women are placing themselves between peaceful Muslims and murderers belonging to an inflexible cult of death. If there is no chance that, given some breathing room, people without the benefit of an existing culture of free public discourse will decide that the Islamic Reformation begins in 2011 instead of on 9/11, then this would be a futile exercise. I believe that it will take longer than that, partly because the lack of free speech has tribal as well as modern political roots, but also because we are doing a piss poor job of public diplomacy.
"...Jihad" and "mujahideen" have very positive connotations in the Arabic language. Every time we use those terms for public statements we just confuse the audience by identifying the enemy as the good guys. Does it do us any good in the GWOT for the President to stand up and say:
"We will hunt down these holy warriors. We must put an end to their striving in the name of God and the threat they pose to the American way of life."
...Call them criminals, call them extremists. Better yet, call them a cult, call them assassins, call them takfiris. But why would you want to call them what they want to be called? What they're dying to be called? Why reinforce their message to the Muslim world by painting them with heroic words?
I fail to see how refusing to call them Jihadists will have any effect. Whether we admit it or not, they are fighting to make Islam supreme to all other religions. And, they are using the Quran to justify their actions.
The following is a brief summary, from "Islam 101" (http://jihadwatch.org/islam101/) describing the Quranic justification for waging war to spread Islam:
"Those Westerners who manage to pick up a translation of the Quran are often left bewildered as to its meaning thanks to ignorance of a critically important principle of Quranic interpretation known as "abrogation." The principle of abrogation -- al-naskh wa al-mansukh (the abrogating and the abrogated) -- directs that verses revealed later in Muhammad's career "abrogate" -- i.e., cancel and replace -- earlier ones whose instructions they may contradict. Thus, passages revealed later in Muhammad's career, in Medina, overrule passages revealed earlier, in Mecca. The Quran itself lays out the principle of abrogation:
2:106. Whatever a Verse (revelation) do We {Allah} abrogate or cause to be forgotten, We bring a better one or similar to it. Know you not that Allah is able to do all things?
It seems that 2:106 was revealed in response to skepticism directed at Muhammad that Allah's revelations were not entirely consistent over time. Muhammad's rebuttal was that "Allah is able to do all things" -- even change his mind. To confuse matters further, though the Quran was revealed to Muhammad sequentially over some twenty years' time, it was not compiled in chronological order. When the Quran was finally collated into book form under Caliph Uthman, the suras were ordered from longest to shortest with no connection whatever to the order in which they were revealed or to their thematic content. In order to find out what the Quran says on a given topic, it is necessary to examine the other Islamic sources that give clues as to when in Muhammad's lifetime the revelations occurred. Upon such examination, one discovers that the Meccan suras, revealed at a time when the Muslims were vulnerable, are generally benign; the later Medinan suras, revealed after Muhammad had made himself the head of an army, are bellicose...
...Then there is this passage revealed just after the Muslims reached Medina and were still vulnerable:
2:256. There is no compulsion in religion. Verily, the Right Path has become distinct from the wrong path. Whoever disbelieves in Taghut {idolatry} and believes in Allah, then he has grasped the most trustworthy handhold that will never break. And Allah is All-Hearer, All-Knower.
In contrast, take 9:5, commonly referred to as the "Verse of the Sword", revealed toward the end of Muhammad's life:
9:5. Then when the Sacred Months (the 1st, 7th, 11th, and 12th months of the Islamic calendar) have passed, then kill the Mushrikun {unbelievers} wherever you find them, and capture them and besiege them, and prepare for them each and every ambush. But if they repent and perform As-Salat (Iqamat-as-Salat {the Islamic ritual prayers}), and give Zakat {alms}, then leave their way free. Verily, Allah is Oft-Forgiving, Most Merciful.
Having been revealed later in Muhammad?s life than 50:45, 109, and 2:256, the Verse of the Sword abrogates their peaceful injunctions in accordance with 2:106. Sura 8, revealed shortly before Sura 9, reveals a similar theme:
8:39. And fight them until there is no more Fitnah (disbelief and polytheism: i.e. worshipping others besides Allah) and the religion (worship) will all be for Allah Alone [in the whole of the world]. But if they cease (worshipping others besides Allah), then certainly, Allah is All-Seer of what they do.
8:67. It is not for a Prophet that he should have prisoners of war (and free them with ransom) until he had made a great slaughter (among his enemies) in the land. You desire the good of this world (i.e. the money of ransom for freeing the captives), but Allah desires (for you) the Hereafter. And Allah is All-Mighty, All-Wise.
9:29. Fight against those who believe not in Allah, nor in the Last Day, nor forbid that which has been forbidden by Allah and His Messenger and those who acknowledge not the religion of truth (i.e. Islam) among the people of the Scripture (Jews and Christians), until they pay the Jizya with willing submission, and feel themselves subdued.
9:33. It is He {Allah} Who has sent His Messenger (Muhammad) with guidance and the religion of truth (Islam), to make it superior over all religions even though the Mushrikun (polytheists, pagans, idolaters, disbelievers in the Oneness of Allah) hate (it).
The Quran's commandments to Muslims to wage war in the name of Allah against non-Muslims are unmistakable. They are, furthermore, absolutely authoritative as they were revealed late in the Prophet's career and so cancel and replace earlier instructions to act peaceably. Without knowledge of the principle of abrogation, Westerners will continue to misread the Quran and misdiagnose Islam as a "religion of peace."
From the Pakistani "Daily Times" (http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2008%5C05%5C03%5Cstory_3-5-2008_pg7_1):
‘Anti-Pakistan’ militants being ‘detoxified’
* Haji Namdar says ‘we will never wage jihad inside Pakistan’
By Iqbal Khattak
BARA: Haji Namdar, the little-known pro-Taliban commander in Khyber Agency who survived a suicide attack on Thursday, said that he was helping to ‘detoxify’ militants staying with him through ‘Islamic classes’, that teach them that attacking Pakistani forces, people or state installations “is no jihad at all”, and that rather, by “doing so we are strengthening anti-Islamic forces”.
Namdar heads the religio-militant Amar Bil Maroof Wa Nahi Anil Munker (Promotion of Virtue and Suppression of Vice) organisation in the Bar Kambarkhel area. “These [mujahideen] leaders brainwash teenagers, telling them that each and every Pakistani is their enemy and his or her killing is justified. And it is also jihad that they should keep killing Pakistanis,” said Namdar. “I am reforming these mujahideen as Islam does not allow jihad against Muslims.”
Talking to Daily Times in an exclusive interview two days before the suicide attack that targeted him and left many injured at his headquarters in Takya, he, however, did not name any of the Taliban leaders who were ‘brainwashing teenagers’.
‘No jihad at all’: Expressing concern over the “anti-Pakistan posture” of some mujahideen leaders in the Tribal Areas, with many having justified attacks inside the country as ‘jihad’, he said, “We will never wage jihad inside Pakistan. Afghanistan needs mujahideen to liberate that country from United States-led foreign occupation.”
“Yes, we do attack the US forces across the border and that is what real jihad is all about,” he admitted. “The way [US] President [George W] Bush is waging a crusade against Islam, we will hit the US wherever and whenever it is possible. Our jihad against the US in Afghanistan goes on,” he added.
Namdar’s influence is restricted to the Bar Kambarkhel tribe, but following his admission that he ‘plays host’ to tribal and foreign militants, this makes him a potentially influential commander in a region through which supply lines to the US and NATO forces in Afghanistan pass.
He said his aim was to make it clear to the mujahideen where and against whom the ‘real jihad’ is to be waged. “My aim is to show them which path is the correct one for waging jihad. Our real enemy is one that has reached closer to us, and is occupying Afghanistan. Why should mujahideen target Pakistan when this country provides everything for jihad in Afghanistan,” he said.
Namdar said he opposed suicide attacks inside Pakistan, but justified them as the “best weapon” against the enemy. “We have to finish our enemy in Afghanistan by any means and suicide bombing is the best weapon.”
His acknowledgement of the presence of Taliban militants and their ‘active participation’ in cross-border anti-US jihad marks a new beginning for the Taliban-linked insurgency in Afghanistan, as reinforcement from Khyber Agency would boost the morale of militants in opening up a new front against Kabul.
Astraeus
05-05-2008, 14:27
انا اجهد في دراساتي
It's an everyday phrase I've used before which includes the verb derived from the noun Jihad. "I'm struggling in my studies." One letter different. That's the form three verbal form of جهد and is commonly used by students around exam time at the American University of Cairo, Beruit, or wherever.
It's true that within the Middle East Jihad is a word and concept with deep religious connotations, but connotes to the vast majority of Muslims the value of striving in one's daily life to do the best that one can. If the U.S. wants to prevent Al-Qaeda from defining the religious vocabulary of the Islamic world, it should avoid propagating these same definitions itself in English.
Based on my very limited experience I would say its a rather large mistake to look at Islam, or Middle Eastern culture in general as some sort of unified or monolithic entity. It is true that moderate voices are failing to make themselves heard, and Middle Eastern society in general is failing to marginalize the extreme voices with any efficacy. I would submit that the best thing that the West can do to deny religious extremists the legitimacy they seek, is to refer to them as common criminals rather then using the heroic vocabulary they use themselves to ascribe a stature they do not deserve. They are not holy warriors, martyrs, or the "pious ones."
This is not about political correctness, it is about not making a mistake in the war of ideas that would be similar to condemning Timothy McVeigh as a "holy saint" after his attack in Oklahoma City was carried out on the anniversary of the raid on David Koresh's Christian militia in Waco.
My 0.02 respectfully,
Greg
I defer to one more learned on the subject and who has spent his adult life studying the Quran and the hadiths, Robert Spencer:
http://frontpagemagazine.com/Articles/Read.aspx?GUID=585FD8A7-ADD1-438A-8395-B8131F2B25B3
The Definition of "Jihad"
By Robert Spencer
FrontPageMagazine.com | 5/22/2007
In a recent FrontPage interview, Mary Habeck, a professor at Johns Hopkins and author of a book about the jihadists entitled Knowing the Enemy, makes a number of observations about the jihad ideology, and why more Muslims don't stand up to the jihadists, that are worth looking at more closely.
...Thus, Muslims are allowed to fight these unbelievers in a just jihad. Their definition of jihad is quite different from that generally accepted by Muslims today. Most Muslims say that jihad is first and foremost an internal struggle to control one's desires or, if it is about fighting, jihad is a defensive just war.
Most Muslims may indeed believe that. Yet while this likelihood provides comfort for non-Muslims with its suggestion that most Muslims would prefer to tend to their own souls rather than to wage war against their non-Muslim neighbors, it actually doesn’t establish what what both Muslims and non-Muslims seem to wish it did. This is because the traditional pedigree of the spiritual jihad is not as firm as it is often advertised to be. The hadith in which Muhammad makes a distinction between “greater jihad” of spiritual struggle and the “lesser jihad” of warfare doesn't appear in any of the hadith collections that Muslims consider most reliable. Jihad understood as warfare against unbelievers in order to establish the hegemony of Islamic law has much greater support in Islamic scripture, tradition, and historical practice -- and leading jihad theorists including Hasan al-Banna, the founder of the Muslim Brotherhood, and Abdullah Azzam, Osama bin Laden’s friend and intellectual mentor and co-founder with him of Al-Qaeda, challenge the authenticity of the saying in their writings. This only buttresses their claim, which Habeck notes below, to represent the "true believers."
These extremists make jihad into the central tenet of their religion, arguing that it is primarily about fighting both defensively and offensively (to spread the just laws of Islam). They also say that any Muslim who does not participate in their jihad is not a "true believer," and is at most a sinner and at worst an unbeliever and can therefore be killed with impunity.
Habeck gives no hint here of the fact that the theology of offensive and defensive jihad is far older than the "extremists," and is in fact rooted in the Qur'an (2:193 and 9:29 and for offensive jihad) and Muhammad's statements, notably the one in which he directs his followers to offer non-Muslims conversion, subjugation, or war. Then there are the schools of Islamic jurisprudence, which all teach the necessity for offensive jihad in order to subjugate unbelievers under the rule of Sharia.
All this answers the follow-up question below far more convincingly than Habeck answers it: the moderate Muslims don't speak out more forcefully against the jihadists because if they do, the jihadists can easily portray them as unfaithful Muslims, and quote Qur'an and Sunnah to establish their position. And that can make the lives of the moderates difficult in many ways.
Habeck is aware of this. Last year, Daveed Gartenstein-Ross reviewed her book and noted that in it she drew a sharp distinction between jihadist theology and "traditional Islam." I wrote to him, asking him a number of questions about the content of this distinction and related matters, and he discussed them with Dr. Habeck over lunch. At the time, he got permission from her for me to publish her answers from his emails -- and he gave me his permission also to publish what he wrote to me.
Here's what Gartenstein-Ross wrote to me in response: "I had lunch with Prof. Habeck on 8/8, a couple of days after receiving your e-mail, and was able to put the question to her myself. Prof. Habeck's answer was that she used the term 'traditional Islam' sloppily in her book. She says that she generally has used the term two ways: referring to Islam as practiced before Napoleon's 1798 invasion of Egypt and referring to Islam as practiced in individual societies such as Indonesia or Pakistan before exposure to Wahhabism/Salafism or other foreign strains that alter the indigenous practice." So in other words, she is referring to what I refer to as "cultural Islam."
I had also asked if Dr. Habeck could name any orthodox sects or schools of Islamic jurisprudence that rejected the necessity of jihad warfare in order to institute Sharia. Gartenstein-Ross answered: "I also put to her your question about traditional Islamic sects that 'reject the proposition that the umma must wage war in order to establish Sharia.' She agreed without hesitation that such sects have not existed within mainstream Islam historically."
Yet despite knowing this, Habeck goes on in the FP interview to assert that the jihadists have hijacked Islam, and to make several other dubious assertions:
FP: Why are “moderate” Muslims so silent, in general, in the face of jihadism?
Habeck: There are probably many reasons for this, but I can give at least three. First, many Muslims have spoken out against jihadism, but they have been ignored by Western media. There was, for instance, a huge demonstration against violence carried out in the name of Islam is Morocco not too long ago (late 2005), but I don't remember reading anything about this is in the mainstream media.
Maybe the mainstream media didn't cover it, but here is a story about it from Lebanon's Daily Star. The story says that the demonstrators were protesting "Al-Qaeda's decision to kill two Moroccan hostages in Iraq," and were "holding banners and chanting 'Muslims are brothers. A Muslim does not kill his brother.'" So they were upset about Al-Qaeda killing Muslims. That is a phenomenon we have noted here many times: Muslims taking umbrage at Al-Qaeda killing fellow Muslims. But where are the protests against Al-Qaeda killing unbelievers? It is not enough for Muslims to "speak out against jihadism" only when its victims are Muslims, but to remain silent when they're non-Muslims -- not enough at least for non-Muslims.
I read memri.org and see many, many moderate Muslims speaking out against these guys every day. Second, in many countries these guys control the public arena and intimidate or even murder anyone who speaks out against them. The intimidation carried out in Western countries recently shows the power that just a few fanatics can have. Finally, there is a peculiar dynamic going on in the Islamic world: most people do not trust their governments or media to be reporting the truth, so they refuse to believe that the jihadis are carrying out these terrible atrocities. It's far more satisfying to believe that the government/US/Zionists are lying about all this rather than to confront the fact that someone has hijacked your religion for their own purposes.
Indeed. And it's also far more satisfying to pretend that the jihadists have "hijacked" an essentially peaceful Islam rather than confront the ugly reality of the deep roots that the jihad ideology has within Islam, even when one has acknowledged that the facts are otherwise.
Now certainly most Muslims aren't jihadists. Most probably do think of jihad primarily as a spiritual struggle. But to pretend that the jihadists don't have the intellectual upper hand in the Islamic world today is to undercut any chances for genuine Islamic reform, which can only proceed from an honest acknowledgment of the realities of Islamic doctrine, not from ignoring those elements and implying they don't exist.
Robert Spencer is a scholar of Islamic history, theology, and law and the director of Jihad Watch. He is the author of seven books, eight monographs, and hundreds of articles about jihad and Islamic terrorism, including the New York Times Bestsellers The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (and the Crusades) and The Truth About Muhammad. His latest book is Religion of Peace?.
x-factor
05-05-2008, 16:05
Now certainly most Muslims aren't jihadists. Most probably do think of jihad primarily as a spiritual struggle. But to pretend that the jihadists don't have the intellectual upper hand in the Islamic world today is to undercut any chances for genuine Islamic reform, which can only proceed from an honest acknowledgment of the realities of Islamic doctrine, not from ignoring those elements and implying they don't exist.
Thats the point exactly. By allowing the jihadists to control the vocabulary you allow them to perpetuate and strengthen their grip on the debate in the Muslim world, which as we've all said is at the center of this whole conflict.
Astraeus
05-05-2008, 17:19
Thats the point exactly. By allowing the jihadists to control the vocabulary you allow them to perpetuate and strengthen their grip on the debate in the Muslim world, which as we've all said is at the center of this whole conflict.
I would concur, but would add that the "is Islam a religion of peace?" discussion misses the point. On the one hand, it is preposterous to claim that Islam is not being used as a very effective vehicle to mobilize Muslims into violence. Of course violence has a religious dimension in the Middle East, every aspect of life has a religious dimension in the Middle East.
On the other hand, those who quote certain passages of the Koran and Hadith on a regular basis to show that Islam is not a "religion of peace" miss the context that they were written in just as surely as the religious extremists who interpret them as a call to war.
It is ironic that the two voices most loudly proclaiming that Islam is a religion of war are Osama bin Laden and some American scholars like the ones cited above. Seems like a self-fulfilling prophecy to me.
From the very beginning Islam was not just a religion, but was also a new tribe, political system, and religion struggling for existence in a harsh political climate. Islam does blend religion and politics (including the political instrument of war) in a unique way not seen in other religions. But the reality is more complicated then labeling Islam either a peaceful religion or a religion of war.
As an example, the concept of martyrdom within Islam:
it is interesting to note that King Hussein's military museum in Amman Jordan, which is called the "Martyr museum," celebrates both fallen military heroes from the 1967 war against Israel, and those who fought against the Muslim Arab forces of Yassir Arafat's PLO during the Black September uprising in 1970. The relocation of these Palestinian militants to southern Lebanon would later lead Israel to invade Lebanon in 1982 to fight against the same people. From the PLO's perspective, both those PLO fighters who died fighting against the Jordanian military in September 1970, and later on fighting against the Israeli military in 1982 are considered martyrs. For both the Jordanian king and the PLO, using the Islamic concept of martyrdom lends their heroes greater credibility in Islamic society. It doesn't matter to either of them what the Koran says.
Does it really matter to Osama bin Laden what conclusions throughly studying the Koran would yield about what "true" Islam says about martyrdom? I think not. While bin Laden considers a form of martyrdom killing oneself to kill 'infidel' including Muslims who accept the West, many Muslims believe that the Koran says that students who die studying abroad (in the West or elsewhere) are martyrs. A Jordanian academic whose cousins were killed in the Amman hotel bombings considered them to be martyrs and the bombers to be murdering infidel. The bombers considered themselves martyrs and his cousins, who were in a western establishment to be infidel. So based on these things, how does one approach the concept martyrdom within Islam or Islam in general? Is it a line in the Koran, or is it an understanding that is constantly being constructed and revised by the individuals and societies that practice the religion? Religion is an intersubjective reality lived by human beings, not a static, monolithic entity that can be described as "peaceful" or otherwise.
I would concur, but would add that the "is Islam a religion of peace?" discussion misses the point. On the one hand, it is preposterous to claim that Islam is not being used as a very effective vehicle to mobilize Muslims into violence. Of course violence has a religious dimension in the Middle East, every aspect of life has a religious dimension in the Middle East.
On the other hand, those who quote certain passages of the Koran and Hadith on a regular basis to show that Islam is not a "religion of peace" miss the context that they were written in just as surely as the religious extremists who interpret them as a call to war.
Astraeus, which one is it? It is either a religion that is used very effectively to "...mobilize Muslims into violence", or it is a peaceful religion taken out of context. Albeit, one taken out of context by 'criminals' in Iran, Iraq, Sudan, Somalia, Thailand, The Phillipines, Indonesia, Egypt, Lebanon, Gaza, Yemen, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Algeria, etc.
It is ironic that the two voices most loudly proclaiming that Islam is a religion of war are Osama bin Laden and some American scholars like the ones cited above. Seems like a self-fulfilling prophecy to me.
Yeah, I'm sure a Muslim on the street decides to engage in violence because an American scholar claims that Islam is not a religion of peace; in the same way that a Catholic priest decides to engage in pedophilia because of criticism of those that do.
Does it really matter to Osama bin Laden what conclusions throughly studying the Koran would yield about what "true" Islam says about martyrdom? No. Nor does it have any bearing on the question of whether or not Islam is a religion of peace.
It is telling that the followers of Ahmadiyya Islam, who do believe Islam is a Religion of Peace, are not considered true muslims by Shia and Sunni alike. They are also persecuted in countries such as Pakistan and Indonesia. Recently, several Ahmadiyyan mosques have been burned in Indonesia.
Hundreds of protesters chanting "Kill, kill" set fire Monday to an Indonesian mosque belonging to a Muslim sect they claim is heretical, police said... The attack was the latest targeting the Ahmadiyah sect in Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim nation.
Most mainstream Muslims consider Ahmadiyah heretical because it does not consider Muhammad to be the final prophet. The sect was founded at the end of the 19th century in Pakistan.
http://www.bakersfield.com/893/story/429366.html
May I propose a thought experiment?
I'll be the first to admit I'm likely to have left some factors out, but that shouldn't affect the idea at a conceptual level. Those with greater familiarity can, perhaps, add some of the factors I neglected.
Let's suppose we have a specific, measurable outcome - say, suicide bombing. A person either ends life as a suicide bomber, or dies some other way. Other outcomes could be used, but the goal would be something easily measured that was clearly exclusive between one category and another. Choosing "terrorist" probably wouldn't work, since my perception is that terrorists have many levels of involvement.
Next, let's define a population to study. Ideally, it would encompass the whole world; but, to simplify - and to focus on religion - we might limit our population to 8 nations. Those might be the U.S., China, India, Venezuela, Russian Republic, Iraq, Jordan and Saudi Arabia. I chose this mix to get a fairly wide distribution, so it isn't anything unique.
Now, we need to look at some factors - we can throw just about anything that might change the outcome. Religion would be one factor, of course; we could look at income level, ethnic background, nationality, educational level, and so forth. What we would want is to look at factors that were different between different groups - finding those might be a major task.
Anyway, we could crunch all the numbers and use a method called "logistic regression" to form predictions about the odds someone would be a suicide bomber. If we did that, we could determine which factors were important, and how big a role they played.
My perception (which I freely admit could be due to ignorance of a lot of issues) is that religion is an important determinant. On the other hand, some of the Emirates sound as if they are quite peaceful.
Where this would get interesting is if (big if, not yet determined) religion is a key factor and does increase the odds of specific behaviors, then we might conclude that shifts of religious preference could have implications for the behaviors in any society - the U.S., or U.K, for example.
I doubt such a study will ever get done...but it would be interesting, I think. :munchin
The problem is too complex to be handled by a regression model. Believe me, I have tried. When you build a list of drivers of terrorist acts (using Sageman and others to identify the drivers then assembling the panel data from various sources), you end up with low explanatory power due to the multicollinearity between regressors.
A better option would be a system dynamics model which explicity models the relationships between variables, but then you get to a level of complexity that is so high that you will never be able to use the work to influence a decision maker. The exercise becomes academic and results in no dead tangos.
The problem is too complex to be handled by a regression model. Believe me, I have tried. When you build a list of drivers of terrorist acts (using Sageman and others to identify the drivers then assembling the panel data from various sources), you end up with low explanatory power due to the multicollinearity between regressors.
Fascinating! I should have known someone had already pursued that path...
Is there anything you could post (without compromising anything or anyone) about the models/factors/and impacts? Or is it too complex for someone who isn't a specialist in the field to understand?
An apropos editorial skewering the DHS's attempts to decouple Islam and Jihadism from terrorism:
May 13, 2008, 6:15 a.m.
The Government’s Jihad on Jihad
Still lookin’ for love in all the wrong places.
By Andrew C. McCarthy
The Department of Homeland Security (and, by extension, the Bush administration) is on a jihad against jihad — the word, that is. Its mission is to purge such terms as jihadism, Islamo-fascism, and mujahideen from our public lexicon. Is this a serious strategy or an episode in politically correct indoctrination? That question is being banged around in several venues, not least National Review Online’s “Corner.”
Last Friday, Mark Krikorian of the Center for Immigration Studies contended that the DHS gambit is reminiscent of an effort by his nemesis, Linda Chavez, who chairs the Center for Equal Opportunity (CEO), to douse what she took to be inflammatory expressions of anti-immigrant sentiment. Mark was not merely straining to find an angle in a story only tangentially related to immigration; he noted that the DHS effort is being spearheaded by Dan Sutherland, a former employee of Linda’s who now heads DHS’s Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties.
Krikorian’s argument drew sharp rebukes from CEO’s president Roger Clegg as well as NR’s own John J. Miller (a CEO co-founder and formerly its vice president). They rose to Sutherland’s defense, essentially countering that Mark was engaged in a baseless guilt-by-association tactic, that association with Linda is nothing to be guilty about in any event, and that — as John put it, based on discussions he’s had with Sutherland — DHS is implementing a strategy intended to peel our potential Muslim allies away from al-Qaeda, “not an exercise in politically correct nonsense.” (To be clear, John took pains to say he was not assessing the soundness of the DHS strategy, just that he accepts Sutherland’s explanation of the agency’s thinking.)
Like JJM and Roger, I am fond of Linda (though I tend to disagree with her on immigration issues). Unlike John and Roger, I don’t know Dan Sutherland, though the fact that they think well of him surely weighs in his favor. That said, I didn’t find Mark’s points to be frivolous, much less offensive. I leave to him to defend the parallel he bases on Linda’s arguments about immigration rhetoric. (He undertakes to do that, here.) I’m not familiar enough with what Linda has said to make an informed judgment, though I do know from my own experience that lessons from mentors tend to get applied in other contexts. What’s more, the Krikorian post did not rely solely on the Sutherland/Chavez tie. Mark recounted that Sutherland has been a point person for DHS’s Muslim outreach initiatives, and is described by a top official from one activist group as “a wonderful breath of fresh air from Homeland Security.”
Rather than address the merits of Mark’s analogy, I prefer to focus on what DHS is trying to accomplish. Respectfully, I do believe the agency, like the wider government, is engaged precisely in an exercise in political correctness.
This, after all, is not the first time such an issue has arisen. Despite mountainous evidence to the contrary, President Bush brands Islam a “religion of peace,” a status raised by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to “religion of love and peace.” The administration routinely designates as “moderates” such luminaries as Iraq’s Ayatollah Ali Sistani (who does not meet with non-Muslims — whom he regards as unclean — and calls, for example, for the brutal killing of homosexuals, citing Islamic law), the former Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (a creation of Iran which has dropped the “Revolution” from its title but remains dedicated to the establishment of a Khomeinist sharia state), and the Palestinian Fatah organization (the legacy of Yasser Arafat which sports its own terror wing and a charter committed to Israel’s destruction).
In Orwellian lockstep, DHS (like the FBI) now compels many of its agents to endure cultural sensitivity training designed to inculcate this relentlessly sunny view of Islam. A year ago, moreover, I caught the Transportation Safety Administration, a DHS agency, posting a press release from CAIR (Council on American-Islamic Relations) on its official government website.
At the time, CAIR, which was created by an arm of Hamas and has a history of operatives being caught up in terrorism investigations, was regarded by the Justice Department as an unindicted coconspirator in a terrorism financing case, had aligned with the ACLU to sue the government over the NSA’s Terrorist Surveillance Program, and had published a “Muslim community safety kit” to counsel Muslims on how to thwart FBI investigations. Yet, this is how it was described on TSA’s website:
CAIR, America's largest Islamic civil liberties group, has 32 offices and chapters nationwide and in Canada. Its mission is to enhance the understanding of Islam, encourage dialogue, protect civil liberties, empower American Muslims, and build coalitions that promote justice and mutual understanding.
Uh-huh.
The arc of the Bush administration’s Muslim outreach has been a study in looking for love in all the wrong places (as the intrepid Muslim reformer Zuhdi Jasser explains, here). For those who’ve watched it closely, it is simply impossible to interpret the new language purge as anything but the latest in a series of maneuvers designed to condition us, against reason and experience, to accept the premise that there is no true Islamic component in the terrorist threat confronting the United States. “The civilized world is facing a ‘global’ challenge, which” the guidance assures us, “transcends geography, culture, and religion” (emphasis added). To DHS’s Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties, that challenge, a siege of savage strikes by Muslims — occurring the world over for what is now decades — has nothing to do with their being, you know, Muslims.
To hear Sutherland tell it (as JJM reports), the guidance is a strategy for influencing an outside audience, Muslims living beyond our shores. Having worked in the federal government for a quarter century, I have no doubt that this is what DHS officials tell themselves. They’ve probably even convinced themselves. But such a strategy comes into existence only because its proponents have gobbled whole its underlying message: Islam is not a part of the problem but a key part of the solution. The guidance reflects a purpose to influence the agency’s most important inside audience: the American people.
DHS can’t prove Islam is not a big part of the problem any more than President Bush or Secretary Rice can show that it is a religion of peace and love. Instead, the administration enshrines as policy its most fervent hopes, as if hopes were facts. Naysayers are dared to naysay . . . at the risk of ostracism from polite, media-driven society — which on this matter, as on precious few others, is four-square Bushy.
Thus, for example, the guidance asserts: “The fact is that Islam and secular democracy are fully compatible — in fact, they can make each other stronger. Senior officials should emphasize this positive fact.” Well, while saying so may get me dropped from the Christmas — er, Holiday card list, this “positive fact” is not a fact at all. At best, it’s a theory . . . and a dubious one, to say the least.
It is, of course, a foundational error to speak of “Islam” as if it were a monolith. There are many Islams in the sense of doctrinal interpretations. (Last week, for instance, reports from Indonesia confirmed that one sect of the Religion of Peace had stoned and torched a mosque belonging to a different sect, the Ahmadi, because the latter accepts neither Mohammed as the final prophet nor jihad as a divine injunction.) Yet, whether one conceives of a single Islam or many, Islamic culture does not have a secular democratic tradition.
The very concept of secular is foreign to Islam, which aspires to be not just a religious creed but a full-blown cultural, legal and political system, sprung from precepts dictated to Mohammed by Allah Himself. Democratic systems, moreover, are based on notions of liberty and equality; in stark contrast, many Islamic traditions (drawing on bedrock Islamic theology) reject freedom of conscience, freedom to make law that countermands sharia, economic freedom, equality for Muslims and non-Muslims, and equality for men and women, to name just a few key divergences.
But even if none of this were so, mightn’t Occam ’s razor have reared its head by now? After 14 centuries, there is no secular democratic tradition in Islamic society. Given that secular democracy is the best guarantor of liberty and prosperity, is it not self-evident that some precinct of the ummah would have adopted it by now, without any help from us, if Islamic society were innately receptive?
After paying lip-service to the notion that “the terms we use must be accurate and descriptive,” the DHS guidance urges that we drop jihad from our lexicon, despite its being a perfectly accurate description of what al-Qaeda and other Muslim terrorist groups are doing. Why? Because, according to DHS and the “influential Muslim Americans” with whom it consulted, the true meaning of jihad is the subject of honest to goodness dispute. Indeed, DHS, in its best moral equivalence, frames the disputants in this supposed controversy as “polemic[ists]” — rather than, as is actually the case, one group accurately invoking jihad to convey the concept of holy war pitted against another trying, whether out of good intentions or duplicity, to reinvent jihad as the virtuous striving to become a better person.
Part 2:
...Not surprisingly, DHS has declined to identify the allegedly “wide variety of Muslim American leaders” with whom it consulted. However motley it may have been, though, it evidently failed to include Muslims whose interpretation of jihad aligns with either Islamic history or the highly touted Dictionary of Islam. As the scholar (and former Muslim) Ibn Warraq observes, the latter defines jihad as “a religious war with those who are unbelievers in the mission of Muhammad,” elaborating that the Koran and other scriptures establish it as “an incumbent religious duty.”
Nevertheless, it is a safe bet that our government’s influential Muslim Americans included the Muslim Public Affairs Council. MPAC was quick to issue a press release lauding the new DHS guidance and patting itself on the back for both its “regular . . . engagement with government agencies including [the Department of Homeland Security,]” and its long advocacy of a “nuanced approach” that stresses “the importance of decoupling Islam with [sic] terrorism.” Unmentioned, of course, is MPAC’s history of lobbying the government for the removal of jihadist organizations like Hezbollah, Hamas, and Palestinian Islamic Jihad from the government’s lists of designated terrorist organizations. (The peerless terrorism expert Steve Emerson provides details, here.)
In any event, the ipse dixit about a friendly jihad, just as validly construed to be a virtue as a mortal threat, flows naturally from the ipse dixit at the heart of the DHS guidance: The premise that “many so-called [so-called?] ‘Islamic’ terrorist groups twist and exploit the tenets of Islam to justify violence[.]” (Emphasis added.)
Really? The Koran (which Muslims take to be the verbatim word of Allah) commands, in Sura 9:123 (to take just one of many examples), “O ye who believe, fight those of the disbelievers who are near you, and let them find harshness in you, and know that Allah is with those who keep their duty unto him.” Does DHS really expect us to believe a terrorist has to “twist” that in order to gull fellow Muslims into thinking Islam enjoins Muslims to “fight those of the disbelievers who are near you, and let them find harshness in you”?
As policy, DHS gives us rose-tinted category error. It confounds Islam with Muslims and non-violence with moderation. There are about 1.4 billion Muslims in the world and the majority of them would not come close to committing a terrorist act. But their rejection of jihadist methods is not an en masse rejection of jihadist goals. Similarly, the belief that America should become a sharia state, which is not all that uncommon among even American Muslims, is not a moderate one, even if a Muslim who holds it is not willing to blow up buildings to make it so. And even if most Muslims resolve the tension between their faith and modernity by choosing to take scriptures non-literally, or by marginalizing their violent directives as relics of a bygone time and place, that makes those Muslims peaceful people; it does not make Islam a peaceful religion. Where combating Muslim terror is concerned, Islam is a hurdle you need to get over, not a means by which you get over the hurdle.
In short, under the guise of prescribing how our government officials should speak “strategically” so as not to offend potential allies in the Muslim world, the new guidance (and, importantly, the government ethos that produced it) is transparently intended to sell Americans on the Islam of DHS’s dreams, not the Islam we actually have to deal with.
This approach serves the agendas of MPAC, CAIR, and similar groups: Once the Islam is bleached out of Islamic terror, it will be far easier to portray the inevitable Muslim violence as driven by “regional” concerns, or as a predictable reaction to American policies, or as legitimate “resistance” against purported oppressors. We will no longer worry about — or defend ourselves against — a global movement, driven by a common religious ideology which, far from a perversion of Muslim doctrine, is both well-rooted in scripture and a lot more mainstream than DHS’s consultants let on.
It’s easy to see what’s in it for them. It’s a lot harder to see how self-delusion serves our interests.
— Andrew C. McCarthy is author of Willful Blindness: Memoir of the Jihad and director of the Center for Law and Counterterrorism at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies.
National Review Online - http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=ODZhZDkyMzc3NDBlNDMxMjM3MDkyOTdlYTU5MmExNjA=