Edition 4 Volume 1 - July 31, 2003
The religious dimension in Middle East politics
• Simple answers no longer suffice -
byLaila Al-Marayati
Even if the majority of Israelis support a return to pre-1967 borders in exchange for peace, hardline American Zionists would oppose such a move.
• Religion and the Middle East -
byUmit Ozdag
It does not seem possible that religion-centered conflicts will come to an end.
• A post-Islamist age? -
byEmmanuel Sivan
The bourgeois embrace authoritarian regimes for fear of the alternative.
• Human misery comes from human mistakes -
an interview withAhmad Yassin
Allah said in the Holy Quran, "And whatever affliction befalls you, it is on account of what your hands have wrought."
Simple answers no longer suffice
by Laila Al-Marayati In the aftermath of the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, politicians and the media in the United States argue that religious extremism, especially Islamic extremism, is the primary enemy facing America and the world today. This message echoes the sentiment of many Israelis who also believe that Islamic extremism is not only a threat to Israel but to all of mankind. Yet the role of religion in the politics of the Middle East and in the US is much more complex and deserving of deeper analysis.
Following the attacks on the World Trade Center, the Bush administration made it clear that American and Israeli interests regarding the fight against terrorism had converged as we were all in the same battle against Islamic extremists. Validation of Israel's struggle provided carte blanche to Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to increase the level of violence against Palestinian resistance groups, Muslim or other. The US was in no position to question Israel's crackdown on terrorists and extremists when we would "have to" do the same elsewhere to avenge the deaths of 3,000 Americans and prevent further carnage.
Since that time, little space has been given in public discourse to discuss the root causes of terrorism, lest any discussion be perceived as an apology or excuse. Rather, the administration and its mouthpieces in the media approach the subject as if it exists in a vacuum: terrorism happens. We don't know why and it doesn't matter. We have declared war on terrorism and we will prevail no matter how long it takes.
Such a simplistic approach satisfies the American media, which currently appeals to the lowest common denominator of American intellectual capacity. The above argument has worked over the past two years because of a largely apathetic public that generally believes what it is told. Public support (or rather lack of public resistance) for anti-terrorism policy after 9/11 gave the neoconservatives who surround US President George W. Bush the momentum they needed to promote a broad domestic and international agenda.
But now that their plans in Iraq have gone somewhat awry, the tide may be turning. Despite the fact that most Americans wrongly believe that Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein was responsible for the attacks of 9/11 (a misconception that is unabashedly exploited by Bush), their support for the war and the ongoing commitment of US troops is showing signs of strain. Also, the circumstances in Iraq are exposing the weakness of Bush's simplistic "us vs. them" philosophy with respect to the Muslim world and our enemies therein. For example, Iran, a Shi'a Muslim theocracy, is part of the "axis of evil" and next on the list. But in Iraq, a majority of the Shi'a Muslims in the south supported the US-led campaign to remove Hussein; their leaders are now calling for an early end to the American occupation. Simple answers no longer suffice and slogans used to garner public support ring hollow as more soldiers die every day.
In response, Americans are eschewing pat responses from our leadership about why America is having such trouble with our foreign policy objectives these days, especially in the Middle East. Even though the majority of the public here supports Israel, according to public opinion polls growing numbers recognize that there is a relationship between anti-American sentiment and our lopsided policy favoring Israel. Many no longer believe that American and Israeli interests are identical.
The bedrock of support for pro-Israel policy emanates primarily from two powerful religious groups in the US: key elements in the American Jewish community and Christian Zionists who mainly belong to the evangelical movement. In the view of Christian Zionists, the restoration of Israel to the Jews is a pre-condition for the second coming of Jesus Christ. As such, members of this group believe that any compromise on Israel's side with respect to giving up land will interfere with the fulfillment of the prophecy. Influential evangelical leaders and their supporters in Congress issued a strongly worded letter to President Bush warning him against pressuring the Israelis into concessions to promote the roadmap to peace. Even if the majority of Israelis support a return to pre-1967 borders in exchange for peace, hardliners among Christian and Jewish Zionists would oppose such a move.
But more Americans are daring to ask questions, calling for increased public debate on the issues, at least at the grassroots level. Opposition voices from both mainstream and evangelical Christian communities are emerging, reaching the public through the pulpit as they are given very little space in the mainstream media.
Even the perceived monolith of unequivocal support for Israel from the Jewish community may be transforming as well. In response to the deaths of hundreds of Israelis, their position, at least to outsiders, has been to support Israel at all costs. Yet this may be giving way to a more critical approach as many realize that current Israeli policy will not bring peace or security to her people.
As positions shift, American Jews, Christians and Muslims have an opportunity to play a more constructive role in shaping US policy in the Middle East--one that promotes peace, justice and reconciliation instead of special interests.-Published 31/7/03(c)bitterlemons-international.org
Dr. Laila Al-Marayati was a presidential appointee to the US Commission on International Religious Freedom from 1999 to 2001. She is the spokesperson for the Muslim Women's League based in Los Angeles.
Religion and the Middle East
by Umit OzdagThroughout history the effect of religion on politics has been of fundamental importance. From time to time religion, or politics under the influence of religion, has actually been a determining factor. It can be argued that the Middle East is probably the sole geographic region that is situated on the axis of politics-religion-war. Even though the pax-areas, meaning the regions of pax-Romana and pax-Ottomana, influenced the region for centuries by bringing peace, it can still be argued that regional wars have been a determining factor.
Despite the fact that religion was the major factor in converting the region into a battlefield, religion was supported by other elements. These are closely related to the technological/sociological structure of the area. The nature of conflict has been determined by the region's location at a crossroads, coupled with the existence of oil, and adding the religion factor. Another element that has provoked conflict is the fact that the three major religions emerged in this region and their centers, which are considered to be holy, are located in the Middle East.
The dynamics of conflict also emerge from the overlap of the existing and the claimed borders of these groups. They are based not only on the differences among three major religions, but also on relationships among different groups within a single religion. These conflicts all influence political processes.
Religion-based conflicts in the Middle East need to be examined within the context of the interactions among three religions: Muslims and Jews, Muslims and Christians, and differences among Muslims.
Muslim-Jewish relations. It is possible to group the differences between Muslims and Jews under several titles: geopolitical, ethnic and religious. The Jews in theory--and a few in reality--believe that Middle East lands, including those they are living on now, were given to them by Jehovah and need to be recovered from others. On the other hand, the Arabs also have no intention of sharing their land with the Jews.
Despite ethnic kinship with the Arabs, Jews perceive them as second class (partially due to religious beliefs and partially for cultural reasons) and do not accept them as equals in interpersonal relations. Judaism is perceived as a religion that unites its people and God at the point of belief. Any other religion that has emerged after Judaism is seen as heretical. The historical events that have occurred between Jews and Muslims also form grounds for conflict. The Prophet Mohammed expelled the Jews from Medina, had one of the three Jewish tribes massacred and deported all the Jews from Saudi Arabia. The Koran contains anti-Semitic statements.
Muslim-Christian relations. From the Christian perspective, religions were born in the Middle East. Jesus and his apostles lived in Jerusalem and elsewhere in the region. These lands were considered for 700 years as the center of Christendom and were perceived as a region that needed to be rescued from the unbelievers. As a matter of fact, throughout history, primarily the Crusades but also other wars in the Middle East emerged due to religion. Christians who perceived the Muslims as usurpers took on a mission to free these lands from the unbelievers. However, the Christian population WAS never strong enough to control the region. Even in Lebanon where Christians held political power, they were defeated by demographic realities.
The power conflict among Christians is highly important for the region. The Nestorians, Syrian Orthodox, Catholics, Maronites and the newly active Protestants argue their priority and superiority in the region. In the case of Iraq, different ethnic groups such as Assyrians, Chaldeans and Syrian Orthodox can be seen as an opportunity for Christendom in the region; however, all these groups harbor distinctive causes conducive to conflict.
Differences among Muslims. The Middle East is perceived as the first region where Islam commenced to spread, and as its first cultural center. In addition to Mecca and Medina in Saudi Arabia, Damascus, Baghdad, Jerusalem and Cairo are very important cultural and settlement centers. In the history of Islam, the importance of these locations is not only appreciated by the regional societies but by other Muslim countries as well.
Due to oppressive totalitarian regimes that united with religion, these regions never had the opportunity to display their own religious identities. Currently they have been transformed by the emergence of a political and radical Islam under the influence of Wahabism. The ruling class in Saudi Arabia and in the Gulf has accepted Wahabism as the official ideology. In addition, there are distorted relations between the ruling class and the governed. Saddam Hussein was a Sunni leader ruling a Shi'ite majority; Hafez Asad was a Shi'ite leader and a representative of the Nusayri (Alawites) ruling a Sunni majority.
When seen from this larger perspective, differences among religions and sects have created a region where the satisfied and the dissatisfied reside together. The Middle East, with its internal problems and conflicts among states, alongside the possession of economic wealth, is constantly open to provocations and conflict.
In conclusion, it does not seem possible that religion-centered conflicts will come to an end. The conflicts in the region are closely tied to the existence of these groups in the Middle East, and this makes a durable peace difficult. In the Middle East war, like peace, is a process. Peace, like war, will be difficult and painful.-Published 31/07/2003 ©bitterlemons-international.org
Professor Umit Ozdag is the chairman of the Center for Eurasian Strategic Studies in Ankara, Turkey. He is coeditor of The Review of International Affairs and Ankara Papers, published by Frank Cass.
A post-Islamist age?
by Emmanuel SivanWe are already in a post-Islamist age, or so argue many analysts, mostly American and French. For Radical Islam, they claim, is on the wane all over the Muslim world, al Qaeda being just a final (but doomed) explosion of those revolutionary energies which have created so much havoc in the last three decades. In a way, they have a point, provided one considers only the Jihadi aspect of that broad socio-cultural and political movement that is Radical Islam.
Yet if one looks at the movement as a whole--made up of a plethora of groups, more or less structured, loosely coordinated and often overlapping--one perceives that it is still vigorous and exercises a lot of influence in various Muslim societies.
The greatest feat of Radical Islam is its sheer survival despite decades of ferocious state repression. It has, at the same time, made tremendous inroads into the hearts and minds of Muslim believers. Already by the 1970s the militant Islamic discourse, with its inbred suspicion of "imported" modernity, that "new apostasy", began to dominate the public sphere. It replaced pan-Arabism and Marxism, and maintains this hegemony to the present day.
Thus it has influenced gender roles, not just in the spread of the veil but also in shaping the attitude of high school educated females who tend to prefer family and child rearing tasks over career and self realization (the latter used to be more popular among this social group in the pre-Islamist era); it bought about an erosion of relations with indigenous Christians (for example, the situation of Copts in Egypt). Governments have succumbed to militant pressure, censoring books, plays and films critical of traditional Islam. The Islamist media--notably in the form of audio and videocassettes--is growing, and religious activism has become the major avenue for venting protest. Young militants engage in grassroots vigilantism against alcohol, pornography and TV satellite dishes, impose Islamic dress codes and monitor the behavior of tourists. Other activists mount court cases and press campaigns against permissive writers and artists, or mobilize mass demonstrations against the rising cost of living, which often succeed in deterring governments from abolishing subsidies for basic foodstuffs and cooking gas. They are practically the only ones to organize mass rallies in favor of introducing a constitution.
This success proceeds, above all, from organizational ability, as manifest in the strength of the voluntary associations fathered by Muslim radicalism. These not only create support and clientele networks for the movement, but also show that Islamic values can be implemented nowadays: in medicine (by clinics staffed by volunteer doctors and nurses), in social welfare (through neighborhood solidarity groups and Muslim, i.e., interest-free, lending associations), etc.
Moreover, the Islamists have a knack for tailoring the message to changing circumstances. Over the last 15 years or so, the message has been the failure of the all-providing nation-state, created by the populist-military regimes as well as by traditional monarchies. The blame is deftly put not at the door of the command economy for dependence on oil revenues, but rather on the moral dissoluteness and the secularism (implicit or explicit) of the powers-that-be.
The inroads of the Islamists are not limited to the lower urban classes, which are the worst hit by the economic policies cutting public expenditures. Islamist associations have sprung up among professional classes, whose high income and sophistication enable them to endeavor to act independently of the state, an unheard-of phenomenon in the 1950s and 1960s, and try to shape decision-making within their professions, and later to stake out a position on wider public issues, e.g., in favor of the immediate application of the Shari'a (Islamic law) or in backing court cases presented by "concerned citizens" against prominent secularist thinkers. The latter have a particularly telling chilling effect on liberals, whose voice has consequently become much weaker in recent years.
Perhaps more important is the osmosis of radical ideas into the conservative religious establishment. The tilt to the right, especially among young clerics, has been evident and is creeping inexorably into the upper ranks, where pressure groups vociferously clamor against changes in the divorce laws, against a ban on female circumcision, for stricter censorship on "public morality" issues and the like.
The difficulty the radicals have in translating social-cultural vigor into political influence is well known. The violent option has been tried time and time again and ended in utter defeat, most recently in the late 1990s. Some participation in the political process is allowed (in Jordan, Morocco, Kuwait, Algeria, Yemen), yet elections are tampered with and those Islamist candidates elected to parliament have seen their role restricted more often than not to mere protesting and posturing.
Participation in governments has usually been short-lived and quite disappointing in terms of policy-making. In other countries (Egypt, Syria, Tunisia) even this paltry political role is unthinkable.
The Islamists do limit, however, the margin of action of the powers-that-be through the deterrent effect of their public protest. Governments think twice before cutting subsidies, amending family status laws, or relaxing censorship on delicate moral topics. Yet the most politically pervasive impact of Radical Islam may be detected among the modern middle class. The latter favors broad human and civil rights and the evolution of a participatory polity. The bourgeoisie is fearful, however, of the rise of Radical Islam, the sole organized force likely to benefit from liberalization. The experience of Islamists in power (Iran, Sudan, Afghanistan) is there for every bourgeois to ponder. They thus have to acquiesce in the harsh regimentation of political life, which was the response of most regimes to the domestic terrorism of the 1990s. They embrace authoritarian regimes for fear of the alternative.
Herein lies the most devastating, long-term effect of Muslim radicalism-slowing down the march towards democracy. It is not the effect the radicals intended, yet the cunning workings of history make it all too real, nevertheless.-Published 31/7/03© bitterlemons-international.org
Emmanuel Sivan teaches Islamic History at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Among his many publications are Radical Islam (Yale UP, 1990), Mythes Politiques Arabes (Paris, Fayard, 1995) and Strong Religion (Chicago UP, 2003).
Human misery comes from human mistakes
an interview with Ahmad YassinBI: How important is religion in providing justice and solving the political problems of the Arab world?
Yassin: The basic difficulty here is a misunderstanding of the true meaning of the word "religion". In the Islamic belief, "religion" refers to every system on earth that human beings abide by to run their lives. In general, "religion" might come from God or be manmade by humans to run their own lives. Life can't continue without religion to protect and maintain the human existence.
In Islam in particular, religion is made by God to protect and maintain itself as religion and maintain property, thought, humanity, and progeny. Islam is an ideal and practical system that was implemented and applied for hundreds of years through Prophet Mohammed, his caliphs (Prophet Mohammed's successors), the Umayyad Islamic state, and then the Abbasid Islamic state. History has proven Islam as a successful system at building and maintaining good societies. The system that succeeds once can succeed many more times.
BI: How does Islam explain Palestinian misery and unhappiness? Is this the work of God or man?
Yassin: First of all, [in the Western world] there is some ignorance towards the true Islamic doctrine. When God sent his messengers and holy books, it was to solve the problems of human beings, but not to end them, because these problems are basic. Periodically, God sent his messengers and holy books to resolve and find solutions for these problems.
The misery that occurs in the lives of humans is a result of their behavior and their mistakes. But the welfare that human beings are offered comes from God. Allah said in his Holy Quran, "And whatever affliction befalls you, it is on account of what your hands have wrought."
Therefore, the misery that inflicts human beings is due to their non-commitment to the system that God sketched for them, and the result is a life of misery and unhappiness.
BI: Hamas has set its goal as an Islamic state in Palestine. How would that state include ideas often associated with modern statehood: democracy, equal rights and religious freedom?
Yassin: Islam gave every human being the right to worship, and rights in matrimony (personal affairs like marriage, divorce, and so on) and this will not be an obstacle in shaping international relationships.
Islam also opened all the gates and borders between the various nations and peoples and led them to the way of goodness and human happiness. In other words, in Islam it is forbidden for Muslims to drink alcohol, but non-Muslims (Christians and Jews) were allowed [to drink] so that Islam was not an obstacle in their lives. Also Islam allowed non-Muslims to make their own internal arrangements according to their own personal status laws so that Islam didn't interfere in their personal lives.
If we have our Islamic state, we will have our own laws to control and standardize our society. I want to ask these modern countries, if the individual breaks the law of the state, would they not punish him or would punishing him be considered a violation of his rights?
Accordingly, in our Islamic state there will be Islamic law that will punish anyone who breaks or violates the law--as in any country. We, as Muslims, have absolute freedom for all people to be creative and to learn. We also have political, economic, social, and personal freedom, but deriving from Islamic law if the individual is Muslim and from the laws of Christianity or Judaism for Christian and Jewish individuals.
BI: What has more effect on the Middle East today, divisions among Sunnis, Shi'ites, Christians and secular Arabs or political divisions over power and money?
Yassin: The real suffering in the Middle East and the problems that the Middle East faces are colonialism and occupation--American, Zionist, Jewish and Christian problems. Shi'ites and Sunnis are both Muslims, but the occupiers and colonizers are those who evoke sectarianism: either between Shiite and Sunni or between Muslim and Christian. The colonizers have adopted a policy to divide and conquer, and accordingly, they are doing their best to separate between the various Arab and Muslim groups to make them easier to control and colonize their countries.
BI: What does Islam teach about reconciliation and making peace and what does that mean in the Middle East today?
Yassin: Islam's basic principles are to make peace and reconciliation, not only among human beings but also in the world of animals and plants. But Islam does not teach Muslims to make reconciliation with aggressors or occupiers that kill innocent people and ravage the land. Allah said in his holy Quran, "And there is life for you in (the law of) retaliation, O men of understanding, that you may guard yourselves."
Or there is the verse "And if you take your turn, then retaliate with the like of that with which you were afflicted; but if you are patient, it will certainly be best for those who are patient."
So, you must defend yourself, your land, your dignity, your property, and your country. One cannot simply tolerate that an aggressor stole one's land and murdered one's people. To do so is not reconciliation or tolerance but surrender, defeat and a trouncing. These days, the Israeli and American enemies are trying to confuse the terminology of "reconciliation" and "self-defense."
Islam is a world system calling for tolerance and reconciliation with all religions. It deals with them in the spirit of brotherhood, but it also does not accept aggression.
God said in the Holy Quran, "Allah does not forbid you respecting those who have not made war against you on account of (your) religion, and have not driven you forth from your homes, that you show them kindness and deal with them justly; surely Allah loves the doers of justice."
The aggressors want us, in the name of reconciliation and Islam, to give up and surrender our occupied lands. If we were to apply the true Islamic system in the Middle East and the world, Islam would create a global civilization and produce enlightened thought and build bridges of friendship and cooperation between the various nations in all aspects of life, science, society, and economy. Islam breaks all barriers between countries concerning commerce and trade.
But in the current situation, the colonizers and occupiers want to open all the gates of the Middle East on behalf of Israel. These gates haven't opened yet, and therefore they are doing their best to damage relationships between the Arab countries. This will maintain and support Israeli existence at the expense of the Palestinian, Arab and Muslim nations.-Published 31/7/03©bitterlemons-international.org
Sheikh Ahmad Yassin is the spiritual leader of the Palestinian opposition group Hamas. He is 65 years old, lives in Gaza City and spent 8 years in Israeli prison before being released in 1997 in a prisoner exchange.
|
All Rights Reserved