Democracy, not terror, is the engine of political Islam

Re:GT
"that India should start preparing for war if extremists come to power in Pakistan "

I thought the extremists in Pak were friendly with our Congress and Gandhi, as per Manto. They may simply ask for a peaceful merger of the two countries... :-)

GT: Thanks for the correction.

With respect to internal communal strife that you seem to be concerned might degenerate into communal war, nothing is impossible. There is a real danger to civilized society in any country no doubt from the superstition, chauvinism, irrationality and simple stupidity that passes for religion in the minds of the extremists. How great that danger is, I dont know for sure.

tahmed sahib:

"...and that India should start preparing for war if extremists come to power in Pakistan (correct me if I misunderstood please)..."

Yes you misunderstand me and that too by miles. When fundamentalists become dominant in Pakistan (not necessarily come to power through elections), they will become dominant in India too. (See my post to Naqshbandi). In Pakistan there won't be many to butcher as hamid, you, HP and yes even zeemax are in the US. But imagine the havoc that will come about in India as there are so many Hindus and Muslims to kill. People will do what they 'individually' think is RIGHT. They will have their own morality and so forth - you see in chowk zee and harimau have their own solid morality. You cannot fight these forces through 'morality'. Neither can you through your 'army' (for the armies will side respectively with the mullahs and pundits).

Dear Naqshbandi:

What you state below is a gem:

"...given a free and fair platform a majority of muslims will prefer to vote for people who stand for islam and islamic values and not for those alien paradigms forced on them by imperialist agents..."

I know that kaal has been arguing with you for a long time. But he will be much pleased with what you state above. The above along with your other assetion:

"....what distinguishes islam is that for muslims islam comes first and everything else second ...."

makes your entire point music to the ears of say the Hindu fundamentalists. What you are saying here eloquently, the RSS goons have been saying in a much more crass way albeit for quite a long time now. Then again there are people like Quasmi (see his article on Assam on FP) who strongly agrees with you but will not state it outright, at least not now. Finally there are people like Farzana V., and perhaps even kaal, who may not like your music at all.

For me, I am just starting to appreciate classical music under masters kaal and echoboom.

GT #21 Always a pleasure to read your coherent, well thought through posts.

At the end of your post, you say that fundamentalists forces could come to power in Pakistan through elections, and that India should start preparing for war if extremists come to power in Pakistan (correct me if I misunderstood please). I disagree:

1. all defense forces (including Indian) are supposed to be always ready for war if attacked anyway, so this suggestion seems redundant.

2. fundamentalists in pakistan have very little chance of coming to power through elections (per past voting patterns). Even they know that: Today I heard maulvi fazlurrehman on TV, and he was strongly hinting that musharraf should approach him (like he did a few years ago) and not BB to make a power-sharing deal.

3. even if they do come to power, there is no reason to believe that they will be like the Taliban (i.e. stupid and irresponsible, due to lack of accountability) and not like the Turkish Muslim party now in power (i.e. smart and responsible, knowing that they owe their position to the people, not to God).

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that is why non-muslims can never truly understand muslims or islam. Muslims, literally, live in a different world.

Sitaaron kay aagay jahaan aur bhi haiN
Ishq kay baaqi imtehaan aur bhi hain

the basic message of this article is correct...given a free and fair platform a majority of muslims will prefer to vote for people who stand for islam and islamic values and not for those alien paradigms forced on them by imperialist agents.

this is nothing new or amazing. what distinguishes islam is that for muslims islam comes first and everything else second.

that is why the notion of an ummah is so revolutionary and powerful.

and why not? Allah says in the Koran that Allah has purchased from the Believers their lives and wealth in return for Paradise and the Prophet also said that a person is not a true believer until Allah and His Messenger are more dear to him/her than anything else.

Everyone who reads 'la ilaha il Allah Muhammadur Rasool Allah' has to have some degree of ishq of Huzoor Paak in their hearts. The degrees and levels of understanding may differ but that the love is their is undeniable. Those who have not got the sweetness of this faith and ishq-e-rasool can never imagine what it is like.

Mr. Dalrymple appears to be on some mission.
“throughout the Muslim world political Islam is on the march;”

Outside of the government sponsored news sites and the US media where do you see political Islam on the march? Yes, the terrorist owned and gangster sponsored Islam is certainly on the March. How could bombing the innocent and destroying the civilian property can be called on the March and since when blasting bombs is political?

The problem with the writers like Mr. Dalrymple is that they try to bunch together several political currents in to one stream. To their convoluted minds that stream is political Islam.

The politics of the Islamic Parties in Pakistan is entirely different than Hammas, Hizab of Lebanon, Muslim Brotherhood of Egypt and the leading pro-religion party in Turkey. One look at their politics would show that they take their guidance not from Islam but from their local conditions. There is no way one can bunch Hammas and the Islamic party in Turkey under one political ideology. They are different and will remain different in their political goals and aspirations.

“In October 2002 a rightwing alliance of religious parties - the Muttahida Majlis Amal or MMA - won 11.6% of the vote, more than doubling its share, and sweeping the polls in the two provinces bordering Afghanistan - Baluchistan and the North West Frontier Province”

That is far from the truth. The MMA did win elections in NWFP but it never swept the polls. It does not even have a 2/3 majority in the Assembly. In Balcohistan, the MMA is a junior partner. JUI, which is a part of MMA now, had always won enough seats in Balochistan to become a junior partner in every Baloch government. JUI was a junior partner with NAP(a secular party) government in Balochistan in 1972. So their success in Balochistan cannot be attributed to the change in the US policy.

A professional historian needs to research before writing outlandish and sweeping statements like the one above.

“Egypt is typical: at the last election in 2005 members of the nominally banned Muslim Brotherhood, standing as independents, saw their representation rise from 17 seats to 88 in the 444-seat people's assembly - a five-fold increase five-fold increase, despite reports of vote-rigging by President Mubarak's ruling National Democratic Alliance.”

“but also in Egypt: since the Brothers' strong showing in the elections, the US has stopped pressing Mubarak to make democratic reforms,”

Read these two statements together. I think Mr. Dalrymple himself is not clued in to what he is writing. This clearly shows that why in a rigged election Mubarak allowed the Muslim Brotherhood to increase its share from 17 to 88.
Perhaps to relieve the US pressure!

It is the same strategy that the Pakistani Army used when it allowed or engineered a MMA victory in NWFP. The purpose was to stave off the US pressure from the Army regime in Pakistan. A tactics they may still use, if the situation begins to get out of hand.

#11 Posted by zeemax on September 21, 2007 3:14:51 am

shouldn't you be more worried about your cab driving surrender monkey army that's either getting whacked or surrendering to the jihadis...

Traditionally, the religious parties there have won only a fraction of the vote. That began to change after the US invasion of Afghanistan.


So a war on terrorists - remember this is a'stan, not iraq - makes pakis vote for people who support terrorists?

And that's somehow America's fault...


mmmkay..

Fundamentalism in politics always existed. What is interesting is their sudden rise in electoral politics. This sudden rise did not start in the Muslim world. The unexpected gains by the BJP in India and the rise of Christian fundamentalism during and after Carter's tenure in the US preceeded the rise of fundamentalism in the Muslim world. Of course it can be argued that fundamentalism was ruthlessly suppressed in countries like Algeria and Egypt and hence their mark on electoral politics is a recent phenomenon.

Being dominant in day to day politics at the grassroot level does not imply dominance in electoral politics. It is here that the author completely misses the plot. The author, in this piece, implies that fundamentalists have become an important part of Muslim polities because of the spread of democracy in these parts. Democracy egged along by American policies. Nothing can be further from the truth. Muslim fundamentalism (just like other religious fundamentalism) has been making tremendous gains in local polities for a much longer time. These movements, at least, in India and Pakistan have been democratizing local socio/economic matters in an environment where 'liberaloons' have been curbing the same process by monopolizing their hold on socio-economic power.

That fundamentalist forces will come to 'power' through the electoral process is a very high probability event. It remains to be seen as to what then? History tells us that there will be violence, e.g. Gujrat under the BJP in India and Afghanistan/Iraq under Bush. But the question is: will the violence go much further? This indeed is a terrifying question and one simply cannot sit back and wait and watch till it happens. At least in India, people should start preparing themselves for this event. An event where right and wrong has to be individually defined. After which people should do their duty of protecting what is right, irrespective of what is moral. As I mentioned earlier ... morality gaya tel leneko.

Dear Dumblimpdick,

Your articles do not add any value and your writings show a lack of political insight. Please feel free to take a much needed holiday to Afghanistan or Wazirastan and then come back to lecture the world on virtues of political Islam.

zeemax: is ben laden threatening to stop using his dialysis machine unless he is made khalifa of india?

#17 Posted by KaalChakra

A believing Muslim has the duty to rebel ...

Yes. It's an obligation, not a choice.

And Islam is one. Not many. Again I quote 7:181!

zee, even a hard-boiled cynic would be amazed at the degree of moral offense Hindus take at the suggestion that the "Indian" Islam is nothing fundamentally different religion than Islam as it is. The idea that Islam is one is the great evil for Hindus!

I had found the recent statement from Al Q to be far beyond the capcities of dollar-counting Hindus to understand. It said: A believing Muslim has the duty to rebel (against injustice, obviously) when he has the *ability* to do so.

Until then there is nothing wrong in 'love' should that keep these folks drunk and high. :)