London’s Hour of Reckoning

ferozk#417

Do I see a book in the making?

Excellent analysis! My reading of the history is superficial and limited to relatively recent past. Based on that I have one question to ask: Do you think that the Islamic world would be the same but for the events of the decade following the second world war? The reason why I am asking this question is that the Islamic world produced by and large fairly modern, progressive people during first part of the twentieth century who assumed leadership during that period. Sukarno in Indonesia, Tunku Abdul Rehman in Malaya, Jinnah in India, Nasser in Egypt and the Shah of Iran may be quite different in many ways but none of them was a regressive Muslim, even the Saudis produced a relatively liberal leadership which lifted bans on pictures and cinema during this period.

However, this progressive leadership did not last. I think that a number of events during the decade after the second world war were critical to this development. These were:

- Creation of Pakistan. Although the movement was led by progressive and modern Muslims like Jinnah and Agha Khan, it heralded the triumph of political Islam and lifted the spirits of the ummah. It was inevitable that this triumph would be used to bring back the image of the past glory of Islam.

- Creation of Israel. This had the opposite effect of feeding the grievances of Muslims who saw in it a stab in the Arab world by a Judeo-Christian conspiracy.

- The powerful effect of Marxism and Socialism on the educated elite of the Muslim, especially Arab, world and the threat it posed to the Western world during the cold war. This led to the West choosing Muslim clergy as a natural ally in a common war against the godless commies.

- The West`s need for a cheap and secure source of energy which made it choose dictators it could manipulate over unmanageable democracies. In the absence of democracies, the only alternative to oppose the West was the mosques and the sermons of the mullahs.

I think that it is difficult to ignore the above factors while analysing the impotent rage felt by the Islamic world against the West.

PewResearch: Let me try again. The ``specific assertion`` you quoted from Friedman is ```Islam has a long tradition of tolerating other religions, but only on the basis of the supremacy of Islam, not equality with Islam` ``

I said that is one man`s view. You have responded by implying that this Friedman is an influential man in the mainstream, unlike Falwell. Maybe so. But he is still just one columnist - people whose job it is to study islam in the west, whose books are the most popular ones on islam, do not share his view of islam. I had referred you earlier to those books, and referred you to read the Quran itself and find out for yourself whether it promotes terrorism (which is the point you had originally made).

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/16/international/europe/16muslims.html?hp&ex=1121572800&en=7b1f44fe6658c193&ei=5094&partner=homepage

This doctor dude is a Brit-paki and he got a party called ``Party of Liberation`` - he wants to establish caliphate and ``to instill Islamic mores and Islamicize almost every aspect of daily life``. The party has followings all over britain and outside.

``....``For our parents, the attention was focused on getting a job and building a life here,`` Mr. Khan said. ``My generation had to go through more of a thinking process to discover who we are, our Islamic identity.``.....``

Boy - brits are really scre!wed. They really have no idea what they are dealing with here.

Re: # 407
Ferozk, thanks for a response that makes sense and does not require me to read other sources to digest. So, Muslims have not recovered psychologically since the Crusades and the result is hypersensitivity and insecurity in a significant percentage of the Muslims that has trapped them ever since? Could this lurking hypersensitivity and insecurity be the reason that results in an exaggerated sense of victimhood that in turn provides fertile soil for breeding homicide bombers from Bali to London? If your hypothesis is correct, then the responsibility of sorting out the centuries old psychological trauma rests primarily on the patient to recognize that he is need of therapy. Meaning the inclusivists have to finally prevail over the exclusivists who have so far held the day. This may take centuries to come about.

Tahmed: You are missing the point again. Friedman made a very specific assertion. Further, he is not in the same league as Falwell and the NYT does not accord Falwell the honor of regular Op/Ed column space on its esteemed pages. Your diffused response of `1 billion muslims...` is not what one would call a logically sound construct to disprove Friedman`s hypothesis. Thanks for trying. It just increases my worry that people like Ferozk are in a minority.

rsridhar: good to hear from you, after a long time. Let us see WHO thinks the majority of the muslims approve of terrorist acts, as you write.

First, it is Indians. That is clear from what I have reading for the past several years on chowk. And it seems reasonable to assume that these Indians represent a significant viewpoint in India (and the success of the hindu nationalist BJP in India indicates that perhaps as much as 50% of the Indian population shares this view). But (as I said earlier), these Indians dont matter: Pakistan is militarily secure from India. The BJP government tried its best in the 1990`s to get Pakistan declared a pariah state at a time when Pakistan was in a weak position - and they miserably failed to make any headway with the international community.

Second, people in the west. After 9/11 in particular, there has been a spate of books written on the subject by western scholars who have been uniformly appreciative of islam as a religion. Thus, even Hoagland (who has often been critical of specific aspects of Pakistan government policy) wrote an article after the london bombing that was in fact highly appreciative of the american muslim community. The 10 million american muslims are in fact often quite involved in community work - and often there are articles about them in the WP for example (e.g. there was an article on the tsunami relief work being done by CAIR, an article on the free medical services provided by muslim doctos at a local mosque, and so forth).

I hope this explains why I dont share your concern about time running out for muslims. The only muslims who need to worry about their safety are the ones living in India - given the mindsets I see among Indian posters on chowk, and given the real life evidence of intimidation and harassment of minorities in India.

re:#409 by tahmed32
while 1 billion muslims may not wake up everyday planning world domination, the world has not seen any kind of concerted effort by this silent majority against the ``terrorist`` minority. This is being interpreted as ``silent acquiescence`` nay, approval of the terrorist acts. It is time this ``silent minority`` showed clearly where it stands. As someone already said, time is running out.
Sridhar

Ajeya #408 I dont have anything more to say to you other than what you yourself quoted at the beginning: ``I am not interested in convincing muslim-haters like you on anything.``.

Obviously, there is some part of ``No`` that you dont you understand. I didnt read the rest of your post.

PewResearch #404 Lots of people say lots of things. Friedman says that Islam requires muslims to become politically dominant in the society they live in. Falwell has said worse things about Islam. Their saying something does not make it true.

You keep insisting on a response to Friedman, so here is my answer: There are over 1 billion muslims in the world, and they dont get up every morning planning world domination. And if anyone seriously thinks they do, then what that person needs is not an ``intellectual`` but a shrink.

Re: #383 by tahmed32


[I am not interested in convincing muslim-haters like you on anything.]

After all, what else do you have left, but using the standard response:

``You hate Muslims, therefore what your logic is, does not need to be debated``.

One would hope that after spending so much time debating people on Chowk, you could see through this threadbare defense.

I remember one of my co-workers was Iranian. One day, I was not feeling well, but still came to work. When you live alone, small health problems can sometimes acquire a much bigger dimension. Nobody at work seemed to have noticed that I was not feeling well. But he did. It made a lot of difference for me.

One of my doctors is muslim. A gentler, nicer, and more dedicated soul is very hard to find.

I could sit here and list dozens of wonderful people I have come across that are Muslim.

If I hated all Muslims, I would lose respect for myself, for having turned into something like an Islamist.



[My discussions on religion are directed to fellow muslims only]


You can argue everything under the sun with non-muslims, but when it comes to inconvenient quetions about Islam you cannot.

Do you see any flaw in this kind of logic?



Re: #386 by tahmed32


[If you are seriously interested in understanding the Quran, then the best thing is to read it for yourself with an open mind. It is not a very big book.]

Most Muslims I have met have studied the Quran MUCH less than I have.

I don`t think you are smarter than me. And I have read different interpretations of the Quran done by different people in different centuries. There is nothing to redeem those Quranic sentences I have quoted, and a thousand others like that. Let alone Muhammad’s life examples.

And I have read EXPLANATIONS of Quranic verses by renowned Islamic scholars.

So I don`t think you have any special knowledge that you could educate me with.


[the Quran explicitly places boundries on the prophet muhammed himself - saying that he is just a messenger, and implementation of the message is not his concern. That is a matter between God and the individual alone.]


This is standard circular logic used by Islamic apologists.

To belive that God transmitted the Quran THROUGH Muhammed, you have to FIRST believe Muhammed. That God came and spoke to him etc.

I CANNOT, and no decent person should believe a man with his track record. Period.

So if you cannot believe him about God talking to him, then everything else is null and void.


[Dont just pick a verse here or there (as you had done), ignoring what the rest of the book has to say.]


Another couple of standard arguments used by Muslims:

1) You are taking the particular sentences OUT OF CONTEXT.

Answer: If I am – SHOW ME HOW!

2) The Quran has lots of good sayings in it, too. If Quran was not such a good book, then how is that possible?

OR

Muhammad did many good things too. If he was not a good man, how come he did these good things?

Answer: This does not make a difference. If you study the lives of ANY serial killer, serial rapist, mass murderer etc. in any country, you will find that they have done some good things in their lives too. This does not change the fact that they are bad people.

See?

No?

Okay….

Re: # 403

I will try to answer to answer your comments/questions and thus, let me include a passage from an article, which I wrote, for another website, as it helps in answering your question.

``Parenthetically speaking, a comparison needs to be drawn, at this stage of the narrative, between the emerging ideals of political power in Europe and the Muslim world, because it would have far reaching consequences. It would also explain why political independence and representative democracy found such a fertile soil to grow in Europe and not in the Arab/Muslim world. The time period, of AD 700s and AD 800s, offers a rare insight into the nature of European power vis-à-vis Muslim power, because the origins and the development of both European and Muslim political ideas was concurrent, but would they end up with diametrically opposing viewpoints on the nature of political power itself.

As already seen, centralized power was resisted in Europe, because its motives were always doubted and in the political skepticism, which resulted from this questioning, Europe was able to articulate a debate on the nature of political power itself. The European political experiences, at the end of the Roman Empire, suggested that political power had to remain diffused and the nature of power, itself, should be based on the idea of compromise. Furthermore, it advocated that such a power should be balanced evenly and not allowed to be concentrated in the hands of one, or a combination of powers. The key criteria was that Europe favored a multi-polarity of powers and it wanted such an arrangement to exist because of the political leverage it allowed the weaker nations in comparison to the powerful nations of Europe. Therefore, Europe wanted to ensure that the fulcrum of political power tilted against centralized power by favoring a de-centralized power structure. Out of this early multi-polarity in European politics, there emerged a European tradition of political dissent, against a strong political power, which would periodically demand more political rights and resist attempts at the consolidation of power.

Unlike the Europeans, the Arabs were never able to initiate a debate on the nature of political power, because the early experiences of Arab politics did not allow the space for such a debate to occur. Arab political power drew its inspiration from the conduct of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH), who practiced both the religious and secular aspects of power, with the result that Arab politics was never able to a create balance, between theocratic absolutism and political pragmatism. This form of centralized political power was the norm in Arab societies and as the Arab political structures matured, there was an increasing concentration of power in the hands of the ruler. The dictates of power were imposed instead of being shared, as was the case in Europe and also; in contrast to the European example of political co-existence, Arab political power, due to its theocratic influences, was disallowed to share political power and instead, it was prompted to subordinate all forms of politics in order to preserve the political integrity of Islam.``

The title of the article, was ``The Eclipse of the Cresent``.

Now, to answer your question.

Political Islam suffers from an actue sense of an inferiority complex and feelings of insecurity. The origins of this harks backs to the days, when Islam was struggling to establish itself in Arabia. The religion of Islam was seen as a political threat by the pre-Islamic societies of Arabia and as a result of this, Islam was openly and agressively persecuted. The fact that Islam and its followers were forced into exile and were still hounded, traumatized the early Muslims. Consequently, a consensus developed within the early Islam, that co-existence with non-Muslims, was not an option and if that Islam was to survive and prosper, it had to assert its own supremacy.

Due to this, Islam was never able to develop a level of political confidence in its own abilities. The early experiences of the Muslims and the lessons, which they learned from the politics of time, reinforced an idea, whose closest analogy would be the Masada Complex of the Jews. Since, Islam had explictly prohibited suicide and that was not an option, the only other resource was to remove the threat itself by force lest it threatened Islam and its political viability. This logic was the underlying reason behind the early Muslim campaigns, which were in reality wars of conquest undertaken with the express and stated aim of enlarging the bounderies of Islam. The extention of the bounderies was intended to protect the core of Islam; Arabia and by creating buffer-zones around it, which would be dominated by Muslims. Hence, the idea was to create a ``bubble of security`` within which Arabia and the seat of political Islam could exist in safety.

The first breach of this bubble of security, was the crusades. The crusades are generally seen a religious war, between Islam and Christianity, but in reality the conflict was not a religious affair as much as it was a political economic war to dominate the trade routes, which passed through the Muslim lands and via the Byzantine Empire into Europe. The motivating idea, behind the crusades was a political attempt by the Holy Roman Catholic Church to unite Europe under its influence and the best way to achive this end, was to stop the inter-European wars and unite the Europeans under the banner of the Church. Crusades, were seen as precedent by church, which would imply that in religious matters, the secular powers of Europe would be subordinated to the religious authority of the church.

On the Muslim side, the crusades were reacted to with a sense of a political angst. The crusades never threatened the religion of Islam, as much they threatened the political power of Islam in the region. The fact that the crusaders butchered everyone in Jerusalem and later sacked the Byzantine capital of Constantinople itself, belied the religious claims. The Muslims were fighting the Christians to protect their political power, which came from their ability to tax the trade, which passed through Muslim controlled lands and the price in all of this was Jerusalem - not because it was city of religious importance to both sides, but because it straddled the trade routes, and had a strategic geo-political importance.

The Muslim reaction, in the aftermath of the crusades, proved the non-religious hypothesis of the wars, because immediately afterwards the Muslim politics entered a period of orthodoxic status quo. Muslim tolerance and openess ended with the crusades, because the sense of security and safety, which Islam was able to engender after its early conquests, was shattered and in the mindsets of the Muslims, political Islam was threatened and had to be protected. However, the problem was that the crusades had brought about a contact, beween Islam and Christians and therefore, the only way political Islam could stop this contact, seen as a threat, was to adopt political and cultural isolationism from the west, whereby offering itself a zone of comfort, where it could recreate the ruptured bubble of security in order to preserve the nature of political Islam.

The last crusade was waged in the 1300s, and the Muslim reaction to it and its self-imposed isolationism would set in a slow, but gradual decline of Muslim fortunes, By early 1500s, Islam was evicted from southern Spain. The Muslim reaction was to ban all forms of change, technical developments and political thought within Muslim societies, which might endanger the political cohesion of Islam. The result was that while Europe was experimenting and progressing, Muslims were viewing progress in a negative light and as political Islam started to show and more signs of its power diminishing, Muslims political thought became more reactionary by seeking to emulate the political glory of Islam in its past as a solution to all its problems.

This is a very instrustive and a salient point, because it empathically suggests that a common consensus was developing, which argued that Islam`s political glory could only be attained as it was in the first instance - by armed conquest. The believe, amongsts Muslims, was that political Islam could not exist, as an equal to Christian Europe, but had to defeat and subjuate it. As Christainity was seen as the most tangible threat to Islam, it had to be defeated, because the growth of the west was bringing it closer and closer to the peripheries of the Muslim security zones.

The political resurgence of Islam, in this sense, was seen in the guise of the Ottoman Turkish conquest of eastern Europe. The conquest of eastern Europe, by the Turks, was again an attempt to push the bounderies of Islam further into Europe, but this could not sustained since the Turkish military conquest was based on a very weak economy. From 1500s to about 1919, the Turks were seen, by the rest of the Muslims as their final bulwark against the creeping of western political power. To the Muslims, western imperialism was tolerable as long as the Turkish Ottoman power was still existant and the collapse of the Ottoman Empire again brought about a feeling of insecurity in the Muslims, which still lingers to this day.

The colonization of large Muslim areas by the west and then the onset of World War I, followed by the inter-war politics and the Second World War did not allow the Muslims much opportunity to respond to the demise of political Islam. However, with Muslim lands gaining independence, this idea of a security bubble started to revive itself. At this point, another schism seems to have appeared in the Muslim political thought. This was the conflict, which existed, and still exists, in the Muslim politics, and it is between those leaders, who seek accomodation with the west and those, who reject it. The leaders, who favor rapprochement with the west, or any non-Muslim dominated society are labled anti-Muslim and a threat to Islam itself. The anti-thesis to this view is the demand to purify Islam by rejecting western influences from its politics and by re-creating it in its early manifestions.

This conflict allow exists on the level of the individuals. Hence, there is a significant majority of Muslims, which does not wish to co-exist with non-Muslims, because they have no wish to share their ``comfort zones`` with non-Muslims. This also explains, why Muslims do not intergrate into non-Muslim societies and why seek to create Muslim ghettos, where they can live in isolation from the mainstream society. The next phase in this self-imposed Muslim segregation is to demand an existence of their own enclaves based on their own laws, on religious grounds.

The irony of this is that Muslims are comfortable ruling over non-Muslims and promise them protection under Muslim laws, but are not willing to accept the promises of non-Muslims and are not comfortable being ruled by their laws. The result of this behavior is a mindset, which is very exclusive and not at all inclusive to towards equality and tolerance unless it is based on the notions of a Muslim supremac. Consequently, the most salient insight, which emerges from this into the Muslim political mind, is that Muslims by the virtue of their religion not only view themselves primus inter pares in a religious sense, but in every sphere of human activity.

The tangent of this view, as seen in the reaction of the Muslims, to the London bombings and the previous terrorist attacks intones an interesting observation. The Muslims` refusal to accept the Muslim mea culpa, in the terrorist acts in New York, Madrid and London, is not a result of a denial, but an admant refusal to adjust their political world views and admit that their historic antecents, to such a political philosophy, are misplaced in a world of global political, and cultural intergration. This is why, the Muslims are not willing to accept anything less than complete supremacy of their views and are not willing to co-exist peacefully, with non-Muslims.

Ciao

Romair #392

`` I always find it funny, how people quickly attempt to tear down anyone whose views contradict with theirs. ``

You mentioned him as an unbiased observer. He is a biased observer with a vested agenda.

`` I only mentioned Margolis` knowledge on Afghanistan, and the character assasinations started. He is recognized, worldwide, including by CNN, as an authority on Afghanistan`s Soviet war. He was, in there fighting with the Afghan Mujahideen. Even his critics recognize his expertise of that area. ``

He does not understand Pushutu or Dari.

`` I am not sure what his mother`s religion has to do with. He is actually an athiest, himself. And is an Eisenhower Republican. And fought in the Vietnam war. His mother, Nexhmie, was actually an American journalist, of Greek and Albanian background........... ``

How do you know his mother`s Albanian background does not influence his thinking ? I never knew it until dost-mittar pointed it out. It explains his anti-Slavic rantings.

`` I don`t think he hates India. He has, however, gone into Kashmir, and written about the human rights violations there. Which maybe why many people think he hates India............``

The Indian government would not allow him.

`` One should look at the point being made, about his experience in Afghanistan, rather than getting into someone`s mother or father, or India or Pakistan.............The other option is to simply close one`s eyes to anyone who disagrees with one`s opinons..........something I have never been willing to do...........but too many on this site prescribe to......... ``

Why does his experiences in Afghanistan make him so qualified ? I will be glad to post his articles on Afghanistan between Sep-11 2001 and Dec 20 2001.

`` I think his knowledge regarding the creation of Al-Qaeda, in Afghanistan, would be far greater than most other people`s. Then again, that should not count, because his mother may(?) have been a Muslim.........How in the world can a son of a Muslim mother (if she even was Muslim), who is an athiest himself, know about Afghanistan!!``

Huh ???

FYI I have read his book ``Top of the world ``

Romair#392:

Thanks for not contradicting me on the substance about Margolis except that he does not hate India. It`s not human rights in Kashmir - whether it`s Kargil, Siachen, cross-border jihadis, Khalistan or any other issue, his views are identical to that of Pakistan. I have never heard him say a positive sentence about India.

Not only CNN, he is a regular panelist on CBC and TV ontario. Not because of his balanced viewpoint but because he is a strong, articulate spokesperson for the Muslim viewpoint and a very good debater. However, I wouldn`t mind recommending you as a good substitute for him. :-)

This is what wikipedia has to say about his political views:

``Margolis`s writings display strong bias in favor of Muslims - noticeable in his coverage of issues of Palestine and Kashmir - and against Russians and other Orthodox Christian Slavs - noticeable in his fervent support for the Kosovo War, and his coverage of the conflict in Chechnya. These biases can be attributed to his close relationships with the Afghan mujahideen and their Pakistani military and intelligence handlers during the Soviet-Afghan war, and also to his Albanian-born mother Nexhmie Zaimi, who was one of the first American female foreign correspondents to cover the Middle East and was one of the few Western journalists in the 1950s to focus on the issue of Palestinian refugees.``

Re: # 401
Tahmed:

I am not looking to you to demonstrate on the streets, and neither am I expecting you to apologize on behalf of terrorists. I am looking for explanations to a troubling conclusion that many NY Times readers might reach that `Islam has a long tradition of tolerating other religions, but only on the basis of the supremacy of Islam, not equality with Islam` and thought that you might fit the bill. If you don`t or can`t then I think that the world is in for a lot of trouble, because if intellectuals like you cannot explain, then not much can be expected from the illiterate masses.

Re: # 400
Tahmed:
Addendum to previous: Friedman writes in his article, ``Islam has a long tradition of tolerating other religions, but only on the basis of the supremacy of Islam, not equality with Islam.``

THAT is a thought that has begun to resonate with liberal Western democrats (the author himself is one). Until only a few months ago, it would have been unthinkable that a statement such as that would be published in a major liberal newspaper. But now, this line of reasoning is very much in play. More than anything else, THAT is what I am trying to either validate or invalidate. Forget me, what would you say in response to Friedman`s assertion?
Thanks

PewResearch:

perhaps you`ve been here long enough to know that most of us are a little off-color here. anyone who is critical of pak policies (and muslims) is automatically branded a hindutva or a BJP walla and anyone who is critical of india policies and the BJP and the RSS is automatically branded a paki muslim jihadi.

no middle ground here. but if you`re a recycled identity here, you already know that.

like hotel california, this is such a lovely place. . . :)

PewResearch #402 As I recall from reading Friedman`s article, he does not call for muslims to start apologizing for their faith. Or to start explaining to nonmuslims that it is possible to be a muslim and not be a terrorist.

He did say something about muslims holding demonstrations condemning the london terrorism - but dont look to me to organize such demonstrations. That requires a level of commitment and time that I just am not interested in.