Last week a group of students in Swarthmore College prevented me from talking or reasoning with them, or with the audience. It was
sad to see young students unable to participate in a peaceful argument. I’m
also saddened that we have missed on an opportunity to enjoy a constructive
debate about our world, which is something I always enjoy. Therefore, I have
decided to imagine that our debate did take place and was not interrupted by an
irresponsible burst of emotional hostility. I will assume that what I imagine
is a common argument was made, and I will try to answer.
One of the corner stone arguments of the
anti-Israel/pro-Islamic activists who come from Muslim communities or leftist
activism, is that the homicidal apocalyptic phenomena which is coming from a
tiny radical minority in the Middle East, is nothing more than a response to
the combination of brutal inhumane Israeli occupation, merciless American
imperialism, and political economic western backed tyrannies. Although, such
opinions should not sound any less defective, misleading, and insufficient than
the opinion that satirist cartoonists bring their own death by ridiculing
people most holy beliefs. However, for the sake of the argument I would like to ask my readers to join me on
the experimental thought that all of this is absolutely true and correct. That
the incredible cruelty that we witness now on daily basis, and that nearly half
a century of Islamic terrorism targeting primarily Jews, Christians, Westerners
and Muslims themselves, is nothing but a reaction to an equal western barbarism.
There is nothing intrinsically bad with the current
mainstream Islamic tradition or the mainstream culture of Muslims. It is the
atrocities committed by Israel and the west which force an inherently good
culture to produce some of the worst mass murderers known to the modern world.
Nevertheless, the majority of Arabs and Muslims are as peaceful as anyone else,
and driven by the same desires and fears as anyone one of their fellow humans.
Any general accusations, or even hinting that Islam or Muslim culture is
somewhat dominated by some bad ideas should be instantly labeled as racist and
Islamophobic. In the light of this assumption I would like to examine some of
the events took place last week:
Last week some individuals of the extremely insignificant
Islamic radical minority, which does not by any means represent the true
peaceful loving nature of main stream Islam, have publicly executed a Jordanian
pilot, burning him alive in an astonishing demonstration of barbarity. It is
naturally expected from the moderate Muslim majority to publicly denounce and
condemn such abhorrent acts of extreme cruelty, which they did. Al Azhar
University in Cairo, widely held to be the capital and chief center of moderate
Sunni Islam, issued a statement denouncing and condemning the horrific act and
claiming that those who performed it are indeed no part of the Islamic faith.
Al Azhar added that the monstrous fighters of ISIS –monstrous indeed no doubt-
“require the punishment mentioned in the Koran for these corrupt oppressors whofight against God and his prophet: killing, crucifixion or chopping of thelimbs." This of course came shortly after Egypt president Sisi was globally celebrated
for publicly demanding “a revolution in religion” and a “reform of Islam”.
Al Azhar is significant, and we should pay attention to
this. Al Azhar is the oldest most prestigious center of Islamic learning in the
world. It is held to be the center of Islamic modernity in its war on
radicalism. It has students from every country in the world, and it is one of
the main reasons Obama chose Cairo to be his podium for addressing the Muslim
world in his landmark New Beginning speech in 2009. The entry for Al Azhar
University in The Encyclopedia Britannica states that it is “chief centre
of Islamic and Arabic learning in the
world”. Obama described Al Azhar as “abeacon of Islamic learning.. that carried the lightof learning through so many centuries” . The bottom line is the legitimacy of Al Azhar theological and legal opinions
is indisputable to the majority of the Muslim world –assuming the majority
follows moderate Al Azhar and not the insane minority. Now let’s again examine
their statement “requires the punishment mentioned in the Koran for these
corrupt oppressors who fight against God and his prophet: killing, crucifixion or
chopping of the limbs.” I don’t know about you, but I personally have a problem
here. You see, crucifying people and chopping of body parts is not exactly my
idea of peace and moderation. We are now wise enough to know that such acts of
extreme cruelty is not accepted in any cultural conext any more by any
normative rationale. This beacon of moderate Islam has miserably failed to
establish an objection to extreme cruelty and violence. They actually did the
absolute opposite as they established the theological ground for killing,
crucifying, and chopping of limbs of others given they are convicted with being
“corrupt oppressors”. Think about this for a moment; the chief center for
Islamic learning globally and what is held to be the most moderate Islamic institution
is incapable in condemning brutality and barbarity without calling for applying
them simultaneously. They are not just self-contradictory, but the capital of
Sunni Islam scholarship has no principle objection to applying violence
and public extreme cruelty –as it is the case with crucifixion- to those which
are seen as corrupt oppressors, let them be Israelis, Americans, Muslim
brothers or blasphemous cartoonists. It is needless to say that any attempt to
interpret “corrupt oppressor” is exactly what opens the wide gates of jihad
depending on any political conflict you are interested in, and one does not
need to think too hard to conclude that taking down towers, a barrage of
rockets from Gaza, bombing of buses and pizza restaurants, as well as stabbings
in public transportation are merely a variation of the methods used to deliver
justice to those who deserve it. You can split a few hairs here and there, and
try to argue about who qualifies to be labeled as a “corrupt oppressor”, but it
will still be left for the perpetrators own judgment of who is.
Moderate Al Azhar quite successfully has refuted all our
presuppositions about the good peaceful ideology, the small bad radical
minority, and the moderate majority in just one statement. Al Azhar is telling
us here that there is nothing America, Israel, or the infidel west can do to
force the main stream Islamic tradition to turn cruel and violent, violence is
already there waiting for any person with the right label to provoke it. If our
passionate anti-Zionist anti-Imperialist activists were wrong about that, why
should they be right about bad Israel and tyrant America? This again is to
remind us that many of irrational pro-Islamic and anti-Zionist activism is out
there to protect Islam, and not Muslims, and even in many cases can be seen
accurately as camouflaged anti-Semitism.
One does not need to look too far in order to find some
evidence of the great consequential moral gap between the tradition which
produced the statement of Al Azhar and the evil western civilization. The very
recent American response to the CIA torture report should serve that purpose
perfectly. The American people consensus consider physical torture –which to no extent was near crucifixion or
chopping of limbs- of the same monstrous terrorists to be a dark stain on
American values, American honor, and the American flag. You should not search
too much in Israeli public media to find the same harsh and sincere self-criticism
of many of Israeli policies. It is my opinion that this huge moral gap accounts
for almost all the miseries of the Middle East. Regardless of what America,
Israel, or the west does. Extreme application of violence is an integral part
of the doctrine of those extremists as well as many of those who we label moderates.
For the past three months or so the government of moderate
Sisi and home of enlightened Al Azhar, has systematically engaged in the
business of hunting, arresting, publicly humiliating, and imprisoning
homosexual Egyptians. Simultaneously, a
stronger more violent state sponsored campaign was launched on atheists. Not
exactly what the west had in mind regarding Sisi’s “reform of Islam” and
“revolution in religion” don’t you think? Last week I was screamed at, cursed
at, and even was successfully prevented from speaking at Swarthmore College by
people who did not agree to what I was saying. Some of them fit the typical
idea of the unveiled, perfect English speaking, moderate Muslim young women who
live and study in the west. Similar “moderates” failed to do the same during my
speech at Temple University the next day. Some of them sadly were students of
journalism. This, along with the open call for crucifixion, chopping limbs, and
Sisi's moral policing should make one thing very clear; these people have no
clue as to what constitutes civil society. Blaming ourselves and Israel for
everything that goes wrong in the world, accompanied with some wishful thinking
towards the “culture and religion of peace”, may make us feel better and
hopeful, however it can’t stand in the face of the very obvious truth, that
this major culture which is controlling huge parts of the developing world has
been taken over and even dominated by some very bad ideas, and they, not us,
and certainly not Israel, are the reason why we expect to see cruel and
horrific deaths of multiple people the next time we look at news.
Assuming that Israel and the west made all the necessary
accommodations and concessions to the warriors of the Islamic world, would
peace be achieved with a society whose only debate about violence is about
determining who deserves his body parts to be chopped off? Is such a
society capable of making peace? More importantly, are they capable of
maintaining peace? We should know with certainty that crucifixions, limbs
mutilation, women oppression, sexual repression, atheist hunting, systematic
human rights violations, speech restrictions, and anti-Semitism will indeed cause
many things, but not peace.
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