After fanning Civil War in Libya, Erdogan turns to Jammu & Kashmir

Pakistan asks - Is ISIS really bad and unIslamic?

Pervez Hoodbhoy in The Dawn


PAKISTAN’S military and government have proscribed the militant Islamic State (IS, aka Daesh aka ISIS) group and declared it an enemy organisation. They have never explained why. Of course, IS’s atrocities — which include beheadings, crucifixions, suicide bombings, and intimidation of civilians in captured territories — have been condemned by many. It is also a fact that IS has killed many more Muslims than non-Muslims. But is IS to be faulted for bad tactics or is its goal to create an Islamic state in Pakistan itself wrong? Should attempts to make a global caliphate be condemned or, instead, assisted?

Our generals and politicians would rather bomb IS than argue logically against it because they know IS’s stated goal resonates with millions of ordinary Pakistanis. Through its internet machinery, IS declares it will establish God’s principality (mumlikat-i-khudadad) headed by a righteous caliph who would govern by God’s law. For this to happen territory must be seized and secured, idolatry and heresy eliminated, and the immoral mixing of men and women stopped. This is sweet music to many Pakistani ears.

IS literature claims that Muslims can properly practise their faith only in an Islamic state. This also resonates perfectly. The leader of Kashmiri separatists and a member of the Jamaat-i-Islami, Syed Ali Shah Geelani, put it succinctly: “It’s as difficult for a Muslim to live in a non-Muslim society as it is for a fish to live out of the water.”
More support comes from Allama Iqbal, Pakistan’s celebrated poet-philosopher who declared that the ultimate goal of Muslims is to create a caliphate. In his influential 1934 lectures The Reconstruction of Religious Thought in Islam, Iqbal said: “In order to create a really effective political unity of Islam, all Muslim countries must first become independent: and then in their totality they should range themselves under one caliph. Is such a thing possible at the present moment? If not today, one must wait.”


Pakistan’s generals and politicians would rather bomb IS than argue logically against it.

With such a powerful voice advocating the caliphate as an eventual goal, should one then accept IS’s vision as authentically Islamic? Does IS genuinely represent Muslim thought and Muslim aspirations today? For two strong reasons — the ones that generals and politicians fail to articulate — I think not.

First, IS claims its legitimacy through Islam. But this is futile. IS’s takfiri Islam is definitely not mainstream Islam. This one particular strain must be contrasted against countless gentler, differently reasoned, more humane forms that reject IS’s harsh interpretations. To say which one of these is the truer Islam is irresolvable since Islam does not have a central authority like the pope.

But IS wants ‘purification’ and so those Shia Muslims and Sunni Muslims who disagree with its version have been declared apostates, stoned, killed, and had their hands and feet cut off. Like the Afghan Taliban, IS delights in destroying humanity’s common heritage. It despises archaeology, women and non-Muslims. Even if some Muslims agree with IS’s deeds, most reject them.

Second, IS’s claim that Islam insists upon a caliphate is not supported by the Holy Quran. Every Islamic scholar has to agree that the Quran does not mention a territorial Islamic state. In fact, there is no word for a territorial state in classical Arabic. That which comes closest today is dawlah but this word acquired its current meaning well after the 1648 Treaty of Westphalia, when the European concept of a geographically defined nation-state was born.

Islam’s greatest sociologist and political scientist, Ibn-i-Khaldun (1332-1406), had emphatically rejected the concept of an Islamic state and opposed using religion in politics. Others such as al-Mawardi (earlier) and Syed Abul Ala Maudoodi (later) thought otherwise, but all agree that the holy texts are not governance manuals.

Quarrels among scholars would have been stilled if the Quran or hadith had defined even the broad outlines of statehood. However these texts provide no hint of an executive or of government ministries. How should administrative units be determined, and the police or army organised. Would there be jails?

Most tellingly, the holy texts leave us guessing on how an Islamic state’s ruler is to be chosen and what might be legitimate cause for his removal. To this day there are furious disagreements as to whether Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) did or did not specify his successor — or even a procedure for determining one. This created an enduring schism on how to select the next leaders of the faithful. So, for example, is Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi acceptable as the present caliph or should it be someone else?

There can surely be hugely different opinions on religious and political matters, including whether a caliphate is desirable or possible in a globalised world. These are tolerable, arguable differences. But what Pakistan absolutely must not tolerate is messianic radicalism that encourages the killing of innocents after labelling them kafirs. Whether a group is anti-Pakistan (IS, Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan), or pro-Pakistan (Afghan Taliban, Lashkar-e-Taiba, Jaish-e-Mohammad) is irrelevant. Every group that calls for violence against civilians inside or outside national borders should be banned. A victory of religious fanatics would ensure limitless suffering and the destruction of every Muslim society on this planet.

So far ideologically unchallenged, IS is now fast increasing its presence across Pakistan and particularly in Balochistan. Even as it loses territory in Iraq and Syria, its propaganda units are trying to create new generations of religious extremists, much as they have done in Europe. Decrying IS as a rogue movement is insufficient to reverse this trend. It is also futile to claim that IS has nothing to do with Islam because its leadership carefully quotes supportive holy doctrines to justify every major atrocity. Therefore IS must first be defeated on ideological grounds — military action can come later if necessary.

Counter narratives to radicalisation do exist within the Islamic paradigm. A meeting of ulema called by the National Counter Terrorism Authority that I attended earlier this year cogently argued that radical takfiri groups depart from Islamic tradition and that their interpretation of Islamic sources is incorrect. But these wise recommendations, like many before them, have met obscurity. No Pakistani civil or military leader of significance has had the courage to endorse or own them. Extremism can breed rapidly in this climate.

Saudi Arabia and Iran - The real enemies of Islam

ISIS Caliphate, Israel-Palestine War & Pakistan's Anti-TTP Operation - Focus Ep171

Syria/ISIS: UK planned to train and equip 100,000 rebels

 By Nick Hopkins Investigations correspondent, BBC Newsnight

The UK drew up plans to train and equip a 100,000-strong Syrian rebel army to defeat President Bashar al-Assad, BBC Newsnight can reveal.

The secret initiative, put forward two years ago, was the brainchild of the then most senior UK military officer, General Sir David Richards.

It was considered by the PM and the National Security Council, as well as US officials, but was deemed too risky.

The UK government did not respond to a request for comment.

Lord Richards, as he is now, believed his proposal could stem the civilian bloodshed in Syria as rebels fought troops loyal to Mr Assad.

The idea was considered by David Cameron and Dominic Grieve, the attorney general, and sent to the National Security Council, Whitehall sources said.

It was also put to senior figures in Washington, including General Martin Dempsey, the US's most senior military officer.

While it was thought to be too radical at the time, US President Barack Obama said last week he was seeking $500m (£291m) funding to train Syrian rebels - an echo of Lord Richards' plan.

Insiders have told BBC Newsnight that Lord Richards, then chief of the defence staff but since retired from the military, warned Downing Street there were only two ways to end the Syrian civil war quickly - to let President Assad win, or to defeat him.

'Extract, equip, train'

With ministers having pledged not to commit British "boots on the ground", his initiative proposed vetting and training a substantial army of moderate Syrian rebels at bases in Turkey and Jordan.

Mr Cameron was told the "extract, equip, train" plan would involve an international coalition.

It would take a year, but this would buy time for an alternative Syrian government to be formed in exile, the PM was told.

Once the Syrian force was ready, it would march on Damascus, with the cover of fighter jets from the West and Gulf allies.

The plan envisaged a "shock and awe" campaign, similar to the one that routed Saddam's military in 2003, but spearheaded by Syrians.

'Chemical weapons'

Though the plan was put to one side at the time, Mr Cameron was later persuaded to consider military action when evidence emerged of chemical weapons use in Syria.

However, MPs voted against giving authority for a direct intervention last August.

The US and UK accused the Assad government of being behind the attacks, but Damascus blamed rebel groups.

Monzer Akbik, spokesman for the Syrian National Coalition, an opposition alliance, said: "The international community did not intervene to prevent those crimes and at the same time did not actively support the moderate elements on the ground.

"A huge opportunity was missed and that opportunity could have saved tens of thousands of lives actually and could have saved also a huge humanitarian catastrophe."

'No good options'

Professor Michael Clarke, of the Royal United Services Institute think tank, added: "We have missed the opportunity to train an anti-Assad force that would have real influence in Syria when he is removed, as he will be.

"I think there was an opportunity two or three years ago to have become involved in a reasonably positive way, but it was dangerous and swimming against the broader tide of history… and the costs and the uncertainties were very high."

He said it was now too late for the West to get involved.

"Western policymakers in a sense have got to have the courage to do nothing and to work on what comes after the civil war," he said.

"There are no good options over Syria. It is a slow-motion road accident."

Tens of thousands of people have died and millions more have been displaced in three years of civil war in Syria.

'Terrorism is bad for us but acceptable for others' : The West and Gulf Arabs

Vijay Prashad  in The Hindu

Both the West and the Gulf Arabs suggest that the terrorism that they dislike against themselves is acceptable to others.

Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi welcomed this Ramadan by declaring the formation of the Caliphate, with him as the Caliph — namely the successor of the Prophet Mohammed. It is the first return of a Caliphate since Kemal Atatürk’s Turkish National Assembly abolished it in 1924. Al-Baghdadi, the nom de guerre for the leader of the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS), has now announced that borders inside the dar al-Islam, the world of Islam, are no longer applicable. He has been able to make this announcement because his fighters have now taken large swathes of territory in northern Syria and in north-central Iraq, breathing down on Baghdad, the capital of the Abbasid Caliphate (750-1258).

Al-Baghdadi’s declaration comes after ISIS threatened to make its presence felt outside the territory it now controls. Bomb blasts in Beirut, Lebanon, hinted at ISIS’ reach. Jordanian authorities hastened to crack down on “sleeper cells” for ISIS as soon as chatter on social media suggested that there would be a push into Zarqa and Ma’an. Private Kuwaiti funding had helped ISIS in its early stages, but now Kuwait hinted that it too is worried that ISIS cells might strike the oil-rich emirate. When ISIS took the Jordan-Syria border posts, Saudi Arabia went into high alert. There is no substantive evidence that ISIS is in touch with al-Qaeda in Yemen, but if such coordination exists (now that al-Baghdadi has fashioned himself as the Caliph) it would mean Saudi Arabia has at least two fronts of concern. “All necessary measures,” says the Kingdom, are being taken to thwart the ISIS advance.

Jihad hub

Several months ago, two intelligence agencies in the Arab region had confirmed that ISIS is a genuine threat, not a manufactured distraction from the war in Syria. Many of those associated with the rebellion in Syria had suggested that ISIS was egged on by the government of Bashar al-Assad to allow his preferred framing of the Syrian war — that his is a war against terrorism and not against a civic rebellion. While it is true that Assad’s government released a number of jihadis in 2011, there is no evidence to suggest that he created ISIS. ISIS is a product of the U.S. war on Iraq, having been formed first as al-Qaeda in Iraq by the Jordanian militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. Deeply sectarian politics, namely an anti-Shia agenda, characterised al-Qaeda in this region. Funded by private Gulf Arab money, ISIS entered the Syrian war in 2012 as Jabhat al-Nusra (the Support Front). It certainly turned a civic rebellion into a terrorist war. Political support from the West and logistical support from Turkey and the Gulf Arab states allowed it to thrive in Syria. It became a hub for international jihad, with veterans from Afghanistan and Chechnya now flocking to al-Baghdadi’s band of fellows. By the start of 2014, ISIS held two major Iraqi cities (Ramadi and Fallujah) and two Syrian cities (Raqqa and Deir Ezzor). Their push to Mosul, then Baghdad was on the cards for at least a year.

The West has been consistently naive in its public assessment of events in West Asia. U.S. policy over Syria was befuddled by the belief that the Arab Spring could be understood simply as a fight between freedom and tyranny — concepts adopted from the Cold War. There was a refusal to accept that the civic rebellion of 2011 had morphed quite decisively by late 2012 into a much more dangerous conflict, with the radical jihadis in the ascendancy. It is of course true, as I saw first-hand, that the actual fighters in the jihad groups are a ragtag bunch with no special commitment to this or that ideology. They are anti-Assad, and they joined Jabhat al-Nusra or Ahra¯r ash-Sha¯m because that was the group at hand with arms and logistical means. Nevertheless, the fighters did fight for these groups, giving them the upper hand against the West’s preferred, but anaemic, Free Syrian Army. The Islamic State’s breakthrough in Iraq has inspired some of these men to its formations in Syria. They want to be a part of the excitement.

The West’s backing of the rebellion provided cover for Turkey’s more enthusiastic approach to it. Intoxicated by the possibility of what Turkey’s Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutog˘lu favoured as “neo-Ottomanism,” the Turkish government called for the removal of Assad and the emergence of a pro-Istanbul government in Damascus. Turkey opened its borders to the “rat-line” of international jihad, with planeloads of fighters from Libya and Chechnya flying into Turkey to cross into Syria to fight for ISIS and its offshoots. ISIS spat in Turkey’s salt. ISIS struck Turkey in 2013 with car bombs and abductions, suggesting to Ankara that its policy has endangered its citizens. In March, the Governor of Hatay province, Mehmet Celalettin Lekesiz, called upon the government to create a new policy to “prevent the illegal crossing of militants to Syria.” His report was met with silence.

Blowback

An ISIS billboard in Mosul depicts the flags of the states in the region. All are crossed out as being traitorous regimes. Only the ISIS black flag stands as a sentinel for justice. Among the regimes to be overthrown is the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia has used its vast wealth to influence the region, and to outsource its own problems with extremism. In 1962, the Kingdom created the Muslim World League as an instrument against secular Arab nationalism and Communism. Twenty years later, the war in Afghanistan provided the opportunity for the Kingdom to export its own disaffected youth (including Osama bin Laden) to fight the Afghan Communists rather than their own royal family. The 1979 takeover of the Mecca mosque by jihadists was an indication of the threat of such youth. Saudi policy, however, did not save the Kingdom. Al-Qaeda, the product of this policy, threatened and attacked the Kingdom. But little was learned.

Saudi policy vis-à-vis Syria and Iraq repeats the Afghan story. Funds and political support for jihadisin the region came from the Kingdom and its Gulf allies. Saudi Arabia tried to stop its youth from going to the jihad — a perilous mistake that it had made with Afghanistan. On February 3, the King issued a decree forbidding such transit. But there is no pressure on Saudi Arabia and its Gulf allies to stop their tacit support of ISIS and its cohort. Nor is there pressure on it to stop its financing of the harsh repression in Egypt, sure to fuel more conflict in the near future. The Arab world, flush with hope in 2011, is now drowning in a counter-revolution financed by petrodollars. Saudi Arabia’s response to the rise of ISIS misleads — no intervention to help the Iraqi state. “We are asked what can be done,” wrote its Ambassador to the U.K., Prince Mohammed bin Nawaf bin Abdul Aziz. “At the moment, we wait, we watch and we pray.”

No age-old conflict

The fact is that both the West and the Gulf Arabs are doing more. They continue to finance the jihadi rebels in Syria (all promises of vetting by the U.S. are comical), and they continue to see the Assad government as an obstacle to peace in the region. Both the West and the Gulf Arabs suggest that the terrorism that they dislike against themselves is acceptable to others. The history of their policies also suggests that Western and Gulf Arab intervention leads inexorably to the creation of police states (as in Egypt) and terrorist emirates. A lack of basic commitment to people’s movements — anchored in unions and in civic groups — will always lead to such diabolical outcomes.

Meanwhile, sectarian lines are being hardened in the region. The battle now does not revisit the ancient fight at Karbala. This is not an age-old conflict. It is a modern one, over ideas of republicanism and monarchy, Iranian influence and Saudi influence. Shadows of sectarianism do shroud the battle of ordinary people who are frustrated by the lack of opportunities for them and by the lack of a future for their children. What motivates these fights is less the petty prejudices of sect and more the grander ambitions of regional control. Al-Baghdadi has announced that his vision is much greater than that of the Saudi King or the government in Tehran. He wants to command a religion, not just a region. Of such delusions are great societies and cultures destroyed.