III. Bin Laden and the Muslim consciousness
V. Sin, expiation and sacrifice
VII. Colonial oppression and reaction
© Bruce T. Murray
Also see “Getting inside the minds of religious militants” with Prof. Mark Juergensmeyer
By Bruce T. Murray
Web Sage Editor
To a Western audience, Osama bin Laden's periodic broadcasts from his caves and rocky outcroppings might appear as the ravings of an eccentric madman, or perhaps a small glimpse of a psychotic mass-murderer.
But to a Muslim audience, even those who condemn bin Laden's actions, bin Laden's words and representations strike another chord.
“Bin Laden rather ingeniously manipulates images that are embedded in the Muslim consciousness,” said Steven Simon, Senior Fellow for Middle Eastern Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations.
The Al Qaeda leader touches the Muslim consciousness by invoking the Prophet Mohammed’s experience, the Koran and the historical experience of the Muslim world.
“Bin Laden is a megalomaniac who self-aggrandizes himself, but there is also a self-effacing side: He dresses in simple clothes and simple military garb. He does not partake in any pleasures which he could have if he had chosen to remain with his family and keep his Saudi citizenship,” Simon said.
Simon examines the origins of Al Qaeda and other Islamic extremist groups in his book, The Age of Sacred Terror, co-authored with Daniel Benjamin. The book explores the historical underpinnings of these groups – and the individuals behind them.
“The phenomenon represented by this group [Al Qaeda] is very complex,” Simon said. “It’s important to recognize the complexity of this phenomenon to understand why it’s going to be so difficult to counter, let alone defeat.”
During the George W. Bush administration's “War on Terror,” government officials often likened Al Qaeda to snake, which must be killed by cutting off its head.
“These zoomorphic images are very revealing about the way in which people deal with the situation,” Simon said. “If on the other hand you don’t believe it’s like a snake, but more like a deadly mold, you might get a better sense of the difficulty in developing strategy to deal with it.”
He noted that despite the fact that many Al Qaeda leaders were killed or captured in the years immediately following the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, terrorist strikes kept happening around the world.
“Since Sept. 11, this movement has been under unrelenting coordinated international pressure,” Simon said. “Yet, in that time, they have attacked planes with surface-to-air missiles; they have attacked trains and gated compounds; they have launched audacious conspiracies to attack American embassies and consulates; they have experimented with toxins; they’ve carried out assassinations; and now they are embarked on a very audacious campaign to challenge American control in Iraq.
“And this is all being conducted by a group that is being chased all over the world and their leaders captured and killed. On a tactical level, you have to give them some credit.”
Osama
bin Laden is a very effective propagandist for the audience he is addressing, Simon said. Bin Laden evokes the image of the murabitoun,
or vigilant warriors, of the early the history of Islam.
“As the Islamic empire was expanding [in the seventh and eighth centuries],
young men would flock to the frontiers of the empire, man the outposts,
push forward the borders of Islam and fight against those would encroach
on lands that had been won for God. These are powerful images, and bin
Laden manipulates them quite well,” Simon said.
Bin Laden frequently talks about the Crusades, which he brings to present times with what he refers to as the “Zionist-Crusader Alliance” between Israel and the United States. In his first statement after the bombing of the World Trade Center, bin Laden referred to the loss of Andalusia in southern Spain during the final push of the Spanish reconquest in the 15th century.
“The Crusades were a twofold experience for Muslims: They learned the bitterness and humiliation of defeat, but later the triumph of victory when Saladin defeated the Frankish defenders of Jerusalem,” Simon said. “These images are very powerful in the minds of Muslims. They are part of the larger template that influences the way in which current realities are assimilated and understood.”
On the other hand, Simon cautioned against stereotypes: “There is no single, unitary Muslim. Muslims of the world are differentiated by country of origin, ethnicity, tribe, profession, interests, and gender. But there are motifs that are familiar to most Muslims that are part of their narrative,” he said.
Al Qaeda and other extremist groups weave certain themes into their statements and propaganda. Among them:
Muslims are deeply concerned about sin and expiation (penance). “It’s a sense that things are bad for Muslims, and that it is the fault of Muslims for letting it happen,” Simon said.
The most dramatic outgrowth of this kind of thinking is suicide bombing. Teenage boys are especially drawn to suicide bombing as a solution to sin and expiation.
“It is very appealing to adolescents. It’s very compelling; it’s very sexy, and very romantic. It becomes a fad,” Simon said. “These are vulnerable people. They are in between things: They are already men, but they are not married; they have finished school, but they are not working. It is precisely such people who are to be sacrificed because they are impure, and they are impure by virtue of their in-between-ness.”
Older people also commit suicide bombing. Even women have been recruited in recent years. Simon said it is important to distinguish the different motivations behind suicide bombing. For example, in October, 2003, a 29-year-old woman and law school graduate Hanadi Jaradat blew herself up at a restaurant in Haifa. Her brother and a cousin had been killed by Israeli defense forces
“This case seems to be explainable on the basis of some horrible things she had experienced. One can see a person like that saying, ‘What have I got to live for? I’m gong to end it all, and get those bastards at the same time,’” Simon said.
Simon’s book, The Age of Sacred Terror, co-authored with Daniel Benjamin, recounts the story of the Islamic reformer Taqiyy ad-Din Ahmad Ibn Taymiyya (1263-1328). Ibn Taymiyya co-founded a law school and advocated a strict constructionist view of Islam.
“He contributed two important concepts to the debate at that time which resonate very strongly in the salafi movement, from which Al Qaeda emerged,” Simon said.
Ibn Taymiyya lived at a time when the Islamic world was suffering from external pressure and internal strife. He believed it is not enough to have a powerful ruler who can create stability, but it is also essential to have a righteous ruler.
“A key attribute of righteousness is the vigor by which a ruler implements Islamic law in his kingdom, and the vigor with which he carries Islam to the lands that lie outside the Muslim perimeter,” Simon said.
Ibn Taymiyya also advocated amending the five pillars of Islam, which are,
“Ibn Taymiyya asked, ‘Where is jihad in these
five pillars of Islam?’ He looked at the prophet’s life and
saw physical combat against the enemies of God was a key component of
his career. He thought it was inexplicable that jihad was not revered
in the same way as the other pillars of Islam,” Simon said.
“There never became six pillars of Islam, yet he set into motion
a train of thinking in Islam that placed jihad on the same level as the
other five pillars of the faith.”
By the time of the late 19th century, much of the Islamic world had come into the orbit of European imperial powers.
“Muslim intellectuals asked themselves how it was that Islam was in this condition and how easily the Muslim lands were occupied by these foreign powers,” Simon said. “Their answer was, ‘We have been untrue to our roots. If we try to recapture the values and practices of the early age of Islam, in its first two centuries of expansion and vibrancy; if we shake off centuries of dead commentary and constraints on thinking, we will be able to challenge our oppressors on equal terms.’
"Then Muslims would be in position to take from the West various advances, make them authentic in an Islamic way, and not only challenge the colonizers, but become better Muslims in the process.”
Before colonial times, clerics occupied an important place in Islamic societies. Under colonial administration, clerics were not considered useful from the standpoint of the colonial governments, which needed natives who could speak European languages and occupy administrative functions. The successor states that arose in the place of colonial governments similarly excluded clerics, and most became despotic military regimes.
In post-colonial Egypt, a radical movement emerged drawing from Ibn Taymiyya’s ideas – that the secular authoritarian rulers were impious and did not deserve to be in power. In the 1970s an Egyptian electrical engineer named Abd al Salam Faraj wrote a book called “The Forgotten Obligation.” Drawing from Ibn Taymiyya, he advocated the sixth pillar of Islam, jihad. The book propelled an insurgency against Anwar Sadat’s government (Sadat was assassinated in 1981), and later against the Mubarak government – which crushed the movement.
“The Egyptians who escaped the hammer and fist of Mubarak’s secret police went to Afghanistan where they linked up with Saudis and formed Al Qaeda,” Simon said.
A new field of jihad has emerged in Europe, with its high populations of unemployed, disaffected Muslims. Most of the radicals emerging from Europe are from third and fourth generation immigrants. (See discussion with Christopher Caldwell, “What is the West’s Problem with Islam?”)
“They don’t speak the languages of their grandparents. In that sense they are completely assimilated. They speak French, Spanish, Italian, German, Dutch, Flemish and of course English. They don’t speak Turkish, Urdu, Farsi or Arabic. They did not have systematic Islamic schooling. And they often view their parents’ Islam as a washed-out set of boring rituals and empty usages with no meaning to them,” Simon said.
“They are excluded from the broader European society in which they live. They are simultaneously assimilated and alienated. They are looking for some identity to which they can hang on and give them some meaning. Islam provides this identity and sense of pride.”
What appeals most to the new converts is jihad.
“When I was interviewing Muslims in Britain, one line was particularly striking: ‘Why would I want to be Anglican? Have you ever seen an Anglican priest kill for his religion? No. What kind of religion is that?’ The alternative is a robust religion that people will fight for and put their lives on the line for,” Simon said. “Sacrifice is a very powerful motivating factor.”
Simon has advocated affirmative action for Muslims in Europe as a way
to help integrate them in their host societies, but it is unlikely any
European government would adopt such a program
“Hell will freeze over before the French adopt affirmative action
for Muslims,” Simon said.
The Middle East and the Muslim world have various attributes that will make the problems there very difficult to solve in both the long and short-term. Among them: