Seductive voice of political Islam
By DAVID ROHDE
THE NEW YORK TIMES
AMERICAN officials scolded Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad recently for declaring to the world's largest Muslim organisation that Jews control the world and that frustrated Muslims should try to learn from them. United States President George W. Bush privately told the Malaysian leader, said presidential aides, that his comments were 'wrong and divisive'.
US National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice said: 'I don't think they are emblematic of the Muslim world.' By many accounts, though, Ms Rice is voicing wishful thinking.
After Dr Mahathir spoke, the Muslim heads of state gathered at the 57-member Organisation of the Islamic Conference gave him a standing ovation for the speech, which ultimately criticised the Islamic world for failing to modernise.
The acceptance of such conspiratorial views may strike Americans as despicable or even laughable, but they reflect the influence of Islamic radicals on the world views of millions of Muslims. Conveyed with ease and authority via the Internet and satellite television, anti-American and anti-Semitic conspiracy theories abound, not only in Muslim countries but across the world.
Many of these theories are spread by radical groups that adhere to an ideology loosely known as political Islam. Stridently anti-Western and anti-modern, political Islam portrays itself as the strongest ideological counter to democracy and capitalism.
Radical Muslims do far more than simply declare that Mr Bush and Israel, for example, are evil. Political Islam is a sophisticated mixture of fundamentalism and nationalism that can foment acts of violence against Western targets. But for its followers, it is a romantic liberation movement - a militant ideology with Marxist echoes that combines Islam's powerful call for social equality with a critique of Western corporate imperialism and the corrupt Muslim elites who benefit from it.
ITS APPEAL
The growing voice of political Islam suggests that the US faces a much more nebulous enemy in its war on terrorism than a movement of religious zealots. It is an ideology that persuades some alienated young Muslims, whether deeply religious or not, to join what they see as an epic struggle against an evil empire.
Pollsters emphasise that popular support for radical Muslims remains relatively low in the Muslim world, a vast amalgam of 1.5 billion people that is by no means monolithic. But by taking advantage of overwhelming Muslim disapproval of American policies in Israel and Iraq, political Islam appears to be gaining traction in some regions.
Growing numbers of Muslims surveyed after the invasion of Iraq say they see the American war on terrorism as a campaign to weaken Muslims - a charge long made by radical Muslims. At the same time, statements by Muslim, Christian and Jewish leaders perceived to be offensive are instantly transmitted around the world on satellite TV or on the Internet, fuelling polarisation on all sides.
Recent comments made at a church breakfast by a top Pentagon official William G. Boykin, likening America's war against Muslim extremists to a battle against Satan, are a case in point. Statements like that, analysts say, play into Muslim conspiracy theories, which blame the US and Jews for the Muslim world's oppressive rulers, stagnant economies and sense of powerlessness.
'You are explaining events that are painful to the public, for which the public has no other explanation that is available, and over which the public has no power,' said University of Maryland professor Shibley Telhami. 'They put forth a theory that explains that the responsibility lies with someone else.'
The Muslim groups are keenly political, often with excellent organisational and public relations skills. In Pakistan, for example, a coalition of religious parties that received only 11 per cent of the popular vote in parliamentary elections last year has turned itself into the country's main opposition group.
The organisations vary widely, ranging from Algeria's ultra-conservative and ultra-violent Armed Islamic Group to Jamaat-e-Islami, a decades-old political movement in Pakistan, Bangladesh and India that calls for establishing Islamic rule through non-violent, democratic means.
The goal, like that of any political organisation, is gaining power. At times, they blame their enemies for their most reprehensible acts. They try to turn their own weakness, as well as their opponents' overwhelming strength, into an asset.
After a car bombing on Oct 12 at an American complex in Baghdad, crowds of Iraqis began chanting that the US had set off the explosion itself. Two years after the Sept 11 terrorist attacks, many Pakistanis still believe the US invaded Afghanistan solely for its natural gas reserves, which are, by global standards, comparatively small.
Last week, Mr Bush appeared to be surprised by the depth of suspicion that moderate religious leaders expressed to him in Indonesia. 'Do they really believe that we think all Muslims are terrorists?' he asked his aides.
Williams College sociology professor Robert Jackall said the Muslims' voice is far larger than their numbers. 'There is a fanatical group, a fringe element that has been able to command the media and has been able to propagate a series of fantastic world images and a series of fantastic conspiracy theories.'
From Iraq to Afghanistan, the number of people who join the guerrilla wars being waged against American forces may not be large, but as past attacks have shown, even a small number can do huge damage.
For American policymakers, countering political Islam and its conspiracy theories can seem baffling. After his meeting with Muslim leaders in Indonesia, Mr Bush seemed particularly perplexed by their belief that the US was uninterested in the creation of a Palestinian state, something the President has repeatedly said he supports.
TOUGH PROBLEM
It was unclear whether the Muslim leaders had not heard Mr Bush's prior statements or considered them a subterfuge.
Johns Hopkins University's professor of Middle Eastern studies Fouad Ajami said part of political Islam's anti-modern approach is a rejection of the Western scientific method. So when some Muslims declared, for instance, that Al-Qaeda caused this summer's blackout on the East Coast, that could be accepted without any proof.
'When there is a break in cause and effect, it's easy to sell these views of the world,' said Prof Ajami. Supporters of an aggressive military campaign against terrorism say the US, as the world's lone superpower, will be distrusted no matter what it does.
But members of the Bush administration panel that surveyed Muslim attitudes say American public diplomacy efforts must be redoubled.
Prof Jackall said the problem is more difficult in some ways than battling communism. Sweeping efforts to counter political Islam could confirm its conspiracy theories and demonstrate its suppleness as an ideology.
After Dr Mahathir's statements were harshly criticised, for example, the Malaysian Prime Minister said the outcry his speech provoked had proven him right. 'The reaction of the world shows that they control the world,' he said, referring to the Jews.
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