Islam isn't the foe in this clash

FEW sights have been more cheering than that of liberated Kabul – of Muslim women shedding their burqas and seeing the world for the first time in years other than through the narrow gauge steel mesh that had previously covered their eyes. There, too, were Muslim men choosing to shave their beards. And the most wildly decadent scene of all – the first legal bicycle race in Afghanistan in half a decade.

Other signs of liberation abounded – a woman newsreader on television, whereas TV itself had been banned by the Taliban. Similarly, traditional Afghan music, yes Afghan music, had been banned but now played freely on radio. In other words many, probably the overwhelming majority of Kabul's citizens were delighted to be liberated from the Taliban's rule. The chief lesson from all this for us is how absolutely stupid it is to generalise about Muslims, or so-called Muslim opinion.

Reaction to the war on terrorism has seen a lot of geo-strategic blather at about the level of Enid Blyton. Most of it has involved a crude version of Samuel Huntington's already very crude "clash of civilisations" thesis. Huntington holds that future conflict will pivot not on national interest or ideology, but on civilisational identity. Although Huntington predicted lots of such conflicts that haven't come to pass, people are focusing most on his view that there is an ineluctable clash between the West and Islam.

This is pernicious nonsense, the falsity of which can be demonstrated in countless messy, complex conflicts of today. After all, if an allegedly universal theory of conflict cannot predict or explain most of the conflicts that actually exist in the real, physical world, what use is it? In truth, theory of any kind is of very little use in foreign affairs, for in foreign affairs the general is always trumped by the particular.

But back to Islam. The Enid Blyton-Secret Seven interpretation of Huntington actually requires us to accept that Osama bin Laden and al-Qa'ida are truly representative of 1 billion Muslims, or at least a majority of them. Yet what do we actually observe when Muslim public opinion is put to the only test that counts, the ballot box? Muslims have a persistent habit of voting for moderates. In the world's largest Muslim nation, Indonesia, where I've been sojourning this past week, Islamic parties did not win a majority of votes at the last election. And the specifically Muslim parties that did win substantial votes were moderate, non-fundamentalist parties.

In Pakistan the fundamentalist parties never get much voter support. In Iran people always vote for the most moderate alternative on offer. Turkey, one of the most powerful of all Muslim nations, offered troops to fight alongside the US in Afghanistan.

What we witness in bin Laden and the Taliban are radically undemocratic forces, with a twisted and utterly non-traditional vision of Islam that they would never test with the Muslim masses at a democratic election. This is the same with Muslim extremists in or out of government. Take a South-East Asian example. Nur Misuari, the long-time leader of the Muslim separatist Moro National Liberation Front in the southern Philippines, launched a bloody rebellion last week in which more than 100 people died. He did so because his term as governor of part of Mindanao, a post he had been given by the Philippines Government as part of a peace deal several years ago, was running out. He had been a hopeless governor and he was not prepared to test his popularity at an election. It was to prevent this election that he launched his unsuccessful rebellion.

Misuari then escaped to Malaysia, where he was promptly arrested and the Government in Kuala Lumpur immediately offered to extradite him to Manila. HOW would the Huntington thesis explain this co-operation by Muslim Malaysia with Catholic Philippines? According to Huntington, surely the Malaysians should have been supporting their civilisational, and indeed ethnic, cousin in Misuari.

The US has often over the past decade taken military action to help or protect Muslims, from the liberation of Kuwait through interventions in Kosovo, Bosnia and Somalia. The US could certainly make its case to Muslim audiences better, and we need to draw out moderate Muslim voices and listen to them more.

The most convincing evidence for the compatibility of Islam and the West is the peaceful way millions of Muslims successfully live in societies such as Western Europe, Australia and, above all, the US.

Former treasury secretary John Stone expressed on this page last Monday his "gravest reservations" towards further Muslim immigration. This piece of stupidity falls into the old trap of lumping all Muslims together – analytically dumb and politically noxious.

More important, it breaches what is really the core doctrine of Western civilisation – that human beings should be judged, whether in their civic capacity or more generally, as individuals, not as members of a religious or ethnic group. If you don't know that much, you really have no business talking about Western civilisation at all.

Once more, Americans have set people free, which gives me a personal sense of retribution for 9/11
since that we would do this is what our enemies now hate most in us. Now, that the Afghan people themselves might
sustain those newly won freedoms to re-work their own destiny, and continue out of the Darkness, and into the Light!

As long as the Afghan people adhere to a restrictive, retrograde version of Islam, it will be very difficult for them to hold on to *any* freedoms at all. Keep in mind that Turkey is a modern country because of the draconian laws enacted at the country's founding by Kemal Ataturk. Religious leaders in the mosques are appointed by the government. Women are still not permitted to wear head coverings in public buildings (like the legislative house or courts.) Personally, I think these restrictions are good and necessary to keep the jihadists on a short leash.

Turkey is about the closest to a "moderate Muslim country," but I know of no countries where Muslims are in the majority where Muslims live in peace with those of other religions. (Bosnia does NOT count, because without the UN presence, the Bosnians would be dead meat, and they have a severe jihad problem of their own.)

Islam is not the foe per se, BUT Muslims (or anyone else) who spread anti-semitic propaganda, as you did here on another thread, in a post that implied Israel was behind the 9-11 attacks, ARE a foe, and a dangerous one at that.

Islam isn't the foe in this clash

I tend to agree - the foe is Arabs - Islam is their excuse and motivation. Indonesia, Malaysia, Pakistan and all non-Arab Islamic countries are not the problem, hence one can surmise its not the religion per se but the Arabic culture which is the foe.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.