The War on Terror: A War for Human Rights
August 11, 2003
FrontPageMagazine.com
Robert Spencer
The Indonesian terrorist group, Jemaah Islamiyah (JI), demonstrated last week that the war on terror is not just an effort to prevent recurrences of September 11; it is a struggle for human rights.
As JI celebrates (yes, celebrates) its murder of fifteen people and the wounding of 150 more in a suicide attack on the Marriott Hotel in Jakarta last Tuesday, as well as the death sentence given Thursday to JI member Amrozi bin Nurhasyim, the “smiling bomber” who murdered 202 people in Bali last October, it is instructive to remember that JI is doing all this killing for the Sharia.
The Sharia is the classic code of Islamic law that mandates stoning for adulterers and amputation for thieves, disallows a rape victim’s testimony in her own case, and hamstrings freedom of conscience by prescribing death for apostates from Islam and those who have blasphemed the Prophet — an offense that Christians in Pakistan and other beleaguered minorities in the Islamic world have found to be distressingly elastic. Jemaah Islamiyah, al-Qaeda’s southeast Asian affiliate, dreams of the day when the Sharia holds sway over the entire world, or at least its own corner of it.
Jemaah Islamiyah is fighting to create a Sharia-ruled Islamic megastate in Southeast Asia, comprising Indonesia, Malaysia, southern Thailand, Singapore, Brunei, and the southern Philippines island of Mindanao. In a certain sense it’s fitting that they see blowing up innocent people as a viable means to attain this end, for the utopia that group members envision is just as brutal and unreasoning. There have been numerous indications of that recently in places where the Islamic law that JI reveres is already (in varying degrees) in force:
- The supreme court of Afghanistan on Thursday upheld death sentences for two journalists, Sayeed Mahdawi and Ali Reza Payam. Their crime? Criticizing what they called the “holy fascism” that still holds sway in Afghanistan, and asking: “If Islam is the last and the most complete of the revealed religions, why are the Muslim countries lagging behind the modern world?”
- A court in Pakistan on Tuesday sentenced another man, Bashir Ahmed, to death for making “derogatory remarks against the Holy Prophet and his companions.”
- Women’s groups in Malaysia protested, thus far in vain, against a decision by that country’s Sharia court that men could divorce their wives by leaving a message on their mobile phones.
- The Jordanian parliament rejected on Islamic grounds a measure that would have given women the legal right to file for divorce, as well as another that would have led to stiff penalties for “honor killings”: the barbaric murder of young women by family members who believe that they have committed adultery, thereby shaming the family honor. Many young women have even been murdered after being raped, since traditional Islamic law allows a rape charge to be established only by the testimony of four male witnesses who saw the act itself.
- In Iraq, Muslim authorities in the Shiite holy city of Najaf overruled, also on Islamic grounds, the appointment by American authorities of a woman judge, Nidal Nasser Hussein. Afrah Najem, who like Nidal Nasser Hussein is a female lawyer in Iraq, knows that she has hit the mother of all glass ceilings: “Ours is an Islamic society that would not tolerate a woman judge.”
Draconian blasphemy laws, appallingly loose divorce laws (for men only), a totalitarian resistance to self-criticism, institutionalized brutality and oppression of women — these are the features of the Sharia law that forms the centerpiece of JI’s dream state. Their path to this utopia is stained with the blood of the nightclubbers, businessmen and bystanders that JI is rejoicing over having slaughtered in Indonesia.
Donald Rumsfeld has declared that the United States will not accept an Islamic state in Iraq. One may hope that this indicates that the human rights component of the war on terror has at least some advocates in high places. For the events recounted above illustrate why everyone who values freedom and basic human rights should oppose the Sharia, whether it is implemented in whole or part, not just in Iraq or Indonesia, but everywhere that it hinders the liberty of human beings — including Saudi Arabia.
Like a peevish schoolmarm, the judge who sentenced Amrozi scolded him for perverting Islam and jihad. But it is unlikely that any of the Muslim onlookers who cheered and shouted “Allahu Akbar” (Allah is great) when Amrozi entered the courtroom were brought to a moment of theological reckoning by the judge’s lecture. After all, moderate Muslims still have not answered the nagging question of why, if Islam forbids terrorism and the Qur’an teaches nonviolence, have so many devout Muslims around the world misinterpreted it so thoroughly and repeatedly. Where are the moderate Muslims who can teach not Western non-Muslims, but their fellow Muslims that Islam is peaceful?
If the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) and other Muslim advocacy groups really want to demonstrate that “Muslims follow a religion of peace, mercy and forgiveness that should not be associated with acts of violence against the innocent,” let them definitively renounce the Sharia for which Jemaah Islamiyah kills, and which brings anything but peace and mercy to those who must suffer under it. Let them work to create in the United States a truly moderate Islam that accepts the principles of Western secular society and coexistence with non-Muslims. If they do not do this, it is clear: history will judge them as being on the wrong side of this great struggle for the rights of mankind.
Robert Spencer is author of "Islam Unveiled: Disturbing Questions About the World's Fastest Growing Faith" (Encounter Books) and Onward Muslim Soldiers: How Jihad Still Threatens America and the West (coming this September from Regnery Publishing). An Adjunct Fellow with the Free Congress Foundation, he writes frequently on Islam in a wide variety of publications.
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=9319Great article.I was very disappointed about the death sentences in Afghanistan for the journalists.Islam doesn't seem to be strong enough to withstand scrutiny.Sharia is an anthema for freedom loving people.May Iran be able to break the bonds.
It seems that I have mixed up Hassan and Hussein Khomeini here
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/957322/posts?page=16#16
they are two different persons. This explains the strange things that Hassan has done. It is not easy when their names are similar and are transcribed ;-)
IMAM'S GRANDSON DEFENDS IRAN'S ACCOMPLISHMENTS.
Recent statements by grandchildren of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the father of Iran's Islamic Revolution, have contributed to the insider-outsider debate in Iran.
The
30-year-old Hojatoleslam Seyyed Hassan Khomeini comes across in his statements as a trusted defender of the Iranian political and social system. He said in a meeting with members of the University Basij on the evening of 5 July that public morale should not be harmed by drawing a negative picture of events, "Entekhab" daily newspaper reported on 7 August. He said negative comments by the factions of the left and right do not represent reality and, in fact, many great things have been accomplished since the 1979 revolution. Among them he cited is the increase in the number of university students (from 70,000 to 1.5 million), the acquisition of nuclear know-how, and an increase in electricity generation.
Hassan has carried out representational duties for the current Iranian regime. For example, in July 2001 he was sent to Cuba where he met with President Fidel Castro and members of his delegation participated in an anti-U.S. march across from the U.S. Interests Section in Havana. In February 2000, furthermore, he visited Islamabad to participate in a conference called, "Imam Khomeini's Role in Revival of Islamic Thoughts." In February 2002, Hassan criticized President George W. Bush's statement about Iran being part of the "axis of evil" that included Iraq and North Korea.
It would be cynical to suggest that there is a connection between Hassan Khomeini's loyalty to the system and his leadership of the Iran-based Imam Khomeini mausoleum foundation, which is worth millions of dollars. Control of a shrine can become "a trump card to play in the political struggle, even an entry ticket to the political scene," Fariba Adelkhah notes in her 1998 book, "Being Modern in Iran." Hassan may be destined for greater things, then.
In contrast with his cousin Hassan,
46-year-old Hojatoleslam Seyyed Hussein Khomeini has, so to say, "gone off the reservation." The London-based Arabic daily "Al-Sharq al-Awsat" reported on 29 July that Hussein had moved from Qom to Al-Najaf to continue his studies, stating that his move to Al-Najaf will contribute to the revival of the Iraqi Howzeh-yi Elmieh (Shia theological schools) at the expense of the politicized one in Qom. According to the Arabic daily, Hussein opposes politicization of the Al-Najaf seminary.
Once in Iraq, Hussein began making highly controversial statements about his former hosts. According to "Al-Sharq al-Awsat" on 4 August, Hussein supported Iranian President Abol-Hassan Bani-Sadr and opposed the Islamists behind Bani-Sadr's 1981 downfall, such as then-Hojatoleslams Ali-Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjani and Seyyed Ali Khamenei. Hussein believes that these individuals prolonged the 1980-1988 war with Iraq in order to stay in power. He also termed the Iranian theocracy "the worst dictatorship in the world," according to the "Al-Sharq al-Awsat" report, and said, "If the Americans provide [freedom], then let them come."
Hussein was very critical in an interview that appeared in the 2 August issue of the Netherlands' daily "De Standaard." He described Iran's leaders as "irresponsible and immature," adding that the Iranian people know that evil things are being done in the name of religion. Hussein also called for the separation of mosque and state in Iran. Hussein went on to suggest in the "De Standaard" interview that Iranian intellectuals, nationalists, and freedom lovers would come to Iraq when the situation stabilizes. "Free Iraq will become a place from where Iran's freedom will be prepared."
Hussein has become so worrisome, "Al-Sharq al-Awsat" reported on 4 August, that an Islamic Revolution Guards Corps assassin has been sent after him. (Bill Samii)
source:RFE/RL Iran Report Vol. 6, No. 33, 11 August 2003