Since 9-11, U.S. national security decision makers have made the Middle East a central focus. Recognizing the misalignment of the Arab world in terms of integrating into the global economy is one of the pivotal factors that have made the region unsuccessful and ripe for Islamic militants. The reasons are many and include a lack of legitimate government, the pervasiveness of despotic regimes who have not used their political power to address a worsening crisis in population, job creation and constructive education of the masses. With United States interest in the region comes a dire need to understand the Arabic texts and origins of Islamic militancy, both as a means of constructing credible public diplomacy products and for U.S. military personnel involved in psychological operations, intelligence and nation-building delving into Islamic sources brings forth a wealth of information that can be used credibly to discredit Islamic militant ideology and anti- American sentiment.
This review essay will look into the writings of an Egyptian counter-terrorism academic and writer Dr. Rifaat Al-Saeed who writes for the Egyptian newspaper Al-Akhbar Al-Yom (the Daily News). His latest Al-Irhaab Al-Mutaslam (Islamized Terrorism) was published in 2004 by the book section of Cairo's newspaper Akhbar El- Yom Book Press. It is an excellent look into how the Middle East and in particular Egypt coped with the fractionalization of the Ottoman Empire after World War I. Islamic militants from Usama Bin Laden to Muslim Brotherhood founder Hassan Al-Banna consider the 1924 abolishment of the Ottoman Sultanate and hence the Caliphate a significant disaster in modern Muslim history. The quest to re-establish the Caliphate is a central theme of Islamic radicals around the world, what few of their foot-soldiers know is that this concept of the Caliphate was hotly debated soon after Attaturk abolished the religious title in 1924, two years after Sultan Abdel-Hamid II, the last Ottoman Sultan was deposed. Not all Islamic clerics in mid-1920s and 1930s Egypt agreed on the concept of the Caliphate and whether it is a religiously required means of Islamic governance. This 234 page Arabic book is part of a series that the Egyptian publishing house Akhbar Al-Yom will issue, the book by Dr. Saeed is the first volume.
Going Into the Classical Islamic Texts
Out of the 70 war verses quoted liberally by Al-Qaeda two things must be understood. First, Islamic militant clergy never explain the historical context of which these verses were revealed. The war verses were primarily revealed when Prophet Muhammad was in Medina attempting to defend his society against the onslaught of a much more powerful opponent in Mecca. For their part, the Meccans could not allow Muhammad to remain in Medina, as he stood between them and the Syrian caravan routes. From Muhammad's view, the Meccan persecution of Muslims created a refugee crisis in Medina that required resources and raiding Meccan caravans offered an easy solution to the refugee crisis. This always must be viewed from the lens of the 7th century. Dr. Saeed exposes in his book that as jihadist quote the 70 war verses out of historical context, there are 124 verses in the Quran that deal with forgiveness, compassion, tolerance, and patience.
When dealing with ironclad Islamic law, the primary source that undisputed is the Quran (which has many interpretations) and the Hadith sayings and actions of Prophet Muhammad. The history of how these Hadiths were compiled is the subject of much Islamic scholarly discussion. The books discusses how out of 500,000 Hadiths collected only 4,500 are undisputedly verified as uttered or done by Muhammad and the codification of the Hadiths did not take its final form until the Caliphate of Al-Mamoun (813-833 AD) under two hundred years after the death of Prophet Muhammad. This leaves a body of untested Hadiths that for the untrained that can be used with deadly results. One must also be aware of the undisputed Hadiths there are contradictions and like the Quran must be explained in its historical context.
Another prominent theorist in jihadist discourse is Sheikh Taqi Ibn Taymiyyah whose writings were collected into a books called Al-Siyasa Al-Shariyah (The Sanctioned Polity). Ibn Taymiyyah existed in 1256 AD and the crown jewel of his book is Ahl Al-Mardaine (The Corrupt Peoples) Fatwa issued against the Mongols who had occupied most of the Islamic lands of Iraq and the Levant. The Mongols had converted to Islam and were engaged in a death struggle with the Mamlukes of Egypt, with skirmishes and battles all over the Levant. Ibn Taymiyyah angry over the sacking of Baghdad a half century before by the Mongols, issued his Fatwa declaring that although the Mongols accepted Islam, they are considered apostates because they continue to practice their traditional Yasa (Mongol) Laws. The book delves into Ibn Taymiyyahs's political reasons for issuing the Fatwa lies not only in them practicing their laws but that the cleric felt that since they converted to Islam their war with other Muslims should cease. Ibn Taymiyyah was reviving a doctrine that was suppressed by the fourth Caliph Ali. It basically articulated that since Ali as first cousin to Prophet Muhammad did not succeed Prophet Muhammad, and accepted the consensus of Medina's leaders for three persons to succeed him; he cheated God of His divine plan and therefore Ali and the majority of Muslims were apostates. Ali found this message so divisive he declared war against what became known as the fringe or Khawarij.
The Abolishment of the Caliphate and the Egyptian Response
When Hassan Al-Banna established the Ikhwan Al-Muslimeen (The Muslim Brotherhood) in 1928 that would evolve into the first Islamist political party, the founder was not immune to events happening in Egypt. The best part of this book contains a debate over the Caliphate, which in turn would spurn a lively discussion on the true role of Islam in politics. A more sinister trend would occur and that is the amalgamation of fascism with Islamist politics, this would occur during this period as Egypt boasted a half dozen political parties in the 1920s to early fifties. They included the Islaah Party, the Umma Party, the Young Egyptian (Fascist Party), the Nationalist (Wafd) Party, the splinter Free Nationalist Party, the Labor Party, and the Socialist Party to name but a few which also included the Islamist Ikhwan or Muslim Brotherhood. Each would have their own group of street toughs to rouse the crowd, a model taken from Italy's fascists and the early infatuation with Benito Mussolini.
The assassination of Egyptian Prime Minister Boutros Ghali represented a new trend in political violence in Egypt. What is crucial is this assassination was transformed from a nationalist crime to a religious obligation by clerics condoning the killing of this Coptic Egyptian. This touched on the Egyptian Coptic-Muslim divide that always lurks beneath the surface of society to this day.
Sheikh Abdul- Aziz Jaweesh preached from his pulpit in Al-Azhar that there was no nationalism in Islam. These sermons directly undermined Egyptian movements attempting to negotiate an end to the British protectorate over Egypt and the withdrawal of British forces form the country, there since 1882. Mustafa Kamel, an Egyptian nationalist hero, argued that the love of the Ottoman Empire has caused Egyptians to forget their Egyptianess. Hassan Al-Bana entered the argument saying that every Islamic nation is one in which every Muslim retains, works for and wages jihad for.
Kemal Attaturk's abolishment of the Caliphate coupled with the multitude of problems resulting from dividing the spoils of the Ottoman Empire among the French and British complicated this debate over identity. It is with great historic irony that between the whirlwind of ideas and ancestor of Al-Qaeda ideologue Dr. Ayman Al-Zawahiri would emerge to move the idea of the Caliphate forward. Sheikh Al-Ahmady Al-Zawahiri would rise to become chief cleric at Al-Azhar University until his removal under pressure by King Fuad I. In the mid twenties however, he sought to resolve the caliphate crisis by calling for an Islamic Caliphate Conference in 1924 to select the next caliph to succeed the last Ottoman ruler Abdel-Hamid II. King Fuad I of Egypt saw this as an opportunity to take the title of caliph for himself and Zawahri the Elder saw it as a chance to move the Islamic center from the Bosporus (Istanbul) to the Nile (Cairo).
To understand why King Fuad I was intrigued by being named the new caliph of all Muslims one must understand how he ascended to power. After World War I, Egypt was technically under Ottoman suzerainty, yet was controlled by the British since 1882. After the war it was determined to make Egypt independent and still a protectorate of Britain, this was achieved when Fuad I, a descendant of the Mohammad Ali Dynasty that ruled Egypt since 1805 was declared King of an Independent Egypt in 1922. He was thus a British creation and in 1923 a constitutional monarchy was established, that led King Fuad to balance a hostile parliament filled with nationalists, the cleric establishment in the great Islamic university of Al-Azhar, and the Egyptian Army, all three were the only organized entities that posed a challenge to Fuad's rule. Other benefits aside from prestige to King Fuad assuming the title of caliph include:
• Giving him prerogative over matters of religion, enabling him to control the different factions of Islam and balance Islamic-Christian relations in Egypt.
• Provides a counter-weight against the popularity of his arch-nemesis and Egyptian nationalist Saad Zaghlul.
King Fuad was the first Egyptian ruler to give the Al-Azhar Rector ministerial status, this was to further encourage efforts to make him caliph and give him control over assignment and leadership of the religious institution. By the leader of Al-Azhar becoming a member of the King's cabinet he was not longer an independent body but was an organ of government. This became apparent when King Fuad used mobs from Al-Azhar to counter Egyptian nationalist and pro-Zaghlul riots in Cairo.
Is the Caliphate an Islamic Obligation?
The conference did not materialize in 1924 but it would spark an Islamic judge and lecturer at Al-Azhar to write a book that would send shockwaves in the debate over the role of religion in politics. Shiekh Ali Abdul-Razzaq wrote Al-Islam Wa Usool Al-Hikam (Islam and the Basis of Rule) in 1925. Its central thesis was that the separation of Islam from politics is not incompatible with the Quran and Hadiths. He goes onto to describe how Islam in its essence is a spiritual not temporal religion that can only be debased if it associates itself with governance or politics. In refuting the need for a caliphate, Abdul-Razzaq writes that Prophet Muhammad was essentially a theological figure who was thrust into being the governor of Medina. The concept or even requirement for a caliphate cannot be found in the Quran or Hadiths and therefore is not obligatory form of governance in the Islamic world.
Abdul- Razzaq's views came at a time when the tide was pushing for moving the caliphate to Cairo and the after-effects of World War I on the Middle East created such ideas as colonialism being another for crusades. Usama Bin Laden ironically has reinvented these concepts when he rails against secularism and globalization as crusader ideas. Another Islamic modernist was the Grand Mufti of Cairo Mohammed Abduh and Sheikh Khalid Mohammed Khalid who argued that clerical fatwas need to concentrate on the industrial age and address such issues as modern finance, the concept of life insurance and the rapid pace of ideas coming from the west such as Darwinism, secularism and modern sciences. Aside from being a senior religious cleric, Abduh led the drive to reform Egypt's education system, arguing for the need for more modern science, mathematics and rational philosophy balanced with Islamic studies. He along with Abdul-Razzaq were attacked by the clerical establishment of Al-Azhar and suppressed, one can only dream of how Egypt if not the Arab World would look like today if they were allowed to continue pursuing this line of debate. The Islamic center of Al-Azhar would be split into three camps due to these debates and arguments:
(1) Mujaddidoon (Renewers) led by Abduh.
(2) Taqlidoon (Traditionalists/fundamentalists) the main Al-Azhar establishment.
(3) Selective Mujadiddoon (led by Rashid Rida and adopted by Islamic Militants).
This debate also renewed the call to open the gates of ijtihaad (analytical reasoning), an Islamic concept used at the time of Prophet Muhammad and done away with in the eleventh century in Sunni Islam. Rashid Rida and Mohammed Abduh had in common a charismatic and controversial cleric who arrived in Cairo in 1890 and observed the issue of Islam needing ijtihaad to survive, he also renewed the doctrines of IbnTaymiyyah and the Khawarij to declare all Muslim leaders who enabled the colonization of Muslim lands are considered apostates. The man was Sheikh Jamal Al-Din Al-Afghani a fascinating and little understood figure in the west. Originally Al-Afghani was Persian, who had learned as much as he could from Shiite centers of learning and decided to travel and learn from Sunni traditions. This led him to the Sunni center of Al-Azhar University in Cairo where he rose from student to one of the more popular lecturers on Islamic jurisprudence. His emphasis on the need to renew analytical reasoning in Islam, stimulated clerics like Mohammad Abduh and Al-Afghani applying the label of apostasy on those Muslims enabling the colonization of Islamic lands earned him the admiration of Rashid Rida and Hassan Al-Banna, who would form the basis of jihadist rhetoric today.
Sheikh Rashid Rida in answering the tomes of Mohammad Abduh and Shiekh Abdul-Razzaq published a pamphlet entitled, Al-Khilafa Aw Al-Imamah Al-Uzma (The Caliphate or the Great Imamate). In it he stressed how clerics who keep only to the mosque were reneging on their duties by not ushering in a just Islamic society and addressing colonialism, Darwinism, and Christian evangelism. It is up to the clergy to set the way towards an Islamic government and to thrust themselves into the socio-political issues of the day. What is important to learn about the debate over governance and caliphate that ensued in the 1920s and 30s is that today this kind of discourse is suppressed by Islamic militants and the mainstreaming of Wahabism in Islam today.
Abdel-Qader Hamza was inspired by Sheikh Razzaq and was moved to pen this commentary in support of separating Islam from politics: "We must free ourselves from the era of submission to the past, so that we do not remain ignorant and weak (as a people) as it is today." Hamza recognized in the 1930s that Arabs, Muslims and Egyptians were enslaved by a sense of victimization that was easy to project upon the Mongols, the Crusades and the British. Today it is the Americans and Israelis who fill this void and Arabs simply do not take ownership of any decisions made, it is always someone else's fault. He also wrote that the Quran came with a general set of laws in which every generation of Muslim has right and obligation to reinterpret these laws. Another cleric of Al-Azhar who spoke in favor of Sheikh Razzaq was Sheikh Tantawi Al-Jawhari, one of the few clerics in Al-Azhar to further the Islamic reform argument. Sheikh Al-Jawhari said that the pursuit of scientific learning and inquiry is a religious obligation and embracing even Darwinism as a means of better discovering the natural world would make us better human beings and only further the divine gift of reason that God has bestowed upon mankind.
Salafists Versus Mujadidoon
The most active voices of the debate centered now on the Salafists, that merged the Taqlidoon (traditionalists) and the selective mujadidoon. The Salafists argued for a return to fundamentalist Islam and the pure Mujadidoon (who advocated renewing the interpretation of Islam to keep pace with the technological age). Both claimed Jamal Al- Din Al-Afghani as one of their sources of inspiration. The Salafists had King Fuad I and his successor King Farouk I, the mainstream of the Al-Azhar clerical establishment as well as the Muslim Brotherhood Islamist grassroots organization. The Mujadidoon (modernists) had several members of the Egyptian cabinet, chiefly the Education Minister Taha Hussein, the Egyptian intelligentsia; Egyptian nationalists like Saad Zaghlul, the Wafd Party and members of parliament who felt the Salafists were another tool for the King to erode their political influence.
Rashid Rida representing the Salafists used the label of apostasy to silence the critical and vocal elements of the Islamic modernists. For instance, he wrote the Wafd Party has no Islamic agenda and the 1923 Constitution was not written with an Islamic character. Rashid Rida using his magazine Al-Manar and pamphleteering was able to give a voice to Al-Azhar clerics like Sheikh Al-Jaweesh who is often quoted because he advocated there was no nationalism in Islam and that Arabist movements in Egypt should be rejected. Al- Jaweesh went onto preach that Islam was under assault with the carving of Muslim lands by European powers, the Italians colonizing and killing Libyans, the French fighting and killing Muslims in Morocco. He gave listeners as early as 1920 an "Islam under siege," mentality. This rhetoric spawned Jamiat Al-Islami (The Islamic Group) in 1912 to Young Muslim Men's Association YMMA in 1927 and finally the Muslim Brotherhood in 1928. Reading Egyptian newspapers of the era the debate is answered not in looking back at Islamic texts to ascertain the requirement for the Caliphate but the need for a caliph to unite all Muslims coming under assault, in many ways a defender of the faithful title reasserting itself.
Contenders to the Caliphate
While the clerics of Al-Azhar in Egypt championed King Fuad I, clerics at Al-Aqsa in Palestine claimed the caliphate should go to Hussein Bin Ali (Sherief of Mecca whose sons Faisal and Abdullah led the Arab Revolt). Other contenders included the King of Afghanistan and a delegation representing the Iranian Hawza (Shiite clerical hierarchy). These competing interests and constituencies surfaced when the Caliphate Conference convened in Cairo in May 1926, it did not agree on a successor to the Ottoman Sultan Abdel-Hamid II.
Conclusion
Dr. Al-Saeed's book represents cutting edge Arab intellectual discussion on Islamic militant ideology that must be followed by US military and counter-terrorism planners. He offers interesting lines of discussion on the caliphate that could be utilized to counter the argument on the religious obligation of such an institution. This new war on Islamic militancy has an ideological dimension that can only be exploited by following books being published in Arabic that support or dispel the notions propagated by Islamic radicals. In this case, this is an excellent examination that dispels the simplistic world Islamic militants are trying to create by pushing forward the concept of the caliphate. It highlights the contradictions within Islam that can be used to ideologically challenge Islamic militant slogans. It also demonstrates that Bin Laden and his ideologue Al- Zawahiri's diatribe is not new and that they draw on many of the books highlighted in Dr. Al-Saeed's exposé of Islamic militant ideology.
Editor's Note: LCDR Youssef Aboul-Enein is a Medical Service Corps and Middle East Foreign Area Officer currently serving at the Office of the Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs. He is a frequent contributor of essays that highlight the Middle East and Islamic militant theory and tactics. His analysis of Dr. Al- Saeed's book, which is in Arabic, represents LCDR Aboul-Enein's understanding of the material.