As the war against terrorism that the US and its allies started in Afghanistan threatens to take a Westerly direction that does not have the same level of world support, N.S. Rajaram traces the history of Jihad that has come to roost in Pakistan
Islamic terrorism is the greatest threat to peace and security in our time. Thanks largely to the September 11 terrorist attack on the New York World Trade Center and the Pentagon the world now knows something of Jihad and its ties to Islamic terror. India of course has suffered much longer. Nonetheless, Jihad continues to be presented as a noble internal struggle over one's baser instincts- something like meditation and Yoga. Even when the violent aspect of Jihad is pointed out, its apologists claim that violence and terrorism cannot be justified as Jihad, as if "real Jihad" is something we should all welcome. As a result, a good deal of confusion prevails in the public mind with regard to the true nature of Jihad and its relationship to Islamic terror. The worst offenders in this game of sophistry are not the Muslims themselves but non-Muslim intellectuals and academics in India, Europe and especially America.
Another point worth noting is that terrorists worldwide acting in the name of Jihad cannot be defeated by redefining Jihad to suit our comfort level. The various Jihadis are drawn to the interpretation of Jihad given by the likes of Osama bin Laden and not the apologists that fill Indian and Western universities and newspaper columns. To understand the true nature of Jihad and its role in terrorism, it is necessary to look at the primary sources that place Jihad in Islamic law and behavior. (Islamic law is part of its scripture.) The picture we then get is quite different from what the 'experts' are telling us.
The meaning of Jihad
Dictionary of Islam defines Jihad
as: "A religious war with those who are unbelievers in the mission of Muhammad
[the Prophet]. It is an incumbent religious duty, established in the Quran
and in the Traditions [i.e., the Hadits or the 'Acts of Muhammad'] as a
divine institution, and enjoined especially for the purpose of advancing
Islam and of repelling evil from Muslims." The last point about "repelling
evil" calls for an explanation: its primary goal is to prevent Muslims
from deviating from the true teachings of Islam of unrelenting hostility
towards Kafirs and lapsing into heresy. Movements intended to root out
such 'evil'-often called 'purification movements'-are a feature of Islamic
history. The Wahabi movement that led to the Saudi brand of Islam and the
Tablighi movement in India are two recent examples of purification. Terrorists
today typically belong to one of these groups.
Dictionary of Islam also observes: "Sufi writers say that there are two Jihads: al-Jihadu 'l Akbar, or the 'greater warfare,' which is against one's own lusts; and al-Jihadu 'l Asghar, or the 'lesser Jihad' against infidels." It is important to note this is a later Sufi innovation that has no scriptural sanction; in fact it is a heresy that is rejected by the orthodox. Historically, most Sufis have actively supported and participated in the violent version of the Jihad, the only one that has any scriptural sanction. The nonviolent version is the one that is invoked by apologists, though it has played hardly any role in history since no one follows it.
Dictionary of Islam is also perceptive in noting: "The duty of religious war (which all commentators agree is a duty extending to all time) is laid down in the Quran in the following verses, and it is remarkable that all the verses occur in the al-Madinah Surahs, being those given after Muhammad had established himself as a paramount ruler, and was in a position to dictate terms to his enemies." So any hint of compromise that one finds in the earlier al-Meccah Surahs can be explained by the fact that they were given at times when Prophet Muhammad felt besieged and was forced to compromise with his adversaries in order to gain time. These were erased by the later Surahs revealed when the Prophet had become the paramount ruler.
The following Surah (IX. 5,6) sheds light on the Prophet's idea of Jihad or the war against the infidels: "And when the sacred months are passed, kill those who join other gods with God [Allah] wherever ye shall find them; and seize them, besiege them with every kind of ambush; but if they shall convert, and observe prayer, and pay the obligatory alms, then let them go their way, for God [Allah] is Gracious, Merciful." So the Mercy of God offers unbelievers the 'choice' of conversion or death. This is just one example of many Surahs in the same spirit. There is no spirit of compromise in Jihad.
Terrorism in history
Like Jihad, terrorism is an integral
part of Islamic history and doctrine. It cannot be separated from its scripture.
Terrorism, by which we mean the threat and use of violence against innocents,
has a long tradition in Islam going back to Prophet Muhammad himself. The
Hadits (compilation of the acts of the Prophet) record that the Prophet
had the poetess Asma bint Marawan assassinated while sleeping with her
child. Her crime was satirizing the Prophet and his claims in some of her
verses. There are other such examples in the Prophet's career. More importantly,
terrorism was not limited to the founding period, like what happened following
the French Revolution. (Robespierre's "Reign of Terror.") Its use as an
instrument of policy is not an aberration but an inseparable and continuing
part of Islamic history down to the present.
The most famous of the early Islamic terrorist organizations was the Nizari Ismailiyun, a Shiite politico-religious sect, founded in 1094 by Hasan-e Sabah. He and his followers captured the hill fortress of Almaut in northern Iran and turned it into their base of operations. Hasan styled himself Grand Master and went on to set up a network of terrorist strongholds in Iran and Iraq. He had trained assassins, most of who according to Marco Polo were drug addicts. According to Marco Polo, young boys captured by the Grand Master were turned into addicts by giving them progressively larger doses of the drug hashish. This way they were totally dependent on him and would do anything in return for hashish. They came to be known as hashishin, from which we get the word 'assassin.' So the deadly mix of terror and drugs is hardly new.
According to the Encyclopaedia Britannica, the Grand Master had "a corps of devoted terrorists, and an unknown number of agents in enemy camps and cities, who claimed many victims among the generals and statesmen of the Abbasid caliphate as well as several caliphs."
The Nizari Ismaliyun or the Order of the Assassins expanded into Syria after its founder's death. In the 12th century, Rashid ad-Din as-Sinan, famous as the 'Old Man of the Mountain,' set himself up as an independent Grand Master of the Assassin Order in the impregnable castle of Masyaf in Syria. For more than a century and half, from 1094 to 1256, the Grandmasters and their assassins spread terror throughout the Middle East. Their end came at the hands of the Mongol warriors of Haleku Khan- the grandson of Chengis Khan. He captured and destroyed the assassin strongholds in Iran one by one, and finally Almaut itself fell in 1256. He killed every one of the assassin agents and their leaders. Two years later, in February 1258, Haleku's soldiers sacked Baghdad itself and ended the Caliphate by executing the Abbasid Caliph al-Mustasim and his sons.
The Syrian castles and strongholds were gradually reduced by the Baybars I, the Mamluk Sultan of Egypt. The Ismaili order gradually faded into insignificance, becoming a minor heresy. It still has some followers in Syria, Iran, with India and Pakistan having the largest numbers. They are known as Khojas and are followers of the Aga Khan. They no longer indulge in terror. In Pakistan though they are considered non-Muslims and often persecuted.
The Caliphate officially ended in 1258 with the death of al-Mustasim at the hands of the Mongols. The 19th century claim of the Ottoman Turkish Sultans to be the inheritors of the Caliphate was not recognized by Muslims outside India. It was a political ploy by the Ottoman Sultans to keep together their crumbling empire. But Mahatma Gandhi made the restoration of the Turkish Sultan as Caliph the centerpiece of the disastrous Khilafat Movement in the support of which he launched the Non-Cooperation Movement in 1921. It resulted in a reign of terror in Malabar (Kerala) known as the Moplah Rebellion. It was the Khilafat that sowed the seeds of the Partition. It also showed that terror could be used for political ends.
Inspired by the terror that followed the Khilafat, Mohammed Ali Jinnah-a 'liberal' Muslim-resorted to terror to gain his political goal of partitioning India. In 1946, his call for 'Direct Action' in support of his demand for Pakistan led to street riots all across North India, especially in the 'Calcutta Killings'. The Congress capitulated and agreed to the Partition of India.
Pakistan as a Jihadi state
In all this, there is an almost
religious belief that terrorism is both legitimate and effective in gaining
political ends. In the Pakistani official manual, The Quranic Concept of
War by Brigadier Malik, it is explicitly stated: "Terror struck into the
hearts of the enemy is not only a means, it is the end in itself. Once
a condition of terror into the opponent's heart is obtained, hardly anything
is left to be achieved... Terror is not a means of imposing decision upon
the enemy; it is the decision we wish to impose upon him."
The idea is to make the enemy live in a state of perpetual terror. The authority for this is the Koran (Anfal 59-60): "Against them make ready your strength to the utmost of your power, including steeds of war, to strike terror into the enemies of Allah and your enemies, and others besides, whom ye may not know, but whom Allah doth know."
This is the seed of indiscriminate terror employed by Grand Masters of the Order of the Assassins centuries ago, and by Osama Bin Laden and a host of others today. This is also the position taken by the terrorist state of Pakistan, which has defined itself as a Jihadi state. This transformation from a home from Indian Muslims to a Jihadi state was brought about by the late President Zia-ul Haq, who may fairly be described as the founding father of Talibanism. He was the one who sponsored the infamous book The Quranic Concept of War, to which he contributed a laudatory Foreword. According to it, Jihad is "the most glorious word in the vocabulary of Islam." The book is required reading for all Pakistani officials, both military and civilian. Copies of an Urdu summary of the book called Jihad have been recovered from the bodies slain terrorists and soldiers.
But this doctrine does not stop here; it goes on to encompass the whole world: "It was the cause of humanity in general and not just the Muslim community in particular," Brigadier Malik informs us. It is a universal doctrine, to be applied to all of us, and not just the believers. So India is only a stepping-stone in taking its campaign of 'justice and freedom from oppression' to the whole world. The Quranic Concept is to Pakistan what Hitler's Mein Kampf was to Nazi Germany. So we should be under no illusions in dealing with such a state. We cannot defeat terrorism by appealing to terrorists to follow the 'true principles of Jihad.' That is exactly what they are doing. The truth is Jihad is terrorism.
(N.S. Rajaram is the author of the
book Gandhi, Khilafat and the National Movement: A Revisionist View Based
on Neglected Sources.)