Islam is for freedom of choice and freedom of speech
by Azzam Tamimi

From Rushdie to the Pope, Islam has been wronged in the name of freedom of speech though in fact it is the one religious tradition that has always stood for freedom of choice and speech

So much injustice has been done to Islam over the issue of freedom of speech. Certain quarters choose to champion the cause of freedom of speech by indulging in acts whose primary objective is to tarnish the image of Islam through unfounded claims and to demonize it or demean its Prophet Muhammad through what they describe as literary or art works. Muslims have been put on the defensive episode after episode since the despicable novel by Salman Rushdie through the ugly Danish cartoons all the way down to the irresponsible remarks by Pope Benedict XVI. Muslims had every right to be offended because as they saw it these were not innocent exercises of freedom of speech but deliberate abuses that say nothing but untruth about Islam and its Prophet. However, the resort by some Muslims to violence has damaged their cause even further. Islam has been the victim at times of deliberate abuse and at times of irrational responses to such abuse by ignorant Muslims.

In fact, Islam – as shown clearly by its history and as its sources reveal – has always been a struggle for freedom of choice and of speech.

For thirteen years since receiving the first Qur’anic revelation in Mecca in 610 CE, Prophet Muhammad responded to the ‘elders’ who rejected his call to worshipping the One and Only God, Allah the Creator, by challenging them not to ‘obstruct the way’ between him and the people. “Let the people choose” was his slogan. Instead, the elders of the tribe of Quraysh, who feared the loss of their power and prestige, used every resource at their disposal in order to prevent any public discussion of what the Prophet had to say about the paganism the Arabs inherited from their forefathers. And it was not just paganism but a way of life littered with some of the most heinous atrocities committed against the weak and the vulnerable. Prophet Muhammad’s message was perceived as a revolution, a rebellion aimed at liberating minds and souls from human-imposed shackles and restrictions.

There is no better proof to the fact that Islam stands for freedom of thought and of expression than the esteemed status “the seeking of knowledge” is assigned in the Qur’an as well as in Prophetic traditions. The first word of revelation was iqra’, meaning read or learn or recite. “Learn in the Name of your Lord who Created man, out of a (mere) clot of congealed blood; learn in the Name of your Lord, the Most Bountiful, Who taught (the use of) the pen and taught man that which he knew not.”

Before Islam came to them, the Arabs prided themselves of being an illiterate community; very few of them learned anything apart from poetry and elementary astronomy enough to help them cross the desert at night. Still, very few of them ever left Arabia or interacted with the bastions of civilizations to the north and the south. While the Arabs despised Jews and Christians, the Qur’an called them the ‘People of the Book’ and linked itself to their religious traditions. Despite having been revealed first to the Arabs, the language of the Qur’an spoke in universal terms to the global human community. From day one, this was not meant to be a religious tradition for a particular racial or ethnic group but for the whole of mankind claiming direct link to all preceding divine missions from Noah through Abraham and Moses all the way down to Jesus.

As an eternal guarantee of the human freedom to choose, the Qur’an declared that “there is no compulsion in religion” and that no person’s conversion to Islam would be acceptable if not out of an absolute free will. Yet, Islam spread out of Arabia in all four directions in record time and the Ummah rapidly grew into a huge community. There is no evidence whatsoever that conversion was coerced although incentives might have been introduced by political regimes at times either in favour of conversion or in favour of discouraging it. What attracted millions of people was the liberating message of the new religion which declared that “an Arab is no better than a non-Arab, a white is no better than a black and a yellow is no better than a red.” The two great empires of the day, that of Byzantium and that of Sassania, had been oppressive powers that suppressed and persecuted the nations that came under their influence. Wars of attritions between the two empires augmented the suffering of millions of people who were being turned into fuel for a conflict that raged for several decades. Not only did the rising Islamic power provide a better alternative but it also emancipated many nations that had been enslaved by the two decaying powers.

It did not take long for Islam to provide humanity with great centres of civilization where scholarship flourished like never before. Philosophers and scientists – Muslim, Jewish, Christian and Sabian alike – turned cities such as Baghdad, Cordova and Seville into minarets of enlightenment for the benefit of all humanity not only innovating but also building on the legacies of the Hellenistic and Persian civilizations. Without the contributions of such centres of learning Europe today would still be in total darkness.

Today, most Muslims live in countries that are governed by despots who, like the elders of Quraysh, fear for their prestige and influence. In majority Muslim countries the police and intelligence services have no job other than muzzle people and make sure that nothing but what pleases the autocratic ruler is said or even whispered. It is not unusual for a person to lose his or her life for speaking out in public in contradiction to the wish of the despot. The largest number of prisoners in any given Muslim country happens to be prisoners of conscience. Few criminals or thieves are in prison because the real thieves are those in power. In fact, much of the struggle that has been going on in Muslim countries from the Atlantic to the Pacific oceans is about freedom. People are fighting for the freedom not only to say what they wish but even the freedom to dress the way they like. It is here that the roots of ‘terrorism’ happen to be. The reason why some people resort to violence in Muslim countries is the lack of space for discussion about issues that matter and the brutality with which people who dare speak out are met.

Those of us Muslims who live in the liberal West appreciate more than anybody else the great bounty of being able to say what we like and to be able to lead the way of life we choose. It is because of this that many of us are gravely concerned that one of the repercussions of the U.S.-led war on terrorism is that the liberal West is undermining one of its most treasured achievement. The defence of freedom of speech in the USA and Europe is becoming increasingly selective. This was supposed to be a political right to be employed by those who are governed against those who govern. Now, authorities in the alliance for war in Afghanistan and Iraq are heading in the direction of stifling the public so as not to question policy or criticize the perpetration of blunders. What is of greater concern is that leading authorities in the liberal West are the backers of some of the most autocratic regimes across the Muslim world.

Freedom of speech is not about the right to publish offensive cartoons or to claim about Islam what is false and unfair but it is to stand up to tyrants and oppressors and prevent them from doing in our name what we abhor and detest. What is frequently claimed to be freedom of speech today is nothing but abuse most intended to settle scores or accomplish fame or perhaps infamy.

The Rise of Hamas and its role in Palestine Politics? part 2
by Azzam Tamimi

JAIR Annual Conference
Tokyo
13-15 October 2006

The Human Bomb
Hudnah was Sheikh Ahmad Yassin’s solution to the crisis created by Hamas’ human bomb campaign. In April 1994 Sheikh Ahmad Yassin was visited inside his prison cell by Israeli army and intelligence officers in the hope of obtaining from him a statement that might dissuade Hamas’ military wing from carrying out more ‘suicide’ or ‘martyrdom’ operations.

A series of devastating human bomb attacks were launched by Hamas in April 1994 in retaliation for the massacre perpetrated on 25 February 1994 by an American-born Jewish settler. Baruch Goldstein, who is believed to have secured the assistance of Israeli troops to sneak into Al-Haram al-Ibrahimi Mosque in Hebron, opened fire and threw hand grenades at worshippers as they kneeled half way through the early morning Fajr (dawn) prayers killing twenty nine of them and wounding scores others.

The series of revenge acts started on 6 April 1994 when Ra’id Abdullah Zakarnah, a Hamas Brigades member, drove a booby-trapped vehicle with an Israeli registration number plate into Afula bus station and detonated it at around noon. Nine Israelis were killed and more than 150 were injured. A statement issued by Hamas military wing, Al-Qassam Brigades, soon afterwards claimed responsibility for the bombing and warned the Israelis to evacuate the settlements in the West Bank and Gaza. With clear reference to what Goldstein had committed inside the mosque, Hamas vowed to make Israelis pay for what pain and harassment Jewish settlers inflict on the Palestinians under occupation.20

The second attack was carried out on 31 April 1994 by Ammar Amarnah, another member of Al Qassam Brigades. The target this time was an Israeli Egad bus working on line 8 at Al-Khadirah (Hadera) to the northwest of Tulkarm. Amarneh blew himself up on the bus killing five Israelis and wounding more than thirty. More operations were carried out that same year; many more were carried out over the years that followed, mostly in response to attacks on Palestinian civilians by Israeli troops or Jewish settlers.

Sheikh Ahmad Yassin told his Israeli prison guests that if they wished to see an end to these attacks they should make a deal that can be limited or comprehensive. In its limited format the hudnah would at least spare civilians on both sides; in its more comprehensive format it would entail an end to hostilities of all types between the two sides. There is no evidence to suggest that the Israelis have ever taken the offer of hudnah seriously.

Many Palestinians were initially shocked by the human bomb tactic. Some argued against it from a purely pragmatic point of view; in their assessment the human bomb tactic could only harm the Palestinian cause. The operations were also opposed on the ground that they were, by their very nature, indiscriminate and resulted in killing innocent civilians, something the critics believed could not be justified or legitimized under any circumstance. The Fatah-led Palestinian Authority opposed the operations primarily on the grounds of its commitments to the peace process and the potential damage they could cause to its role in peace-making.

Resorted to out of utter desperation, the ‘martyrdom operation’ was not without controversy when it was first launched. Hamas spokesmen maintained that such a tactic was the only means available to the Palestinians in order to deter the likes of Goldstein from ever attacking the defenseless Palestinian population under occupation. In time, an increasing number of Palestinians accepted that the human bomb was necessary to offset the balance that had been totally in favor of the Israelis who managed to acquire highly advanced military technology from the United States of America and Europe.

On the whole, Palestinians have generally appreciated and admired the heroism and altruism of the men and women who volunteered their bodies and souls to go on sacrificial missions on behalf of the cause. The more the Palestinians felt vulnerable the more they supported martyrdom operations and even demanded more of the same. It did not take much to convince those who had qualms that nothing else seemed to work as a means of self-defense or deterrence. Nevertheless, Palestinian public support for martyrdom operations has varied. Polls conducted at different times gave rise to different results but rarely has support for these operations dropped below fifty per cent. A poll conducted in the Gaza Strip by the Norwegian pollster Fafo in the first week of September 2005 indicated that a majority of 61% of those quizzed agreed with the statement that “suicide bombings against Israeli civilians are necessary to get Israel to make political concessions.” Fafo conducted a face-to face survey with 875 respondents to monitor Palestinian views on the Israeli withdrawal from the occupied Gaza strip.21 The Jerusalem Post reported on 16 October 2003 that a poll had shown that seventy-five percent of Palestinians supported the suicide bombing of the Maxim restaurant in Haifa on 4 October 2003. The opinion poll was conducted by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research (PSR) in Ramallah.22 An earlier poll conducted by the PNA’s State Information Service (SIS) between 11 and 13 June 2002 in both the West Bank and the Gaza Strip revealed that 81 per cent of the sample polled objected to the PNA’s designation of martyrdom operations as terrorist acts. Fifty two per cent of them said the PNA resorted to labeling these operations as terrorist because of ‘international pressure’. The total number of those polled was 1137 aged 18 years and above, 456 of them from the Gaza Strip and 681 from the West Bank. Incidentally, the poll also revealed that 86 per cent of the sample “supported military attacks against Israeli occupation troops and Jewish settlers inside the Palestinian territories.” Sixty nine per cent believed that the objective of carrying out martyrdom operations inside Israeli towns was to force an end of the occupation while 13.4 per cent believed the objective was to undermine the peace process and 11.3 per cent said the operations aimed to weaken the Palestinian Authority and embarrass it before the international community.23

Until employed in Palestine, the human bomb was seen as alien to the Sunni community within Islam. It had been more commonly associated with Shi’ism; the Iranians are believed to be the first Muslims to employ it. They did so quite successfully in the war with Iraq throughout the 1980s. Hundreds of Iranian young men were sent on martyrdom missions along the borders between the two countries to deter the well-equipped and armed to the teeth Iraqi troops, thanks to Western and Arab support. The tactic served the Iranians well because their Iraqi counterparts, many of whom had not been convinced of the legitimacy of the war their government waged on their neighbor, were not prepared to make similar sacrifices.

The tactic then moved to Lebanon in the aftermath of the Israeli invasion in 1982. The first martyrdom operation within Lebanon took place on 11 November 1982 when Ahmad Qasir, identified as a member of the Islamic Resistance, drove his Mercedes car into the headquarters of the Israeli military governor in Tyre and detonated its 200 kg of explosives killing 74 Israelis. From then on the human bomb became a routine weapon employed by the Lebanese resistance against Israeli occupation troops. The most memorable of all suicide bombings in Lebanon were the two simultaneous attacks carried out on 23 October 1983 against the US Battalion Landing Team headquarters and the French paratroopers’ base situated just four miles (6km) apart in Beirut. The two suicide bombers, both of whom died in the attack, were named as Abu Mazen, 26, and Abu Sij’an, 24. A previously unknown group called the Free Islamic Revolutionary Movement (FIRM) claimed responsibility for the two attacked that killed 241 American and 58 French soldiers. FIRM was believed to have been made up of Lebanese Shi’a Muslims associated with the Amal militia. Hezbollah had not emerged yet but FIRM might have been its precursor. Lebanon also produced the first female suicide bombing in the Arab world; her name was Sana’ Mhaidli. Her car bombing of an Israeli military convoy on 9 April 1985 was claimed by the secular Syrian Nationalist Party.

The Lebanese Hezbollah, founded with Iranian backing as a Muslim Shi’te response to the Israeli occupation of South Lebanon, inherited the resistance and the tactic of the human bomb, which it continued to employ until Israel withdraw unilaterally from South Lebanon in May 2000 when the cost of occupation could no longer be borne.

Elsewhere in the world, the Sri Lankan Tamil Tigers, who struggle for an independent Tamil state, began carrying out suicide bombings in 1987. It is estimated that they have since perpetrated over 200 such attacks. The Tamil suicide bomb attacks were employed primarily to assassinate politicians opposed to their cause. In 1991, they assassinated former Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi and in 1993 they assassinated President Premadassa of Sri Lanka in 1993. In 1999, the Tigers attempted to assassinate Sri Lankan President Chandrika Kumaratunga using a female suicide bomber. While the Tamils tend to prefer female bombers Islamic groups in Lebanon and Palestine did not deem it appropriate to do so until the eruption of the second Intifada. Hamas was reluctant to recruit female bombers but removed the ban under pressure from female members some of whom threatened to go it alone or in association with other factions. The first female bomber in Palestine was 26 year old Wafa Idris who detonated in Yaffa Stree in Jerusalem on 28 January 2001. She was followed by ten other female ‘martyr bombers’ the last of whom was Zaynab Ali who detonated on 22 September 2004. The campaign was launched by Fatah’s Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades and was soon joined by the Palestinian Islamic Jihad and Hamas.

It is very likely that Hamas was persuaded to employ the human bomb when it became clear that the tactic was delivering results in Lebanon. It could not have been a coincidence that the first martyrdom operation was carried out in Palestine nearly a year following the return of Hamas and Islamic Jihad deportees from South Lebanon where for a year they had ample time to listen and learn. But this brought pressure to bear on Hamas political leaders who, while defending the tactic, were keen not to be associated directly with planning the operations or authorizing them; they attributed them to the movement’s military wing Izziddin Al-Qassam Brigades (IQB). Hamas spokesmen were at pains to explain the relationship between the political and the military wings of the movement, which also had relief, media and educational institutions that needed to be saved from Israeli reprisals or from punitive measures by the international community.

An attempt was made to compare the political and the military within Hamas with the IRA-Shin Fin dichotomy. The political leadership of Hamas was said to draw the general policy of the movement whereas the military wing, known as the Brigades of Izziddin Al-Qassam, was an independent body that functioned in total freedom away from any coordination with the political leadership but in accordance with the general policy that would be drawn by the political leadership.24 The Israelis were never convinced nor were the Americans or the Europeans. By 2003 Hamas and many of the organizations identified as having been associated with it directly or indirectly were proscribed and put on the terrorism list. A number of Hamas political leaders were targeted for assassination by the Israeli army or by the Mossad. Some escaped but many took direct hits.

Human Bombs: Tactic or Desperate Act
There has been much debate over whether resorting to the ‘human bomb’ is prompted by dire economic conditions or is simply part of a strategy aimed at achieving certain political objectives. It would be wrong to suggest that it has to be an ‘either/or’ case. Many visitors to the occupied territories have privately or publicly expressed an understanding as to why the Palestinians resort to these operations. While it is true that the majority of ‘martyrs’ do not come from poor desperate backgrounds, and that many of them are well-educated and well-positioned inside the community, the general condition of despair and frustration contributes to the motivation. However, from the organizational point of view these operations are not simply reactions, though they are occasionally presented as such, to the dire economic crisis caused by occupation. More so, they are seen as the only means of pressuring the Israelis, both state and society, to recognize the rights of the Palestinians and to agree to a cease-fire deal that would at least spare the civilians.

Hamas is explicit in its objectives. In the abovementioned document entitled -This is what we Struggle for,- the movement declares that martyrdom operations -are in principle directed against military targets.- It explains that -targeting civilians is considered an aberration from Hamas’ fundamental position of hitting only military targets; they represent an exception necessitated by the Israeli insistence on targeting Palestinian civilians and by Israel’s refusal to agree to an understanding prohibiting the killing of civilians on both sides; an understanding comparable to the one reached between Israel and Hezbollah in southern Lebanon.- This is a reference to the agreement concluded between Hezbollah and Israel in the aftermath of the Qana massacre in the mid-90s. Sheikh Ahmad Yassin, who repeatedly offered the Israelis a truce, is quoted in this same document as saying: -Hamas does not endorse the killing of civilians, but that is sometimes the only option it has if it is to respond to the murdering of Palestinian civilians and the cold-blooded assassination of Palestinian activists.- He himself was assassinated by Israel in March 2004.

Tahdi’ah
Hamas only resorted to the human bomb in the hope of forcing the Israelis to agree to spare the civilians on both sides and still better to negotiate a long-term ceasefire agreement. Following his release from detention and return to Gaza in October 1997, Sheikh Ahmad Yassin offered to suspend Hamas martyrdom operations if the Israelis were ready to -stop their attacks on [Palestinian] civilians, end land confiscation and house demolitions, and release the prisoners and detainees.- This is not quite the same as the long term truce which he said his movement was ready to engage in provided that Israel withdrew from the West Bank and Gaza and dismantled its Jewish settlements.25

The offer of truce was reiterated in October 1999 by Hamas armed wing, the Izzidin al-Qassam Brigades, who said it was ready to stop attacks on Israeli civilians -provided Israel stops its settlement activities and land confiscation and provided Israeli troops and Jewish settlers stop attacking Palestinian civilians.-26

There were at least three occasions on which a ‘temporary hudnah,’ usually referred to as tahdi’ah (calming), was unilaterally declared by Hamas and other Palestinian factions. The most recent tahdi’ah was agreed upon during the Cairo talks of March 2005; it was supposed to last until the end of 2005 but went well beyond that.

The first tahdi’ah, however, was in 2002; it was brokered by EU emissary Alistair Crooke. The tahdi’ah was shattered several weeks later when the Israelis assassinated Hamas leader Salah Shihadah on 22 July 2002.

On 29 June 2003 Hamas and Islamic Jihad declared a unilateral truce. The decision to observe this tahdi’ah was announced by Hamas leader Abd Al-Aziz Al-Ranitisi who explained that it was a gesture to give a chance to newly appointed Palestinian Prime Minister Mahmud Abbas to sort things out with the Israelis. The tahdi’ah came to an end seven weeks later after Israel assassinated Hamas leader Isma’il Abu Shanab on 21 August 2003. Israel alleged that the assassination was in retaliation for the bombing of a Jerusalem bus that left twenty-one Israelis dead and more than a hundred wounded.

In fact, the Israelis never recognized or appreciated the unilateral truce declared by the Islamic factions in Palestine. They pursued their strategy of eliminating whoever they considered a potential threat to their security. Throughout the month of July 2003 several Palestinians were assassinated in Nabulus and Hebron. The attack in Jerusalem on 19 August 2003 was carried out by Ra’id Misk, a native of Hebron, who retaliated for the assassination of some of his friends in the town by Israeli army special units in the aftermath of the declaration of the truce. It transpired later that Hamas members in Hebron were ordered to observe the truce despite the Israeli provocations. However, they could not remain indifferent while their colleagues were being hunted down one after the other. The Israeli campaign of targeted assassinations in the Hebron area started before Hamas declared its unilateral truce and included the murder of a local Hamas leader, Sheikh Abdullah Al-Qawasimi, on 22 June 2003.

Israel’s refusal to reciprocate led many Palestinians to lose confidence in the usefulness of declaring a unilateral truce. The sense of frustration was augmented when the European Union decided in August 2003 to proscribe Hamas and place it on the terrorism list. Encouraged by the EU decision, Israel made its first attempt to assassinate Sheikh Ahmad Yassin on 6 September 2003. An Israeli fighter jet dropped a 500lb bomb on a residential building in Gaza City where Sheikh Yassin was visiting in the company of a number of Hamas figures including Isma’il Haniyah who in 2006 became Prime Minister. Fifteen Palestinians were wounded and Sheikh Yassin escaped with scratches.

The Israelis also attempted to assassinate Dr. Mahmud Al-Zahar. The air strike on his family home leveled it to the ground. Dr Al-Zahar escaped with injuries but lost his elder son in the attack that left his wife permanently paralyzed and his daughter seriously wounded. At a rally held in November that year, Sheikh Yassin announced that the movement found it futile to observe a cease-fire unilaterally: He said: -We declared a truce in the past, but it failed because Israel did not want peace or security for the Palestinian people.- Addressing the same rally, Hamas leader Al-Zahar urged the Palestinians to resume armed resistance.27

What comes after hudnah?
Hamas is silent about what happens when a long-term hudnah signed with the Israelis expires. While its leaders have left open the length of the hudnah term, considering this to be a subject for negotiation with the Israelis once they accepted the principle, they generally suggest that the future should be left for future generations.

It is usually assumed that a long term hudnah will likely last for a quarter of a century or more. That is seen as too long a time for someone to predict what may happen afterwards. There will always be the possibility that the hudnah will come to an end prematurely because of a breach. If that happens it is highly unlikely that the breach will come from the Hamas side for the simply reason that it is religiously binding upon the Islamic side to honor the agreement to the end unless violated by the other side. Should the hudnah last till the prescribed date, one scenario is that those in charge then will simply negotiation a renewal.

Another scenario that is prevalent within the thinking of some intellectual Hamas quarters is that so much will change in the world that Israel as a Zionist entity may not want, or may not have the ability, to continue to be in existence. As a matter of principle Muslims, Christians and Jews can live together in the region as they lived together for many centuries before. What Islamists usually have in mind is an Islamic state, a Caliphate, which is envisaged to encompass much of the Middle East in an undoing of the fragmentation the region was forced to undergo due to 19th century colonialism and then in accordance with the Sykes-Picot agreement of 1916. The entities created in the process became separate ‘territorial states’ in the aftermath of the collapse of the Ottoman order in the second decade of the 20th century. While Israel as an exclusive state for the Jews in Palestine is something an Islamic movement such as Hamas can never recognize as legitimate, the Jews can easily be accommodated as legitimate citizens of a multi-faith, multi-racial state governed by Islam. The post-Israel scenario, which has become a subject for debate within the movement, is one that envisages a Palestine, or a united Middle East, with a Jewish population but no political Zionism. This is a vision inspired by the South African reconciliation model that brought Apartheid to an end but kept all communities living together. Zionism is usually equated to Apartheid and its removal is seen as the way forward if Muslims, Christians and Jews were ever to coexist in peace in the region. It would be impossible for such a scenario to translate into a reality without a long-term hudnah that for the life time of an entire generation provides communities and peoples in the region with the opportunity to restore some normalcy into their lives.

Those who are skeptical about the hudnah may argue that it means nothing but a prelude to finishing Israel altogether. But without hudnah too the Palestinians will still dream of the day on which Palestine, their country, is free and their right of return to their homes is restored. Without a hudnah there is no guarantee that they will cease to pursue that end using whatever means that are at their disposal. The advantage of the hudnah is that it brings to an end the bloodshed and the suffering because of the commitment to do so for a given period of time. In the meantime, let each side dream of what they wish the future to look like while keeping the door open for all sorts of options. Under normal circumstances, the best option is the least costly option.

From Resistance to Governance
Following the eruption of the Intifada, and for many months and years, the Israelis spared no effort to crack down heavily on Hamas arresting wave after wave of its leaders and activists, deporting several hundreds of them to Lebanon and assassinating hundreds others including some of the most senior leaders such as its founder Sheikh Ahmad Yassin and several of his colleagues. As early as 1989, the merciless Israeli campaign against the movement prompted its leadership to transfer all executive powers to the Palestinian Ikhwan outside Palestine; the move was intended primarily to protect the organization from total collapse under the impact of the Israeli hammer. In response to the brutality of Israeli occupation troops, an increasing number of Hamas members decided to go underground and organize themselves in small cells in order to plan and carry out reprisal attacks against the Israelis. It was in these circumstances that the Hamas military wing, Martyr Izziddin Al-Qassam Brigades, came into existence. The combat tactics used by the Brigades were to a large extent proportionate to the Israeli measures. The more the Palestinians suffered the more willing were the Brigades to employ new methods that were primarily intended to deter the Israelis. As mentioned earlier, in April 1994 the Brigades introduced the ‘human bomb’ tactic in response to the massacre perpetrated on 25 February 1994 by American-born Jewish settler Baruch Goldstein inside Al-Haram al-Ibrahimi Mosque in Hebron killing twenty nine Muslim worshipers and wounding scores others.

Hamas willingness to challenge the occupation and, in doing so, make considerable sacrifices won the movement the hearts and minds of an increasing number of Palestinians who had been disillusioned with the peace process and angered by the rampant corruption within the PLO and its main faction, the Fatah movement, which signed the Oslo Accords with the Israelis in 1993 and set up the Palestinian National Authority in 1994. The rise of Hamas coincided with a popular conviction among the Palestinians that the entire peace process had been intended right from day one to stifle Palestinian resistance against the Israelis and bring the Intifada to an end. It was natural, therefore, that Hamas would be seen as the victim and the main target of this new alliance between the PLO and Israel conceived at Oslo not for the purpose of regaining Palestinian rights and creating peace but of aborting the resistance project and prolonging the subjugation of the Palestinians to Zionist oppression.

Hamas’s popularity inside Palestine and around it continued to grow despite the ever intensifying pressure on it and in spite of the campaigns launched against it by Israel, the Palestinian Authority Jordan and the United States of America and its allies in Europe. The electoral success of January 2006 was the decisive verdict testifying to the popularity of Hamas, which had until then been winning municipal, trade unions and students elections but never before took part in parliamentary ones. The earlier legislative elections of 1996 were boycotted by the movement which did not at the time believe the elections were likely to be fair and free. In 1996, the Fatah organization was in full control and could with the backing of the Israelis manipulate the election to produce a Legislative Council (PLC) that fitted the criteria agreed on between the two sides in the Oslo Accords.

The decision to participate in the elections this time was not without lengthy discussions among the various ‘chapters’ of Hamas. Hamas members in the Gaza Strip were most enthusiastic about participating. They felt confident that they could win a comfortable majority especially that Israel had already withdrawn unilaterally from Gaza and Fatah had been in a mess following the death of its father-figure Yassir Arafat in late 2004. In contrast, Hamas members in the West bank were least supportive of the idea. Mixed feelings were expressed by Hamas members inside the prisons whereas Hamas members abroad were cautiously supportive of participation. The outcome of all these deliberations was submitted to the highest authority in Hamas, the Al-Istishari (consultative) Council, which took the decision that Hamas should seize the opportunity of the election and participate in full.

Several factors contributed to boosting Hamas confidence that the political breeze was blowing in a favorable direction: the utter failure of the peace process; the disappearance of Yassir Arafat from the political scene; Israel’s decision to disengage unilaterally and end its occupation of the Gaza Strip; the general belief among Palestinians that it was the resistance by Hamas and other factions that forced the Israelis out of Gaza; and the disarray within the Fatah movement and the disillusionment of the public with the PNA because of corruption and because of the failure of the peace process.

Observers came out with an array of explanations as to how or why the movement managed such an electoral success. The most widely adopted explanation was the assumption that voters chose Hamas to punish Fatah, who had been in charge since the creation of the Palestinian Authority in 1994.

Hamas massive win has been attributed to a number of factors. Some of those who said they voted for Hamas gave one or more reasons for having decided to vote for the movement. The first reason pertains to Hamas loyalty to the Palestinian dream. Most Palestinians, including those who did at one stage express readiness to settle for less, would love to see Palestine, the whole of it, completely free. They dream of the day when millions of Palestinian refugees will return home to the towns and villages from which they or their parents were driven out when Israel was created in 1948. Hamas, which believes that the State of Israel is an illegitimate political entity that will one day disappear just as the 11th century Crusader Kingdoms in Palestine and Syria disappeared, keeps the dream alive. The 1988 Fatah-dominated PLO decision to recognize Israel’s right to exist in exchange for being recognized as the sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people was the turning point for many Palestinians. It was from then on that Hamas, which had been in existence for no more than a year, started being perceived by an increasing number of Palestinians as the alternative to the derailed Fatah.

The second reason pertains to the record of the Muslim Brotherhood and then Hamas as a service provider. Many Palestinians could hardly manage without the social, educational and medical services provided by the United Nations and an army of NGOs the most efficient of which had been the ones set up and run by Hamas. As Israel collectively punished the Palestinians and destroyed the infrastructure of their society and authority it provided Hamas, so unwittingly, with the greatest of opportunities. The rampant corruption that spread across the rank and file of Hamas main rival, Fatah, and throughout the Palestinian Authority, was being compared by many Palestinians with the clean hands Hamas officials had. The Palestinians could not help but admire the decency, honesty and transparency with which Hamas conducted its affairs and provided its services to the public. Despite channeling millions of dollars worth aid to those in need every year, top Hamas officials continued to live as they had always done; their living standards were average and many of them resided inside the refugee camps as part of the people and close to their minds and hearts. Sheikh Yassin, who lived all his life in a refugee camp at a standard of living hardly distinguishable from that of his neighbors in the same camp provided a stark contrast to the leaders of Fatah many of whom had made fortunes and built empires out of peace making with the Israelis.

The third reason is Hamas Islamic ideology, which – unlike the secular nationalism of Fatah – is fully compatible with the powerful inclination toward Islam within Palestinian society. Since the early seventies, Palestine has seen a massive Islamic revival that was in part a reaction to the failure of secular Arab nationalism, blamed by Palestinians for the loss of the rest of Palestine to the Israelis in 1967. Additionally, and as an increasingly religious community, Palestinians identified more with the moral code espoused by Hamas that with the more libertine agenda of the leaders of Fatah. Many previously diehard Fatah members, who in more recent years had become more religious, found themselves closer to Hamas than to the organization they had been affiliated to.

The forth reason is to do with the failure of the peace process between Israel and the PLO right from Oslo to the Road Map. Rather than deliver the Palestinians from their misery the open-ended process seemed only to augment their suffering. Hamas had predicted all a long that Israel would not deliver, that it was using peace-making in order to expropriate more land, and that only jihad would force the occupation to come to an end. Israel proved Hamas right when it turned against its own partners in the peace process destroying the PNA institutions and imposing a siege around its leader, Yassir Arafat, whom many Palestinians believe was eventually poisoned. The unilateral withdrawal from Gaza only served to further vindicate Hamas which claimed that it was its struggle that forced Sharon to withdraw settlers and troops unconditionally.

As a gesture, Hamas leaders, who were hoping that the new Israeli leadership would choose to reciprocate and perhaps negotiate a long-term cease-fire arrangement, decided to extend the unilateral truce the movement had been observing. Additionally, having proven to the Palestinian people its unwavering loyalty to the cause of resisting Israeli occupation, Hamas hoped to be given the chance to provide a model of good governance.

However, the Hamas electoral success was immediately met with U.S. and EU unwillingness to deal with the new authority unless it agreed to three conditions. It had to recognize Israel’s right to exist, it had to renounce violence and disarm and it had to honor all the agreements signed earlier between the PLO and Israel. But there was no way Hamas would agree to any of these conditions. Doing so would destroy its credibility and negate the very essence of its claim to provide a better alternative to the bankrupt Fatah. Hamas leaders responded by asserting that if the Americans indeed wished to see peace prevail in the region they should put pressure on Israel so as to end its occupation and not on the Palestinians who are the victims and not the oppressors. It would seem that the Americans felt embarrassed by Hamas’s success because they were the ones who insisted on conducting the elections as a means of effecting political reform in the territories. It puzzled people that the Americans should have known better; Fatah, their favorite, was in a rather bad shape and it simply stood no chance of winning.

With no signs of yielding on the part of Hamas, the United States, Israel and the European Union forged an alliance to force Hamas to change or exit the political game altogether. A series of processes were put in place and a number of tactics were employed one after the other to ensure one of the two outcomes. World nations were told not to give Hamas a chance; not to deal with it or grant it recognition. The war on Hamas soon turned into a collective punishment of the entire Palestinian people inside the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. The Palestinians have long been divided: Fatah supporters see no exit apart from a compromise on the part of Hamas in the form of compliance with the demands of the ‘international community’ while Hamas supporters insist that such a compromise is out of the question. The atmosphere is reminiscent of the days the preceded the eruption of Intifada I and Intifada II; many expect Intifada III to erupt at any time.

The Rise of Hamas and its role in Palestine Politics? Part 1
by Azzam Tamimi

JAIR Annual Conference
Tokyo
13-15 October 2006

Introduction
On 25 January 2006, the Islamic Resistance Movement in Palestine (Hamas) made a sweeping win in one of the fairest democratic exercises ever allowed to take place in the Arabic-speaking world. For more than a decade Hamas has been a major player not just in the Palestinian arena but within the entire Middle East region.

Outside Arab and Muslim circles many of those who wrote about Hamas could only see it through an Israeli lens. Most of the books written on it have adopted the Israeli point of view and their authors relied heavily on security agencies’ reports including confessions extracted from Palestinian detainees under duress. One such example has been the recent book authored by Matthew Levitt, who when the book was published in 2006 was deputy assistant secretary for intelligence and analysis at the U.S. Treasury Department. Hamas: Politics, Charity, and Terrorism in the Service of Jihad depicts Hamas as a terrorist organization that uses -its extensive charitable and educational work to promote its foremost aim: driving Israel into the sea.- Hamas’s reputable charity activities are condemned as nothing but a device for recruiting new soldiers to its -holy war- against Israel. The movement’s sponsored mosques, schools, orphanages and sports leagues are portrayed as -integral parts of an overarching apparatus of terror.-2

In contrast, Hamas sees itself as an organization of Palestinians who happen to be both Arab and Muslim and who perceive themselves as the immediate victims of an unjust world order that saw fit to create a ‘European’ Jewish state in their own country at the very centre of Arab and Muslim heartlands. Hamas founders and affiliates see the Israelis as their oppressors who dispossessed them and their fellow countrymen and who have, since then, been persecuting them generation after generation. Resisting Israeli occupation of Palestinian land and Israeli oppression of the people of the land is one of several elements that inform the thinking of the movement and instruct its activism. The womb out of which Hamas was born was essentially a social project motivated by philanthropy and dedicated to charity, and that explains the network of civic services and activities in which the movement continues to engage.

Roots
Hamas was born out of the Association of Al-Ikhwan Al-Muslimun (the Muslim Brotherhood), best described by its affiliates as a comprehensive reform movement. The Ikhwan was originally Egyptian but has since its creation grown into a global network. The mother organization was founded by Hassan Al-Banna (1906-1949) in the Egyptian town of Al-Isma’iliyah in 1928 where he taught at a primary school not far from the headquarters of the British occupation troops’ garrison. Combining elements of spirituality acquired from his association with the Hasafiyah Sufi order with the pristine monotheistic teachings of Islam learned inside the Salafi school of Muhammad Rashid Rida (1865-1935) – a disciple and close associate of Muhammad Abduh (1849-1905), Al-Banna’s project had a great popular appeal.

It did not take long for Al-Ikhwan movement to grow, quite rapidly, within Egypt and beyond it. Inside Egypt, it had four branches in 1929, 15 in 1932, 300 by 1938 and more than 2000 in 1948. By 1945, it had half a million active members in Egypt alone and between 1946 and 1948 it opened branches in Palestine, Sudan, Iraq and Syria.

Al-Ikhwan’s long-term goals were: first, to free the Islamic homeland from all foreign authority; and second, to establish an Islamic state within the re-united Islamic homeland. But the movement’s founder Al-Banna taught his followers that neither objective could be achieved without first attending to the more immediate needs of society. His project was, above all, an endeavor to ‘rehabilitate’ the Ummah starting with the individual, then the family and ending up with society as a whole through a process of gradual reform.

These two same goals have been pursued, using the same methodology of gradual reform, by Al-Ikhwan offshoots across the Arab region including Palestine where the Palestinian Ikhwan took root immediately after the end of the Second World War. Having initially opened a few local branches in the Gaza Strip, the edifice of the movement neared completion with the official inauguration on 6 May 1946 of its Central Office in Jerusalem in the presence of local dignitaries as well as guests who arrived from Cairo to represent the mother movement in Egypt.

The creation of Israel in two thirds of Palestine in 1948 led to a de facto split of the Palestinian Ikhwan into two separate organizations one in Gaza, which came under Egyptian military rule, and the other in the West Bank, which was annexed to the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan.

The occupation of the rest of Palestine in the aftermath of the six-day war in June 1967 was a blessing in disguise for the group. From 1967 to 1977 the Ikhwan of Palestine endeavored to unite their ranks and put their house in order. Within a few years they managed to regain some of the ground they had lost to the secular nationalist movements that gained their popularity from mounting resistance against the Israeli occupation but that were also dealt fetal blows as a result of the loss of confidence across Palestine and the Arab region in Arab nationalism, as exemplified by Nassirism, which was held responsible for the major defeat of the Arabs and the loss of much more land to Israel in 1967.

However, as they rose in popularity and enhanced their appeal, the Ikhwan were being challenged to take a stand against the Israeli occupation, which the Palestinian populations of the West Bank and Gaza could no longer tolerate. Palestinian student communities, initially in Egypt and Kuwait but soon afterwards in the newly emerging Palestinian universities in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, played a significant role in revolutionizing the thinking within the movement as a whole prompting its leadership to take a decision in 1977 to start planning for the launch of their own resistance project that saw the light ten years later with the outburst of the Intifada.

This decade preceding the Intifada saw the creation of major institutions by the Ikhwan in Gaza, such as the Al-Mujammah’ Al-Islami and the Islamic University, which provided Palestinian society with essential services in social, medical and educational spheres and contributed significantly to boosting the movement’s standing and to enhancing its popularity. As Israeli oppressive policies took their toll on the Palestinians, deepening their sense of humiliation and entrapment, the late eighties saw the transformation of the Ikhwan into a resistance movement, more widely known today for its acronym HAMAS, a day after the incident on 8 December 1987 that sparked the first Intifada.3

What Hamas Stands for
A document authored by Hamas Political Bureau in the mid-1990s begins with the following assertion: -The Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) is a Palestinian national liberation movement that struggles for the liberation of the Palestinian occupied lands and for the recognition of Palestinian legitimate rights.- The refined political discourse of this document is a far cry from the overly religious language in which the Hamas Charter was coined. Representing the first attempt by the movement to produce a written document for others to learn what Hamas stood for, the Charter, known in Arabic as Al-Mithaq (the Covenant), was released to the public on 18 August 1988, less than nine months following the birth of the movement. Since then, however, it has hardly ever been referred to or quoted by the top leaders of Hamas or its official spokespersons.

The Charter aside, the discourse of the Hamas leaders could hardly be distinguishable from the discourse of freedom fighters in Latin America, South Africa or East Asia. Consider for instance the following statement made by Hamas leader in Gaza Dr. Abd Al-Aziz Al-Rantisi on 7 March 2004 just ten days before Israel assassinated him:

Hamas’ strategy is underpinned by four principles: 1) We have a homeland that is in its entirety usurped; we cannot concede one inch of it; 2) there is an obvious imbalance of powers in favor of the Zionist enemy; 3) we do not possess the armament our enemy possesses but we possess a faith that generates a will that does not recognize defeat or retreat short of accomplishing the goals, a faith that demands sacrifice for the sake of faith and homeland; and 4) there is an Arab and Islamic Ummah that is weak, feeble and broken and therefore cannot support the people of Palestine, and there is an international community that is hostile to the hopes and aspirations of the Palestinian people and that supports Zionist terrorism. Hamas’ strategy proceeds in two parallel lines: 1. resisting occupation and confronting Zionist aggression; and preserving the unity of the Palestinian people and protecting the Palestinian ranks from the threat of internal fighting which would only distract everyone from resisting the occupation.

Ironically, the Hamas Charter has been more frequently invoked by the movement’s opponents and critics as proof of either its inflexibility or its anti-Semitism. When it was written the Charter honestly represented the movement’s ideological and political stands at that point in time; it is a reflection of how the Ikhwan, out of whom Hamas was born, perceived the conflict in Palestine and how they saw the world then.

In the months leading up to the election of January 2006, Hamas political leadership was becoming increasingly convinced that the Charter had to be re-written. Apparently, the idea of writing and publishing a charter while the movement was still in its infancy was never given enough consideration. Once written, the document never went through proper consultation. According to Khalid Mish’al, Hamas Political Bureau Chief, the Charter was hastily released to meet what was perceived at the time as a pressing need to introduce the movement to the public. It was never studied carefully within the movement whose leading institutions inside and outside Palestine had no opportunity to evaluate before it went public. He, therefore, does not consider it to be a true expression of the movement’s overall vision, which -has been formulated over the years by inputs from the movement’s different institutions.- As far as he is concerned, the Charter is a historical document from which one may learn how the movement conceived of things at the time of its birth but -should not be treated as if it were the fundamental ideological frame of reference from which the movement derives its stances or on the basis of which it justifies its actions.-4

Until recently, very little debate had been taking place within the movement over the Charter despite the fact that much of the criticism leveled against Hamas has involved references to the Charter. It is as if Hamas totally forgot that it had a Charter or as if its leaders were completely oblivious to critique, or attacks, directed against the movement thus far.5 It is only recently that some of them have been voicing their concern that it might have taken them too long to say that -the text of the Charter does not reflect the thinking and understanding of the movement- and that this may -constitute an obstacle or a source of distortion or a misunderstanding vis-à-vis what the movement stands for.-6

It was in the aftermath of 9/11 that urgency was felt for an image-building initiative to counter the endeavors by certain academic and media quarters to lump all Islamic movements and organizations in one basket together with Al-Qaeda. A series of consultations conducted in Beirut and Damascus between the beginning of 2003 and the end of 2005 bolstered the conviction by several top Hamas political bureau officials that it was time the Charter was re-written. The consultations concluded with commissioning work on a draft for a new Charter. However, in the aftermath of the Palestinian legislative elections of 25 January 2006, the project was put on hold until further notice lest the new Charter is seen as a compromise forced by outside pressure.

Hamas leaders, today, recognize the need to express the ideas that relate to fundamental and immutable positions within the Charter in a language that appeals to both Muslims and non-Muslims alike. Instead of adopting an overwhelming religious discourse, the new Charter would tell, albeit briefly, the story of the Palestinian problem as it unfolded tracing its roots to the Jewish problem in 19th Century Europe. This would constitute a more universally accepted argument than the idea that Palestine is a waqf (endowment) -consecrated for future Muslim generations until Judgment Day.-7 As article eleven of the Charter itself explains, the lands conquered by the Muslims from the time of the second Caliph Omar onwards were all assigned as waqf and therefore were not distributed as booties among the conquering troops. The same designation applies equally to Iraq, Persia, Egypt, North Africa and even Spain. The reference in the Charter to this issue was in the context of condemning those who were willing to give away any part of Palestine to the Israelis as part of a peace agreement. Hence is the phrase -it is not permissible to concede it or any part of it or to give it up or any part of it; that is not the right of any single Arab state or all the Arab states together nor any king or president or all the kings and presidents together nor any single organization or all the organizations together whether Palestinian or Arab. This is so because the land of Palestine is an Islamic waqf (endowment) property consecrated to the generations of Muslims up to the Day of Resurrection; and who can presume to speak for all Muslim generations to the Day of Resurrection?-8 It is widely accepted today within Hamas that this matter is strictly jurisprudential and that the Charter is not the best place for addressing it.

However, the biggest problem in the Charter is its treatment of the Jews. Part of the problem here is language. Israelis are referred to by an average Palestinian as yahud, which is the Arabic equivalent for Jews. Terms such as ‘Zionist’ or ‘Israeli’ figure mostly in the writings and conversations of the secularly cultured elite. They are not current in the public lexicon and have until recently been absent from the Islamic discourse. When Arabic literature with references to the Israelis as yahud is translated into European languages it may indeed sound anti-Semitic.

In his series of ‘testimonies’ broadcast on Aljazeera Arabic satellite station between 17 April and 5 June 1999, Sheikh Ahmad Yassin refers to the Israelis interchangeably at times as Al-Isra’iliyun (the Israelis) and at times as Al-Yahud (the Jews). In the second episode of the ‘testimony’ broadcast on 24 April 1999 he said: -The Israelis usually deal with the Palestinian people individually and not collectively. Even inside the prisons, they would not agree to deal with (the prisoners) except individually. However, we forced our will on them despite them and refused to deal with them except through a leadership elected by the Palestinian (prisoners) to face the Jews and resolve the problems with them.- This is just one sample paragraph of what his style was like. Most Palestinians and Arabs unconsciously do the same thing. Leah Tsemel, an Israeli lawyer who has been defending Palestinians in Israeli courts for some 30 years, notes that her clients routinely describe soldiers or settlers as al-yahud – the Jews. They complain for instance that -al-yahud (the Jews) took my ID card,- or -al-yahud (the Jews) hit me,- or -al-yahud (the Jews) destroyed this or that.- She expresses anxiety at the fact that Israel in the minds of its Palestinian victims becomes identified with all the Jews in the world and fears that as a consequence all the Jews in the world may be seen as soldiers and settlers. 9

This problem is not confined to Palestine but exists across the region where Jews once lived in large numbers but had, with few exceptions, long been gone. Following the creation of the State of Israel in Palestine in 1948 Jews living in various Arab countries were encouraged, at times intimidated so as, to migrate to Israel which, having expelled close to a million Palestinians, was in dire need of beefing up its population.10 Additionally, Jews from Iraq, Yemen and Morocco provided a source of cheap labor and performed functions not ‘befitting’ for the Ashkenazim (Easter European Jews) who presided over the Zionist colonial project in Palestine and treated themselves as first class citizens of the newly founded ‘Jewish’ state in contrast to Sephardic Jews who came from the Arab countries.11

Until the beginning of the twentieth century Muslims, Christians and Jews coexisted peacefully throughout the Muslim world where, for many centuries, the Islamic empire, whose terrain extended over three continents, provided a milieu of tolerance under a system that guaranteed protection for what is today referred to as minorities. Islam, whose values and principles governed the public and private conduct of Muslim individuals and communities, recognized Christians and Jews as legitimate communities within the Islamic State and accorded them inalienable rights. The followers of both Christianity and Judaism participated on equal footing with the Muslims in building the Arab-Islamic civilization on whose fruits European renaissance philosophers were nourished.

In contrast, Jews repeatedly suffered persecution in the European lands. Whenever that happened they sought refuge in the Muslim lands where they were welcomed and treated as ‘people of the book’ in accordance with the ‘Covenant of God and His Messenger.’ Such Muslim perception of the Jews remained unchanged until the Zionist movement, which was born in Europe, started recruiting Jews in the Muslim lands for a project that was seen by the Muslims as an attack on their faith and homeland. The change in the Muslim attitude toward the Jews came as a reaction to the claims of the Zionist movement, which associated itself with the Jews and Judaism. Despite the secular origins of the Zionist project and the atheism of many of its founding fathers, the Zionist discourse justified the creation of the State of Israel in Palestine and the dispossession of the Palestinians in religious terms. The Bible was invoked by Zionist pioneers, although few of them really believed in it or showed any respect for it, in a bid to bestow religious legitimacy on their project and gain the support of the world’s Jews, most of whom had initially been opposed to political Zionism.12

It is for this reason that the Hamas Charter conceives of the problem in Palestine as a religious strife between the Jews and the Muslims. This notion continues to be dominant in many parts of the Muslim world today. The continued association of Israel with the Jews and the Jews with Israel only reinforces the conviction of many Muslims that the conflict in the Middle East between the Palestinians and the Israelis is indeed a religious one. Many Arabs and Muslims find it extremely difficult to accept that anti-Zionist Jews, who not only criticize Israel but also refuse to recognize its legitimacy, do exist.13

One of the major weaknesses of the Charter is that it adopts conspiracy theory. It bases its analysis of the conflict in Palestine on the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, a false document that purports to represent the ideas of a secret society of Jewish elders for conquering the world. What the author of the Charter wished to convey was a direct correlation between an ongoing Jewish quest for global domination and the occupation of Palestine. Following a common trend among Muslim writers of the time, the author of the Charter invoked the Qur’an and Hadith (Prophet’s sayings) to substantiate his claim of an ongoing Jewish conspiracy against Islam and the Muslims that goes back all the way to the early days of Islam. Such selective reading, or convenient interpretation, of the Scripture is not uncommon in contemporary Muslim writings. In this particular case the Qur’anic chastisement of bad conduct and ill-manners by some of the Israelites in Biblical times or by some of the Jews during Prophet Muhammad’s time are taken out of their historic context and then universalised. It is astonishing that in spite of the fact that conspiracy theory is in essence un-Islamic it was, until the early nineties of the twentieth century, widely espoused by Muslim intellectuals across the Arab world. The permeation of such thinking has been a symptom of decline and backwardness, which in turn precipitate a deep sense of desperation and frustration.

The only positive reference to the Jews in the Hamas Charter is seen in Article thirty-one which states that -in the shade of Islam it is possible for the followers of the three religions Islam, Christianity and Judaism to live in peace and security.- It is expected that, while underlying this historical fact, the new Hamas Charter will be cleansed from all the ludicrous claims of a Jewish conspiracy. It will instead emphasize the racist nature of the Zionist project and explain that many Jews are opposed to it. The idea that not every Jew is a Zionist is already widely accepted by the Islamists who previously thought this was a myth invented by Palestinian secular nationalists.

By shedding light on the roots of the conflict the charter will appeal to the world’s public opinion to sympathize with the Palestinian victims rather than with their Israeli oppressors. To reach out to peoples and nations across the world, it will have to adopt a universal ‘human rights’ discourse. The new Hamas charter is also expected to assure the Jews, as Sheikh Ahmad Yassin did several times until he was assassinated by the Israelis in 2004,14 that Hamas does not have a problem with the Jews because of their faith or race and that it does not believe the conflict in the Middle East to be between the Muslims and the Jews or between Islam and Judaism. It will stress that Islam does recognize Judaism as a legitimate religion and accords its adherents with respect and protection. As a matter of principle, the Charter needs to stress a position that has been expressed repeatedly by Hamas leaders over the past fifteen years or so, namely that contemporary Jews and Muslims can, as did earlier Muslims and Jews for many centuries, live together in peace and harmony once the Palestinians’ legitimate rights are recognized and restored.

Hudnah (Truce)
The one thing a new Hamas Charter will keep unchanged is the movement’s position vis-à-vis the State of Israel. If Hamas is to remain loyal to its founding principles it cannot afford to recognize Israel’s right to exist. Born out of the Intifadah (uprising) of 1987, Hamas declared that it had emerged -in order to liberate the whole of Palestine, all of it.-15

The movement came to existence partly in response to the oppressive treatment the Palestinians suffered under Israeli occupation in the West Bank and Gaza and partly because Fatah, the Palestinian national liberation movement, had faltered. Like Fatah before it, most of Hamas’ members and supporters had been refugees or children of refugees whose real homes were not the appalling camps in which they were born or where they grew up. Their real homes are on the other side of the so-called “green line” where Jewish immigrants, who had come from Europe and elsewhere in the world, now colonize. Like millions of Palestinians inside Palestine and in the Diaspora the founders of Hamas felt betrayed when the leadership of Fatah, having hijacked the PLO, decided to give a way their right of return to their homes.

It is highly unlikely, therefore, that Hamas will ever recognize the legitimacy of the state of Israel or its right to exist. The movement regards Israel as nothing but a colonial enclave planted in the heart of the Muslim world in order to obstruct the revival of the Ummah (global Muslim community) and to prolong Western hegemony in the region. On the other hand, Palestine is an Islamic land that has been invaded and occupied by a foreign power; it would contravene the principles of Hamas’ Islamic faith to recognize the legitimacy of the foreign occupation of any Muslim land let alone one that is home to the Muslims’ first Qiblah (the place worshippers face during prayer) and third most important mosque on earth.

This position is not exclusive to Hamas. Muslim scholars, with a few exceptions, have constantly expressed their absolute opposition to recognizing the legitimacy of the creation of a “Jewish State” in Palestine. Over the past century Ulama (Muslim scholars and jurists) issued numerous fatawa (pl. of fatwa: religious edict) declaring null and void any agreement that legitimized the occupation of any part of Palestine. The first collective fatwa on this issue predates the creation of the State of Israel in Palestine. On 26 January 1935, more than two hundred Islamic scholars came to Jerusalem from around Palestine to issue a fatwa prohibiting the forfeiture of any part of Palestine to the Zionists. Similar conferences were held and fatawa issued at various junctures in the history of the Middle East conflict. During the Nassirist era (1952-1970) in Egypt, the prestigious Al-Azhar Islamic institution in Cairo maintained the position of prohibiting recognizing the State of Israel or any peace-making with it. Sheikh Yusuf Al-Qaradawi, one of the most authoritative scholars of contemporary times, repeatedly expressed that position affirming that it was unanimously adopted by more than three hundred Islamic scholars from around the Muslim world during a meeting of the Islamic Jurisprudential Council in Kuwait in the mid-1990s. He explained that the fatwa which prohibited recognizing Israel was based on the consideration that -Palestine is an Islamic land that cannot be forfeited voluntarily.- He added that the same fatwa was re-issued at a later Islamic Jurisprudence conference in Bahrain.16

However, such a dogmatic position does not deny the right of the Jews to live in Palestine provided their existence in it is not the outcome of invasion or military occupation. Nor does it bar the Muslims, including the Hamas movement, from negotiating a cease-fire agreement with the Israeli State in order to put an end to the bloodshed and to the suffering on both sides for as long as can be agreed on.

The idea of a hudnah (truce) with Israel originated in the early nineties. It was referred to by the Amman-based Head of Hamas Political Bureau, Musa Abu Marzuq, in a statement published by the Amman weekly Al-Sabeel , the organ of the Jordanian Islamic Movement, in February 1994. A similar first reference to it inside Palestine was made around the same period in 1994 by Hamas founder Sheikh Ahmad Yassin from his prison cell. He proposed the hudnah as an interim solution to the conflict between the Palestinians and the Israelis. Both Abu Marzuq and Sheikh Yassin repeated the offer on several occasions thereafter but failed to interest the Israelis. Of late, hudnah has been routinely referred to by various Hamas spokesperson.

Hudnah is recognized in Islamic jurisprudence as a legitimate and binding contract whose objective is to cease fighting with the enemy for an agreed period of time. The truce may be short or long depending on mutual needs or interests.17 A truce treaty would be different from the ‘Oslo peace accords’ according to which the PLO recognized the State of Israel and its right to exist. The difference is that under the terms of hudnah the very issue of recognition will not come up simply because Hamas cannot, as a matter of principle, accept that the land the Israelis seized from the Palestinians has become theirs; the movement has no authority to renounce the right of the Palestinians to return to the lands and the homes from which they were forced out in 1948 or at anytime afterwards. It can however say that under the present circumstances the best it can do is regain some of the land lost and secure the release of prisoners in exchange for a cessation of hostilities. This would be somewhat similar to the IRA agreeing to negotiate an end to the conflict in Northern Ireland without recognizing British sovereignty over the territory. The Irish Catholics continue to hope or dream that one day the whole of Ireland will be united and that British rule will come to an end. Negotiating an end to violence in Northern Ireland was never conditioned upon the IRA first renouncing its dream of reuniting Ireland; had this been the case no peace would ever have prevailed.

In justifying hudnah, Hamas leaders look to the example of what happened between the Muslims and the Crusaders in the last decade of the 12th century. The conflict between the two sides in Palestine and around it lasted for nearly two hundred years. Of particular interest to Hamas in this regard is the Ramleh treaty Salah Al-Din Al-Ayyubi (Saladin) concluded with Richard the Lionhearted on 1 September 1192 CE. The truce, which marked the end of the third Crusaders campaign, held for a period of three years and three months during which the Crusaders maintained control of the coast from Jaffa to Acre and were allowed to visit Jerusalem and had the freedom to carry out their commercial activities with the Muslims.

Reference is often made, as well, to the first hudnah ever in the history of Islam. Known as Al-Hudaybiyah, which was the name of the location on the outskirts of Mecca where it was concluded, the agreement saw the suspension of hostilities between the Muslim community under the Prophet’s leadership and the tribe of Quraysh inside Mecca. The duration of the hudnah agreed to by both sides was ten years. However, it came to an end less than two years later when Quraysh breached it with the unlawful killing of some members of the tribe of Khuza’ah that was allied to the Muslim side.

Once hudnah is concluded it is considered sacred and fulfilling its obligations becomes a religious duty; so long as the other side observes it the Muslim side cannot breach it for doing so is considered a grave sin. As in the case of other international treaties, a hudnah is renewable upon the expiry of its term by mutual agreement.

The overall long-term hudnah proposed by Hamas stipulates as a first condition an Israeli withdrawal to the borders of 4 June 1967, which means a return of all the land occupied by the Israelis as a result of the six-day war including East Jerusalem.18 Such measure would entail the removal of all Jewish settlers from those areas.19 In addition, Israel would have to release all Palestinians held in its prisons and detention camps. It is highly unlikely that Hamas would settle for anything less in exchange for a long term truce that may last for a quarter of a century or longer.

Interesting Read: Inadequate responses to recent affronts to Islam
by Sayyid Al-Aiderus

Malaysia Today
http://www.malaysia-today.net/index.html

The recent flurry of suggestions and comments on the conversion of Mohammad Abdullah (M. Moorthy) culminated in a history-making move by non-Muslim Cabinet Ministers who signed and sent an unsolicited memorandum to their boss, the Prime Minister of Malaysia, that has embarrassed the government and raised the eyebrows, concern and temper of Muslims, especially the Malays in this country. The action was seemingly taken because of a series of recent events that resulted in a spate of views expressed by a segment of society that feels that Article 121 (1A) should be reviewed or amended. The Cabinet Ministers appear to have been encouraged and emboldened by the heated rhetoric of a few. Their insensitive and callous act has naturally offended Muslims in this country and has raised suspicion and questions of intent?thus invoking feelings of distrust and misgivings, especially about the sincerity of component parties, a trust that has been a long time in building. This move is all the more curious since it was made by seasoned politicians who undoubtedly knew exactly what they were doing, but interestingly enough, preferred to take the issue to a public platform rather than to a closed Cabinet.

Since then, eight of the nine Ministers have agreed to withdraw the memorandum, leaving Tan Sri Bernard Dompok standing in defiance of the Prime Minister’s call to reconsider the submission. However, the deed is done and the act has served its purpose?to show supporters that an attempt had been made to force the hand of an unyielding government. Where the solidarity of the National Front should have been paramount on the agenda of the component parties, they opted to show fragmentation. Hence, the Prime Minister and his party found themselves standing alone.

The somewhat initial reticent response from officials, either in speech or action, appears now to have been interpreted to mean an admission of the inadequacy of the law or an attempt at a back-handed apology or an expression of guilt.

In a plural society, discussing some issues is like kissing the head of a cobra: the act itself is intriguing, but in itself, it possesses little merit?a side show is a side show no matter how you cut it. Rev. Wong’s statement, which was placed prominently on the first page, right next to the pictures of the nine Ministers, is nothing more than double-talk: a loaded declaration that implies more than it says: it has forked some lightning. It is worth pondering why his statement, and not that of any one of the Ministers, was displayed on the occasion. (He states, “It should not be looked at as only a religious issue. It is a social issue emerging out of a religious matter.” It is interesting that Wong Chun Wah in his column ‘On the Beat’ concludes his article almost stating verbatim what Rev. Wong had said: “The issue should not be treated as a religious or racial issue but a social issue with social problems that have emerged out of religious laws.” More amazing is Rev. Wong’s remark that some people are attempting to turn this to an emotional issue. What did he expect? This is the reason why there are certain forums in which certain discussions should take place.

There is a part of religion that rightfully abandons reason and embraces emotion. The act of sending the memorandum is an affront to all Muslims: it is unacceptable and shows a total disregard for the feelings of a peaceful majority. I am reminded of a heart-rending story of a forced conversion that took place in the United States in 1989.

An Albanian Muslim father in Texas, Sadri Krasniqi, was wrongly accused of molesting his four-year old daughter in public during his son’s karate competition. He was eventually found innocent by the court, when experts proved that the manner of his expression of love to his daughter was part of a 1500-year old tradition of a people who do not have a history of molesting children, let alone have sex with them. However, the system jumped the gun, and the children were put up for adoption by the Texas Child Protective Services before the father was cleared of all charges. The children were forced to become Christians and the civil judge who had presided over the case considered it the right decision, even though prosecutors called the verdict a “disgusting result.” The judge purportedly had even said that the children were better off growing up as Christians. To the parents’ dismay, their children were forced to eat pork, wear crosses, attend church and perform other duties of a Christian. The Krasnisqis, who had owned 5 restaurants, lost everything in the course of clearing their name and attempting to get their children back. The children were never returned to them. It was reported on the news that the Governor of the State of Texas was the only one who could have corrected the situation, but Governor George Bush (yes, the present president of the U.S. of A), a conservative Christian, chose to do nothing.

Mohammad Abdullah’s case is not at all like that of Krasniqi’s. At least, our government has been compassionate and considerate with Mohammad’s family and has done much to help ease their pain. In the eyes of the Syariah court Mohammad was a Muslim; there was no mala fide in the decision. The courts went by his declaration that he was a Muslim. The issue here is Kaliammal was denied the right to be heard, not the right to bury her husband as a Hindu which is an outcome that may or may not have taken place if she was given a hearing. She claims that he was a practicing Hindu. Who is to say that he was not a practicing Muslim? Islam gives those who are physically-challenged or in difficult situations a great deal of latitude. Such a person would have been exempted from having to go to mosques and could have performed his prayers at home by just gesturing with his fingers or moving his eyes.

In recent developments, the Syariah courts have been portrayed as institutions that cannot act impartially and that Islamic law does not accommodate non-Muslims. The Syariah courts may have to take some of the blame for the former perception because of their dismal and embarrassing handling of some divorce cases. What needs to be made clear here is that non-Muslims have a voice in Syariah courts.

All of us jealously guard our own. Even people who are not religious tend to feel strongly about conversions. Hence, it is not surprising to me that some people are reluctant to profess their new faith to their family members or friends, afraid of repercussions that may even amount to violence or loss of life. I know through firsthand experiences narrated by friends who had converted to Islam that their family members stayed angry at them for years, including some who have refused to reconcile to this day and those who were victims of verbal and physical abuse.

Declaring one’s faith to one’s family members is a private issue. No government or institution should interfere with this right of an individual. Only a convert should decide on the right time to announce such an important change in his life to his family, a decision that may anchor upon so many factors, including the ill health or age of family members or the degree of their reaction, revulsion or acceptance of such news: in handling such vicarious situations, it is sometimes all in the timing.

In the last few months, the media has highlighted a great number of subjects that have stirred the emotions of the people: one was an issue of rights that was racially-laced, that is, the squatting incident, the other, the Islamic Family Law Bill that invited solicited and unsolicited comments from all over, including a sweeping character assassination by the Director of the Sisters in Islam, Zainah Anwar, who called the drafters of the Bill “patriarchal” and “misogynists,” words that usually make up her repertoire. Her fury sent her lashing out in every direction, once again referring to the rights of a man to divorce his wife, beat her, in cases of disobedience and a host of other complaints. (Of course, we all know that good Muslims constantly remind their wives of such things to keep them in line. I have reduced my wife-beating activities to only once a week after over twenty years of marriage. For those who are dense enough to believe this, I have to state categorically, I have never beaten my wife in my life). Heads of NGOs and citizens, who profess other religions, were encouraged to come to the aid of SIS, and in their zeal, more often than not, overstepped their boundaries by commenting on matters beyond their jurisdiction and scope, having found their courage in numbers and in the hasty retreat of Datuk Dr Abdullah Md Zin from the controversy. Then there is the incident of Jawi’s setting up of the Morality Policing Squad (The term “Snoop Squad” is a derogatory term and a misrepresentation of the purpose and intent of the program) which elicited naïve and uninformed responses from even the President of the Bar Council, Yeo Yang Poh, who expressed shock that holding hands could be considered a sin in the year 2006, hence, shifting attention from the more severe acts of public indecency that was mentioned and describing the move as a preposterous and antiquated act, thus, ignoring the reality that promiscuity may result from innocent touches. (Yes, Yeo, in a divine religion, a sin 1400 years ago would still be a sin today, though holding hands would not involve capital punishment; in fact, the prescription would be to offer advice and encourage couples from desisting from acts that may lead to grievous sins or incurable maladies. Even the US has moved its position on sex from asking people to use contraceptives to abstinence–while here we are talking about using condoms). We are all for a society that still maintains a certain degree of its conservatism and decorum in public.

The past few weeks have also brought out that highly western argument, in this case from Ivy Josiah, the President of Women’s Aid Organization, that women should not fear dressing in whichever manner they choose since this is their right, neglecting the fact that actions have consequences. If women choose to dress skimpily to attract attention to themselves, then, they should expect to be ‘complemented accordingly’ in the age old fashion of men. (No, we are not talking about harassment, but the kind of teasing and stares that invite hot-blooded, breathing individuals to life.) I doubt women wear mini-skirts to air out their legs or shove on fitting jeans to tighten their skins or squeeze out their fat or iron out their cellulite or wrinkles. The feminist activist Jac S Kee lamented that “Jawi has turned the quality of love and affection into a crime and social ill,” calling the program “ridiculous.” Public indecency is now described as a show of “love and affection” and to check such an expression is deemed “ridiculous,” and what does one call having sex in public these days”goodwill and romance?”

Then, there was the issue of the hijab, brought up by a non-Muslim graduating student at IIUM. There was an uproar from certain quarters of the public that prompted the issue to be discussed in the Parliament: all this over a university graduation attire. When I was a student in the University of the Ozarks in Clarksville, Arkansas, all students, regardless of their country of origin, race or religion, were required to attend chapel seven times in a semester or else they would not be able to obtain their grades. We did not object to this unconstitutional requirement; we just went along. Here in Malaysia, races that have lived peacefully with one another have suddenly become Islamophobics and every expression of discomfort is treated like a major ailment.

The Syariah is the domain of Islam and should be off limits to non-Muslims. Shura on Islamic matters should not involve non-Muslims. Muslims do not need non-Muslims to tell them what is good or not good for Islam. People like Judith Loh-Koh, President of All Women’s Action Society, should not even contemplate the possibility of giving feedback on the Islamic Family Law Act as she expressed the government should recently in the papers. Zainah Anwar, who has the ear of the media and certain quarters in the government and the sympathy of the West, does not represent mainstream Islam or the views of the majority of Muslim women. The organization has ideas and opinions that are highly questionable as far as the religion is concerned. Yet they are included in high level negotiations on matters pertaining to Islam, even though Zainah’s biases are deep-rooted and of a dubious nature, including her opinions about polygamy.

In a recent interview in the paper she said that people she knew who practiced polygamy said that it was difficult–nothing like stating the obvious. No woman need remind a man that polygamy is difficult, and no woman need stand in the way of a man who has the God-given right to practice it. No pilot survey result, as mentioned by Zainah, for or against polygamy, should ever be used as the basis to abrogate God’s laws or discriminate against men.

Zainah’s statement that the young daughters of her friends are “declaring that they have no plans to marry or that they will not marry a Malay” is laughable. People do not get married to get divorced. What are these parents prompting their children to do? lead a life of celibacy or promiscuity? Marrying a foreigner too presents its own variety of challenges. Those who are feeding their daughters with horror stories about marriage are irresponsible parents. The marriage of their daughters, we pray to God, will turn out better than the failed marriages of their parents. (I hope these parents provide better counsel to their very Malay sons). Those of us who are happily married sometimes wonder where this kind of animosity stems from and what bitter experiences in the lives of these angry women have caused them to view the world in such lugubrious terms and wasting their lives fighting a battle that cannot possibly be sanctioned by God or won through time. The issue of love is beyond anyone’s control: I seriously doubt that when love comes a calling, these young girls will be flipping through the pages of the Syariah laws before deciding on their future. (I propose a pre-nuptial agreement). People do not venture into the sacred institution of marriage with a load of confounding ‘what ifs’ that can only be answered by God.

There is a kind of extremeness expressed in our society that confronts decency. We are all for fair play and rights as given to us by the Creator, but there is a limit to everything, and the goings-on in recent weeks have tested our patience and honor sorely.

Interesting Read: Muhammad’s Sword
by Uri Avnery; Gush Shalom; September 25, 2006

Since the days when Roman Emperors threw Christians to the lions, the relations between the emperors and the heads of the church have undergone many changes.

Constantine the Great, who became Emperor in the year 306 – exactly 1700 years ago – encouraged the practice of Christianity in the empire, which included Palestine. Centuries later, the church split into an Eastern (Orthodox) and a Western (Catholic) part. In the West, the Bishop of Rome, who acquired the title of Pope, demanded that the Emperor accept his superiority.

The struggle between the Emperors and the Popes played a central role in European history and divided the peoples. It knew ups and downs. Some Emperors dismissed or expelled a Pope, some Popes dismissed or excommunicated an Emperor. One of the Emperors, Henry IV, “walked to Canossa”, standing for three days barefoot in the snow in front of the Pope’s castle, until the Pope deigned to annul his excommunication.

But there were times when Emperors and Popes lived in peace with each other. We are witnessing such a period today. Between the present Pope, Benedict XVI, and the present Emperor, George Bush II, there exists a wonderful harmony. Last week’s speech by the Pope, which aroused a world-wide storm, went well with Bush’s crusade against “Islamofascism”, in the context of the “Clash of Civilizations”.

IN HIS lecture at a German university, the 265th Pope described what he sees as a huge difference between Christianity and Islam: while Christianity is based on reason, Islam denies it. While Christians see the logic of God’s actions, Muslims deny that there is any such logic in the actions of Allah.

As a Jewish atheist, I do not intend to enter the fray of this debate. It is much beyond my humble abilities to understand the logic of the Pope. But I cannot overlook one passage, which concerns me too, as an Israeli living near the fault-line of this “war of civilizations”.

In order to prove the lack of reason in Islam, the Pope asserts that the prophet Muhammad ordered his followers to spread their religion by the sword. According to the Pope, that is unreasonable, because faith is born of the soul, not of the body. How can the sword influence the soul?

To support his case, the Pope quoted – of all people – a Byzantine Emperor, who belonged, of course, to the competing Eastern Church. At the end of the 14th century, the Emperor Manuel II Palaeologus told of a debate he had – or so he said (its occurrence is in doubt) – with an unnamed Persian Muslim scholar. In the heat of the argument, the Emperor (according to himself) flung the following words at his adversary:

“Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached”.

These words give rise to three questions: (a) Why did the Emperor say them? (b) Are they true? (c) Why did the present Pope quote them?

WHEN MANUEL II wrote his treatise, he was the head of a dying empire. He assumed power in 1391, when only a few provinces of the once illustrious empire remained. These, too, were already under Turkish threat.

At that point in time, the Ottoman Turks had reached the banks of the Danube. They had conquered Bulgaria and the north of Greece, and had twice defeated relieving armies sent by Europe to save the Eastern Empire. On May 29, 1453, only a few years after Manuel’s death, his capital, Constantinople (the present Istanbul) fell to the Turks, putting an end to the Empire that had lasted for more than a thousand years.

During his reign, Manuel made the rounds of the capitals of Europe in an attempt to drum up support. He promised to reunite the church. There is no doubt that he wrote his religious treatise in order to incite the Christian countries against the Turks and convince them to start a new crusade. The aim was practical, theology was serving politics.

In this sense, the quote serves exactly the requirements of the present Emperor, George Bush II. He, too, wants to unite the Christian world against the mainly Muslim “Axis of Evil”. Moreover, the Turks are again knocking on the doors of Europe, this time peacefully. It is well known that the Pope supports the forces that object to the entry of Turkey into the European Union.

IS THERE any truth in Manuel’s argument?

The pope himself threw in a word of caution. As a serious and renowned theologian, he could not afford to falsify written texts. Therefore, he admitted that the Qur’an specifically forbade the spreading of the faith by force. He quoted the second Sura, verse 256 (strangely fallible, for a pope, he meant verse 257) which says: “There must be no coercion in matters of faith”.

How can one ignore such an unequivocal statement? The Pope simply argues that this commandment was laid down by the prophet when he was at the beginning of his career, still weak and powerless, but that later on he ordered the use of the sword in the service of the faith. Such an order does not exist in the Qur’an. True, Muhammad called for the use of the sword in his war against opposing tribes – Christian, Jewish and others – in Arabia, when he was building his state. But that was a political act, not a religious one; basically a fight for territory, not for the spreading of the faith.

Jesus said: “You will recognize them by their fruits.” The treatment of other religions by Islam must be judged by a simple test: How did the Muslim rulers behave for more than a thousand years, when they had the power to “spread the faith by the sword”?

Well, they just did not.

For many centuries, the Muslims ruled Greece. Did the Greeks become Muslims? Did anyone even try to Islamize them? On the contrary, Christian Greeks held the highest positions in the Ottoman administration. The Bulgarians, Serbs, Romanians, Hungarians and other European nations lived at one time or another under Ottoman rule and clung to their Christian faith. Nobody compelled them to become Muslims and all of them remained devoutly Christian.

True, the Albanians did convert to Islam, and so did the Bosniaks. But nobody argues that they did this under duress. They adopted Islam in order to become favorites of the government and enjoy the fruits.

In 1099, the Crusaders conquered Jerusalem and massacred its Muslim and Jewish inhabitants indiscriminately, in the name of the gentle Jesus. At that time, 400 years into the occupation of Palestine by the Muslims, Christians were still the majority in the country. Throughout this long period, no effort was made to impose Islam on them. Only after the expulsion of the Crusaders from the country, did the majority of the inhabitants start to adopt the Arabic language and the Muslim faith – and they were the forefathers of most of today’s Palestinians.

THERE IS no evidence whatsoever of any attempt to impose Islam on the Jews. As is well known, under Muslim rule the Jews of Spain enjoyed a bloom the like of which the Jews did not enjoy anywhere else until almost our time. Poets like Yehuda Halevy wrote in Arabic, as did the great Maimonides. In Muslim Spain, Jews were ministers, poets, scientists. In Muslim Toledo, Christian, Jewish and Muslim scholars worked together and translated the ancient Greek philosophical and scientific texts. That was, indeed, the Golden Age. How would this have been possible, had the Prophet decreed the “spreading of the faith by the sword”?

What happened afterwards is even more telling. When the Catholics re-conquered Spain from the Muslims, they instituted a reign of religious terror. The Jews and the Muslims were presented with a cruel choice: to become Christians, to be massacred or to leave. And where did the hundreds of thousand of Jews, who refused to abandon their faith, escape? Almost all of them were received with open arms in the Muslim countries. The Sephardi (“Spanish”) Jews settled all over the Muslim world, from Morocco in the west to Iraq in the east, from Bulgaria (then part of the Ottoman Empire) in the north to Sudan in the south. Nowhere were they persecuted. They knew nothing like the tortures of the Inquisition, the flames of the auto-da-fe, the pogroms, the terrible mass-expulsions that took place in almost all Christian countries, up to the Holocaust.

WHY? Because Islam expressly prohibited any persecution of the “peoples of the book”. In Islamic society, a special place was reserved for Jews and Christians. They did not enjoy completely equal rights, but almost. They had to pay a special poll-tax, but were exempted from military service – a trade-off that was quite welcome to many Jews. It has been said that Muslim rulers frowned upon any attempt to convert Jews to Islam even by gentle persuasion – because it entailed the loss of taxes.

Every honest Jew who knows the history of his people cannot but feel a deep sense of gratitude to Islam, which has protected the Jews for fifty generations, while the Christian world persecuted the Jews and tried many times “by the sword” to get them to abandon their faith.

THE STORY about “spreading the faith by the sword” is an evil legend, one of the myths that grew up in Europe during the great wars against the Muslims – the reconquista of Spain by the Christians, the Crusades and the repulsion of the Turks, who almost conquered Vienna. I suspect that the German Pope, too, honestly believes in these fables. That means that the leader of the Catholic world, who is a Christian theologian in his own right, did not make the effort to study the history of other religions.

Why did he utter these words in public? And why now?

There is no escape from viewing them against the background of the new Crusade of Bush and his evangelist supporters, with his slogans of “Islamofascism” and the “Global War on Terrorism” – when “terrorism” has become a synonym for Muslims. For Bush’s handlers, this is a cynical attempt to justify the domination of the world’s oil resources. Not for the first time in history, a religious robe is spread to cover the nakedness of economic interests; not for the first time, a robbers’ expedition becomes a Crusade.

The speech of the Pope blends into this effort. Who can foretell the dire consequences?

Pope Benedict, Islam and Violence
by Dr. Mazeni Alwi

When the Christians of Jerusalem decided to give in to the Muslim army that had been laying siege to the city under the command of Amr bin Al As (RA), they set a condition that Caliph Umar (RA) must come in person, to sign the peace treaty. Umar and his attendant had only one camel and they took turns to ride from Medina to Jerusalem. He approached the city peacefully and by foot, to be cordially received by its Christian guardian, Bishop Sephronious. Umar signed the peace treaty with the rulers of Jerusalem which read,

“This is the protection which the servant of God, Umar, the Ruler of Believers, has granted to the people of Jerusalem. The protection is for their lives and property, their churches and crosses, their sick and healthy and for all their coreligionists. Their churches shall not be used for habitation, nor shall they be demolished, nor shall any injury be done to them. There shall be no compulsion for these people in the matter of religion, nor shall any of them suffer any injury on account of religion. The people of Jerusalem must pay the poll tax like the people of other cities and they must expel the Byzantines and the robbers …”

The gates of the city were opened and Umar went to the Temple Mount and said his prayer. Afterwards the Bishop invited him to tour the biggest church of the city. Umar was in the church when the time for the afternoon prayer came. The Bishop offered to let him pray in the church. “No” replied Umar, “If I do so, the Muslims one day might take this as an excuse to take the church from you”. So Umar prayed on the steps of the church. He then gave the Bishop a pact that forbade Muslims from ever praying on the steps of the church. Until today, the keeper of the key to Jerusalem’s Church of Holy Sepulchre is in the same Muslim family for generations. The fire-bombing of a church in Gaza in the wake of Muslim protests over Pope Benedict’s speech represents an aberration in Christian – Muslim relations in Palestine, one that is spurred by the radicalization of society under a long and brutal military occupation than the teachings of Islam itself.

The portrayal of Islam as a religion that preaches violence and is primarily spread by it is nothing new in western discourse. It is the most potent argument for justifying all manner of prejudicial treatment on the religion and its followers, from soft discrimmatory policies to islamophobic writings in the media even to occupation of muslim lands killing their innocents, destroying their societies and plundering of their resources. This is something that Muslims have learned to accept to live with, especially in the last few years.

But why did the Muslim react in such a manner when Pope Benedict repeated something that we are already accustomed to hearing from not so friendly western public figures? After all flamboyant televangelists like Jerry Falwell have said worse things than the Pope – calling the Prophet of Islam a paedophile and terrorist – yet we never asked for an apology. In the modern era, not least because of the late Pope John Paul II, Muslims have a genuine respect for the head of the Catholic church. The Crusades, the Reconquista, the Inquisitions were far behind us. The Catholic Church with its long history and tradition, its large number of faithful and the authority of its leadership, its unambiguous moral precepts and its liturgies and rites represent what constitutes Christian orthodoxy to ordinary Muslim eyes, as the last bastion against the inexorable march of secularization of western society. The Pope and the church is seen as embodying the vestiges of sacredness and other worldliness of that society, whose historical trajectory and fortunes is a reminder to us of the dangers of unfettered hubris. This is also an era where few have the neither the desire nor the stomach for religious wars. Where the role of religion in society has been radically rolled back, both the Islamic and Christian orthodoxies should be sharing a common vision of restoring spirituality to moderate the rampant individualism, materialism as well as other less edifying aspects of modernity. This is at least the general view point of ordinary Muslims, given the position as the Christian faithful as “People of the Book” and the reverence with which Jesus (AS) is held by Muslims.

Therefore, to Muslim eyes, what the Pope said in his address at his old university about the Prophet and Islam is totally uncharacteristic for someone holding the office of Head of the Catholic Church. That Pope Benedict was the Vatican’s foremost theologian before his appointment, for His Holiness to have descended to the language and rhetorics of American televangelists pressed into the service of President Bush’s war on terror is a great disappointment and utterly shocking to Muslims.

One can’t help comparing him to his predecessor, whom Muslims regarded as someone who had served his faith with utmost sincerity, and at the same time a genuine builder of bridges. At his death Muslim religious leaders praised Pope John Paul as having contributed greatly to his religion and humanity, as a unique example in spreading peace and tolerance among peoples. When the Muslim world felt anguished and humiliated, he stood firmly against the US-led occupation of Iraq and the Israeli separation wall, pointing out that US Middle East policies were not helping the cause of peace.

Not only did Pope Benedict’s attack on Islam and the Prophet followed by a half-hearted apology grudgingly given evoked strong reaction in the Muslim world, a number of western commentators took him to task for his low-brow critique of Islam that appeared more like common-place prejudice and questioned his possible motives, juxtaposing his well known position on Turkey with regards to its EU membership bid for greater effect. One notable piece that has been in wide circulation among Muslims was written by the veteran Israeli journalist and peace activist Uri Avneri. Drawing many examples mainly from the Ottoman era and Andalusian golden age to debunk the Pope’s thesis, he gave an insightful account of Muslim society’s tolerance of Christians and Jews in their midst, some flourishing as scholars while some others rose to the ranks of ministers.

It has to be admitted that wars are part of Islamic history from very early on, but perhaps not more or not less than in the history of other religions that have built civilizations. Wars were simply an instrument of politics for much of the history of human civilization up to the recent era when the massive destruction and colossal loss of lives wrought by modern warfare in World War II made us shudder, and diplomacy and international law became established as the framework for settling the affairs of nations. The battles led by the Prophet at Badr and Uhud was a defence against the idolators of Mecca who mustered a superior force to annihilate the nascent Muslim community. In the classical Islamic period there were many wars fought between Muslim political entities vying from power within the larger body-politics of the Islamic Caliphate – wars that were motivated primarily by worldly ambitions. The biography of Ibn Khaldun tells of his fortunes and reversals as he switched political loyalties from one court to another in the mini kingdoms of North Africa of the 1300’s. It was during one of his low periods that he spent 3 years in isolation to write his “History of the Maghreb” whose introductory volume, “the Muqaddimah” became a celebrated text today a pioneering work in sociology/historiography. In the early Islamic period violent strife stirred up by extremist elements like the Kharijites had been the cause of costly internecine battles that took the lives of some eminent companions of the Prophet (SAW). The war that the first Caliph Abu Bakr (RA) waged on the rejecters of the zakat was perhaps the rare instance where religion rather than realpolitik had been the basis.

It is understandable that in the context of the politics times, the prophet and his companions took part in battles and wars. Even in the era of the primacy of international law, however undesirable and destructive wars are, they may be inevitable and legitimate. Just as “just war” is an accepted concept in international law and diplomacy, jihad in its specific military sense is part of the Islamic lexicon. What Islam laid down should war becomes inevitable is ethical limitations and chivalrous conduct, that the humanity of the adversary must be respected, that non combatants, women, children, the aged and religious leaders must not be harmed and that public buildings, dwellings, crops and water sources must not be destroyed. The books of fiqh of the classical Islamic period would customarily have a chapter on Jihad to remind Muslims of their religious duty to act within the limits.

Needless to say, how Muslim armies conducted themselves throughout Islamic history or what their motives were for going to war may not necessarily accord with what have been laid down in the books of Fiqh anymore than the conduct of crusader Reginald of Chatillon or the Serbian militia’s murder and rape of Bosnian Muslims in the name of defending Christendom represent Christian teachings.

Had Pope Benedict questioned why the Muslim armies crossed the Straits of Gibraltar and went on to conquer Spain for Islam or why the Moors pushed north as far as Poitiers and Tours in the French heartland to support his argument, we may have some difficulty in giving a convincing answer, never mind that conquest of Spain gave birth to civilization that became a conduit for Europe’s recovery of the Greek intellectual legacy though the works of Ibn Rushd, Ibn Sina and Al Faraby that was to pave the way for the Renaissance and the Enlightenment. But Pope Benedict chose to attribute to Prophet Muhammad (SAW) himself the violence and the sword to perpetuate the western prejudice on Islam. Thanks to early Muslim scholars for their scrupulousness who have recorded in meticulous detail the prophet’s life, his companions and Islam’s early history, it is not difficult to respond to misconceptions and deliberate distortions. One such example from Al Tabari is the “Covenant of Umar” the second Caliph of Islam, a document addressed to the people of Jerusalem after the conquest of the city in 638 CE, 5 years after the prophet’s death, narrated in the introductory passage above. Not only did Umar (RA) act in a just manner that is a reflection of his deep piety, being one of the Prophet’s closest companions, he also exhibited the austere simplicity (zuhd) that was exceptional for the age when conquering emperors would ride in triumphantly with pomp and splendor. The Caliph took turns to ride the one camel he shared with his attendant from Medina to Jerusalem. Al-Tabari also wrote in detail of similar treaties made by the Prophet’s companions with the inhabitants of other conquered cities in Syria-Palestine and Egypt. It is clear that the Islamic conquest of Jerusalem and other cities in the region was not to seek conversion of the Christians. It was an imperative of realpolitik of the age and the Muslims sought to put Islamic political order in place of the Byzantines who happened to be Christians.

In Baladhuri’s account of the early jihad (Futuh al Buldan – the openings of the nations), there is clear evidence of the importance Muslims attached to the idea of “no compulsion in religion”, as demonstrated by a text written by the Prophet to the Christian community of Najran in Southern Arabia guaranteeing them certain social and religious rights under Islamic rule,

“Najran and their followers are entitled to the protection of Allah and to the security of Muhammad the Prophet, the Messenger of Allah, which security shall involve their persons, religion, lands and possession, their camels, messages and images (a reference to crosses and icons) … No attempt shall be made to turn a bishop, a monk from his office as a monk, nor the sexton of a church from his office”

The other controversial point raised by Pope Benedict commented on the verse “There is no compulsion in religion (2:256)”, was the charge that the Prophet was the author of the verse which he later abrogated. He noted that the “experts” say that this was composed early on when “Muhammad was powerless and still under threat” but later he ordered the use of the sword in the service of the faith. Was the Pope implying that the Quran was authored by the Prophet? While this is perfectly understandable for a non muslim to hold as a personal opinion, to insist so publicly in such a manner while holding the highest office in the Catholic Church is insensitive and does great damage to good faith between Muslims and Christians.

The decline of religion and religious culture in the west, the catholic countries like Spain, France, Italy and Ireland included, is not about to let up. Known for his doctrinal conservativeness, this must be one of Pope Benedict’s major area of concern. In the attempt to conflate Christianity with post-modern, post-Christian west and doing its bidding by recycling the old European myths about Islam and its Prophet – is this a sign of desperation in a struggle against the relentless decline of religion? In the modern European context Islam is not in competition with Christianity. Muslim readily recognize Europe’s Christian heritage and its immense contribution to western civilization from art and architecture to the development of academic disciplines and the university, to providing the ethical foundations in liberal thought, even if many have decried religion as an obstacle to human progress. The idea of re-asserting Christian values, culture and identity in highly secular Europe is going to be tough and one can only view it with resigned pessimism. However it is something that many Muslims could identify with if the vision is to leaven secular modernity with a moral and ethical compass that is expansive and accommodative. However the Pope started on the wrong footing by reviving the old prejudices against Islam.

Today it is the Muslims who continue to fiercely hold on to the notion of the Sacred Transcendent, Divine Guidance and Grace through prophethood, of unambiguous immutable moral precepts and values, and of the Sacred Law without having to apologize to secular materialism. If the Catholic Church needs friends in these lean times, they can find them in the Muslims.