Alla inlägg taggade med: "egypten"
The Arab Tomorrow
DAVID B. OTTAWAY
October 6, 1981, was meant to be a day of celebration in Egypt. It marked the anniversary of Egypt’s grandest moment of victory in three Arab-Israeli conflicts, when the country’s underdog army thrust across the Suez Canal in the opening days ofthe 1973 Yom Kippur War and sent Israeli troops reeling in retreat. On a cool, cloudless morning, the Cairo stadium was packed with Egyptian families that had come to see the military strut its hardware.On the reviewing stand, President Anwar el-Sadat,the war’s architect, watched with satisfaction as men and machines paraded before him. I was nearby, a newly arrived foreign correspondent.Suddenly, en av arméns lastbilar stannade direkt framför granskningsläktaren precis när sex Mirage-jetplan vrålade ovanför i en akrobatisk föreställning, måla himlen med långa spår av rött, gul, lila,och grön rök. Sadat reste sig, uppenbarligen förbereder sig för att utbyta hälsningar med ännu en kontingent av egyptiska trupper. Han gjorde sig själv till ett perfekt mål för fyra islamistiska mördare som hoppade från lastbilen, stormade pallen, och fyllde sin kropp med kulor. När mördarna fortsatte under vad som verkade vara en evighet att spraya stativet med sin dödliga eld, Jag funderade ett ögonblick på om jag skulle slå i marken och riskera att bli trampad ihjäl av panikslagna åskådare eller stanna kvar och riskera att ta en lös kula. Instinkten sa åt mig att hålla mig på benen, och min känsla av journalistisk plikt fick mig att gå och ta reda på om Sadat levde eller var död.
| Sep 26, 2010 | kommentarer 0
The Totalitarianism of Jihadist Islamism and its Challenge to Europe and to Islam
Basso tibi
When reading the majority of texts that comprise the vast literature that has been published by self-proclaimed pundits on political Islam, it is easy to miss the fact that a new movement has arisen. Further, this literature fails to explain in a satisfactory manner the fact that the ideology which drives it is based on a particular interpretation of Islam, and that it is thus a politicised religious faith,
not a secular one. The only book in which political Islam is addressed as a form of totalitarianism is the one by Paul Berman, Terror and Liberalism (2003). The author is, dock, not an expert, cannot read Islamic sources, and therefore relies on the selective use of one or two secondary sources, thus failing to grasp the phenomenon.
One of the reasons for such shortcomings is the fact that most of those who seek to inform us about the ‘jihadist threat’ – and Berman is typical of this scholarship – not only lack the language skills to read the sources produced by the ideologues of political Islam, but also lack knowledge about the cultural dimension of the movement. This new totalitarian movement is in many ways a novelty
in the history of politics since it has its roots in two parallel and related phenomena: first, the culturalisation of politics which leads to politics being conceptualised as a cultural system (a view pioneered by Clifford Geertz); and second the return of the sacred, or ‘re-enchantment’ of the world, as a reaction to its intensive secularisation resulting from globalisation.
The analysis of political ideologies that are based on religions, and that can exert appeal as a political religion as a consequence of this, involves a social science understanding of the role of religion played by world politics, especially after the bi-polar system of the Cold War has given way to a multi-polar world. In a project conducted at the Hannah Arendt Institute for the application of totalitarianism to the study of political religions, I proposed the distinction between secular ideologies that act as a substitute for religion, and religious ideologies based on genuine religious faith, which is the case in religious fundamentalism (see note
24). Another project on ‘Political Religion’, genomfördes vid universitetet i Basel, har klargjort poängen att nya synsätt på politik blir nödvändiga när en religiös tro väl klätts i en politisk klädsel. Utifrån de auktoritativa källorna till politisk islam, denna artikel föreslår att den stora variationen av organisationer inspirerade av islamistisk ideologi ska begreppsliggöras både som politiska religioner och som politiska rörelser. Den unika egenskapen hos politisk islams lögner är det faktum att den är baserad på en transnationell religion (see note 26).
| Sep 15, 2010 | kommentarer 0
Islam, Politisk islam och Amerika
Arab Insight
Är "Broderskap" med Amerika möjligt?
khalil al-anani
"det finns ingen chans att kommunicera med någon U.S. administration så länge som USA behåller sin långvariga syn på islam som en verklig fara, en syn som sätter USA i samma båt som den sionistiska fienden. Vi har inga förutfattade meningar om det amerikanska folket eller USA. samhället och dess medborgerliga organisationer och tankesmedjor. Vi har inga problem med att kommunicera med det amerikanska folket men inga tillräckliga ansträngningar görs för att föra oss närmare," sa Dr. Issam al-Iryan, chef för Muslimska brödraskapets politiska avdelning i en telefonintervju.
Al-Iryans ord sammanfattar Muslimska brödraskapets syn på det amerikanska folket och USA. regering. Andra medlemmar av Muslimska brödraskapet skulle hålla med, liksom den bortgångne Hassan al-Banna, som grundade gruppen i 1928. Al- Banna såg västvärlden mest som en symbol för moraliskt förfall. Andra salafister – en islamisk tankeskola som förlitar sig på förfäder som exemplariska modeller – har antagit samma syn på USA, men saknar den ideologiska flexibilitet som det Muslimska brödraskapet förespråkar. Medan Muslimska brödraskapet tror på att engagera amerikanerna i civil dialog, andra extremistgrupper ser ingen mening med dialog och hävdar att våld är det enda sättet att hantera USA.
| Sep 15, 2010 | kommentarer 0
Liberal Democracy and Political Islam: the Search for Common Ground.
Mostapha Benhenda
Denna uppsats syftar till att skapa en dialog mellan demokratiska och islamiska politiska teorier.1 Samspelet mellan dem är förbryllande: till exempel, för att förklara förhållandet mellan demokrati och deras uppfattning om den ideala islamiska politiken
regimen, den pakistanska forskaren Abu ‘Ala Maududi myntade neologismen” teodemokrati ”medan den franska forskaren Louis Massignon föreslog oxymoron” sekulär teokrati ”. Dessa uttryck tyder på att vissa aspekter av demokrati utvärderas positivt och andra bedöms negativt. Till exempel, Muslimska forskare och aktivister stöder ofta principen om härskarnas ansvarsskyldighet, vilket är ett avgörande inslag i demokratin. Tvärtom, de förkastar ofta principen om åtskillnad mellan religion och stat, which is often considered to be part of democracy (at least, of democracy as known in the United States today). Given this mixed assessment of democratic principles, it seems interesting to determine the conception of democracy underlying Islamic political models. Med andra ord, we should try to find out what is democratic in “theodemocracy”. To that end, among the impressive diversity and plurality of Islamic traditions of normative political thought, we essentially focus on the broad current of thought going back to Abu ‘Ala Maududi and the Egyptian intellectual Sayyed Qutb.8 This particular trend of thought is interesting because in the Muslim world, it lies at the basis of some of the most challenging oppositions to the diffusion of the values originating from the West. Based on religious values, this trend elaborated a political model alternative to liberal democracy. Broadly speaking, the conception of democracy included in this Islamic political model is procedural. With some differences, this conception is inspired by democratic theories advocated by some constitutionalists and political scientists.10 It is thin and minimalist, up to a certain point. Till exempel, it does not rely on any notion of popular sovereignty and it does not require any separation between religion and politics. The first aim of this paper is to elaborate this minimalist conception. We make a detailed restatement of it in order to isolate this conception from its moral (liberal) foundations, which are controversial from the particular Islamic viewpoint considered here. Verkligen, the democratic process is usually derived from a principle of personal autonomy, which is not endorsed by these Islamic theories.11 Here, we show that such principle is not necessary to justify a democratic process.
| Sep 09, 2010 | kommentarer 0
Islam och det nya politiska landskapet
Back, Michael Keith, Azra Khan,
Kalbir Shukra och John Solomos
I KÄLLAN efter attacken mot World Trade Center den 11 september 2001, och bombningarna av Madrid och London av 2004 och 2005, a literature that addresses the forms and modalities of religious expression – particularly Islamic religious expression – has flourished in the penumbral regions that link mainstream social science to social policy design, think tanks and journalism. Much of the work has attempted to define attitudes or predispositions of a Muslim population in a particular site of tension such as London or the UK (Barnes, 2006; Ethnos Consultancy, 2005; GFK, 2006; GLA, 2006; Populus, 2006), or critiqued particular forms of social policy intervention (Bright, 2006a; Mirza et al., 2007). Studies of Islamism and Jihadism have created a particular focus on the syncretic and complex links between Islamic religious faith and forms of social movement and political mobilization (Husain, 2007; Kepel, 2004, 2006; McRoy, 2006; Neville-Jones et al., 2006, 2007; Phillips, 2006; Roy, 2004, 2006). Conventionally, the analytical focus has spotlighted the culture of Islam, the belief systems of the faithful, and the historical and geographical trajectories of Muslim populations across the world in general and in ‘the West’ in particular (Abbas, 2005; Ansari, 2002; Eade and Garbin, 2002; Hussein, 2006; Modood, 2005; Ramadan, 1999, 2005). In this article the emphasis is different. We argue that studies of Islamic political participation need to be contextualized carefully without recourse to grand generalities about culture and faith. This is because both culture and faith are structured by and in turn structure the cultural, institutional and deliberative landscapes through which they are articulated. In the case of the British experience, the hidden traces of Christianity in the formation of the welfare state in the last century, the rapidly changing cartography of spaces of the political and the role of ‘faith organizations’ in the restructuring of welfare provision generate the material social context determining the opportunities and the outlines of new forms of political participation.
| Sep 08, 2010 | kommentarer 0
Islamic Reformation
Adnan Khan
The Italian Prime Minister, Silvio Berlusconi boasted after the events of 9/11:
“…we must be aware of the superiority of our civilisation, a system that has guaranteed
well being, respect for human rights and – in contrast with Islamic countries – respect
for religious and political rights, a system that has its values understanding of diversity
and tolerance…The West will conquer peoples, like it conquered communism, even if it
means a confrontation with another civilisation, the Islamic one, stuck where it was
1,400 years ago…”1
And in a 2007 report the RAND institute declared:
“The struggle underway throughout much of the Muslim world is essentially a war of
ideas. Its outcome will determine the future direction of the Muslim world.”
Building moderate Muslim Networks, RAND Institute
The concept of ‘islah’ (reform) is a concept unknown to Muslims. It never existed throughout the
history of the Islamic civilisation; it was never debated or even considered. A cursory glance at classical
Islamic literature shows us that when the classical scholars laid the foundations of usul, and codified
their Islamic rulings (fiqh) de tittade bara på förståelsen av de islamiska reglerna för att kunna
tillämpa dem. En liknande situation inträffade när reglerna fastställdes för hadith, tafseer och den
arabiskt språk. Lärda, tänkare och intellektuella genom islams historia tillbringade mycket tid
förstå Allahs uppenbarelse – Koranen och tillämpa ayaat på verkligheten och myntade
principer och discipliner för att underlätta förståelsen. Därför förblev Koranen grunden för
studier och alla discipliner som utvecklades var alltid baserade på Koranen. De som blev
slagen av grekisk filosofi som de muslimska filosoferna och några från Mut'azilah
ansågs ha lämnat islams fålla när Koranen upphörde att vara deras studiegrund. Alltså för
alla muslimer som försöker härleda regler eller förstå vilken hållning som bör intas till en viss
fråga Koranen är grunden för denna studie.
Det första försöket att reformera islam ägde rum i början av 1800-talet. Vid tur av
talet hade Ummah befunnit sig i en lång period av nedgång där den globala maktbalansen förändrades
från Khilafah till Storbritannien. Monteringsproblem uppslukade Khilafah medan Västeuropa var inne
mitt under den industriella revolutionen. Ummah kom att förlora sin orörda förståelse av islam, och
i ett försök att vända nedgången som uppslukade Uthmanernas (ottomaner) några muslimer skickades till
väst, och som ett resultat blev de slagen av vad de såg. Rifa'a Rafi' al-Tahtawi från Egypten (1801-1873),
vid hemkomsten från Paris, wrote a biographical book called Takhlis al-ibriz ila talkhis Bariz (The
Extraction of Gold, or an Overview of Paris, 1834), praising their cleanliness, love of work, and above
all social morality. He declared that we must mimic what is being done in Paris, advocating changes to
the Islamic society from liberalising women to the systems of ruling. This thought, and others like it,
marked the beginning of the reinventing trend in Islam.
| Sep 07, 2010 | kommentarer 0
Islam in the West
Jocelyne Cesari
The immigration of Muslims to Europe, North America, and Australia and the complex socioreligious dynamics that have subsequently developed have made Islam in the West a compelling new ªeld of research. The Salman Rushdie affair, hijab controversies, the attacks on the World Trade Center, and the furor over the Danish cartoons are all examples of international crises that have brought to light the connections between Muslims in the West and the global Muslim world. These new situations entail theoretical and methodological challenges for the study of contemporary Islam, and it has become crucial that we avoid essentializing either Islam or Muslims and resist the rhetorical structures of discourses that are preoccupied with security and terrorism.
In this article, I argue that Islam as a religious tradition is a terra incognita. A preliminary reason for this situation is that there is no consensus on religion as an object of research. Religion, as an academic discipline, has become torn between historical, sociological, and hermeneutical methodologies. With Islam, the situation is even more intricate. In the West, the study of Islam began as a branch of Orientalist studies and therefore followed a separate and distinctive path from the study of religions. Even though the critique of Orientalism has been central to the emergence of the study of Islam in the ªeld of social sciences, tensions remain strong between Islamicists and both anthropologists and sociologists. The topic of Islam and Muslims in the West is embedded in this struggle. One implication of this methodological tension is that students of Islam who began their academic career studying Islam in France, Germany, or America ªnd it challenging to establish credibility as scholars of Islam, particularly in the North American academic
context.
| Sep 07, 2010 | kommentarer 0
ISLAM, DEMOKRATI & USA:
Cordoba Foundation
Abdullah Faliq
Intro ,
Trots att det är både en perenn och en komplex debatt, Arches Quarterly granskar om från teologiska och praktiska grunder, den viktiga debatten om förhållandet och kompatibiliteten mellan islam och demokrati, som ekade i Barack Obamas agenda för hopp och förändring. Medan många firar Obamas uppstigning till Oval Office som en nationell katarsis för USA, andra förblir mindre optimistiska om en förändring i ideologi och synsätt på den internationella arenan. Även om mycket av spänningen och misstron mellan den muslimska världen och USA kan tillskrivas strategin att främja demokrati, gynnar vanligtvis diktaturer och marionettregimer som ger läpparnas bekännelse till demokratiska värderingar och mänskliga rättigheter, efterskalvet av 9/11 har verkligen cementerat farhågorna ytterligare genom USA:s ståndpunkt om politisk islam. Det har skapat en vägg av negativitet som hittats av worldpublicopinion.org, enligt vilken 67% av egyptierna tror att Amerika globalt spelar en "främst negativ" roll.
USA:s svar har alltså varit träffande. Genom att välja Obama, många runt om i världen sätter sitt hopp om att utveckla en mindre krigförande, men rättvisare utrikespolitik gentemot den muslimska världen. Testet för Obama, när vi diskuterar, är hur Amerika och hennes allierade främjar demokrati. Kommer det att vara underlättande eller imponerande?
Dessutom, kan det vara en ärlig mäklare i utdragna konfliktzoner? Anlita prolifis expertis och insikt
c lärda, akademiker, rutinerade journalister och politiker, Arches Quarterly lyfter fram förhållandet mellan islam och demokrati och Amerikas roll – såväl som de förändringar som Obama åstadkom, i att söka den gemensamma grunden. Anas Altikriti, VD:n för Th e Cordoba Foundation ger inledningen till denna diskussion, där han reflekterar över de förhoppningar och utmaningar som vilar på Obamas väg. Följer Altikriti, den tidigare rådgivaren till president Nixon, Dr Robert Crane ger en grundlig analys av den islamiska principen om rätten till frihet. Anwar Ibrahim, Malaysias tidigare vice premiärminister, berikar diskussionen med de praktiska realiteterna i att implementera demokrati i muslimskt dominerande samhällen, nämligen, i Indonesien och Malaysia.
Vi har också Dr Shireen Hunter, från Georgetown University, USA, who explores Muslim countries lagging in democratisation and modernisation. Th is is complemented by terrorism writer, Dr Nafeez Ahmed’s explanation of the crisis of post-modernity and the
demise of democracy. Dr Daud Abdullah (Director of Middle East Media Monitor), Alan Hart (former ITN and BBC Panorama correspondent; author of Zionism: Th e Real Enemy of the Jews) and Asem Sondos (Editor of Egypt’s Sawt Al Omma weekly) concentrate on Obama and his role vis-à-vis democracy-promotion in the Muslim world, as well as US relations with Israel and the Muslim Brotherhood.
Minister of Foreign Aff airs, Maldives, Ahmed Shaheed speculates on the future of Islam and Democracy; Cllr. Gerry Maclochlainn
– en Sinn Féin-medlem som fick utstå fyra års fängelse för irländska republikanska aktiviteter och en kämpe för Guildford 4 och Birmingham 6, reflekterar över hans senaste resa till Gaza där han bevittnade effekterna av brutaliteten och orättvisan mot palestinier; Dr Marie Breen-Smyth, Direktör för Centrum för studier av radikalisering och samtida politiskt våld diskuterar utmaningarna med att kritiskt forska om politisk terror; Dr Khalid al-Mubarak, författare och dramatiker, diskuterar utsikterna till fred i Darfur; och slutligen journalisten och människorättsaktivisten Ashur Shamis ser kritiskt på demokratisering och politisering av muslimer idag.
Vi hoppas att allt detta ger en omfattande läsning och en källa för reflektion över frågor som berör oss alla i en ny gryning av hopp.
Tack
| Sep 07, 2010 | kommentarer 0
US Hamas policy blocks Middle East peace
Henry Siegman
Failed bilateral talks over these past 16 years have shown that a Middle East peace accord can never be reached by the parties themselves. Israeli governments believe they can defy international condemnation of their illegal colonial project in the West Bank because they can count on the US to oppose international sanctions. Bilateral talks that are not framed by US-formulated parameters (based on Security Council resolutions, the Oslo accords, the Arab Peace Initiative, the “road map” and other previous Israeli-Palestinian agreements) cannot succeed. Israel’s government believes that the US Congress will not permit an American president to issue such parameters and demand their acceptance. What hope there is for the bilateral talks that resume in Washington DC on September 2 depends entirely on President Obama proving that belief to be wrong, and on whether the “bridging proposals” he has promised, should the talks reach an impasse, are a euphemism for the submission of American parameters. Such a US initiative must offer Israel iron-clad assurances for its security within its pre-1967 borders, but at the same time must make it clear these assurances are not available if Israel insists on denying Palestinians a viable and sovereign state in the West Bank and Gaza. This paper focuses on the other major obstacle to a permanent status agreement: the absence of an effective Palestinian interlocutor. Addressing Hamas’ legitimate grievances – and as noted in a recent CENTCOM report, Hamas has legitimate grievances – could lead to its return to a Palestinian coalition government that would provide Israel with a credible peace partner. If that outreach fails because of Hamas’ rejectionism, the organization’s ability to prevent a reasonable accord negotiated by other Palestinian political parties will have been significantly impeded. If the Obama administration will not lead an international initiative to define the parameters of an Israeli-Palestinian agreement and actively promote Palestinian political reconciliation, Europe must do so, and hope America will follow. Unfortunately, there is no silver bullet that can guarantee the goal of “two states living side by side in peace and security.”
But President Obama’s present course absolutely precludes it.
| Sep 07, 2010 | kommentarer 0
Islamismen återupptogs
MAHA Azzam
Det råder en politisk och säkerhetsmässig kris kring det som kallas islamism, en kris vars föregångare länge föregår 9/11. Under de senaste 25 år, det har funnits olika betoningar på hur man förklarar och bekämpar islamism. Analytiker och beslutsfattare
på 1980- och 1990-talen talade om grundorsakerna till islamisk militans som ekonomisk sjukdomskänsla och marginalisering. På senare tid har det varit fokus på politiska reformer som ett sätt att undergräva radikalismens dragningskraft. Alltmer idag, the ideological and religious aspects of Islamism need to be addressed because they have become features of a wider political and security debate. Whether in connection with Al-Qaeda terrorism, political reform in the Muslim world, the nuclear issue in Iran or areas of crisis such as Palestine or Lebanon, it has become commonplace to fi nd that ideology and religion are used by opposing parties as sources of legitimization, inspiration and enmity.
The situation is further complicated today by the growing antagonism towards and fear of Islam in the West because of terrorist attacks which in turn impinge on attitudes towards immigration, religion and culture. The boundaries of the umma or community of the faithful have stretched beyond Muslim states to European cities. Umman existerar potentiellt varhelst det finns muslimska samhällen. Den gemensamma känslan av att tillhöra en gemensam tro ökar i en miljö där känslan av integration i det omgivande samhället är oklar och där diskriminering kan vara uppenbar. Desto större förkastande av samhällets värderingar,
oavsett om det är i väst eller till och med i en muslimsk stat, desto större konsolidering av islams moraliska kraft som kulturell identitet och värdesystem.
Efter bombningarna i London på 7 juli 2005 det blev mer uppenbart att vissa ungdomar hävdade religiöst engagemang som ett sätt att uttrycka etnicitet. The links between Muslims across the globe and their perception that Muslims are vulnerable have led many in very diff erent parts of the world to merge their own local predicaments into the wider Muslim one, having identifi ed culturally, either primarily or partially, with a broadly defi ned Islam.
| Sep 06, 2010 | kommentarer 0
ISLAM AND THE RULE OF LAW
Birgit Krawietz
Helmut Reifeld
In our modern Western society, state-organised legal sys-tems normally draw a distinctive line that separates religion and the law. Conversely, there are a number of Islamic re-gional societies where religion and the laws are as closely interlinked and intertwined today as they were before the onset of the modern age. At the same time, the proportion in which religious law (shariah in Arabic) and public law (qanun) are blended varies from one country to the next. What is more, the status of Islam and consequently that of Islamic law differs as well. According to information provided by the Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC), there are currently 57 Islamic states worldwide, defined as countries in which Islam is the religion of (1) the state, (2) the majority of the population, eller (3) a large minority. All this affects the development and the form of Islamic law.
| Sep 06, 2010 | kommentarer 0
Islamic Political Culture, Demokrati, and Human Rights
Daniel E. Pris
It has been argued that Islam facilitates authoritarianism, contradicts the values of Western societies, and significantly affects important political outcomes in Muslim nations. Consequently, scholars, commentators, and government officials frequently point to ‘‘Islamic fundamentalism’’ as the next ideological threat to liberal democracies. This view, dock, is based primarily on the analysis of texts, Islamic political theory, och ad hoc-studier av enskilda länder, som inte tar hänsyn till andra faktorer. Det är min påstående att islams texter och traditioner, som andra religioner, kan användas för att stödja en mängd olika politiska system och politik. Landsspecifika och beskrivande studier hjälper oss inte att hitta mönster som hjälper oss att förklara de olika relationerna mellan islam och politik i länderna i den muslimska världen. Därmed, ett nytt tillvägagångssätt för att studera
koppling mellan islam och politik efterfrågas.
jag föreslår, genom en rigorös utvärdering av relationen mellan islam, demokrati, och mänskliga rättigheter på gränsöverskridande nivå, att alltför stor vikt läggs på islams makt som politisk kraft. Jag använder först jämförande fallstudier, which focus on factors relating to the interplay between Islamic groups and regimes, economic influences, ethnic cleavages, and societal development, to explain the variance in the influence of Islam on politics across eight nations. I argue that much of the power
attributed to Islam as the driving force behind policies and political systems in Muslim nations can be better explained by the previously mentioned factors. I also find, contrary to common belief, that the increasing strength of Islamic political groups has often been associated with modest pluralization of political systems.
I have constructed an index of Islamic political culture, based on the extent to which Islamic law is utilized and whether and, if so, how,Western ideas, institutions, and technologies are implemented, to test the nature of the relationship between Islam and democracy and Islam and human rights. This indicator is used in statistical analysis, which includes a sample of twenty-three predominantly Muslim countries and a control group of twenty-three non-Muslim developing nations. In addition to comparing
Islamic nations to non-Islamic developing nations, statistical analysis allows me to control for the influence of other variables that have been found to affect levels of democracy and the protection of individual rights. The result should be a more realistic and accurate picture of the influence of Islam on politics and policies.
| Sep 06, 2010 | kommentarer 0
PRECISION IN THE GLOBAL WAR ON TERROR:
Sherifa Zuhur
Seven years after the September 11, 2001 (9/11) attacks, many experts believe al-Qa’ida has regained strength and that its copycats or affiliates are more lethal than before. The National Intelligence Estimate of 2007 asserted that al-Qa’ida is more dangerous now than before 9/11.1 Al-Qa’ida’s emulators continue to threaten Western, Middle Eastern, and European nations, as in the plot foiled in September 2007 in Germany. Bruce Riedel states: Thanks largely to Washington’s eagerness to go into Iraq rather than hunting down al Qaeda’s leaders, the organization now has a solid base of operations in the badlands of Pakistan and an effective franchise in western Iraq. Its reach has spread throughout the Muslim world and in Europe . . . Osama bin Laden has mounted a successful propaganda campaign. . . . His ideas now attract more followers than ever.
It is true that various salafi-jihadist organizations are still emerging throughout the Islamic world. Why have heavily resourced responses to the Islamist terrorism that we are calling global jihad not proven extremely effective?
Moving to the tools of “soft power,” what about the efficacy of Western efforts to bolster Muslims in the Global War on Terror (kvot)? Why has the United States won so few “hearts and minds” in the broader Islamic world? Why do American strategic messages on this issue play so badly in the region? Why, despite broad Muslim disapproval of extremism as shown in surveys and official utterances by key Muslim leaders, has support for bin Ladin actually increased in Jordan and in Pakistan?
This monograph will not revisit the origins of Islamist violence. It is instead concerned with a type of conceptual failure that wrongly constructs the GWOT and which discourages Muslims from supporting it. They are unable to identify with the proposed transformative countermeasures because they discern some of their core beliefs and institutions as targets in
this endeavor.
Several deeply problematic trends confound the American conceptualizations of the GWOT and the strategic messages crafted to fight that War. These evolve from (1) post-colonial political approaches to Muslims and Muslim majority nations that vary greatly and therefore produce conflicting and confusing impressions and effects; och (2) residual generalized ignorance of and prejudice toward Islam and subregional cultures. Add to this American anger, fear, and anxiety about the deadly events of 9/11, and certain elements that, despite the urgings of cooler heads, hold Muslims and their religion accountable for the misdeeds of their coreligionists, or who find it useful to do so for political reasons.
| Sep 06, 2010 | kommentarer 0
Demokrati, Elections and the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood
Israel Elad-Altman
The American-led Middle East reform and democratization campaign of the last two years has helped shape a new political reality in Egypt. Opportunities have opened up for dissent. With U.S. and European support, local opposition groups have been able to take initiative, advance their causes and extract concessions from the state. The Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood movement (MB), which has been officially outlawed as a political organization, is now among the groups facing both new opportunities
and new risks.
Western governments, including the government of the United States, are considering the MB and other “moderate Islamist” groups as potential partners in helping to advance democracy in their countries, and perhaps also in eradicating Islamist terrorism. Could the Egyptian MB fill that role? Could it follow the track of the Turkish Justice and Development Party (AKP) and the Indonesian Prosperous Justice Party (PKS), two Islamist parties that, according to some analysts, are successfully adapting to the rules of liberal democracy and leading their countries toward greater integration with, respectively, Europe and a “pagan” Asia?
This article examines how the MB has responded to the new reality, how it has handled the ideological and practical challenges and dilemmas that have arisen during the past two years. To what extent has the movement accommodated its outlook to new circumstances? What are its objectives and its vision of the political order? How has it reacted to U.S. overtures and to the reform and democratization campaign?
How has it navigated its relations with the Egyptian regime on one hand, and other opposition forces on the other, as the country headed toward two dramatic elections in autumn 2005? To what extent can the MB be considered a force that might lead Egypt
toward liberal democracy?
| Sep 05, 2010 | kommentarer 0
EGYPT’S MUSLIM BROTHERS: CONFRONTATION OR INTEGRATION?
Research
The Society of Muslim Brothers’ success in the November-December 2005 elections for the People’s Assembly sent shockwaves through Egypt’s political system. In response, the regime cracked down on the movement, harassed other potential rivals and reversed its fledging reform process. This is dangerously short-sighted. There is reason to be concerned about the Muslim Brothers’ political program, and they owe the people genuine clarifications about several of its aspects. But the ruling National Democratic
Party’s (NDP) refusal to loosen its grip risks exacerbating tensions at a time of both political uncertainty surrounding the presidential succession and serious socio-economic unrest. Though this likely will be a prolonged, gradual process, the regime should take preliminary steps to normalise the Muslim Brothers’ participation in political life. The Muslim Brothers, whose social activities have long been tolerated but whose role in formal politics is strictly limited, won an unprecedented 20 per cent of parliamentary seats in the 2005 val. They did so despite competing for only a third of available seats and notwithstanding considerable obstacles, including police repression and electoral fraud. This success confirmed their position as an extremely wellorganised and deeply rooted political force. At the same time, it underscored the weaknesses of both the legal opposition and ruling party. The regime might well have wagered that a modest increase in the Muslim Brothers’ parliamentary representation could be used to stoke fears of an Islamist takeover and thereby serve as a reason to stall reform. If so, the strategy is at heavy risk of backfiring.
| Sep 05, 2010 | kommentarer 0
Islam and Democracy: Text, Tradition, and History
Ahrar Ahmad
Popular stereotypes in the West tend to posit a progressive, rational, and free West against a backward, oppressive, and threatening Islam. Public opinion polls conducted in the United States during the 1990s revealed a consistent pattern of Americans labeling Muslims as “religious fanatics” and considering Islam’s ethos as fundamentally “anti-democratic.”1 These characterizations
and misgivings have, for obvious reasons, significantly worsened since the tragedy of 9/11. However, these perceptions are not reflected merely in the popular consciousness or crude media representations. Respected scholars also have contributed to this climate of opinion by writing about the supposedly irreconcilable differences between Islam and the West, the famous “clash of civilizations” that is supposed to be imminent and inevitable, and about the seeming incompatibility between Islam and democracy. Till exempel, Professor Peter Rodman worries that “we are challenged from the outside by a militant atavistic force driven by hatred of all Western political thought harking back to age-old grievances against Christendom.” Dr. Daniel Pipes proclaims that the Muslims challenge the West more profoundly than the communists ever did, for “while the Communists disagree with our policies, the fundamentalist Muslims despise our whole way of life.” Professor Bernard Lewis warns darkly about “the historic reaction of an ancient rival against our Judeo–Christian heritage, our secular present, and the expansion of both.” Professor Amos Perlmutter asks: “Is Islam, fundamentalist or otherwise, compatible with human-rights oriented Western style representative democracy? The answer is an emphatic NO.” And Professor Samuel Huntington suggests with a flourish that “the problem is not Islamic fundamentalism, but Islam itself.” It would be intellectually lazy and simple-minded to dismiss their positions as based merely on spite or prejudice. In fact, if one ignores some rhetorical overkill, some of their charges, though awkward for Muslims, are relevant to a discussion of the relationship between Islam and democracy in the modern world. Till exempel, the position of women or sometimes non-Muslims in some Muslim countries is problematic in terms of the supposed legal equality of all people in a democracy. Liknande, the intolerance directed by some Muslims against writers (e.g., Salman Rushdie in the UK, Taslima Nasrin in Bangladesh, and Professor Nasr Abu Zaid in Egypt) ostensibly jeopardizes the principle of free speech, which is essential to a democracy.
It is also true that less than 10 of the more than 50 members of the Organization of the Islamic Conference have institutionalized democratic principles or processes as understood in the West, and that too, only tentatively. Finally, the kind of internal stability and external peace that is almost a prerequisite for a democracy to function is vitiated by the turbulence of internal implosion or external aggression evident in many Muslim countries today (e.g., Somalia, Sudan, indonesien, pakistan, irak, Afghanistan, algeriet, and Bosnia).
| Sep 04, 2010 | kommentarer 0
IkhwanScope på Facebook
IkhwanScope på Scribd
IkhwanScope på Twitter