THE LEFT AND JIHAD
Lucien
van der Walt of South Africa is a rare breed of
Anarchist. He speaks the truth about radical Islam and is not taken in by their
attempts to hijack the Left.
Leftists
love to bash Israel for being part of the American hegemonic satellite.
The
truth is we are a very weak suzerainty of the US. As van der
Walt says below, the US has far more powerful countries in its satellite, among
them Muslim countries: Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Egypt and lesser partners:
Indonesia, Malaysia and Pakistan.
How
many Leftists know that and, if they know it, dare to "break ranks"
and write it on the net?
However,
let me hasten to say, and this is critical if we will have peace, that is
a small number of genuine Muslim Anarchists and other progressive thinkers in
Britain, the US and elsewhere. They are intrepid individuals. I am sure
there are some in Arab lands too, but they dare not speak.
We
Jewish Anarchists have A LOT in common with them. Every effort should be made
to join forces with them. We have more in common as Anarchists who hold to a
Monotheistic tradition than we have differences. Muslim Anarchists are not jihadists. They are very much "live and let
live".
We
should exert ourselves to put out "feelers" for Anarchists and
progressives in our area and establish ties with them, support their efforts,
let them know there are like-minded Jews in the area, and let them know they
are not alone.
It
transpires that there have always been a few Muslims with Libertarian ideas.
This article is very interesting:
"Ibn Khaldun; A 14th C. Arab Liberatarian":
Let's
put our conditioning and prejudice aside, as we ask them to do concerning us,
and build bridges.
On
Anarchy Africa van der Walt posted the following
link:
"The
Left and Jihad" to be found on: http://tinyurl.com/lw79a
He
also wrote:
"I
think we need to distinguish several things here: 1) the propaganda the US
wages in its imperialism 2) imperialism and its effects on countries and 3)
criticisms of Islam, as such.
On the first point, sure, the US government has sometimes invoked the supposed
flaws of Islam to justify its current interventions in the Middle East, and the
more nebulous "war on terror" through which it is pursuing its
military project elsewhere. I think, though, its a
serious misrepresentation of the US propaganda to claim it is outright "Islamaphobic". Give me some concrete cases, not vague
references to lots of materials being produced by the flunkies of the CIA, and show
me I'm wrong.
I don't think the idea that "one who doesn't like muslims is not going to tell you he doesn't like muslims he's going to tell you he wants to defend the
rights of women or freedom of speech" helps your case. You are simply
asserting a hidden agenda, not showing one. And the implication of your
argument that Islamaphobia is orchestrated by the
CIA, and that critics of Islam are the conscious or unconscious tools of
imperialism, is that every critic of Islam is a scoundrel and a rogue, which is
just insulting.
Moreover, how does your theory explain the US setting up a puppet regime in
Iraq, run by Muslim extremists? The fact that the US invasion of Iraq toppled a
relatively modernist secular Arab nationalist in favour
of his Islamist rivals? The point that one of the merits of
the overthrow of Hussein highlighted by Washington was the massive expansion in
public space for Muslims in Iraq? That the US-backed constitution makes
Islam the official religion and source of law?
Things are a bit more complex than the West versus Islam.
On the second point. Some historically Muslim
countries are directly oppressed by imperialism but are they oppressed because
they are Muslim? Are they oppressed any more than countries that are not
officially Muslim? Are historically Muslim countries oppressed on a larger
scale, in a larger number, in a more systematic fashion than other countries?
Some historically Muslim countries are junior partners of Washington (like
Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Egypt); some are lower-level imperial powers who also sometimes
clash with American agendas in their own regions (like Indonesia, Malaysia,
Pakistan); some are directly subject to Washington (like Afghanistan, Iraq);
some are seeking allies with other great powers (like the EU). The variety of
relationships shows the picture is much more complex than the notion of "Islamaphobia" suggests; the same variety of
relationships that exist between between historically
Muslim countries and the great powers can be found for any other grouping of
less powerful countries one might identify (e.g. sub-Saharan Africa).
Yes, I am against imperialism and capitalism, but I am also critical of Islam
in general, and absolutely opposed to Islamic
fundamentalism.
On the third point, there is nothing wrong with criticising
mainstream Islam, and there is an absolute necessity of fighting against
Islamic fundamentalism.
The first is a broad set of religious ideas, which take many forms, and have
many contradictions, and which certainly contain many objectionable elements.
The second is an actively reactionary movement, and the expression of the same
upsurge of the far right that is represented in western
Europe by forces like
the NF in France. (We can and must distinguish between criticism of Islam as a
religion, and the struggle against Islamic fundamentalism, although it is
misleading of groups like the Labour Party in
Pakistan to draw a neat and absolute distinction between the two, and claim
that Islam as a religion is not a political force). We live in a time of
all-sided ethnic, tribal, religious and racial conflict, promoted, deliberately
and also accidentally, by the great powers, but also driven from below by local
warlords and thugs.
An anarchist must be a merciless critic of any doctrine, or behaviour,
or institution, that hinders social and economic
equality. Just like mainstream Christianity, mainstream Islam can and should be
criticised. Islamic fundamentalism is a quasi-fascist
and counter-revolutionary movement, actively involved in massacring leftists
and union members and feminists, and repressive in the extreme in power. It is
anti-imperialist, but that is no saving grace: some of the worst thugs to cross
the 20 century stage were anti-imperialist, among them Hendrik
Verwoed, Idi Amin, and Mao Zedong.
I don't hold back on criticising capitalism because
Stalin might have agreed with some of my points, and I don't hold back from
attacking mainstream Islam just because George Bush might have agreed with some
of my points. That a character like George Bush might agree with some of the
criticisms that honest people make of Islam in no sense makes such criticisms
illegitimate. If George Bush thinks slavery is bad, or that murder is bad, does
it follow that people can't criticise slavery or
murder?
The only logical endpoint of the position that criticism of Islam is "Islamaphobic" is the uncritical defence
of Islam, in all its forms, and regardless of its record.
Finally.
I said before why I think its a problem to call,
without qualification, these countries "Muslim countries": do we call
Latin American countries "Christian countries" or part of the
"Catholic world"? This is just stereotyping: it ignores the struggles
and varieties within these countries (the great clashes after 1945 between
radical Islam/ Arab nationalism/ Communist forces, for example; the revolt of
many youth against the old traditions; the rise of labour
etc.), and concedes the key claim of the Islamic fundamentalists (that all
countries where Islam played some role in the past are essentially part of a universal
Ummah).
But things are not that simple. See, for example,
Iraqi Communists Celebrate May Day 2007
http://www.iraqslogger.com/index.php/post/2583/Iraqi_Communists_Celebrate_May_Da\
y
Farooq Sulehria,
Making Of The Islamic Threat, Labour Party Pakistan
http://www.laborpakistan.org/articles/intl/notmyname.php
Houzan Mahmoud, The Constitution, Islamic Sharia law, and Women's Rights in Iraq
and Kurdistan, Worker-Communist Party of Iraq
http://www.wpiraq.net/english/2007/HouzanMahmud-Media210307.htm
Lucien"
Let's
clear out the obfuscations of radical Islam that is dressing up in Leftist
clothing and make peace with real Muslim Anarchists and progressives.
In response to this, a contributor to another list wrote:
"Dear
Doreen:
Having
been a history buff, having studied all types of history for a lot of years;
I've read some pretty horrendous things done to people, done mostly to the Jews
who lived along the route either by the Christian or by the Muslims. Things I
won't discuss on this thing as I won't talk like that in front of women or
children. It's not obscene language it's the terrible things that were done to
the Jewish women. When I first reared it I simply couldn't believe one human
being could do this to another but after you read account after account of this
sort of thing being done to innocent people just because they were Jews.
Now to learn that these people are
teaching it to their children as though they or those who did this awful thing
to the women and babies just because they were Jews, then these people are
compared to devils. Not so, I wouldn't down grade a devil to level. Compared to
these people who could justify the terrorist actions of those to children,
they're worse than the one's who committed the acts in the first place.
I'm sorry for these as they'll have to
pay for their crimes either in this life or in the next.
Shalom,
Shalom."
To
which I responded:
You
may rest assured that Muslim Anarchists and progressives are not the kind of
people who commit atrocities and are as sickened by them as you are.
They
are as critical of that which does not serve humanity in their religion as
Jewish Anarchists are aware of same in our religion.
It
is no more fair to assign collective guilt to another
ethnic group or religious group, in toto, than it is
for the anti-Semites to assign such to all Jews.
There
are those who fault all of us Jews for the horrific deeds that have been
carried out at the behest of the super-wealthy Jews. The wars that have been
waged to keep them rich have spawned deeds (carried out not by them, oh no,
they don't get their hands dirty, but by the soldiers that were
sent to do their dirty work for them and die and be maimed if need be)
were *just as ugly* as anything ever done to us.
Yes,
we have to *admit* the guilt of the Jewish rich. AND we have to admit that they
have harmed the rest of Jewry no less than our enemies have and no less than
they harm other Peoples and cultures. They care not one whit for our
welfare. We should not excuse them to ourselves or to the world.
If
we separate ourselves from the rich Jews who cause so much harm to the world,
we will not be despised for their sake. It is because we cover for them that
the guilt is laid at our doorstep too. The effect of this is that poor Jews in
Israel die to keep rich Jews in America and Europe and Asia rich AND we have
incurred the disgust of the world as well.
I
say, let the world know that the rich Jews are no less a pox on us than they
are on them.
Shabbat
Shalom,
D2
In
response to this he answered simply:
"Dear
Doreen:
Amen!
Shabbat Shalom"
Doreen Ellen Bell-Dotan, Tzfat, Israel