The chain of events following September Eleven “divided the Sons of Adam into the ‘civilized’ who obeyed the US orders, and the ‘barbarians’ who did not”, writes Safar Al Hawali in his vociferous Open Letter to the US President. The powers of ‘good’, spearheaded by the US, were shown to be locked in a pious Crusade against the Evil Enemy of ‘terrorism’ (whatever that means). Lines and distinctions blurred, black and white turned indistinguishable. The ‘terrorist’ as pictured by the generality of men came to be seen as a bearded, turbaned, dark-skinned fanatic of invariably Arab origin. And the Global Enemy, not very surprisingly, came to be assimilated with Islam itself. Ordinary practising Muslims living in the West had to bear the brunt of this worldwide hate-campaign against Muslims. And now we hear of painters representing the devil in characteristically Muslim attire on Cathedral walls. Unfortunately, it has come to be believed by many that extremism is somehow inherent within the Islamic doctrine.

They do not understand, however, that extremism, more than being a religious phenomenon, is a psychological one. A more judicious observation reveals that most people described as ‘religious fanatics’ are not motivated by religion at all. Because religion, particularly Islam, would never condone the activities that the so-called ‘Islamic fundamentalists’ indulge in. The Quran calls its followers ‘the middle nation’, not one of extremes. The essence of Islam, as exemplified in the life of the Prophet (SAW), is moderation, a middle way in everything; neither to victimize, nor let yourself be victimized; neither to terrorize, nor let yourself be terrorized. The oft-used expression ‘Islamic terrorist’ is erroneous through and through. The very word ‘Islam’ means peace, wholehearted submission and wilful surrender to Allah. It is disgusting to couple it with terrorism. Surrendering to the fundamentals of this great religion never creates terrorists. It creates Muslims__ those who entrust themselves, heart and soul, to their Lord who is Merciful and Loving and Just.

‘Extremism’ as the world knows it can best be described as a kind of religious fervour for irreligious ends. ‘Religious terrorists’, so to speak, are as far from the essence of basic religion as can be. Fanaticism is not an outpouring of a deep and firm faith in God, but a venting out of outrage at injustice suffered for your religious identity. This outrage, fuelled by frustration, fears, insecurity and anxiety, turns overwhelming enough to make the victims commit acts that manifest a disregard of the spirit of the very same religion that they claim, in their misdirected enthusiasm, to defend. Fanaticism, therefore, originates in minds and not in religious doctrines. It is groundless to associate it with a particular religion.

A quick glance at the history of religions indicates that in their respective periods of crisis, each religion has experienced rising trends of fanaticism in its ranks. This was at its ugliest in during the Crusades, when the Christian Papacy threw up the most hideous form of religious fanaticism and bigotry. An interesting example that comes to mind is that the use of water for cleaning was declared a crime punishable with death for the reason that it resembled the Islamic ritual of ablution before every prayer. Infact, Christianity, with its tenets of ‘forgive thine enemy’ and ‘turn the other cheek to thy oppressor’, began to glorify militarism and valour in the field. The institution of Knighthood became a holy order, and the Knight, with his sword, lance and armour, became the epitome of the ideal Christian virtues. Fanaticism infused an element of ruthlessness in the Church’s penal system. The Crusades brought about a gradual deterioration of the Church as a gruesome fundamentalism began to seep in. ‘Heresy’ became looser and wider in definition as untried, alleged ‘heretics’ were burnt at the stake in Rome. This bigotry that lodged itself in the Church’s system after the Crusades, finally brought about its own fall through the birth of the cult of ‘Rationalism’ during the Renaissance years in reaction to the fixity in the Church’s religion. We find similar examples in Jewish history too. The Zionism that has entrenched itself into the power-wielding centres all over the world is an institutionalized form of the xenophobia which was an outgrowth of the frustration and deprivation that the Semites felt throughout the course of their tumultuous history. Infact, since Herzl’s foundation of the World Zionist Organization, this freemasonic ideology, with its fanatical power, has permanently sidelined the real true Judaism that was. The Jewish religion has dwindled into an irreligious religiosity. This is how fundamentalism undermines true religion. Through the ages, it has destroyed the true spirit of religions, races, nations and civilizations.

Terrorism, therefore, is engendered by deprivation, injustice, defeat, loss, crises and turmoil. In our times, the powerful West has launched an all-out war on the Muslims, decorously disguised under the euphemism of ‘War on terrorism’. Yet ‘terrorism’ remains elusive, vague and indefinable. It is actually Islam which has suffered most since the ‘anti-terror’ onslaught. The war is, stripped of this camouflage, quite nakedly an attack on Islam. In the face of all the irrefutable evidence in this regard, it would only be the politically naïve who would believe otherwise.

All oppressed, tyrannized, exploited, subjugated nations in the world happen to be Muslims. You cannot call it a coincidence. Nor can you call it a mere oversight when Israel, which has openly violated more than 60 UN resolutions, is never made to suffer the plight that Iraq, for instance, had to suffer for violating some of the same. We hear US Presidents making solemn vows to ‘hunt down and punish’ the ‘evil’ people responsible for all the misery in the world. And yet Arch-terrorists, war criminals and those responsible for mass-genocide of Muslims are hailed as ‘men of peace’ and torch-bearers of freedom and democracy in the ‘civilized world.’ Nor does anyone raise a finger at the state patronised Holocaust let loose on Muslims in Gujarat. Rogue states are given licenses to kill as they please only because they do not happen to be followers of a particular religion that the world hates for its high moral ideal. The ‘collateral deaths’ of more than nine thousand Afghan civilians during the so-called ‘War on Terror’ remained unlamented, unsung, and the death of more than one and a half million Iraqi children was termed by US diplomats as ‘a number we’re not terribly interested in’.

In the face of such vile, naked injustice, those who do not have a sound grasp of the essence of religion (and there is always a good round sum of such people everywhere), seek desperate means to avenge the wrongs done to them. It is then that terrorists are born. The hurt of injustice is cruel, poignant, maddening. It turns victims into perpetrators. It turns the sinned-against into sinning. It creates desperately fraught people, driven, out of their distress, into recklessness. It devastates lives, distorting precious human beings into ugly fanatics, brandishing weapons, hungering to forcibly win back what was snatched away from them, thinking themselves to be the pious devotees of a noble cause, with a God-given license to seek revenge in any irreligious, immoral way. And yet can they be held accountable? An outraged fanatic trying to defeat the system that made him what he is, is a mere symptom of a greater malaise that ails our planet. Terrorism is a mere outcome of an unjust New World Order spearheaded by xenophobia, arrogance and megalomania. The following extract from Kahlil Gibran seems extremely quotable here: ‘And if anyone of you would punish and lay the axe on the evil tree, let him see to its roots. What judgement would you pronounce on him who slays in the flesh and yet is slain in the spirit? And how persecute you him who is a deceiver and oppressor and yet in himself is aggrieved and outraged?’

The US has played well with words, carefully drilling into its public that the ‘terrorists’ hate the US for its freedom and democracy. This twisted logic has duped most of the US public who deem the US’s maniacal ‘War on Terror’ as morally justified. But it is not these glorious ideals that are hated. Instead, the painful lack of these same values in the US’s international policies is what the sinned-against of this world resent. And this is what creates terrorists. And again: Ironical that the world focuses its enthusiasm on fighting an enemy that it engendered itself through the ruthless imposition of an unjust world order. Terrorism is born out of deprivation and distress which stem from the injustice in this world. The rotten tree grows and branches out of the fears and insecurity felt by the victimized. And that tree will only fall if the axe is laid at the very roots. If the leaders of the ‘war on terrorism’ sincerely wish to pursue their professed aims, they must first revoke their own unjust policies that create terrorism. The wrongs that create terrorists and suicide bombers must be redressed in all sincerity or the poison tree will keep yielding more of its rotten fruit. The lack of sincere effort towards addressing the grievances of the outdistanced world of Islam only shows an insidious complicity of the anti-terror Coalition in engendering terrorism as a part of this Great Game. ‘A single leaf turns not yellow but with the silent assent of the whole tree. So the wrong-doer cannot do wrong but with the secret will of you all.’ (Kahlil Gibran)