Hedging Their Condemnations
When is an apology not sincere? When it is spoken in words that leave the listener with the distinct impression that equivocation plays a large part in its utterance. As in an incomplete mea culpa, which expresses regret, with a but, a however, a qualifier. When is a statement of condemnation - long in coming but very much of the moment and needed and appreciated - seen to be equivocation? Why, when it is burdened with doubt, as when the condemnation is accompanied by expression of extenuation which explain the actions of malefactors.So when one reads that Muslim scholars meeting in Lucknow, India, have issued a statement of condemnation of terrorism one sighs relief and exhales finally! A declaration signed off by no fewer than 20,000 scholars meeting at the Darul-Uloom Deoband madrassa is on its face succinct and definitive: "Islam is a religion of mercy for all humanity. Islam sternly condemns all kinds of oppression, violence and terrorism. Islam prohibits killing of innocent people."
Of India's greater-than-a-billion population roughly 14% is Muslim. During their meeting the Islamic scholars mulled over the distressing facts of Islamist jihadists targeting Muslims as well as infidels. And since the group of 20,000 represented clerics from all the various sects of Islam, their statement is meaningful. But their purpose and their collective declaration also highlighted their concerns with respect to what they see as harassment of Muslims in the cause of isolating terrorists.
So what, one might enquire, was the prime motivator here; the presumed innocence of many Muslims being apprehended by authorities around the world, targeted simply because they are Muslim, or the insidiously pervasive and ever-accelerating incidents of jihadist slaughter of the innocents? Muslim and non-Muslim alike. In all fairness, one would have to admit that the representatives of over 4,000 madrasas along with all prominent Islamic institutions of India are concerned with both, as dire threats to the stability of Islam.
India, like so many other countries of the world, from the Philippines to Indonesia; from Sudan to Egypt; from Israel to Lebanon; from Great Britain to Spain - to name but a handful - has been the scene of Islamist attacks against its citizens. And, in response, Indian security authorities have sought to identify and take suspects into custody for these crimes. Security activities, sometimes proactive, that have earned them censure from among the Muslim community on the basis of discrimination.
"A terrorist should be arrested only on the basis of hard evidence and not on biased conjectures", according to Maulana Rabe Hasan Nadvi, chairman of the All India Muslim Personal Law Board, a body whose concerns are with Islamic affairs in India. Unfortunately, hard evidence is sometimes difficult to come by, and authorities must sometimes rely upon anecdotal confidences, as well as informed conjecture, with the assurances that the innocent will be released in due course.
The expressed concerns of Muslim clerics and scholars are certainly not ill placed, but the ultimate concern of authorities is the safety of communities, and when Muslim youth are being targeted there is a history which indicates that on hard evidence it is Muslim youth who have been radicalized and committed to jihad that link themselves with terrorism; therein lies the "tendency" to link them with terror acts. There will always be victims in such circumstances; innocents whose appearance at the wrong place at the wrong time wrongly implicate them.
What then, are the public safety and security authorities to do otherwise than to pursue all possible avenues in attempting to track down the jihadists among the innocents? For they do not purposefully bring attention to themselves; rather they prefer to melt into the general atmosphere of the innocents, to further their deadly ambitions, undetected until such time as their suicide or bomb attacks bring firm attention to either the shredded, headless corpse of a suicidist, or the hasty absence of a murderer from the scene of his crime.
While the condemnation by the assembled scholars of terrorism in the name of Islam is welcomed and applauded as vital indication that the bloody assaults in India and Pakistan and Afghanistan bring no glory to Islam, the world at large hopes with bated breath that these scholars and clerics will go further. That, in their madrasas and in their mosques they will now vigorously spare no language to counter the twisted preachings of their fellow clerics who exhort Muslim youth to jihad.
The condemnation of terror activities should be without equivocation, not take equal status with the perceived targeting of Muslims under the guise of anti-terrorism activities. For the simple fact is, incontrovertibly, hordes of Muslim youth have undergone a radicalization process through the very auspices of their neighbourhood mosques and madrasas. It is Islamist jihad that has spread terror throughout the world. It is the venomous disease of Islamist jihad that must be singled out, with no side issues, for full condemnation.
The issue of terror cannot be second to that of perceived injustice against Muslim youth. The statement issued at the conference, that "The objective behind the meet is to not only highlight the injustice being meted out to innocent Muslims invariably booked on pre-determined suspicions, but to also let everyone know that Islam is totally opposed to any kind of violence and terrorism." This is a critical issue that cannot take second place to any other issues, however imperative. Prove it by making it a single, overwhelming issue of concern.
These statements: "Unleashing violence or spreading terror or killing people are not only serious sins but are also heinous crimes. That is why all Islamic clerics attending this anti-terrorism conference not only condemn every type of violence in the severest of terms, but also express their anger and disillusionment over this dangerous situation emerging at both the national and international levels." must be stand-alones - front and centre - full stop.
But they're not, and this dilutes their singularity, the apprehension of their sincerity and their effectiveness. Simply because in the next breath the scholars and clerics sought fit also to condemn the role of Western nations in "oppressing" Muslims in Palestine, Iraq, Afghanistan and Bosnia. Thus effectively and most efficiently offering just cause, in their scholarly opinion. What started out as a religiously upright, moral and justified denunciation of terrorism limped lamely into a segue on just cause, and a political statement on cause-and-effect.
Worse than useless. They're literally morally conflicted, and that reflects most adequately in another statement, part of the resolution: "The central government must promptly bring an end to the character assassination of Muslims and madrasas; it must also direct its machinery not to pass the buck in every act of terror to Muslims; but of course it must award the severest punishment to the actual guilty."
How's that for having your cake and eating it, too?
Their resolution should be sent right back at them, slightly amended: "The religious Islamic entities of great authority in the Muslim world must promptly bring an end to the vision of Islamist jihad and their deadly activities against all peoples targeted; infidels, Jews and Muslims; and of course it must itself prosecute the severest punishment to those defiant of its authority."
Labels: Religion, Terrorism, Traditions
posted by Pieface @ Tuesday, February 26, 2008
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