Muslim
'Reformers' Are All Talk
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Originally published under the title, "'Muslim
Reformers': Forever Talking the Talk, Never Walking the Walk."
Due to its rarity, it's always notable whenever a top Islamic leader
publicly acknowledges the threat of Islamic radicalism and terror. And
yet, such denunciations never seem to go beyond words—and sometimes not
even that.
Thus, in "An
Arab Prince Denounces Islamism," Daniel Pipes highlights "a
remarkable but thus-far unnoticed address on Dec.
5" by Salman bin Hamad Al-Khalifa, the crown prince of Bahrain. In
his address, the prince "candidly analyzed the Islamist enemy and
suggested important ways to fight it."
After discussing the positive aspects of this speech, Pipes remarks:
So far, perfect. But Salman avoids the
bitter reality that the "twisted" and "barbaric"
ideology he describes is specifically Islamic and the theocrats are all
Muslim: "this war that we are engaged in cannot be against Islam, …
Christianity, … Judaism, … Buddhism." So, when naming this ideology,
Salman dithers and generalizes. He proffers an inept neologism
("theo-crism"), then harkens back to World War II for
"fascist theocracy." He implicitly rejects
"Islamism," saying he does not want a "debate about
certain political parties, whether they're Islamist or not."
In fact, this sort of equivocation is typical of ostensibly moderate
leaders and institutions throughout the Islamic world. Consider Egypt.
One of the most appealing characteristics of President Sisi has been his
outspokenness concerning the need for a more modern, moderate Islam.
For example, months before Sisi was elected president, I reported/translated
the following:
During his recent speech at the Dept.
of Moral Affairs for the Armed Forces [in January 2014], Gen. Abdul Fateh
al-Sisi—the man who ousted former President Morsi and his Muslim
Brotherhood in response to the June Revolution and who is seen as the
nation's de facto ruler—declared that "Religious discourse is the
greatest battle and challenge facing the Egyptian people, and pointed to
the need for a new vision and a modern, comprehensive understanding of
the religion of Islam—rather than relying on a discourse that has not
changed for 800 years."
What has Sisi actually done
about renewing Islamic discourse since becoming president?
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Sisi further "called on all who follow the true Islam to improve
the image of this religion in front of the world, after Islam has been
for decades convicted of violence and destruction around the world, due
to the crimes falsely committed in the name of Islam."
As with the pronunciations of Bahrain's crown prince, so far so good.
Yet what has Sisi actually done about renewing Islamic discourse
since becoming president? "Absolutely nothing," says one
prominent Egyptian journalist. Speaking recently on his popular TV show,
Ibrahim Eissa said:
What is the position of the Egyptian
government concerning religious radicalization among the religious
parties? And now I specifically refer to the position of President Sisi
concerning this matter. Five months have passed since he became
president, after his amazing showing at elections. Okay: the president
has, more than once, indicated the need for a renewal of religious
discourse…. But he has not done a single thing, President Sisi, to renew
religious discourse. Nothing at all.
Actually, if anything, it appears the Sisi government has done the
reverse, for instance, allowing Salafis—those Egyptian Muslims most
similar in ideology to ISIS—to
return to the podium. One political activist called this move
a major setback that will make it that
much harder for the government to combat reactionary thinking—and this,
after the Egyptian public had made great strides against such thinking….
Permitting the Salafi sheikhs to ascend to the pulpits again revives the
bitter experiences of confronting this form of thinking, bringing us back
to square one.
Individuals aside, what about important Islamic institutions that
ostensibly condemn terrorism? How influential are they? This last
December 5, the embassy of Egypt issued a press release saying,
Al-Azhar, the oldest center for Islamic
learning, pressed for Muslims to combat extremist ideology at an
international conference [possibly the same one that the crown prince of
Bahrain spoke at] …. Delegitimizing the ideology of ISIS is an important
pillar of the global effort to combat the group. Egypt's religious
leaders play a critical role in that effort.
Good words. Yet, for all its talk about "combatting extremist
ideology," Al Azhar University—perhaps Islam's most authoritative
voice—will not even
denounce the Islamic State as "un-Islamic."
When pressed on it, an Al Azhar spokesman, Abbas Shouman, recently
said: "As an official entity, Al Azhar has never in all its history
proclaimed anyone or any organization as un-Islamic …. [B]eing occupied
by this question will not lead to anything," because "Al Azhar will
not judge ISIS or its Islam as un-Islamic, for it is not its right,
neither concerning ISIS nor anyone else."
But, as one human rights advocate in Egypt was quick to quip:
"What, didn't the ulema and sheikhs of Al Azhar denounce as
un-Islamic Naguib Mahfouz and Farag Foda and others from among the
intellectuals and writers whose activities were stopped and some of whom
were assassinated due to Al Azhar's position?"
Al Azhar will vent against
secular/humanist Muslims, thus inciting the mob against them, while
refusing to denounce the cancerous Islamic State.
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Indeed, Farag Foda was a prominent Egyptian professor, writer, and
human rights activist who was assassinated after being denounced by none
other than Al Azhar. And although Naguib Mahfouz won the Noble Prize for
Literature, his literature was denounced by Al Azhar and, predictably, he
was stabbed in the neck with a knife when he was 82-years-old outside his
home.
What accounts for this stark double standard—that Al Azhar will vent
against secular/humanist Muslims, thus inciting the mob against them,
while refusing to denounce the cancerous Islamic State? Or that it will denounce
terrorism, but praise jihad (as in this
bizarre article full of twisted logic and semantic quibbling)?
Muhammad Abdullah Nasr, coordinator
of a group of former Al Azhar graduates who support a civil government,
explains:
The Islamic State can never denounce
the Islamic State as un-Islamic. For the Islamic State is the working,
postgraduate project for graduates from Al Azhar. And after this
statement [refusing to denounce IS as "un-Islamic"], Al Azhar's
mask has fallen…. Everything that the Islamic State does exists in the
curriculum of Al Azhar and is taught to students, including apostasy
[punishing Muslims who leave Islam], payment
of jizya, sex
slaves and the captivity
of women.
At this late point in the game—as I write, Islamic jihadis are
terrorizing Sydney, Australia—all purported Muslim moderates and
reformers, individuals and organizations, need to understand—or rather,
be made to understand by their Western counterparts—that talking the talk
is no longer enough: they must walk the walk before they can ever be
taken seriously.
Raymond
Ibrahim is a Shillman Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom
Center, a Judith Friedman Rosen Writing Fellow at the Middle East Forum
and a CBN News contributor. He is the author of Crucified
Again: Exposing Islam's New War on Christians (2013) and The
Al Qaeda Reader (2007).
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