By:Tashbih Sayyed, Ph. D.
Just as US President George W. Bush has devoted considerable time and energy since 9/11 to build relationships with moderate Muslims, British Prime Minister Tony Blair has also found himself seeking assistance from moderate British Muslims following last year's 7/7 London attacks to challenge the extremist Islamist ideology that is responsible for a seemingly never ending Islamist terrorism. Blair and Bush both would like moderate Muslims to use their unique insight and access to do more to undermine the extremists' methods and false sense of grievance about the West Blair has insisted that government alone could not eliminate extremism, that only the Islamic community could accomplish this goal.
Both Bush and Blair obviously place much faith in moderate Muslims, but without any clear understanding of who these people really are. Without first establishing what makes a moderate Muslim, relying too much on easy answers is a recipe for certain disaster.
Who is a moderate Muslim?
Muslims who oppose theocracy, who seek democracy, who want equal rights for women and an end to child labor, honor killings, and child marriages are moderates. But there is much more to the concept than just these basics. Before enlisting an apparently moderate Muslim group in the war on Islamist terror, we must know a bit more. Do they believe that non-Muslims are inherently inferior? Do they consider religious or national identity pre-eminent? What do they believe about Jews and Israel? How do they characterize Arab terrorism in Israel? What is their opinion about Osama bin Laden's long list of grievances? Do they consider the war on terror a war on Islam?
Today in the United States, almost all of the Islamic organizations, groups, and parties that claim to be moderate have also been known to encourage anti-Americanism. A majority of the moderate Muslims find it very difficult to disagree with the Al-Qaeda manifesto. Even secular Muslims have been found to be sympathetic to many of the causes advanced by political Islam.
For example, the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), which has established itself as a moderate Islamic group, has remained on the wrong side in the war on terrorism. It called on Los Angeles-based KCOP Television, Inc., channel 13, to remove billboards that featured a picture of Osama bin Laden with the headline "the sworn enemy." CAIR has denied bin Laden's responsibility for the East African embassy bombings and did not want to accept that bin Laden had anything to do with the attacks on America.
According to scholars and observers, "CAIR consistently defends other militant Islamic terrorists too. The conviction of the perpetrators of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing it deemed 'a travesty of justice'." According to FBI's former chief of counter terrorism, Steven Pomerantz, "CAIR, its leaders, and its activities effectively give aid to international terrorist groups. CAIR has been known to work against those Muslims who support US foreign policy and condemn Arab terrorism in the Jewish lands. CAIR has defamed moderate Muslims who reject its extremist agenda, leading to death threats against them.
"Moderate" Muslims may give their own reasons to be serving the cause of jihad. They may not like to be fettered by the rigid interpretations of their religion, but they definitely do not agree with the US policies toward Muslim countries. This is not a religious issue, they insist, but a question of Muslim dignity and self-respect.
The reason for such brazen anti-Americanism is very simple. Most of the "moderate" Islamic organizations in the US, UK and Europe are front groups for Wahhabi jihadism and the Muslim Brotherhood of Egypt or funded by Saudi Arabian and other Arab sources. This helps them advocate the case of Wahhabism and the Muslim Brotherhood, insisting that both of these movements are in essence represent moderation in Islam.
Trusting blindly "moderate" Muslims has already hurt the cause of our war on terror. "Moderate" leaders like Yasser Arafat and Saddam Hussein had our support but did their best to hurt our interests. Similarly, today we support leaders like Hosni Mubarak and General Pervez Musharraf, who appear to be moderate. But none of them have been able to advocate our case convincingly to their peoples. The reason is simple. They do not support us out of shared values, but for reasons of self-interest and pragmatism.
The United States needs not only moderate Muslim allies, but those who accept the truth that all human beings are created equal. Only someone who believes in a democracy that does not exclude anyone, that does not discriminate against its citizens because of their faith is a real moderate.
No one who believes in others' inferiority can be a moderate. An anti-Semite individual such as former Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Muhammed can never be a moderate. Despite his other actions, Mahathir Muhammed's statements like "But today the Jews rule the world by proxy. They get others to fight and die for them," are enough to belie his claims of moderation. The West considers Egyptian president, Hosni Mubarak, a moderate. But the transmission and propagation of the notorious anti-Semitic hoax, The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, under his rule confirmed his anti-Semitism and undermined his image of moderation.
Many British Muslim leaders, toward whom Mr. Blair is now looking for help, are part of this Islamist phenomenon. They betrayed their feelings by not blaming the 7/7 terrorists un-conditionally and without any reservations. They sincerely believe that the UK's participation in the wars against Afghanistan and Iraq has been a key contributory factor in the radicalization of some young Muslims and they demanded a public inquiry to discover the factors behind Britain's growing extremism.
Aslam Beg is a Pakistani retired general. He is also considered a moderate and holds a position of influence in Pakistan's government. He believes that terrorists are freedom fighters of a "Muslim world facing unprecedented oppression and injustice". He has also called the Bush-Blair strategy to combat global terrorism "a declaration of total war on freedom movements" that will disproportionately target Muslims.
To win the war on terror, the West must find a way to support, cultivate, and empower those Muslim voices which have established themselves as honest and sincere Americans and supporters of this war on Islamist terror. We must be extremely cautious when we endorse individuals and groups as moderates without first confirming their true motivations and beliefs. Without fully understanding their agenda, the war on terror will only be harmed.
(Tashbih Sayyed is the Editor in Chief of Pakistan Today and The Muslim World Today, President of Council for Democracy and Tolerance, an adjunct fellow of Hudson Institute, and a regular columnist for newspapers across the world.)
