These murderous acts have nothing to do with suicide. They are the actions of premeditated religious fanatics, and in their own words, it is "The Holy War of Islam-Death in Martyrdom-The Promised Hereafter-By Means of Muslim Kamikaze-who are Human Bombs" and indeed that is the entire story. It is not and cannot in any way be considered an act of bravery or courage; it is an act of shame and cowardice.
The West, especially the U.S. had no problem using Islamists to do it's proxy fighting with the Soviet Union and as pointed out in the article, if they were aware of what was happening they chose to ignore it and thus were largely complicit in the rise of Islamist terrorism. Raphael Israeli writes: "Only when the West woke up to a reality of the existence of 60 al-Qa'ida bases worldwide, including in Western countries, could it bite its fingers with remorse and regret for having allowed that horror to build-up in their own societies. This conjures up the concept of the difference between conscience and consciousness: the latter is when one becomes aware of reality, the former is when one wishes he had not."
This assessment also points out the uncomfortable fact that Islamist fanaticism and the terrorism which has resulted and threatens the rest of the world is a product of U.S. and Western influence and sponsorship and often we do reap what we sow. At least in this case that seems to the the case.
Hank Roth
...Islamikaze
Raphael Israeli
One of the most puzzling aspects of Islamic terrorism, which has almost no parallels in other cultures, is the readiness of the perpetrators to blow themselves up in the process of destroying their enemy, in what has mistakenly come to be called 'suicide bombing'. This amazing example of self-sacrifice in the service of a cause is all the more stupefying in view of the normative Muslim prohibition on taking one's life, since it belongs to Allah, its Creator, and no human can override His Will. Suicide (intihar) is therefore looked down upon, shunned and discouraged in Muslim tradition, and consequently provokes reactions of horror, disbelief, fear, outrage, dismay and anger, especially when it is performed en masse, like on 11 September, with 19 murderers co-ordinating their harrowing act of terrorism-cum-self-immolation and producing a slaughter never previously equalled of thousands of innocent civilians.
In spite of the fact that murders and other targeted killings have happened before, some of them to attain political goals, the world had never seen wanton murder on this scale of people who had nothing to do with the sick hallucinations of the perpetrators, or with their pathological sense of revenge, or the murderous character of their ideology. So much so, that governments and peoples have raised their hands in despair; tried to appease the murderers instead of fighting them, under the excuse that 'against mad, sneaky and unpredictable assassins there was nothing that could be done'. Many attempts were pursued, in vain, to draw up a profile of the so-called 'suicide bomber' in order to be able to predict the likely person to put his life on the line, of his own volition, in order to achieve a goal he is made to believe in. But it turned out that people of almost all ages, socio-economic backgrounds, education, family situations and walks of life could be drawn into this kind of murderous web.
The murderer is not necessarily a poor, psychologically unstable being who finds himself in dire straights, when he has the stamina, forebearance, talent, means and motivation to study long years of engineering and piloting, or hide in caves when he could easily enjoy his 'normal' life elsewhere, just in order to attain what looks to us an insane pursuit. In other words, why would young men, sometimes with a promising future ahead of them, apparently sane and healthy in every respect, put themselves in jeopardy and volunteer for units, and for tasks, which are likely to put an end to their dreams and unfulfilled lives? They could, for example, join a high-risk combat unit if all they desired was to serve a collective goal for their nation and at the same time satisfy their sense of adventure or their machismo inclinations. But here, it seems that they are pushed towards death by some mysterious latent impulse. Or, is it the rosy promise full of delight and clear of worry, awaiting them in the hereafter, which kindles their passion? After all, the so-called 'suicide bombing' is not a natural death, nor is it the sort of 'running away' from the vagaries of life as we perceive them that occurs in Western culture. To remove any doubt regarding the motivations of these murderers, one ought to consider the parameters which, from the point of view of Western psychiatry, define the requisite steps of the regular and 'normal' suicide type.
- A thought about killing oneself.
- The presence of a plan-how to proceed, what are the precise steps to be taken, their sequence and timing and so forth-all concocted in solitude and single-handedly.
- The suicidal individual must have a certain energy level, that is, a capacity to carry out the plan.
By contrast, in the case of the terrorist killers we are talking about, it is the determination to kill the perceived enemy which is the driving force; the plan relates to killing others and it is often prepared by the killer's superiors, not independently on his own initiative, because unlike the candidate for suicide he does not carry alone the burden of decision, and therefore he does not have to evince the same high degree of 'suicidal resolve'. According to psychiatrists, the above three cumulative factors are among the most important for providing an indication of the likelihood of a suicidal occurrence. Moreover, they say, suicide can be sudden, as in the case of major depression, or in compulsive individuals under conditions of extreme frustration; or it can premeditated, as in a long-standing major depression where the individual has perhaps crafted a careful plan and meticulous preparations, such as giving away his most precious belongings, or may sometimes have written a note on his impending suicide. This certainly cannot be said about the terrorists, who are a part of a larger scheme for which they are trained and prepared, together with others who share their convictions, and are prepared for arduous and long-term studies and physical and mental training and preparations.
The mass murderers of al-Qa'ida, the Hamas and their like, never go for a 'sudden death'; it is always premeditated and carefully planned, though not necessarily by them personally. However, while it is difficult to cite individual depression, frustration or compulsion in all these cases-because otherwise it is hard to envisage how this kind of individual could enroll in an all-volunteer programme designed by others with a strategic goal to attain-it is also not unthinkable that some of these individuals may entertain their own private goal of quitting this world and moving on to the next. The person who commits self-immolation usually causes embarrassment after the fact to his friends and family, who are ashamed to be related to such a weak character who was unable to confront his problem and elected to run away from it. The terrorist killers, by contrast, are models of adulation; their loved ones are proud of them as they join the gallery of martyrs, and are usually rewarded financially by the organizations which had sent them to their death; unlike suicidal types who often abandon their families in need and add economic difficulty to the sorrow of separation.
These higly motivated terrorists do write 'suicide notes'-in our days in the form of video-tapes-and may also pre-distribute their belongings, both signs of suicidal intentions, but in this case the interpretation of these signals ought to be vastly at variance with the classic suicidal syndrome. When a self-immolating terrorist writes or records a note or a tape or a video, it is not usually geared to vindicate his act, to ask for clemency from the bereaved relatives and friends, or to 'punish' them by disappearing and causing them disarray and embarrassment. Quite the contrary, the messages left behind are 'educational' in essence, formulated so as to provide role models and positive examples to other youth who might be recruited after them. In any case, the recording session is orchestrated by the operators, who then undertake the duty of propagating the 'legacy' of the deceased. In fact, all those terrorists killed in action become martyrs and heroes, they are celebrated and receive citations in their community, and their relatives, far from evincing grief outwardly, on the contrary exalt with pride the honour that the departed has imparted to them. When the terrorist is killed in operation, what is left to distribute after him is a 'pension' disbursed to the family by the operating organization. In other words, this is not a pre-death parting with belongings that is typical to the suicidal type, but a promise to the family that they would not be forgotten after the death of the martyr. Due to their generally young age, these martyrs very seldom leave any property behind, but when they do, their belongings-such as pictures, items of clothing, written notes and so forth-achieve the status of 'relics' which may become the object of worship-like adoration.
The prevailing terms for a self-sacrificing Muslim devotee, who dies for the sake of Allah or of Islam has been traditionally distilled into the two notions of shahid and fida'i, both connoting death in the course of a worthwhile act, usually the jihad discussed above. But, not only is there a difference between these two terms, but also in the nuances when either of them is used. Shahid can have three varying meanings: a martyr who died for the sake of Allah; the fallen in the jihad; or a Muslim who experienced suffering before a tragic death. In spite of the various nuances attached to each meaning, they are all founded on a religious concept connected to death in the process of performing a worthy act recommended by the Faith. The Holy Book of Islam, in fact, attests to such a death, even if the use of the term shahid there refers often to a 'witness' of all sorts. Fida'i, as Bernard Lewis attests, was the name which the medieval Isma'ili Assassins (Hashishiyun) used for themselves. They were considered to be criminal fanatics by their victims, but for their masters they were:
A corps d'élite in the war against the enemies of the Imam; by striking down oppressors and usurpers, they gave the ultimate proof of their faith and loyalty and earned immediate and eternal bliss. The Isma'ilis themselves used the term fida'i, roughly devotee, of the actual [operator-] murderer, and an interesting poem has been preserved praising their courage, loyalty and selfless devotion. In the local Isma'ili chronicles of Alamut…there is a roll of honour of assassinations, giving the names of the victims and of their pious executioners… Isma'ili writers see the sect as custodians of secret mysteries to which the Believer could attain only after a long course of preparation and instruction, marked by progressive initiations.
One will have noticed that, except for the harrowing 'roll of honour', a sort of Hall of Fame nowadays reserved for outstanding sportsmen, or wax-museum for other celebrities, the fida'i is very close in mission, state of mind, conduct and training to the Islamist murderers we are talking about. It is no coincidence, therefore, that the Palestinians adopted the same title for their messengers of death back in the 1950s and 1960s, when the Fidayeen wrought havoc and terror against Israeli nurseries, schools, roads and other innocent civilian targets. However, while the classical fida'i had targeted a person who was considered an oppressor and usurper, today's murderers in the name of Islam execute indiscriminate mass murders against innocent civilians, which have won them the attribute of 'terrorists'. The difference in modus operandi may also be imputed to the development of the means of destruction. For while the medieval Assassin had to approach his targeted victim and stab him to death, point blank, something which required considerable courage and a very high motivation, today's murderers carry high explosives on their bodies sufficient to annihilate anyone in sight, without necessarily targeting anyone specifically.
Thus, both shahid and fida'i are motivated by a profound and numbing religious fanaticism which pushes them to commit acts of self-sacrifice, which we usually refer to as 'suicide attacks', though they have nothing to do with suicide. However, while the shahid is a martyr in the sense that he is a serving a cause, the fida'i connotes more of a devotion to a leader, be he religious (like Sheikh Ahmed Yassin of the Hamas, Sheikh Fadallah of the Hizbullah or Bin-Laden), or layman (like Arafat or Habash). In current parlance, both these types of murderers are confounded in the world of practise, as we have seen Palestinian killers adopting both appellations in various periods of their activity. In both cases, however, the self-sacrificing hero is assured of martyrdom and of very concrete rewards in the hereafter, not only for himself, but also for his loved ones. It is not uncommon, therefore, to witness hordes of well-wishers coming to the bereaved family of the martyr to express not condolences, but congratulations for the way their relative had paved for them the road to Paradise. In either case, the would-be killers have to be trained and prepared psychologically in such a fashion as to neutralize the normal human instincts for self-preservation, and to be able not only to defy death, but to be eager in the face of it.
The total and unmitigated devotion of the fida'i to his leader, to the point of committing acts of murder for him without posing questions or raising doubts, conjures up the legendary loyalty of the Japanese samurai, which has been immortalized in the notion of junshi, that is, 'accompanying the lord to his death' by committing suicide after his death, or, more commonly, abiding by the bushido (the samurai code of conduct) which required fighting for the lord to one's death. Anecdotally, one might notice that the samurai dressed up colourfully (contrary to his wont in daily life), cleaned and perfumed himself prior to his battles for his lord, so that he remain 'respectable' in his death, and he often tied a white kerchief around his forehead (chimaki), ostensibly to absorb sweat before it leaked into his eyes and irritated them during the battle. Not surprisingly, the Muslim 'suicide bombers' we have all been witnessing have also been known to cleanse themselves and dress up before they launch their horrific acts of terror, so as to be presentable at the entrance gate to the promised Paradise. We have also seen the processions of Hizbullah and Hamas members in the cities of Lebanon and the Palestinian Authority, parading their white (connoting celebration of death), green (the Prophet's favourite colour) or red (the colour of blood) kerchiefs around their foreheads, adorned with scriptures advertising 'Allah Akbar!' ('Allah is the Greatest'-the war-cry of Muslim fighters, or the shahada-the first of the five Pillars of Islam-'There is no God but Allah, and Muhammed is his Prophet').
Remaining with the Japanese parallel, we may push it still further and consider the most famous Japanese form of ritual or dutiful suicide (as contrasted with the trivial form of 'normal' suicide). In Japanese tradition, this kind of self-immolation could be motivated by a strong sense of protest against an existing order or state of affairs that one is unable to withstand or to alter, or by a desire for revenge on a person or group with which one is disenchanted but from which one cannot disengage. Therefore, one performed hara-kiri, or ritual suicide, which provided a respectful way out to people in such dire need. The most poignant example of the former was the mass harakiri performed in front of the Imperial Palace in Tokyo after the Emperor announced his country's capitulation to the Americans at the end of the Pacific War in August 1945. The most important form of hara-kiri, however, was the ritual self-killing that the samurai was ordered to perform by his lord, as an honourable self-inflicted punishment in order to escape a degrading and humiliating execution that he had 'earned' by his misdeeds or misbehaviour. In Islamic 'suicide bombing', the elements of protest against powers-that-be, or of despair in the face of an overwhelming situation one cannot control or change, are certainly there, though it is difficult to isolate them under the rhetoric of bombastic self-righteous proclamations after each bombing horror.
An aspect of the culture of shame has also to be addressed in the context of these murderous bombings. In Japan, one defended ferociously both one's own and the nation's honour, and committed self-immolation to escape humiliation. No other culture has ever made self-immolation, individual or collective, such a lofty ideal which allows an individual and society to save face and avoid facing shame. Countless samurai performed hara-kiri to avoid punishment by their lord; politicians or generals who failed in their duty committed suicide or were assassinated by other Japanese who felt humiliated by their deeds; and many Japanese preferred self-inflicted death to the humiliation of submission to their enemies. Thus, in Japan, suicide of all sorts was undertaken in situations of failure-moral, political, or in the line of duty. The Muslim 'suicide' killers, though they also share with the Japanese a culture of shame, belong to a tradition of vengeance which ties them back to the lex talionis that preceded Islam in ancient Arabian society. The humiliated party, whose honour had been trampled upon, would go to the ends of the earth to demonstrate that he would not forgive or forget until the wrong had been redressed. Out of the sense of seeking to redress what had been wronged, including striking the evil-doing enemy where it hurt him most, they would even commit missions of 'suicide bombing' if it were deemed necessary.
However, unlike the hara-kiri performers and others of their kind, the Japanese soldiers who were organized in 'Special Units' and designated to blow themselves up with their enemies during the Pacific War were typically motivated by their devotion to their country and their Emperor, in addition to being influenced by the mental infrastructure of shame in the face of failure. The coupling of protest and hara-kiri had been instilled into them by their culture. This new type of fighter became popularly known as kamikaze-the 'Spirits of the Gods' -and they inflicted casualties, damage and terror on the US forces during the final stages of the Pacific War (1944-45).
These special units, which were trained, indoctrinated and sustained by the Japanese State, were in quite a different category from the harakiri in the sense that they were not self-motivated, did not cater to their own personal instincts or needs, and were part of a larger group of like-minded fellows. They felt that in their act they were making an ultimate sacrifice for a cause, which not only had a political-ideological purpose, but also had a strong religious colouring (the 'Spirits of the Gods'); and, in so doing, they were prepared to sacrifice their lives without hesitation.
Typologically, then, the Muslim fundamentalist self-immolating assassins-who have nothing suicidal about them nor ressemble the hara-kiri of either the imposed or the voluntary type-come closest to the kamikaze in organization, ideology, execution of their task, posthumous glory, and historical background of self-effacing loyalty, murderous fanaticism (samurai and fida'i, kamikaze and shahid) and culture of shame. It is therefore proposed to adopt the appellation of Islamikaze to describe them, combining their inner Islamic motivation and vocation with the other outward attributes of their fellow kamikaze. In fact, a report from an Afghan camp where the Islamikaze were being trained in the mid-1990s, and which has come to be known as the 'Kamikaze Barracks', sported a slogan at its main entrance, made of whitewashed pebble and stone, which stated 'Jihad-Istishhad-Paradise-Islamic Kamikaze-Human Bombs', meaning: 'The Holy War of Islam-Death in Martyrdom-The Promised Hereafter-By Means of Muslim Kamikaze-who are Human Bombs'. This is, in essence, the entire story."
It has been customary for the media and governments, until 11 September 2001, to report on Hizbullah and Hamas terrorism in the Middle East, and in recent years also about al-Qa'ida's trouble-making in East Africa, but there was little publicity on the Islamikaze camps in Afghanistan, which were wholly Muslim in both their trainees and instructors, where, in contrast with the dismal development of the country, the latest technologies of death and terror were imparted to Muslim volunteers who had streamed there from all over the Muslim world to prepare for their sinister missions. There are also comparable camps in Lebanon, in Iran, in the Sudan, and in any number of other Islamic countries under conflict which do not attract much attention, but their impact on world terrorism is no less acute. However, Afghanistan, until recently, has been the ideal ground for such camps owing to several factors:
- Many of the camps are the offshoot of the long-standing intake of immigrants from all over the Arab and Islamic worlds who went to Afghanistan to fight on the mujahedin side in the 1980s, at the instigation of the Americans and the Saudis, in order to undermine the Soviet grip there. Upon returning to their homelands at the end of the war, these battle-hardened, so-called Afghanis often became the spearhead of Muslim oppositions to the illegitimate regimes of their countries. Bin-Laden himself, and the many Arabs and other Muslims who flocked to his call once he moved his al-Qa'ida organization to Afghanistan, are graduates of these camps.
- During the First Afghan War (1979-89), the Pakistani border city of Peshawar, which had previously been a remote backwater, grew into a major centre which gave shelter to millions of real Afghan refugees. The city also became the staging area for mujahedin counter-attacks against the Soviets and, under Pakistani protection and American connivance, also a teeming centre of international terrorist and other illicit activities: arms smuggling and deals of all sorts, spying grounds, drug traffic and so on. It is in Peshawar that the blind Sheikh Abdul Rahman, ostensibly an Egyptian political refugee from his native country, concoted the first attempt against the Twin Towers in 1993, and then was allowed into unsuspecting America to carry out his scheme.
- Afghanistan is a country torn by ethnic differences, but after the Soviet invasion in 1979, they were quick to organize, with US and Pakistani backing, a unified movement of mujahedin against the godless Communist invaders. As long as the battles raged and US aid abounded, all factions were kept busy and happy, for all prescribed Islam as their goal and way of life, and all vowed to extirpate the Soviets from the land at any cost and regardless of the time this would necessitate, much to the delight of the Americans and the West in general. But as soon as the Soviets tired of this endless war of attrition, as their casualties mounted and the vanity of the campaign became evident, they also realized that their goal of suffocating radical Islam in Afghanistan, lest it spread to their own Muslim Republics, had backfired on them and had increased its fervour and capacity to resist them. The Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan signalled the division of the country between local warlords, though there was a nominal central government in Kabul, and they facilitated the establishment of the Islamikaze camps in their midst due to the benefits they reaped from them.
- While the foreigners who fought alongside the mujahedin returned home to stir up trouble in their own countries, the Afghani militias deployed their full forces and prepared to take over Kabul. The infighting that ensued left Afghanistan ruined and Kabul half-destroyed in a senseless civil war that lasted from 1992 to 1996 until the Taliban takeover. In that chaos, each militia used any kind of income it could obtain: foreign aid from supportive countries (Iran, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan), drug trafficking, and sponsorship of Islamikaze camps.
- After the Taliban takeover and the invitation of al-Qa'ida to base itself in Afghanistan, Bin-Laden was not only happy to go back to his militant roots, but also to lend his sponsorship and financial aid to the Islamikaze camps and to encourage old Afghani hands to flock back to him there.
The evidence existing on the Islamikaze camps following the 1996 report of al-Watan al'Arabi (the written equivalent of the al-Jazeera Televison network today, which should have been heeded but was not), and which was published in 1997 but also not heeded, pointed out all the components of Islamic international terrorism that the West was 'surprised' to awaken to on 11 September 2001. Since the reporters who compiled this survey of the camps were versed in Arab and Islamic affairs, and presumably Arab and/or Muslim themselves, their warnings should have awakened even the dead. They wrote, inter alia, the following enlightening remarks.
The camp, which they saw was located in a remote area in the vicinity of the Afghan-Pakistani border and was the ground for extremely demanding physical training. For example, the trainees would run long stretches of the road every day, carrying bags of rocks and sand on their shoulders. This suggests, of course, that these people were not simply sent to their death, as their misnomer 'suicide bombers' would suggest, but were rather instilled with skills of fighting, survival and resilience.
The instructors in that particular camp originated from Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the Yemen and were known for the toughness of their character. The Egyptians and Saudis at least came from countries supposedly friendly to the United States, and most of them were probably known to the security services of their native countries.
The weapons instruction included arms of all sorts and of various origins: Chinese, American, Turkish, even the famous Israeli Uzi sub-machine-gun. The calibre of the weapons spanned the entire gamut: from rifles and pistols to anti-aircraft Stinger missiles. This means that not only an abundance of these weapons was still available as a remnant of the First Afghan War, and obviously irresponsibly distributed into the wrong hands, but, more ominously, that the trainees were taught to handle them to down enemy (and also civilian) aircraft.
Instruction of the Islamikaze also included urban guerilla combat, sabotage, handling and concocting explosives and installing carbombs, again a testament to the sophistication of these new terrorists, and to their perception and self-perception as being more war-and death-machines than mere human bombs.
The trainees were all designated, recruited, indoctrinated, dispatched and financed by their local Islamic organizations. It was the foreign currency poured into Afghanistan to finance these courses, with the collaboration of successive foreign currency-hungry governments, which kept the Islamikaze camps going. The Islamic organizations and their sponsors, either governments or wealthy private benefactors (Bin-Laden was one of them), then determined where the hardened graduates of these courses were to act, under what cover and to what specific tasks they would be assigned. And all this under the soundly snoring noses of the security apparatus of those countries from which the future murderers originated, or where they sought asylum, or planned to infiltrate, including, of course, the United States and other unsuspecting Western democracies.
Trainees came from not only Arab and Islamic-majority countries, but also from countries where Muslim minorities, or Muslim areas under non-Muslim rule, were deemed to be oppressed. Cases in point: Muslims in France (mainly North Africans), in Germany (mainly Turks), Palestinians (under Israeli rule), Bosnian Muslims, Chechnians, Filipino Moros and others. Only when the West woke up to a reality of the existence of 60 al-Qa'ida bases worldwide, including in Western countries, could it bite its fingers with remorse and regret for having allowed that horror to build-up in their own societies. This conjures up the concept of the difference between conscience and consciousness: the latter is when one becomes aware of reality, the former is when one wishes he had not.
Graduates of these courses were found later serving in such Islamic countries as Jordan and Egypt, or they stole across the Pakistan border to help remove Benazir Bhutto from power. Once again, these places are known as close allies of the United States, and their security machines were generally able to disrupt and arrest these sorts of subversive elements before they acted against the regimes in place. Was there a lapse in the state of alertness of those governments involved in these cases, or were they reluctant to unnecessarily infuriate their Muslim radicals as long as they did not threaten them?
Other graduates arrived in Kashmir to help terrorize the Indians into submission and install a Muslim government there; many of them went to fight in Bosnia against the Serbs, again courtesy of the West who supported the Muslims. The expert saboteurs among them have detonated explosive charges in Delhi, Bahrain and New York, to cite only a few examples. This means that these dedicated fighters of Islam had begun to take up positions in their target-countries well before 11 September.
The trainees were 16-25-year-old boys. Those who graduated to the upper echelons of training, in preparation for Islamikaze missions, were subject to a particularly testing regime: they did not talk to each other in order to encourage introspection and avert hesitation under the influence of free dialogue. Side by side with taxing their physical endurance, they underwent endless sessions of religious indoctrination, mainly by Egyptian and Saudi 'ulama' (scholars of the Holy Law). The identity of those preachers may indicate that they were reacting specifically to the overly close relationship (to their minds) between their governments and the hated West.
The camp in question was founded by a Pakistani scholar of this type. This suggests that, like those 'ulama' who groomed the Taliban (literally 'students') until they graduated from Pakistani puritanical madrasa's (religious schools) and were to take over rule in Afghanistan, the Pakistani preachers in the camps were exporting their teachings into the Islamikaze camps in Afghanistan and thence to the entire Islamic world.
The graduates who were earmarked for Islamikaze missions were considered by their operators to be of a higher quality and so 'deserving of the ultimate form of training in preparation for their supreme act of devotion. Their solitary state of meditation was to allow them pave for themselves the last portion of their way to Paradise on their own.
The internal fighting in Afghanistan, until the Taliban takeover, had enabled foreign trainees to test both their weapons and their methods in real battle in real time, all without any outside interference. This unlike similar camps in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Iran, Libya, the Sudan and Algeria, where such camps might be subject to the scrutiny, or literally to the mercy, of the local authorities, who manipulate them for their own needs and interests.
Each course lasted for a few months and cost approximately US$3,000 per trainee, hence the bonanza of foreign currency for impoverished Afghanistan. But it was reported that both instructors and trainees also engaged in drug trafficking and smuggling, either as personal moonlighting or to ensure the smooth functioning of the camp. Local Afghan warlords, at least until the Taliban takeover, collaborated with the camps in order to obtain some illicit income for themselves, while according, on their part, freedom of operation to the Islamikaze and their mentors. So, all rival parties in Afghanistan, from that of the nominal President Rabbani to arch-rebel Hikmatyar, could count on the camps in their areas of control for foreign currency income. There is no reason to believe that things have changed dramatically under the Taliban or that the new post-Taliban government in Kabul will be able or willing to act to alter this state of affairs.
It seems rather aberrant that countries such as pre-Taliban Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran, Libya, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and the Sudan-which had enjoyed a close relationship with the United States and the West in the past, or are continuing to promote it at the present, at least officially-should turn so violently anti-Western, not only on the rhetorical level but also in the domain of terrorism. But one has to remember that these countries share one common denominator, namely Islam which, prima facie, cuts through diverse ethnic, linguistic, national, political and social systems, and facilitates the growth of international, mainly anti-Western and anti-Israeli, terrorism. Moreover, if one takes into account the diffusion of the Afghanis and their like throughout nearly all Islamic countries, including those considered 'moderate' or pro-American, one could come to the erroneous conclusion that Islam equals terrorism, or that Islam, by definition, overrides all other considerations when it comes to international terrorism.
The reality is much more varied and nuanced, and it is tied specifically to local conditions in each country. The Islamikaze stand in most Islamic countries not as part of the established order, but in opposition to it. Although their claim to Islamic legitimacy sounds loud and clear in contrast with their illegitimate rulers, they represent not the mainstream of Islam-which is usually pragmatic and strikes compromises with the rulers in place in accordance with the Sunnite precept of 'better a bad ruler than political chaos' where no Muslim would be able to practice his faith-but more or less marginal groups in Islamic society. These groups may have many sympathizers and supporters, but they themselves thrive on the disoriented, the disaffected, the disenchanted and the dysfunctional strata who cannot catch up with the rapid changes in society and who abhor modernity. They harshly criticize the regimes of their own countries, accuse them, not without good reason, of corruption and submission to subversive and immoral Western values at the expense of Islamic ideals and tradition; and they often urge, and at times even attempt, the toppling of their home regimes. In other words, unlike established Islam which seeks Islamization of society gradually and peacefully, in collaboration with the regime, these radicals want everything here and now, and they are ready to use violence to attain their goals. Their passion is impatient.
The Islamists, as they are sometimes termed in the West, gather their forces, their passion and their deep commitment around charismatic leaders, like Sheikhs Yassin and Fadlallah, or Bin-Laden and Mullah Umar, who usually have an impeccable record of simplicity, modesty and honesty, shun extravagance and waste, and provide their followers with a model of populistic sincerity, paternal devotion and concern, and scholarly wisdom and knowledge. They come to regard their immensely popular leaders as role models and they almost adore them as the epitome of rightfulness and as their source of guidance, not unlike the Jewish hassidim vis-à-vis their rabbi. Setting themselves apart from the evil society of sinners which surrounds them, they wholeheartedly and boundlessly follow the word, the example and the hard path traced for them by their leaders as the ultimate interpretation of the Will of Allah. Wherever the need arises, these leaders can pronounce tailor-made fatwas (religious verdicts) to lend justification to the warranted action. One can understand how, propelled by this kind of relentless drive, enveloped by an approving and supporting environment, and guided by the almost divinely inspired sanction of the leader-generated fatwa, a Muslim radical can also transcend the ordinary into the mystic and magnetic world of the Islamikaze.
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Today is Friday November 21, 2008
Hank Roth (on the Internet since 1982)
While I don't use a standard blog (weblog software) mostly because I've been doing this too long - having been there with Ike when the precursor to the Internet, Arpanet got started and every step of the way since, I can't get into all the many fads over the years (now it is social networking), but I have been an observer and participant in events which shape the world since my time with NSA and with Army Security and as a voice security cryptologist in the White House for the President, and the War Room at the Pentagon for the Chairman of the Chiefs of Staff plus two wars. You could say this site is one of the better kept secrets [grin] on the InterNUT. You are invited back as often as you would like to see what I and others, I trust, may be saying.
-- Hank Roth