Page 253 - Encyclopedia Of Terrorism

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Militant Islam———231

By the end of World War I, the Ottoman Empire lost the spread of militant Islam. The Brotherhood soon
its grip on the Middle East; the British and French found inspiration in Sayyid Qutb (1906–1966), who
consequently divided up the former Muslim empire as provided justifications taken from the Koran for
spoils of war. The most painful defeat, however, was attacking Muslim leaders with governments not in
likely the loss to Israel in 1948 when a unified front accordance with shari’a.
of five Arab armies lost to a military of only several In his most famous book, Milestones, Qutb advo-
hundred thousand Jews. cated “jihad for eliminating the Jahili [ignorant] order
Along with these Western military advances came and its supporting authority for they interfere with and
cultural and intellectual concepts often new to Islam prevent the efforts to reform the beliefs and ideas of
in the practical and physical sciences, modern humanity at large.” The Egyptian regime executed
weaponry and military tactics, mass communication, Qutb in 1966. His followers were devastated, but his
law, and political science. A threat to the status quo, legacy survived. The Brotherhood today has hundreds
these concepts were often considered radical and of branches in more than 70 countries worldwide.
destabilizing, and did not fit comfortably within the A year after Qutb’s death, adherents to militant
traditional Muslim culture. Islam were further devastated by the Arab loss to
While many adapted, some Muslims rejected these Israel in the 1967 Six-Day War. Apart from losing to
changes. Instead, they created a rigid ideology deeply the Jews, a people militant Muslims regard as inferior,
imbedded in a fundamentalist interpretation of Islam. Jerusalem (Islam’s third holiest city) had been con-
This ideology, militant Islam, came to be seen as a quered. Moderate Muslims began to look for meaning
struggle to return to the era when Islam was dominant. in these shocking events. An increasing number
The ideology rejected the West, modernity, and many turned to their Islamic roots. Among them, many
of its innovations. Indeed, it even perceived the source adopted the militant Islamic ideology.
of these innovations (the West) as its enemy. Amid the Arab oil boom of the 1970s, militant
In time, the militant Islamic vision crystallized. Islam grew exponentially. Nowhere was this more
It rejected not only the influence of the West but also apparent than in Iran, where the first modern Islamic
the legitimacy of secular governments in the Muslim republic was established. Ayatollah Ruhollah Kho-
world for their subservience to the West. Thus, the meini overthrew Iran’s secular regime and estab-
overthrow of these regimes became an important part lished a new militant Islamic nation. Militant Islam
of their agenda. was no longer merely an ideology; it had inspired
a state.
THE RISE OF MILITANT ISLAM After Iran, Sudan fell prey to a Muslim Brotherhood
coup d’état in 1989. By the mid-1990s, the militant
The most significant boost for the militant Islamic Islamic Taliban government rose to power in Afghani-
movement came in 1928, when the Ikhwan al- stan thanks to a vacuum created by years of civil war
Muslimun, or Muslim Brotherhood, emerged in Egypt. and tribal violence. Saudi Arabia’s royal family, all the
The cornerstone for many of today’s militant Islamic while, has long been under the influence of the Wahabi
movements, the Muslim Brotherhood rejected Western strain of militant Islam since becoming a modern state
influence and, more specifically, England’s secular in 1903.
influence over Egypt. The organization, founded Other countries continue to safeguard their states
by Hassan al-Banna (1906–1949), advocated the from militant Islamic rule, but pay the price in lives.
Egyptian institutionalization of Islamic beliefs and Algeria, for instance, has engaged in an ongoing bat-
values. Without religious governance, al-Banna argued, tle with the Islamic Salvation Front (FIS) and Armed
the Muslim world would be “a society of cultural mon- Islamic Group (GIA) in which more than 100,000
grels and spiritual half-castes.” Al-Banna and his have died. Egypt has repeatedly been challenged by
followers soon developed armed cells that attacked militant Islamic groups, with attacks ranging from
government officials and supporters, leading the move- the assassination of President Anwar al-Sadat in 1981
ment to be outlawed. The group, however, continued (Al Jihad) to the massacre of foreign tourists in Luxor
its activities, wreaking havoc on the Egyptian regime. in 1997 (Gama’a al-Islamiyya). Syria faced an insur-
In an attempt to quell the movement, al-Banna was gency from its Muslim Brotherhood branches in
killed in Cairo in 1949, but his death did not prevent the early 1980s, but quelled the violence by literally