Moderate Muslims celebrate public rebuke of bin Laden

Published March 29, 2005

From The Washington Times

From combined dispatches
CAIRO -- The condemnation of Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda by the Islamic Commission of Spain on the first anniversary of the train bombings in Madrid that took 200 lives is making waves throughout the Muslim world.
The Spanish commission's fatwa, or condemnation, follows other signs of the kind of public theological debate rarely seen in the Muslim world, openly challenging the dominance of Saudi Arabia's wealthy Wahhabi fanatics.
One Islamic scholar even calls it a sign of "a counter-jihad."
In a recent interview with the Qatari daily newspaper Al-Raya, for example, Abd Al-Hamid Al-Ansari, the former dean of Shariah and law at the University of Qatar, urged his fellow Muslims to purge their heritage of fanaticism and adopt "new civilized humane thought."
Such humane thought, he said, "must be translated [into deeds] in educational ways, via the media, tolerant religious discourse, nondiscriminatory policy and just legislation."
"We must purge the school curricula of all sectarian implications and elements according to which others deviate from the righteous path and the truth is in our hands alone. We must enrich the curricula with the values of tolerance and acceptance of the other who is different [in school of faith, ethnic group, religion, nationality or sex].
"The political regime must refrain from sectarian or ethnic preference; it must respect the rights and liberties of the minorities and must guarantee them through legislative action, practical policy and equal opportunity in the areas of education, media and civil positions."
Other Muslims quickly attacked the Spanish fatwa.
A group calling itself al Qaeda in Iraq -- the name Jordanian-born militant Abu Musab Zarqawi gave his organization after he aligned himself with bin Laden -- mocked it in the familiar religious rhetoric. "Allah has promised us victory," it said in a posting on its Internet Web site. "... Terrorizing enemies of God is our faith and religion, which is taught to us by our Koran."
Nevertheless, the reaction to the Spanish fatwa astonished its authors, who were swamped with e-mail messages of congratulations.
"I couldn't even read them all -- there's at least a thousand, maybe more," said Mansur Escudero, secretary-general of the Islamic Commission of Spain. "The tone was nearly all the same: 'It's about time someone did it. Bravo!' "
Says Khaled Abou El Fadl, an authority on Islamic law at the University of California at Los Angeles: "The long and painful silence of moderate theologians and experts in Islam jurisprudence -- who had been bought off or intimidated into silence -- is finally starting to break apart. We are seeing signs of a counter-jihad."
The response to the Spanish fatwa was dominated by Muslims outside the Middle East, suggesting most moderates live outside traditional Muslim areas.
"I'm glad that someone of authority in Islam is taking a stand and demanding their religion back from the terrorists who have hijacked it," a respondent from the United States wrote.
"This shows the Muslim world is tired of the harm that radicals and terrorists are doing to Islam," said Mr. Escudero, whose declaration carried the support of Muslim leaders in Morocco, Algeria and Libya. "We hope this will inspire others to speak out."
The subject of suicide attacks sharply divides the Islamic world. Many Islamic scholars denounce it, citing the Koran: "Do not kill yourself." There are deep divisions over what the Koran justifies in a perceived defense of Islam. "There needs to be an awakening that radicals are manipulating the Koran for their own narrow motives," said Omid Safi, professor of philosophy and religion at Colgate University.
In December 2003 -- a year after the Bali bombings that killed 202 persons -- Indonesia's highest Islamic authority, the Ulema Council, declared terrorism and suicide bombings illegal under Muslim law, but said "holy war" is justified if Islam is under attack.
Some scholars caution that moderates exchanging fatwas and denunciations with radicals does little to make lasting reforms.
"Islam needs a new approach -- to get away from the Islam of the Middle East being the only point of reference," said Abdullahi An-Na'im, a specialist in Islamic law at Emory University in Atlanta.

Moderate Muslims celebrate public rebuke of bin Laden

Published March 29, 2005

From The Washington Times

From combined dispatches
CAIRO -- The condemnation of Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda by the Islamic Commission of Spain on the first anniversary of the train bombings in Madrid that took 200 lives is making waves throughout the Muslim world.
The Spanish commission's fatwa, or condemnation, follows other signs of the kind of public theological debate rarely seen in the Muslim world, openly challenging the dominance of Saudi Arabia's wealthy Wahhabi fanatics.
One Islamic scholar even calls it a sign of "a counter-jihad."
In a recent interview with the Qatari daily newspaper Al-Raya, for example, Abd Al-Hamid Al-Ansari, the former dean of Shariah and law at the University of Qatar, urged his fellow Muslims to purge their heritage of fanaticism and adopt "new civilized humane thought."
Such humane thought, he said, "must be translated [into deeds] in educational ways, via the media, tolerant religious discourse, nondiscriminatory policy and just legislation."
"We must purge the school curricula of all sectarian implications and elements according to which others deviate from the righteous path and the truth is in our hands alone. We must enrich the curricula with the values of tolerance and acceptance of the other who is different [in school of faith, ethnic group, religion, nationality or sex].
"The political regime must refrain from sectarian or ethnic preference; it must respect the rights and liberties of the minorities and must guarantee them through legislative action, practical policy and equal opportunity in the areas of education, media and civil positions."
Other Muslims quickly attacked the Spanish fatwa.
A group calling itself al Qaeda in Iraq -- the name Jordanian-born militant Abu Musab Zarqawi gave his organization after he aligned himself with bin Laden -- mocked it in the familiar religious rhetoric. "Allah has promised us victory," it said in a posting on its Internet Web site. "... Terrorizing enemies of God is our faith and religion, which is taught to us by our Koran."
Nevertheless, the reaction to the Spanish fatwa astonished its authors, who were swamped with e-mail messages of congratulations.
"I couldn't even read them all -- there's at least a thousand, maybe more," said Mansur Escudero, secretary-general of the Islamic Commission of Spain. "The tone was nearly all the same: 'It's about time someone did it. Bravo!' "
Says Khaled Abou El Fadl, an authority on Islamic law at the University of California at Los Angeles: "The long and painful silence of moderate theologians and experts in Islam jurisprudence -- who had been bought off or intimidated into silence -- is finally starting to break apart. We are seeing signs of a counter-jihad."
The response to the Spanish fatwa was dominated by Muslims outside the Middle East, suggesting most moderates live outside traditional Muslim areas.
"I'm glad that someone of authority in Islam is taking a stand and demanding their religion back from the terrorists who have hijacked it," a respondent from the United States wrote.
"This shows the Muslim world is tired of the harm that radicals and terrorists are doing to Islam," said Mr. Escudero, whose declaration carried the support of Muslim leaders in Morocco, Algeria and Libya. "We hope this will inspire others to speak out."
The subject of suicide attacks sharply divides the Islamic world. Many Islamic scholars denounce it, citing the Koran: "Do not kill yourself." There are deep divisions over what the Koran justifies in a perceived defense of Islam. "There needs to be an awakening that radicals are manipulating the Koran for their own narrow motives," said Omid Safi, professor of philosophy and religion at Colgate University.
In December 2003 -- a year after the Bali bombings that killed 202 persons -- Indonesia's highest Islamic authority, the Ulema Council, declared terrorism and suicide bombings illegal under Muslim law, but said "holy war" is justified if Islam is under attack.
Some scholars caution that moderates exchanging fatwas and denunciations with radicals does little to make lasting reforms.
"Islam needs a new approach -- to get away from the Islam of the Middle East being the only point of reference," said Abdullahi An-Na'im, a specialist in Islamic law at Emory University in Atlanta.

Waltzing across the U.N. stage

By William Hawkins
Published March 28, 2005

From the Washington Times

There is a basic contradiction in U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan's reform proposal. In a dynamic world of contending nation-states, the United Nations is anything but united. It cannot be both "the world's only universal body with a mandate to address security, development and human rights issues" -- the dream of world government, and still respect that "sovereign states are the basic and indispensable building blocks of the international system" -- the reality Mr. Annan grudgingly concedes.

The way Mr. Annan tries to square the circle is the old saw about collective security. "In an era of global interdependence, the glue of common interest, if properly perceived, should bind all states together in this cause, as should the impulses of our common humanity," he writes. "Such cooperation is possible if every country's policies take into account not only the needs of its own citizens but also the needs of others." But the needs of others are vast.

Mr. Annan feels "whatever threatens one threatens all. ... We must respond to HIV/AIDS as robustly as we do to terrorism and to poverty as effectively as we do to proliferation."

Resources are always limited. It is nonsense to plea, as Mr. Annan does, that while "we perceive different threats as the most pressing... the truth is we cannot afford to choose." Governments must make choices, putting their own peoples' welfare and security first. States are reluctant to commit blood and treasure to matters of little strategic interest.

Effective action requires coalitions of the willing. Mr. Annan notes a majority of U.N. peacekeeping missions are in Africa, "where, I regret to say, developed countries are increasingly reluctant to contribute troops." Yet, it is only where major powers have no vital interests that the U.N. can be called in.

Mr. Annan knows the problem, "an essential part of the consensus we seek must be agreement on when and how force can be used to defend international peace and security. In recent years, this issue has deeply divided member states."

Iraq is the case in point, but the lack of consensus has run through the entire history of the United Nations as well as the League of Nations before it. Both were formed by the alliances that won the world wars. To idealists, the new postwar bodies were to transcend these alliances in the name of collective security. But the only consensus was protection of the status quo created by the victors. Even that did not last very long.

There is an endless waltz to history, a three-step dance of war, peace and revolution. Wars are fought to create a new order of peace, but that status quo does not suit everyone. Allies fall out, enemies rebuild and new powers arise. Their revolt against the status quo shatters the peace. Those who prevail create the next system of order, and the band plays on. E.H. Carr wrote in 1939 of this waltz between the world wars, "Utopian writers from the English-speaking countries seriously believed that the establishment of the League of Nations meant the elimination of power from international relations. ... What was commonly called the 'return to power politics' in 1931 was, in fact, the termination of the monopoly of power enjoyed by the status quo powers."

The revolutionary powers were the Soviet Union and the German-Italian-Japanese Axis. All but Germany fought in World War I on the side of the remaining status quo allies, England, France and the United States. But time, and changes in governments, shifted their alignment.

This also occurred after World War II, and in less time. The Soviet Union remained a revolutionary power, and China became another after its civil war. The former Axis states supported the new order that emerged from their defeat.

And while communism has failed as an economic system in Russia and China, both powers remain discontented. The alliances that confronted each other in the Cold War have undergone realignments, with the United States enjoying more support among former Warsaw Pact states than in an "old Europe" dominated by traditional foes France and Germany.

The U.N. Security Council still represents the WW II coalition that created it. In the debate over Iraq, the five permanent members split 3-2. Expanding the Security Council by including Japan, Brazil, Germany and India will make consensus harder to find, not easier.

Mr. Annan sees the rising pressure of new revolutionary forces: "Divisions between major powers on key issues have revealed a lack of consensus about goals and methods. Meanwhile, over 40 countries have been scarred by violent conflict. More than 1 billion people still live below the extreme poverty line." Mr. Annan assails the status quo (and indirectly the United States) by noting "many states have begun to feel that the sheer imbalance of power in the world is a source of instability."

Mr. Annan wants the United Nations to become "a forum for resolving differences rather than a mere stage for acting them out." But the history and nature of world politics indicates successful diplomacy is based on hard bargaining that recognizes conflicting national interests and the balance of power, not on illusions about a "common humanity."

William Hawkins is senior fellow for national security studies at the U.S. Business and Industry Council.

A Jihadist's Tale How a young Jordanian left his American life and died an insurgent in Iraq

By SCOTT MACLEOD/AMMAN
Monday, Mar. 28, 2005

From Time Magazine

Ra'ed al-Banna loved America. Â During his nearly two years in the U.S., al-Banna, a lawyer by training, made a living as a factory worker, a shuttle-bus driver and a pizza tosser. He went to the World Trade Center and the Golden Gate Bridge, grew his hair long and listened to Nirvana. He told his family back in Jordan about the honesty and kindness of Americans. "They respect anybody who is sincere," he told his father. He said he had planned to marry an American woman until her parents demanded that the wedding take place in a Christian church. After a visit home in 2003, he set off again for the U.S., hoping to find a wife, have a family, settle down. "He was hoping for a job that earns a lot of money," says Talal Naser, 25, who is engaged to one of Ra'ed's sisters. "He loved life in America, compared to Arab countries. He wanted to stay there."

He never got the chance. After he was denied entry at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport for apparently falsifying details on his visa application, al-Banna's life took a turn that led him down the path of radical Islam and ultimately to join the insurgency against the U.S. in Iraq. His odyssey ended on March 3 when al-Banna's brother Ahmed received a call on his cell phone from a man identifying himself as "one of your brothers from the Arab peninsula"--the term radical Islamists use to signify the core of the Muslim world, centered on the holy city of Mecca. Al-Banna's family says that as far as they knew, Ra'ed was in Saudi Arabia working at a new job. But the voice on the other end sounded Iraqi, Ahmed says. "Congratulations," the caller told him. "Your brother has fallen a martyr."

In the two years since the invasion of Iraq, thousands of young Arabs have poured into the country to take up arms against U.S. forces and their Iraqi allies--and, in some cases, to seek martyrdom through suicide bombings, of which there have been at least 136 since May 2003. The lethality of the jihadists was highlighted on Feb. 28 when a suicide bomber detonated himself outside a health clinic in the city of Hilla, killing at least 125 people, the worst single massacre since the U.S. invasion. On March 11 the Amman daily newspaper Al-Ghad identified Ra'ed al-Banna as the attacker, in an article purporting to describe the family's wedding-like celebration of his martyrdom. The story was picked up by Arab satellite channels, provoking outrage among Iraqi Shi'ites, who have held demonstrations ever since outside the Jordanian embassy in Baghdad. The report also ignited a diplomatic feud between Jordan, which has denied that al-Banna was involved in the Hilla attack, and the interim Iraqi government, which is furious at the failure of its neighbors to stop the flow of foreign fighters into Iraq. The war of words has become so heated that both countries briefly recalled their ambassadors. "The people are fed up," says Labid Abawi, an Iraqi Deputy Foreign Minister. "They don't see the Arabs as helpful. The [Hilla] incident has really exploded a lot of bad feelings."

For all the emotion it has stirred, the attack remains shrouded in mystery. The accounts of the Bannas' reported exuberance at Ra'ed's funeral have been refuted by other accounts of the event, which depict the family as distraught. In interviews with TIME at their home in Amman, al-Banna's family members denied that Ra'ed was the Hilla bomber; instead, they say, he died in an insurgent operation in Mosul. They point out that Al-Ghad later retracted its report citing Ra'ed as the culprit. In some respects, the Bannas resemble the many other families around the Arab world whose sons have gone to fight and die in Iraq. But the Bannas also express astonishment that Ra'ed joined the insurgency, insisting that he had never shown signs of Islamic extremism or hatred for the West. On the basis of accounts given by his family, friends and neighbors, Ra'ed apparently led a double life, professing affection for America while secretly preparing to join the holy war against the U.S. in Iraq. "Something went wrong with Ra'ed, and it is a deep mystery," says his father Mansour, 56. "What happened to my son?"

Born in 1973, Ra'ed grew up in a comfortable merchant family that was religious but not rigidly so. After his son graduated from Jordan's Mu'tah University, Ra'ed's father set him up with a law office in Amman, but in three years the practice failed to prosper. In 1999, his family says, Ra'ed spent six months as an unpaid intern at the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in Amman, working with a legal-protection unit to help Iraqis fleeing Saddam Hussein's regime. When his father questioned the lack of salary, Ra'ed replied that he envisioned a future career as a U.N. official. "Ra'ed always wanted to be a leader," Mansour explains.

Sometime before Sept. 11, 2001, Ra'ed scored a visa to the U.S., in the hope of enrolling at an American law school. "If you are not successful," his father told him, "just don't get a job as a dishwasher." As it happens, Ra'ed appears to have bounced among odd jobs while in the U.S. But if he was disappointed by his fortunes, Ra'ed didn't tell his family. The photo albums his family keeps show him in various all-American settings: enjoying a crab dinner, walking on a California beach and sitting on a Harley-Davidson motorcycle. In one picture, apparently taken at a weekend fair, he is standing in front of a military helicopter, holding up a tiny U.S. flag.

His family can provide few other details about his life in the U.S. To this day, family members know he lived in California for nearly two years, but they have no idea where. After being denied entry to the U.S. in 2003, Ra'ed returned to Jordan and became withdrawn. Although outwardly charming, he coveted his privacy. Throughout 2004 he holed up in a makeshift studio apartment in the family's backyard, often sleeping until noon. The room features a television with satellite channels, a stereo with huge speakers and a motorcycle helmet, a prized souvenir from the U.S. A poster hanging over the sofa depicts an F-117 Stealth fighter in flight over a city that looks like Los Angeles.

Ra'ed began to show a deepening interest in religion. He took to praying five times a day and listening to Koranic verses on the radio. His family says he rarely discussed politics, but a friend told TIME Ra'ed became radically opposed to U.S. policies toward the Muslim world while still in the U.S. and later talked about going to Iraq. A neighbor, Nassib Jazzar, 32, recalls that a few months ago, Ra'ed criticized the U.S. occupation of Iraq. "He felt that the Arabs didn't have honor and freedom," says Jazzar. "Then he said, 'We the Arabs are no good. We allow others to come and occupy us.'" Mansour believes that Ra'ed also felt guilt over his father's financial problems, which came to a head in late 2004 when a bank threatened to seize the family's possessions.

Last November, Ra'ed made an Islamic pilgrimage to Saudi Arabia but claimed that it was also a job search. A month later, he returned to Amman showing no outward signs of transformation. In January he abruptly informed his father that he was departing again for Saudi Arabia. Jordanian authorities have told Mansour that after leaving Jordan on Jan. 27, his son crossed into Syria, the favorite route for Iraq-bound jihadists. Throughout February, Ra'ed called home several times but seemed careful to avoid his father. He told his brother he had found a good job and that his living quarters were uncomfortable but he planned to change them. He vowed to make enough money so he and his brother could afford to get married.

Ra'ed phoned home for the last time, catching Ahmed on his cell phone, around the time of the Hilla bombing on Feb. 28--though the family's accounts of the precise date are unclear. Besides being particularly affectionate, Ra'ed said nothing to indicate his life was about to end. On March 3, Ahmed received the call telling him Ra'ed was a martyr. The caller read Ra'ed's last will and testament. Four days later, there was another call, to Mansour, who says he was invited, "Allah willing," to visit Ra'ed's tomb near the Iraqi city of Mosul. The Banna clan ran an obituary in the newspaper Ad Dustour announcing that Ra'ed had "won martyrdom in the land of Iraq" and "died in the name of God."

Today Ra'ed's father denies that the family favors jihadist attacks in Iraq, insisting that in line with Muslim custom he calls his son a martyr simply because he was killed in a foreign land. Had he known what Ra'ed was up to, he says, he would have blocked his son's plans to leave the country and informed the police to keep an eye on him. Mansour says he would not be surprised if Ra'ed showed up at the door someday, as if his disappearance were some mistake or just a bad dream. But like so many others, the Bannas may never know exactly how they lost Ra'ed to the jihad. "The calls stopped," says Ahmed. "Ra'ed doesn't phone us anymore." --With reporting by Christopher Allbritton/Baghdad and Saad Hattar/Amman