Date: Sun, 30 Sep 2001 18:30:55 -0400
To: Matthew Gaylor <freematt@coil.com>
From: Matthew Gaylor <freematt@coil.com>
Subject: Dr. Imad-ad-Dean Ahmad: A War Against Whom?
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" ; format="flowed"

Source: Islam Online
URL: http://www.islam-online.net/
Type: Web Pointer; Web Sample
Date: 30 Sept 2001
Title: Dr. Imad-ad-Dean Ahmad: A War Against Whom?

TEXT:

    Islam Online
    Last Update: Sun, 30/Sep 18:12 GMT

    _____


        A War Against Whom?

    By Imad-ad-Dean Ahmad, Ph.D.
    Minaret of Freedom Institute; http://www.minaret.org/
    http://www.islam-online.net/english/Views/2001/09/article10.shtml

       27/09/2001

    It appears that we have entered a war. I wish to
    evaluate both President George W. Bush's actions since
    September 11th and those of the American Muslim
    community. I realize that wartime is a dangerous time
    to risk offending parties in such precarious positions,
    but I am more afraid of offending Allah.

    The good news is that for the most part Mr. Bush has
    handled the situation well. He has understood the fine
    line he needs to walk between assuring the American
    people as a whole that effective action will be taken
    and the American Muslim community that he wants them
    united with the rest of America, on his side in his
    decision to treat the September 11th horrors as an act
    of war rather than as a criminal offense.

    And American Muslims, have on the whole, reacted well,
    sharing in the grief of our non-Muslim neighbors (as
    well as our own: there may have been hundreds of
    Muslims killed that day) and offering to help with
    funds and blood donations.

    Yet I am disappointed in both parties. In Mr. Bush, for
    his absurd assertion in his address to Congress that
    the motivation of the terrorists was a hatred of
    freedom and democracy, and disappointment in American
    Muslims who, in their understandable reluctance to
    believe that Muslims would do such an evil act have
    given credence to every absurd rumor to come out over
    the Internet or backyard fence.

    Muslims must condemn Osama bin Laden's calls for the
    murder of civilians whether or not he was involved in
    planning or funding the attacks on the World Trade
    Center and the Pentagon. At the same time, Mr. Bush
    should stop evading the fact that the motivation for
    bin Laden's ire is not freedom and democracy (however
    he might feel about those issues) but disastrous
    American interventionist foreign policies. America has
    not been a sleeping giant, but a sleepwalking
    superpower blundering across the world stage making
    enemies without understanding why.

    Even if bin Laden was not behind the September carnage,
    a declaration of war against him is logical. After all,
    he declared war on the United States in February of
    1998. His signature appears on a fax sent to the
    London-based al-Quds al-Arabi of a directive that
    specified "crimes and sins committed by the Americans
    are a clear declaration of war on God, his messenger,
    and Muslims" and on the basis that struggle "is an
    individual duty if the enemy destroys the Muslim
    countries" that therefore "to kill the Americans and
    their allies - civilians and military - is an
    individual duty for every Muslim who can do it in any
    country in which it is possible to do it, in order to
    liberate the al-Aqsa Mosque and the Holy Mosque from
    their grip, and in order for their armies to move out
    of all the lands of Islam, defeated and unable to
    threaten any Muslim" (Bin Laden, et al. 1998). If
    someone knows that bin Laden has repudiated this fax,
    they should produce the evidence now, otherwise it is a
    top priority for American Muslims to denounce it, and
    him.

    The fact that a man trains people to kill and tells
    them it is okay to use the techniques they learn
    against the innocent (and then gives a prayer of thanks
    when he hears that someone has done just that) is
    sufficient cause to consider him a terrorist. As
    Muslims we are obligated to use the same standard of
    justice with regard to bin Laden as with regard to
    Ariel Sharon. This is what the Qur'an means when it
    says: "O ye who believe! Stand out firmly for justice
    as witnesses to God even as against yourselves or your
    parents or your kin and whether it be [against] rich or
    poor: for God can best protect both. Follow not the
    lusts [of your hearts] lest ye swerve and if ye distort
    (justice) or decline to do justice verily God is
    well-acquainted with all that ye do" (4:135).

    As for Mr. Bush, if he is sincere in his desire to
    avoid a demonization of Islam, then why in his address
    to Congress did he say that the terrorists were
    motivated by a hatred of democracy and freedom? Bin
    Laden, whom he accuses, never once criticized democracy
    or freedom in his directive of February 1998. He
    denounced the presence of American troops in the land
    of the two holy mosques. He denounced American
    embargoes and bombings that have killed so many Iraqis.

    He denounced American support of the illegal Israeli
    occupation of Palestine. The U.S. actions bin Laden
    criticized are distorted perversions of democracy and
    outright abominations against freedom, no less than the
    bombing of the World Trade Center was a distortion of
    jihad (struggle) and an abomination against the peace
    and justice commanded in the Qur'an.

    Mr. Bush has made it clear that he is not out after
    only one man, nor even just his network of presumed
    collaborators, but also those who "harbor him". What
    this means is that when someone commits a criminal or
    violent act against a community and another community
    gives protection to that man, refusing to extradite him
    to those he has injured that the injured community has
    the right to retaliate against the community that
    protects him. Revenge is not only an ancient lust, it
    is a modern one as well. Napoleon promised to kill ten
    of the enemy for every one of his killed. The
    difference between retaliation in the Napoleonic code
    and qisas (the law of equality) in Islamic law is that
    the Qur'an strictly limits retaliation. One for one and
    like for like. In this limitation says the Qur'an
    "there is [a saving of] life to you O ye men of
    understanding! That ye may restrain yourselves"
    (2:179).

    Against whom have we gone to war? Is it Mr. Bush's
    intention to restrain himself, to give measure for
    measure, or perhaps less, until the conspirators are
    turned over so that the guilty may be punished and the
    innocent left alone? Or shall he expand his war to
    Sudan, Iraq, even Iran as some Zionists have demanded,
    or even worse? Does he aim to remind the exiled Saudi
    who was so happy to see six thousand civilians killed
    in fifteen minutes that America is the country that
    once killed tens of thousands of civilians in fifteen
    seconds (at Hiroshima)?

    Bin Laden calls his incitement against America a
    "fatwa" and Americans sing "God Bless America" as they
    stand on the brink of the slaughter of Afghanis. It
    would be wise to remember how often both sides of a war
    have insisted that God was on their side. Truly godly
    people know that the important question is: Are we on
    God's side? Whether Mr. Bush chooses a proportioned and
    narrowly targeted action or a broad retaliation in
    Afghanistan, and later elsewhere in the Muslim world,
    will demonstrate whether or not he is on God's side, as
    will whether he continues the material support of the
    slaughter of non-combatants with American weapons by
    Israelis.

    As I reflect on these things, one thought keeps
    returning to my consciousness. A glorious act of jihad
    (struggle in the way of God) took place on September
    11th. It was not the provocative murder of innocent
    civilians by the embittered terrorists. It was the
    brave fight by the passengers on the plane from
    Pittsburgh that successfully foiled the conspirators
    from attacking one more target and who knows how many
    more innocent lives. They could have had no motive
    other than to please God, for their death was a virtual
    certainty. But unlike the hijackers, the passengers'
    purpose was to save life, not to destroy it. Of this
    Allah, the Exalted and Glorified, has truly said: "We
    ordained that if anyone saved a life it would be as if
    he saved the life of the whole people" (5:32).

    References:

    Shaykh Usamah Bin-Muhammad Bin-Laden, Ayman
    al-Zawahiri, Abu-Yasir Rifa'i Ahmad Taha, Shaykh Mir
    Hamzah, and Fazlul Rahman (signatories), "Text of World
    Islamic Front's Statement Urging Jihad Against Jews and
    Crusaders"  - Al-Quds al-'Arabi, English translation by
    Emergency Response and Research Institute, Chicago
    (9/24/2001).  URL: http://www.emergency.com/bladen98.htm


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