Right now I am in the midst of a three-part series on the aftermath of the London bombings of July 7. I just finished part two early this morning, and part three will be a progress report on both current progress and failures in the global war. Two things I have read recently have prompted me to draw together some disparate comments on the Muslim role here – Karim Elsahy’s Pray4Peace project and the recently released Pew survey on Muslim attitudes toward democracy, terrorism and al-Qaeda.

Karim’s project, Pray4Peace, centers around the idea of a Muslim-led campaign, inclusive of members of other religions, to gather in various spots around the world and pray for peace in all time zones at the same time. He provides some basic details of the organizing here, and some broader comments reacting to the London bombings here. I certainly do think the pray for peace project is a good idea, although with regard to his comments on the latter link I think he, like many people, is too pessimistic as to the overall situation. I believe that we have made a lot of progress in fighting al-Qaeda and other terrorist organizations since 2001, and will deal with that issue in the third and final part of my London aftermath series.

What I want to focus on here is what I believe the role of Muslims can most effectively be, and that is counter-education to the global network which is propagating al-Qaeda’s version of the doctrine of jihad, which differs from the historical concept. Muslim terrorists do not just get the idea of murdering civilians out of the air; they are taught in certain Islamic schools (“madrassas”) in parts of the Muslim world and are propagated in books, pamphlets and websites all over, including the West. An article from the Times of London on The Pakistan Connection illustrates the phenomenon well. Schools which teach children nothing but the Islamic sciences, and a distorted version of them at that, need to be replaced with schools which teach a holistic curriculum whose religious content deals in a mainstream manner with the concept of religious struggle. The Arab states of the Persian Gulf, especially Saudi Arabia, need to be pressured into paying a disproportionately high percentage of the cost for this worldwide campaign. The Saudis have now redirected their state-supported imams on this issue, and they will have the opportunity to prove they have changed their ways here. For reasons explained below, this must be a Muslim-only campaign.

It is in this context that I will also note the recently published findings by the Pew Global Attitudes Project which have been widely publicized and of which you have probably already read. Among other things, the survey found that confidence in Osama bin Laden had declined in the past two years in most of the Muslim world, but was still significant in some areas and had risen in Jordan and Pakistan. The survey also had other findings regarding the workability of democracy and views of Islamic extremism.

I have a few further comments regarding the details of this counter-education campaign which I have in mind (read especially if you are not familiar with Islamic law or the proper definition of jihad):

• There is a good case which can be made on purely Islamic grounds that Bin Laden’s concept of jihad is a misinterpretation. There is a well-accepted hadith (saying) by the prophet Muhammad in which he tells his warriors that they are not to kill women, children or the aged (i.e. noncombatants). There are several verses in the Quran regarding fighting in the path of God which are sufficiently ambiguous to be interpreted as justifying religious war, but it takes some real effort to interpret the Quran as condoning, much less commanding, Muslim soldiers to walk down the street and wantonly hack down noncombatants in order to terrorize them into submission.
• The classical legal doctrine of jihad involves two different commands: (1) A collective obligation on all Muslims to resist aggression by an enemy, and (2) an affirmative obligation on the state to expand the borders of Islam through conquest, implementing Islamic law as to Muslims and carving out sub-state entities which allowed Christians and Jews to maintain their religious practices, albeit with inferior legal status.
• Although the classical concept of jihad was often offensive in nature, it was not terroristic – in addition to the prohibition on the intentional killing of noncombatants, Islamic law contains rules about the proper treatment of non-Muslims who surrender on terms, giving proper warning after a truce before the reopening of hostilities, etc. Thus the repeated attacks on Constantinople which concluded in its conquest in 1453 are not really analogous to the attacks on the United States, Britain and Spain since 2001.
• There is a caveat regarding polytheists, since Islamic law only protected monotheists, and polytheists could be forced to convert upon pain of death. Bin Laden uses this by calling Westerners “polytheists.” Yet this rule itself is an interpretation from the Quran and prophetic sayings, not an explicit pronouncement, and Muslims today need not be bound by it. Indeed, this rule was widely ignored, especially when the Muslim empire of the Mughals ruled India (1526-1858).
• This educational fight is one that only Muslims can wage effectively. I do not believe non-Muslims, especially Americans and Europeans, ought to take it upon themselves to promote what they view as “true Islam,” because this lends credence to the idea that a coexisting Islam is an “American Islam” or “liberal Islam” promoted by the West. Imagine Muslims going to Italy to teach Catholics about Catholicism. (This is of course distinguished from commentaries aimed at educating Westerners about Islam, such as mine.) Western governments can and should fund independent media which promotes democracy and freedom, but that is all.
• The concept of jihad also has a spiritual application, and can refer to personal struggle for spiritual purity, but the word’s primary use, both in classical times and today, is military.
• The Pew survey linked above has a section on Muslim attitudes toward democracy. Of the six countries surved, in four – Lebanon, Jordan, Morocco and Indonesia – roughly 80% believed that democracy could work in their country. In the other two, Pakistan and Turkey, slightly less than half did. Sufficie it to say that the role of Islam in democratic development is quite complex, and while there are certain precepts of Islamic law which make democratization more difficult, modern Muslim thinkers have done a lot of work on this. For a more in-depth look at classical Islamic political theory, read chapter four of my book.

It bears emphasis that it is a matter of self-interest, not merely humanitarianism, for Muslims to fight against Bin Ladenism. Not only does Islamic terrorism impede foreign investment, economic development and political freedom, it could also lead to greater carnage in the Muslim world than even now might be imaginable. As Bernard Lewis wrote in the conclusion to his 2003 book, The Crisis of Islam, using words which bring the contrast between the American role in Iraq and the Russian role in Chechnya to mind: “Sooner or later, Al-Qa’ida and related groups will clash with other neighbors of Islam – Russia, China, India – who may prove less squeamish than the Americans in using their power against Muslims and their sanctuaries. If the fundamentalists are correct in the calculations and succeed in their war Äconverting Muslims to their version of IslamÅ, then a dark future awaits the world, especially the part of it that embraces Islam.”

Contributed by Kirk H. Sowell of Window on the Arab World, and More!