Block that simile
James Bloodworth pointed out an extraordinary claim by Stop the War yesterday:
Say what?
Benn does not even seem to realize that the jihadist movement that ultimately spawned Daesh is far closer to the spirit of internationalism and solidarity that drove the International Brigades than Cameron’s bombing campaign – except that the international jihad takes the form of solidarity with oppressed Muslims, rather than the working class or the socialist revolution.
No. It isn’t.
The kind or type or category of internationalism and solidarity that drives Daesh is profoundly different from the kind or type or category that drove the International Brigades. (Here I’m talking about the individuals who joined the IB, not the Stalinists who ran them and ended up purging them.) The “spirit” that drives Daesh is far closer to the “spirit” that drove Franco and the falangists than it is to the one that drove the IB. Franco crushed the Spanish Republican government for Catholicism and the clergy as well as for the monarchy. Daesh has very little in common with the people who joined the IB and a great deal in common with Franco and company. The mere fact that Daesh attracts people from all over the planet is far from enough to make it comparable to the IB.
The ummah is not like the global community that Marxists or human rights campaigners have in mind. The ummah is defined by a single religion, called Submission. It assumes the non-existence of other religions, and to the extent that the other religions persist, their members are not part of the ummah. People who have no religion are also not part of the ummah. People who were once (voluntarily or by birth) members of Submission who have left are really not part of the ummah.
The ummah is ruled by a book, one single book. It has a “prophet” who is to be treated as quasi-divine. This “prophet” issued a lot of rules 14 centuries ago, and submission to those rules is the whole duty of the ummah. Punishments in the ummah are harsh.
The ummah is not any kind of utopia or Better Place. The Stoppers are terribly confused.
Harry’s Place has more. Stop the War took the post down but here’s a cache.
And more along your lines…
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2015/03/what-isis-really-wants/384980/
A key passage from the Atlantic article cited above:
Many denials of the Islamic State’s religious nature, he said, are rooted in an “interfaith-Christian-nonsense tradition.”… Every academic I asked about the Islamic State’s ideology sent me to [Princeton scholar Bernard] Haykel. Of partial Lebanese descent, Haykel grew up in Lebanon and the United States, and when he talks through his Mephistophelian goatee, there is a hint of an unplaceable foreign accent… According to Haykel, the ranks of the Islamic State are deeply infused with religious vigor. Koranic quotations are ubiquitous. “Even the foot soldiers spout this stuff constantly,” Haykel said. “They mug for their cameras and repeat their basic doctrines in formulaic fashion, and they do it all the time.” He regards the claim that the Islamic State has distorted the texts of Islam as preposterous, sustainable only through willful ignorance. “People want to absolve Islam,” he said. “It’s this ‘Islam is a religion of peace’ mantra. As if there is such a thing as ‘Islam’! It’s what Muslims do, and how they interpret their texts.” Those texts are shared by all Sunni Muslims, not just the Islamic State. “And these guys have just as much legitimacy as anyone else.”
To be sure, the vast majority of ordinary Muslims, even in Saudi Arabia, live peaceful if often restricted lives, and (like many of my own relatives) are kind, hospitable, utterly gentle souls. They live in the 21st century. It’s their religion that’s still mired in the 7th century. It’s a religion that has never been reformed. Thinking that it resembles modern mainstream Christianity is a dangerous mistake. Or that it can be harnessed for some pie-in-the-revolutionary-sky (cf. the Stoppers) an even more dangerous one.
Good points. Just one quibble:
“…a single religion, called Submission.”
All the Muslims I know interpret that as meaning submission to Allah. This is not too different from the Judaic duty to worship the Lord and obey his commandments, or Jesus saying ” Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment.”
If this is a flaw – and I think it is – it’s not unique to Islam.
While Stop the War has taken the piece down, its author stands behind it. He says everyone has it all wrong, probably deliberately but maybe just because they don’t understand English:
http://infernalmachine.co.uk/my-life-as-a-fascist-sympathizer/
He insists that he despises Daesh, but that jihadists in general have not wanted to “throw homosexuals off balconies” or “murder office workers in the twin towers.” and are instead usually “motivated by idealism, loathing of injustice and oppression, and [a] spirit of adventure.”
This is what the kids call “doubling down,” no?
David @ 3 – no, I know it’s not unique to Islam…although Islam is the only one that calls it Submission.
And submission to Allah – what does that even mean? Since they don’t know who where how Allah is, it means they submit to things written down by a human a very long time ago. That’s all. Same with the other monotheisms.
TGGP @ 4 – well he does make what I think is a core point –
I’m relieved that he sees that it’s a very narrow concept of solidarity and internationalism.
Oh great. Let’s have solidarity with this.
(Excuse me. *vomit*)
@3 David
Islam is quite different from both Judaism and Christianity in that it dissolves the distinction between temporal and spiritual authority. In Islam the ‘priest’ and the ‘politician’ are merged into one, single pole of authority. There is little or no bifurcation, no dialogue, no opposing opinion, no tug of war between two competing and legitimate sources of authority…and that’s a situation that makes reform nearly impossible.
There are also important distinctions to be made when it comes to ‘submitting’ to god or simply ‘loving’ god Submission implies slavery or at least a vastly inferior status, whereas as love implies a relationship that puts at least some emphasis on equality. Submission implies undivided obedience; no fuss, no complaining and certainly no questioning. It transforms an individual into a non-entity, a creature without agency, a being whose entire fate is decided solely by god.
Not everyone on the left is deluded.
http://quillette.com/2015/12/06/the-shame-and-the-disgrace-of-the-pro-islamist-left/
Note the willful blindness that describes Jihad as ‘solidarity with oppressed Muslims.’ How did anyone, beyond Mohammed’s first followers in Mecca, BECOME ‘Muslim?’ By conquest and coercion.
The Arab Jihad was perhaps the most rapid, and violent imperialist expansion in history. ‘Oppressed’ Islam was ‘defended’ from Morocco to the Philippines, from South Africa to the Alps. And every square foot of territory is still ‘Islamic land’ in SOMEBODY’S mind.
Sadly, they are not confused. It’s a staple of the “Revolutionary Left” that anything going against the “West” (scare quotes intended all around) is part and body of their fight. It’s a delusion, and a dangerous one at that. The enemy of my enemy…
You know we don’t meet eye to eye on a lot of topics, but on this one, I’m staunchly behind you.