Reign Of Terror

Wahhabism

Some Muslim religious scholars have begun to issue a fatwa or religious decree clarifying that suicide attacks are haram or forbidden in Islam. This will be welcome news to Western political leaders who vociferously condemn terrorism. But these same leaders seem to be more reticent when it comes to pinpointing the actual source of the ideology behind these attacks. Former Norwegian ambassador to Saudi Arabia, Carl Schiotz Wibye, has contributed greatly to our understanding of these ideological sources.

After spending five years in Saudi Arabia, Schiotz Wibye wrote a definitive book that explores the links between that country and Islamist extremism. During this period, the former ambassador not only became aware that Saudi Arabia was a hub of radical Islam, but also how the militant, regressive and violent ideology of Wahhabism (named after Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab at-Tamimi who founded it), had come to play an important part in the ‘radicalisation of the (Sunni) Islam’ story.

Schiotz Wibye says that the Saudi’s are producing ‘factories’ of radical preachers trained at the so-called Islamic University of Medina. Interpretations of the Koran have been put into the text by scholars and translators which have then been used by the Saudi government and followers of Wahhabi ideology to push its more militant verses. These have then been exported and received by Muslim communities throughout the world.

Schiotz Wibye emphasizes that the silent majority of Muslims are peaceful and just want to live normal lives. But largely due to the fact that few have spoken out, it’s mainly the militants who have come to dominate. Unfortunately, the passivity of the majority has also played into the hands of the nefarious divisive agendas within the wider community of liberal democratic societies, many of whom are keen to brand all Muslims with the terrorist epithet.

Toxic

But Schiotz Wibye says that fomenting division within these societies is also the goal of the radical Wahhabis who, through the prism of the Saudi royal family and the imams, work together to spread their toxic ideology.

In the Western capitals, there is an historic tradition (dating back to Roosevelt’s 1944 meeting with the Saudi King in the Suez Canal) of the Saudis enjoying a certain immunity from criticism because of their business dealings.

It’s this immunity from criticism that has arguably helped facilitate the spread of Wahhabi ideology throughout Europe. The extent to which radical imams have been able, both to get a foothold to preach their toxic message, and to ascertain what the causes and effects resulting from this toxicity are, has been difficult to establish because not everything is under the radar of the security services.

Schiotz Wibye explains:

“If you want to find out how a mosque is financed how do you do that? Nobody knows. They have a preacher and they say, ‘Well, we are paid by the community’. But the mosque will cost millions and millions of euros. And who pays for that? It’s very difficult to ascertain who pays for what and who is exporting what. Secret recordings inside mosques have imams outlining the basic original message of Wahhabism from the 1700s, which is basically hate speech. Looking at that and looking at the Islamic State and their basic ideology, it corresponds exactly to what Muḥammad ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhāb at-Tamīmī said 250 years ago.”

However, the former ambassador says that this ideology had only been rigidly adhered to for the first 100 years prior to the Saudi defeat to the Ottomans. The situation shifted in the 1900s after the Saudi’s began to accumulate huge sums of money for export. This culminated in the relatively milder, but nevertheless brutal, version of Wahhabism that we see today.

Problematic

Schiotz Wibye says that attempts to address the issue of Wahhabi ideology in the context of democratic liberal societies is potentially problematic in the sense that it has been argued by some that freedom of expression is an unconditional fundamental right. But others also argue that freedoms come with certain responsibilities, both legal and moral, to not cause harm or incite hate and/or violence towards others.

Wahhabi ideology, it is argued, is incongruous to the notion of liberal democracy and as such preachers in the West who incite hate and violence should be identified and stripped of their citizenship.

On the other hand, the result of this course of action could be counterproductive leading to the potential for more terrorist attacks and the fomenting of an even deeper divide between Muslims and non-Muslims.

Schiotz Wibye argues that the policies of largely unrepresentative NGOs have been a significant barrier in terms of the ability of Western European governments to take decisive action against the radical preachers, while at the other extreme, many countries in Eastern Europe have resorted to draconian forms of state repression that adhere to the principle that all Muslims are terrorists.

All the while, the voices of moderate Muslims are side-lined or not heard at all. Muslim women, who are regarded by Wahhabism as little more than dirt on the floor, have a particularly important role in trying to create a paradigm cultural shift in the way that the Koran is interpreted by the fundamentalists and thus help integrate this shift into wider society.

Schiotz Wibye says that even in Saudi Arabia in recent years there have been positive shifts in terms of the role Muslim women play in that society and is optimistic that these women will continue to push back against the repressive Wahhabi ideology.

Short-termism

However, Schiotz Wibye is also aware that the persistent short-termism of Western governments in dealing with the Middle East has ultimately incubated a massive problem. He notes, for example, that the ‘war on terror’ strategy has been an exercise in futility and has done nothing to advance the cause of women or moderate Islam more broadly:

“Western interventions”, says Schiotz Wibye, “have not been very successful. We should leave those states to their own resources. Instead of bombing and shooting, we should look at how we can promote democracy, not by shooting half the population and hoping the other is democratic, but by really going into the structures and trying to see from the outside, how can we help this place develop.”

Schiotz Wibye believes that democracy and Islam are not necessarily irreconcilable concepts:

“Of course you can say the ideology is so strong that it rules out any democratic leadership. But then again, Christianity once upon a time was so strong that it completely dominated societies. So it’s all a question of how you interpret the basic text. You can interpret it in such a way that you again separate religion from politics. I know it’s especially difficult in Islam because the Koran has so many political texts, but it can be done. And many countries are doing it. Although they might call themselves Islamic, many are a still normal functioning, relatively democratic countries”, says Schiotz Wibye.