Monday, November 23, 2015

Heed Pope Francis' Exhortation to Find 'Adequate Interpretation' Of Holy Quran पोप फ्रांसिस के, कुरान की प्रासंगिक, अन्योक्ति-संबंधी छ्न्दो के योग्य व्याख्या तलाश करने की सलाह पर विचार करने का आग्रह


 

सुल्तान शाहीनसंपादकन्यु एज इस्लाम
UNHRC में एजेंडा आइटम 8 पर आम बहस:  वियना घोषणा और कार्य योजना का कार्यान्वयन और उसपर अनुवर्ती कार्यवाही
28 सितंबर 2015
अध्यक्ष महोदय,
शांति के लिए हमारी खोज और इस्लामी आतंकवादियों के खिलाफ लड़ाई  में, परम पावन पोप फ्रांसिस ने एक उल्लेखनीय योगदान दिया है। मैं यहाँ दुनिया भर में मुस्लिम समुदाय का प्रतिनिधित्व कर रहे लोगों से कहना चाहूँगा कि वे पोप के उपदेश को गंभीरता से लें और उसको मानें, क्योंकि यह केवल  एक अच्छी सलाह ही नहीं बल्कि यही बात पवित्र कुरान में भी  बार-बार कही गई है।
पोप फ्रांसिस ने पवित्र कुरान को "शांति की पवित्र  पुस्तक" बताया है और  मुसलमानों से इसका सही अर्थ समझने के लिए कहा है।
अध्याय 39:  आयत 55, 39:   18; 39: 55; 38: 29; 2: 121; 47: 24, आदि में ,कुरान भी मुसलमानों  से बार-बार आयतों  पर चिंतन करने और इसका सबसे अच्छा अर्थ खोजने के लिए कहता है।
इस प्रकार, कुरान और पोप फ्रांसिस  दोनों ही  मुसलमानों से आयतों  के शाब्दिक अर्थ पर न जाकर इनका सबसे अच्छा अर्थ निकालने  या सबसे पर्याप्त तरीके से व्याख्या करने के लिए कह रहे हैं।
पैगंबर पर थोपे गए युद्ध के दौरान, उनका मार्गदर्शन करने के लिए आई हुई आयतों की संदर्भ देखे बिना व्याख्या और पैगंबर के निधन के दशकों और सदियों बाद एकत्र की गईं हदीस या पैगंबर की बातेों की दिव्य प्रेरणा के संबंध में आम धारणा  से ही आज आतंकवाद, विद्वेष, असहिष्णुता, फासीवादी सर्वोच्चता और स्री जाति से द्वेष का  वर्तमान संकट उत्पन्न हुआ है।
केवल यही नहीं है कि मुसलमानों ने कुरान और हदीस की इन पंक्तियों पर विचार नहीं किया  है। इमाम गजाली, इब्न-ए-तैमिया, अब्दुल वहाब, शाह वलीउल्लाह और शेख सरहिंदी आदि जैसे प्रमुख धर्मशास्त्रियों के भी विचार भी हमें सर्वोच्चता और जिहाद की अंधी गलियों में  ले जातें हैं। जाहिर है यह व्याख्या वर्तमान समय  में पर्याप्त नहीं है।
सबसे अच्छा अर्थ और पर्याप्त व्याख्या खोजने के बाद ही, हम मुसलमान शांति और बहुलवाद, विविधता की स्वीकृति, लिंग समानता, धार्मिक स्वतंत्रता और सभी के लिए मानव अधिकारों वाला एक नया और सुसंगत थियोलोजी विकसित करने में सक्षम हो पाएंगें, जो इस्लाम की शिक्षाओं के  अनुरूप और समकालीन और भविष्य के समाज के लिए उपयुक्त हो।
अध्यक्ष महोदय,
पोप फ्रांसिस का 'उपदेश एक बहुत ही  महत्वपूर्ण समय में आया है।  9/11 के चौदह साल बाद, मुस्लिम जगत अभी भी अपने खेमे के भीतर चरमपंथ के ज्वार को रोकने  के  अपने प्रयासों में डगमगा रहा है। लेकिन समस्या गहरा रही  है और वास्तव में, कट्टरता  दुनिया भर में बढ़ रही है।  स्कूल के युवा लड़कें- लड़कियाँ अपने  घरों से भागकर, दुनिया में  इस्लाम को फैलाने के घोषित लक्ष्य के साथ इराक और सीरिया में अपने क्षेत्र का विस्तार करने के लिए आई एस आई एस द्वारा किए जा रहे तथाकथित जिहाद में शामिल हो रहे हैं। पिछले एक साल में ,100 देशों से तीस हजार नए रंगरूट आईएसआईएस में शामिल हुए हैं।
इस साल की शुरुआत में मक्का में एक आतंकवाद विरोधी सम्मेलन में मिस्र की शीर्ष इस्लामी संस्था जामिया अजहर के प्रमुख ने  कहा कि बढ़ रही कट्टरता के ज्वार को रोकने के लिए मदरसों के पाठ्यक्रम को   संशोधित करना होगा । बड़े इमाम शेख अहमद अल तैय्यब ने कहा कि ऐतिहासिक रूप से कुरान की  ग़लत व्याख्या के कारण इस्लाम की असहिष्णु व्याख्याओं को बढ़ावा मिला है। उन्होंने इस्लामी उग्रवाद के प्रसार से निपटने के लिए धार्मिक शिक्षण में मूलभूत सुधार की मांग की।
जनवरी 2015 को काहिरा में अल-अजहर सम्मेलन केंद्र में  एक टेलीविजन भाषण में मिस्र के राष्ट्रपति सिसी ने इस्लाम में "एक धार्मिक क्रांति 'का आह्वान किया। उन्होंने वहाँ उपस्थित इस्लामी विद्वानों से कहा कि  उग्रवादी सोच बाकी दुनिया के लिए चिंता, खतरे, हत्या और विनाश का एक स्रोत बन गई है।  इसे बदलना होगा - और स्कूलों, मस्जिदों में और रेडियों- टेलीविजन  पर विद्वानों   को इसके विरूद्ध एक प्रमुख भूमिका निभानी होगी। उन्होंने कहा: "आप, इमाम, अल्लाह के सामने जिम्मेदार हो। पूरी दुनिया इंतजार कर रही है  पूरी दुनिया को यह इंतजार है कि आप  क्या कहते हैं क्योंकि इस देश को बर्बाद किया जा रहा है ।
इसी प्रकार,  मोरक्को ने इमामों के प्रशिक्षण के लिए Malekite संस्कार और Ashaarite सिद्धांत पर आधारित एक सहिष्णु और खुले इस्लाम का  एक कार्यक्रम शुरू किया है। नाइजीरिया और अन्य अफ्रीकी देश भी इस्लाम में संयम को बढ़ावा देने के लिए अपने इमामों  को प्रशिक्षण प्राप्त करने के लिए, मोरक्को   भेज रहे   है।
जॉर्डन, इंडोनेशिया और मलेशिया जैसे अन्य मुस्लिम देशों  भी बढ़ रही कट्टरता को रोकने के लिए जो कर सकते हैं,  वे कर रहे हैं।
भारत सहित दुनिया भर से ये फतवे आते रहते हैं कि इस्लाम शांति का धर्म है और आतंकवाद के साथ इसका कोई लेना देना नहीं  है।  अभी हाल ही में, विभिन्न विचारधाराओं वाले दुनिया भर से  120 उलेमा ने, स्व-घोषित खलीफा अबू बकर अल-बगदादी 'को एक खुला पत्र भेजा है।  14,000 से अधिक शब्दों वाला यह फतवा बगदादी और उसकी ज्यादतियों की निंदा करता है। इससे  "खलीफा" बगदादी के फैसलों की  गलतियों का विस्तार से पता चलता है।
लेकिन, इससे अधिक महत्वपूर्ण बात यह है कि यह खुले  पत्र से यह भी पता चलता है  कि इस समय माडरेट इस्लाम क्या गलत कर रहा है ।   सही बातों का असर क्यों नहीं हो रहा है, क्यों हमारे बच्चें आईएसआईएस और अन्य आतंकी केंद्रों के प्रति आकर्षित हो रहे हैं। वास्तव में,
अगर हम इन पर ध्यान दें तो पता चलेगा कि हिंसक इस्लामवादी विचारधारा के समर्थक
इनपर हावी क्यों हो जातें हैं और अपनी बात का औचित्य सिद्ध करने के लिए इनका इस्तेमाल कैसे कर लेते हैं। उदाहरण के लिए:
"... कुरान में सब कुछ सच है, और प्रामाणिक हदीस में सब कुछ दैवीय है।"
यह माडरेट उलेमा द्वारा इस बात की पुष्टि है कि आतंकवादी विचारक द्वारा किसी विशेष प्रसंग में आईं कुरान की सैन्यवादी आयतों और उनके आतंकवादी कार्यवाहियों के हथियार के रूप में पैगंबर (सल्ल.) की हदीसों का प्रयोग उचित है। आतंकवादियों का तर्क भी तो यही है। कुरान और हदीस में कोई अंतर नहीं है; दोनों दैवीय हैं। कुरान की हर आयत का महत्व बराबर है। पैगंबर (सल्ल.) द्वारा कही गई मानी जाने वाली हर हदीस महत्वपूर्ण है। सभी अपरिवर्तनीय, सार्वभौमिक, आने  वाले समय में अनन्त मार्गदर्शन के लिए हैं।
अध्यक्ष महोदय,
माडरेट उलेमा के खुले  पत्र पर विस्तार में चर्चा करने के लिए अनुमति चाहूँगा क्योंकि इससे  पता चलता है  कि कट्टरता को समाप्त करने के हमारे प्रयास क्यों विफल हो रहे हैं और कट्टरता और ज्यादा क्यों बढ़ रही है।
खुला पत्र - अध्याय 13 - जबरदस्ती और मजबूरी  – माडरेट फतवा कहता है: "यह ज्ञात है कि आयत: 'धर्म में कोई बाध्यता नहीं है',  मक्का की विजय के बाद नाज़िल हुई इसलिए, कोई यह दावा नहीं कर सकता है कि इसे निरस्त कर दिया गया है। "  फिर फतवा जबरदस्ती करने के लिए बगदादी की आलोचना करता है। लेकिन महत्वपूर्ण बात यह है कि माडरेट फतवा भी बगदादी और अन्य आतंकवादियों के इस मूल आधार को स्वीकार करता है कि मक्का की विजय से पहले शांतिपूर्ण आयतें जो शांतिपूर्ण इस्लाम की रीढ़ है उन्हें रद्द कर दिया गया है या कम से कम शायद रद्द कर दिया गया होगा और अब युद्ध से संबंधित आतंकी आयतें ही प्रभावी होंगी।
बिंदु 16. हुदुद (सज़ा) में, माडरेट फतवा एक आम नियम स्थापित करता है: " हुदुद दंड कुरान और हदीस में तय किए गए हैं और ये निश्चित रूप से इस्लामी कानून में अनिवार्य हैं" बगदादी की सोच के मूल आधार को स्वीकार करने के बाद ये तथाकथित इस्लामी राज्य में इसके कार्यान्वयन की आलोचना करते हैं। इसमें कहा गया है "हालांकि,इन्हें स्पष्टीकरण, चेतावनी, उपदेश, और सबूत के बिना लागू नहीं किया जाए और इन्हें क्रूर तरीके से लागू नहीं किया जाए।" लेकिन जब  एक बार माडरेट उलेमा ने" 7 वीं शताब्दी बेडुइन आदिवासी अरब संस्कृति पर आधारित हुदुद (सज़ा) के मूल आधार निश्चित रूप से इस्लामी कानून को अनिवार्य   रूप में स्वीकार कर लिया है, तब संयम और उग्रवाद के बीच क्या फर्क रह जाता है।
बिंदु 20 में, माडरेट उलेमा मूर्तियों के विनाश को न्यायोचित ठहराते हैं। खुले पत्र से निम्नलिखित पढ़ें:
"आपके पूर्व नेता अबू उमर अल बगदादी ने कहा: 'हमारी राय में, मूर्ति पूजा के सभी रूपों को नष्ट किया जाना चाहिए  और इन्हें हटाना चाहिए और ऐसे  सभी साधनों को प्रतिबंधित करना अनिवार्य है क्योंकि साहिह मुस्लिम में यह हैः अबू अल हियाज -अल-असदी के मुताविक अली इब्ने अबी तालिब ने कहा: " क्या मैं आपको बताऊँ कि पैगंबर (सल्ल) ऐसा करने के लिए मुझे भेजा: हर एक मूर्ति को उखाड़ने के लिए और हर एक कब्र को समतल करने के लिए।" परन्तु, उसने जो भी कहा वह सही भी हो फिर भी यह पैगंबर (सल्ल) या साथियों की कब्र पर लागू नहीं होगा क्योंकि पैगंबर (सल्ल) और उसके दो साथियों, अबू बकर और उमर के बारे में आम सहमति थी कि उन्हें पैगंबर की मस्जिद के पास की एक इमारत में दफनाया जाएगा।
इसका अर्थ स्पष्टत: यही निकलता है कि माडरेट उलेमा केवल " नबी या  उनके साथियों की कब्र" को नष्ट करने के विरूद्ध हैं (मूर्ति पूजा) की अन्य अभिव्यक्तियों के लिए वे कुछ नहीं कहते समकालीन दुनिया में अंतर-धार्मिक संबंधों को बनाए रखने का यह तरीका नहीं है । सभी सभ्य देशों के लोगों को उनके धर्म का उनके अपने तरीके से पालन करने का अधिकार दिया जाता है। दुनिया के कई हिस्सों में मूर्तियों की पूजा की जाती है। इस्लाम में उदारता का आधार, धार्मिक विविधता की स्वीकृति होनी चाहिए, जैसाकि पवित्र कुरान में हमें सिखाया गया है। इस्लाम के आगमन के13 साल के बाद, जब पैगंबर और उनके साथियों को पहली बार खुद बचाव करने के लिए अनुमति दी गई थी, तब कुरान में उनसे केवलअपनी धार्मिक स्वतंत्रता की ही नहीं बल्कि सभी धार्मिक समुदायों की धार्मिक स्वतंत्रता की रक्षा करने के लिए कहा गया था । ईश्वर अपनी  पूजा केवल मस्जिदों में ही नहीं, बल्कि चर्चों, सभाओं, मठों, मंदिरों में, हर जगह करवाना चाहता है। यहां पवित्र कुरान में अल्लाह के कहे गए शब्दों का अनुवाद दिया गया है।

 "और अल्लाह लोगो में अंतर करता, तो मठों और चर्चों, सभाओं और मस्जिदों में, जहाँ उसकी प्रशंसा की जाती है वे पूरी तरह से नष्ट कर दिए गए होते।"(पवित्र कुरान 22:40)
खुले पत्र का मुद्दा 22  शीर्षक , खलीफा, माडरेट उलेमा बगदादी गुट के इस बुनियादी प्रस्ताव से फिर सहमत हैं कि : " विद्वानों के बीच (इत्तिफाक) है कि खिलाफत उम्मा पर दायित्व है 1924 सीई के बाद से उम्मा में खिलाफत की कमी रही है। इसके बाद ये काफी कड़ी भाषा में बगदादी की मुसलमानों से आम सहमति के अभाव की आलोचना करते और उसपर राजद्रोह, फितना, आदि का आरोप लगाते हैं। लेकिन समस्या वही रहती है। मॉडरेट उलेमा उम्मा के लिए एक खलीफा होने के तथाकथित दायित्व पर बगदादी के साथ सहमत हैं। यह बात आज की दुनिया में बेतुकी है। जाहिर है बगदादी समूह और मॉडरेट उलेमा दोनों आज भी 7 वीं शताब्दी में रह रहे हैं।
क्या इस्लाम में संयम और उग्रवाद के बीच सर्वोच्चता, नफरत और असहिष्णुता, विद्वेष, मध्ययुगीन दंड लगाने में क्रूरता की डिग्री  का ही अंतर है?
स्पष्ट रूप से यहाँ समस्या  यह है कि मॉडरेट उलेमा आदि भी अपने विश्वास की पुष्टि उसी थियोलोजी  से कर रहे है जिससे आईएसआईएस, अल कायदा, तालिबान, बोको हरम या लश्कर-ए-तैय्यबा, जैसे आतंकवादी समूह, अपने विश्वास की पुष्टि करते हैं।
अब सवाल यह  है कि इस्लाम की शुरुआत से आज तक महान धर्मशास्त्रियों द्वारा बताए गए और लगभग सार्वभौमिक स्वीकार किए इस्लाम के आवश्यक तत्व हैं क्या ।
अध्यक्ष महोदय,
मैं मुस्लिम दुनिया का प्रतिनिधित्व कर रहे लोगों से अनुरोध करता हूँ कि वे हमारे इन महान धर्मशास्त्रियों के निम्नलिखित फैसलों को देखें और फैसला करें कि क्या आज की दुनियां में इसकी कोई जगह है और क्या हमारे मदरसों और इस्लामी अध्ययन में इन्हें जारी रखा जाना चाहिए।
अबू हामिद अल गजाली (1058 - 1111), जिन्हें सभी धर्मशास्त्रियों का सबसे बड़ा माना जाता है और बहुत से लोग, पैगंबर मोहम्मद के बाद, इस्लाम के बारे में इनकी ही समझ को मानते हैं:
 "...प्रत्येक व्यक्ति को साल में कम से कम एक बार जिहाद पर जाना चाहिए ... वे उनके [गैर-मुसलमानों] के खिलाफ एक गुलेल का भी प्रयोग कर सकते । जब वे किले में हों, चाहें वे महिलाओं और बच्चों के बीच में हों, तब भी वहाँ आग लगाई जा सकती है और / या उन्हें डुबोया जा सकता है। उनकी बेकार पुस्तकों को नष्ट करना होगा .. जिहादी जो चाहें ले सकते हैं. ईसाइयों और यहूदियों को देना होगा अधिकारी उनकी दाढ़ी पकड़कर, उनके कान के नीचे मार सकता है, जज़िया देते समय धिम्मी का सिर झुका हुआ होना चाहिए। अन्य लोगों के मामले में न्यायविद जज़िया के संबंध में अलग राय रखते हैं।
उन्हें उनकी शराब या चर्च की घंटी को प्रदर्शित करने की अनुमति नहीं हैं उनके घर मुस्लिम के घर से अधिक ऊँचे नहीं हो सकते हैं, चाहें मुस्लिम के घर कितने भी नीचे क्यों न हों। कोई धिम्मी घोड़े या खच्चर की सवारी नहीं कर सकता; वह एक गधे की सवारी तभी कर सकता है,जब उसकी काठी लकड़ी की हो। वे सड़क के अच्छे हिस्से पर नहीं चल सकते । उनके कपड़ों पर महिलाओं के लिए भी एक की पहचान का पैच होना चाहिए, और यहां तक ​​कि उन्हें ये कपड़े स्नान के समय भी पहनने  चाहिए, धिम्मियों को कम बोलना चाहिए,   ... "(किताब अल वागिज़ एफआई फिग़ मधाद अल इमाम अल-सफीi पृष्ठ 186, 190, 199-203)
इमाम इब्न तैमिया (1263 -1328) वहाबी-सलाफी मुस्लिमों के बीच सबसे प्रतिष्ठित हनबली विधिवेत्ता और विद्वान जिनका प्रभाव हाल ही में सऊदी राजशाही द्वारा इनके धर्म के प्रचार-प्रसार के साथ काफी बढ़ गया है:
 “चूंकि न्यायसंगत युद्ध ही जिहाद है और इसका उद्देश्य है कि धर्म पूरी तरह से ईश्वर का है और ईश्वर का कथन सर्वोच्च है, इसलिए सभी मुस्लिमों के अनुसार इस उद्देश्य के रास्ते में जो भी आता है उनसे लड़ा जाना चाहिए... किताब वालों और पारसियों  से तब तक लड़ा जाना चाहिए जब तक वे मुसलमान न हो जाएं  या जज़िया न दे दें और दीन हीन न हो जाएं। दूसरों के संबंध में, उनसे जज़िया लेने के संबंध में न्यायविदो में मतभेद है। उनमें से अधिकांश इसे गलत मानते हैं" (रूडोल्फ पीटर्स, शास्त्रीय में जिहाद और आधुनिक इस्लाम (प्रिंसटन, न्यू जर्सी के कुछ अंश:। मार्कस वीनर, 1996), पृष्ठ 44-54)
शेख अहमद सरहिन्दी (1564-1624) - भारतीय इस्लामी विद्वान, हनाफी विधिवेत्ता, माना मुजादिद अल्फ-ए-सानी, दूसरी सहस्राब्दी की इस्लाम के पुनर्उद्धारक:
1. " भारत में गाय की बलि इस्लामी प्रथाओं में महानतम है।"
2. "कुफ्र और इस्लाम एक-दूसरे के विरोधी हैं। एक की प्रगति केवल दूसरे की कीमत पर ही संभव है,  इन दो विरोधाभासी धर्मों के बीच दूसरे और सह-अस्तित्व की कीमत पर अकल्पनीय है।
3. "इस्लाम का सम्मान कुफ्र और काफिरों का अपमान करने में निहित है। जो काफिरों का सम्मान करता है वह मुसलमानों का अपमान करता है। "
4. "उन पर जिज़या लगाने का  असली उद्देश्य उनका अपमान करना है। जिज़या के डर के कारण, वे अच्छी तरह से या आराम से न रहें। वे लगातार डरे हुए और भयभीत रहें ।
5. "किसी भी यहूदी का मारा जाना, इस्लाम के लाभ के लिए है।"
(सैईद अतहर अब्बास रिजवी, सोलहवीं और सत्रहवीं शताब्दी (आगरा, लखनऊ में उत्तर भारत में मुस्लिम पुनरुत्थानवादी आंदोलनों से कुछ अंश: आगरा विश्वविद्यालय, बालकृष्ण बुक कं, 1965), पृष्ठ.247-50, और योनाहन फ्राइडमैन, शेख़ अहमद सरहिन्दी:एन आउटलाइन आफ हिज थाट एन्ड ए स्टडी आफ हिज इमेज इन द आइज आफ पोस्टेरिटी(मॉन्ट्रियल, क्यूबेक: मैकगिल विश्वविद्यालय, इस्लामी अध्ययन संस्थान, 1971), पृष्ठ 73-74)।।
शाह वलीउल्लाह देहलवी (1703-1762): अत्यधिक सम्माननीय भारतीय विद्वान, धर्मशास्त्री, मुहद्दीस और विधिवेत्ता ।
“नबी का कर्तव्य है कि वे अन्य सभी धर्मों पर इस्लाम का वर्चस्व स्थापित करें और किसी को भी इसके बाहर न रहने दें। चाहें वे इसे स्वेच्छा से या अपमान के बाद स्वीकार करें।। इस प्रकार लोगों को तीन श्रेणियों में विभाजित किया जाएगा।
(नीच काफिर (अविश्वासी), उनसे निचले दर्जे के काम लिए जाएं जैसे भार ढ़ोना, फसल कटाई  के काम जिसके लिए जानवरों का इस्तेमाल किया जाता है। पैगम्बर भी काफिरों पर दमन और अपमान के एक कानून लगाता है और उन्हें अपमानित करने के लिए और उन पर हावी होने के लिए जिज़या लगाता है। वे उन्हें किसास, दियात, शादी और सरकारी  प्रशासन में मुसलमानों के बराबर नहीं मानते हैं जिससे ये  प्रतिबंध उन्हें अंततः उन्हें इस्लाम कबूल करने के लिए  मजबूर कर दें।“
हुजातुल्लाहू अल बालिगाह, मात्रा - 1, अध्याय 69, 289 पृष्ठ नहीं)
मोहम्मद इब्न अब्दुल वहाब, (1703- 1792 22 जून):
"चाहें मुसलमान बहुदेववाद से बचें रहें और Muwahhid (भगवान की एकता में विश्वास रखने वाले हों) फिर भी उनकी आस्था तब तक पूर्ण नहीं होगी जब तक वे गैर-मुसलमानों के खिलाफ अपनी शत्रुता और घृणा न प्रदर्शित करें।"
 (मजमूआ-अल-रासैलवाल मासैल-अल-नजदियाह 4/291)
अबुलअला मौदूदी  (25 सितंबर 1903 - 22 सितंबर 1979):
"इस्लाम सम्पूर्ण  पृथ्वी पर ऐसे सभी राज्यों और सरकारों को नष्ट करना चाहता है जो इस्लाम की विचारधारा और कार्यक्रम के विरोधी हैं,चाहें उस देश या राज्य पर कोई भी  शासन कर रहा हो। इस्लाम का प्रयोजन यह परवाह किए बिना अपनी विचारधारा और कार्यक्रम के आधार पर राज्यों की स्थापना करना है कि कौन सा राज्य इस्लाम के मानकों का वाहक है या कौन सा राज्य वैचारिक इस्लामी राज्य की स्थापना की प्रक्रिया में नियमों की अनदेखी कर रहा है।
... "इस्लाम को पूरी पृथ्वी चाहिए - न सिर्फ एक हिस्सा, पूरी कायनात, क्योंकि पूरी मानव जाति को [इस्लाम की] विचारधारा और कल्याण कार्यक्रम का लाभ मिलना चाहिए... इस उद्देश्य के लिए इस्लाम  ऐसे सभी बलों को ळगाना चाहता है, जो  क्रांति ला सकते हैं इन सभी ताकतों का प्रयोग  'जिहाद' है।... इस्लामी जिहाद का उद्देश्य सभी गैर- इस्लामी व्यवस्था को खत्म करना है और इसकी जगह  राज्य शासन की इस्लामी व्यवस्था को स्थापित करना है।
ज़ाहिर है, यह,  हदीसों, शरीयत, कुरान की Tafasir, सीरा पुस्तकों  और ऐसी न जाने कितनी किताबों में दिए गए कानूनी फैसलों का एक  बहुत छोटा सा नमूना है।
अध्यक्ष महोदय,
चरमपंथ और इस्लाम सर्वोच्चता मुस्लिम समाज की नसों में समा गया है । हम सर्वोच्चता की बात करते समय या सुनते समय  इस पर ध्यान तक नहीं देते हैं। उग्रवाद और सर्वोच्चता इस्लामी इतिहास में लगभग शुरू से ही मौजूद है । मुसलमान हदीस के संग्रह और शरीयत के सृजन  से पहले से ही आपस में बुरी तरह से लड़े थे। अब वे हदीस और शरीयत को  दिव्य मानते हैं। मुसलमानों को अभी भी कुरान के प्रासंगिक, उग्रवादी आयतों का कोई इलाज नहीं मिला है, जो अब इंटरनेट के कारण हर  किसी को उपलब्ध हैं। कुरान की सभी आयतों को, उनके संदर्भ के बिना, शाश्वत मानने, और  इन्हें  हर समय के लिए मुसलमानों पर लागू मानने से समस्या का समाधान नहीं होगा। हदीस और शरीयत को दैवीय कहने से आज की समस्या का कोई हल नहीं निकलेगा। मुसलमानों को ऐसा थियोलोजी छोड़ देनी चाहिए जो सिर्फ हिंसा और सर्वोच्चता की ओर जाता है और एक नए थियोलोजी की ओर देखना चाहिए, जो शांति और बहुलवाद को अपनाने वाला और इस्लाम की मूल शिक्षाओं के अनुरूप, और समकालीन और भविष्य के समाज के लिए हो।
नई थियोलोजी कुरान की एक पर्याप्त व्याख्या और कुरान की आयतों के सर्वोत्तम अर्थ का पता लगाने पर  आधारित होना चाहिए, जैसाकि पोप ने सुझाव दिया है और कुरान में बार-बार आह्वान किया गया  है। कुरान की प्रासंगिक आयतों को शाब्दिक रूप मेंपढ़ना छोड़ना होगा और कुरान की ऐसी आवश्यक, विधान आयतों को प्रधानता देनी होगी जिन्हें  सही मायने में शाश्वत महत्व का माना जा सकता है।
हमें उन व्याख्याओं, बड़े धर्मशास्त्रियों के कानूनी फैसलों के विशाल कोष का परित्याग करना होगा , जिसका हम सदियों से सम्मान कर रहे हैं।ला इकराहा फिद्दीन (धर्म में कोई बाध्यता नहीं है) लकुम दीनाकुम वलेय दीन (आप के लिए आपका धर्म मेरे लिए मेरा) हर माडरेट इस्लामी दर्शन की आधारशिला है। ये कुरान की विधान आयतें हैं और इनका महत्व शाश्वत हैं। ये हमारे लिए हर समय के लिए मान्य हैं।
समस्या प्रासंगिक और रूपक आयतों के संबंध में आती है, जब उनका शाब्दिक अर्थ ले लिया जाता है या उनकी व्याख्या अपनी समझ के अनुसार कर ली  जाती है । समस्या तब पैदा होती है जब तथाकथित उग्रवादी आयतों को  उनके शाब्दिक रूप में लिया जाता है और उन्हें सभी मुसलमानों के लिए अल्लाह के उपदेश के रूप में सभी समय के लिए वैध माना जाता है, और आज भी  उनका पालन उसी रूप में किया जाता है। आईएसआईएस नेताओं ने अपने मकसद हो सकते हैं, परन्तु हमारे बच्चें और युवा, लड़के और लड़कियाँ, जो हमारे अच्छे-भले  घरों और निजी स्कूलों को छोड़कर जा रहे हैं  वे इन आतंकवादी, आक्रामकआयतो  का शाब्दिक पढ़ने के बाद और उन्हें सार्वभौमिक समझकर ही ऐसा कर रहे हैं। कुरान की सभी आयतों को सृजित नहीं माना जाता है और मदरसों में सिखाया जाता है कि ये शाश्वत हैं और आने वाले समय में मुसलमानों के मार्गदर्शन के लिए हैं।
कुरान की एक रूपक आयत की यह व्याख्या की जा रही है कि मलहामा (Armageddon) केवल दो साल दूर है । दाईश (इस्लामी राज्य) मलहामा कही जाने वाली अंत समय की लड़ाई लड़ रहा है। यह गलत दावा भी एक कारण है जिसकी वजह से हमारे युवाओं के अंत समय की लड़ाइयों में शामिल होने के लिए दूर जा रहे हैं । इसलिए, मैं सोचता हूँ कि संदर्भ के बिना प्रासंगिक आयतें या रूपक आयतों के शाब्दिक अर्थ को पढ़ना या रूपक आयतों की तोड़-मरोड़ कर की गई व्याख्या ही हमें विनाश की और ले जा रही हैं।
हमें कुरान को अल्लाह द्वारा सृजित ऐसा काम समझना चाहिए, जिसमें वैधानिक,  प्रासंगिक और रूपक आयतें शामिल है जिनका अलग अलग समय और अलग अलग संदर्भों में अलग –अलग अर्थ है। जिसका मतलब है कि हमें कुरान में दी गई इस सलाह का पालन करना चाहिए कि आँख बंद करके कुछ भी स्वीकार करने से पहले हमें उसपर विचार करना चाहिए। पोप फ्रांसिस ने जैसा कहा है कि हमें सबसे अच्छा अर्थ या पर्याप्त व्याख्या खोजने की कोशिश करनी चाहिए। इसका मतलब है,कुरान की सभी आयतों को शाब्दिक रूप से नहीं पढ़ा जाना चाहिए।
मैं फिर से मुस्लिम राज्यों का प्रतिनिधित्व कर रहे प्रतिनिधिओं से अनुरोध करता हूँ  कि वे पोप की सलाह और कुरान  में बार-बार दोहराई गई बात को मानें और कुरान के सारभूत आयतों के सही अर्थ को समझे और उनकी सही व्याख्या करें और इस आधार पर एक नया थियोलोजी बनाएं। ऐसा करने के लिए हमारे पास बौद्धिक संसाधन हैं। हमे जरूरत है पुराने थियोलोजी  को छोड़ने के साहस की और शांति और बहुलवाद, सह -अस्तित्व और धार्मिक विविधता की स्वीकृति, और न्याय और सभी के लिए मानव अधिकारों वाले नए थियोलोजी को बनाने की इच्छाशक्ति की।

Sunday, November 22, 2015

Sultan Shahin, Not Owaisi, Represents India’s Muslims



By Madhav Nalapat
21 November, 2015
If portions of Islamic texts talk of war and violence, so do those of other religions.
When the Supreme Court gave its verdict establishing the rights following the divorce of an elderly Muslim woman, Shah Bano, against her ex-husband, most members of her gender within the community rejoiced. After all, as Arif Mohammad Khan pointed out, most males are not merely husbands but fathers of daughters, brothers of sisters and friends and relatives of women, each of whom was deserving of those protections of the law guaranteed by the Constitution of India. A few dissented, seeking to ensure that for the Muslim community, India followed the trajectory of Saudi Arabia, where a woman cannot drive a car on the road or travel freely alone. It was in 1985 a matter of a few lakh rupees to engineer riots and demonstrations on any issue, a situation that has changed only in that these days, the money involved in organising such “manifestations of the public will” adds up not to lakhs but to crores. Unfortunately, the predictable fringe protests which followed the Supreme Court judgement persuaded Rajiv Gandhi to pass a law, which denied Muslim women the post-divorce rights enjoyed by women from other communities. Earlier, in 1971, Indira Gandhi had similarly backtracked on freeing Muslim women from Saudi-style restrictions by ensuring that they were given the same status as their counterparts in Turkey. Still earlier, in 1955, during the drafting of the Hindu Code Bill, Jawaharlal Nehru rejected the advice of B.R. Ambedkar to extend a similar modernising touch to Muslims and Christians, whose personal laws were consequently left untouched.
The consequence of this triple failure by a single family to enact a code sensitive to the changes in society since the medieval era is that Muslim women in India have a much lower level of protection under the laws than even their sisters in post-Zia, indeed, post-Taliban, Pakistan. Muslims belong to a faith that has over a billion followers across the globe, and number 160 million within India, a number hardly of a size which would be in danger of vulnerability. However, in the 1930s, despite having a larger share within the total population within the subcontinent than is the case in 2015, several tens of millions of Muslims belonging to all regions and classes believed M.A. Jinnah’s canard that the community was in danger of their subordination to the British getting exchanged post-Independence to a similar fate under the Hindus. Jinnah’s scare tactics continue in different forms to this day. The Congress party, during 1931-47 failed to counter Muslim League accusations intended to create a siege mentality within the Muslim community. Jinnah’s campaign to vivisect India was given a boost by Mahatma Gandhi expelling from his midst a son who had converted to Islam. Since then, despite democracy and secular values, there have been multiple instances of murder of an individual of Community X by miscreants from Community Y and vice versa, but to conflate this into “proof” that Muslims, who in India form a strong, vibrant and overwhelmingly moderate community, are in imminent danger of death at the hands of frenzied Hindu goons is not simply ridiculous, but irresponsible in the context of the history of the past.
In reality, the most potent threat to the Muslim community and the primary reason for its relative lack of success in so many areas of endeavour is the fact that many of its young study in schools where the subjects taught exclude those needed to equip them for success in the 21st century. There is indeed room for madrasas, Veda pathsalas and Bible schools, not as replacements for conventional school education, but as add-ons for those seeking an enhanced understanding of the issues taught in such institutions. Wherever Muslims choose (or can afford) high-quality modern education, rather than study whole time in religious schools, they are more frequently than not in the lead in business and the professions.
If portions of Islamic texts talk of war and violence, so do texts in Hinduism, Judaism and Christianity. However, in the latter three faiths, such portions do not in the public mind supercede the other sections the way they have in discussions on Islam, especially in Europe and in North America. The consequence of such selectivity has been that non-Muslim elements in societies everywhere believe that it is individuals of the persuasion of Asaduddin Owaisi rather than Sultan Shahin, of Imam Bukhari rather than the Diwan Saheb of Ajmer Dargah, who most accurately represents the Muslim community. That only the wearer of a burkhas or a man who sports a long beard are taken as “genuine” followers of what in its overall teachings is among the most democratic faiths in the world, with each believer given the right to absorb the Quran’s teachings without the pervasive and sometimes misleading intermediation of the ulema that remains commonplace even in the present. Errors in typecasting of the faith and its followers by the rest of society have led to a gross inflation of the perceived importance of the fringe of that society, whereas among Hindus or Sikhs, similar elements are correctly categorised as fringe rather than mainstream. If Muslim society is undergoing the trauma of some within it getting seduced by Wahhabism, part of the fault rests in the manner in which non-Muslims have dealt with the fringe in the Muslim community as being the only genuine representatives of a community that is as moderate and as modern as are Christians, Hindus, Jains, Buddhists and Sikhs in India. The next time there is a debate on national television or a delegation gets invited for a dialogue with a policymaker, hopefully it will be the Sultan Shahins and the Diwan Sahebs who are given priority over fringe co-religionists, the way it is with all other communities in India.
Madhav Das Nalapat (M.D. Nalapat) is an Indian academic and columnist. Currently Editorial Director of The Sunday Guardian and ITV Group,[1] Vice-Chair of Manipal University's Advanced Research Group, and Director of the Department of Geopolitics, Manipal University. He has been the Coordinating Editor of the Times of India and editor of the Mathrubhumi.

Source: goo.gl/eRKUxR

Listening to the Inner Voice


By Roshan, New Age Islam
22 November 2015
It’s good to be busy, doing the things we have to, of course, but it’s also good to take some time off each day to be with ourselves, to enjoy our silence, to listen to what our inner voice—our true self—wants to tell us. Our inner voice constantly speaks to us, but how often do we take time off from our unnecessarily packed schedules to heed it?
I hadn’t a clue about the inner voice and the importance of listening to it till some months ago, when my good fortune  led me to a group of men and women, of varying age groups, nationalities and class religious backgrounds, who were on a tour sharing with people their experiences with ‘inner voice listening’.
The informal presentation the group made was deeply moving, and in a short while I was completely won over by the simple but compelling idea that they had come to talk about. “Sit in silence for, say, 20 minutes or half an hour every day, preferably in the morning,” they explained, “and invite your inner voice to speak. Listen attentively to what it says. If what you hear is in accordance with the norms of honesty and goodness and the welfare of all, you could take it to be your inner voice telling you something important. Note it down in a note-book. It’s as simple as that.”
Listening to one’s inner voice, the group explained, was key to self-realization, which is the essential purpose of all religions underneath their apparent diversity.  Anyone and everyone could do inner-voice listening. It wasn’t tied to any particular religion. You didn’t have to believe in any particular religion or ideology to do it. After all, no matter what our belief-system may be, every one of us has an inner voice.
Often, we just cannot bear to listen to our inner voice because we want to run away from what it seeks to tell us. We fear that what it wants us to hear maybe too painful or embarrassing. We think it may go against what we want to think about ourselves. We may consider the verdict of our inner voice too inconvenient to accept. This could be because of deep-rooted guilt for some action of ours that we are reluctant to admit. But try as much as we can, the guilt simply refuses to go away—the conscience refuses to allow it to. And so, it builds up inside, taking the form of resentment, hate, jealousy and anger, even as these negative emotions corrode us from within, harming ourselves much more than anyone else. Accepting the inner voice’s reminders about the wrongs that we have done and making amends for them is key to overcoming negativities and becoming a happier person, I learned that day.
“When you listen to your inner voice, you may be confronted by memories of some harm you may have done or hurt you may have caused to someone, through word or deed. Your inner voice may tell you to make reparations for this. If you heed this, you will be liberated from your guilt. An enormous burden will be lifted from your shoulders, and you will experience a great sense of relief,” the group explained.
This was no empty rhetoric. Members of the group revealed how following the lead of their inner voice, they had apologized to people they had hurt and how this had led to healing of broken relationships, freeing them from the burden of guilt and bringing in great joy in their lives.
While engaged in listening to your inner voice, I learned, you could give it topics to deal with. For instance, you could lead your inner voice to guide you about what to do with regard to a troubled relationship, to suggest a way out of a difficult situation or to take a decision on an issue about which you are confused. You could also direct the inner voice to help you list some of important things for your to-do list for the day.
“Keep up the practice of listening to your inner voice every day, and you will gradually grow in awareness of your true self. And as you begin to transform as a result, you will find people around you being transformed, too,” the group continued. “The world can be changed only if we as individuals change. ‘Be the change that you wish to see in the world’, as Mahatma Gandhi famously put it.’”
The testimonies of the members of the group about the amazing transformation that inner voice listening had brought about in their own lives bowled me over completely. That very morning, I did my first inner voice listening session, along with members of the group.
One of the first things that my inner voice prompted me to do was to confess some of the things I’ve done in the past that I had then sought to uneasily justify to myself but which I now was compelled to admit were completely unacceptable. So, for instance, I wrote to a professor who had, some two decades ago, given me a generous fellowship, and told him about how I had cheated on the bills that I had presented for reimbursement for expenses that I had wrongly claimed I had incurred. I had given the college fake bills, and I begged him to forgive me for this. I wrote to a landlady, saying how ungrateful I had been to her for her kindness. She had treated me wonderfully when I had lived in her house, but when she came to stay with me on vacation, I had treated her really shoddily. I requested her to pardon me for my terrible behaviour. I sent off a friendly email message to my sister-in-law, whom I had cut off links with because I had stopped speaking with my brother, her husband.  And so on.
And guess what? The results of all this were truly amazing! People who I thought would never forgive me did so with great alacrity! And in the process, I was relieved of a heavy burden of guilt and resentment that I had carried for years. It was truly wonderful being released of an enormous mountain of bitterness!
Inner voice listening has now become a part of my daily life. I set the alarm for around 20-25 minutes for this every morning, and sitting on my chair I let my mind speak to me as I sip my coffee. I get many messages from my inner voice every time I turn to it. It tells me how to manage challenges and navigate through life’s sometimes rough waters. It draws my attention to the beauty and goodness in people whom I sometimes resent. It insists that I apologise to someone I have been cruel to. It goads me to do this or refrain from doing that. It also suggests to me some important things that I must do that day. I jot down all that it tells me in a note-book. This exercise is one of the major highlights of my day, and I just love it!
You might like to try making listening to your inner voice a part of your everyday life, too. I’m sure you’ll find it beautiful, just as I have!

Rise of the European jihadi

By Praveen Swami
“Protect Islam and the Muslims”, he said, “humiliate polytheism and the polytheists, and allow the banner of Truth and Islam to fly high.
Why are some young Europeans turning against their own? The answer lies in the stories of those who carried out the Paris attacks — young unemployed men in the suburbs, part of street gangs, involved in drugs and petty crimes, till they gave themselves a “cause”
That day, a few hours before the massacre, Imam Muhammad Khatta was delivering his Friday afternoon sermon to the congregation at the Aisha mosque, in the French city of Montpellier. “Protect Islam and the Muslims”, he said, “humiliate polytheism and the polytheists, and allow the banner of Truth and Islam to fly high. Support your servants, the mujahideen everywhere, Lord of Mankind”.
In Paris, at about the same time Khatta ended his sermon, a group of young men were preparing for their final journeys. In the night, at 9.40 pm, one would send out a text message: “time to go”. Two would travel, vests filled with home-made but lethal explosives, to the Stade de France, hoping to target football fans crowding the entry gates. Held up by the traffic, they arrived too late to kill, but not to end their own lives. Elsewhere, though, things went as planned. Three men entered the Bataclan theatre, killing almost a hundred people. Four others drove to bars and cafés, emptying their assault rifles before blowing themselves up.
France’s president, François Hollande, has promised a “pitiless war” against the perpetrators — but that’s a more complex undertaking than it might seem. Though the hands that guided them are hidden in the Islamic State’s headquarters in Raqqa, those perpetrators who carried out the strikes are all French or Belgian-born and raised.
That has led many to ask why some young Europeans are turning on their own people with such ferocity. Is it France’s tradition of laicite, the rigorous separation of religious from public life, that has engendered segregation? Is it the depressing poverty of the Banilieus, the suburban housing estates that are home to so many Muslims? Does the answer lie in the hate-filled words of neo-fundamentalist preachers such as Khatta that fall on the receptive ears of young believers?
These easy-reach answers don’t begin to explain what happened. The outlines of the truth lie somewhere in the stories of the perpetrators and others like them.
A cult of death
Everyone in the Brussels neighbourhood of Molenbeek knew where to find Salah Abdeslam and his brother Brahim Abdeslam — and it wasn’t at the local mosque. The brothers would spend hours at Les Beguines, a local bar known for its relaxed attitude to its patrons’ drug use. Salah, in particular, was known for his freewheeling sex life. He paid great attention, neighbours recall, to his appearance, buying expensive teeth whiteners to remove tobacco stains. The thick cloud of marijuana became too much, though, for those living around the bar and it was shut down.
Local residents recall that when everyone in the market would gather at the mosque to pray, the brothers could be seen on the terrace ledge of a building, smoking marijuana.
Then, on a Friday morning the world will not soon forget, Salah Abdeslam drove his brother to his death at the Bataclan theatre, in a rented Renaut Clio — and disappeared.
Police records show Salah Abdeslam met slain Islamic State commander, Abdelhamid Abaaoud, in prison. In 2010, the two men were convicted of breaking into a parking garage, to steal car stereos they could sell for drugs. Then, the next year, Salah was jailed again, for a drunken assault near the metro station. In 2011, he was fired for skipping work too often. The two men were then arrested for armed robbery.
It’s hard to say just when, and how, Abdeslam turned jihadi — but his story is true to the template of the Paris killers.
Omar Mostefai, the Bataclan theatre killer, also turned radical in prison. Born to an Algerian father and a Portuguese mother, who converted to Islam when she married, Omar grew up in a secular environment: his parents visited the mosque on festivals, but had little to do with god otherwise.
Mohammed Dem, who studied with Mostefai and played with him in a local rock band, remembers him as an unexceptional teenager. “He was just like the rest of us,” Dem says. He was: before Mostefai was 21, he’d been convicted eight times, on charges ranging from drug dealing to brawling.
In the Paris suburb of Courcouronnes, scarred like so many similar neighbourhoods by gang-violence and unemployment, this wasn’t unusual. The family moved south to Chartres, 96 km away from Paris, a decade ago, perhaps hoping for a new start. The young Mostefai began work as a baker and had a child. Mostefai appears to have aroused little suspicion at the housing block he shared with his family. Arnauld Froissart, a 34-year-old bank employee who lives in the area, remembers Mostefai as “very discreet”.
Ben Bammou, the head of the local Islamic Association, remembers Mostefai attended the local al-Nusra mosque with his father until two years ago. “He was a reserved young man who played soccer with his colleagues.” Then, he disappeared — into the bowels of the Islamic State, police now believe, to join a group of jihadists led by Abdelhamid Abaaoud, the Belgian-born terror commander reported killed by jihadists last week.
Early this year, two days after the Charlie Hebdo shootings, a tall, black man shot dead three shoppers and an employee at a supermarket in Paris. Then, he calmly introduced himself to the 15 people who were now his hostages. “Je suis Amedy Coulibaly”, he said, echoing the Je Suis Charlie slogan that had echoed across the world. “I am Malian and Muslim. I belong to the Islamic State,” he went on.
For most of his life, god and nation were at some distance from Coulibaly’s life. A one-time armed robber and drug-user, his journey casts light on the dark spaces in our knowledge of the Friday killers’ lives.
In 1999, just 15 years old, Coulibaly had begun a career in armed robbery and drug dealing. The son of working-class immigrants who set up home in a poor Paris suburb, he began circulating through France’s prison system. Each term in jail seemed to do little to prevent the next.
Then, in 2006, he ran into Chérif Kouachi, the man who, with his brother, would attack the Charlie Hebdo office. The two found a common prison mentor in Algerian-born Djamel Beghal. Long a member of the Islamist movement in Algeria, Beghal had visited Afghanistan to join al-Qaeda in 2000. He was arrested while plotting to bomb the United States embassy in Paris.
Iranian-born scholar Farhad Khosrokhavar spent three days a week, for three years, in French prisons before the publication of his book Radicalisation, an authoritative study of the Islamist movement. Khosrokhavar believes Islamism is, for some Muslim prisoners, a kind of spiritual experience: “thorough jihadism”, he writes, “they transform the contempt of the others into fear”. Educated by hardcore jihadists, they come to believe “that they belong elsewhere, to the Islamic community, and not to the French society”. Thus, becoming a jihadist involves abandoning a real community for a new, imaginary one, the global ummah, or nation, that exists online.
In a video posted online just after his death, Coulibaly visually illustrated his transition: first, he wore the street-gangster’s leather jacket, then a military uniform and, finally, the white gown of the martyr.
Why France
Ten years ago, before he was arrested in Pakistan and despatched to the United States, Syrian jihadist Mustafa Nasar, known to his comrades as “Abu Musab al-Suri” and friends as “Redhead”, appeared in an online video. “It is our legitimate right to strike at France”, he said, “because we are at war with that country”.
In Algeria, Nasar argued, the jihad failed because its ambition exceeded its military capacity: the insurgency against the Algerian State had, eventually, been annihilated. He called, instead, for a war based on “the level of individual operations”.
Now, as the Islamic State has begun to suffer significant territorial losses, that’s a lesson it has studied carefully, as it brings its war to Europe.
For France, the war against Islamism isn’t new. In 1985 and 1986, bombs went off at iconic locations, like the Champs Elysées, and upmarket department stores, including the famous Galeries Lafayette. French intelligence eventually tracked down the perpetrators — an Iran-linked cell known as the Fouad Ali Saleh group.
Then, in the 1990s, fresh attacks followed: bombs went off on the public transport system, in cafés, in the streets. In 1992, the Islamic Salvation Front, or FIS, had won elections in Algeria, but was denied power by a military-led secularist coup. France supported the coup — and became a target. Led by veterans of the anti-Soviet jihad in Afghanistan, the Islamic Armed Group, or GIA, launched a campaign of terror, killing dozens of foreign hostages, as well as thousands of Algerian citizens.
In the years after 9/11, France launched a fresh assault on Islamist networks. Zacharias Moussaoui, the so-called “twentieth 9/11 hijacker”, was traced down by French intelligence and eventually convicted in the United States.
Later arrests, though, showed France remained a recruitment hub for global jihadists. In May 2002, French police arrested Ghulam Mustapha Rama, the leader of the ethnic Pakistani association Chemin Droit and the preacher at a mosque in Saint-Denis, for attempting to send recruits to the Lashkar-e-Toiba.
Then, in 2005, French intelligence dismantled a cell recruiting for the war in Iraq — the jihad against American invasion that would evolve, inside a decade, into the Islamic State.
In his book, jihadist ideologue Nasar wrote that “terrorism is like talent for poetry, music, painting and different aspects of the arts. The trainers and those supervising the foundation of Resistance cells must discover those talents and refine them with culture and training so that they find their place in leading terrorist operations in this type of blessed jihad”.
France’s disenfranchised suburban Muslims, many believe, is where that talent was to be found.
The French intifada
 “F… the Police”, read the graffiti outside the housing block’s entrance. A gaggle of teenagers stood outside, smoking, heads pulled into hoods of their track suits, not caring about the cold drizzle. Like many of Chêne Pointu’s young, the men were likely unemployed, living several to a room on premises rented from a ghetto landlord.
The teenagers didn’t want to talk about their lives, perhaps because there wasn’t a lot to say. The lobby of the building was covered in broken glass. The elevator wasn’t working: some young people made a living hauling groceries or luggage up the stairs.
It was called the French intifada: France’s worst riots in generations, which began in Chêne Pointu, when two young boys who erroneously believed the police were pursuing them ended up being electrocuted. Thousands of cars were burned, public properties vandalised, and dozens injured, in violence that tore through the suburbs, home to many of France’s Muslims.
The riots were centred in the most destitute quarters of the suburbs, often called “cités” or “quartiers difficiles”. Yet, as the eminent scholar Olivier Roy has pointed out, Islam was never invoked by the rioters. He noted that rioters, gangs of 20-200 young men, coalesced around neighbourhood identity: “Cité des 4000”; “La Madeleine”; “Val Fourré”; “Les Minguettes”.
Led by a caïd, Arabic for leader, the gangs were typically made up of very young people. Half of those arrested for the 2005 riots, police records show, were under 18; almost no one was over 25, and there were very few girls.
French sociologists offer several explanations for the growth of the gangs. There has been a breakdown of parental authority: fathers often don’t work, or are absent. There are large numbers of single mothers, struggling to make a living. In many homes of recent immigrants, mothers are disconnected to the world because of language difficulties.
The children, moreover, often earn more than their parents from small-time street crime, especially selling drugs.
Economic opportunity, moreover, is limited, with youth unemployment levels often touching 40 per cent. The industrial working class, which the suburbs were built of, has almost disappeared. France has a new economy — but the children of the suburbs, poorly schooled, do not have the skills to enter it.
Thus, the gang is an alternate social order, based on violence, complete with its rites of passage. In the suburbs, there’s no sign of a blooming of Islamism, just the gangs. The youth share the idioms and aspirations of Western youth culture, cherishing expensive sports shoes and designer clothes. Their music is hip-hop, not religious anthems.
“They want to be part of the consumer society, even as predators,” Roy has observed. “The suburban riots in France have more to do with the inability to cope with a ghettoised young generation underclass than with Islam”.
France’s growing Muslim middle class, a class which is thoroughly secularised in its personal life and has the highest rates of inter-religious marriage in Europe, has fled the Banlieues. This is true, too, of the tens of thousands of Muslim-origin students who pass through France’s university system each year.
In some suburbs, neo-fundamentalist Muslim movements, like the Tablighi Jamaat and a welter of Salafist groups, have tried to reach out to young people. Though some jihadists have begun their journey in these religious circles, their message of secession from the secular world has little attraction for the youth.
The world of the Belgian jihadists involved in the Friday massacre bears out this proposition. Though some of the Molenbeek district’s old factories have become chic addresses for yuppies, back streets — with their halal butchers and mosques — are some of the poorest in north-west Europe.
Every fourth resident of Molenbeek is unemployed — 37 per cent, if they are under 25. The children of immigrants brought in to work in the district’s textile factories have, like their French counterparts, found themselves jobless.
The neighbourhood has a strong presence of Saudi Arabia-funded establishmentarian mosques, as well as radical jihadist organisations like Sharia4Belgium. Even though small groups of people have flown Islamic State flags in the district, there’s no evidence that more than a handful of people from Molenbeek have been drawn to the cause.
Belgium has seen alarming levels of recruitment to the Islamic State, over 400, but that’s a tiny part of a population of over 700,000. Instead, the district is mainly attractive to jihadists, and other criminals, because of the easy availability of guns, shipped in by narcotics syndicates operating out of the Balkans.
This New Year’s day, Interior Minister Manuel Valls announced that 1,067 cars and trucks were torched across France by youth gangs in the Banlieues the previous night — a “significant reduction”, he noted, from the 1,193 vehicles that were burned in 2013. The gangs destroy some 40,000 cars each year, along with school premises, job-centres, and community facilities. It’s a war, perhaps, but not a holy war the perpetrators of the Paris massacre called for.
Source:  goo.gl/zIzMmi

India Ideas Conclave Discusses Wahhabi Threat









By Cleo Paskal
22 November, 2015
From 15 to 17 November, over 350 world leaders, academics and writers gathered in Goa for the 2nd India Ideas Conclave, hosted by the India Foundation. The Conclave, as one journalist put it, “shows a large intellectual ecosystem, in India and abroad, bound by a common concern for what is good for India”.
There were panels devoted to Indian digital innovations, new economics, Dalit entrepreneurships, and more.
But, given the timing, it was inevitable that the recent terrorist attack in Paris infused many presentations. The Valedictory session of the Conclave began with a minute of silence for the departed and many presenters warned that the Indian cultural underpinning of Islam in the subcontinent was at risk of being replaced by, as attendee Sultan Shahin put it, a Saudi-funded “desiccated Salafist/Wahhabi version of Islam”.
At the same time, presentations lauded India’s “unity without uniformity”. For example Dattatreya Hosabale, joint general secretary of the RSS said, “Unity is when all treat a person who comes to their door as a God. But that is not uniformity. How you do that might be different.” Ambassador Muhammad Zamir of Bangladesh said, “SAARC countries have a shared culture.” And Vinay Sahasrabuddhe, director of BJP’s Public Policy Research Centre, said, “Unity gives you the space for diverse manifestations. In India there is a spiritual democracy that is the cornerstone of our sustainable pluralism.”
However, there was widespread concern that Wahhabism was threatening that unity. Attendee Tshering Tobgay, the Prime Minister of Bhutan said, “The attacks on France were an attack on humanity.” While Sultan Shahin said, “The idea that life begins in the grave is a ticking time bomb that should be defused by all governments, Muslim and otherwise.”
Daniel Pipes, President of the Middle East Forum said, “There have been three earthshaking radicalism in 20th century: Fascism, Communism, and Islamism. The first two have been defeated, now we must defeat the third.”
It was acknowledged, however, that it wouldn’t be easy. M.J. Akbar noted, “You can’t scare a suicide bomber with the threat of death. When you think your stupidity is endorsed by your culture and your God, you can be proud of your stupidity. This is an existential challenge.”
However, Pipes also noted that Islamism has major flaws: adherents fight each other, as seen in Syria and elsewhere, and Muslims living under Islamist rule don’t like it, as seen in Egypt and elsewhere.
Tufail Ahmad, author of Jihadist Threat to India, made concrete suggestions on how to counter the threat in India. The core was to follow the Indian Constitution and ensure that the fundamental right to education.
Ahmad said: “Madrasas capture the Muslim child’s mind during the critical 6-14 years of age, an age when children are required to be protected by the Right to Education Act. All children must be in proper schools during the school hours of the day. A proper school means: students must achieve the same educational outcomes in mathematics and other material sciences which students from mainstream schools achieve. If a specific madrasa does not deliver these educational metrics, it must be banned as unconstitutional, in violation of the Right to Education Act.”
Ahmad said: “I don’t want quotas, I want my daughter to learn math and sciences,” adding, “the Muslim siege mentality and minority syndrome reside in Hindu-Muslim riots and quota politics. To remove siege mentality, India must ensure radical zero-tolerance police reforms and we must make quota politics redundant by developing a national policy of free books, free clothes and free schooling for children of all BPL card holders, irrespective of their religion and caste.”
“As a long-term strategy” Ahmad said, “the Indian government must introduce three textbooks from Grade 1 through 12: One on Indian classics such as Upanishads, Mahabharata, Gita and classical Indian thinkers; a second primer on the Constitution’s ideals; and a third primer containing good points from all religions. History gives us hopeful lessons: In India itself, Hindu youths abandoned castes and sati. Christianity and Judaism went through their internal conflicts; the Bible and the Torah are removed from public life. Since Islam is the youngest of the Middle Eastern religions, there is hope. The cause of Islamic Reformation in India must begin in the age group of 6-14 years.” The Conclave also explored vibrant Indian technology, literature, spirituality, and culture. It was a glittering kaleidoscope of hope and innovation — even brighter in comparison to the dark shadow of Wahhabism.
Source: goo.gl/0dHzT4

Saudi Arabia, an ISIS That Has Made It

By Kamel Daoud
NOV. 20, 2015
Black Daesh, white Daesh. The former slits throats, kills, stones, cuts off hands, destroys humanity’s common heritage and despises archaeology, women and non-Muslims. The latter is better dressed and neater but does the same things. The Islamic State; Saudi Arabia. In its struggle against terrorism, the West wages war on one, but shakes hands with the other. This is a mechanism of denial, and denial has a price: preserving the famous strategic alliance with Saudi Arabia at the risk of forgetting that the kingdom also relies on an alliance with a religious clergy that produces, legitimizes, spreads, preaches and defends Wahhabism, the ultra-puritanical form of Islam that Daesh feeds on.
Wahhabism, a messianic radicalism that arose in the 18th century, hopes to restore a fantasized caliphate centered on a desert, a sacred book, and two holy sites, Mecca and Medina. Born in massacre and blood, it manifests itself in a surreal relationship with women, a prohibition against non-Muslims treading on sacred territory, and ferocious religious laws. That translates into an obsessive hatred of imagery and representation and therefore art, but also of the body, nakedness and freedom. Saudi Arabia is a Daesh that has made it.
The West’s denial regarding Saudi Arabia is striking: It salutes the theocracy as its ally but pretends not to notice that it is the world’s chief ideological sponsor of Islamist culture. The younger generations of radicals in the so-called Arab world were not born jihadists. They were suckled in the bosom of Fatwa Valley, a kind of Islamist Vatican with a vast industry that produces theologians, religious laws, books, and aggressive editorial policies and media campaigns.
One might counter: Isn’t Saudi Arabia itself a possible target of Daesh? Yes, but to focus on that would be to overlook the strength of the ties between the reigning family and the clergy that accounts for its stability — and also, increasingly, for its precariousness. The Saudi royals are caught in a perfect trap: Weakened by succession laws that encourage turnover, they cling to ancestral ties between king and preacher. The Saudi clergy produces Islamism, which both threatens the country and gives legitimacy to the regime.
One has to live in the Muslim world to understand the immense transformative influence of religious television channels on society by accessing its weak links: households, women, rural areas. Islamist culture is widespread in many countries — Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia, Libya, Egypt, Mali, Mauritania. There are thousands of Islamist newspapers and clergies that impose a unitary vision of the world, tradition and clothing on the public space, on the wording of the government’s laws and on the rituals of a society they deem to be contaminated.
It is worth reading certain Islamist newspapers to see their reactions to the attacks in Paris. The West is cast as a land of “infidels.” The attacks were the result of the onslaught against Islam. Muslims and Arabs have become the enemies of the secular and the Jews. The Palestinian question is invoked along with the rape of Iraq and the memory of colonial trauma, and packaged into a messianic discourse meant to seduce the masses. Such talk spreads in the social spaces below, while up above, political leaders send their condolences to France and denounce a crime against humanity. This totally schizophrenic situation parallels the West’s denial regarding Saudi Arabia.
All of which leaves one skeptical of Western democracies’ thunderous declarations regarding the necessity of fighting terrorism. Their war can only be myopic, for it targets the effect rather than the cause. Since ISIS is first and foremost a culture, not a militia, how do you prevent future generations from turning to jihadism when the influence of Fatwa Valley and its clerics and its culture and its immense editorial industry remains intact?
Every weekday, get thought-provoking commentary from Op-Ed columnists, The Times editorial board and contributing writers from around the world.
Is curing the disease therefore a simple matter? Hardly. Saudi Arabia remains an ally of the West in the many chess games playing out in the Middle East. It is preferred to Iran, that gray Daesh. And there’s the trap. Denial creates the illusion of equilibrium. Jihadism is denounced as the scourge of the century but no consideration is given to what created it or supports it. This may allow saving face, but not saving lives.
Daesh has a mother: the invasion of Iraq. But it also has a father: Saudi Arabia and its religious-industrial complex. Until that point is understood, battles may be won, but the war will be lost. Jihadists will be killed, only to be reborn again in future generations and raised on the same books.
The attacks in Paris have exposed this contradiction again, but as happened after 9/11, it risks being erased from our analyses and our consciences.
Kamel Daoud, a columnist for Quotidien d’Oran, is the author of “The Meursault Investigation.” This essay was translated by John Cullen from the French.
Source: goo.gl/kUaMeQ

A Letter to Prophet Muhammad



 By Taymullah Abdur-Rahman
19/11/2015
Dear Prophet Muhammad,
Remember the man who stood up in front of a huge crowd and accused you of stealing from your own people when you were alive? His name was Hurgoos ibn Zuhair? When he stormed out of the mosque you said,
"From this man will come people who recite the Quran but they will not understand Islam. They will apostate due to their random killing of people. If I were to live, I would fight them."
As you prophesized, those people have emerged and they are wreaking havoc all over the world. You would be so hurt if you could see how Islam has been misrepresented and how many innocent lives have been lost as a result.
It all started when these people we call terrorists, killed Uthman, your third successor just 24 years after your death. They then killed his successor, Ali, shortly thereafter. They've been popping up and shedding innocent blood for hundreds of years now. Every time they appear they have a new name but the agenda is the same; kill as many people as possible who don't follow their molested version of Islam.
They've forgotten how you lived and frankly they don't care. They disregard the fact that you never once ordered the murder of a politician or a secret kidnapping when you and your companions were tortured in Mecca for thirteen years. They ignore that you were hit, kicked, spat on and even assaulted by your uncle Abu Lahab, who hated Islam and you did nothing in return. They don't mention that you said,
"Towards the end of time, if someone breaks into your home and wants to take your property be like Able, the better of the two sons of Adam."
I cry for Islam today Muhammad, because these evil people have misunderstood the Quran altogether. They claim that Allah ordered you to kill the 'People of the Book' but they don't understand that you weren't ordered to kill Jews and Christians at all. You taught us that those verses of war were ordering you to defend yourself against your own pagan Arab tribe at that time. These evil people discount the fact that you did business with Jews and Christians and had relationships with them.
These terrorists try and suppress the humanity and forbearance you demonstrated. Remember when you were chased out of the land of Taaif and stoned bloody and took no revenge? Remember when the pagan Arabs used to dump animal carcasses on your doorstep and even on your back while you prayed, and you would clean up without saying a word?
Just last week I debated a man who claimed that Islam and democracy are diametrically opposed to one another. I reminded him of the period you entered Medina and wrote a constitution allowing Jews and Christians the right to practice their faith openly, choose their own leaders, keep their own property and engage in business as they pleased. You even insisted that people of other faith-practices should settle their differences using their own laws. The man had no idea this was true. Most don't.
There are even some small-minded men who attempt to follow the letter of 7th century Islamic Law, rather than the spirit of it. They don't realize that Islam can be practiced in the 21st century with contemporary conditions taken into consideration. They want the entire world to continue to ride camels.
Since you've been gone, women have become the scorn of many patriarchal Muslim tribes even after you said,
"Be kind to women."
These so-called Muslims execute women who seek an education and if a woman is raped, she is blamed. You viewed women as an equal counterpart to men and you encouraged future fathers saying,
"Whoever has two daughters, educates them and takes care of them until adulthood will receive Paradise."
Considering the ascetic lifestyle you encouraged us to lead you'd be shocked at the number of corrupt Muslim leaders there are. Many Muslims have migrated from the Middle East to western lands because the leaders have stolen all of the wealth for themselves. Millions of young adults are illiterate, and with no functional economy to work for, they travel to the west seeking education and employment. Can you blame them?
I don't want to make it seem as if you weren't successful in your message. There was a golden era of a few hundred years where Muslims followed the true teachings of the Quran. We were prosperous, and lived in peace with others. We were the pinnacle of civilization with our inventions and scientific discoveries. We entertained guests from all over the world who came to take knowledge from us in places like Timbuktu, Spain, Morocco, and even Baghdad. But today, it seems the further we move away from the true message of Islam; which is peaceful submission to God and service to mankind, the more we become confused.
Those of us who are trying to hold on to the true teachings of Islam are having a difficult time in the west. People suspect us of being secretly in cahoots with the terrorists. College students, professionals and even school-aged Muslims have a pervading suspicion of guilt hanging above their heads no matter where they go. All of this is caused by the terrorists because now the average non-Muslim doesn't know what Islam really teaches us.
I pray that we can do what you advised us to do when you said,
"Make things easy for the people and do not make them difficult."
Only time will tell...
Your follower,
Taymullah
Source: goo.gl/uhb5TZ