An extremist figure whose role in terrorist activities is questioned comes to the forefront ahead of Indonesian presidential polls, and corruption, economic woes and disillusionment could pave his way.

By John CK Daly

Reports say that Abu Bakar Ba'asyir - the reputed spiritual leader of the militant Jemaah Islamiyah (JI) and head of the Majelis Mujahidin Indonesia party (MMI) - is considering running for president of Indonesia in elections scheduled for 2009.

While an estimated 86.4 percent of Indonesia's 234 million citizens are Muslims, most are moderates, and some of Ba'asyir's policies, especially his call for the implementation of Sharia law, could well strike resonant chords among many.

Ba'asyir's MMI is an umbrella organization for groups fighting for Sharia law in Indonesia.

While Ba'asyir denies involvement with the militant JI, he has stood trial and been convicted of involvement in terrorism and the recent arrests of top JI commanders have implicated him in direct involvement in the group's leadership.

During a recent interview in Jakarta, MMI spokesman Fauzan al-Anshori said that Ba'asyir first had the idea of running in the 2009 presidential election after a scandal involving illegal funds in the 2004 electoral campaign emerged in June. The scandal appears to involve all the candidates, including Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono.

"Ba'asyir is considering the possibility" but "he said that he wants to see what the people say first," Al Anshori told reporters.

On 9 June, Ba'asyir's involvement in JI again came to the forefront when Indonesia special police arrested the reputed head of JI, Zarkasih (also known as Mbah, or Grandfather), and the group's alleged military commander, Abu Dujana (whose aliases include Yusron Mahmudi, Pak Guru, Mahfud, Ainul Bahri, Sobirin and Dedi) in Banyumas, Central Java.

Both Dujana and Zarkasih trained in Afghanistan.

Between 9-11 June, special police also arrested seven other JI suspects: Arif Syaifudin, who was caught in Surabaya; Aris Widodo, caught in Karanganyar, Central Java; and Aziz Mustofa and Nur Afifudin, both of whom were arrested in Ngaglik, Sleman, Yogyakarta. All the suspects are believed to be aides of Dujana.

Taking no chances about mistaken identity, National Police spokesman Inspector-General Sisno Adiwinoto said fingerprint and DNA analysis had helped police identify Dujana.

Dujana, who speaks fluent Arabic, and Zarkasih were wanted for a spate of terrorist attacks, including the bombings of two nightclubs on Bali on 12 October 2002, in which more than 200 people were killed, along with a bombing at the JW Marriott hotel in Jakarta on 5 August 2003, a suicide bombing outside the Australian embassy in Jakarta on 9 September 2004 and 2 October 2005 suicide bombings on Bali, which killed 23 people.

During a press conference with the Indonesian national police, Dujana said: "From 1993 to 2000, Jamaah was led by ustadz [teacher] Abdullah Sungkar, then he was replaced by Abu Bakar Ba'asyir from 2000 to 2002. Then from 2002 to 2003, [JI] was led by ustadz Abu Risyan. From 2003 to 2005, it was led by ustadz Adung, and from 2005 until now [it has been led] by Zarkasih."

More damning evidence followed, with police telling reporters after the raids that they had seized video footage showing another top JI operative saying that Ba'asyir had once led JI.

Al-Anshori was quick to denounce the allegations. "It's a lie. Ustadz Ba'asyir was never appointed as JI's leader. He was only a friend of Abdullah Sungkar," he said. According to Al-Anshori, a Supreme Court ruling had vindicated Ba'asyir, "We defer to the Indonesian Supreme Court's decision proving that Abu Bakar Ba'asyir had nothing to do with Jemaah Islamiyah […] or with terror attacks in Indonesia."

While Zarkasih and Dujana were arrested on 9 June, their capture was only announced on 15 June. That morning, before the arrests were announced, according to a report on the Indonesian Internet site Jakarta detikcom, Ba'asyir, speaking from his residence at the Al-Mukmin Islamic School in Sukoharjo, called on Zarkasih to continue fighting for his principles.

"Keep your belief. If [Zarkasih] is confident that the way that he has chosen is in line with Islamic Sharia, he must not turn from this position, even though he has to face security problems. If he admits to having chosen the wrong path, he must repent of his sins immediately. Then he must tell the government if he actually did do the things that the government has accused him of or not."

Ba'asyir said that he first met Zarkasih when he was a student at Al-Mukmin, when he was known as Arif Sunarso. "I met him several times at some Koran recitation forum in Malaysia. I do not know about his current activities," Ba'asyir was quoted as saying. "I stress that they [who commit violence] do not commit any terror. Actually they are counter-terrorists. Their objective is good, but they have chosen the wrong way. They aim to fight against the real terrorist, the United States and its ally. So they are only ordinary criminals."

The trial trail

Ba'asyir was arrested a week after the October 2002 Bali bombings. He was put on trial in 2003, but because the prosecution failed to prove that he was a JI leader, he was sentenced instead to 18 months in prison for immigration offences. Police then rearrested him in April 2004 immediately after his release from prison and charged him under Indonesia's new anti-terrorism law.

During his trial, Malaysians Syamsul Bahri and Amran bin Mansur testified that Ba'asyir did in fact head JI. Bahri said he was told by Mukhlas, who was sentenced to death for his role in the 2002 Bali bombings, that Ba'asyir assumed the JI leadership after founder Abdullah Sungkar died in 1999. Amran - also known by his Indonesian name Andi Saputro - gave a less damning testimony, saying "I did hear people saying that Ba'aysir was selected to replace Abdullah Sungkar as JI leader but some people also said that it was Abu Rusdan, not Abu Bakar Ba'asyir."

Ba'asyir was sentenced to 30 months in prison after being convicted of having a role in planning the Bali bombings. He was freed in June 2006 after serving 26 months of his sentence. On the day of his release, he told reporters: "I thank Allah that I am free today. I call on all Muslims to unite behind one goal, which is the implementation of Sharia law."

On 21 December 2006, the Indonesian Supreme Court overturned Ba'asyir's conviction for involvement in the Marriott hotel bombing, greatly angering the Australian government.

Ba'asyir has made a number of provocative statements on terrorism. In October 2002, in the wake of the Bali bombings, he said: "I support Osama Bin Laden's struggle because his is the true struggle to uphold Islam, not terror - the terrorists are America and Israel."

Indonesia treads gingerly

In Indonesia, officials are treading gingerly, and there is considerable debate among Indonesian intelligence specialists as to how much the recent arrests have actually weakened JI. Police say the JI structure has been simplified and centralized, and has four wings: proselytism, education, logistics and the armed wing, which was allegedly led by Dujana. More than 400 alleged JI members have been arrested since the 2002 Bali bombing, and Jakarta has prosecuted almost 200 people for terrorist offenses since then, sentencing five to death.

Ba'asyir certainly views himself as having a political role, if only as an adviser. On 19 February, he and a dozen followers went to the presidential palace to urge President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono to implement Sharia law, saying: "We are here simply to advise the president that the country would be devastated if Islamic Sharia law is not implemented."

President Yudhoyono declined to meet with him.

In 2004, Washington requested Ba'asyir's extradition, but Jakarta refused, citing the fact that Indonesia had no extradition treaty with the US.

Washington strongly believes that Ba'asyir is connected to JI. On 13 April 2006, the US Treasury froze the assets of four JI leaders.

"As JI's top leader, Ba'asyir has authorized terrorist operations and the use of JI operatives and resources for multiple terrorist attacks in Southeast Asia. According to JI members, Ba'asyir needed to approve significant JI operations, either personally or through his leadership council. Ba'asyir authorized the Bali bombings of October 12, 2002, that killed 202 people. He authorized the use of JI operatives and resources for a plan to conduct simultaneous bomb attacks against US embassies in Southeast Asia on or near the first anniversary of the September 11, 2001 attacks. Ba'asyir also ordered a series of bomb attacks on Indonesian churches on December 24, 2000. The Christmas Eve bombings, carried out in 38 locations in 11 cities, killed 19 people and wounded approximately 120," the Treasury Department said in a statement.

In the meantime, advocates of Sharia law see their time as coming. And Jakarta has already made concessions. In December 2000, the government agreed to Aceh province to implement Sharia law as a compromise to pacify demands for the province's independence.

Another plank in JI's philosophy is the re-establishment of the Caliphate, a 1,600-year-old Muslim religious office ended by Ottoman Turkish leader Kemal Ataturk in 1924, which dated back to the time of the death of the Prophet Muhammad. The idea has steadily gained ground in recent years, and a Ba'asyir victory could energize militants worldwide pressing for the institution's restoration.

Altering the political landscape
If Ba'asyir does decide to run for election, he will face the choice of either establishing or affiliating with one of the country's marginal conservative Islamic parties, as Indonesian electoral law currently prohibits independent presidential contestants.

Particularly galling to Ba'asyir is Article 29 of the Indonesian Constitution that guarantees freedom of religion to Muslims as well as the country's Christian and Hindu minorities, estimated in the 2000 census at 8.7 percent and 1.8 percent, respectively. Other religious minorities, including Buddhists, are numbered at 3.4 percent.

A number of factors could alter Indonesia's political landscape before the 2009 elections. Indonesia's fragile economy, which, while largely recovered from the 1997 Southeast Asian economic crisis, could still experience a downturn. Furthermore, Muslim groups' influence has benefited from increased poverty. When Yudhoyono took office in 2004 he promised new policies to stimulate foreign investment, alleviate poverty and provide millions of jobs - vows that remain largely unfulfilled.

Corruption is also a major concern. Transparency International's 2007 survey places Indonesia among the most corrupt countries in the world, with a lax attitude towards prosecuting offenders, including former president Suharto, accused of embezzling an estimated US$15 billion-US$30 billion during his 32 years in power.

Indonesia placed 55th on Foreign Policy's 2007 Index of Failed States, which nevertheless said the situation had improved from the previous year. "The first direct elections were held in December in Indonesia's Aceh Province, host to a three-decade-long separatist war that ended in a truce in 2005. Former rebel leader Irwandi Yusuf, who escaped from jail after his prison was destroyed by the December 2004 tsunami, was elected governor, sidelining former elites who had long monopolized power."

Further besmirching Yudhoyono's reputation is a burgeoning scandal involving former fisheries minister Rokhmin Dahuri, who admitted in court that he distributed US$1.8 million in government money to candidates in the 2004 elections. Yudhoyono is also accused of having received some of that money - a charge he denies.

Another possible factor aiding a possible Ba'asyir candidacy is the country's fragmented political landscape, with more than 20 political parties. While radical Islamic parties received few votes during 2004 legislative elections, an anti-corruption platform combined with a moderate Islamic platform could well receive in an increased hearing in 2009, especially if Indonesia's major parties trot out tired candidates with dubious track records.

Ba'asyir has proven to be a master at advocating Islamic values while downplaying his reported terrorist connections. A major economic downturn, combined with yet more damaging corruption charges against the country's political elite could well boost his visibility at the polls - a situation that could provide Western democracies with a most unpalatable electoral choice in the world's most populous Muslim nation.



Dr John C K Daly is a Washington DC-based consultant and an adjunct scholar at the Middle East Institute. Article originally published at ISN


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The foiled plot in London and the attack on Glasgow Airport on the 29-30 June weekend offer several lessons and a warning for security services and terrorism analysis. Both incidents challenge some current assumptions, illustrate the difficulty of conducting terrorist operations, and may have opened a new form of aviation attack.

By John Harrison

The attacks in the United Kingdom have forced us to reexamine two assumptions and perhaps confirm an existing theory. First, it appears that all of the identified suspects were foreign nationals who had only recently arrived in the UK. This information will cause a re-examination of the idea that the threat is primarily from the host community Muslims. This assumption still has validity, but as was seen with the recent plot against the JFK airport, we have to recognize that the imported terrorist poses a major threat. And unlike the earlier trends, this group appeared to want to establish a longer operational life cycle. The fact that the attack in London was not a suicide operation may have been to allow for the attack in Glasgow.

Emerging profile

The emerging profile of the attackers is that of well-educated medical doctors. This should finally bury the notion that poverty causes terrorism. International terrorist organizations cannot conduct global operations with poor uneducated members. Insurgent groups, such as the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) or the Abu Sayyaf Group (ASG) require large numbers, and as they draw on a large rural population, they will have a high proportion of members in poverty. The profile of the latest UK attackers does support the theory that jihadi linked groups tend to draw heavily from the hard sciences. It appears that individuals who work in areas that have a binary world view - it is either right or wrong - are more susceptible to an ideology that shares this outlook. The two attackers who have been identified are both medical doctors working in UK hospitals.

Operationally, there is much public commentary on the direct tactical links to Iraq. Sir John Stevens, former head of the Metropolitan Police and advisor on terrorism to Prime Minister Brown, has even drawn a link from Bali to Baghdad to Glasgow. One must be careful in making this leap. It is clear that the tactics of using gas as a critical component in car bombs has been seen in Iraq. As a tactic it has a rather mixed record, one that was illustrated in the plots in the UK. It is clear that the use of incendiary devices is being advanced in Iraq, but incendiaries have been widely discussed in a range of jihadi publications for years. The knowledge is widespread given that groups across the ideological spectrum have used these types of bombs.

Message for Blair or Brown?

The timing of the attack has however created much discussion, with most commentators indicating it is either a farewell statement to Blair or a welcome reception for Gordon Brown. This of course may be the case, but it is not standard practice for the jihadi community to conduct operations based on western political cycles. The two occasions that this has happened - the attack on the USS Cole and certainly Madrid - have met with mixed results. So any linkage to the change in leadership in the UK is more likely to be coincidental.

The attack in the UK does illustrate how difficult conducting a terrorist operation actually can be. The cell does appear to have been well-funded; a Mercedes is an atypical choice for a car bomb and the cell had access to middle class housing. As none of the attackers conform to existing profiles, and did not have local support, they do not appear to have attracted the attention of the security services as likely terrorist suspects. Some had been involved in activities which had drawn the attention of the security services such as protests over the Danish caricatures of the Prophet. Even with these critical advantages, the plots were not successful. The bombs appear to have been put together in a rapid fashion, with little understanding of the impact of gas fumes on the driver. The cell made no effort to conceal their members’ identities, mask their communications, or appear to have understood the security and surveillance situations in their area of operation. This is particularly odd give the fact that the cell was intending to conduct two attacks with the same members. None of this would matter of course if the cell had succeeded in the attack on Glasgow. The fact that they failed to successfully execute any of the attacks illustrates a poorly understood aspect of terrorism: they are human and are prone to all the same fallibilities facing the rest of humanity.

Far too often we are led to believe that terrorists are smarter and better skilled than the average person. They are exposed to a different skill set, and they are perhaps demonstrating a higher commitment to a cause than the average person, but they are still human. In this case they were operating in a hostile environment with no apparent local support for the cell and thus had to conceive of the plan, conduct surveillance, acquire materials, rehearse and then conduct the attack on targets more than 500 kilometers apart, relying on there own materials and knowledge. None of this is easy with local knowledge.

New tactic

There is, however, one worrying new tactic. The attack on Glasgow Airport was a new methodology. To date we have not seen many attacks on airport terminals outside of war zones, and none in the western world using a car bomb. If the plot had unfolded in the way the attackers intended, and there is some debate as to the actually possibility, the causalities could have been devastating. Imagine the impact on the industry if hundreds of passengers were killed on the ground waiting to check in. The aviation security system is designed to protect passengers while in the air. If the focus has shifted, we must face the reality that there is little that can be done to protect queuing passengers at the ticket counters or security screening points. The aviation industry may be in for some even more difficult times in the months ahead.

We need to remember that our society remains under threat. But we cannot respond to that threat if we are to remain free and open. We need to evaluate the risks and take necessary and appropriate precautions based on that assessment.



John Harrison is Manager of Terrorism Research at ICPVTR and an Assistant Professor at the S Rajaratnam School of International Studies, NTU

Reprinted with permission from RSIS. Copyright (c) 2007 S Rajaratnam School of International Studies, Nanyang Technological University, Blk S4, Level B4, Nanyang Avenue, Singapore 639798.


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By James Ross

It's not every day that a 26-year veteran in U.S. military intelligence puts his career on the line by publicly criticizing a high-profile operation. But Lt. Col. Stephen Abraham, an Army reservist and lawyer, did just that last week in a Supreme Court affidavit that challenges the court's refusal to hear the claims of Guantánamo Bay detainees.

Abraham spent six months in 2004-2005 as a panelist on the Combatant Status Review Tribunals, or CSRTs, at Guantánamo, which were created to determine whether individual detainees were ''enemy combatants.'' His statement, claiming that determinations were based on outdated, generic intelligence that was rarely case specific, captures the extent to which the Bush administration has been willing to ignore if not manipulate the facts in pursuing the ''global war on terror'' -- even if it undermines those very efforts.

The CSRTs are not a requirement of the Geneva Conventions or a long-standing U.S. military practice. They were concocted by the Defense Department nine days after the Supreme Court ruled in June 2004 that Guantánamo detainees had the right to challenge the grounds for their detention in court through habeas corpus, the time-hallowed Great Writ that protects against unlawful and indefinite detention.

To date three-member military tribunals at Guantánamo have processed the cases of 572 detainees. Only 38 were found not to be enemy combatants. Unlike habeas proceeding, where the burden is on the government to show that the detention is lawful, the CSRTs required the detainee prove he was not an enemy combatant. And the CSRT rules prohibited the detainee from having the assistance of a lawyer or seeing most of the evidence against him.

But it turns out that the military panelists had not much more access to the evidence than did the detainees. Abraham says his repeated requests for information that would shed light on specific cases were routinely rejected. ''What were purported to be specific statements of fact lacked even the most fundamental earmarks of objectively credible evidence,'' he stated.

Criticism of the CSRT process is not new. In January 2005, a federal judge found that CRST rules were so unfair as to deny detainees any real opportunity to challenge their detention. And declassified transcripts of CRST proceedings released to the media are frequently unpersuasive in showing the detainee's combatant status. But Abraham's remarks are especially damning because they come from an experienced CSRT insider. The administration has repeatedly claimed that it had the goods on the Guantánamo detainees but that it needed the information to stay classified -- we now know that the secret evidence may have been secret simply because it didn't exist.

It's now clearer than ever that the Pentagon used the CSRTs to paint a veneer of legality over a largely predetermined decision. If this isn't troubling to the Bush administration, it should be to the American public. Not only are people being held for years unjustly, but the military's efforts and resources are being misdirected from those who really have the intention and means of doing the country harm. Adding these dubious panels to the Guantánamo mix of indefinite detention, abusive interrogations and unfair military commissions, and it's not hard to understand why the U.S. has received less than full support from its allies in the fight against terrorism.

Instead of trying to fix a CSRT process that is fundamentally flawed, the federal courts should be hearing the detainees' habeas petitions. But a ''court stripping'' statute blocks the way. Under the Military Commissions Act rushed through Congress last fall, the courts are prevented from reviewing habeas petitions brought by Guantánamo detainees or other nonnationals held abroad. By tampering with a fundamental right that dates back to the Magna Carta, the act threatens the protections against unlawful detention to which we are all entitled.

Several bipartisan measures are now before Congress that in one form or another would restore habeas to the Guantánamo detainees. That is important and necessary. But the Bush administration need not wait for a new law to be enacted. Abraham showed forthrightness and courage by publicly raising his concerns about the CSRT process at Guantánamo -- perhaps at the expense of his distinguished army career. The administration could show similar fortitude and take steps now, rather than later, to restore an independent check on detentions and ensure that the United States is no longer holding anyone outside the pale of law.


James Ross is legal and policy director at Human Rights Watch. Published in The Miami Herald


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By Ekklesia

The National Association of British Arabs (NABA) has strongly condemned the attack on Glasgow Airport and the car bombs found in London at the weekend - stressing that secular opinion as well as that of Muslims, Christians and others must be taken into account in seeking to move beyond war and terror.

Dr Ismail Jalili, who is chair of the National Association of British Arabs and past president of the British Arab Medical Association and the Iraqi Medical Association - UK, declared: "Such attacks do not serve any process for peace. Neither do they reflect the wishes of Arabs who, the world over, seek only to live in peace and who, perhaps more than most, know the despair of losing innocent family and friends as victims to such vicious attacks."

He continued: "The youth and professional status of those arrested today should demonstrate that we are now dealing with a generation that has grown up in a world dominated by injustice and a ongoing state of conflict and all that entails. This should give us cause for grave concern for those who have lost hope and the ability to ration and think clearly; who go beyond reasoning to kill themselves and other innocents as tit-for-tat measures. Revenge by killing innocent civilians is not a solution; it serves only to escalate conflict on all sides."

Dr Jalili said: "We welcome Gordon Brown’s acceptance that there must be an approach to ‘hearts and minds’ but this can only be achieved by Britain resuming its important role on the world stage as a mediator for good. We urge him to address the international issues behind terrorism."

He went on: "We also urge [the Prime Minister] and the media to review the wisdom of previous government policy which has focused on faith to the determent of secular organisations. This focus has detracted and diverted potential gains that could have been made into persuading and empowering disillusioned youth to participate via the British democratic framework."

With thanks to Helen Glibert

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By Robert Duncan

Folks seem to be in a quandary when asked if the terms “Islam” and “Fascists” can be used in the same sentence. Those who line-up on the naysayers' side claim any such linkage demonstrates a lack of sensitivity toward the vast majority of followers of Islam.

But despite some weak politically correct attempts, the fact is that the press for the most part is guilty of whitewashing one simple fact: There is a radical, heretical brand of Islam fostering terrorism that is indeed a by-product of Fascism and a hatred of Jews.

Shahid Nickels, a member between 1998 and 2000 of the group headed by Mohammed Atta who led the 9-11 attacks, said that "Atta's weltanschauung was based on a National Socialist way of thinking. He was convinced that 'the Jews' are determined to achieve world domination. He considered New York City to be the center of world Jewry which was, in his opinion, Enemy Number One," according to an article written by Dr. Matthias Küntzel. (1)

Atta’s peculiar “Nationalist Socialist way of thinking,” however, was far from unique. In fact, it was a seed germinating for 80 years among radical Islamists that can be traced to Hassan al-Banna, a 22-year-old school teacher who gathered discontent Muslims to found the Muslim Brotherhood in 1928/1929.

While initial growth of the Muslim Brotherhood was moderate, the organization's membership rolls - coinciding with rising anti-Semitism in Europe – by August 1938 had swelled to more than two hundred thousand members. By the end of World War II the Muslim Brotherhood had around half a million members.

"Islamism, or fascism with an Islamic face, was born with and of the Muslim Brotherhood. It proved (and improved) its fascist core convictions and practices through collaboration with the Nazis in the run-up to and during World War II. It proved it during the same period through its collaboration with the overtly fascist "Young Egypt" (Misr al-Fatah) movement, founded in October 1933 by lawyer Ahmed Hussein and modeled directly on the Hitler party, complete with paramilitary Green Shirts aping the Nazi Brown Shirts, Nazi salute and literal translations of Nazi slogans. Among its members, Young Egypt counted two promising youngsters and later presidents, Gamal Abdel Nasser and Anwar El-Sadat," so begins an Asia Times article by Marc Erikson. (2)

"The "Supreme Guide" of the brethren knew that faith, good works and numbers alone do not a political victory make. Thus, modeled on Mussolini's blackshirts (al-Banna much admired "Il Duce" and soul brother "Fuehrer" Adolf Hitler), he set up a paramilitary wing (slogan: "action, obedience, silence", quite superior to the blackshirts' "believe, obey, fight") and a "secret apparatus" (al-jihaz al-sirri) and intelligence arm of al-Ikhwan to handle the dirtier side - terrorist attacks, assassinations, and so on - of the struggle for power," writes Erikson elsewhere. (3)

According to John Loftus, a former prosecutor with the US Justice Department, "Al-Banna formed this nationalist group called the Muslim Brotherhood. Al-Banna was a devout admirer of Adolf Hitler and wrote to him frequently."

Loftus adds that Al-Banna was so persistent in his "admiration of the new Nazi Party that in the 1930s Al-Banna and the Muslim Brotherhood became a secret arm of Nazi Intelligence. With the goal of the Third Reich to develop the Muslim Brotherhood as an army inside Egypt.” (4)

So what was Al-Banna teaching?

Well, for one thing Al-Banna idealized death.



"To a nation that perfects the industry of death and which knows how to die nobly, God gives proud life in this world and eternal grace in the life to come" and "We are not afraid of death, we desire it... Let us die in redemption for Muslims," Al-Banna once wrote.

The Muslim Brotherhood also "used and disseminated a quotation from the Koran that Jews are to be considered 'the worst enemy of the believers.' In addition, they evoked old stories of the early history of Islam by pointing to the example set by Mohammed who, as legend has it, succeeded not only in expelling two Jewish tribes from Medina during the 7th century, but killed the entire male population of the third tribe and sold all the women and children into slavery." (5)

Spreading their hate-filled message toward Jews, the Muslim Brotherhood found a soul-mate in Amin el-Husseini, the Mufti of Jerusalem who held the highest political and religious posts in Palestine from 1921 until after World War II.

Loftus and other authors note that the Muslim Brotherhood and Mufti had common goals with the new Nazi doctrines: a hatred for Western culture, democracy and Jews.

The Mufti with the Muslim Brotherhood and Nazi ideology was a dangerous cocktail.

"As early as 1929, a Mufti-led pogrom killed 133 autochthonous Jews in Jerusalem and Hebron. Shortly thereafter, the Mufti declared the relentless fight against the Jews as the most important responsibility of all believers. Those who dared to resist his anti-Jewish orders were publicly denounced and publicly threatened in the mosques during Friday prayers." (6)

"In a letter to Adolf Hitler, the Mufti emphasized his unflagging and successful efforts to use the "the Palestine question'' in order 'to coalesce all Arab countries in a common hatred against the British and the Jews.'" (7)

Starting in 1933, the Mufti repeatedly offered to serve the German Nazi government. In the beginning, however, the Mufti's fight against Jews was only supported in terms of ideology. That soon, however, changed.



The Palestine’s 1936 "Arab Revolt" was in a large part incited by the Mufti, with cries of "Down with the Jews!" and "Jews get out of Egypt and Palestine!"



It was not until 1937 that the Mufti's "Holy War" began to receive substantial financial support and weapons from Nazi Germany, which allowed Hitler's Islamist agents both in Palestine and the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt to spread their anti-Jewish hatred.

Klaus Gensicke writes in his dissertation on the Mufti's collaboration with the Nazis: "The Mufti himself admitted that it was entirely due to the money contributed by the Germans that allowed him at that time to carry out the uprising in Palestine."



“The Mufti's so-called "Arab Revolt" took place against the background of the swastika: Arab leaflets and signs on walls were prominently marked with this Nazi symbol; the youth organization of the Mufti´s political party paraded as "Nazi-scouts", and Arab children greeted each other with the Nazi salute. Those who had to pass through the rebellious quarters of Palestine attached a flag bearing the swastika to their vehicles so as to insure protection against assaults by the Mufti's volunteers.” (8)



By 1945 the Nazi Islamist agents were openly spreading terror. “The core of anti-Semitism had thus begun to shift from Germany to the Arab world. On the anniversary of the Balfour-declaration, demonstrators rampaged the Jewish quarters of Cairo. They plundered houses and shops, attacked non-Muslims, devastated the synagogues and then set them on fire. Six people were killed, several hundred more were injured.” (9)

Al-Husseini, wrote in his post-WWII memoirs, "Our fundamental condition for cooperating with Germany was a free hand to eradicate every last Jew from Palestine and the Arab world. I asked Hitler for an explicit undertaking to allow us to solve the Jewish problem in a manner befitting our national and racial aspirations and according to the scientific methods innovated by Germany in the handling of its Jews. The answer I got was: 'The Jews are yours.'" (10)

According to an article by David Storobin in Front Page magazine, "Controlling a spectacular sum of money and the right to appoint Palestinian Islamic preachers, al-Husseini built a ‘political machine’ that brought the religious and political establishment under his domination. Through them, he was able to arouse religious fanaticism against Jews and the West. His preachers urged their flock to ‘go out and murder the Jewish infidel in the name of the holy Koran,’ constantly declaring that ‘he who kills a Jew is assured of a place in the next world.’” (11)

Dr. Matthias Küntzel quotes Klaus Gensicke who claims that "The Mufti himself admitted that it was entirely due to the money contributed by the Germans that allowed him at that time to carry out the uprising in Palestine." (12)

Storobin notes that al-Husseini was, “officially received by Adolf Hitler on November 28, 1941, who agreed to establish a bureau for al-Husseini which was used to spread propaganda on behalf of Nazi Germany, organize spy rings in Europe and the Middle East, and most importantly, establish Muslim Nazi SS divisions and Wehrmacht units in Bosnia, the Balkans, North Africa and Nazi-occupied parts of the Soviet Union. After the meeting, the Mufti was also named SS Gruppenfuehrer by Heinrich Himmler and referred to as the “Fuhrer of the Arab World” by Adolf Hitler himself.”

”The largest Muslim Nazi SS unit was the 13th division known as “Hanjar.” Husseini also organized smaller, less efficient units, including the 21st Waffen SS division known Skanderbeg (made up predominantly of Croatians) and the 23rd Waffen SS division known as Kama and made up mostly of Albanian Muslims. Thus, the Hitler’s Mufti organized or helped to organize three out of 27 Waffen SS divisions formed before 1945.” (13)

Loftus too claims that the Mufti “went to Germany during the war and helped recruit an international SS division of Arab Nazis. They based it in Croatia and called it the Handzar Muslim Division, but it was to become the core of Hitler's new army of Arab fascists that would conquer the Arabian Peninsula and, from there, on to Africa—grand dreams." (14)

According to Küntzel, "The powerful collaboration of the Muslim Brothers with the Mufti and the pogroms against Jews a few months after the world learned about Auschwitz clearly showed that the Brotherhood either ignored or even justified Hitler´s extermination of European Jews."

Küntzel telling writes that "The consequences of this attitude, however, continue to be far-reaching and characterize the Arabic-Jewish conflict to this day." (15) Küntzel notes that this group of Islamists in 1947 explained away the international support of the creation of Israel and the murder of six million European Jews by Nazi Germany, by reverting to anti-Semitic conspiracy theories.

In this vein, the Muslim Brotherhood considered the UN-decision of 1947 to partition Palestine to be an "international plot carried out by the Americans, the Russians and the British, under the influence of Zionism," (16) Küntzel noted. (17)

Not surprisingly, given their role in WWII, the Muslim Brotherhood was wanted for War Crimes. However, instead of being brought to justice the Arab Nazis were snapped up by foreign spy agencies.

Specifically, John Loftus claims that, almost the entire network was taken in by the British Secret Service. “Then a horrible thing happened. Instead of prosecuting the Nazis—the Muslim Brotherhood—the British Government hired them. They brought all the fugitive Nazi war criminals of Arab and Muslim descent into Egypt, and for three years trained them on a special mission. The British Secret Service wanted to use the fascists of the Muslim Brotherhood to strike down the infant state of Israel in 1948. Only a few people in the Mossad know this, but many of the members of the Arab armies and terrorist groups that tried to strangle the infant State of Israel were the Arab Nazis of the Muslim Brotherhood.”

”Britain was not alone. The French Intelligence Service cooperated by releasing the Grand Mufti and smuggling him to Egypt, so all of the Arab Nazis came together. So, from 1945 to 1948, the British Secret Service protected every Arab Nazi it could, but failed to quash the State of Israel”, according to Loftus. (18)

Despite being now on side of the Allies, the Brotherhood didn’t sit still – nor did their ideology get any tamer.

One of the main voices behind the Muslim Brotherhood was Sayed Qutb. With time, Qutb would eventually become the organization’s ambassador in the 1950s in Syria and Jordon, as well as being the editor of the Brotherhood’s official publication. While in prison following an assassination attempt on Egypt’s Nasser, Qutb wrote his treatise, Milestones, that advocated overthrowing Arab governments that refused to be run by anything other than the law of Islamic Shariah.

According to a BBC article, “For Qutb, all non-Muslims were infidels - even the so-called ‘people of the book’, the Christians and Jews - and he predicted an eventual clash of civilisations between Islam and the west.” (19)

"Having played a large role in Nasser's power grab, the Muslim Brotherhood, after the 1949 assassination of Hassan al-Banna by government agents under new leadership and (since 1951) under the radical ideological guidance of Sayyid Qutb, demanded its due - imposition of Sharia (Islamic religious) law. When Nasser demurred, he became a Brotherhood assassination target, but with CIA and the German mercenaries' help he prevailed. In February 1954, the Brotherhood was banned. An October 1954 assassination attempt failed. Four thousand brothers were arrested, six were executed, and thousands fled to Syria, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Lebanon," notes Erikson. (20)

When Nasser cracked down on the Muslim Brotherhood in 1955 they initially moved headquarters to London and Geneva. Incidentally, the head of the Geneva offices was Said Ramadan, the son-in-law of al-Banna. In Geneva, Ramadan launched the Institute for Islamic Studies – to become the civilized face of the Muslim Brotherhood, even having the distinction of dining with US President Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1953 at the White House. (21)

That fleeing of Muslim Brotherhood members – people who had been radicalized by Qutb, the Mufti and Nazi ideology – and the consequent spreading of their message, is something that the world is still living with.

According to that same BBC article, “Qutb and (Pakistan’s Syed Abul Ala Maududi) inspired a whole generation of Islamists, including Ayatollah Khomeini, who developed a Persian version of their works in the 1970s.

Author and journalist Robert Dreyfuss also claims that the groundwork for the Ayatollah Khomeini was done by an Iranian by the name of Ali Shariat who was influenced by the Brotherhood.

As a sidenote, with respect to Hezbollah, it is widely reported that the organization got its beginnings in Iran. That is an oversimplification.

“The origins of Shi'i Islamism in Lebanon go back not to Iran, as is commonly thought, but to Iraq in the 1960s where a Shi'i religio-political revival took place in the "circles of learning" (hawzat al-'ilmiya) in Najaf, led by the charismatic Ayatollah Muhammad Baqir as-Sadr,” according to an article in the Middle East Review of International Affairs - Sept. 1997.

“Hezbollah represented a militant, nonsecular alternative to the Nasserite Fatah, Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, and other groups that took their bearing from Pan-Arabism rather than Islam. Hezbollah split the Shiite community in Lebanon -- which was against Sunnis and Christians -- but most of all, engaged the Israelis. It made a powerful claim that the Palestinian movement had no future while it remained fundamentally secular and while its religious alternatives derived from the conservative Arab monarchies.” (22)

Iran’s importance only became more noted upon the death of Sadr, and the success of the Iranian Revolution led by Khomeini. By 1984, Iran was financing around 90 percent of Hezbollah’s social works in Lebanon.

As it stands now, Hezbollah “subscribes to Khomeini's theory that a religious jurist (wilayat al-faqih) should hold ultimate political power. The authority of this jurist, both spiritual and political, may not be challenged; he must be obeyed. Hezbullah sees itself fulfilling the messianic role of turning Lebanon into a province of Islam. In its "open letter" of February 1985, Hizbullah declared that Muslims must "abide by the orders of the sole wise and just command represented by the supreme jurisconsult, who is presently incarnate in the imam_Ayatollah Khomeini. It also called for a battle with vice, meaning foremost the United States, and for the destruction of Israel to make way for Palestine,” according to that same Middle East Review of International Affairs article.

Eventually, says Loftus the control of the Muslim Brotherhood passed to the United States and the CIA - or its earlier form – as a counterweight for Arab Communists.

But this still doesn't explain how we get the current form of Islam Fascists. For that one needs to remember that after Nasser expelled the Muslim Brotherhood from Egypt many of them went to Saudi Arabia.

According to Loftus, "during the 1950s, the CIA evacuated the Nazis of the Muslim Brotherhood to Saudi Arabia. Now, when they arrived in Saudi Arabia, some of the leading lights of the Muslim Brotherhood, like (Dr Abdullah) Azzam, became the teachers in the madrassas, the religious schools. And there they combined the doctrines of Nazism with this weird Islamic cult, Wahhabism.”

“Everyone thinks that Islam is this fanatical religion, but it is not. They think that Islam—the Saudi version of Islam—is typical, but it's not. The Wahhabi cult has been condemned as a heresy more than 60 times by the Muslim nations. But when the Saudis got wealthy, they bought a lot of silence. This is a very harsh cult. Wahhabism was only practised by the Taliban and in Saudi Arabia—that's how extreme it is. It really has nothing to do with Islam. Islam is a very peaceful and tolerant religion. It always had good relationships with the Jews for the first thousand years of its existence.” (23)

Interestingly, according to a Wikipedia entry on Wahhabism, Al-Banna, is said to have been influenced by the Wahhabis. “The Muslim Brotherhood also claimed to be purifying and restoring original Islam. When the Muslim Brotherhood was banned in various Middle Eastern countries, Saudi Arabia gave refuge to Brotherhood exiles. This seems to have set the stage for a mingling of Brotherhood and Wahhabi thought under the aegis of the term Salafism. Rebels against the Saudi state found justification in the thought of Sayyed Qutb, a member of the Brotherhood who spent years in Egyptian jails. Some Wahhabis, or Salafis, rejected what they call Qutbism, as a deviation from true Salafism. Thus there is now a considerable spectrum of religious opinion within Saudi Wahhabism/Salafism, to a great extent divided on the question of whether the Saudi state is to be supported, endured patiently, or violently opposed. The modern day Salafis, deny that Hassan al-Banna or Sayid Qutb were followers of the Salaf, since they upheld the view that it is allowed to overthrow the Muslim leader, and to make "Takfeer" (the act of placing a Muslim out of the fold of Islam, making him a disbeliever) on him based on Major Sins. (24)

To this last point, Trevor Stanley also writes that today there are "a profusion of self-proclaimed Salafi groups," where each accuses "the others of deviating from 'true' Salafism."

Stanley notes that "Since the 1970s, the Saudis have wisely stopped funding those Salafis that excommunicate nominally Muslim governments (or at least the Saudi government), condemning al-Qaeda as ‘the deviant sect’. The pro-Saudis correctly trace al-Qaeda’s ideological roots to Qutb and al-Banna. Less accurately, they accuse these groups of insidiously 'entering' Salafism. In fact, Salafism was imported into Saudi Arabia in its Ikhwani and Qutbist forms. This does not mean that the pro-Saudi Salafis are necessarily benign - for example, Abu Mu'aadh as-Salafee’s main criticism of Qutb and Muslim Brotherhood founder Hassan al-Banna is that they claim Islam teaches tolerance of Jews." (25)

Meanwhile, non-Muslims and mainstream Muslims alike use the ‘Wahhabi-Salafi’ label to denigrate Salafis and even completely unrelated groups such as the Taliban, adds Stanley.

It was in the Saudi Arabian madrassas, or schools, of Abdullah Azzam that Nazi Fascism with religious extremism were married.

And in one of those madrassas, the student Osama bin Laden studied.

"Should it further surprise us that Osama bin Laden accuses 'the Jews" of "holding America and the West hostage' given the fact, that the founder of Hamas, the Palestinian Abdullah Azzam, was at the same time the most important teacher and patron of al Qaida's leader?" asks Dr. Matthias Küntzel (26)

"The origins of Bin Laden's concept of jihad can be traced back to two early 20th century figures, who started powerful Islamic revivalist movements in response to colonialism and its aftermath," writes Fiona Symon, a Middle East analyst. "Pakistan and Egypt - both Muslim countries with a strong intellectual tradition - produced the movements and ideology that would transform the concept of jihad in the modern world."

"They blamed the western idea of the separation of religion and politics for the decline of Muslim societies ... This, they believed, could only be corrected through a return to Islam in its traditional form, in which society was governed by a strict code of Islamic law," Symon writes, adding: "Al-Banna and Maudoudi breathed new life into the concept of jihad as a holy war to end the foreign occupation of Muslim lands." (27)

Loftus – and many other authors - says that with the Russian invastion of Afghanistan in 1979, "the CIA decided to take the Arab Nazis out of cold storage."

"So we told the Saudis that we would fund them if they would bring all of the Arab Nazis together and ship them off to Afghanistan to fight the Russians," according to Loftus. "We had to rename them. We couldn't call them the Muslim Brotherhood because that was too sensitive a name. Its Nazi past was too known. So we called them Maktab al-Khadamat al-Mujahidin, the MAK." (28)

One of those people shipped off to Afghanistan, after being indoctrinated in Azzam's madrassas, was Osama bin Laden - and who in turn melded the ideas of Hassan al-Al-Banna's Muslim Brotherhood with those of Pakistan's Syed Abul Ala Maududi's Jamaat Islami after being exposed to it while fighting in Afghanistan.

Their terror has now extended to the entire world.

While the vast majority of believers in Islam certainly cannot be labeled as Islam Fascists, it remains that there is a group within the Muslim ranks that does have its roots based in National Socialism and Fascist ideologies. In an effort to brand Bush as politically incorrect, anti-Bush politicians and bloggers who are ignorant of history have become unwitting apologists for Islamo-Fascism, a movement within Islam that many Muslims claim is heretical.





Bibliography

1) Islamic Antisemitism And Its Nazi Roots

2) Islamism, fascism and terrorism (Part 3)

3) Islamism, fascism and terrorism (Part 1)

4) The Muslim Brotherhood, The Nazis and Al-Qa'ida

5) Islamic Antisemitism And Its Nazi Roots

6) Ibid.

7) Ibid.

8) Der Mufti von Jerusalem Amin el-Husseini, und die Nationalsozialisten, Frankfurt/M. 1988, S. 234

9) Islamic Antisemitism And Its Nazi Roots

10) Mohammad Amin al-Husayni Wikipedia

11) Nazi Influence on the Middle East During WWII

12) Islamic Antisemitism And Its Nazi Roots

13) Nazi Influence on the Middle East During WWII

14) The Muslim Brotherhood, The Nazis and Al-Qa'ida

15) Islamic Antisemitism And Its Nazi Roots

16) Quoted from: Abd Al-Fattah Muhammad El-Awaisi, "The Muslim Brothers and the Palestine Question 1928-1947", London 1998, p. 195.

17) Islamic Antisemitism And Its Nazi Roots

18) The Muslim Brotherhood, The Nazis and Al-Qa'ida

19) Analysis: The roots of jihad

21) America's Devil's Game with Extremist Islam

22) A closer look at Hezbollah's motives

23) The Muslim Brotherhood, The Nazis and Al-Qa'ida

24) Wahhabism

25) Understanding the Origins of Wahhabism and Salafism

26) Islamic Antisemitism And Its Nazi Roots

27) Analysis: The roots of jihad

28) The Muslim Brotherhood, The Nazis and Al-Qa'ida


Robert Duncan is a journalist and ombudsman for foreign press in Spain. He is an Executive Board Member and Vice-President for the Organización de Periodismo y Comunicación Ibero-Americana, and Vice-President of the energy and telecommunications association, APSCE. He is News Editor for Spero News, and Editor-In-Chief of EnerPub. More of his writings can be found here, as well as at the Santificarnos website.

He has also been published in World Catholic News, National Catholic Register, Renew America, Lifesite.net, as well as Capital Hill Coffee House, Common Conservative, The Conservative Voice, Enter Stage Right, News By Us, Conservative Crusader, World Net Daily, Mens News Daily and others. Robert was the bureau chief for an international news agency in Madrid for many years, and was published regularly in Dow Jones Newswires, with articles appearing in The Wall Street Journal.



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By Matthew M. Anger

It was a forwarded article from a relative. It told of a new French documentary by Pierre Rehov, Suicide Killers, making the politically incorrect link between Muslim theology and terrorism. Rehov referred to Islam as a "culture of hatred in which the uneducated are brainwashed to a level where their only solution in life becomes to kill themselves and kill others in the name of a God whose word... has became their only certitude." But there was a fly in the ointment. For, according to Rehov, Islamic violence is really the product of sexually-repressed Muslim males. "The separation between men and women in Islam is absolute," he says. "This leads to a situation of pure anxiety, in which normal behavior is not possible. It is no coincidence that suicide killers are mostly young men dominated subconsciously by an overwhelming libido that they not only cannot satisfy but are afraid of." Thus we are confronted with the only permissible critique that a sex-obsessed world has to offer.

Rehov's thesis was no doubt inspired by prize-winning French novelist Michel Houellebecq, who opined that Islam is "the stupidest religion," along with some more obscene observations about the followers of Mohammed. In his pornographic story Platform (2001), for example, Houellebecq pits attractive Western hedonists against bloodthirsty Muslims driven by what he sees as moral fanaticism. The novelist was barely cleared in 2002 by a Paris court of committing "hate crimes." But as journalists were quick to remark, Houellebecq was an equal opportunity bigot, having expressed his disdain for all monotheistic creeds.

Cynical Amoralizing

The linkage of "virtue" to evil is not a new one. Houellebecq's is simply a new variation on this theme. Back in the Cold War, there were libertines (conservative and liberal) who opposed Communism simply for its "puritanism," ranking all forms of morality as thought-control. They no doubt felt vindicated when the mobs pouring over the Berlin Wall in 1989 made a beeline not for grocery stores or fashion outlets, but for adult bookstores.

Houellebecq is not the only fashionable Western amoralist. There is the late Theo Van Gogh — Netherlands' "Michael Moore" — best known for his savage death at the hands of Mohammed Bouyeri in November 2004. One also recalls Louis-Ferdinand Céline, author of aimless, erotic novels like Journey to the End of the Night, who was a rabid anti-Semite and collaborator with the Nazis in occupied France. These men share a sense of frustration with contemporary society, often mocking mainstream ideals. But, like all post-Modernists, they do not even attempt a real spiritual solution, preferring a chaotic individualism that expresses itself in despair.

Houellebecq waxes obscene about the frustration of Western men with their feminist counterparts, and their quest for sexual partners in the Orient. Yet his characters are haunted by futility. They are satiated with monotonous indulgence at clubs and nudist colonies, when not having endless affairs. Characters are always on the brink of achieving fulfillment when it is suddenly snatched away by disease, suicide, accidents or, in the case of Platform, by terror attacks by Islamic fundamentalists. In this respect, the novel was unintentionally prophetic, portraying terror bombings on sex tourism centers like the ones that occurred in Bali in 2002. But Houellebecq's answer is more of the same. As seen through the eyes of the main character:

Michel doesn't like capitalism much himself (the West has created a system that reeks of "egoism, masochism and death," he thinks gloomily, "and we keep on exporting it"), but he'll take it over Islam any day.

The Evil that "Good" Men Do

To people of Houellebecq's contrarian mindset, it is virtue that produces vice. Muslim men are abnormal because of strict codes on sexual, and other, behavior. Take that away and they would become charming and inoffensive epicureans. According to Brendan Bernhard's summary in the LA Times:

Michel meets a Jordanian banker who has a theory about why certain Muslim fundamentalists are so hostile to the American way of life. Their secret dream, he tells Michel over a beer, is to become a part of it themselves, and their aggression is a symptom of impotent envy. As for the paradise promised by the prophet, the problem for Muslims is that you don't need to die to find it. "There are places on this earth where available and lascivious girls dance for the pleasure of men, where one can get drunk while listening to heavenly music," he says. "There are twenty such places within a five-hundred-meter radius of this hotel. These places are easily accessible, and to enter them you don't need to fulfill the Muslim's seven duties or dedicate oneself to a Holy War; all you have to do is pay a few dollars."

Such flippancy exudes a certain charm for the indolent. But there are just a few holes in this argument. According to criminological and psychological studies, sexually explicit entertainment is closely linked to violent behavior. One recalls the testimonies of serial killers Ted Bundy and Jeffrey Dahmer. Utah child killer Gary Bishop admitted some years ago that, "I am a homosexual pedophile convicted of murder. Pornography was a determining factor in my downfall ... For me, pornography was like lighting a fuse on a stick of dynamite. I became stimulated and had to gratify my urges or explode."

Nor are killers on a wider scale necessarily diverted by sexual freedom. It is often posited that political leaders who lack inhibitions are less likely to channel their urges into violent directions. Unfortunately, this overlooks the fact that Hitler had Eva Braun and Stalin went through a number of mistresses. And it need not be mentioned how many human beings in recent decades have been terminated in the quest for "safe sex." Hedonism has a darker side as well.

Dysfunctional Creeds

That is not to deny that the voluptuaries are, in their rather warped way, onto something. Filmmaker Theo van Gogh, before he was shot and hacked to death by an Islamic fanatic in broad daylight, detailed the stories of Muslim women in Holland who were beaten, raped and forced into marriage. Sexual slavery, including harems, is a persistent and entrenched practice in the Islamic world. So is temporary marriage (as found in Iran, which permits "licit" shacking-up). Even in the afterlife Islam makes explicit promises about fleshly delights. No doubt this is the basis for a long tradition of erotic story-telling in Islam as found in The Thousand and One Nights and The Perfumed Garden. It is ironic to see people like van Gogh condemn Islam because of its intolerance of homosexuality and feminism. Yet liberals generally seem happy to overlook such apparent shortcomings, hating Christianity more than its rivals.

Unfortunately, Playboy ethicists, on both the left and the right, do little to inspire opposition to Muslim zeal. Nor is the idea that Islam poses a principled challenge to the decadent West exclusively confined to Allah's adherents. There are those (like the aforementioned Céline) who favor nihilistic ideologies, including fascism. But whether Muslim or agnostic, the problem stems from non-Christian views of morality which focus purely on externals. In the case of Houellebecq, it is a superficial appreciation of terror and its causes — i.e., "fundamentalism" as opposed to "liberating" profligacy. For other simplifiers, it is a totalitarian ethic.

Undoubtedly, moral frustration does play a role in the contradictory faith of the Koran. Muslim terrorists simultaneously acknowledge sin while suppressing their own consciences. It is part of an age-old tradition of cloaking self-indulgence under sanctimonious activity. Marx and Mohammad have come to tell us that it is okay to "hate your neighbor" in the name of the higher cause. They also share the belief that vice, as they define it, can be eradicated or ignored through the institutions they have established.

Vice and Virtue Defined

It is said that in this life, all men agree on the ends; they disagree on the means. In that all men want happiness (as Aristotle states), this is certainly true. But how one defines this "happiness" makes a difference. Consider the methods used by followers of messianic creeds who think that they can buy a quick ticket to heaven — be that heaven in this world or the next. Sins are "cleansed" away by "what we are" and not what we do. It is adherence to the Party Chairman, the Jihad, or sola fide that makes us "pure." In such manner Mohammed Atta and his co-terrorists, having partaken of such Western vices as drinking and frequenting striptease bars, could make up for their indulgence through an act of "martyrdom." They also made use of pornographic chat rooms to post their covert instructions to one another. The ends justified the means.

That still leaves us with the hedonist allegation that evil is tied to an ill-defined "fundamentalism" (i.e., strong moral beliefs). It is true that ethical structures can be warped, but only so long as they are subjective. Virtue does not lead to vice, and vice certainly does not lead to virtue. The Western system of objective ethical norms, espoused by the ancients and embraced by the Catholic Church, denies that virtue can be validated on an individual, emotive basis. Rather, that is the error of moral rebels, and the basis of all crimes.

Totalitarians partake of all the transgressions valued by Western liberals even if they cloak and "justify" them in other ways. Yet individualists really only differ in their choice of methods. Houellebecq and Atta, for example, both want their unfettered sex. Likewise, fanatical hedonists and Muslims share a craven ruthlessness in striving to maintain their artificial structures of reality: Houellebecq rejoices every time he hears that a Palestinian child is "gunned down in the Gaza Strip," while Muslim militants find it necessary to behead Christian schoolgirls in Indonesia. In neither case have these men understood the true meaning of morality and virtue.


***
Matthew Anger is a freelance journalist who has written essays on history, philosophy and literature from a Catholic perspective. He lives with his wife and eight children in the Richmond, Virginia area, where he is employed as a web/multimedia designer. In addition to Seattle Catholic, he contributes to The Latin Mass and Homiletic & Pastoral Review. He also maintains Imlac's Journal, a philosophical blog.