ABSTRACT ISLAM AND THE WEST: PROBLEMATIZING A DISCOURSE OF DUALISM Nathan Chapman Lean July 2010 Director: Derek F. Maher International Studies Program “Islam and the West,” a dualistic phrase that gained sudden ascendancy following the events of September 11, 2001, is used variously to refer to the mutual relationship between Muslims and those living in a sometimes ill-defined region called “the West.” The binary phrase in question serves to reify what are depicted as incommensurate and incompatible opposites in terms of politics, culture, religion, and otherwise. This thesis argues that the perceived division between Islam and “the West” arises within a discourse that presumes, configures, and reinforces a relationship of conflict between the two. Coming from different viewpoints, the individuals examined in this thesis end up deploying similar linguistic maneuvers that advance their own ideological beliefs, reinforce their self-identities, and represent their respective values as universal. As a result, each group views the other as threatening and necessarily oppositional. An analysis of key terms and phrases used by influential scholars, political and religious leaders, and the general public within “Western” and Muslim-majority societies will reveal the constructed nature of the division between Islam and “the West.” Additionally, this thesis will examine the ways in which other discursive practices such as selective representation, reification, and the deployment of charged stereotypes influence policy makers who seek to establish global positions of power. By problematizing the language that both sides of this perceived dualism use to represent themselves and the other, it will be demonstrated that the perceived conflicting relationship between Islam and “the West” results, in part, from the linguistic practices that each side deploys. ISLAM AND THE WEST: PROBLEMATIZING A DISCOURSE OF DUALISM A Thesis Presented to the Faculty of the Department of International Studies East Carolina University In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Master of Arts in International Studies by Nathan Chapman Lean July 2010 © Copyright 2010 Nathan Chapman Lean ALL RIGHTS RESERVED ISLAM AND THE WEST: PROBLEMATIZING A DISCOURSE OF DUALISM by Nathan Chapman Lean APPROVED BY: DIRECTOR OF THESIS: _________________________________________________ Derek F. Maher, PhD COMMITTEE MEMBER: _________________________________________________ Mona Russell, PhD COMMITTEE MEMBER: _________________________________________________ Jalil Roshandel, PhD COMMITTEE MEMBER: _________________________________________________ Ken Wilburn, DPhil DIRECTOR OF THE MA in INTERNATIONAL STUDIES: _________________________________________ Sylvie Debevec Henning, PhD DEAN OF THE GRADUATE SCHOOL: _____________________________________________________________ Paul Gemperline, PhD For Naima, the love of my life. For your spirit and warmth, your support and affection, and your steadfast love. CONTENTS Acknowledgements ............................................................................................. vii Introduction ........................................................................................................... 1 1. “The Land Where Darkness Awaits” .............................................................. 22 2. “The Arabs Need to Be Jolted Out By Some Foreign-Born Shock” ................ 62 3. “Now Remind Me All the Four Es Again” ...................................................... 127 4. “I Hate Those Westerners and Despise Them” ............................................ 155 Conclusion ........................................................................................................ 204 Bibliography ...................................................................................................... 220 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This thesis has been the one of the largest undertakings of my academic career thus far. Over the past year and a half I have poured through books, articles, magazines, journals, blogs, and websites; I have developed a new love for coffee and late-night writing. During this process, I reflected on the wonderful experiences I have shared over the past few years with my many friends in Morocco and Tunisia. While the names are too numerous to mention, their friendship, encouragement, and insights inspired me many times over and motivated me to explore this topic. For this, I am sincerely grateful. Derek Maher, my thesis director and my mentor, guided me along this journey. After taking one of his courses on classical Islam in the spring of 2007, I knew that I wanted to continue to study with him. I approached him in the spring semester of 2009 with an idea about a topic I wanted to research. He encouraged me and challenged me; he set the bar of achievement high and offered patient advice. Each week throughout the writing process, we met and reviewed my writing. I looked forward to those meetings then, and I miss them now. I am thankful for Derek’s mentorship and friendship. I aspire to be the type of scholar and person that he is. The members of my thesis committee—Mona Russell, Jalil Roshandel, and Ken Wilburn—read various drafts of chapters along the way and provided me with new perspectives at each juncture. I am grateful for their guidance and advice. Finally, I am fortunate to have the love and support of my family. They tolerated my many rants on topics that they had little knowledge of or interest in and encouraged me viii when I felt overwhelmed. To my father, Larry, my mother, Linda Rose, and my beautiful sister Katherine, I love you all very much. INTRODUCTION Stepping onto the tarmac of Casablanca’s Mohammad V International Airport in early June of 2006, my first impressions of a Muslim-majority country did not align with the various representations that had filtered into my mind from various American media outlets. There were no camels, wild-eyed warriors, tent-dwellers, or dark-skinned sheikhs decked out in turbans and white robes, ruminating over a potential oil deal. Rather, Shakira’s new single, “Hips Don’t Lie,” blasted from the sound system of a Mercedes C Class sedan while Moroccan youth sent text messages back and forth on their iPhones, waiting for a relative or friend to arrive on an incoming flight. Businessmen wearing the latest trends of pin-striped suits, colorful silk ties, and cuff links stood in line to rent cars; a portrait of Morocco’s king, Mohammad VI, wearing a grey muscle shirt, Nike running shorts, and Ray Ban sunglasses, hung above the counter. Notably absent from the scene was the towering presence of “the green menace,” a singular, virulent Islam, eagerly waiting for a chance to extinguish American tourists or to impose its threatening credo on them. During the hour-long ride to the apartment I would call home in Rabat for the next three months, the cab driver suddenly pulled off to the side of the road, stopped the engine, and with the sound of the call to prayer echoing from a distant mosque, began to pray along the highway as other cars sped by us. Ten minutes later, he returned and said in heavily accented English, “God is good.” I smiled as I remembered the many friends and relatives who, meaning well, warned me of the dangers of “those people over there.” 2 Under the auspices of a generous scholarship from my alma mater, East Carolina University, I partnered with the United States Embassy to develop a program of cultural diplomacy that sent me traveling up and down the coastline of Morocco, performing piano recitals, teaching lessons, leading music-related workshops, and interacting with musicians. (My undergraduate degree is in classical and jazz piano performance) Two days after my arrival, just before an early-morning meeting with the embassy officials who helped schedule these events, my cell phone rang. It was the Cultural Affairs attaché calling to inform me that we would need to reconfigure our schedule as Washington had just announced that Karen Hughes, the Undersecretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs, would visit Morocco as part of her “listening tour.” The State Department announced that Hughes would speak about “important reforms” that the Kingdom of Morocco had recently undertaken. While I do not remember all of the details of Hughes’s visit, the hustle and bustle that inundated the Office of Public Affairs prior to her arrival on June 4, 2006, remains clear in my mind. Preparations for her Sunday afternoon speech at the Sidi Moumen Sports Complex in Casablanca had the trappings of a star-studded, red carpet event. She was also slated to travel to the city of Marrakech for the grand opening of Morocco’s own “American Corner”—a small, library-like resource center with information highlighting American culture, history, and government. Hughes described her visit to Morocco as part of “America’s conversation with the world.” In short, this conversation was expected to restore America’s woeful image in the world—an image that had suffered a particularly precipitous decline in recent years within Muslim-majority countries. 3 As the events surrounding Hughes’s arrival unfolded, I found myself suspended between two viewpoints. An American citizen abroad, I felt a certain sense of pride in the American values of freedom admired by people all across the globe. In part, I attributed my opportunities and accomplishments in life to an environment that allowed me to forge my own path and channel my interests in the direction of a future I hoped to build. After all, my presence in Morocco that summer was the result of a system of public education that provided opportunities for students to realize their ambitions through the assistance of scholarship funds. Yet at the same time, I felt uncomfortable with the way that Hughes’s visit was projected into Moroccan society. Newspapers proclaiming the arrival of Karen Hughes flooded local food stands and cafés. Television stations broadcast her image as part of reports on her interactions with Muslim youth. And occasionally, in the middle of an evening radio news broadcast in Arabic, I would hear the name “Karen Hughes” accompanied by what seemed to be an outline of her visit. There appeared to be a concerted effort to promote this event as a privilege for Moroccans. The media depicted the visit as that of a high-ranking American diplomat who was taking the time out of her busy schedule to cross the Atlantic and tell America’s story. The narrative she had come to tell, it was implied, was superior to that of Morocco’s. These ruminations provoked in me a sense that the “conversation” was more complex than it had initially appeared. In fact, I began to believe that it was hardly a conversation at all. Rather, it seemed that Hughes, acting on behalf of the American government, was interested in engaging the citizens of Morocco for specific ideological reasons, not as a passive listener or even as a neutral interlocutor, but rather to 4 advance American aims concerning commerce, political relations, and public relations. I could not help but notice the way she smiled and nodded in approval as Moroccan ministers detailed various reforms that the Kingdom was instituting; her praise had the aura of a mother commending her child for an accomplishment deemed as particularly worthy. I also remember the images of Hughes stepping out of the U.S. Ambassador’s bulletproof BMW, sporting a cherry-red power jacket and clinging to her Eyewitness Travel Guide to Morocco, all under the watchful eyes of stone-faced secret service agents, ready to pull their weapons should anyone breach the rope line. I was particularly perplexed to catch an image on television of Hughes, this powerful diplomat from the United States, displaying the common touch in an overtly staged event by playing a moment of basketball with several underprivileged Moroccan youth in a Casablanca slum. “We’re a very diverse and tolerant country, but people don’t see us that way. They think we’re very arrogant, and they get that from the movies and TV coverage they watch,” Hughes said.1 She continued, commenting, “At a time of war, at a time when we’re trying to liberate the people of Iraq from a horrible dictator, it’s really hard to convey what America is like.”2 Hughes’s stops in Morocco and various other Muslim-majority countries on her “listening tour” appeared to me to have been motivated by a newfound sense of urgency to understand Muslims and Islam, a need stemming from the new epistemological terrain that emerged after September 11, 2001. Within the general public, this new understanding confirmed the suspicions of some while others gained a more nuanced 1. Karen Hughes, as quoted in Ilana Ozernoy, “Ears Wide Shut,” The Atlantic, November 2006, http://www .theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2006/11/ears-wide-shut/5271/ (accessed August 29, 2009). 2. Ibid. 5 view of the diversity of Islam. Within the American government, the events of September 11, 2001 and the long history of foreign policy objectives in Muslim-majority countries underscored the need to know more about Muslims and Islam. By understanding the history, doctrines, and orthodoxies of a religious system used by some of its followers to project monstrous displays of violence, the American government believed that it might be able to prevent these types of events from happening again. In both cases, the relationship between knowledge and power was prevalent; increased knowledge of Islam and Muslims would help restore a sense of power that was lost as the United States witnessed the worst terrorist attack in its history. The attacks stunned Americans, exploiting the openness of American society and using its advanced systems of transportation as weapons that destroyed the symbols of its economy and killed over 3,000 people. Immediately following September 11, 2001, Muslims and Islam became the subjects of a revived and intensified discourse about “the other.” In the United States, the point of reference for discussing Islam was violence—terrorism, rage, and war. This discourse was situated in the belief that the United States and Islam were fundamentally incompatible with one another; the “clash of civilizations” theory provided a powerful paradigm for framing this relationship. Shortly after September of 2001, The New York Times published a new section of the newspaper titled “A Nation Challenged.” This section appeared every day for four months and contained articles that reinforced the idea that Islam and “the West” were on a collision course. Titles of the articles in this section included: “Yes, This is About Islam,” “Jihad 101,” “Barbarians At the Gates,” “The Core of Muslim Rage,” “The Force of Islam,” “Dreams of Holy War,” The Age of 6 Muslim Wars,” “The Deep Intellectual Roots of Islamic Rage,” and “This Is a Religious War.” The Washington Post also published an article titled “A Fervor America Should Easily Recognize.” Written by journalist Dan Morgan, the article suggested that the American government should go to great lengths to respect Islam as it had “awakened” and was posturing to strike the United States. Accompanying the article was a photograph of hooded men carrying the Qur’an and a hatchet.3 In the new way of discussing Islam that followed September 11, 2001, it occurred to me that Islam and Muslims were most commonly discussed only as they pertained to the interests of the United States and its allies. Absent were narratives of the average Muslim family living and working in a city like Rabat, angered by the ways in which a handful of radicals misrepresented the values of their religion. Stories like those of the Muslim fireman from New York City, who responded to the attacks on the World Trade Center grieving not only for the loss of American lives but also for the way in which his religion was misrepresented, were scarcely recounted in news media. Instead, a myriad of vibrant images insinuating the presence of a threat flooded the airwaves. When Islam was discussed in the news media, a handful of familiar iconographic visages accompanied the stories. Thus, almost without regard for the subject of a given story, viewers would be greeted with depictions of Muslim men praying in a mosque, women wearing dark burqas, or groups of people in the street burning American flags and shouting angrily into the camera as their clenched fists stabbed the air. Another iconic image was that of terrorist trainees, wearing turbans and loosely fitting black clothing, performing training exercises on monkey bars. A dusty, sandy desert served as their 3. Chiara Bottici and Benoît Challand, “Rethinking Political Myths: The Clash of Civilizations as a Self-Fulfilling Prophecy,” European Journal of Social Theory 9, no. 315 (2006): 323. 7 backdrop and immediately following their routine, the news report jumped to an image of Osama bin Laden sitting cross-legged in a tent clinging to a Kalashnikov assault rifle. The sheer repetition of these images allowed them to slip into the subconscious of the American public. Because they reinforced the discourse about the threat of Islam and confirmed presuppositions about a “clash of civilizations,” they formed the image of an essentially violent and monolithic Islamic bloc at odds with an essentially peaceful and monolithic “West.” Through the reification of the religion of Islam and the geographical or cultural construction of “the West,” the binary narrative of “Islam and the West” became the common framework for discussing a supposed dichotomous relationship between these two groups. In the wake of September 11, 2001, the phrase “Islam and the West” appeared in the titles of many books that sought to examine the complicated nature of Islam on the one hand and its relationship to “the West” on the other. Some of these titles included: Islam and the West: A New Political and Religious Order Post September 11, Islam and the West: Conflict or Cooperation, Islam and the West: Critical Perspectives on Modernity, Islam and the West Post 9/11, Islam and the West: A Dissonant Harmony of Civilizations, and Islam and the West: Understanding Islamic Fundamentalism. Moreover, each of the individual terms within the phrase “Islam and the West” is utilized uncritically. While the binary phrase “Islam and the West” is deployed frequently, the titles above raise questions about the meaning of these terms and reflect a common usage that warrants the need for critical inquiry. In an effort to uncover what these terms actually mean—to which “Islam” and which “West” the terms actually refer, a series of 8 questions must be asked. These include: Which Islam? (Interpretations of Islam in Saudi Arabia are quite different from interpretations in Tunisia) Which “West?” How is “the West” defined? Who represents “the West?” Who represents Islam? Has “the West” fully evolved or is it still evolving? Similarly, is Islam a static set of principles that cannot be changed or is it a dynamic, spiritual response to life guided by a certain set of beliefs? Unfortunately, it is rare for such questions to be asked. Correspondingly, discourses such as “Islam and democracy,” “Islam and modernity,” “Islam and women’s rights,” “Islam and human rights,” “Islam and education,” “Islam and technology,” and “Islam and globalization” configure the two monolithic entities. What results is a meta-narrative in which Islam is always the element that has to be measured and assessed, while the other term has a fixed meaning, one that corresponds to the values embraced in “the West;” it is against such determined metrics that Islam must be compared, and lo and behold, it does not fare well. Once the two sides are constructed as opposites, participants on each side of the dichotomy suggest an incompatibility. For those in “the West,” complexities and ambiguities are represented as existing essentially within Islam, due to which the religion is depicted as being incompatible with democracy, modernity, etc. Thus, interrogating Islam is not only acceptable but expected. Seval Yildrim comments on this view: Inquiries about the value of Islam for the West were desirable and to be commended, as an act of generous inquiry—almost like when a grandparent approaches a child in play and asks "what are the parameters of your imaginary world?" The unthought part of this picture is that the grandparent is in a position of power as to the child and asks without fear, for it is to the grandparent's paradigms to which [sic] the child must relate. In other words, the grandparent needs to understand because, after all, it 9 is the adult world that determines what the acceptable terms and methods of play are.4 Today, it is the United States that determines what the acceptable terms and methods of play are. In a position of power over various other actors on the global stage, various members of the American government feel that they have an obligation to engage in some attempt to understand these other actors. Nowhere else is this more common than in the field of public diplomacy. Asked a second time by a seemingly skeptical crowd to explain the purpose of her trip to Morocco, Hughes responded, “I'm here really to listen and to learn … I think it is very important that we have these kind of people to people exchanges so that we can all get to know each other better.” Hearing this comment, it occurred to me that Hughes seemed to believe that it was the up to United States, as the senior partner to the relationship, to open up such dialogues. It seems that the United States’ privileged position of power affords its diplomats the right to travel to other countries, inquiring about the nature of their political and socio-cultural systems in a comparative way. Smaller, less powerful countries like Morocco are not expected to inquire about the concerns or beliefs of Americans. Certainly, the United States would not take kindly to less powerful countries assessing American political and cultural systems and offering suggestions for improvement. To my knowledge, a Moroccan diplomat or Muslim cleric has never visited the United States on a “listening tour” or “conversation with the world” where they report back to a local government, insights gained as to the parameters of the American culture. As I began to reflect on these ideas more carefully during my summer stay in Morocco, an incident occurred 4. Cemil Aydin, “Discussing Islam in the Post 9/11 Epistemological Terrain,” Pace International Law Review 19, no. 4 (2007): 223. 10 that offered me a new and enlightening perspective. Walking into the internet café Apostrophe on John Kennedy Boulevard in Rabat was a regular part of my morning routine. After a quick breakfast on my balcony and a chat with the neighborhood watchman, I normally strolled across the highway and into the café where I sipped on hot mint tea and checked my email. I envisioned July 12, 2006 being no different. Approaching the front door, I noticed a swarm of Moroccan youth gathering around a small television set in the office. It was obvious from the lack of activity in the normally- bustling computer area and the youths’ fixation on what appeared to be a newscast, that some important event had occurred. As it turned out, earlier that morning the Islamist political and military group, Hezbollah, launched rockets into Israel to create a diversion for a ground invasion. At that time, Hezbollah guerilla forces were sent into Israeli territory, killing three soldiers and capturing two. As a result, Israeli Prime Minster Ehud Olmert described the event as an act of war and promised that Lebanon would bear the consequences of its actions.5 Over the course of the summer, what eventually became known as the 2006 Hezbollah-Lebanon War unfolded. Reactions to the war across the Middle East were strong and the conflict became the centerpiece of evening news reports as well as café gossip. Fortunately, Morocco was a safe place to observe public reactions to the conflict, and I felt that I had an unusual vantage point: I was an American living abroad, witnessing first-hand Moroccans’ reactions to a war that would likely be broadcast in short thirty-second clips on American news programs or the internet. Additionally, this 5. Cable News Network, “Timeline: Decades of Conflict in Lebanon, Israel,” CNN.com, July 14, 2006, http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/meast/07/14/israel.lebanon.timeline/ (accessed September 1, 2009). 11 was the most recent example of the long-enduring Arab-Israeli conflict—a period of great tensions and open hostilities between Arab-majority countries and Israel. As my ability to speak French and Arabic had not yet advanced to a level that I felt comfortable conversing casually, I relied more heavily on my English-speaking friends when discussing the war and other topics that required specialized vocabulary. During the weekends, I met with students from a local language institute in downtown Rabat. Sometimes we gathered for a pot-luck lunch at my apartment. Other times, we met for an orange juice at a café that overlooked the Bou Regreg River. I felt a close connection with these students who quickly became my good friends. In their mid-20s, they represented a growing movement of Moroccan youth eager to break the mold of what it meant to be a Muslim growing up in a world where the suicide bomber had become the face of Islam. Their beliefs about religion and politics were as diverse as their tastes in music. This mixture of perspectives made our get-togethers particularly interesting as a spirited debate was just as likely to take place over the role of the hijab in society as it was over who would win Best New Artist at the Grammy Awards. Despite the diversity of the group, perspectives on the war between Lebanon and Israel were uniform. Regardless of the undisputed fact that Hezbollah launched the first round of attacks, my friends viewed Israel as the aggressor, outlining a long list of grievances, most of which revolved around the topic of Palestine. Ali, a 22 year old communications major who drove me around Rabat in his mother’s Mercedes, told me that some Arabs refer to the conflict that erupted that summer as the “Sixth Arab–Israeli War.” This did not come as a complete surprise to me, as I knew of the strong negative sentiment that Israelis and Arabs had for one another. Despite the fact that my 12 Moroccan friends were quick to point out their discontent with the violent way in which members of Hezbollah chose to express themselves, their objection was certainly not to be taken as an admission of sympathy for Israel. In fact, I observed that the conflict between Lebanon and Israel was refracted through a lens of history that began long before my five Moroccan friends were born—the creation of the Israeli state in 1948 and the conflict with Palestine that followed. Nonetheless, they seemed to feel a sense of duty to react to the current dynamics of this ongoing conflict with a fervor and zeal that united them. Israel’s longstanding conflict with Palestine was the underlying motive for their reactions to the war between Lebanon and Israel. Further, the long alliance between the United States and Israel, and the United States’ continued financial aid to the Israeli military added another complicated layer to perceptions of this conflict. Qawtar, a particularly outspoken member of our group, expressed to me her views of the situation. I remember her saying, “The United States has its military in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Iraq. As if that’s not enough, its pet—Israel—uses American money to take Palestinians homes and kill them in the process.” Such a candid description left me awkwardly hunting for a dignified response. While I do not recall exactly how I managed to mollify that tense moment, I do remember how that exchange led me to think about the ways in which people from different backgrounds can look at the same event and view it in distinct or even contradictory ways. I thought about how American and Israelis perceptions of their mutual relationship often aligned while no such alignment exists between either of them and Arabs. Additionally, I pondered the way in which my Moroccan friends, and others like them, viewed the relationship between the United 13 States and Israel. It soon became obvious to me that prevalent, divisive narratives such as “the clash of civilizations” and perceptions and images that inform our understanding of “the other” sustain one another; the divisions we so often believe exist between ourselves and others may result from a cognitive representation that maps the world not as it is, but rather as how we see it. This experience allowed me to think about narratives of conflict between groups of people in a new way. It occurred to me that people view the world through their own cultural lenses. Experiences and ideologies form certain subjective frameworks that shape our perceptions of the world and our roles in it. This cultural lens also shapes our perceptions of others. With these experiences and ideas in mind, I returned to North Carolina in the fall of 2007 to finish my music degree. Hoping to graduate that year, I was a few credits short in the area of humanities. Reflecting on my time in Morocco and my newfound interest in Arab and Muslim cultures, I enrolled in a course on classical Islam. Little did I know that the course would change the way I viewed the world. Aside from participating in regular class activities, I also was part of a small group that spent the semester reading Edward Said’s Orientalism. Every few weeks, the group would convene to discuss various sections of the book and by the end of the semester I had developed an appetite for more. Said’s work provided me with a framework for understanding my convictions about the ways in which some Europeans represented Arab and Muslim cultures in service of their colonial ambitions. Even today, there is a disparity between my experiences with Arabs and Muslims and the portrayals of them in American media. I 14 was unsure of how to discuss this discrepancy until I learned of Edward Said and read Orientalism. If there is one work that is at the foundation of this thesis, it is Orientalism. While many authors have inspired and informed my writing, it is Said, most of all, whose theoretical work and penetrating insights in the areas of literary criticism, post-colonial studies, and critical theory helped me frame my own thoughts. Said calls into question the underlying assumptions that contribute to generalizations, stereotypes, and racial and religious prejudices of “the other.” He suggests that European assumptions about Muslims and Arabs are the result of a long tradition of caricatures and crude representations not generated from facts but rather from preconceived ideas that configure an ideal “other.” According to Said, a mirror image of what the Occident, or “the West,” is not, characterizes the Orient, or “the East.” He proposes that Orientalism is a process whereby the multifaceted experiences and diverse cultural dynamics of “the East” are reduced to a homogenous bloc that is situated in a place of opposition and inferiority to a dominant, powerful, and defining “West.”6 The purpose of these representations is to configure a system of power relations between the two, with the “West,” defined variously throughout time, as the superior element controlling the inferior other. The language deployed in this discourse is critical to the construction of the relationship between the Occident and the Orient. Accordingly, the weak, backward Orient requires the strong, rational Occident; the Orient exists for and is defined by the Occident. Following a trail pioneered by Said, I hope to add to the body of existing literature that interrogates representations of “the other.” While Said’s focus is directed primarily 6. Said was influenced Antonio Gramsci, an Italian writer, philosopher, and theorist, who is known for developing the concept of cultural hegemony. 15 at the ways in which the Occident represents the Orient, I will discuss how both sides of this perceived dichotomy—Muslims and “Westerners”—participate in a similar discourse of separation and conflict. A discourse is a conceptual framework that governs the way in which a topic is meaningful by producing the vocabulary, expressions, and styles that define knowledge of that topic. Of the many intellectuals who have discussed the topic of discourse at great length, none is more celebrated than Michel Foucault. Foucault’s foray into the area of discourse began in 1969 with The Archaeology of Knowledge where he analyzes “the statement” as the basic unit of discourse. From there, Foucault explored various methodologies of discourse as they related to the study of madness, sexuality, punishment, and love. He defines discourse as: A group of statements which provide a language for talking about—a way of representing the knowledge about—a particular topic at a particular historical moment … Discourse is about the production of knowledge through language.7 One of the ways in which language produces knowledge is by constructing meaning through difference. Knowing what a thing is can often be understood by knowing what it is not. Pairs of terms such as good and evil, right and wrong, light and darkness, or madness and reason often privilege one side over the other; difference forms a system of hierarchy that configures a given society in terms of what is acceptable and unacceptable, appropriate and inappropriate. This thesis explores the way in participants in this discourse of dualism—“Islam and the West”—situate themselves and the other within a framework of opposition and 7. Stuart Hall, “The Spectacle of The Other,” in Representation: Cultural Representations and Signifying Practices, ed. Stuart Hall (London: Sage, 1997), 223-290. 16 characterized their relationship by using certain terms and phrases that configure and reinforce a division. Perception of a polarized relationship between Muslims and “Westerners” may result in the use language that frames the discourse in terms of this division. On the other hand, perceptions of a more harmonious relationship between Muslims and “Westerners” may result in the deployment of certain phrases that suggest more congruity. In each case, participants in the discourse believe that the way in which they represent the other defines something essential about it—their language constructs their reality. I will argue that the perceived dualism between Islam and the “West” is the result of a discourse that presumes, configures, and reinforces a relationship of conflict between the two. Through this discourse, participants who are Muslims and those who consider themselves as “Westerners” deploy certain linguistic maneuvers in service of advancing their own ideological beliefs. Actors on each side distort the beliefs of the other through selective representation, reification, the use of charged stereotypes, and other methods. The influences of those discursive practices result from their ability to produce a particular way of thinking about themselves and the other. Their self-identities of Muslims and “Westerners” are situated around a set of values, and each group seeks recognition for itself as a community of moral worth. Given that each side perceives its own values to be universal, the ideology of the other is seen as threatening. In an effort to reinforce their sense of self, each group depicts the other in negative ways and suggests that the values of the other are necessarily opposed to their own values. Thereby, the relationship is depicted in a polarized fashion and the perceived division is attributed to the shortcomings of the other. 17 In chapter one, I will problematize key terms and phrases deployed by prominent intellectuals, politicians, and members of the general public in the United States and Western Europe and in Muslim-majority countries. I begin with a brief look at Raphael Patai’s The Arab Mind. In this text, Patai’s use of key terminologies and groupings generalizes and stereotypes Arabs in ways that represent them as inferior. I will trace the use of this divisive language into contemporary politics, exploring the 2008 United States presidential election where the Democratic nominee for president, Barack Obama, was often the target of language that questioned his ethnicity and religion. Correspondingly, I will explore the ways in which some in the news media and entertainment industry of Muslim-majority countries depict the United States in a negative way. By examining these representations, I hope to provide a more comprehensive view of how Muslims and “Westerners” alike participate in a discourse that presupposes a division between them. In chapter two, I will explore the ways in which this discourse of division is situated within a framework of hierarchy and political power within the United States. I begin by critiquing the ways in which Bernard Lewis, a prominent scholar of Islamic studies represents Muslims and Islam in particular ways. I will show how Lewis selectively represents key concepts and events in Islamic history that confirm the suspicions of various members of President George W. Bush’s administration. For this reason, Lewis became a influential voice in the White House, advising the president, vice-president, and other high ranking officials on issues related to the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. I will also discuss, in detail, the work of former Undersecretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs, Karen Hughes. Hughes’s “Four Es” 18 initiative for public diplomacy in Muslim-majority countries was part of a massive public relations campaign launched by the Bush administration in the years that followed the Iraq war. I will critically examine Hughes’s “listening tour,” through which she represented the United States, Muslim-majority countries and the relationship between the two, paying particular attention to the complex and restrictive system of discourse that produces the roles of “speaker” and “listener.” In chapter three, I will discuss representations of the United States by prominent and often vilified Muslim individuals. Among them are Hassan al-Banna, Sayyid Qutb, Ayman Zawahiri, and Osama bin Laden—political and religious figures who present an image of the United States that contrasts the image that Bush and Hughes seek to deploy. Viewing the world through an ideological lens, these individuals utilize certain terms and phrases similar to those of Lewis, Patai, and members of the Bush administration in a discourse that confirms their presuppositions of a division between Islam and “the West.” I will show how these representations that reify and stereotype the United States is similar to representations that are deployed about Islam and suggest a monolithic enemy. Rather than a “clash of civilizations,” these conflicting narratives about the world and the relationship between self and other reveal a clash of representations. I have intentionally avoided phrases like “the Arab world” and “the Muslim world” in the writing of this thesis. Like “Islam and the West,” these phrases are non-specific and their vagueness often encourages generalizations. Rather, I have sought to use phrases like “Muslim-majority countries” and “Arab-majority countries,” where agency is placed on the human being, not the reified entity. In addition, I have attempted to avoid 19 phrases like “the West,” “Western civilization,” “Western culture,” and “the Western world” for these same reasons—they are not specific and their meaning fluctuates over time, often in response to various historical circumstances. For example, France and Britain declared war on Germany in September of 1939, marking the beginning of World War II and placing them out front as the leading members of the Western Allies. It was not until two years later, after the December 1941 attacks on Pearl Harbor that the United States entered the war. This would suggest that between 1939 and 1941, the United States was not entirely part of what was considered “the West.” Similarly, over sixty years later, when the United States was rallying support for the invasion of Iraq, France adamantly opposed the idea, formally protesting and refusing to send troops. This placed France (along with Canada, Belgium, New Zealand, and Sweden who also opposed to war), outside of what was considered “the West.” When problematizing the phrase “the West” and suggesting that its use is generic and unspecific, I will employ quotation marks. However, in an attempt to move beyond what I call a discourse of dualism, characterized by the use of generic phrases such as “Islam and the West,” I have aimed to describe the precise groups of people that these terms may be taken to connote in a particular context. I seek to draw attention to the fact that wars and conflicts do not take place between civilizations or even religions but between individuals who comprise nations, belong to religions, or advocate for certain political perspectives, that is, between specific groups of particular people with competing views about how the world should be. This thesis is a product of my experiences and reflections over the past four years. It is a reaction to my observations about the world and has been shaped by my 20 interactions with people who have offered me new perspectives that challenged my worldview. It is a response to a discourse of division between Islam and “the West” that I believe warrants critical examination and thoughtful inquiry. In many ways I see this thesis as a plea to establish critical distance between ourselves and the language we use to depict others; if language constructs reality, the way that we desire the world to be may be realized if we speak of it in those terms. Just prior to my departure from Morocco during the summer of 2006, I had the opportunity to perform at the World Music Festival in Casablanca. In late July I was contacted by a U.S. Embassy official in Rabat who made arrangements for me to meet and rehearse with the headlining band, Gawa Fusion. On the day of the concert, I arrived at the Casablanca train station where I was met by a man who took me to a warehouse to introduce me to the members of the group. While language barriers prevented us from communicating verbally, music served as our vehicle for exchanging ideas. For over four hours that afternoon, I learned the songs that we would perform that night and offered my own jazz-inspired flavor to a few of them. Shortly before eight o’clock in the evening, we all got into a van and drove to the park in the middle of Casablanca. What happened next was like a dream. When the time came for us to perform, we huddled in a circle where the lead singer said a prayer in Arabic, and as the lights dimmed, we took the stage. For nearly an hour, we played music for the 25,000 people in attendance. As the night progressed, our creative musical interactions with one another produced a bond of friendship. There we were—an American college student and seven Moroccan musicians—participating in a discourse that united us based on our commonalities, not our differences. The stereotypes, generalizations, and 21 divisive mechanisms so common in verbal communication were not present in our musical interaction. Our goal in communicating as musicians was to create harmony, not dissonance; we chose our notes and rhythms carefully, making sure that they complemented one another and added something meaningful to our collective story. My experiences in North Africa did not end that summer. Three years later, in 2009, I was awarded a Critical Language Scholarship by the United States Department of State and the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs to study Arabic in Tunisia. This scholarship allowed me to advance my research on this thesis by providing me with the opportunity to enhance my proficiency in Arabic and converse with native speakers. In an ironic twist of fate, this award was part of the National Security Language Initiative—a $114 million program designed by the administration of President George W. Bush and overseen by Karen Hughes—to expand the number of American citizens mastering critical-need languages. I had traveled full circle: my initial experiences in Morocco led me to a train of thought that eventuated in writing a thesis that is critical of the Bush administration and my return to the region was the result of an initiative developed by those very individuals. As I imagined would be the case, my summer studying Arabic in Tunisia gave me a deeper insight into how perceived differences between the United States and Muslim-majority countries result from representations that presuppose difference and opposition; it is through words that we see and understand what we call “reality.” As an ancient Arabic proverb says: jurh al- kalam aamaq min jurh assuyuf—the wounds of words are worse than the wounds of swords. CHAPTER ONE “THE LAND WHERE DARKNESS AWAITS” Raphael Patai is known for his long career as an anthropologist, specializing in the field of Hebrew myth and history. Of Hungarian-Jewish origin, he was also a scholar of Semitic languages and Oriental history, spending much of his career writing about the ancient Hebrews and Israelities. Over the course of his career in academia, Patai held various teaching positions at Hebrew University, New York University, and the Herzl Institute. Of his many publications, The Arab Mind, published in 1973, gained the most attention as a result of its controversial depiction of Arabs as a tribal, nomadic, and backwards ethnic group. Patai was well aware of the potential fury that his book would cause. In a letter to his close friend, English poet and novelist Robert Graves, Patai wrote that just as his “Jewish” books had evoked Jewish wrath, so too will this new venture “arouse the ire of the Arabs.”8 The opening lines of Patai’s The Arab Mind, published in 1973, read: When it comes to the Arabs, I must admit to an incurable romanticism; nay, more than that: to having had a life-long attachment to Araby. When exactly and how it all started I can no longer remember. But some events and experiences which, to put it more prosaically this time, first awakened and then deepened my interest in the Arabs, have etched themselves indelibly into my memory.9 Depicting Arabs as a homogenous ethnic group, the members of which think, act, and behave identically, Patai’s compendium of observations denies the plurality and diversity amongst Arab cultures. Patai portrays Arabs as passive objects, worthy of 8. Eva Hentschel, “Obituary: Raphael Patai,” The Independent, August 7, 1996, http://www .independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/obituary-raphael-patai-1308610.html (accessed June 23, 2010). 9. Raphael Patai, The Arab Mind, (New York: Scribner Press, 1973), 1. 23 exploration and susceptible to his romanticization. Patai, however, does not belong to this ethnic group. In constructing the reified entity Patai calls “the Arab mind,” he comments in detail on such subjects as “Arab child-rearing practices,” “the realm of sex,” and “the Islamic component.”10 As Patai explores the subject of how Arabs raise their children— as if such practices were strangely different from the way other ethnic groups raise children—he probes the Arabic language in a way that strikes some Arabic speakers as superficial.11 He suggests that because plural words are derivatives of singular, gender- based roots, Arabic speakers have no understanding of their genderless meaning in a larger context. He says: When asking a man (e.g., in connection with a census) how many children he has, the word used will be “awlad” (the plural of walad, meaning male child,) and, accordingly, the answer will specify the number of sons. Then, the experienced census taker will have to ask again: And how many daughters (banat)? Only thus can he arrive at the total of the man’s progeny.12 Patai concludes that because the word for “children” derives from a gendered root, Arabs raise their children based on their sex. He says, “There are no ‘child’ rearing practices in the Arab world, but only ‘boy’-rearing practices on the one hand and ‘girl’- rearing practices on the other.”13 If this claim were accurate, it would reinforce his point. However, it does not seem to be justified in this case. In the Arabic language, the word awlad, is understood to mean male and female children collectively, without gender distinction. The word atfal is also commonly used to refer to children and can 10. Ibid, v. 11. Ann Marlowe, “Sex, Violence, and ‘The Arab Mind,’” Salon, June 8, 2004, http://dir.salon .com/story/books/feature/2004/06/08/arab_mind/ (accessed October 1, 2009). 12. Patai, The Arab Mind, 27. 13. Ibid., 28. 24 accompany such questions as “How many children do you have?” Moreover, when referring specifically to the gender of children, the words ibn (son), abna (sons), ibna (daughter), and banat (daughters) are commonly employed. Patai does not appear to consider the vast number of other languages that follow similar patterns, including Spanish, French, and Italian. For example, the Spanish word for “children” is niños, deriving from the singular niño, meaning “boy.” Nonetheless, he generalizes his claim: The overwhelming desire of all parents is to have sons, and on the very wedding day (or wedding week) the friends and relatives of the young couple wish them many sons. Once the wife becomes pregnant, she hopes and prays that she will be graced with a boy. If indeed a boy is born, he is greeted with exuberant joy. If a girl—the mother is ashamed and the father’s face darkens with displeasure.14 Patai’s continues in this vein in his discussion on sex in the Arab culture. He suggests that sex is an “all-encompassing preoccupation”15 within “the Arab mind” and that this obsession is the result of a fixation on things considered by that society to be taboo. He writes: The segregation of sexes, the veiling of women where it is practiced, and all the other minute rules that govern and restrict contact between men and women, have the effect of making sex a prime mental preoccupation in the Arab world.16 Patai goes on to suggest that all Arab men and women see members of the opposite sex as sex objects and are convinced that they themselves are regarded in that manner. More, Patai appears to view all actions of women, as “sub specie sexi,”17 or under the aspect of sex. A casual reader may easily come away with the impression 14. Ibid.,118. 15. Ibid.,125. 16. Ibid. 17. Ibid. 25 that Arabs, in their totality, are libidinous beings, waiting for the next opportunity to rebel against a culture that forbids such expressions. Columbia University professor Joseph Massad, author of Desiring Arabs, cites the widespread physical and sexual torture of Iraqi prisoners at the Abu Ghraib prison in 2004 as evidence that Arabs are vulnerable to sexual humiliation. Referencing veteran American journalist Seymour Hersh, Massad notes that Washington insiders used the Arab’s supposed inclination to all things sexual as a talking point prior to 2003: According to Hersh, America’s neocons learned of such a “vulnerability” from the infamous racist book, The Arab Mind, written by Israeli Orientalist Raphael Patai in 1973. Hersh quoted his source that the book was “the bible of the neocons on Arab behavior.” Hersh’s source asserts that in the discussion of the neocons, two themes emerged: “One, that the Arabs only understand force and, two, that the biggest weakness of Arabs is shame and humiliation.”18 For someone who claims to have an “incurable romanticism” for the Arab culture, such stereotypes as Patai’s only serve to heighten the strangeness of “the other.” Yet, the problem here is that Patai resorts to reductionist and pejorative generalizations that do not appear to be based on anything other than his claimed expertise on the subject of “the Arab mind.” His professed knowledge of “the Arab mind” and of Arab culture in general is merely a compilation of anecdotal evidence based on his observations of a select group. But, cultures and ethnicities can only be fully understood by members of the inside group that defines them and they cannot be fully conveyed to an outsider. To Patai and others who participate in this sort of Orientalist discourse, Arabs do not exist in the present immediacy, but rather abide in some idealized space in their own timeless environment—the Arab World. This space precludes the full exploration of 18. Joseph Massad, Desiring Arabs (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2007), 45. 26 social, political, and economic factors that have shaped Arab culture and represents Arabs as unchanging beings whose societal traditions and histories fail to adapt and evolve over time. Edward Said refers to this space as “that semi-mythical construct which since Napoleon’s invasion of Egypt in the late eighteenth century has been made and re-made countless times by power acting through an expedient form of knowledge.”19 Characterizations like Patai’s continue to animate contemporary discourses on Islam, Arabs, and still others.20 Similarly, corresponding rhetorical maneuvers are deployed to situate such people in their places and to configure their roles in the world. These discourses then configure various political, military, and diplomatic agendas. Colonel Norvell B. De Atkine, director of Middle East Studies at the JFK Special Warfare Center and School at Fort Bragg, wrote the preface to the 2001 reprint of The Arab Mind. De Atkine remarked, "At the institution where I teach military affairs, The Arab Mind forms the basis of my cultural instruction. Over the past 12 years I have also briefed hundreds of military teams being deployed to the Middle East."21 He goes on to say: The officers returning from the Arab world describe the cultural barriers they encounter as by far the most difficult to navigate, far beyond those of political perceptions. Thinking back on it, I recall many occasions on which I was perplexed by actions or behavior on the part of my Arab hosts— actions and behavior that would have been perfectly understandable had I read The Arab Mind.22 19. Edward Said, Orientalism, (New York, Vintage Press, 1978), xiii. 20. David Ghanim, a Senior Lecturer and Researcher of Middle Eastern Studies in the School of Global Studies at the University of Gothenburg, Sweden, suggests in hi 2009 book, Gender and Violence in the Middle East, that women in the Middle East are not only victims of domestic violence but welcome it as a result of a lifestyle of subordination to men. 21. Norvelle B. De Atkine, as quoted in Patai, The Arab Mind, rev. ed., xi. 22. Ibid. 27 De Atkine’s fondness for The Arab Mind, and his incorporation of the text as a basic training tool for the military units he oversees, is not surprising. In fact, his negative representations of Muslims and Arabs dates back to the mid 1990s. In 1995, De Atkine and the controversial neo-conservative commentator Daniel Pipes, known for his anti- Muslim website Campus Watch, published an article in Academic Questions criticizing various Middle Eastern Studies scholarship. In the article, titled “Middle Eastern Studies: What Went Wrong,” De Atkine and Pipes write: It is very difficult to have a critical discussion of controversial Middle Eastern issues with Middle Easterners at present, for they display a hypersensitivity to criticism that nearly shuts off debate. The same applies to scholars of the Middle East, who infuse intense emotions and hyperbole into their scholarship.23 Here, De Atkine and Pipes suggest that a strong emotional component prevents Middle Easterners and scholars of Middle Eastern Studies from engaging in an open, objective discussion. Without providing any substantial evidence to support their generalizations, their claims take on ideological overtones. Human beings tend to construct hierarchical orderings as a way of privileging their own status and delegitimizing others. A feature of this projection is the urge to reify group identities. Phrases like “the West,” “the Muslim World,” and “the Arab World,” not to mention Patai’s “the Arab Mind,” become unconsciously embedded into casual language and perceptual frameworks. World leaders and laymen alike refer to these constructed identities when speaking about specific groups of people that happen to share some general features. While there are, indeed, common threads amongst 23. Norvell B. De Atkine and Daniel Pipes, “Middle Eastern Studies: What Went Wrong,” Academic Questions, Winter 1996. http://www.danielpipes.org/392/middle-eastern-studies-what-went- wrong (accessed June 28, 2010). 28 people living within Arab, Muslim, American, and European communities, the presumption that a group can be reduced to a set of shared attributes obscures the diversity of individuals within the group. Through such a discourse, the reified concepts of Muslims, Arabs, and “Westerners” are mental constructs that emerged out of British and French imperial narratives in the 19th and 20th centuries and continue to enliven contemporary geopolitics. Efraim Halevy, Director of the Center for Strategic and Policy Studies at Hebrew University writes: The borders, which if you look on the maps of the Middle East are very straight lines, were drawn by British and French draftsmen who sat with maps and drew the lines of the frontiers with rulers. If the ruler, for some reason or other, moved on the map, because of some person’s hand shaking, then the frontier moved, ten, 20, 30 miles in one direction or another.24 While such idealization may have once been appropriate, their use today fails to acknowledge the blurring of political, social, economic, and even geographical borders that have be modified through globalization. In his article, “Comparative Religion: Whither—and Why?” Wilfred Cantwell Smith discusses the evolution of scholarship in the discipline of comparative religions. He addresses the various phases of that academic enterprise, saying that the first phase of study was marked by “the accumulation, organization, and analysis of facts.”25 He observes that “In the first phase there was amassed an imposing knowledge about other peoples’ religions. In the second phase it is those other people themselves that 24. Efraim Halevy, “Winds of Change in Middle East” (speech, Los Angeles World Affairs Council, Los Angeles, CA, April 16, 2005) http://www.lawac.org/speech/2004-05/Halevy%202005.pdf (accessed September 29, 2009). 25. Wilfred Cantwell Smith, “Comparative Religion: Wither—and Why?” in The History of Religion: Essays in Methodology, ed., Mircea Eliade and Joseph M. Kitagawa (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1959), 34. 29 are present.”26 The “other,” once mentioned as “them” in “our” discourses has now become an active part of the discourse itself such that the conversation is now one of a collective “we” talking about “us.” Use of the term, “the West,” is also complex. Most commonly, it is used to refer to Western Europe and the United States. While “the West” may have been a geographic designation at one point in time, today its meaning is more multivalent. As a geographical description, the word “west” is relative to one’s location. For example, the same region that Europeans regard as the Middle East is referred to as West Asia by residents of India. Though the meaning of such geographic designations has become less clear over time, the connotations of these designations has become more multivalent. Nathan Calverley of the History News Network suggests that the origin of the East-West divide began in the eleventh century with the Great Schism, the event that divided medieval Christianity into what came to be regarded as Eastern and Western branches; these branches were later called the Eastern Orthodox Church and the Roman Catholic Church.27 In addition to a geographic setting, “the West” has come to signify a culture characterized by industry, technological advancement, wealth, knowledge, and power. As Calverley notes, the Industrial Revolution, an event that occurred around the same time as European imperialism, marked the beginning of a period where Britain and France began to distinguish themselves from other parts of the world based on cultural 26. Ibid., 32. 27. Nathan Calverley, “Where did the term ‘The West’ Originate?” History News Network, June 5, 2006, http://hnn.us/articles/25977.html (accessed July 10, 2010). 30 differences. Jacob Whitaker, professor of history at Michigan State University, comments: Around the time of the Industrial Revolution, Europeans and the societies in the Americas that were closely tied to Europe began to create a historical narrative of “the West” that played up the progressive, evolutionary aspects of ‘Western Civilization’ and portrayed “the Orient” as timeless, stagnant, and doomed to backwardness unless it could imitate “the West.”28 Such valences have come to be the primary resonances of what once was merely a geographical designation such that Australia and New Zealand, (both situated further east than even the Middle East or perhaps further west than the U.S.) can be called Western by virtue of their citizens having a common heritage and culture with the people of the United Kingdom and the United States. These countries are historically rooted in ancient Greece and were developed primarily by people of the Judeo-Christian tradition. Their defining characteristics commonly include liberal democratic governments and freedoms within a framework of laws, placing them on similar political pages and aligning them in terms of their visions for foreign policy.29 It is difficult to imagine a Muslim-majority country that would be considered “Western” by these standards. Even so, in July of 2010, Ahmet Davutoglu, the Turkish Foreign Minister, said that “We are part of the West.”30 He commented: If the West sees us as outside and an object that can be lost or won, their logic is wrong. We have an equal right to speak in NATO as any other country. No one has the right to see the Western alliance as its domain 28. Jacob Whitaker, as quoted in Calverley, “Where did the term ‘the West’ Originate?” 29. Caroline Cox and John Marks, The West, Islam, and Islamism: Is Ideological Islam Compatible with Liberal Democracy? (Civitas: Institute for the Study of Civil Society in London, 2003), 2. 30. Jorge Benitez, “Ahmet Davutoglu: ‘We are a Part of the West,’” Atlantic Council, July 10, 2010, http://www.acus.org/natosource/ahmet-davutoglu-‘we-are-part-west’ (accessed July 10, 2010). 31 and name another as inside or outside of it. If Western values are soft power, economic interdependency, human rights, then we defend them.31 Though Turkey may consider itself a part of “the West” due to its commitment to democracy, secularism, and human rights, many of the representations that some in Muslim-majority countries deploy of “the West” in this thesis appear to be directed at countries that have a history of military domination of other nations, whether in the form of European imperialism or present-day American-led wars, in the region. In addition to resentment and anger over a physical military presence, Muslims also directed their feelings of frustration toward the cultures associated with those occupying countries. Fatema Mernissi writes: Once colonization had ended after World War II, the newly independent Muslim states did not renounce their vendetta against reason. They fought against the advances of the Enlightenment philosophy and banned Western humanism as foreign and “imported.”32 Mernissi goes on to suggest that democracy is a form of government that is often associated with those nations that brutally colonized Arab and Muslim-majority countries. The historic presence of foreign governments that imposed European systems on their subjects cannot be easily forgotten. Thus, Mernissi suggests that it is not entirely surprising to see much frustration, fear, and anger directed towards Britain, France, and the United States in the midst of the ongoing wars in the Middle East. Jalai Ali-I Ahmed, an Iranian writer, activist, and intellectual, comments on the language underlying the notion of an East-West divide in his 1982 book Occidentosis: A Plague from the West: 31. Ibid. 32. Fatima Mernissi, Islam and Democracy: Fear of the Modern World (Reading: Perseus Publishing, 1992), 43. 32 For me, ‘West’ and ‘East’ have neither political nor geographic meaning. Instead they are two economic concepts. ‘West’ means the well-fed countries and ‘East’ means the hungry countries. For me, the state of South Africa is a piece of the ‘West,’ even though it forms the southern tip of Africa. Most of the countries in Latin America are part of the ‘East,’ even though they are on the other side of the globe.33 Similarly, the terms “the Arab world” and “the Muslim world” have also acquired connotations that are not ethnically or religiously oriented. These include, but are not limited to, the sense of backwardness, hostility, extremism, and most commonly, terrorism.34 A September 25, 2007 Pew Research poll on public opinion comparing Mormonism and Islam reports the following: Twice as many people use negative words as positive words to describe their impressions of the Muslim religion (30% vs. 15%). The most frequently used negative word to describe Islam is "fanatic," with "radical" and "terror" often mentioned as well.35 Within any discourse it is important to break down these labels in order to understand what they actually represent. The term “Muslim” is nothing more than a label that derives its meaning from context. In fact, this is the case with all words. Gabrielle Marranci, professor in the anthropology of Islam at the University of Western Sydney says, “Surely ‘Muslim’ is not a ‘person’ in the agency signifier of the term, but rather an ‘idea’, or in other words, an abstraction.”36 Marranci paraphrases author Gregory 33. Jalal Ali-i Ahmad, Occidentosis: A Plague From the West, trans. Paul Sprachman (Delmor: Mizan Press, 1982), 28. 34. Bernard Lewis, “The Roots of Muslim Rage,” The Atlantic, September 1990, http://www .theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1990/09/the-roots-of-muslim-rage/4643/ (accessed September 12, 2009). 35. Pew Research Center, “Public Express Mixed Views of Islam, Mormonism,” September 25, 2007, http://pewforum.org/surveys/religionviews07 (accessed September 16, 2009). 36. Gabriele Marranci, “Muslims as Cultural Objects,” Islam, Muslims, and an Anthropologist’s Blog, July 5, 2009, http://marranci.wordpress.com/2009/07/09/muslims-as-cultural-objects%C2%A0/ (accessed October 4, 2009). 33 Bateson’s Steps to an Ecology of Mind,37 in which Bateson describes this process of reification: If you happen to be sitting on a train and notice a dark complexioned man wearing a long beard and a Muslim cap sitting near you, and if his cumbersomely large rucksack makes you feel uneasy, it is logically incorrect to say that you fear the “Muslim.”38 Marranci goes on to suggest that, in fact, there are no Muslims, or even Christians, trains, or rucksacks present in our minds. Instead, there are only mental images and representations of what those nouns mean. The problem lies in confusing one’s idea, or mental representation of such things, with reality. In addition, Marranci suggests that the primary commonality among Muslims is not Islam, but rather the fact that they are human beings. He explains this theory in The Anthropology of Islam: For people who profess credo in Islam, [the term] “Muslim” has an emotional component attached to it. They feel to be Muslims. Then, and only then, the “feeling to be” is rationalized, rhetoricized, orthodoxized, or orthopraxized. Of course, people feel to be Muslim in different ways, which are unique to each of them, and express this feeling in the form of discourse.39 Thus, while it may be common to associate Arabs or Muslims with particular images or conceptions, reducing the individual to a set of collective representations, and deploying those representations as the reality of what individuals are may constitute intellectually dishonesty.40 Such maneuvers suggest that the entire identity of a particular group may be summed up by an arbitrarily chosen expression. With Islam, this misconstruction commonly represents Muslims as being influenced by religion alone; the level of one’s “Muslimness,” is said to define every aspect of their identity. Rather than recognizing a 37. Bateson’s Steps to an Ecology of Mind describes a situation similar to the one paraphrased by Marranci, using lions instead of human beings. 38. Marranci, “Muslims as Cultural Objects.” 39. Gabriele Marranci, The Anthropology of Islam (Oxford: Berg Press, 2008), 7-8. 40. Ibid. 34 Muslim as a human being first, as Marranci advocates, religious affiliation is commonly used as the primary identifier. Philosopher and political scientist Alfred Korzybski provides an instructive image with his suggestion that map is not territory. This thesis, later made popular by Jonathan Z. Smith in his book of the same name, suggests that our perception of reality is not reality itself, but our own representation, or map, of it.41 In other words, just as delineations of borders between countries as illustrated on a map are merely representations, imaginary lines constructed by humans in an attempt to make sense of the earth’s undifferentiated geography, so similarly a person’s mental representations about things in the world are simply maps instead of territory. In the case of Muslims, “The map is often shaped by illusion and abstraction—namely, that something called Islam may exist in itself. Of course, this is not the case.”42 The fear embedded in this sort of polarized outlook is evident in political discourses. The case of Montana Senator Keith Ellison, an American Muslim, is an example of this. As Ellison took office, he used a Qur’an to take his oath. Virginia Senator Virgil Goode responded to one of his constituent’s concerns about this fact by writing: [I]f American citizens do not wake up and adopt the Virgil Goode position on immigration there will likely be many more Muslims elected to office and demanding the use of the Koran . . . I fear that in the next century we will have many more Muslims in the United States if we do not adopt the strict immigration policies that I believe are necessary to preserve the 41. Jonathan Z. Smith, Map is Not Territory (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1978). 42. Marranci, “Muslims as Cultural Objects.” 35 values and beliefs traditional to the United States of America and to prevent our resources from being swamped.43 President Barack Obama, later recalling that episode in an address to Muslims at Cairo University on June 4, 2009, emphasized values of religious pluralism dating back to the third American president. Obama said: And when the first Muslim-American was recently elected to Congress, he took the Oath to defend our Constitution using the same Holy Koran that one of our founding fathers—Thomas Jefferson—kept in his personal library.44 During the 2008 presidential election, President Obama himself was often the focus of divisive language on Islam and Muslims. A University of Texas poll released six days before the general election found that 23 percent of Texans believed Democratic nominee Barack Obama was a Muslim. Similarly, a USA Today poll released on April 1, 2008 found that 10 percent of American voters believed Obama was a Muslim.45 Just months after Obama assumed the presidency, a similar percentage, 11 percent, believed him to be a Muslim with thirty-five percent indicating that they did not know about his religion, either because they did not have enough information or had heard confusing claims. These beliefs had less to do with whether or not Obama ascribed to a particular set of religious beliefs called Islam, and more to do with the negative perceptions associated with Islam—perceptions reinforced by the language of political scientist Samuel Huntington, American conservative political commentator and former 43. John Nichols, “Keith Ellison and the Jefferson Qur’an,” The Nation, January 3, 2007, http://www .thenation.com/blog/keith-ellison-and-jefferson-koran (accessed October 12, 2009). 44. Barack Obama, “A New Beginning, ” (speech, Cairo University, Cairo, Egypt, June 4, 2009) http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/NewBeginning (accessed November 4, 2009). 45. Texas Politics Project and Department of Government at the University of Texas at Austin, “McCain Ahead of Obama in Texas; 23 percent believe Obama is a Muslim, poll shows,” October 30, 2008, http://www.utexas.edu/news/2008/10/30/politics_poll (accessed September 22, 2009). 36 presidential candidate, Pat Buchanan, author Bernard Lewis, former Congressman Virgil Goode, and others. It is his status as an outsider—an African-American with a nonstandard name, direct connections through his father to Africa, a biography that includes residence in Indonesia, and other markers of difference—that has permitted people discomfited by his differences to configure him as belonging to another category with similar valences, that is, as a Muslim or remarkably as an Arab. To this point, an ABC News/Washington Post poll on views of Islam released April 5, 2009 indicated that 48 percent of Americans hold an unfavorable view of Islam—the highest unfavorable rating since 2001. Additionally, 29 percent expressed the belief that Islam encourages violence against non-Muslims. Yet, 55 percent of those polled concede that they lack a general understanding of Islam, and 53 percent admitted that they do not know a Muslim personally.46 These polls indicate how associations and mental representations of a group often come to define the group itself. “The Arab World,” as it is understood by non-Arabs, is commonly associated with the religion of Islam. It is common to mistakenly assume that the Arab World is co- extensive with the Muslim World. Just as the term “Muslim” has been the object of negative stereotyping, so too has the term “Arab.” The words “Muslim” and “Arab” are often used interchangeably and are commonly linked to feelings of fear or skepticism. Misconceptions such as these were evident in the language of Gayle Quinell, a 75-year old woman from Shakopee, Minnesota whose comments at a town hall meeting with the 46. Gary Langer, “Most Back Outreach to Muslim Nations, But Suspicion & Unfamiliarity Persist,” ABCNews.com, April 5, 2009, http://abcnews.go.com?PollingUInit/story?id=724871&page=1 (accessed October 4, 2009). 37 2008 Republican presidential nominee Senator John McCain became a favorite subject of major newscasts and talk shows. Quinell said of Obama, McCain’s opponent, “He’s…he’s an Arab.”47 Later, reporter Dana Bash of CNN spoke with Quinell: Bash: You called him [Obama] an Arab terrorist? Is that correct? Why do you think he is an Arab? Quinell: Because his dad is. Bash: His dad is Muslim. His dad was Muslim. Barack Obama has never been a Muslim. He’s a Christian. His father was Muslim, and he’s a Christian. Quinell: Yeah, but he’s still got Muslim in him. So that’s still part of him.48 This anecdotal evidence of a confusion between the meanings of the terms Arabs and Muslims stems not only from stereotypes that dominate prevailing discourses on Islam but also from inaccurate portrayals of Muslim and Arabs in history. Susan Douglass and Ross Dunn, authors of “Interpreting Islam in American Schools” argue that American textbooks often portray Islam as the result of intersection between two “historical matrices:” Arab society and culture and the actions of Muhammad as the “founder” of Islam.49 Douglass and Dunn suggest that American textbooks describe Islam as “the religion of the Arabs”50 and begin such discussion by depicting the Arabian Peninsula in a sensational tone. They say, “Some textbooks use romantic language, as in this extreme example: ‘They lived as desert wanderers, these Arab traders . . . lacking a permanent home, these nomads, or wanderers, called themselves Arabs.’”51 The 47. Uptake, “McCain Volunteer Sends Out ‘Obama is an Arab’ Letters,” Video Clip, [n.d.], YouTube.com, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LOU9xZ4zcss (accessed October 9, 2009). 48. Ibid. 49. Susan Douglass and Ross Dunn, “Interpreting Islam in American Schools,” The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political Science and Social Science 588, no. 1 (2003): 52. 50. Ibid. 51. Ibid. 38 authors go on to say that the religious context of Arabia is often described as pagan, with paganism being “part and parcel of nomadic Arab culture.”52 They write: Two of the texts mention the hanif tradition, one with strong ethnic overtones: “Holy men known as hanifs denounced the worship of idols. They rejected Judaism and Christianity, preferring to find a uniquely Arab form of monotheism.”53 It is true that the majority of Arabs adhere to the faith of Islam, but the mistaken equation of Arabs and Muslims does not take in to account the many Arabs who adhere to other faiths. A notable example is Edward Said, who has described himself as “a Christian wrapped in Muslim culture.”54 Said was born in Jerusalem (then in the British Mandate of Palestine) but spent time living in Cairo until the age of 12 and has referred to his childhood as being “between worlds.”55 Just as Americans commonly assume that all Arabs are Muslims, it is even more common to assume that all Muslims are Arabs. In fact, this is hardly the case. Only 25 percent of the world’s Muslim population is of Arab ethnicity, and the majority of Arab- Americans adhere to some form of Christianity. In fact, of the largest Muslim-majority countries in the world (Indonesia, Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, and Turkey) none have an Arab-majority population.56 Conceptions such as these, along with particular mental representations of Muslims and Arabs are common in American media as well, where contemporary 52. Ibid. 53. Ibid. 54. Edward Said, as quoted in Harold Veeser, Edward Said: The Charisma of Criticism (New York: Routledge, 2010). 55. Edward Said, “Between Worlds,” London Review of Books 20, no. 9 (1998): 3. http://www .lrb.co.uk/v20/n09/edward-said/between-worlds (accessed June 20, 2010). 56. The Associated Press, “Study: Muslims Make up 25 percent of World Population. Princeton Professor: Report Obliterates Notion that Muslims are Arabs and Arabs are Muslims,” August 10, 2009, http://www.haaretz.com/news/study-muslims-make-up-25-percent-of-world-population-1.6465 (accessed June 27, 2010). 39 movies like Syriana, Rules of Engagement, Body of Lies, and Patriot Games situate dark-eyed, dark-haired, enemies against a backdrop of mosques, minarets, and madrasas (religious schools), wearing burqas, hijabs, or other Islamic religious attire. Additionally, video games such as Delta Force and American Army give players a chance to participate in killing enemies in such settings. Edward Said, in Covering Islam, discusses how the media’s depiction of ethnic and religious groups reinforces the relationship between knowledge and power. Said writes: If knowledge is power, those who control the modern Western media (visual and print) are most powerful because they are able to determine what people like or dislike, what they wear and how they wear it, and what they should know and must not know about themselves.57 Said goes on to suggest that Muslims are only brought up in American media when the story pertains to military engagements, terrorism, or other events that bring “them” into “our” lives. Thus, non-Muslims’ perceptions of Muslims are largely based on filtered information situated around what it means to be a Muslim in relationship to the United States—how are “they” useful to “us,” with the “they” described as the Muslims and the “us” described as Americans. While representations such as these are still prevalent in contemporary discourses on Islam, some world leaders have taken an approach that reveals and confronts common stereotypes. General Colin Powell, in an interview on Meet the Press on October 19, 2008, indicated his distaste for the deployment of such maneuvers: It is permitted to be said such things as, “Well, you know that Mr. Obama is a Muslim.” Well, the correct answer is, he is not a Muslim, he’s a Christian. He’s always been a Christian. But the really right answer is, “What if he is?” Is there something wrong with being a Muslim in this 57. Edward Said, Covering Islam (New York: Vintage Press, 1997), 170. 40 country? The answer’s no, that’s not America. Is there something wrong with some seven-year-old Muslim-American kid believing that he or she could be president? Yet, I have heard senior members of my own party drop the suggestion, “He’s a Muslim and he might be associated with terrorists.” This is not the way we should be doing it in America.58 In a similar yet more subtle manner, President Barack Obama, in his famous speech to Muslims at Cairo University in June of 2009, spoke about the relationship between Muslims and Americans that is “based on the truth that America and Islam are not exclusive and need not be in competition.”59 Pushing back against images that are often aligned with the religion of Islam, such as those noted in the Pew Research poll mentioned earlier (“radical,” “fanatic,” “terror”), Obama did not use the words “terror” or “terrorism” once when referring to such relationships. Additionally, Obama refrained from mentioning a dualism of good versus evil. Just as English-language speakers have utilized various terms to represent Islam, Muslims, and Arabs, the etymology of the certain words in the Arabic language provides clues as to how some Arabic-speaking peoples view and discuss “the West.” As Fatima Mernissi points out in Islam and Democracy: Fear of the Modern World, the Arabic words for “the West” and the adjective foreign or strange share the same root. Thus, ghariba, or foreignness in Arabic, shares a strong spatial connection with “the West,” or al-gharb; it is more than a geographic signifier; it is a land where the sun sets and darkness and strangeness await.60 Mernissi notes that the same root exists with the words al-ghurab, or crow, and gharib, or strange. The crow in Arab culture is said to be the herald of blindness and 58. Colin Powell, as quoted in Alex Johnson, “Powell Endorses Obama for President,” MSNBC.com, October 19, 2008, http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/27265369/ (accessed August 28, 2009). 59. Obama, “A New Beginning.” 60. Mernissi, Islam and Democracy,13. 41 misfortune while mystical meanings of the word gharib in the Shia branch of Islam, suggest estrangement from God and from just government.61 Thus, because of these similarities, discussions about “the West” among some Arabic speakers may bring about images and concepts of strangeness, darkness, misfortune, and detachment from God. Just as it is possible for Americans to conflate mental representations of Islam, Muslims, and Arabs with reality, it is also possible for Arabs to associate these mental representations of strangeness, foreignness, and misfortune with the reality of the West. A related deployment of language among some Muslims is found in the Persian word gharbzadegi, or “Westoxication,” introduced by philosopher Ahmad Fardid in the 1940s. This term shares the root gharb with the Arabic language and combines it with the Persian word zade, a suffix that means “to be affected.”62 Thus, the term’s literal translation becomes “to be affected by the West.” Commonly referred to in English as “Westoxication,” Fardid’s term is a play on the word “intoxication,” meaning an abnormal physiological state resulting from the consumption of a substance, in this case Hellenic Westernism. The term evokes the notion of a gradual loss of Iranian cultural identity as the result of the spread and influence of Greek philosophy. Fardid suggests that this philosophy positioned man at the center of the universe and separated him from his spiritual calling in the world.63 Jalil Ali-i Ahmad referred to gharbzadegi as “Westitis.” He explains his revulsion to “Westitis:” I speak of being afflicted with “Westitis” the way I would speak of being afflicted with cholera. If this is not palatable let us say it is akin to being stricken by heat or by cold. But it is not that either. It is something more on the order of being attacked by tongue worm. Have you ever seen how 61. Ibid. 62. Ali-i Ahmad, Occidentosis, 343. 63. Ibid. 42 corn rots? From within. The husk remains whole, but it is only an empty shell like the discarded chrysalis of a butterfly hanging from a tree. In any case, we are dealing with a sickness, a disease imported from abroad, and developed in an environment receptive to it.64 The writings of Mernissi, Fardid, and Ali-i Ahmad indicate that representations of the “other” extend beyond American and European depictions of Arabs and Muslims. In fact, there exists a counterpoint of representations whereby some Arabs and Muslims depict Americans and Europeans in particular ways. Salman Rushdie writes in a 2002 article titled “Anti-Americanism Takes the World by Storm” that, “What America is accused of—close-mindedness, stereotyping, ignorance—is what its accusers would see if they looked into a mirror.”65 Portraying the American culture as a monolithic rival, representations of the United States, particularly in some Middle Eastern news media, employ many of the same maneuvers found in Orientalist discourses. These include but are not limited to: the conflation of key terms and ideas, the reification of certain concepts, and the reduction of complex cultural dynamics to generic labels that define an entire population. A brief review of selected news media from the Middle East and North Africa will demonstrate the similarities that exist between some American and Middle Eastern representations of one another. On November 5, 1979, one day after the siege on the United States Embassy in Tehran that launched the Iranian hostage crisis, the Ayatollah Khomeini of Iran reflected on the event declaring at a public news conference that the United States of America 64. Ibid. 65 Salman Rushdie, “Anti-Americanism Takes the World By Storm,” The Guardian, February 6, 2002. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2002/feb/06/usa.afghanistan (accessed February 16, 2010). 43 was “the great Satan”66 of the world. Since that time, a war of words between the United States and Iran has dominated public discourse with each state hurling various epithets back and forth. Various politicians in the United States labeled Iran a “rogue state” and part of the “axis of evil.”67 Some Iranian political leaders suggest that in addition to “the great Satan,” the United States is a “paper tiger.” While these types of exchanges are most commonly observed between political leaders, they have encouraged a public sphere of discourse, where Iranian and American journalists, activists, and members of the general public represent one another using similar these same terms. Mohammad Tabar notes in “The Beloved Great Satan: The Portrayal of the U.S. in the Iranian Media since 9/11,” that in January of 1989, Ayatollah Khomeini, who founded the Islamic Republic, sent a religious delegation to Kremlin to meet with Mikhail Gorbachev, the last president of the Soviet Union. Tabar recalls the meeting: The founder of the Islamic republic had a very simple message for Gorbachev: your empire will collapse; convert to Islam. He wrote: “Your country’s main problem is not ownership, economics, or freedom. Your main problem is lack of true belief in God.”68 Not surprisingly, Gorbachev thanked the delegation for their efforts but did not heed Khomeini’s warning. Just two years later, the Soviet Union and the communist ideology crumbled. The fall of the Soviet Union energized Khomeini’s followers. They believed that their vision was confirmed and that the United States would collapse next. 66. Ayatollah Khomeini, as quoted in The Associated Press, “Iranians Threaten to Kill Hostages; Bargarzan Resigns,” The Indiana Evening Gazette, November 6, 1979, http://www.newspaperarchive .com/ (accessed March 12, 2010). 67. In 2001, the State Department released a list of “rogue nations,” one of which was Iran. In 2002 State of the Union Address, President Bush called Iran part of the “axis of evil.” 68. Mohammad A.Tabaar, “The Beloved Great Satan: The Portrayal of the U.S. in the Iranian Media Since 9/11,” Crossroads 80, no. 108 (2006): 23. 44 As Barry Rubin writes in Hating America: A History, the events of September 11, 2001 could have been expected to heighten sympathy for the United States. However, that was not the case.69 Rather, Iranian news media viewed September 11th as the beginning of an American downfall. The newspaper Jomhouri Eslami quoted the French author, Emanuel Todd, writing, “The U.S. is imploding because of its growing budget deficit and the fact that it is no longer on the cutting edge of science, knowledge, democracy, and freedom.”70 Additionally, Resalat, a conservative newspaper whose mission is described as “spread[ing] the words of God and Ahl al-Bayt (Shia) school of thought in order to establish God’s will and governance”71 on earth, wrote that “No philosopher or sociologist has any doubt about the fall of the West.”72 The paper reported that the United States has committed a “capital crime” by preventing women from playing “her unique role in the family.”73 Moreover, the paper commented that “reducing the value of women to consumer goods” and ignoring her “shining status” in the center of civilization constitutes a capital crime.74 Resalat also noted that western liberalism and socialism have ignored human rights, and particularly women’s rights and for this reason, “Western civilization is on a slide towards collapse.”75 The paper suggested that American immorality was at the heart of the collapse, sustaining that claim by saying that “10 percent of American male chefs are suspected of having a kind of sexual disease called ‘fetishism.’”76 69. Barry Rubin, Hating America: A History (New York: Oxford University Press), 155. 70. Emanuel Todd, as quoted in Tabaar, “The Beloved Great Satan,” 24. 71. Resalat News, “About.” http://www.resalat-news.com/Fa/ (accessed November 12, 2009). 72. Resalat News, as quoted in Tabaar, “The Beloved Great Satan,” 24. 73. Ibid. 74. Ibid. 75. Ibid. 76. Ibid. 45 What emerges from these representations is the idea that the United States, as a result of being outpaced in science, technology, knowledge, democracy, and freedom, as well as having deplorable moral standards, is on the verge of collapse. Media outlets in Iran indicated that the vulnerability of the United States on September 11, 2001 was evidence of this vulnerability. However, some media outlets in Iran represented the United States as devious and conniving, suggesting that the attacks of September 11th were actually organized by members of the United States government in order to satisfy their desire for conflict. In other words, the United States government wanted to invade the Middle East but needed a reason to do so. With no obvious threat that could justify an invasion, members of the Bush administration created one. Kayhan, a conservative newspaper known for its ardent support of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, wrote in March of 2002 that “Research done on the September 11, 2001 incidents by independent investigators inside the United States and outside it leave little doubt that the said attacks could not be the work of al-Qaeda or any other foreign organizations.”77 Additionally, Resalat and Jomhouri Eslami both ran stories quoting American military and commercial pilot, Russ Wittenberg. In addition to flying over one hundred combat missions with the U.S. Air Force, Wittenberg flew the same two airplanes that were hijacked on September 11, 2001. The article quotes Wittenberg as saying that “The 9/11 attacks were carried out by the U.S. government.”78 Following September 11, 2001, Wittenberg was known for his postulations of a conspiracy as well as his strong criticism of the Bush administration. Use of his comments by Resalat and Jomhouri Eslami 77. Kayhan Newspaper, as quoted in Tabaar, “The Beloved Great Satan,” 27. 78. Ibid. 46 illustrates how some conservative news media may choose particular sources and narratives that represent and uphold their views. Aside from selectively representing incidents related to September 11, 2001 in ways that lend credence to conservative Iranian beliefs, these conservative news outlets distorted quotes from prominent Americans in order to advance their own messages. On August 6, 2005, Resalat ran a cover story with the headline “Noam Chomsky: The U.S. President Should be Executed.”79 Beneath the headline, the newspaper added that “The war crime law that was ratified by the 1996 Republican dominated Congress says that disobeying the Geneva Convention is a war crime which has a capital punishment.”80 The newspaper Jomhouri Eslami ran a story in May of 2005 with the headline “Samuel Huntington: The U.S. Will Not Win in Iraq”81 while Kayhan published an article that said, “Along with 540 thousand Americans, 105 U.S. congressmen want to impeach Bush.”82 These misrepresentations appear to be an attempt to bolster support for particular beliefs by creating a false sense of agreement among prominent American intellectuals as well as inspire anti-Americanism that resonates among some conservative Iranians. Other negative representations of the United States are found in Middle Eastern media. The Egyptian media provides a wealth of examples and is worthy of a brief review for two distinctive reasons. First, Egypt has the largest population of all Arab- 79. Ibid., 30. 80. Ibid., 30. 81. Ibid. 82. Ibid. 47 majority countries at 75 million people. In addition, Egypt provides a wider sampling of the diverse ideological orientations that are represented in both news and other media.83 A recent case study of the ways in which the United States is represented in Arab media was conducted by Hossam Mohamed, a researcher and specialist in media studies at the Al-Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies in Cairo. His findings were published in his article “Media Matters: The Arab Portrayal of the United States.” To begin his study, Mohamed chose nine Egyptian newspapers that were largely representative of the different ideological trends commonly found in Egyptian journalism. The newspapers were: al-Ahram, al-Akhbar, and al-Gumhouriya (government-run papers); al-Wafd, al-Ahali, and al-Arabi (opposition political party papers); and al-Usboo’, Saut al-Umma, and al-Alam al Yaum (independent, privately- owned papers). Mohamed’s study analyzed the content of each newspaper between July 2003 and July 2004, rating the content of the news articles as “negative,” “positive,” “neutral,” or “balanced” in terms of its representations of the United States. Articles classified as “negative” included language that was not only critical of U.S. policy but also contained phrases with specific negative meanings, connotations, or disparaging remarks. Articles classified as “positive” praised U.S. policy and contained phrases carrying positive meanings or connotations. Articles classified as “neutral” did not have positive or negative representations and articles classified as “balanced” provided an equal sampling of both positive and negative representations. Mohamed indicates that of the 2,647 articles surveyed by Mohamed, 1,951 or 73 percent, represent the United 83. Hossam Mohamed, “Media Matters: The Arab Portrayal of the United States,” Arab Insight 1, no. 2 (2007): 36. 48 States in a negative way. Only 90 articles, or 3.4 percent, portrayed the United States in a positive light.84 In discussing his findings in more detail, Mohamed indicates that the overwhelming majority of the articles that represented the United States in a negative way dealt with topics related to American foreign policy. Mohamed explains his findings in detail: American foreign policy issues were the most important source in forming the U.S. image in the Egyptian press, with foreign policy being the subject of about 86.5 percent of the sample, compared to only 6.3 percent for domestic American politics, 4.8 percent for Egyptian-American relations, 1 percent for the American economy, and 0.9 percent for culture and society.85 From these numbers, Mohamed indicates that the general trend in most pieces was the belief that the American goal is “hegemony” over the Arab world—to achieve the dream of “forming an American empire of unrivaled supremacy.”86 Additionally, rather than assuming the role of just ruler, news articles represent the United States as “a state above the law,” who “with its behavior plants the seeds of hatred and evil in the world.”87 The following statements are quotes from the newspapers that reflect this image: The invasion of Iraq, which was founded on lies, deceit, and the fabrication of justifications which frightened the military Goliath of the superpower which reneged on its duty in spreading justice and supporting international legitimacy.88 The Statue of Liberty is no longer a symbol of America, but rather that which the world recognizes of American freedom is the image of the Iraqi prisoner.89 84. Ibid. 85. Ibid., 36. 86. Ibid., 38. 87. Ibid. 88. As quoted in Mohamed, “Media Matters,” 38. 89. Ibid. 49 Bush and his soldiers’ treatment of the Iraqis is no different that Saddam’s treatment of them.90 Saddam undertaking atrocities against the Iraqis is not the equivalent to the Americans doing so, since America boasts night and day of its respect for human rights and rejection of torture.91 The recurring theme in each of these statements is related to American foreign policy in Iraq. In fact, just as a majority of Egyptian news media focus on American foreign policy, such focus dominates news media that extend beyond Egypt’s borders: Arab satellite news channels. In 2004, a Washington Post/University of Maryland poll found that of all the Arab satellite channels, al-Jazeera and al-Arabiya were the most watched.92 As Hossam Mohamed comments, “Al-Jazeera, in particular, relied on Iraq as its principal source in feeding the negative image of the United States.”93 A few examples will illustrate this point. In a June 2004 episode of the television show The Opposite Direction, host Faisal al-Qassem commented on the transfer of power from American to Iraqi forces. He asks a series of rhetorical questions in a candid and mocking tone: Are the new Iraqi intellectuals not embarrassed of themselves to be thanking Bush and Blair while millions around the world demonstrate against a visit by Bush to their country? Does America still consider itself an occupying force in Iraq? Isn’t it going to ask for thousands of new soldiers? Is there any sovereignty under occupation? Didn’t the Imam of the Abu Hanifa mosque describe the new Iraqi officials as a bunch of foreign agents? Didn’t the American newspapers say that the new Iraqi prime minister was a CIA agent and undertook sabotage missions inside Iraq that killed many children and civilians? How is he different from Saddam Hussein, whose hands are soaked in the blood of the Iraqis?94 90. Ibid. 91. Ibid. 92. Ellen McCarthy, “Va.-based, U.S.-Financed Arabic Channel Finds Its Voice,” The Washington Post, October 15, 2004, http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A33564-2004Oct14 (accessed June 26, 2010). 93. Ibid. 94. Ibid., 43. 50 In another program, More Than One View, the host proposed the possibility of American aspirations for regional dominance: There are different views as to what happened in Iraq, was what happened actually out of the Americans’ desire to free the Iraqi people from the former regime or bring Iraq democracy, or was there a hidden global strategic agenda which the administration was working to achieve, not only in Iraq but rather across the region?95 Another reporter remarked: The U.S. project is one of American hegemony over the entire region— controlling everything that happens, monitoring everything that takes place within it, and so it’s a project completing its hegemony. There is military hegemony, which must be followed by cultural hegemony and political hegemony. Cultural and political hegemony are included in this project, particularly taking into consideration the ideas and principles which Bush came with.96 Mohamed concludes that the negative image of the United States in Arab media is the result of the Arab media’s focus on American foreign policy. The United States is represented as a country that has lost its credibility, an invading power that acts outside of international laws and legitimacy, and a country whose policies contradict its values of justice, human rights, and liberty.97 Aside from the issue of Iraq which has been reviewed above, the relationship between the United States and Israel is at the heart of many negative representations of the United States. Al-Wafd, an Egyptian newspaper based in Cairo, wrote in a May 2004 article titled “The American Ambassador’s Lies,” that “It is America who offers Israel arms and ammunition … who gives it billions of dollars and protects its possessing all the weapons of mass destruction.”98 The United States’ staunch support 95. Ibid. 96. As quoted in Mohamed, 45. 97. Mohamed, “Media Matters,” 45. 98. Al-Wafd, as quoted in Mohamed, 39. 51 of Israel is viewed as a threat to many Arabs as Israel has long occupied Palestine and forced many Palestinians from their homes. Majed Kyaly, a political analyst whose research is focused on the Arab-Israeli conflict, comments that much of the financial support that the United States gives Israel “goes towards efforts to ensure Israel’s advantage over other countries in the region, technologically, scientifically, militarily, and economically.”99 American financial aid to Israel is estimated to be $2.4 billion per year. This estimate, however, does not include every dimension of financial support. Shortly before President Bush left office, he announced that Israel would receive an additional $600 million per year in military aid. These funds, many Arabs believe, are being used to wedge Palestinians out of their homes as Israel seeks to expanse its territory and influence in the region. In August of 2005, Al-Gomhouriya newspaper published an article titled “America and Israel Behind the Walls,” saying, “The mistakes and the ongoing deceit by America provides Israel enough cover and time to seize the rest of the Palestinian Territories and wipe out the Palestinian people.”100 Kyaly comments in an article titled “It’s Israel, Stupid!” that America’s image according to some Arabs is synonymous with Israel; Israel is considered aggressive, colonial, racist, and arrogant, flouting international laws and standards to impose its will on the less powerful.101 The relationship between the United States and Israel has been depicted beyond descriptions in news stories. In fact, many newspapers in the Middle East have caricatured that relationship in political cartoons that appear regularly in countries like 99. Majed Kyaly, “It’s Israel, Stupid!” Arab Insight 1, no.2 (2007): 78. 100. Al-Gomhouriya News, as quoted in Mohamed, “Media Matters,” 40. 101. Kyaly, “It’s Israel, Stupid!” 74. 52 Bahrain, Qatar, Jordan, Syria, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia. A few examples will illustrate this point. The Bahranian newspaper Akhbar al-Khalij, known for its Arab-nationalist slant, published a series of cartoons in 2005 that illustrated a mix of American pro-Israeli sentiment and aggression. One cartoon published on May 22, 2005 showed an American (identified by the stars and stripes on his top hat) pouring pictures of Saddam Hussein in his underwear from a bucket labeled “American policy” onto “the Islamic world which is already soiled by the scandal of Koran desecration.” In the cartoon, the American’s top hat includes a prominently displayed Star of David, the symbol of the Jewish faith. The cartoon refers to the 2005 incident where U.S. military officials at Guantanamo Bay tore out pages, stood on, and urinated on copies of Qur’an while questioning Muslim prisoners.102 In another example, published just one month later on June 9th, 2005, an American soldier is shown attempting to shoot an arrow with the Star of David on its tip at the Qur’an. In the second panel of the drawing, the arrow launches only to return in the third panel, hitting the soldier between his eyes.103 The next day, on June 10th, 2005, the same paper published a cartoon depicting a Hasidic Jew with a parakeet on his arm that resembles U.S. President, George W. Bush. The Jewish man commands the parakeet to say “I hate the Arabs.” The parakeet responds accordingly, “I hate the Arabs, I hate the Arabs.”104 102. Radio Islam, “Some Cartoons: Some Caricatures in the Arab Media about the Jewish Occupation in Palestine,” http://www.radioislam.org/cartoons/arabic/presse.htm (accessed March 1, 2010). 103. Tom Gross, “Cartoons from the Arab Word,” http://www.tomgrossmedia.com/ArabCartoons.htm (accessed March 1, 2010). 104. Ibid. 53 In addition to the cartoons in Bahrainian newspapers, other countries have produced similar material. In fact, Qatar, home of the Al-Jazeera news network, has regularly published anti-American political cartoons in its newspapers. One of the best known cartoons of this sort was published on May 13, 2003 in Al-Watan. It depicts an American and a Jew with sharp teeth, pointed noses, and angry expressions, eating from both sides of an apple labeled “the Arab states.” The same paper published a cartoon one year earlier in June of 2002 showing Ariel Sharon watching from the sidelines as airplanes fly into the World Trade Center in Manhattan. The phrase “the peace” is written in Arabic and formed from the smoke across the sky. The Twin Towers represent the word “the” in that phrase. This cartoon represents the United States and Israel as being behind the attacks of September 11, 2001 in an attempt to make a case for invading Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan. Newspapers in the Middle East discussed the 2008 U.S. presidential elections and the influence of Israel on politicians as well. In June of 2008, Ar-Risala, a Palestinian-based newspaper, showed presidential candidate Barack Obama in the back pocket of a Jewish man, identified by the Star of David on his pocket. The caption read: “The wagon that gets you to the White House.” The paper inferred that expressing support of Israel would be sufficient to win the election and further, that Israel had American politicians “in it’s pocket,” or under its influence.105 A similar cartoon appeared in Al-Watan, a Saudi Arabian paper. The image showed both John McCain and Barack Obama in the front pocket of a Jewish man, identified by his blue and white tie with the Star of David appearing in the middle. The image of American political candidates “in 105. The Anti-Defamation League, “The U.S. Presidential Candidates: Cartoons in the Arab Media,” http://www.adl.org/main_Arab_World/as_cartoons_candidates.htm (accessed March 1, 2010). 54 the pocket” of the Jewish lobby was common during the elections. Depictions of Obama, McCain, and Clinton in the pockets of Jews appear in Al-Watan (Saudi Arabia) ArabNews (Saudi Arabia), Ar-Risala (Palestine), and Akhbar al-Khalij (Bahrain) newspapers.106 From this brief review, it is clear that the relationship between the United States and Israel occupies a special position in the formulation of the American image in Arab- majority countries. From the perspective of Arabs and Muslims, the United States’ long- term support of Israel is unjust and does not resonate with the values of liberty, justice, and human rights that it advocates. Raghda Dirham, a prominent U.S.-based Arab journalist writes: For as long as dispute has existed between most Arabs and U.S. policies toward the region, it has been because of the U.S. adoption of Israel at the expense of Arab rights and interests, and also because of the prevailing impression that the United States allied itself with Arab governments at the expense of their peoples, and that if thought only of Israel and oil when it designed its policies toward the region.107 The relationship between the United States and Israel is an issue that relates to not only nationalist goals but also religious feelings. It is possible to imagine how some Muslims may feel that the United States and Israel have teamed up against them. After all, Christianity is the largest religion in the United States and the heritage it shares with Judaism makes such an alliance seem natural. Additionally, Arabs and Muslims may view the conflict with Israel in terms of a process of liberation from a foreign occupier. This perception, combined with a sustained American military presence in the region, 106. Ibid. 107. Raghda Dirgham, “Iraq Caused for Arabs an Overlap Between Fatalism and an Anticipation of an Unknown Tomorrow,” Al-Hayat News, December 27, 2002 in Kyaly Majed, “It’s Israel, Stupid!” 55 contributes to the feelings of anti-American sentiment outlined in the representations above. Aside from newspapers and television newscasts, another medium used to portray the United States in a particular way has found a hotbed of support in Egypt: movies. The year 2007 marked the one hundred anniversary of the birth of Egyptian and Arab cinema. Despite the long history of Arab cinema, there are few films that depict the relationship between Arab-majority countries and the United States; Egyptian cinema is the exception. Khaled El-Sargany, vice president of the Egyptian film cinema, writes in an article titled “From Alexandria to New York: Uncle Sam in Egyptian Cinema:” Throughout the past century, Egyptian films have dealt almost exclusively with this topic [the relationship between the United States and Arab- majority countries], while films produced in the rest of the Arab world have generally stayed away from commenting on the United States or its policies.108 El-Sargany notes that political factors have played a role in the way the United States is represented in Egyptian cinema. Additionally, it cannot be denied that the filmmakers’ particular bias factors into the representations. However, Egyptian and Arab values also affect how a filmmaker or director portrays the United States and certain negative images in Egyptian and Arab cinema often reflect prevailing public opinion about the United States. As El-Sargany observes, one of the first Egyptian films to portray the United States was An American from Tanta. This film was released in December of 1954 during a period of friendly relations between Egypt and the United States; at this time, 108. Khaled El-Sargany, “From Alexandria to New York: Uncle Sam in Egyptian Cinema,” Arab Insight 1, no. 2 (2007): 49. 56 Egypt had not yet taken a firm position against American politics. As a result of the friendly political climate, the films director, Ahmad Mursy, chose non-political factors as focal points for his representation of the United States. The film negatively portrays “the American dream.” Mahrous, an Egyptian immigrant living in the United States, deludes his family in Egypt into believing that he has become a millionaire. Returning to his hometown of Tanta, his family expects that he will raise them from poverty to wealth. To their surprise, they discover that he is penniless. The film ends with the “American millionaire” working in a restaurant, claiming that he once owned an upscale eatery in Chicago.109 Mursy notes that for many people living in Egypt and elsewhere, the United States is often considered to be a magical land where anything is possible. Yet in the film, the American dream is portrayed as a delusion. Mahrous returns to Egypt financially ruined and dismayed that the “land of the free” had let him down. According to Mursy, the solution to longing for prosperity and success can be found in Egypt; the outside world does not necessarily provide the answers to life’s challenges. Further, Mursy represents the United States as being idolized for its glamour and fortune at the expense of Egyptian culture and values.110 Fifty years after the release of An American from Tanta, Egyptian filmmakers still explored “the American dream” in a similar light. In 2004, Yousef Chahine released Alexandria…New York, a film that examines the post-September 11th era through the lens of a reunited couple. The protagonist, an Egyptian film director named Yehia, 109. Ibid., 50. 110. Ibid. 57 travels from Alexandria, Egypt to New York City where he is being honored at a film festival. While in New York, he encounters his first love, an American woman named Ginger who he dated during his studies there some 40 years earlier. He learns, with great surprise, that he fathered a son with her. As Yehia struggles to make sense of his life and the relationship with Ginger and their son, he comes to the conclusion that the “American dream” is not what it used to be. Mursy comments on Yehia’s realization: He comes to the fundamental conclusion that mutual understanding between the Arab world and the West, represented by the United States, is impossible due to unavoidable factors like Zionist propaganda, Westerners’ condescension toward anyone from the developing world, and the predominating assumption of Western superiority over the backward, barbarian Arab world.111 Two other films, Amrika Shika Bika and Land of Dreams also explore topics of immigration, “the American dream,” and a supposed incompatibility of Arab and American cultures.112 In Land of Dreams, produced by Dawoud Adbel and released in March of 2005, the protagonist Nigris seeks to join her son in the United States in order to obtain U.S. visas for her other sons. Before she leaves Egypt for the United States, she loses her passport and meets Raouf, a nightclub comedian in Egypt. Nigris and Raouf search endlessly for her passport and in the process, Nigris discovers that she does not really want to travel to the United States. She views life in America as a “counterfeit dream.”113 In a similar vein, Amrika Shika Bika tells the story of a man named Gaber Fawaz who works in the black market obtaining U.S. visas for people interested in moving to the United States. Approached by a group of Egyptian men desiring to immigrate, Fawaz procures fake visas and travels with the group, only to 111. Ibid., 52. 112. Ibid., 53. 113. Ibid., 54. 58 abandon them at the border between Romania and Hungary. Unable to move beyond the border without Fawaz’s assistance, the men become disillusioned, angered, and desperate. They are overwhelmed by frustration and return to Egypt after realizing Fawaz’s scheme. Amrika Shika Bika does not depict America directly, however the indirect portrayal through the characters that seek a new life there is clear. El-Sargany comments on these two films, writing: In both films, the United States is portrayed in a negative light. Both directors belong to the neo-realist school and have leftist affiliations, which go a long way in explaining their negative stances towards the United States and the issues they chose to highlight. In the end, they both offer the viewer the message that the American dream is a mirage, and that dreams are best realized within one’s own country. Indirectly, the two directors sharply criticize the idea of migration to the United States, and the belief that migration is the perfect solution to the problems Egyptians suffer.114 While the films discussed above project certain negative representations of the United States, they do so in an indirect way. In fact, the United States is rarely depicted except through the storylines of the Egyptian characters who became dismayed with “the American dream.” However, the film Hello, America does not follow that pattern.115 El- Sargany describes the film as “the most disparaging toward America, which is portrayed as a merciless jungle drowning in materialism.”116 In the film, the main character Bakhit travels to the United States with his fiancé Adila in search of a better life. When he arrives, he finds that in order to achieve residency he must abandon Adila and marry an obese American woman. Bakhit’s problems continue. One afternoon while walking down the street, he is hit by the motorcade of a presidential candidate. Injured, he seeks 114. Ibid. 115. Other Egyptian movies that were released around this time period followed a similar style. Blue Dress, Hello Amriki, and Amrika Amrika all reference the United States in an direct and critical way, 116. Ibid., 55. 59 a lawyer who helps him win a large lawsuit but discovers that the majority of the money is claimed by the lawyer for his compensation. The film ends with Bakhit and Adila driving through the streets of America, laughing and throwing money into the air, watching as an eager crowd that has gathered “fights over these green scraps of paper.”117 Hello, America uses satire to represent the United States. Chahine’s film is designed to exploit negative stereotypes in a way that makes the United States appear absurd to Egyptian viewers. Though it is considered a comedy, its serious message of Americans’ obsession with money is evident. The films mentioned above are only a sampling of the vast genre that is Egyptian cinema. It light of space constraints, it is impossible to discuss this field with the true attention that it deserves. However, a few points must be made regarding the thematic threads that run through each of the examples above and others. As Walter Armbrust, Lecturer of Anthropology at St. Antony’s College at Oxford University, notes, American journalistic representations of Egyptian cinema often result in straightforward labels of anti-Americanism and anti-Semitism. These representations suggest that anti- Americanism within Egyptian society is unrelated to American or Israeli policies.118 Neoconservatives and Zionists alike dismiss the notion that American foreign policies need to be critically examined as the underlying cause of anti-Americanism. In a similar vein, neoconservatives and Zionists tend to dismiss anti-Americanism itself as interest in the topic has subsided over the years. To these groups, anti-Americanism has 117. Ibid. 118. Walter Armbrust, “Bravely Stating the Obvious: Egyptian Humor and the Anti-American Consensus,” Arab Media and Society 3 (2007) http://www.arabmediasociety.com/?article=413 (accessed June 26, 2010). 60 become so normative and “their narratives of state-controlled media instilling anti- Americanism [are] so dominant that nobody thinks to question [them].”119 While few will argue that some representations of the United States in Middle Eastern mass media cross the line of civility, dismissing them in their entirety does not take in to consideration the real nature of their message. Armbrust writes: The fact that some representations of the United States do cross lines of civility that are not condoned in American mass media should not oblige us to accept the notion that there is no link between public opinion about American policy and mass mediated representations of America.120 Armbrust goes on to note the importance and relevance of Egyptian representations of the United States. He notes that a historical view of Egyptian cinema shows that the root of negative representations is American policies.121 The examples in this chapter reveal the different ways in which some Americans and some in Muslim-majority countries represent one another negatively. The language they deploy comprises an evolving discourse of dualism that divides the world into two monolithic and opposed spheres: Islam and “the West.” The specific linguistic maneuvers that drive this discourse—stereotypes, generalizations, and reification— reinforce the strangeness and incompatibility of “the other.” Though this discourse is common within the general public, it is influenced and reinforced by prominent intellectuals and political leaders. As chapter two will illustrate, inner policy making circles of the American government employ many of these divisive linguistic maneuvers and in doing so, they widen the perceived gap between Islam and the “West;” the 119. Ibid. 120. Ibid. 121. Ibid. 61 language they project strengthens perceptions of two competing civilizations by validating the narratives of those individuals they seek to marginalize. CHAPTER TWO “THE ARABS NEED TO BE JOLTED OUT BY SOME FOREIGN-BORN SHOCK” There are no data as given. Data are what I choose for my argument.122 —Jonathan Z. Smith Bernard Lewis is celebrated in academic circles as a leading specialist in the history of the Ottoman Empire and an expert on Islam. Having authored many of the encyclopedic entries that carry the weight of authority on various topics related to the Middle East he is hailed on his book jackets as “the doyen of Middle Eastern Studies,” “the father of Islamic studies,” “the West’s most distinguished scholar on the Middle East,” and “a sage for the age.” Lewis has authored thirty-one books on topics that range from the emergence of modern Turkey to race relations within Muslim societies. The influence of his writings extends beyond the academy and into the general public. Some of his early works, including The Arabs in History and Islam in History, offer significant insight into the history of Arab and Muslim cultures. Lewis surveys the governments, economies, and demographics of these societies in an evenhanded manner, offering the reader a balanced and detailed perspective of various dynamics that influenced early Muslims and Arabs. However, towards the end of the 1980s, Lewis’s work takes an ideological turn. In 1988, Lewis published The Political Language of Islam which highlights terms such as jihad and salam and suggests that the key religious terminology is inseparable 122. Jonathan Z. Smith, “The Domestication of Sacrifice,” in Robert G. Hammerton-Kelly, ed., Violent Origins: Ritual Killing and Social Formation (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1998), 207. 63 from a political narrative. This work was followed two years later by an article in The Atlantic titled “The Roots of Muslim Rage,” in which Lewis suggests that Muslim expressions of violence result from their disdain of secular Judeo-Christian culture and their inability to adapt to European and American standards. In 1993, Lewis released Islam and the West, situating these two “civilizations” in opposition to one another. In 1994 Lewis published Cultures in Conflict, discussing Islam, Christianity, and Judaism in terms of a conflictual relationship. In 1998 Lewis’s The Multiple Identities of the Middle East was released and three years later in 2001, his most popular work, What Went Wrong: The Clash Between Islam and Modernity in the Middle East, gained widespread attention within the general public. He responded to the public’s demand for that text in 2003 with The Crisis of Islam: Holy War and Unholy Terror. During this period, Lewis contributed frequently to op-ed pages of newspapers and wrote articles for a number of popular magazines. Some of his titles include: “The Revolt of Islam,”123 “Time for Toppling,”124 “The Enemies of God,”125 “Jihad vs. Crusade,”126 and “Muslim Anti- Semitism.”127 Each of these pieces depicts Islam as enraged and threatening. These titles all reinforce a common theme: a conflict between Islam and “the West” that results from the backward nature of Muslim societies. In these writings, it becomes customary for Lewis, though aware of the diverse history of Islam, to selectively situate Islamic concepts in ways that willfully distort them. It appears that his 123. Bernard Lewis, “The Revolt of Islam,” The New Yorker, November 19, 2001 http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2001/11/19/011119fa_FACT2 (accessed May 29, 2010). 124. Bernard Lewis, “Time for Toppling,” The Wall Street Journal, September 27, 2002 http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB1033089910971012713,00.html (accessed June 2, 2010). 125. Bernard Lewis, “The Enemies of God,” The New York Review of Books, March 25, 1993 http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/1993/mar/25/the-enemies-of-god/ (accessed June 2, 2009). 126. Bernard Lewis, “Jihad Vs. Crusade,” The Washington Post, September 27, 2001 http://online. wsj.com/article/SB1001547201928681240.html (accessed June 2, 2009). 127. Bernard Lewis, “Muslim Anti-Semitism,” Middle East Quarterly 5, no. 2 (1998): 43-49. 64 sudden shift in style results from an effort to advance particular views of a clash between Islam and Europe and later between Islam and the United States. By choosing only those details of Islamic history that align with his thesis, Lewis cleverly avoids various realities of that history in his later publications. Acknowledging such realities would unravel the claim that constitutes the foundation of his thesis: a bifurcated world where two rivals, a powerful and advancing “West” (understood by Lewis as the United States, Israel, Western Europe, and secular Judeo-Christian culture) and a backwards, self-loathing Islam, compete in a struggle for power. This glib treatment of history is demonstrated in two of Lewis’s work mentioned above: What Went Wrong and “The Roots of Muslim Rage.” Other scholars have dissected Lewis’s various prevarications, analyzing, for example, his 2002 text What Went Wrong: Western Impact and Middle Eastern Response. It is not the purpose of this thesis to review the critiques of that work as its underlying faults have been exposed thoroughly. Rather, What Went Wrong will serve as a point of departure from which we will explore a pattern of generalizations, selective representations, and strategic avoidance of contrary evidence that characterize Lewis’s latter portrait of Islamic history. As Edward Said points out in a 2002 review, Lewis’s What Went Wrong fills a need felt by some Americans: “to have it confirmed for them why ‘Islam’ attacked them so violently and so wantonly on September 11, and why what is ‘wrong’ with Islam deserves unrelieved opprobrium and revulsion.”128 Yet, as Said observes, the majority of Lewis’s endnotes reference Turkish examples, with only a handful of token Arabic and 128. Edward Said, “Impossible Histories: Why Many Islams Cannot be Simplified,” Harpers, July 2002. http://harpers.org/archive/2002/07/0079248 (accessed October 17, 2009). 65 European sources included in the mix. Nonetheless, Lewis uses these sources as evidence that the illness he diagnoses among Muslims in the Ottoman Empire is symptomatic of all Muslims, everywhere. Said comments: How this allows him to imply that his descriptions have relevance, for instance, to all twenty-plus Arab countries, or to Indonesia or Pakistan or Morocco, or to the 30 million Chinese Muslims, all of them integral parts of Islam, is never discussed; and indeed, Lewis never mentions these groups as he bangs on about Islam's tendency to do this, that, or the other, backed by a tiny group of Turkish sources.129 In a similar vein, Louis A. Delvoie calls into question the same generalizations and evasion of indigenous sources in his 2002 review of What Went Wrong in the International Journal. Delvoie notes that over ninety percent of Lewis’s essay contains a study of interactions between Europe and the Ottoman Empire from the fifteenth to the twentieth centuries. In addition, while Delvoie assures the reader that Lewis’s understandings of the Ottoman Empire and Muslim relations during this five century time period are accurate, he suggests that any relevance to contemporary Muslim populations drawn from such a study is oversimplified and a “leap of logic.”130 Delvoie comments: To draw wide ranging conclusions about the world of Islam from a study that focuses almost exclusively on a Turkish Empire and the Middle East is also at best misleading. Of the one billion or so Muslims in the world today, a clear majority live in four countries: Indonesia, Pakistan, India, and Bangladesh. These countries and their peoples are neither Turkish, nor Arab nor Persian, and they are certainly not Middle Eastern. Can they readily be fitted into an essentially Mediterranean mold labeled “Islam versus Christendom?” At first sight, it would seem to make for a very uneasy fit. For example, the 400 million Muslims of South Asia seem far 129. Ibid. 130. Louis Delvoie, “Review of What Went Wrong: The Clash Between Islam and Modernity in the Middle East by Bernard Lewis,” International Journal 58, no.1 (2002): 230. 66 more immediately preoccupied with Hindu India than with Western Christendom, or with a secular West for that matter.131 Delvoie is charging that Lewis fails to address significant areas of Islamic history that presented problems for his tightly woven narrative. Yet such avoidances suggest that there is more to Lewis’s presentation than an effort at an objective account of history. His account represents Muslims as suspended between two options: regressing backwards in time to adopt traditions of the past or joining the European and American bandwagon by implementing more secular systems. He supposes they are unable to harmonize the two and does little to actually explain what, if anything, “went wrong.” Lewis’s attempts to explain his thesis seem to result in a tautological argument, suggesting that Muslims have failed because they are failures. The following claims made by Lewis demonstrate the circular nature of his thesis: 1. In the course of the twentieth century it became abundantly clear in the Middle East and indeed all over the lands of Islam that things had indeed gone badly wrong.132 2. Updated armies brought a series of humiliating defeats. The quest for prosperity through development brought in some countries impoverished and corrupt economies in recurring need of external aid, in others an unhealthy dependence on a single resource—oil. Worst of all are the political results: the long quest for freedom has left a string of shabby tyrannies, ranging from traditional autocracies to dictatorships that are modern only in their apparatus of repression and indoctrination.133 3. Many remedies were tried—weapons and factories, schools and parliaments—but none achieved the desired result. They failed to remedy or even to halt the increasing imbalance between Islam and the Western world…Compared with Christendom, its rival for more than a millennium, 131. Ibid. 132. Bernard Lewis, What Went Wrong: The Clash Between Islam and Modernity in the Middle East (New York: Oxford University Press, 2002) 151. 133. Ibid. 67 the world of Islam had become poor, weak, and ignorant. The primacy and therefore the dominance of the West was clear for all to see.134 Rather than providing details that clearly illustrate how and why things “went wrong,” Lewis justifies each of his premises with another premise, using stronger language each successive time. First, he suggests simply that “things” went wrong. Next, he pinpoints those “things” as military defeats, corrupt economies, and tyrannical, repressive governments. Lastly, he suggests that remedial approaches supposedly aimed at halting an imbalance between “the Western world” and “Islam” failed. For that reason, as he clearly indicates, the “primacy” and “dominance” of the Europe and the United States over Muslim-majority countries was obvious. Lewis’s use of words or phrases that depict Muslims and their history as inferior to an advanced and urbane Europe qualifies his circular argument. Juan Cole, professor of history at the University of Michigan, comments on this maneuver in a 2003 review of Lewis’s essay. Cole notes that Lewis uses the phrase “sadly appropriate” to describe the first telegraph sent from the Middle East to the outside world. The telegraph detailed the fall of Sebastopol during the Crimean War of 1854. Lewis’s obvious despair appears to result from two things: the fact that “the first telegraphic message sent from the Middle East to the outside world was a military communiqué”135 and that the first use of this “Western device” by Muslims produced a message that was “inaccurate.”136 Cole comments: He adds, with drop-dead timing, that "It is also sadly appropriate in that it was inaccurate; it hadn't yet fallen" (p. 51). What sort of history writing is 134. Ibid. 135. Lewis, What Went Wrong, 51. 136. Juan Cole, “Review of What Went Wrong: Western Impact and Middle Eastern Response by Bernard Lewis,” Global Dialogue 4, no. 2 (2002). Reprint available from http://www.juancole.com/essays /review.htm (accessed October 19, 2009). 68 this? The clear implication is that the important news about the Middle East has for some time been military. The other clear implication is that the military news coming out of the region is full of falsehoods. The use of clever asides to create such a latticework of calumny has more in common with the techniques of propaganda than with academic history. Has Europe witnessed fewer wars than the Middle East in the past two centuries? Surely the comparative death toll from wars is about 100 to one in that period in Europe's favor.137 Here, Lewis uses an adjective in place of an argument. His use of the phrase “sadly appropriate” seems to express pity and even disapproval for various self-evident shortcomings of Islamic history. Lewis implies that after years of struggling to catch up with “Western” technology, Muslims finally make use of the telegraph, which he hastens to point out is a French invention. Yet clumsily, and to the apparent amusement of Lewis, the message that they send is not only related to a military event, but wrong. He reminds his reader that “[Sebastopol] hadn’t yet fallen. That didn’t happen until a little later.”138 The insertion of Lewis’s opinion, coupled with his erudition in the area of Islamic history, appears to present an aura of authority within which he claims to be empowered to declare some outcomes as “sadly appropriate.” Yet, they are little more than means of making claims without having to make arguments or offer substantial evidence. Such appraisals, couched in the discourse of a prominent intellectual, are less likely to be questioned or criticized by those who are unaware of his agenda. The phrase “sadly appropriate” indicates a value judgment; it is Lewis’s ability to assess the topic and draw distinctions of good and bad, acceptable and unacceptable, and appropriate and inappropriate. French sociologist Peirre Bourdieu writes about the power to define 137. Ibid. 138. Lewis, What Went Wrong, 51. 69 aesthetic concepts in his 1984 publication Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgment of Taste. He writes: Social subjects, classified by their classifications, distinguish themselves by the distinctions they make, between the beautiful and the ugly, the distinguished and the vulgar, in which their position in the objective classification is expressed or betrayed.139 Lewis, a scholar and prolific author, is able to distinguish himself by making such value judgments as “sadly appropriate.” While it is certain that representations of intellectuals will likely be refracted through a lens of their own perspectives, it is problematic for such representations to “bypass the normal conventions of intellectual discourse, including proof,” as Said phrases it.140 Similar generalizations and avoidances are found in Lewis’s other later writings. A detailed examination of Lewis’s 1990 essay “The Roots of Muslim Rage” will illuminate these various maneuvers and demonstrate that they are not exclusive to any one work by Lewis. Rather, they seem to appear as part of a grand pattern that Lewis has deployed over the latter part of his career in an effort to advance his particular worldview. Lewis wrote “The Roots of Muslim Rage” two decades ago when American and European discourses on Islam were not as lively as they are today, especially in the post September 11th environment. During that time, Americans and Europeans directed their attention to the post-Cold War world as American diplomatic, economic, and military pressures resulted in the fall of Communism. On the cusp of a new era and with no rival “other” remaining, those in need of such challenges welcomed Lewis’s timely depiction of a new threat: Islam. 139. Pierre Bourdieu, Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgement of Taste, trans., Richard Nice (Paris: Routledge, 1984), 6. 140. Said, “Impossible Histories.” 70 Of the many non-specific declarations that Lewis deploys, his interpretation of the classical period of Islam (632-1258 A.D.) is particularly problematic. He begins by discussing the concepts of dar al-Islam and dar al-harb, or House of Islam and House of War, respectively. These concepts were developed and deployed during the early eighth century by Muslim jurists who sought to establish geopolitical boundaries that divided the world in ways that were meaningful Muslim populations. Glossing over the historical timeline of classical Islamic history to choose a particular point of departure that he reifies to constitute “the classical Islamic worldview,” Lewis selects one of many diverging views on these concepts, writing: In the classical Islamic view, to which many Muslims are beginning to return, the world and all mankind are divided into two: the House of Islam, where the Muslim law and faith prevail, and the rest, known as the House of Unbelief or the House of War, which it is the duty of Muslims ultimately to bring to Islam.141 It will be beneficial to examine this passage in detail. It is hard to imagine that the 626 years comprising the classical period of Islam (632-1258 A.D.) could be so easily packaged into a single worldview—“the classical Islamic view.”142 Such a vast span of time, which includes the founding of the religion and its height as a world empire, is likely to have produced multifarious perspectives of the world from intellectuals and laypeople alike with diverging ideas and various influences informing their positions. Religions themselves, sacred texts, and the 141. Bernard Lewis, “The Roots of Muslim Rage, The Atlantic, September 1990, http://www .theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1990/09/the-roots-of-muslim-rage/4643/” (accessed September 12, 2009) 142. It is problematic to reify any religious worldview with use of a singular article, “the.” Today we can even see divergences among the main branches of Christianity: Protestantism, Catholicism and Orthodox, not to mention the various sub-denominations that constitute Protestantism. Suggesting that any one view constitutes the Christian worldview would likely prompt protest. Curiously, many people have little troubling suggesting that the histories and traditions of Muslims can be generalized and simplified in such a way. 71 doctrines and ideas they contain all require interpretation by individual people. Muslims and believers of all faiths interpret various religious doctrines that shape their perceptions of the world. It is these individual perceptions that are often reified and conflated as a singular worldview articulated by the religion itself. Omid Safi, professor of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, comments on this process of reification in the introduction to his 2003 text Progressive Muslims. Safi writes: “Islam” teaches us nothing. The Prophet Muhammad does. Interpretive communities do … “Islam” does not get up in the morning. Islam does not brush its teeth. Islam does not take a shower. Islam eats nothing. And perhaps most importantly for our consideration, Islam says nothing. Muslims do. Muslims get up in the morning, Muslims brush their teeth, Muslims shower, Muslims eat, and Muslims speak.143 It seems, however, that Lewis cannot acknowledge the possibility of a dynamic, living, breathing Muslim culture populated by diverse individuals who are animated by distinct objectives and values. Doing so would undermine his claim of a stagnant Muslim community whose members operate with a single mindset. Lewis deploys this representation as part of his “Islam versus Christendom” meta-narrative. Thus, Lewis’s argument, in order to remain afloat, necessitates such one-dimensional representations. Beyond that, the suggestion that the concepts dar al-Islam and dar al-harb are essentially “Islamic” situates them as being informed by the religious tradition of Islam. In fact, these terms are not found in the Qur’an or the sunnah, the example of 143. Omid Safi, ed., Progressive Muslims: On Justice, Gender, and Pluralism (Oxford: OneWorld Publications, 2003), 22. 72 Muhammad. Rather they are geopolitical designations developed and deployed by Muslim jurists in the early 8th century.144 Even if Lewis’s suggestion of “the classical Islamic view” is taken at face value, complexities still remain. Beyond a shallow description of the land “where the Muslim law and faith prevail” and “the rest,” Lewis offers no explanation of the dynamics that led to the development of these concepts nor does he convey the temporal framework in which they evolved. Such details provide clarity and depth to the nuanced meanings of these terms, revealing a complex dimension that Lewis avoids in his treatment of them. The views of Muslim jurists during this time period are hardly as unified as Lewis’s singular treatment suggests. In fact, divergences on the definition and application of the concepts dar al-Islam and dar al-harb are seen within the two earliest schools of Islamic jurisprudence, the Hanafi and Maliki schools. According to the perspective of the Hanafi school, these classifications emerged from within a consideration of the security and protection of Muslims; those who followed this school of legal thought placed emphasis on individual religious freedoms rather than political expansion and divisions of territory into areas of the Mu’min (believer) and the kafir (unbeliever). Early discussions on the issue of non-Muslims who converted to Islam while living in non-Muslim majority territories represent the fluid nature of this interpretation. Muhammad al-Shaybani (750-805 A.D.), a prominent follower of Abu Hanifa and noted jurist of the Hanafi school (699-767 A.D.) reports that the duty to migrate to areas of dar al-Islam after conversion was abrogated during the time of 144. It may be said that these geopolitical designations are not entirely unlike contemporary labels of “Third World” countries and even groups like the “G8.” They are reified terms that gain currency in time and place; these terms configure geopolitical mappings of the world. 73 Muhammad.145 Like those Muslims who accepted Islam but refused to follow Muhammad in Medina, they were simply not entitled to the spoils of war.146 In the event that Muslim-majority territories are conquered by an outside non-Muslim force, similar focus remains on the individual rather than the territory. Taha Jabir Al-Alwani, writes in Muslims’ Place in the American Public Square: Hope, Fears, and Aspirations, comments on this pluralistic approach. He writes: Dar al-Islam becomes dar al-harb after conquest by the unbelievers, if the laws of the unbelievers are enforced on Muslims, if the conquered territory is adjacent to dar al-harb, and if the lives and properties of Muslims and dhimmis [protected non-Muslims] are not safe. This implies that according to the Hanafi jurisprudence, an Islamic region that has been conquered by unbelievers can remain dar al-Islam as long as the conquerors appoint a qadi (judge) to administer Islamic law and as long as Muslims and dhimmis are secure as they were under Muslim law. In other words, Muslim sovereignty is not a precondition for dar al-Islam.147 There is a diversity of opinion on how to interpret the concepts of dar al-Islam and dar al-harb. For the jurists described above, territories controlled by non-Muslims may be considered dar al-Islam provided that Muslims are guaranteed safety and freedom to exercise their own religious beliefs. Rather than flee to Muslim-majority areas ruled by Islamic law, Muslims are entitled to remain within Muslim-minority populations and worship alongside other faiths. Such interpretations illuminate the possibility of religious pluralism within these communities. Though the concepts of dar al-Islam and dar al- harb do not stem from Qur’anic scriptures, it is possible to imagine how the following 145. Khaled Abou El-Fadl, “Legal Debates on Muslim Minorities: Between Rejection and Accommodation,” The Journal of Religious Ethics 22, no. 1 (1994): 134. 146. Ibid. 147. Taha Jabir Al-Alwani, “Towards A Fiqh For Minorities,” in Muslims’ Place in the American Public Square: Hopes, Fears, and Aspirations, ed., Zahid H. Bukhari, Sulayman S. Nyang, Mumtaz Ahmad, and John L. Esposito, (Oxford: Littlefield Press, 2004), 43. 74 passage from Surah 109, al-Kafirun (The Unbelievers), may have inspired such perspectives of the Hanafi school: Say: O unbelievers, I worship not what you worship and you are not worshiping what I worship nor am I worshiping what you have worshiped, neither are you worshiping what I worship. To you your religion and to me my religion.148 In sharp contrast to the Hanafi view, the Maliki School deployed strong arguments against Muslims living in non-Muslim majority territories.149 As a result of having a Muslim-minority population and lacking Islamic law, those lands are said to comprise dar al-harb, or House of War. Additionally, traveling to these Muslim-minority countries, even for the purposes of trade, was frowned upon. The famous Maliki jurist Sahnun ibn Said ibn Habib at-Tanukhi reports that Imam Malik ibn Anas (founder of the Maliki School) defended this view on the basis that Muslims who traveled to such territories may become subject to non-Muslim law.150 Thus, precluding Muslims from venturing to these territories would ensure that they remained within the jurisdiction of Islamic law. Khaled Abou El Fadl, author of “Islamic law and Muslim Minorities: The Jurist Discourse on Muslim Minorities from the Second/Eighth to the Eleventh/Seventeenth Centuries,”151 comments: The operative legal cause in Malik's view is that Muslims will be forced to submit to non-Muslim law, an issue that later became a crux of legal discussions. It is also reported that Malik discouraged people from residing in territory in which the Companions of the Prophet are vilified. 148. Qur’an: Text, Translations, and Commentary, trans., Abdullah Yusuf Ali (New York: Tahrike Tarsile Qur’an, 1987), 109:6. 149. The Hanafi School of fiqh was most common in the Middle East while the Maliki School comprised much of North Africa. 150. Fadl, “Legal Debates on Muslim Minorities.” 151. The split dates of El-Fadl’s title represent both the Islamic and European calendar systems. 75 This is taken by later Maliki jurists to mean that residence in lands of widespread sin is not allowed.152 To illustrate this point, when Ja’far al-Sadiq (702-765 A.D.), the sixth Imam according to Shia tradition, was asked if he would die an unbeliever if he entered dar al-harb, he responded that, in fact, he may be able to better serve Islam within Muslim-minority territories.153 In contrast, Malik’s position on this issue seems to reveal a perceived threat: Muslims should not venture into those lands where they may be ruled by non- Muslim law as doing so may somehow impinge on a Muslim’s faith. This interpretation explains how those jurists within the Maliki School may have envisioned the world as being divided by lines of demarcation that distinguish various boundaries of acceptable religious environments. These environments are deemed as acceptable places in which to dwell, not by the mere safety of the individual Muslim, but rather through the implementation of a legal framework that guarantees that safety by way of sovereignty. In cases where Muslim armies would conquer existing empires and establish Islamic rule, Muslim communities would realize religious freedoms through the new ruling powers. It is necessary to consider that though clear divisions exist between the Hanafi and Maliki schools on the issue of dar al-Islam and dar al-harb, divergences on these concepts also existed within the individual schools of thought. A notable example comes from the Maliki school where Ibn Rushd (1126-1198), the foremost Maliki jurist of his time, expressed uncompromising views that did represent the unanimous view of his 152. Khaled Abou El-Fadl, “Islamic Law and Muslim Minorities: The Jurist Discourse on Muslim Minorities from the Second/Eighth to the Eleventh/Seventeenth Centuries,” Islamic Law and Society, 1, no. 2 (1994): 144. 153. Ibid. 76 school. On the issue of Muslims living in or traveling to areas of dar al-harb, Rushd deploys his strict interpretation in a fatwa, or legal opinion, declaring that such travels are explicitly forbidden. This fatwa was issued on the grounds that “only an unethical and corrupt Muslim” would accept living in dar al-harb.154 Khaled Abou El Fadl writes, “Consequently, such Muslims are generally of suspect credibility, their testimony in court cannot be accepted, and they cannot be allowed to lead prayer.”155 Another leading Maliki jurist of this time, Al-Mazari disagreed with Rushd’s perspective. When asked if the rulings of judges appointed by non-Muslims in Sicily were applicable in Muslim-majority territory, Al-Mazari responded in the affirmative. He suggested that while a Muslim should not be allowed to reside in a non-Muslim territory, that did not necessarily undermine a Muslims’ credibility.156 Furthermore, Muslims residing in Muslim-minority territories need their own judges to mediate disputes, and while the appointment of such judges by non-Muslims may be regrettable, that does not undermine their authority to provide legal counsel for Muslim populations. The portrait that emerges from this review is multi-dimensional and does not lend itself to reductionistic generalizations. The concepts of dar al-Islam and dar al-harb are understood through the process of ijtihad, or independent interpretation. The interpretation of these concepts varied both between and within the earliest schools of Islamic jurisprudence. Thus, there is little evidence to suggest the existence of some unified understanding of these concepts that could properly be labeled as “the classical Islamic view.” While such descriptions may be convenient for Bernard Lewis’s thesis, 154. Ibid. 155. Ibid. 156. Ibid. 77 the reality is that the classical period of Islam produced a much more dynamic and vibrant society than Lewis depicts in his static representation. Though he glosses over this historical timeline to select a point of departure that suits his agenda, what remains clear, and perhaps ironic, is that Lewis is well aware of the schools of thought that characterize this time period. In his celebrated text Islam and the West, Lewis acknowledges the diversity of the classical era, even detailing the various perspectives. Lewis writes: Over time, different schools of jurisprudence arose among the Muslims … several different schools emerged in the Middle Ages, four of which have survived to the present time. These are the Maliki school, which predominates in almost the whole of Muslim Africa outside Egypt; the Shafi i school, which is found principally in the eastern Arab countries and among the Muslims of South and Southeast Asia; the Hanafi school in Turkey, Central Asia, and the Indian subcontinent; and the Hanbali school in Saudi Arabia. Although these differ from one another on many minor and a few major points, all recognize the other as Muslim and within the limits of permitted difference of opinion. There is indeed a dictum, first cited by Abu Hanifa, founder of the Hanafi school, and later ascribed to the Prophet, that “difference of opinion within my community is a sign of God’s mercy.”157 It is difficult to reconcile Lewis’s obvious awareness of the dynamics of this era with the assertion that one particular reading of classical Islamic history constitutes “the classical Islamic view.” An essentialist representation of this sort is not consistent with the diversity that Lewis himself articulates in the passage above. Packing a variety of interpretations and opinions into a singular representation, Lewis’s depictions make it difficult to discern the classical period of Islam as being influenced by a multiplicity of individual worldviews. Through his reductive depiction, Lewis is able to shift the focal point away from the complex nature of the human and 157. Bernard Lewis, Islam and the West, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003), 46. 78 towards a reified representation of the religion. When representations such as these are deployed in a given discourse, their reified nature projects a sense of absoluteness as use of the word “the” limits the possibility of alternative perspectives. Thus, in his narrative of a perennial clash between Islam and “the West,” Lewis’s responsibilities for explaining a dynamic human dimension that may unravel his thesis are relieved. Lewis’s generalizations about Islam do not end with his monolithic portrait of “the classical Islamic view.” Lewis continues, interjecting that “many Muslims are beginning to return” to such a view. Yet it is unclear what facts encourage Lewis to offer such an assertion. While the identities of the “many Muslims” that Lewis mentions remain undefined, it may be gathered that his claim of their return to “the classical Islamic view” is qualified by his various observations of Muslims. These observations are likely based on the same information that is available to and discussed among the general public: representations of Muslims in various news media. (In fact, Lewis himself played a role in shaping these representations through his frequent appearances on news programs, his backroom advice to officials during the Bush administration, and the prevalence of his writings in academic journals and more influentially in the opinion pages of newspapers.)158 With the combination of television, radio, newspapers, and various mediums of the internet, a powerful system of news reporting has emerged, constantly informing the world of events taking place beyond the restrictive frontiers of immediacy; Yet, events considered to be newsworthy are often filtered into a cycle of headlines that offers only a glimpse of a much larger picture. It is these glimpses that observers often catalog as complete knowledge of a given topic. 158. Michael Hirsh, “Bernard Lewis Revisited,” Washington Monthly, November 2004, http://www .washingtonmonthly.com/features/2004/0411.hirsh.html (accessed June 27, 2010). 79 Unfortunately, events that the media considers newsworthy in Muslim-majority countries often focus on violence. Extreme interpretations of jihad, or struggle, are common manifestations of this violence. Militant Islamists and suicide bombers who dominate news cycles frequently employ a broader and more contested definition of the term, suggesting it to mean “holy war.” Concurrently, these groups suggest that their militaristic interpretation is a return to the classical tradition of Islam. Likewise, Lewis writes in The Political Language of Islam that, “The overwhelming majority of classical theologians, jurists and traditionalists understood the obligation of jihad in a military sense.”159 Alas, it is possible to envision how, through this exercise in selective representations, a one-dimensional portrait of Muslims and the classical tradition of Islam emerges. Considering various representations of jihad during the period of time in which Lewis wrote “The Roots of Muslim Rage” may reveal further how he arrives at the conclusion that “many Muslims” are returning to his interpretation of “the classical Islamic view.” A first reading today may suggest that by “many Muslims,” Lewis refers to al- Qaeda and the likes of Osama bin Laden, who the American and European governments represent as icons of “what went wrong” with Islam. However, bearing in mind that Lewis made this claim in 1990, such a possibility is premature; al-Qaeda was officially formed in 1988 with its first organized terrorist attack coming in 1992—two years after Lewis’s article was published. Thus, the nascent nature of this group would prevent it from producing the vast displays of violence needed to justify a claim of 159. Bernard Lewis, The Political Language of Islam, (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1988), 72. 80 “many” Muslims returning to “the classical Islamic view,” as Lewis sees it. His claim must be informed by prevailing religious and political landscapes either prior to or during the time of his article. It is possible that by “many Muslims,” Lewis is referring to various episodes of violence that unfolded during the Iranian Revolution of 1979. Popular backlash against the American-backed Shah, Reza Pahlavi, prompted violent demonstrations calling for the rejection of American and European influence and led to the overthrow of Pahlavi’s government. Replacing him was Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, a religious and political leader known for his austere interpretations of Islamic scripture. Or, perhaps Lewis was thinking of the Iran-Iraq War of the 1980s. Iraq, under the leadership of Saddam Hussein, invaded Iran seeking to quell Islamist influence that may have spurred a revolution similar to that of Iran, in Iraq. The war followed a long history of border disputes between the two countries and resulted in hundreds of thousands of casualties. Still, Lewis may be referring to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, a land dispute that centers around the security and legitimacy of Israeli’s and Palestinians and their right to inhabit a contested territory fractured by conflict. Even more, perhaps Lewis is thinking of the various aircraft hijackings of the 1980s. The December 1984 hijacking of Kuwait Airways Flight 221 by a Lebanese Shia militia and the September 1986 Pan Am Flight 73 hijacking by members of the Abu Nidal terrorist organization are two common examples. While it is difficult to deny that the various events described above are anything but violent, it is problematic to assert that their violent nature stems from Islam. When Lewis suggests that “many Muslims” are returning to “the classical Islamic view,” and that such a view is informed by militarism, he is situating the religious identity of the 81 individuals or groups he has in mind at the forefront of his argument. To Lewis, it appears that before these individuals are fathers, brothers, Americans, Moroccans, teachers, bankers, or even human beings, they are Muslims. Their religion is the totality of their identity. Representing them in this way makes it clear to everyone that there is a particular reason for their violent nature: their faith. This maneuver results in the perception that it is the degree to which they internalize Islam, or their “Muslimness,” that is responsible for such acts. To Lewis, it appears that expressions of brutality and hostility exhibited by these “many Muslims” results from some arbitrary yet inherent thirst for violence. By this account, their identity as Muslims is sufficient evidence to explain why they would resort to plane hijackings, revolutions, or violent disputes over land. Lewis does not appear to consider that if in fact “many Muslims” are indeed returning to some hostile worldview, their return must be prompted by something. It is widely asserted that the creation of the Israeli state in 1948 incited the long history of conflict between Israelis and Palestinians as the former were forced to give up their land, thousands of them killed in the process. The 1979 Iranian Revolution is said to be the result of many in Iran believing that the Pahlavi government was a puppet of American and European powers in the region—a facade of imperialism imposing a foreign system of government on an unwelcoming population. The mujahideen warriors of the Afghan-Soviet War fought the Soviet army, present in Afghanistan to prop up a fading Communist regime. In fact, attacks on the 82 Soviet army by the mujahideen warriors were encouraged by the United States government.160 As Reza Aslan writes in How to Win a Cosmic War: God, Globalization, and the End of the War on Terror, “It is tempting, even comforting, to consider abominable acts of terror to be the result of irrational or pathological behavior. But the truth is that terrorism is almost always a calculated choice.” This choice often comes as the result of some motivating factor—some trigger that transforms feelings of hostility into car bombs, hijacked airplanes, and suicide vests. It cannot be ignored that these violent acts are often reactions to either real or perceived threats. Adam Sabra, professor of Middle Eastern history at Western Michigan University comments: This attitude relieves the West of any sense of responsibility for current conditions in the Islamic world or elsewhere ("the blame game" as Lewis calls it), whether for imperialism, capitalism, short-sighted Western support for repressive regimes in the region or anything else. In his view, the disenfranchisement of the Palestinian people and destabilization of the Middle East result purely from the unwillingness of Arabs and Muslims to face facts and look beyond grievances. Lewis has no patience for the idea that at least some of these grievances may be well-founded. Nor does he consider the possibility that the Arab and Muslim states, like any other states, may have their own geopolitical interests which differ from those of the US.161 For Lewis, acknowledging these possibilities may be detrimental to the monolithic portrait he paints of Islam. The lone suicide bomber, angered at the advances of Europe and the United States and inspired by his religion to manifest that anger in a violent way, presents a different picture than the Palestinian hijacker, whose home and 160. Appearing with members of the mujahideen on the White House lawn after a meeting in 1985, President Ronald Reagan said that "These gentlemen are the moral equivalents of America's founding fathers." (Ironically, the individuals who carried out the September 11th attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon were linked to the mujahideen fighters of the Afghan-Soviet War.) 161. Adam Sabra, “What Is Wrong with What Went Wrong,” Middle East Report, August 2003, http://www.merip.org/mero/interventions/sabra_interv.html (accessed October 19, 2008). 83 property were taken from him, his wife and children killed by the Israeli army while the United States funnels $7 Million in military aid per day to Israel.162 To Lewis, it is because Muslims are “returning” to “the classical Islamic view” that they are hostile and violent, not because they feel threatened and thereby inspired to rise and protect themselves. It is not difficult to imagine the public outrage that would result from representing Christianity in a similar way. After all, the existence of the Christian religion hinges on a violent act—the rejection, torment, abuse, and eventual crucifixion of Jesus. Beginning with that brutal point of departure, the Crusades, the massacre of Serbs in Bosnia, and the violent conflicts between Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland all present a picture of Christianity that is quite different from that which many know. Additionally, the abortion clinic bomber and Christian Identity member Eric Rudolph, cult leader of the Branch Davidian Protestant Sect, David Koresh, and the Catholic “Oklahoma City Bomber”, Timothy McVeigh, are rarely referred to as “Christian terrorists.” More importantly, their actions do not represent the vast majority of Christians. If the events and individuals spelled out above are considered in light of particularly violent Biblical verses, it becomes quite easy to envision a violent version of Christianity which inspires its followers towards violence as well. This selective representation distorts reality by magnifying isolated dynamics, divorcing them from a lager context. While it is possible to extrapolate only the most violent people and events from the history of any religion and represent those people and events as normative, this practice is most common in representations of Islam. 162. Jeremy Sharp, “U.S. Foreign Aid to Israel,” Report for Congress, February 3, 2009, http://www.ifamericansknew.org/download/CRS-AidToIsrael-2009.pdf (accessed June 27, 2009). 84 Examining Lewis’s argument more closely, the entire phrase “to which many Muslims are beginning to return” is problematic. In fact, it is these last four words—“are beginning to return”—that present an additional layer of complication. To suggest that Muslims are “beginning” to return to one particular worldview or another is to know that this shift is only the initial phase of some larger trend. Thereby, while “many” Muslims are “beginning” to return to this particular view now, more will purportedly return to it with the passage of time. This emotionally charged language would likely be interpreted by most readers as a dire warning from Lewis: take caution, for this is only the beginning of a larger return to an archaic ideology. At best, Lewis’s claim is a speculative maneuver that is convenient for his own narrative of a perennial “clash” between “the West” and Islam. Suggesting that “many Muslims” are “beginning to return” to “the classical Islamic view,” Lewis leaves the rest of the story open-ended. There is no indication if and when this return to a classical Islamic worldview will end nor is there any detail of the parameters that would define an end of this shift. Knowing how this trend will play out over time would allow Lewis to pinpoint his observations as the “beginning.” This maneuver requires some knowledge of future events. Certainly Lewis is unable to travel forward into the future and gather evidence to indicate that indeed his initial suspicions were accurate, that his observations marked a point of departure for a larger movement of Muslims embarking on a journey backwards in time. Therefore, not only is Lewis’s declaration unsubstantiated but more so, unsubstantiatable. As such, a limitless representation emerges allowing Lewis to more easily make the case for a perpetual struggle between 85 Islam and “the West” without providing any corroboration. After all, it is impossible to substantiate a claim that is based on evidence that exists in the future. What appears less obvious, however, is the rhetorical maneuver that drives Lewis’s representation. Suggesting a perennial clash between Islam and “the West,” Lewis confirms this claim not by providing substantial evidence that would attest to its legitimacy, but rather, with another claim—one suggesting that Muslims have indeed returned to a worldview that would produce this type of clash. Lewis seems to believe that the end result of “many Muslims” returning to “the classical Islamic view” is a clash of civilizations—the very idea he proposes in his article just three pages later. Thus, a self-fulfilling prophecy emerges where the truth of Lewis’s claims is contained within his premise, not his conclusion. This brand of tautology offers Lewis a broad platform on which to deploy his narratives about Islam, guaranteeing that any one claim needs nothing more than a subsequent claim in order to appear convincing. Next, Lewis’s suggestion that this move towards “the classical Islamic view” is a “return” poses two challenges. First, it permanently situates these concepts, dar al-Islam and dar al-harb in the classical tradition, removing the possibility of their significance today. However, it is impossible for one to return to something unless they have left it for one reason or another. A “return” to this worldview would mean that Muslims have either abandoned it at some point or that the passage of time has caused it to become irrelevant with these concepts becoming replaced by more contemporary ones. If this is the case, Lewis does not take into account those Muslims to whom such concepts may resonate today. Perhaps the concepts are meaningful in different ways, yet still meaningful. Moreover, how can Lewis know that this “return” to “the classical Islamic 86 view” will result in an interpretation of these terms as he sees them or even in a “classical” sense? He does not take into the account the various contemporary experiences, influences, and interactions that may alter the way contemporary Muslims reflect upon their traditions and histories. Lewis does not seem to be aware that terms can change meaning over time or that they find their meaning in their context. It may be possible for Muslims to return to concepts which evolved during the classical period and adopt interpretations that harmonize with the dynamics of their lives today. With these possibilities absent from Lewis’s narrative, there emerges a picture of Muslims resistant to contemporary dynamics, unaffected by the changing nature of the world, and whose minds cannot evolve past their own histories. Finally, Lewis defines “the classical Islamic view” in binary terms: dar al-Islam and dar al-harb, the House of Islam and the House of War respectively. It is, by this account, the responsibility of those Muslims living in dar al-Islam to “bring Islam” to dar al-harb. As has been mentioned above, these concepts have been contested over time, especially among the early schools that developed and deployed them. While some may argue that Lewis presents an accurate description of them, it is certain that his representation is not complete. Rather, Lewis only presents the portion of Islamic history that advances his thesis depicting a world divided squarely into two opposing spheres. Yet, not all classical Muslim scholars shared this binary worldview. The Shafi i school of fiqh offers perspectives that contrast views depicting a binary division of the world. The Shaf’ii school suggested that non-Muslim majority countries not at war with Muslim communities, did not inevitably constitute dar al-harb; neither did the absence of 87 Islamic law. The possibility of viewing the world in this manner was offered by the Shafi i school as dar al-ahd, or House of Treaty. Through this third division, jihad cannot be waged against people simply because they dwell in lands inhabited by a non- Muslim majority population or are ruled by a law other than shari a.163 Moreover, among those classical scholars who maintained that Islam inclined to peace and not war, dar al-harb may be defined as the area where “peaceful relations are cut because of the aggression of its people upon Moslems. It is the abode where war is being fought actually, where no security or safety prevails.”164 This diverging view, among Muslim scholars of the Shafi i school suggests that Lewis’s presentation of a binary classical worldview is, at best, a one-sided representation of history. In addition to his one-sided representation of history, Lewis deploys other rhetorical maneuvers that distort history to benefit his argument. In “The Roots of Muslim Rage,” Lewis comments: At first the Muslim response to Western civilization was one of admiration and emulation—an immense respect for the achievements of the West, and a desire to imitate and adopt them. This desire arose from a keen and growing awareness of the weakness, poverty, and backwardness of the Islamic world as compared with the advancing West.165 By employing the phrase “at first,” Lewis would appear to be gesturing at the beginning of Muslim encounters with Europe, presumably around the eighth century when Muslims from North Africa advanced into the Spain. Whatever period Lewis has in mind, he declares it to be a time marked by Muslim admiration and emulation of the advancements of “Western civilization.” 163. Maouncher Parvni and Maurie Sommer, “Dar al-Islam: The Evolution of Muslim Territoriality and Its Implications for Conflict Resolution in the Middle East,” International Journal of Middle Eastern Studies 11, no. 1 (1980): 4. 164. Ibid., 14. 165. Lewis, “The Roots of Muslim Rage.” 88 This representation, however, appears to be part of a self-serving narrative. During the late seventh century, Rashidun armies established the Islamic caliphate, or empire.166 The caliphate was considered to be a continuation of Muhammad’s political authority and an attempt to maintain unity among the umma, or community of Muslims. This expansion of power led to the rise of the subsequent Umayyad and Abbasid caliphates (661-658 and 750-1258 respectively), inaugurating Islam’s Golden Age (8th to 13th centuries). Characterized by vast advancements in mathematics, science, medicine, ethics, philosophy, and literature, Islam’s Golden Age was a period of unrivaled intellectual activity in all fields. This period gave rise to various academic institutions, among them the University of Al-Karaouine in Fes, the oldest degree granting university in the world, and the University of Al-Azhar in Cairo, considered to be the center of Arabic literature at the time. Howard Turner, author of Science in Medieval Islam, speaks to the vast impact of the Golden Age saying, “Muslim artists and scientists, princes and laborers together made a unique culture that has directly and indirectly influenced societies on every continent.”167 During this era, Muslims made Aristotle known to Christian Europe through the preservation of ancient texts, contributed to the fields of science and mathematics with the development of algebra, and transformed the study of medicine in Baghdad through greater understandings of anatomy and disease prevention. In addition, the Islamic Golden Age witnessed revolutions in agriculture as Muslims developed sugar refineries and introduced the 166. Also known as the Rightly-Guided Caliphate, the Rashidun Caliphate was established after the death of Muhammad in 632 and comprised the first four caliphs in Islamic history. At its peak, the Rashidun Caliphate was the largest empire in history up until its time. 167. Howard Turner, Science in Medieval Islam, (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1995), back cover. 89 system of cash cropping. Moreover, Muslims in and around the Levant during that time period preserved much of the knowledge of ancient Mesopotamia, Persia, Egypt, India, Greece, and Rome. That knowledge was later transmitted into texts by Syriac Christian communities and were used to aid the spread of Christianity. In short, Muslim advancements during this time far surpassed those of the “Western civilization” Lewis references. Instead of these earlier periods, when Muslim societies were more advanced than those in Europe, Lewis appears to be focusing on the period in which Muslims came to admire European civilization, perhaps during the Enlightenment or the rise of European empires around the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. But this too is problematic. During the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, Europe experienced vast advances in the areas of philosophy, science, and political thought, advocating reason as a method for achieving objective truth. And, while this Age of Reason revived a continent once ravaged by religious wars, it is difficult to maintain that such achievements warranted feelings of respect, admiration, and the desire to emulate European systems. First, intellectuals during this period proposed a new role for religion in the public square. Reducing religion to only those things that could be rationally defended, stronger emphasis was placed on the human being. People turned towards science and rationalism for answers to life’s challenging questions, placing less emphasis on their faith. From the perspective of Muslim-majority societies, where religion had a prominent role in the public sphere from the very time of its inception, it is not likely that these new secular institutions were viewed as admirable or worthy of adoption. Professor of Islamic Studies at George Washington University, Seyyed 90 Hossein Nasr, suggests that some Muslims may have viewed the Enlightenment as separating knowledge from value. Nasr argues that European advances in science and technology only concern themselves with increased knowledge, paying little attention to the consequences of such knowledge. He says, “Science no longer serves humanity, but its own quest for yet more knowledge.”168 Other Muslims suggest that these advances caused people to place trust in reason alone while Islam places trust in God alone; according to this view, science reduces the world to those things that may be empirically verified, while Islam focuses on a more spiritual dimension. Additionally, if Lewis is indeed referring to this particular period of history, he does not seem to consider a trend that dominated the relationship between Islam and Europe at the turn of the 18th century: European colonialism. Colonialism changed the map of Muslim majority countries. Following World War II, the French government was present in western and northern Africa, Lebanon, and Syria; the British government in Palestine, Iraq, the Arabian Gulf, and Malaysia; the Dutch in Indonesia. Colonial officers and Christian missionaries became the face of European expansionism and imperialism. Conflicting ideals came with the spread of political power and the new imperial systems replaced the indigenous educational, legal, political, and economic systems. Additionally, religion of Islam was often cast as being inferior to the religion of the powerful Europeans. The disregard for Islam under imperial rule is best evidenced by the language of Lord Cromer, the British General in Cairo from 1883 until 1907. In the introduction to Orientalism, Edward Said alludes to Cromer’s taste for imperialism, drawing attention to his statement: “As a social system, Islam has been a complete 168. S.H. Nasr, Traditional Islam in the Modern World, (London: Routledge, 1990), 41. 91 failure. Islam keeps women in a position of inferiority, it permits slavery, and its general tendency is intolerance towards other faiths.”169 John Esposito, Professor of Islamic Studies at Georgetown University, suggests just the opposite—that Islam as a social system was based on mutual respect and tolerance. In Unholy War: Terror in the Name of Islam, Esposito outlines the early social reforms of Muhammad, saying: [Muhammad’s] insistence that each person was personally accountable not to tribal customary law but to an overriding divine law shook the very foundations of Arabian society... Muhammad proclaimed a sweeping program of religious and social reform that affected religious belief and practices, business contracts and practices, male-female and family relations.170 Historian and Islamic Studies scholar Montgomery Watt offers a similar perspective in Muhammad: Prophet and Statesman: [Muhammad created a] new system of social security and a new family structure, both of which were a vast improvement on what went before. By taking what was best in the morality of the nomad and adapting it for settled communities, he established a religious and social framework for the life of many races of men.171 Lewis proposes that after careful self-examination, Muslims came to view themselves as “backwards,” requiring colonial systems of government as a prescription for their ailing society. According to this view, the sudden desire for change was the result of an internal enlightenment among Muslims which led to a rejection of their indigenous values and social structures. Lewis suggests that this came after Muslims’ encounter with the technologies and values of Europe—freedom, democracy, and advances in science and medicine. However, this appears to be a convenient maneuver by Lewis to delegitimize the histories and traditions of Muslim societies in a self-serving narrative of 169. Lord Cromer, as quoted in Said, Orientalism, 71. 170. John L. Esposito, Unholy War: Terror in the Name of Islam, (New York: Oxford Press, 2002), 30. 171. Watt, Muhammad: Prophet and Statesman, 234. 92 European supremacy. By indicating that Muslims themselves came to such realizations, Lewis attempts to shield himself from criticisms that may label his language as prescriptive and imperialistic. Rather than prescribing the adoption of European political and social structures from the outside, Lewis situates his narrative as a product of Muslim desires. Nonetheless, Lewis’s comments may be comparable to the imperialistic overtones found in conservative politician Arthur James Balfour’s June 13, 1910 lecture before the British House of Commons. Balfour, seeks to justify British rule of Egypt, and discusses “the problems with which we have had to deal in Egypt,”172 saying: Western nations, as soon as they emerge into history, show the beginnings of those capacities for self-government. You may look through the whole history of the Orientals in what is called, broadly speaking, the East, and you never find traces of self government … is it a good thing for these great nations —I admit their greatness—that this absolute government should be exercised by us? I think it is a good thing. I think experience shows that they have got under it a far better government than in the whole history of the world they ever had before.173 Both Lewis and Balfour imply that European political and social structures are beneficial for Muslim communities. While Balfour suggests that Muslims should know that British advances and models of government are superior, Lewis argues that, indeed, they do know and in fact, desire themselves to adopt such structures. In effect, Balfour suggests a premise that Lewis, speaking on behalf of Muslims and their desires, verifies. It would be more appropriate for Lewis to suggest that Muslims viewed the rituals of pre-Islamic Arabia as “backwards,” thus, the development of indigenous social structures within an uniquely Islamic framework. Such an observation may be more true 172. Arthur James Balfour, as quoted in Said, Orientalism, 32. 173. Ibid. 93 to Islamic history and less imbued with the prevailing motives of European colonial empires. Prior to the advent of Islam, Mecca was characterized by the worship of idols and tribal gods at the Kaaba, the center of Meccan religious life. Shortly after Muhammad received his first revelations, he began to condemn idol worship as polytheism. This denunciation redefined religion in the Arabian Peninsula, and as Islam began to spread, pagan populations of Mecca and Medina came to embrace it. Approaching Lewis’s conjecture of “backwardness” from this perspective would fall more in line with historical understandings of pre-Islamic Arabia and the interactions of Muhammad in and around Mecca during that time. Problems arise in examining the relationship between imperial Europe and Islam from a strictly religious point of view, indicating that Lewis’s depiction of awe-struck Muslims craving European achievements is in need of revision. Professor of Islamic Studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Carl Ernst, writes in Following Muhammad: Rethinking Islam in the Contemporary World: Throughout the medieval period, all of the characteristics of the Prophet Muhammad that confirmed his authenticity in the eyes of Muslims were reversed by Christian authors and turned into defects. They simply could not tolerate the notion of a new prophet after Christ. The traditional doctrine that Muhammad was illiterate, which to Muslims was proof of the divine origin of the scripture he transmitted, indicated to Christians that he must have been a fraud … When challenged by the pagan Meccans to produce miracles, Muhammad had answered that the Qur’an was his only miracle. While Muslims viewed this as proof of the spirituality of his mission, Christian antagonists considered his lack of miracles as clear evidence that he was not a prophet.174 It seems unlikely that such sentiments, deployed by Christian European rulers about their Muslim subjects, would engender among those Muslims feelings of admiration, 174. Carl Ernst, Following Muhammad: Rethinking Islam in the Contemporary World, (New York: Oxford University Press, 2003), 14. 94 respect, and the desire to adopt and emulate European achievements. Resentment may have been inspired by claims that Muhammad was a fraud and assertions belittling Islam by suggesting that its narratives of miracles were somehow inferior to those of Christianity. Yet, the acknowledgement of these possibilities does not produce the result that Lewis appears to seek: it does not represent Muslims as categorically awestruck by Christian Europe. But surely there is more to the story than mere feelings of religious and cultural superiority. When Lewis suggests that Muslims failed to catch up with the advances of European achievements in navigation, weapons, science, and technology, he does not elaborate on what exactly caused the Ottoman Empire to fall behind, only noting that it was after European armies repeatedly defeated Muslim armies that they realized their failure and inability to catch up with “the West.” Additionally, he does not explain what aspect of nineteenth century Europe he thinks would have caused Muslim societies to be so impressed, only noting that they could not consider science and philosophy as the secret of success because, as Juan Cole comments, “They reduced philosophy to the handmaiden of theology.”175 It appears, however, that Lewis has overlooked a number of important examples that may present evidence that is contrary to his narrative. First, Rifa’ah al-Tahtawi (1801-1873), an Egyptian writer, teacher, and intellectual, traveled to Paris in the nineteenth century to study arts, sciences, philosophy, and even modern military techniques. He returned to Egypt with the idea that European advances in “practical philosophy” were the primary reason for its prosperous and progressive 175. Cole, “Review of What Went Wrong.” 95 civilization.176 Tahtawi began to share the ideas of the philosophy that he studied in Paris and published Takhlis Al-Ibriz Fi Talkhis Bariz (The Extrication of Gold in Summarizing Paris) in 1834, outlining his experiences in prose.177 In the text, which became popular in Egypt and Paris, Tahtawi notes that Egypt and other Muslim-majority countries had much to learn from Europe. He comments on the advances in science and the literary arts: Whoever reflects on the state of the sciences and literary arts and craftsmanship will see that it is in the city of Paris that humanist studies (al-ma’arif al-bashariyya) have reached their apogee. No other Europeans compare to the scholars of Paris, nor any of those from the past.178 However, this statement was hardly a rejection of Muslim values or a recommendation for the wholesale adoption of European advances. Rather, it was a manifesto declaring the need to adapt European practices to Islamic culture and to synthesize the principles and practices of both. Tahtawi continues, acknowledging the possibility for conflict with holy texts, saying, “Although their sciences are filled with error opposing the holy books of revelation, they are based on proofs whose refutation would be most difficult.”179 In addition to the failure of acknowledging Tahtawi, whose work was considered so important that some scholars even suggest that his return to Egypt resulted in the beginning of the Arab renaissance,180 Lewis goes on to suggest that Egyptian factories that were designed to equip and clothe armies failed and that “Most factories became 176. Ibid. 177. It may be noted that Tahtawi’s title, referring to the extraction of gold, suggests that in panning or mining for gold, one carefully chooses gold gems out of mixture of other rubble, leaving rocks, mud, and other elements remaining. Observing Paris and taking back the elements of European society that he viewed as valuable while leaving the elements he did not view as worthy of being adapted may be considered in the same light. 178. Rifaa Al Tahtawi, Takhlis Al-Ibriz Fi Talkhis Bariz, ed., and trans., Daniel L. Newman, (London: Saqi Press, 2004), 206. 179. Ibid. 180. Azzam S. Tamimi, “The Renaissance of Islam,” Daedalus 132, no.3 (2003): 53. 96 derelict.”181 Yet as Juan Cole notes, while it is true that the Egyptian textile industry was not successful and ultimately collapsed, Lewis seems to suggest that the failure came as a result of Egyptians inability adapt European methods. However, at their peak, Egyptian factories employed over 40,000 workers in a number of areas other than making uniforms for armies. Reasons for their failure are disputed. Cole notes that some blame the European treaties and tariffs of 1838 and 1840 while others suggest that Egypt’s lack of coal for creating energy led to poor performance and eventual failure. Still, others point to Pasteur’s invention of a method of quarantining healthy silkworms from diseased ones while Lebanese and Iranian silkworms were affected by outbreaks of disease and had no such protection.182 Khaled Fahmy presents a different picture in his essay “Women, Medicine, and Power in Nineteenth Century Egypt.” Fahmy notes that the School of Midwives, established in 1832, was one of the premiere medical institutions in Egypt, training women in the basics of modern medicine. He suggests that at a time when men in Europe were considered superior to women in terms of ability within the medical profession, the School of Midwives pioneered women into public health professions, breaking ground for education in modern medicine and improvements to state-sponsored public health systems.183 Fahmy writes: During the six years of study, the first two focused on Arabic literacy, followed by four years of special training in the following fields: obstetrics, pre- and post natal care, dressing wounds, cauterization, vaccination, scarification, cupping, and the application of leeches, in addition to identification and preparation of the most common medicines.184 181 Lewis, What Went Wrong, 47. 182. Cole, “Review of What Went Wrong.” 183. Khaled Fahmy, “Women, Medicine, and Power in Nineteenth Century Egypt,” in Lila Abu Lughod, ed., Remaking Women: Feminism and Modernity in the Middle East, (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1998), 35. 184. Ibid. 97 That Lewis offers no explanation for these frequently mentioned possibilities, only noting the failure of Muslim-majority societies to adapt. By using the phrase “at first” to describe the Muslim response to European societies without specifying the exact period of time he has in mind, or the context of events surrounding a particular time, Lewis is able to situate his thesis of Muslim “backwardness” and self-loathing around an arbitrary point of departure that serves his motives. Elsewhere, Lewis makes similar moves. He describes the return of the classical Islamic terminologies, dar al-Islam, or House of Islam, and dar al-harb, or House of War: In the classical Islamic view, to which many Muslims are beginning to return, the world and all mankind are divided into two: the House of Islam, where the Muslim law and faith prevail, and the rest, known as the House of Unbelief or the House of War, which it is the duty of Muslims ultimately to bring to Islam.185 Just as Lewis glosses over the historical timeline of Islam to choose a particular point of departure that reinforces his views of Muslim admiration of Europe, here too, Lewis takes an intricate component of classical Islamic history, refrains from elaborating on the various social practices and local contexts that animate it, and links it to the actions of contemporary Muslims who are thought to be charged with the “duty” to spread Islam. Situating the House of Islam and the House of War as opposing binaries caught in a web of perennial conflict, Lewis suggests that Muslims have “returned” to this historic system of classification with an obligation to bring Islam to non-Muslims. Yet, it is unclear on what basis Lewis asserts such a claim. While he spends much time ruminating on the supposed rivalry between Islam and Christianity, Lewis mentions a return to the classical worldview quickly and in passing, without substantiating his claim. 185. Lewis, “The Roots of Muslim Rage.” 98 The evocation of this binary elicits fear of the “other”—Lewis represents Muslims as returning to an original, archaic state of Islam in which the world is either Muslim or non- Muslim. According to this premise, those areas that are non-Muslim must be converted to Islam. Lewis’s assertion that this type of language exists with Muslim communities is not untrue. There are indeed some Muslims for whom this type of rhetoric is lively. Osama bin Laden, Ayman Zawahiri, Sayyid Qutb, and Hassan al-Banna, all of whom are discussed in this thesis, deploy this type of narrative to justify their particular ideological beliefs. The problem lies in Lewis’s suggestion that because a few individuals or groups employ it, it is universal among the wider community. Muslim clerics, political leaders, and scholars have used the term dar al-Islam, or House of Islam, to refer to those countries where Muslims were able to practice Islam freely. Often, these areas were under the rule of Islamic law. Dar al-Islam is contrasted with dar al-harb, or House of War, which describes those countries where Muslims were not permitted to practice Islam freely. As mentioned earlier, these terms do not originate from the Qur’an or the sunna, (the example of Muhammad) but rather they constitute a human attempt to comprehend the world and provide Muslim communities with geopolitical understandings that are appropriate and meaningful for specific historical contexts. The geopolitical realities of the early seventh century have changed over time, and thus Muslims face new challenges of harmonizing historical frameworks within a contemporary landscape. While it may be convenient for Lewis to suggest that dar al-Islam and dar al-harb originated uniquely among Muslims as a way of carving up the world into religious spheres and conquering those lands not ruled by Muslims, religious intolerance is 99 evident in Europe as well. From 303 A.D. until the Edict of Milan in 313 A.D., the Diocletianic Persecution—the final and most severe persecution of Christians in the Roman Empire—resulted in the repeal of the legal rights of Christians and required that they comply with traditional religious practices. In 325 A.D., the First Council of Nicea resulted in the banishment of various Christian sects, as council members sought to establish the first pure version of Christianity; during this period in North Africa, many Donatists were banished and massacred for refusing to return to the Catholic Church. Later, beginning in 1095 and lasting for nearly 200 years, the Crusades ushered in a new wave of religious violence and intolerance, killing thousands in the process. Considering these historical trends in terms of contemporary societal dynamics, Muslims are faced with similar, albeit less violent threats to their religious freedom. Such threats warrant a reconsideration of these traditional spheres of influence. As a result of September 11th, Islamophobia and religious repression have become increasingly common in Europe. In early 2004, the French National Assembly voted to ban the hijab, or Muslim headscarf, from France’s public school system. Citing guiding secular principles of French society, the law also banned Jewish skullcaps and Christian crosses from being worn. In 2009, the Swiss government voted to ban the construction of minarets, Islamic towers that usually accompany a mosque and from which the adhan, or call to prayer, is performed. French President Nicholas Sarkozy came to the defense of the Swiss government urging a “discreet” practice of the religion.186 These anecdotes illustrate the increasing challenges for Muslims to practice Islam freely. While 186. Charles Bremner, “Sarkozy: Muslims Must Be Discreet About Faith,” Times Online, December 8, 2009, http://www.timesonline.co.uk/to/news/world/europe/article6948905.ece (accessed February 4, 2010). 100 France does not collect religious or ethnic data in censuses, it is estimated that Muslims comprise nearly eight percent of the population.187 In Switzerland, it is estimated that Muslims comprise approximately five percent of the population.188 Still, it may be said that as a result of these laws that restrict religious expression and practice, France and Switzerland fall under the category of dar al-harb to those Muslims who view the world through these designations. While Lewis chooses to focus on dar al-Islam and dar al-harb, he does mention that these are not the only geo-political divisions within Islam. Dar al-kufr, or House of Disbelief, dar al-hudna, or House of Calm, dar al-ahd, or House of Truce, dar al-dawa, or House of Invitation, and dar al-amn, or House of Safety, exist and had central roles in intellectual, philosophical, political, and religious dynamics of the early Muslim umma. Additionally, Muslim intellectuals have called on Muslims to reconsider these geopolitical divisions today, among them, a leading Sunni scholar in Lebanon, Faysal al-Mawlawi. In his book Al-usus ash-shar’iyya lil-‘alqat bayna al-Muslimun wa-ghayr al- Muslimin, (The Islamic Principles Concerning the Relations between Muslims and non- Muslims), Mawlawi writes: If we wish to maintain the traditional classification of the world as set out in fiqh [Islamic jurisprudence] with the “abode of Islam,” the “abode of war,” and the “abode of treaty,” we are in that case, in the West, in an “abode of treaty.” If on the other hand, we consider that the old fiqh classification is no longer applicable in our current situation—and this is the view we prefer—then on that basis we say we are in an “abode of dawa,” as were the Prophet and the Muslims in Mecca before the Hijra.189 187. U.S. Department of State, “France: International Religious Freedom Report,” 2008, http://www .state.gov/g/drl/rls/irf/2008/108446.htm (accessed June 25, 2010). 188. Euro News, “Minaret Ban Angers Swiss Muslims,” EuroNews.com, November 19, 2009 http://www.euronews.net/2009/11/19/minaret-debate-angers-swiss-muslims/ (accessed June 16, 2010). 189. Faysal al-Mawlawi, as quoted in Tariq Ramadan, Western Muslims and the Future of Islam (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004, 72. 101 Al-Mawlawi, in comparing the contemporary religious landscape to that of Mecca before Muhammad’s pilgrimage, describes a region where Islam has only been introduced recently. We may consider this imagined region to be similar to the United States. As such a population has not been exposed to Islam before, it may be injudicious to consider it within the traditional nomenclature of dar al-harb. The nascent nature of Islam during this time makes classifications under the category of dar al-Islam premature. Thus, dar al-dawa presents Muslims with the opportunity to bear witness to their faith in a new environment, and as Tariq Ramadan (see below) notes, not submitting to it, but securing their positions and becoming a positive influence within it.190 Consideration of context, various social and political conditions, and local customs are absent from Lewis’s assertions that “many Muslims” are returning to what he calls the classical Islamic worldview characterized by irrevocable opposition. Lewis implies that he believes that Muslims are incapable of or choose not to harmonize the geopolitical frameworks of the seventh century with various contemporary dynamics. Rather than illustrating the diverse and pluralistic worldview of Muslims during a time of turmoil in Christian Europe, Lewis presents dar al-Islam and dar al-harb as two opposing geographic entities, destined to clash as Muslims seek to spread Islam. Tariq Ramadan, in Western Muslims and the Future of Islam, writes: The old geographical representation, with two juxtaposed universes that could stand face to face in relative stability, no longer bears any resemblance to the reality of hegemony and spheres of influence in civilization, culture, economics, and subsequently, of course, politics.191 190. Ramadan, Western Muslims and the Future of Islam, 73. 191. Ibid., 75. 102 Representing Muslims as culturally, economically, and politically diverse, however, does not facilitate Lewis’s attempts to decipher “the roots of Muslim rage.” The threat of the “other” is often more real when the “other” is simplified and reduced to its most basic elements, or “roots.” Suggesting the return of an opposing binary —dar al-Islam and dar al-harb—provides the platform for such reductions. In addition to Islam and the West and “The Roots of Muslim Rage,” Bernard Lewis has written other works that attempt to answer the now-classic post-September 11 question: Why do they hate us?—with the “us” defined as the United States and Europe and the “they” defined as Muslims. In recent years, Lewis has recently published two books for a popular audience: The Crisis of Islam: Holy War and Unholy Terror and What Went Wrong?: The Clash between Islam and Modernity in the Middle East. These books argue for the view that a “clash of civilizations” is inevitable, suggesting an inherent incompatibility between people he depicts as having singular affiliations and identities. Lewis describes these works as offering an “undefensive account of Islam as it truly is.”192 Described by his supporters as “one of the foremost authorities on Islamic history and culture”193 and “the most influential postwar historian of Islam and the Middle East,”194 Lewis’s books became bestsellers. In addition, they became favorites within Washington’s powerful foreign policy circles during the Bush administration.195 Lewis 192. Bobby Ghosh, “Q & A: Bernard Lewis on Islam’s Crisis,” Time Magazine, September 20, 2008, http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1843104,00.html (accessed June 26, 2010). 193. Lewis, What Went Wrong?, back cover. 194. Martin Kramer, “Bernard Lewis: One of the Most Influential historians of the Middle East,” Martin Kramer on the Middle East: Alternative Readings of Islam and the Arab World, http://www.geocities.com/martinkramerorg/BernardLewis.htm (accessed November 17, 2009). 195. Hirsh, “Bernard Lewis Revisited.” 103 takes an exceptionalist196 view which suggests that Muslims’ expressions of anger at the United States stem from a centuries-long conflict between Islam and Christianity. By this account, Christian civilization developed and embodied modernity that Muslims first rejected but later attempted to emulate. Lewis suggests that this professed rivalry began with the advent of Islam in the seventh century. The perennial failure of such emulation, according to Lewis, resulted in an inability to harmonize Islam and modernity and produced a permanent discontent with the so-called “Western world.” For that reason, Lewis suggests that American intervention in the affairs of Muslims is not only necessary, but that past failures of Muslim nations to modernize warrants such an intervention. Lewis recalls a time when a Jordanian friend said, “We got rid of the Crusaders. We got rid of the Turks. We'll get rid of the Jews,”197 to which Lewis replied: “Excuse me, but you've got your history wrong. The Turks got rid of the Crusaders. The British got rid of the Turks. The Jews got rid of the British. I wonder who is coming here next."198 Lewis’s views helped define a shift in American foreign policy as he provided counsel to the Bush administration following the events of September 11, 2001. His influence within inner policy circles of the Bush administration was not only the merely the result of his long resume or his prolific writings on Islam. Rather, it resulted from his close alliance to a network of neoconservatives that held key posts in the White House. 196. Exceptionalism is the belief that a country, society, movement, period of time, etc. is unusually extraordinary and does not conform to traditional, normal rules. Among the many examples are American exceptionalism and the belief that the Holocaust was the greatest period of genocide and persecution in human history. 197. Peter Waldman, “A Historian’s Take on Islam Steers U.S. in Terrorism Fight,” Wall Street Journal, February 3, 2004, http://online.wsj.com/article/SB107576070484918411.html?mod=home% 255Fpage%255Fone%255Fus (accessed November 27, 2009). 198. Ibid. 104 Among them were Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz. Lewis was also particularly close to Vice President Dick Cheney, who called him “the very ideal of the wise man.”199 The relationship between Cheney and Lewis dates back almost two decades now. Cheney, reflecting on that relationship at the 2006 World Affairs Council Luncheon in Philadelphia, said: I had the pleasure of first meeting Bernard more than 15 years ago, during my time as Secretary of Defense. It was not long after the dictator of Iraq had invaded Kuwait, and we brought in a large number of outside experts to speak about the history and the way forward in the Middle East. As you might imagine, I got a wide range of advice—some of it very good and some of it terrible. No one offered sounder analysis or better insight than Bernard Lewis. He was an absolute standout, and I decided that day that this was a man I wanted to keep in touch with, and whose work I should follow carefully in the years ahead. Since then we have met often, particularly during the last four-and-a-half years, and Bernard has always had some very good meetings with President Bush. 200 David Frum, a former speechwriter for President Bush, confirmed those meetings, indicating that at times, he saw Bush with Lewis’s marked up articles among his daily briefing papers.201 During one such meeting with Bush, Lewis suggested that the soul- searching question of “why Muslims hate us” needed revision. According to Lewis, vast campaigns designed to educate Muslims about America’s virtues were misplaced. Rather, Lewis suggested a “get tough or get out” approach—one that echoes Pax Britannica,202 imposed by the British Empire that Lewis once served during his time in 199. Richard Cheney, “Vice President’s Remarks at the World Affairs Council of Philadelphia Luncheon Honoring Bernard Lewis,” Available from the George W. Bush Administration White House website. http://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2006/05/ 20060501-3.html (accessed October 24, 2009). 200. Ibid. 201. Waldman, “A Historian’s Take.” 202. Pax Britannica refers to the period of relative peace in Europe following the Battle of Waterloo. This period, realized by vast displays of force, was typified by British political and economic dominance. 105 the British Army’s Royal Armored Corps and Intelligence Corps during the second World War.203 Lewis seemed to believe that respect was a product of fear and that fear could be established by displays of force and power. He explained how that force could be deployed in a private meeting with Vice President Cheney, saying, “I believe that one of the things you’ve got to do to Arabs is hit them between the eyes with a big stick. They respect power.”204 Moreover, George Packer, journalist and author of The Assassin’s Gate: America in Iraq, summarizes a memo sent to Cheney from Lewis in September of 2001. A portion of it read, “The Arabs cannot pull themselves out of their historic rut. They need to be jolted out by some foreign-born shock. The overthrow of the Iraqi regime would provide one.”205 Three years after the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, Cheney said, “We'll continue to rely on Bernard Lewis's rigorous thinking, his sound judgment, his realism, and his optimism.”206 Speaking in 2002, Paul Wolfowitz, Deputy Secretary of Defense said, “Bernard has taught how to understand the complex and important history of the Middle East, and use it to guide us where we will go next to build a better world for generations to come."207 In effect, the Lewis Doctrine became American foreign policy.208 Though Lewis influenced the Bush administration’s policies in the Middle East, his writings do not clarify why things “went wrong” beyond suggesting that Muslims could not keep up with the advancements made by Christendom and as a result 203. Waldman, “A Historian’s Take.” 204. Dick Cheney, as quoted in George Packer, The Assassin’s Gate: America in Iraq (New York: Farrar, 2005), 51. 205. Ibid. 206. Cheney, “Vice President’s Remarks.” 207. Waldman, “A Historian’s Take.” 208. Ibid. 106 became bitter and rebellious. Further, Lewis does not offer a solution for the deficiencies he suggests exists. Rather, he merely presents an historical account dating back to the 17th century that he uses as a basis for approaching contemporary challenges. Cemil Aydin, professor of Middle Eastern history at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, writes in his article “The Politics of Conceptualizing Islam and the West:” [Lewis] does not offer any concrete analysis of the recent political events beyond an assertion that in an ambiguously defined Islamic “world” (though the book relies mostly on Ottoman history) things “went wrong,” in contrast to the “West,” where things went right.209 Aydin suggests that as a result of Lewis’s lack of specificity, readers may not be attracted to his specific arguments. Rather his books may have appeal in that they reinforce presumptions about the “other.” Following the events of September 11, 2001, the Bush administration aided in the establishment of a local government and military in Afghanistan in an effort to defeat terrorists and the networks that supported them. In fact, on September 21, 2001, President Bush told a joint session of Congress, “The enemy of America is not our many Muslim friends. It is not our many Arab friends. Our enemy is a radical network of terrorists and every government that supports them.”210 Later similar rhetoric was employed to justify the invasion of Iraq. It is unclear, then, why Bernard Lewis, a revered scholar of Islam, was among those who advised the Bush administration. Lewis’s area of expertise is Islamic history and especially the Ottoman Empire and Turkey, not 209. Cemil Aydin, “The Politics of Conceptualizing Islam and the West,” Ethics and International Affairs 18, no. 3 (2008): 90. 210. George W. Bush, “Address to Joint Session of Congress and the American People,” (speech, Joint Session of Congress, Washington, D.C., September 20, 2009). Available from the George W. Bush Administration White House website. http://www.georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/ news/releases/ 2001/09/20010920-8.html (accessed September 2, 2009). 107 international relations, politics, or terrorism. In fact, Lewis’s texts only mention terrorism as it pertains to his thesis which traces the roots of Muslim “rage” back to an historic clash between two world religions: Islam and Christianity. Lewis’s presence in the small group of Bush’s advisors situates Islam in the forefront of policy talks. However, Bush indicated clearly that Islam was not responsible for the terrorist attacks on September 11th. If Lewis was an expert in the areas on foreign policy, national defense, or terrorism, his presence in the White House would appear more normal. Additionally, if Turkish terrorist groups were involved in the attacks of September 11th and the Bush administration inquired about particular dynamics of Turkish society, Lewis’s expertise would seem appropriate. However, Lewis’s presence among White House advisors following September 11th indicates that officials within the Bush administration sought the opinions of those people whose scholarship would confirm their presuppositions about Muslims and Islam and provide their subsequent foreign policy in the Middle East with a voice of authority and approval. In addition to Lewis, the Bush administration also sought the expertise of another intellectual: Fouad Ajami. Ajami provided an additional layer of credibility to the inner circle of policy makers who were developing strategies for going to war with Iraq. Not only was Ajami a known scholar of Islam and the Middle East, but more importantly, he was a Muslim. Thus, as a Muslim, Ajami was expected to have an “insider’s understanding” as to the cultural and political dynamics of Muslim-majority countries. In fact, Adam Shatz of The Nation, referred to Ajami as the “native informant” of Bush’s 108 inner policy circle.211 Ajami, of Lebanese descent, is a professor of political science at Princeton University and became known for his strong support of the invasion of Iraq in 2003. While his support of the Bush administration’s policies leading up to the Iraq War was criticized by Arabs and Muslims who believed he was a traitor to fellow Muslims, his writings and public statements expressing his approval of the policies caught the ear of Dick Cheney. In August of 2003 at a reunion of Korean War veterans in San Antonio, Texas, Cheney tried to assuage skeptics who believed that a unilateral attack may cause more harm than good. He said, “As for the reaction of the Arab Street, the Middle East Expert, Professor Fouad Ajami predicts that after liberation in Basra and Baghdad, the streets are sure to erupt in joy.”212 On March 22, as bombs rained down over Baghdad, Ajami was the featured guest on a CBS News program where he declared, “We are coming into acquisition of Iraq. It’s an amazing performance.”213 Later in Foreign Affairs magazine, Ajami said, “The driving motivation of a new American endeavor in Iraq and in neighboring Arab lands should be modernizing the Arab world."214 Ajami loathed what he saw as increased anti-Americanism as a result of the Iraq War and regretfully admitted, "We have to live with this anti-Americanism. It's the congenital condition of the Arab world, and we have to discount a good deal of it as we press on with the task of liberating the Iraqis."215 The approaches of Lewis and Ajami are much alike and Ajami is quick to mention his fondness for Lewis. In May of 2006, Ajami published an editorial in The Wall Street 211. Adam Shatz, “The Native Informant,” The Nation, April 10, 2003, http://www.thenation.com/ doc/20030428/shatz (accessed March 23, 2010). 212. Ibid. 213. Ibid. 214. Ibid. 215. Ibid. 109 Journal, titled “A Sage in Christendom: A Personal Tribute to Bernard Lewis.” In this, he expresses his fondness and admiration for Bernard Lewis not only as a person but as a scholar who accurately depicts the Middle East. Ajami writes: Mr. Lewis was the voice of conservatives, a brooding pessimist, in the time of a sublime faith in things new and untried. It was he, in that 1990 article, who gave us the notion of a "clash of civilizations" that Samuel Huntington would popularize, with due attribution to Bernard Lewis. The rage of Islam was no mystery to Mr. Lewis. To no great surprise, it issued out of his respect for the Muslim logic of things.216 He continues, expressing approval for Lewis’s suggestion that Islam and Christianity are ultimately at odds with one another: A pain afflicts modern Islam--the loss of power. And Mr. Lewis has a keen sense of the Muslim redeemers and would-be avengers who promise to alter Islam's place in the world. This pain, the historian tells us, derives from Islam's early success, from the very triumph of the prophet Muhammad. Moses was not allowed to enter the Promised Land; he had led his people through wilderness. Jesus had been crucified. But Muhammad had prevailed and had governed. The faith he would bequeath his followers would forever insist on the oneness of religion and politics. Where Christians are enjoined in their scripture to "render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's and unto God the things which are God's," no such demarcation would be drawn in the theory and practice of Islam.217 Ajami goes on to note that one of Lewis’s texts was translated by the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood who called it “the work of a candid friend or an honest enemy” and that Lewis is “someone who disdains falsification.”218 Ajami himself comments that “Mr. Lewis was one of the academic gods. I approached him with awe. But his grace was our bridge. I was of the old world he studied.”219 On November 9, 2006, in the Oval Office of 216 Fouad Ajami, “The Sage of Christendom: A Personal Tribute to Bernard Lewis,” Wall Street Journal, May 1, 2006, http://www.opinionjournal.com/editorial/feature.html?id=110008313 (accessed March 30, 2010) 217. Ibid. 218. Ibid. 219. Ibid. 110 the White House, Ajami and Lewis were awarded the National Humanities Medal by President George W. Bush.220 The type of intellectuals that influenced Bush indicates the existence of a preconceived idea about how events would play out, and, those scholars who participated in and confirmed this side of the discourse to Bush were often touted as paradigmatic examples of intellectuals in their areas of expertise. Conversely, intellectuals who dissented or offered sharp critiques of prevailing policies were not only disregarded, but in one definitive example, marginalized. Secretary of State Colin Powell was often outspoken about the need to have a multilateral force for the invasion of Iraq in 2003. Suggesting that he would only support an invasion by the international community, Bush asked Powell to take his case to the United Nations. Just over one month prior to the commencement of hostilities, on February 6, 2003, Secretary of State Colin Powell addressed the United Nations Security Council saying that there was “no doubt in my mind” that Iraqi President Saddam Hussein was working to obtain nuclear weapons. In a vivid moment of that speech, Powell held up a sealed vial of anthrax, a deadly bacteria that many believed terrorists would use against the United States. He later recounted how Vice President Cheney joked with him before the speech. According to Powell, Cheney said, “You’ve got the high poll ratings. You can afford to lose a few points.”221 As it became clear that the Bush administration’s case for war with Iraq was based on faulty intelligence, Powell became increasingly outspoken. Washington Post reporter Karen DeYoung wrote on October 1, 2006 that eight days 220. Ibid. 221. Karen De Young, “Falling On His Sword,” Washington Post, October 1, 2006, http://www .washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/09/27/AR2006092700106.html (accessed December 12, 2009). 111 after Bush’s election to a second term, Chief of Staff Andrew Card phoned Powell and said, “The president would like to make a change.”222 DeYoung writes: He noted briskly that there had been some discussion of having Powell remain until after Iraqi elections scheduled for the end of January, but that the president had decided to take care of all Cabinet changes sooner rather than later. Bush wanted Powell's resignation letter dated two days hence, on Friday, November 12.223 Efforts were also made to marginalize intellectuals outside the circle of Bush’s advisors. Tariq Ramadan, a prominent Muslim scholar, critic of American foreign policy, and the man Foreign Policy magazine ranked as the eighth among the world’s top one hundred public intellectuals in 2008 was refused entry into the United States shortly after accepting a position at the University of Notre Dame’s Institute for International Peace. The Department of Homeland Security cited the ideological exclusion provision as the basis for the revocation of his visa. This provision states that individuals associated with terror or terrorist groups may be banned from entering the United States. Ramadan was accused of donating money to a Palestinian humanitarian organization between 1998 and 2002. The organization allegedly supported HAMAS, and as a result, it was claimed that Ramadan endorsed terrorism. He raised questions about his visa ban in a 2006 Washington Post op-ed: The U.S. Embassy claims that I "reasonably should have known" that the charities in question provided money to Hamas. But my donations were made between December 1998 and July 2002, and the United States did not blacklist the charities until 2003. How should I reasonably have known of their activities before the U.S. government itself knew?224 222. Ibid. 223. Ibid. 224. Tariq Ramadan, “Why I’m Banned in the USA,” Washington Post, October 1, 2006, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/09/29/AR2006092901334.html (accessed October 7, 2009). 112 Ramadan’s scholarly works explore relations between the United States and Muslim majority countries, and he rejects the bifurcation of “the West” and “the Muslim world.” Winner of the 2006 European of the Year award, the Swiss-born, self-described western Muslim calls on his co-religionists to embrace Islam in a way that harmonizes European traditions with the universal laws and values of Islam. Moreover, Ramadan has been outspoken about controversial topics such as capital punishment and religious freedoms. He wrote in a 2005 article in The Guardian: The unilateral condemnations one hears in the West will not help to move things along. On the contrary, Muslim populations are convincing themselves of the Islamic character of these practices through a rejection of the West, on the basis of a simplistic reasoning that stipulates that "the less Western, the more Islamic.”225 Advocates of Ramadan’s ban cited his speeches that are critical of the United States’ steadfast support of Israel and an American military presence in the Middle East. It appeared that his criticism cast doubt upon his loyalty to American values. While Ramadan is a Swiss-born citizen, the fact that he is a Muslim and the grandson of Hassan al-Banna, the founding member of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood, caused skepticism and fear that his views on United States foreign policy would result in violence. The Middle Eastern Studies Association, the American Academy of Religion,226 and the American Civil Liberties all expressed their discontent with the decision to refuse Ramadan entry into the United States and while various lawsuits and legal 225. Tariq Ramadan, “We Must Not Accept This Repression,” The Guardian, March 30, 2005, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2005/mar/30/religion.uk (accessed December 2, 2009). 226. Notably, after being denied entry to the United States to attend the annual meeting of the American Academy of Religion for five years in a row, Ramadan was finally able to attend the 2009 meeting when it was held in Montreal. He addressed the 2008 meeting by way of satellite link. 113 actions ensued, the ban was not reversed. Ramadan, currently living in the United Kingdom, went on to say in the 2006 op-ed: My experience reveals how U.S. authorities seek to suppress dissenting voices and—by excluding people such as me from their country— manipulate political debate in America. Unfortunately, the U.S. government's paranoia has evolved far beyond a fear of particular individuals and taken on a much more insidious form: the fear of ideas.227 What emerges from this picture is the idea that people in positions of power have the ability to control what knowledge is transmitted within a particular discourse. The facts, then, that operate within a particular discourse are not always undetached from ideology; they do not stand alone as true representations of reality. Jonathan Z. Smith makes the point that people’s biases cause them to selectively employ information when he says, “There are no data as given. Data are what I choose for my argument.”228 Considering Tariq Ramadan and Fouad Ajami, both revered Muslim intellectuals with strikingly different views of United States foreign policy and the relationship between the United States and Muslim-majority countries, it becomes clear that Ajami was chosen to provide the “data” used by the Bush administration for going war with Iraq because his worldview aligned with those who made policy in the Bush administration. Ramadan, on the other hand, was not only not consulted, but he was marginalized through a visa ban that prohibited him from entering the United States. It may be said that among those voices opposed to United States foreign policy, none was more pronounced than the “enemy” himself, Osama bin Laden. Bin Laden has long been a critic of the United States’ military presence in Saudi Arabia, the birthplace of Islam, as well as the United States’ long-term alliance with Israel. His 227. Ramadan, “Why I’m Banned in the USA.” 228. Smith, “The Domestication of Sacrifice,” 207. 114 criticisms of U.S. foreign policy are manifested in a Manichaean229 struggle that carves the world up into forces of good and forces of evil, each opposed to the other in a rival dualism. In this struggle, bin Laden depicts himself as the leading the “good” forces that fight the “evil” American forces, led by President Bush. Though the two are seemingly unalike, their language is strikingly similar. On November 6, 2001, speaking at a joint news conference with French president Jacques Chirac, President Bush said: You are either with us or against us in the fight against terror. This [Osama bin Laden] is an evil man that we’re dealing with, and I wouldn’t put it past him to develop evil weapons to try to harm civilization as we know it. And that’s why we must prevail and that’s why we must win.230 Just one month earlier in a videotaped address, Osama bin Laden said, “I tell them that these events have divided the world into two camps, the camp of the faithful and the camp of the infidels. May God shield us and you from them.”231 These two narrative traditions imagine a dichotomous world in which the forces of good contend with the forces of evil, each side variously defined by the different parties. They define a religious dualism between good and evil that is used to signify the presence of two basic, opposed, and irreducible forces. These two opposed forces are depicted as being in competition with one another, and each side views itself as essentially good while the other is viewed as fundamentally evil. Such language has become pronounced in meta-narratives about Islam and the United States. 229. Manichaeism is a religious worldview distinguished by a struggle between good spiritual forces of light and evil spiritual forces of evil. 230. Cable News Network, “You are either with us or against us,” CNN.com, September 16, 2001, http://archives.cnn.com/2001/US/11/06/gen.attack.on.terror/ (accessed August 29, 2009). 231. Online News Hour, “Bin Laden Statement,” PBS.org, October 7, 2001, http://www.pbs.org/newshour/terrorism/international/binladen_10-7.html (accessed October 2, 2009). 115 Good and evil, light and dark, threat and threatened, tyranny and liberty, and hero and villain are binaries that orient this structure. Bush and bin Laden seem to understand these binaries in a similar way, and they deploy similar reductive language in setting forth their metaphysical and political beliefs and in encouraging popular support for their objectives.232 In his 2009 farewell speech to the United States citizenry, President Bush said, “I have often spoken to you about good and evil. This has made some uncomfortable. But good and evil are present in this world, and between the two there can be no compromise.”233 David Loy, author of The Great Awakening: A Buddhist Social Theory, says, “What is the difference between bin Laden’s view and Bush’s? They are opposites, of course—mirror opposites.”234 Loy suggests that bin Laden and Bush are actually participating in the same discourse. Whatever bin Laden views as good, Bush views as evil. Whatever Bush views as good, bin Laden views as evil. Loy comments, “That makes them two different versions of the same holy war between good and evil.”235 The narratives of Bush and bin Laden require the presence of an enemy; their rhetoric necessitates a perpetual struggle between one another. George Orwell’s 1949 classic, Nineteen Eighty-Four provides an anecdotal yet instructive example of the need for an evil other. In the novel, Orwell depicts three 232. Sarah Ovenall designed a website called “Jerry Falwell-Pat Robertson-Usama bin Laden Quiz” that pointed out similarities in the rhetoric of Falwell, Robertson, and bin Laden. Users were asked to attribute various quotes to one of the three individuals and often performed poorly as similarities in their language made it difficult to discern who said what. 233. George W. Bush, “President’s Radio Address,” Available from the George W. Bush Administration White House webpage, http://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov news/ releases/2009/01/20090117.html (accessed January 17, 2010). 234 . David Loy, The Great Awakening: A Buddhist Social Theory, (Somerville: Wisdom Publications, 2003), 105. 235. Ibid. 116 nations—Oceania, Eurasia, and Eastasia—in a state of perpetual war with each other. The governments of these nations use war as a tool to justify the control of their populations and as an excuse for their failures. Governments of each nation create fear and hatred of the other nations and the economic, political, and social wellbeing of each notion depends on it being at war with the other “enemies.” This dualistic way of understanding creates a cycle of peril that perpetually calls into existence an “other.” The “other” is not only understood as being evil but must also be battled for the good of society. For many years, that evil was Communism. In March of 1983, President Ronald Reagan said in his famous Evil Empire speech, “There is sin and evil in the world, and we're enjoined by Scripture and the Lord Jesus to oppose it with all our might.”236 Reagan referred to the Soviet Union as “an evil empire” and said that communism “is the focus of evil in the modern world.”237 Following the Cold War, President George H.W. Bush spoke about the U.S. invasion of Iraq and the beginning of the First Gulf War, proclaiming the dawn of a “new world order.”238 The war was a building block for an eventual shift in the United States’ enemy—the conception of the evil other eventually moved from communism to Islamic fundamentalism. Saddam Hussein became the “most dangerous man in the world” and America’s first post-Cold War bogeyman. The United States government suggested that Iraq had plans to 236. Ronald Reagan, “Remarks to the National Association of Evangelicals,” (speech, Annual Convention of the National Association of Evangelicals, Orlando, FL, October 8, 1983) http://americanrhetoric .com/speeches/ronaldreaganevilempire.htm (accessed November 19, 2009). 237. Ibid. 238. George H.W. Bush, “Address Before a Joint Session of Congress on the Persian Gulf Crisis and the Federal Budget Deficit,” (speech, Washington, D.C., September 11, 1990) Available from the George H.W. Bush Presidential Museum and Library website. http://bushlibrary.tamu.edu/research/ public_papers.php?id=2217&year=1990&month=9 (accessed June 29, 2010). 117 dominate the entire Middle East, creating a narrative to justify what would become decades of a military presence in the region.239 Shortly after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, President Bush said, “My administration has a job to do and we’re going to do it. We will rid the world of evil- doers.”240 Addressing the multi-faith prayer service following the attacks, Bush remarked, “Our responsibility to history is already clear: to answer these attacks and rid the world of evil.”241 Events such as the Soviet Union’s nuclear build-up, the feared expansion of communism, the Iranian Revolution, and the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks exacerbated the perceived threat of the other, fortifying and legitimizing dualistic narratives of good versus evil. In a similar way, bin Laden evoked the dualism of good and evil suggesting that God had attacked the United States. Bin Laden writes in a statement titled “The Winds of Faith” in October of 2001: God has struck America at its Achilles heel and destroyed its greatest buildings, praise and blessings to Him … When God Almighty granted success to one of the vanguard groups of Islam, He opened the way for them to destroy America utterly … The very least you can say about these people [Americans] is that they are immoral, dissolute, apostates, who help the butcher slaughter his victim and help the oppressor against the innocent child. May God Almighty protect me against them, and may He give them what they deserve.242 The narrative of good and evil unfolds on a stage that is already set. Qualities that are good are instinctively claimed by members of an inside group. As a consequence, members of the outside group are automatically assigned the qualities of “evil.” By this, 239. Leon T. Hadar, “The Green Peril: Creating the Islamic Fundamentalist Threat,” CATO Policy Analysis 177, August 27, 1992. http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa-177.html (accessed July 1, 2010). 240. Cable News Network, “Bush vows to rid the world of ‘evil-doers.” 241. Charles Babbington, “Bush: U.S. Must ‘Rid the World of Evil,” Washington Post, September 14, 2001, http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn?pagename=article&node=&contentId=A30485- 2001Sep14¬Found=true (accessed November 12, 2009). 242. In Bruce Lawrence, ed., Messages to the World: The Statements of Osama Bin Laden (London: Verso, 2005), 208. 118 good and evil do not exist independently but only as negative projections one another. What good is, evil is not. What evil is, good is not. Thus, each term enhances the other by contrast making it difficult to speak of one term independently. Further, once one constructs an evil other, its annihilation becomes a pressing issue. David Loy writes, “If the world is a battleground of good and evil forces, the evil that is in the world must be fought and defeated by any means necessary.”243 Bush displays a sense of urgency to defeat this evil when he says, “We must prevail … we must win.”244 Though Bush does not explain the consequences of not winning, it is clear that he regards them as perilous and fearful. Winning, defined here as eradicating the presence of an evil enemy, is not something that may possibly happen as a result of good’s triumph over evil, but in fact, is necessary for the continuation of “civilization as we know it.”245 Similarly, bin Laden suggests the urgency of defeating “the infidels,”246 by invoking imagery of God shielding “us and you from them.”247 The invocation of God in bin Laden’s speech not only refers to a holy war where the faithful fights the infidel who has projected military power into Muslim sanctified spaces, but also suggests the presence of an enemy so strong that only God can offer full protection. Bruce Lincoln, author of Holy Terrors: Thinking About Religion after September 11th, comments on the way in which Osama bin Laden negotiates relations with those people he addresses in his speech. Lincoln writes: 243. David Loy, The Great Awakening: A Buddhist Social Theory (Somerville: Wisdom Publications, 2003), 106. 244. Mark Silva, “Bush: ‘America can and must win,’” Los Angeles Times, March 20, 2008, http://articles.latimes.com/2008/mar/20/nation/na-bush20 (accessed December 30, 2009). 245. Ibid. 246. Online News Hour, “Bin Laden Statement.” 247. Ibid. 119 Two of the pronouns—“us” and “them”—are set in opposition to each other, and the third (“you”) is suspended between these two parties. The task this text takes for itself is to draw that “you” into close association with “us” and away from the enemy “them.” It does this by aligning the sole noun of the phrase and its transcendent marker unambiguously with the “us”: “May God shield us—and you—from them.”248 Bin Laden’s suspension of “you” between “us” and “them” indicates that the group he speaks to is not fully identified as part of his inside group but as an outside group that has a choice to make in a battle where the sides have already been drawn. With no room for neutral ground, the “you” bin Laden addresses is obliged to reinforce the existing dualism of good and evil by choosing one side or the other. In a similar manner, Bush separates “you” from his inside group “us,” strengthening the dualism by limiting neutrality. He says, “You are either with us or against us in the fight against terror.”249 Both Bush and bin Laden are methodical in their appeal to those they label as “you.” Osama bin Laden invokes the blessing of God on potential supporters, engendering sympathy to join a cause he views as sanctified. Bush takes a similar approach, though does not make specific religious references. Appealing to the emotions of those he addresses, Bush presents a choice grounded in logic. He warns against “evil weapons” held by an “evil man” and suggests that harm may come to “civilization as we know it” if bin Laden is allowed to continue on his path.250 Thus, for the wellbeing of society, Bush encourages enlistment on his side of the dualism. Perceptions of good and evil cannot be identified with one specific religious worldview as many world religions have narratives depicting a Manichaean struggle 248. Bruce Lincoln, Holy Terrors: Thinking About Religions After September 11, (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1988), 20. 249. Cable News Network, “You are either with us or against us.” 250. Silva, “Bush: ‘America can and must win.’” 120 between the two opposing forces. In fact, dualisms are common in and perhaps even borne out of monotheistic religions. Among them, the Abrahamic religions—Islam, Christianity, and Judaism—provide clear examples. These monotheistic dualisms include: God and Satan, angels and demons, Heaven and Hell, and salvation and damnation. These religions teach their followers to resist and even fight against evil and that doing so will provide them with rewards, if not in this life then in the afterlife. A safety net, or as Peter Berger calls it, a “sacred canopy,” emerges from ones beliefs and provides a sense of security from the “evil” forces that compete with or try to destroy those beliefs. Resisting participation in these discourses risks defeat by the “enemy”. Loy says, “We can feel comfortable in our own goodness only by attacking and destroying the evil outside us.”251 Loy suggests that popular fascination with war is a result of the need for a heroic identity—one that aligns “us good guys here against those bad guys there.”252 The petty challenges of daily life are recast into larger more complex conflicts so that, as Loy points out, “The problems with my life and yours are now over there.” The events of September 11th bring focus to the dynamics of this dualism as political and religious dimensions became intertwined. While Osama bin Laden was more pronounced in his declarations of a conflict among religious lines that pits the faithful against the infidels, Bush spoke of religion with a more muted tone. Expressing tolerance and respect for “a faith based on peace and love and compassion,”253 Bush distanced himself from efforts to portray Islam as a 251. Loy, The Great Awakening, 111. 252. Ibid. 253. George W. Bush, “The President’s Quotes on Islam,” Available from the George W. Bush Administration White House website, http://www.georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/ 2001/09/20010929-8.html (accessed September 2, 2009). 121 violent religion. Dana Milbank of the Washington Post commented in an article written on November 30, 2002: President Bush finds himself in a rare disagreement with conservatives in his party over his efforts to portray Islam as a peaceful religion that is not responsible for anti-American terrorism…a large number of foreign policy hawks—some of them with advisory roles in the Bush administration— have joined religious conservatives in taking issue with Bush’s characterizations. While most of them understand the political rationale for Bush’s statements—[which suggests] there’s no benefit in antagonizing Muslim allies such as Pakistan and Indonesia—they say the claim is dishonest and destined to fail.254 It seems unlikely that President Bush himself viewed the War on Terror as a war of religions. In fact, on a number of occasions President Bush met with Muslim leaders, visited the Islamic Center of Washington, and sat alongside religious clerics of multiple faiths at prayer breakfasts. Milbank reported that Bush was struggling to prevent the war in Afghanistan from being perceived exactly as Osama bin Laden wanted: a clash of civilizations between a confident, wealthy, Judeo-Christian United States and a resentful, weak “Muslim world.”255 Yet, preventing this perception became increasingly difficult as other Bush advisors embraced and even deployed language suggestive of a millennial struggle between Islam and Christianity. Kenneth Adelman, a former Reagan official who served on Bush’s Pentagon Defense Policy Board said of Islam, “The more you examine the religion, the more militaristic it seems. After all, its founder, Mohammed, was a warrior, not a peace advocate like Jesus.”256 Another member of that advisory board, Eliot Cohen, spoke of the “enemy” in a Wall Street Journal editorial: 254. Dana Milbank, “U.S. Conservatives Disputes Bush’s Portrayal of Islam as Peaceful,” Washington Post, November 29, 2002, http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A55273-2002Nov29 (accessed February 2, 2010). 255. Ibid. 256. Anouar Boukhars, “The ‘Global Divide’ is not Islam vs. America,” Global Beat, May 12, 2003, http://www.bu.edu/globalbeat/syndicate/boukhars051203.html (accessed January 3, 2010). 122 The enemy has an ideology, and an hour spent surfing the Web will give the average citizen at least the kind of insights that he or she might have found during World Wars I and II by reading Mein Kampf or the writings of Lenin, Stalin or Mao.257 Paul Weyrich, co-founder of the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think-tank that informed policy makers in the Bush administration, said: Islam is at war against us. I have had much good to say about President Bush in recent months. But one thing that concerned me before September 11 and concerns me even more now is his administration’s constant promotion of Islam as a religion of peace and tolerance just like Judaism or Christianity. It is neither.258 The candid language of Weyrich, Cohen, Adelman, and others illustrates how particular ideologies of Washington insiders may influence foreign policies directed at the groups of people their language demeans. The theses of Bernard Lewis, whose influence on the Bush administration has been aforementioned, echo these sentiments as well. Lewis argued that Islam and Christianity have been in perpetual collision since the advent of Islam and that contemporary conflicts are marked by Christendom’s historical rise over and outpacing of Islam in various areas on advancement and development. As a result, Lewis suggests that contemporary “Muslim rage” is a result of their defeat by Christians in the seventh century. He writes: The struggle between these rival systems has now lasted some fourteen centuries. It began with the advent of Islam, in the seventh century, and has continued virtually to the present day. It has consisted of a long series of attacks and counterattacks, jihads and crusades, conquests and reconquests.259 257. Milbank, “U.S. Conservatives dispute Bush’s portrayal of Islam.” 258. Ibid. 259. Lewis, “The Roots of Muslim Rage.” 123 With the term “jihad,” there is disagreement amongst Muslims on how its definition should be applied as well as the evolution of its meaning over time. The most recent example of this is its association with terrorism because of its application to the events of September 11, 2001. Conceptions of jihad as a violent display of fanaticism appeared in books such as American Jihad: Terrorists Living Among Us, Jihad: The Rise of Militant Islam in Central Asia, and Islam Rising: The Never Ending Jihad Against Christianity. Yet, many Muslims suggest that jihad, the Arabic word for “struggle,” refers to a Muslims’ attempt to improve themselves and their relationships with God and society through nonviolent means and while the term has had historical connections with violence through the spread of Islam, contemporary political and religious climates beg a different contextual application. The term jihad has, over time, acquired meanings that extend beyond the insider political and religious spheres it so commonly inhabits and has taken on more popular, outsider definitions. Douglas Streusand, professor of Islamic history at The Institute of World Politics says that the first time he searched the Internet for the term jihad, the first thing that appeared was a “jihad to remove Barney from television.”260 Other examples include Jihad Against Free Speech, the American Jihad Against Gay Marriage, and the Jihad Against the Abuse of Jihad. Additionally, the term “crusade” has transcended its religious association and is more commonly used to describe a central, concerted effort against something. Some examples include the Avon Breast Cancer Crusade, the Community Crusade Against Drugs in South Florida, the American Crusade Against Lynching, and The Physicians Crusade Against Abortions. Insider terms such as 260. Guy Raz, “The War on the Word ‘Jihad,’” NPR.org, October 30, 2006, http://www.npr.org/ templates/transcript/transcript.php?storyId=6392989 (accessed November 4, 2009). 124 “crusade” and “jihad” have become so common within contemporary discourses that their definitions within their contexts of origin may be ambiguous.261 It is quite possible that many people use the terms “crusade” and “jihad” without fully understanding their historical significance or present-day ramifications.262 While political scientist, Samuel Huntington, known for his thesis on the post- Cold War world order, titled The Clash of Civilizations, refrained from the use of language indicating a battle between two specific world religions, he did suggest a cosmic struggle between Islam and “the West,” reinforcing an underlying dualism that drives political rhetoric. Huntington writes: Islam’s borders are bloody and so are its innards. The fundamental problem for the West is not Islamic fundamentalism. It is Islam, a different civilization whose people are convinced of the superiority of their culture and are obsessed with the inferiority of their power.263 Huntington’s position as a U.S. State Department consultant and White House Coordinator of Security Planning for the National Security Council during the Carter administration gave his assessments greater credence and set the tone for discussions of Islam within American political circles. Following the tone of Huntington’s thesis of an inevitable clash of civilizations, former presidential candidate and Nixon speechwriter 261. A common example of this is the term “Mecca.” For Muslims, the city of Mecca represents a holy place of worship where each year the hajj, or pilgrimage, takes place. But, over time the term “Mecca” has come to signify something that is paramount in a hierarchy of pleasure. The term usually refers to places. For example, “McDonalds is the ‘Mecca’ of fast food restaurants.” 262. It is important to note that the Qur’an uses the word qital (fighting or killing) when referencing a physical confrontation. The phrase qatilu fi sabil Allah, or fight in the way of God, is most commonly used to justify defensive acts of violence that are kutiba, or ordained, by God. Fighting in the way of God is, therefore, not a practice that comes by default of the religion of Islam. 263. Samuel Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order (New York: Simon and Shuster, 1996), 258. 125 Patrick J. Buchanan said, “What we must avoid is a war of faiths, a war of civilizations between Islam and America.”264 Since September 11, 2001, an international climate of fear of Islam has existed among Americans, producing a polarization of political positions as the government of the United States evaluated possible responses to an increased threat of terrorism. This climate of fear produced an American discourse emphasizing the existence of a foreign ideology, Islam, which threatened to bring about the demise of the United States from within. The main feature of this discourse, observed in the media and in the language of the Bush administration, was the construction of two opposing spheres of influence, “us and them,” extensions of the dualism “good and evil.” Speaking before a joint session of Congress on September 21, 2001, Bush said, “Freedom and fear are at war. The advance of human freedom, the great achievement of our time and the great hope of every time, now depends on us.”265 This rhetorical strategy of Bush is situated within a fear of the other, and the language used to drive such a discourse is imbued with generalizations and mental representations that reinforce the thought of Lewis and Huntington. Although many realms of life offer vivid examples of a disjunction between language and reality, Edward Said argues in Covering Islam that there is a “close affiliation between language and political reality.”266 The construction of beliefs about the significance of policies, events, crises, changes, or leaders is critical for immobilizing 264. Patrick J. Buchanan, “Is Islam a Religion of Peace?” Patrick J. Buchanan: Right From the Beginning, http://www.buchanan.org/blog/pjb-is-islam-a-religion-of-peace-504 (accessed September 29, 2009). 265. Bush, “Address to Joint Session of Congress and the American People.” 266. Edward Said, Covering Islam, (New York: Vintage Press, 1997), vii. 126 opposition and mobilizing support. Support is achieved by deploying language that legitimizes favored courses of action and reassures people so as to encourage their support. In an effort to convey the political realities of America’s response to terrorism, President Bush relied on his close friend and advisor, Karen Hughes. With the task of selling unpopular policies to an increasingly skeptical foreign audience, Hughes developed a public diplomacy strategy that sent her to the Middle East, interacting with Muslim-majority audiences and assuring them that the hardships of war were necessary for a peaceful future. CHAPTER THREE “NOW REMIND ME ALL ‘THE FOUR Es’ AGAIN” Karen Hughes’s role in behind-the-scenes politics dates back to the mid-1980s, and her work in communications and message crafting dates back even further. Graduating from Southern Methodist University with a Bachelor of Arts in English and a Bachelor of Fine Arts in journalism, Hughes said as recently as July of 2008, “I love communications and feel my strengths are in the areas of strategic positioning, message development, writing and speaking.”267 Hughes spent seven years as a television reporter for an NBC affiliate in the Dallas and Fort Worth area. Additionally, she worked as Director of Media Relations for a small public affairs firm in Dallas and press coordinator for the 1984 Reagan-Bush presidential campaign. She also served as public relations consultant, spokesperson, and eventually the executive director of the Republican Party in Texas.268 Thus, it seemed quite natural that the rising political star of Texas politics, George Walker Bush, would seek Hughes’s expertise in communications and message crafting for his campaign for governor of Texas in 1995. Facing a popular incumbent Democrat, Ann Richards, Bush worked closely with Hughes, as she shaped his message and communicated his agenda to the people of Texas. Despite being outspent by nearly twenty-three percent, Hughes and Bush realized an unlikely victory, forging a close friendship in the process. Hughes was named communications director for 267. Karen Hughes, as quoted in Joe Nocera, “Would You Take Strategic Advice From This Woman?” New York Times, July 14, 2008, http://executivesuite.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/07/14/would- you-take-strategic-advice-from-this-woman/ (accessed January 4, 2009). 268. Ibid. 128 Governor Bush and served in that capacity for his six years in the Texas capital.269 Bush later recounted, “Karen Hughes has known me since the motorcade was only one car." Republican political consultant and Bush family friend, Mary Matalin, said, “They had a mind meld. They understand each other, and she has been instrumental in crafting some of the most genius language of his proposals.”270 When it became apparent that Governor Bush was the Republican frontrunner for the 2000 presidential nomination, the abiding friendship and trust between the two of them grew. Hughes recounts in her autobiography Ten Minutes From Normal that it was clear he wanted her at his side during the campaign. Bush approached Hughes and said, “I'm not going unless you're going.”271 Hughes continued her role as the director of communications, managing nearly every aspect of Bush’s message to the public, including reintroducing the phrase “compassionate conservative” into campaign discourse.272 She labored to soften the connotations of the word “conservatism” in an effort to appeal to women voters. Hughes recalled, "A campaign is less about what happens, than it is about what is perceived to have happened."273 Appearing on various television and radio stations, Hughes successfully used her experience in journalism and communications to represent Governor Bush in a way that portrayed him as a better candidate than Vice President Al Gore in the 2000 presidential election. After the election, Hughes was appointed as Counselor to the President where she remained a trusted advisor and 269. Karen Hughes, Ten Minutes from Normal (New York: Viking Press, 2004), 15. 270. Mary Matalin in Lisa Myers, “Governor George W. Bush’s Rind-Hand Woman,” (interview, NBC News, January 18, 2000) http://icue.nbcunifiles.com/icue/files/icue/site/pdf/3153.pdf (accessed September 22, 2009). 271. Hughes, Ten Minutes from Normal, 4. 272. The phrase “compassionate conservative” was first introduced by presidential advisor Doug Wead in his book The Compassionate Touch. It was later made popular by the Reagan administration. Reagan is considered by conservatives to typify the “compassion conservative.” 273. Hughes, Ten Minutes From Normal., 43. 129 friend, carefully shaping and overseeing his message to the public. Author Laura Flanders writes: Never has there been a woman whose job brought her into closer, more influential contact with the President. As “Counselor to the President”— Bush created the position uniquely for her—she sat in on every meeting, oversaw the offices of press secretary, communications and speechwriting, and had the communications directors of every department reporting directly to her.274 Yet, the events of September 11, 2001 changed the dynamics of the country and the White House. Hughes realized the gravity of communicating the president’s message not only to the United States but also to the larger international community. Her responsibilities as Counselor to the President grew; feeling that her responsibilities to her family needed to take precedence after nearly eight years of public service, Hughes decided to step down in 2002 and return to Texas where she continued to provide advice and counsel to the president from home. During that time, the United States military invaded Afghanistan, launching a widespread counterattack on terrorist elements; the conflict was branded as the Global War on Terror. Initial support for a dramatic military response was high, domestically and internationally. However, as the United States began to seek international support for its invasion of Iraq in March of 2003, international perceptions of America began to decline as most people beyond America’s border did not regard that engagement as being a part of the reaction to al-Qaeda. In June of 2006, the Pew Research Center released their Pew Global Attitudes Project report detailing international opinions of the United States over a six-year period, from 2000 to 2006. The report indicated a significant decline in America’s global image abroad: 274. Laura Flanders, Bushwomen: Tales of a Cynical Species (London: Verso Press, 2004), 105. 130 A year ago, anti-Americanism had shown some signs of abating, in part because of the positive feelings generated by U.S. aid for tsunami victims in Indonesia and elsewhere. But favorable opinions of the United States have fallen in most of the 15 countries surveyed. Only about a quarter of the Spanish public (23%) expresses positive views of the U.S., down from 41% last year; America's image also has declined significantly in India (from 71% to 56%) and Indonesia (from 38% to 30%).275 Favorable ratings of The United States were lower in twenty-six of the thirty-three countries for which data was available. Additionally, the report indicated that favorable views of America in Muslim majority countries dropped precipitously. Only nine percent of those surveyed in Turkey, fifteen percent in Pakistan, and thirteen percent in the Palestinian Territories had favorable views of the United States. The decline was less abrupt in other countries. Jim Zogby, a Lebanese-American pollster, speaking before the Council on Foreign Relations on December 2, 2002, about his new book What Arabs Think, said: We asked again questions about the rest of the world. We asked 13 countries and we asked people to gauge them favorably or unfavorably. America came out very badly. Actually, net negative numbers in every country [sic].276 Understanding that America’s global image had slipped greatly, President Bush turned again to Karen Hughes and asked her to deploy her skills in communications and message-crafting in a new role: Undersecretary for Public Diplomacy. Hughes accepted the assignment, and at her nomination in March of 2005, President Bush said, "Karen 275. Pew Center for the People and the Press, “Bush Unpopular in Europe, seen as Unilateralist,” (report, August 15, 2001) http://people-press.org/reports/pdf/5.pdf (accessed September 22, 2009). 276. James Zogby, “What Arabs Think: Values, Beliefs, Political Concerns,” (speech, Council on Foreign Relations, New York City, New York, December 2, 2002), http://cfr.org/publications/5354/ what_arabs_think.htm (accessed December 29, 2009). 131 Hughes has been one of my most trusted and closest advisers, and she has the experience, expertise and judgment to lead this critical effort.”277 The position of Undersecretary for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs was not a new one. The Foreign Affairs Reform and Restructuring Act of 1998, instituted under President Bill Clinton, created the position to oversee three bureaus at the Department of State: Educational and Cultural Affairs, Public Affairs, and the International Information Programs. However, the term “public diplomacy” dates back to nearly thirty years earlier. Dean Edmund Guillon of the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University first used the term “public diplomacy” in 1965 at the founding of the Edward R. Murrow Center for Public Diplomacy. The Murrow Center, named for the pioneer in American journalism and former United States Information Agency director, described public diplomacy as follows: Public diplomacy deals with the influence of public attitudes on the formation and execution of foreign policies. It encompasses dimensions of international relations beyond traditional diplomacy; the cultivation by governments of public opinion in other countries; the interaction of private groups and interests in one country with those of another; the reporting of foreign affairs and its impact on policy; communication between those whose job is communication, as between diplomats and foreign correspondents; and the processes of inter-cultural communications.278 Thus, just as Karen Hughes had influenced American public opinion through a carefully crafted message during her earlier work in political communications, her new role as Undersecretary of Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs required similar responsibilities, but with a different message and a more diverse international audience. Rather than 277. Associated Press, “Karen Hughes Named to State Department Job,” MSNBC.com. March 14, 2005. http://www.msnbc.com/id/7182208/ (accessed September 25, 2009). 278. Public Diplomacy Alumni Association, “What is Public Diplomacy?” http://www. publicdiplomacy.org/1.htm (accessed September 25, 2009). 132 selling the message of a political candidate to a domestic audience of voters, Hughes would now be responsible for selling the American image to a global community whose perceptions of America were declining. Shortly after Hughes’s confirmation hearing before the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, Republican Chairman Richard Lugar said: The United States is involved in an international strategic communications campaign to promote and defend American interests in the world. Public diplomacy is a national security function of the highest magnitude. Americans are troubled by examples of virulent anti-American hatred in the Islamic world, and they are frustrated by public opinion in allied countries that seems increasingly ready to question American motives or blame American actions for a host of problems.279 Hughes’s new position was subject to widespread scrutiny as she was the third appointee to the post of Undersecretary of Public Diplomacy since President Bush took office. Her predecessors, Charlotte Beers and Margaret Tutwiller resigned early in their tenures. Members of Congress and leaders of the Arab world reported displeasure of Beers’s tactics in public diplomacy, mainly objecting to a series of television advertisements titled “Shared Values,” depicting American Muslims reaping the benefits of freedom and democracy. One advertisement showed a Lebanese-born schoolteacher, her head covered with a hjiab, a Muslim headscarf, as she praised American values with her children playing softball nearby. The advertisements were eventually suspended in several Arab countries, and Egypt, Jordan, and Lebanon refused to air them. John Stauber, former Executive Director of the Center for Media and Democracy said: 279. Richard G. Lugar, “Opening Statement for Nomination,” (Address to the U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, United States Capitol Building, Washington, D.C. July 7, 2005.) http://foreign.senate.gov/testimony/2005/LugarStatement050722.pdf (accessed September 24, 2009). 133 The problem with these messages is not that they were necessarily false. The problem is that, like the rest of Charlotte's web, "Shared Values" avoided discussing the issues at the core of Muslim resentment of the United States—the Palestinian/Israel conflict and the history of U.S. intervention in the region.280 Seeking to strike a different tone with Muslim audiences, Hughes began to develop her plan for the effective communication of America’s foreign policy. At a town hall meeting in Washington, D.C. on September 8, 2005, Karen Hughes explained the ideas that would comprise her new role as the Undersecretary for Public Diplomacy before a crowd assembled in Loy Henderson Auditorium. In her brief remarks, she said: Our opponents have to resort to propaganda and myths and distortion and indoctrination because they want closed minds; they don't want people to question or think for themselves. We want open minds. We want people to consider and decide for themselves. So our mission then becomes: How do we create the conditions and the climate that allow people to give our ideas that fair hearing? Because again, we are confident, if they are able to think for themselves, if they're able to give that fair hearing, that people will choose the power of our ideals. Now, how do we do that? Well, as a communicator, I like to boil things down to pretty basics [sic] and things that are memorable, so our pillars are going to be the Four Es: Engage— and the Secretary mentioned them—Engage, Exchange, Educate and Empower.281 Hughes’s aim is to influence the attitudes of Arabs and Muslims for political and ideological purposes. She does this by deploying a one-sided message in ways that appeal to the emotions of her audience in an attempt to persuade them towards her agenda. Hughes indicates that her “Four Es” program is powerful, in part, because it is memorable. By repeating each pillar of her program, Hughes believes she will convince her audience of its virtue. President Bush deployed this rhetorical maneuver in May of 280. John Stauber, Weapons of Mass Deception: The Use of Propaganda in Bush’s War in Iraq (New York: Tarcher Press, 2004), 31. 281. Karen Hughes, “Remarks with Undersecretary for Public Diplomacy and Affairs Karen Hughes at Town Hall on Public Diplomacy,” (Speech, George Washington University, Washington. D.C., September 8, 2005), http://merln.ndu.edu/archivepdf/nss/state/52748.pdf (accessed September 20, 2009). 134 2005 where he spoke in New York at a town hall meeting on social security. Bush said, “See, in my line of work you got [sic] to keep repeating things over and over and over again for the truth to sink in, to kind of catapult the propaganda.”282 To Hughes, the task of changing the minds of Arabs and Muslims in North Africa and the Middle East was a matter of implementing a programmatic formula. Hughes supposes that the mental faculties of Arabs and Muslims would be subject to manipulation through her “Four Es” and reveals her enthusiasm for her scheme: It's always nice when somebody else mentions your Four Es because that means the message maybe is getting out. She [Condoleezza Rice] asked me this morning, she said, "Now remind me all the Four Es again.”283 Hughes evinces a confidence that through the implementation of the four pillars, it will be possible to reform attitudes towards the United States among Muslims. Expressing each of the “Four Es” as a verb, Hughes implies that the respective actions are performed by one party on behalf of the other. We engage them, we exchange with them, we educate them, and finally, we empower them. Her intended audience understands who “we” are and who “they” are. The process is not a mutual exchange where interactions produce understanding for the benefit of each party. If that had been the intent, alternative verbs could have been employed, such as interact or communicate. Rather, the process envisioned is unidirectional such that the American self-image is affirmed by participating in actions that reinforce power: educating, empowering, and engaging a less powerful group. 282. George W. Bush, “President Participates in Social Security Conversation in New York,” (speech, Athena Performing Arts Center, Greece, New York, May 24, 2005) Available from the George W. Bush Administration White House website. http://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/ releases/2005/05/20050524-3.html (accessed April 3, 2010). 283. Ibid. 135 Hughes’s language suggests that she thinks that Arabs and Muslims are people that can be studied, engaged, educated, empowered, and eventually changed. Whatever original, indigenous identities once existed amongst them can gradually be subsumed within a larger, more powerful American narrative. This reconfiguration, in essence, creates a version of the “other” that is situated through the power of the United States. Through Hughes’s plan, the education of Arabs and Muslims suggests that American knowledge is transmitted to non-Americans. Yet, this knowledge is not like data recorded from the first spacewalk, the detection of carbon atoms found in pre- historic fossils, or other uncontested, generally agreed-upon scientific findings. Rather, it is values-based knowledge grounded in culturally conditioned beliefs of how to govern best and how to live in society. Those who embrace a pluralistic outlook accept that values-based knowledge is not accepted universally and cannot be regarded as objectively true, like mathematic formulae or scientific equations. Such knowledge is formed within and representative of distinct cultures and contexts. Furthermore, the idea that it is possible for the United States to empower Arabs or Muslims situates the former at the top of a vertical plane of authority where power is dispensed from above to those holding a lower place in the hierarchy. Within this hierarchy of power, those who occupy a lower position are merely feeble bystanders of a departed era, watching the more advanced and civilized world speed past. As Edward Said comments about the supposed role of such subservient people: Their great moments were in the past; they are useful in the modern world only because the powerful and up-to-date empires have effectively 136 brought them out of the wretchedness of their decline and turned them into rehabilitated residents of productive colonies.284 Hughes language suggests that the entire history and culture of a people can be reconfigured through policy initiatives promoting especially American values. Yet, to do so would be to delegitimize and ignore the plethora of languages, cultures, and experiences that have shaped the lives of so many. Peoples’ lives cannot be marginalized to objects that are made and remade, defined and redefined, only to serve the desires of the more powerful players. Hughes comments, “If they’re able to think for themselves, if they’re able to give that a fair hearing, people will choose the power of our ideals.”285 This statement implies that if Arabs and Muslims are not able to think for themselves and do not give her plan a fair hearing, they will choose ideals other than those of America. Hughes aligns fairness and the ability to think for oneself with choosing American ideals over others. Further, this language indicates that the United States is in a position to give Muslims the ability to think for themselves. In reducing others’ ability to think independently to something that can be accomplished by the members of an outside group, Hughes asks rhetorically, “Now, how do we do that? Well, as a communicator, I like to boil things down to pretty basics [sic] and things that are memorable, so our pillars are going to be the Four Es: Engage, Exchange, Educate and Empower.”286 Hughes seems not to understand that changing the way people think by instilling particular values in them hinders their ability to formulate conclusions based on their own value systems. 284. Said, Orientalism, 35. 285. Karen Hughes, “Remarks by Undersecretary for Public Diplomacy and Affairs Karen Hughes at Town Hall on Public Diplomacy,” (speech, George Washington University, Washington. D.C., September 8, 2005). http://merln.ndu.edu/archivepdf/nss/state/52748.pdf (accessed September 20, 2009). 286. Ibid. 137 Hughes goes on to say, “But to advocate substantially more resources, we must show that public diplomacy dollars are a good investment. If I hadn’t announced the Four Es before we thought of a fifth, I might have added a fifth: Evaluation.”287 It becomes clear from this account that the success of Hughes’s public diplomacy agenda is measured by the rate at which the countries she visits adopt American values. Further, Hughes’s language represents Muslim majority societies as investments. The acceptance of American policies, achieved by the implementation of the “Four Es” signifies a good investment. Resistance to Hughes’s plan and American policies signifies a poor investment. Thus, Hughes’s plan to evaluate Muslims casts them as subjects to be appraised, whose merit and worth are determined by the extent of their adoption of a specified American agenda. Curiously, when discussing the implementation of her four pillars, Hughes resorts to language that evokes the use of military force. Perhaps she is revealing the forceful nature of her agenda when she suggests the need to “engage more vigorously,” advocate our ideals “aggressively,” produce a “rapid and aggressive response” to wrong information, and “deploy regional SWAT teams” who formulate “strategic” approaches to American assets. Hughes referred to this as “waging peace.”288 She said, “I use the word ‘waging’ very intentionally because I believe that we must be very focused and clear about the commitment and years of effort that success will require.”289 Yet, Hughes’s intentional use of the verb “to wage,” coupled with militaristic phrases do not indicate that “waging peace” will result in any different consequence than “waging war.” 287. Ibid. 288. “Waging Peace” is also the title of Dwight. D. Eisenhower’s memoir. 289. Ibid. 138 In fact, this terminology suggests that peace will come as the result of a long-term American presence and a conflict where two opposing forces battle for their own respective objectives. For many in the Middle East, that American presence was not a suggestion but a reality. Hughes’s remarks came three days prior to the fourth anniversary of the September 11th attacks—an event that resulted in a U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan. One month earlier, Canada’s top general Andrew Leslie warned that coalition efforts in Afghanistan could be “a twenty year venture.”290 Additionally, at the time of her speech, the United States was in its second full year of war with Iraq. More than 1,300 Iraqi citizens were killed during the month Hughes laid out her plans for diplomacy, 16 of them on the same day she spoke. Hughes was not the only one deploying this language. Part of Hughes’s “investment” was the diffusion of American spokespeople into Pan-Arab media outlets. This is highlighted by the development of a rapid response center at the State Department, which Hughes outlined at the Shell Distinguished Lecture Series at the Baker Institute for Public Policy on March 29, 2006. She said: This center puts out a daily early morning summary of stories driving news around the world, and sums up America’s message in response … we are now in the process of setting up regional hubs, to position spokesmen in key media centers like Dubai–their full time job will be to get on television and media and advocate our values and policies. We’ve dramatically increased our presence on Arab media… I’ve got a working group looking at ways we might use MP3 players, DVDs and other current technologies to better tell America’s story especially to young people.291 290. CBC News, “General warns of 20-year mission in Afghanistan,” CBC.ca, August 5, 2005. http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2005/08/08/Canada-Afghanistan-050808.htm (accessed August 18, 2009). 291. Karen Hughes, “Remarks at the Shell Distinguished Lecture Series,” (speech, Baker Institute for Public Policy, Houston, TX, March 29, 2006.) Available from: http://merln.ndu.edu/archivepdf/nss/ state/64106.pdf (accessed December 23, 2009). 139 In addition to the American military already-present in Iraq and Afghanistan, the presence of American spokespeople on their televisions during the nightly news confronted Arabs throughout the greater Middle East. Monitoring and countering local media that reported on American military operations in Iraq and the Bush administration’s War on Terror these reports advocated President Bush’s so-called freedom agenda and the need for democratic reform. Hughes said, “State Department personnel made 148 appearances on Arab and regional media in January and February alone—a good number of them in Arabic.”292 While Hughes’s goal was to employ language that portrayed American values and political goals as pious, much of her discourse used a polarized vocabulary meant to distinguish the group speaking from the group spoken for or about. This binary created a fictional reality where Hughes and others in her position were able to transcend immediacy to speak on behalf of a silent and absent “other.” This discursive practice allowed Hughes, she thought, to speak for others. This dichotomy of self and other—us and them—is part of an ancient, perhaps primordial, pattern of discourse deployed more recently by Europeans during colonial expansion. Edward Said references how this language was used by James Balfour in his June 10,1913 address to the British House of Commons. Balfour, in justifying British colonization of Egypt, suggested that “we,” understood to be the British, know Egypt better than “they,” understood to be Egyptians, know it themselves. Said points out that through this language, the “other” becomes the subject of conversations held by an inside group called “us.” It is common to associate oneself with a person speaking or 292. Ibid. 140 writing regardless of agreement on the subject matter as use of the collective term “us” creates a relationship indicating shared beliefs or traits. In order to define the categories of “us” and “them,” one must be in a position that enables them to do that thus, making such designations implies a sense of authority. Said writes, “Knowledge to Balfour means surveying a civilization from its origins to its prime to its decline—and of course, it means being able to do that.”293 Stripped of identity, the “other” becomes a voiceless, powerless subject who idly watches a more powerful entity reconfigure its meaning and place in the world. As Trinh T. Minh-ha comments in her book Woman, Native, Other, “A conversation of ‘us,’ with ‘us,’ about ‘them’ is a conversation in which ‘them’ is silenced. ‘Them’ always stands on the side of the hill, naked and speechless, barely present in its absence.”294 Phrases like: “They hate freedom,”295 “They hate our way of life,” and “They hate our vision for human rights and human dignity and prosperity and peace,”296 so commonly heard in discourses about Muslims and Arabs in the post September 11th world, are problematic because they suggest a lockstep desire of an entire ethnic or religious group. Additionally, these phrases suggest that “they” (Muslims and Arabs) only become a part of the ongoing conversation when acknowledged by one of “us.” Minh-ha observes: [The] subject of discussion, ‘them,’ is only admitted among ‘us,’ the discussing subjects, when accompanied or introduced by an ‘us’ member, 293. Said, Orientalism, 32. 294. Trinh T. Minha, Woman, Native, Other (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1989), 67. 295. Ben Sheppard, “ Bush Says Afghan War Must Be Won To Stop ‘Tyranny,’” AFP News, October 30, 2009, http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5iLCi2 _R1F91HLDt3ZixueMYXBwow (accessed December 21, 2009). 296. George W. Bush, as quoted in Al Jazeera, “Uncertainty Grows over Afghan Poll,” http:// english.aljazeera.net/news/ asia/2009/10/20091031497459199.html (accessed April 10, 2010). 141 hence the dependency of ‘them’ and its need to acquire good manners for the membership standing.297 In discourses related to democratic reform, people only become referred to as members of the inside American group after adopting and implementing democratic structures of government that are approved by the United States. Much of Karen Hughes’s public diplomacy discourse is laden with this style of speech. In her July 22, 2005 confirmation hearing, Hughes said, “In the long run, the way to prevail in this battle is through the power of our ideals; for they speak to all of us; every people in every land on every continent.”298 This statement evokes the theory of American exceptionalism, which suggests that America, by virtue of its democracy, historical evolution, and national credo, is unique and qualitatively superior to other nations. Alexis de Tocqueville, a French political thinker and historian who introduced the phrase “American exceptionalism” writes in his 1831 book Democracy in America: The position of the Americans is therefore quite exceptional, and it may be believed that no democratic people will ever be placed in a similar one . . . Let us cease, then, to view all democratic nations under the example of the American people, and attempt to survey them at length with their own features.299 Similar to the tone of de Tocqueville, Hughes seems to suggest that American ideals are meaningful to the entire world. Additionally, she feels capable of speaking on behalf of Congress as a whole when she employs the pronoun “our” into her language. By employing this collective term, Hughes endeavors to include senators as members of an inside group that is characterized by ideals she feels empowered to 297. Minha, Woman, Native, Other, 67. 298. Karen Hughes, “Opening Statement,” (speech, U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, United States Capitol Building, Washington, D.C. July 22, 2005), quoted in J. Michael Waller, The Public Diplomacy Reader. Institute of World Politics Press: Washington, D.C. 2007, 37. 299. Alexis De Tocqueville, Democracy in America (Cambridge: Sever and Francis, 1863), 519. 142 define. She assumes the authority to speak of the ideals, values, and beliefs that all Americans supposedly share, as if they were uncontroversial. While it may be true that the ideals Hughes speaks of are agreed upon and shared by some members of Congress, others may not. Less than three months after her confirmation hearing, in remarks at the 2005 Forum on the Future of Public Diplomacy, Hughes said: America is also confident of our ideals. We believe, given a fair hearing and a free choice, that people the world over will choose freedom over tyranny, tolerance over extremism, diversity over rigid conformity and justice over injustice.300 Hughes intends to include all Americans in her collective inside group. The problem here is that Hughes has imagined that a set of principles that is embraced idiosyncratically by a sub-set of the Republican Party normatively defines the ideals and the identities of Americans. However ideals are concepts and have no meaning on their own. Their meanings are not derived from detached qualities that make them inherently American. Rather, they come from the experiences of individuals who espouse them; ideals, like values, feelings, emotions, or other abstractions, exist within the imaginations of individuals. Therefore, one individual cannot speak on behalf of a collective ideal any more than one person can speak on behalf of the experiences of another individual. Here, the concern is not with the words “American” and “ideal.” Rather, it is with their meaning. To ask “What is an ideal?” is quite different than to ask “What are American ideals?” The definition of the word “ideal” is agreed upon, referring to some 300. Karen Hughes, “Remarks to the 2005 Forum on the Future of Public Diplomacy,” (speech, George Washington University, Washington, D.C. October 14, 2005), http://ics01.ds.leeds.ac.uk/papers/ vp01.cfm?outfit=pmt&requesttimeout=500&folder=7&paper=2510 (accessed November 1, 2009). 143 standard or principle to which people aspire. Yet, the qualities that make an ideal “American” are not universally agreed-upon. A Rasmussen survey conducted in July of 2009 found that seven percent of Americans disagree with the premise that “We are all endowed by our Creator with certain unalienable rights among them, life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness”—a premise that forms the core of the Declaration of Independence. Similarly, 23 percent disagree that “all men are created equal” and one in four Americans disagree that governments derive their only just authority to govern by “consent of the governed.”301 Hughes assumes that such concrete definitions exist and does not seem to be aware that her audiences in the Middle East may in fact not share her belief in the universality of such values. Alcoff goes on to say that, “Thus, how what is said gets heard depends on who says it, and who says it will affect the style and language in which it is stated, which will in turn affect its perceived significance.”302 Hughes’s discourse on the Middle East illustrates these points. Shortly after her appointment as Undersecretary of Public Affairs, she embarked on her first official trip to the region, visiting Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and Turkey. Termed a “listening tour,” Hughes described the objective of her five-day outing as an opportunity to hear the concerns of the people she encountered; the presumption is that she intended to be spoken to, rather than to speak. Before a group of five hundred women at Dar Al-Hekma Women’s College in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia on September 27, 2005, Hughes remarked that she looked 301. Rasmussen Reports, “Americans Still Embrace Ideals from Declaration of Independence,” Rasmussen Reports Website. July 3, 2009. http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/lifestyle/ holidays/july_2009/americans_still_embrace_ideals_from_declaration_of_independence (accessed October 10, 2009). 302. Linda Alcoff, “The Problem of Speaking for Others,” Cultural Critique, no. 20. (Winter 1991- 1992): 13. 144 forward to the day that women in Saudi Arabia would play an active role in their society, and, quoting First Lady Laura Bush, she said, “A bird can’t fly if one wing is broken.” Hughes also suggested that the “brokenness” of Saudi women was due in part to their inability to drive. Hughes commented: I believe women should be full and equal participants in society. And I feel as an American woman that my ability to drive is an important part of my freedom. It has allowed me to work during my career, it has allowed me to go to the grocery store and shop for my family; it allows me to go to the doctor. It gives me a measure, an important measure, of independence.303 Here, Hughes has constructed an image of Saudi women as being broken and subjugated and then presents that representation to the Saudi women themselves. Failing to ask the women in attendance how they might describe themselves and the conditions in which they live, Hughes depicts their identity to them based on the cultural assumptions that are part of her own identity, and she forms a judgment that resonates poorly within the group. In reply, one female student in attendance commented, “The general image of the Arab woman is that she isn’t happy. We are not oppressed. We are not prisoners in our own homes. We are all pretty happy.”304 In June, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, perhaps more conscious of the problems attendant to such judgments, traveled to Cairo to discuss democracy and freedom but declined to comment on questions related to driving, saying it was “a line that I have not wanted to cross.”305 303. Karen Hughes, “Question and Answer with Students at Dar al-Hekma College,” (speech, Dar-al-Hekma College, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, October 12, 2005), http://findarticles.com/p/news-articles/political-transcript-wire/mi_8167/is_20051012/karen-hughes- delivers-remarks-students/ai_ n50547153/?tag=content;col1 (accessed October 31, 2009). 304. Ibid. 305. Glenn Kessler, “Hughes Raises Driving Ban With Saudis,” Washington Post, September 28, 2005, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/09/27/AR2005092701311.html (accessed July 4, 2010). 145 Hughes has taken what linguistic anthropologist Kenneth Pike calls an etic perspective. Pike coined the terms “emic” and “etic” to suggest that there are two perspectives that may be employed when studying or observing a society’s cultural system. The etic perspective is the observer’s extrinsic interpretation of the intrinsic cultural elements of a given society, while an emic perspective is the observance of how indigenous members of that society derive meaning from their own cultural systems. Thus, Hughes’s estimation of Saudi women can be seen as an external projection that lacks an understanding of the innate cultural matrices that provide meaning to and shape the lives of cultural insiders and, for this reason, cannot be interpreted as an accurate representation. Anthropologist Clifford Geertz, author of Local Knowledge, discusses a related notion in terms of conceptual structures that are experience-near and experience-distant, terms that were originally introduced by psychoanalyst Heinz Kohut. An experience-near concept is “one that someone—a patient, a subject, in our case an informant—might himself naturally and effortlessly use to define what he or his fellows see, feel, think, imagine and so on.”306 An experience-distant concept is “one that a specialist of one sort or another—an analyst, an experimenter, an ethnographer, and even a priest or an ideologist—employ to forward their scientific, philosophical, or practical aims.”307 In this case, because Hughes cannot “swim in the stream of experience”308 of those Arab peoples with whom she talks, she is only capable of having experience-distant concepts. Geertz describes the process of grasping experience-near concepts as a task as delicate as pulling oneself into someone else’s skin: 306. Clifford Geertz, Local Knowledge: Further Essays in Interpretive Anthropology (New York: Basic Books, 1983), 57. 307. Ibid. 308. Ibid., 58. 146 The ethnographer does not, and in my opinion, largely cannot, perceive what his informants perceive. What he perceives, and that uncertainly enough, is what they perceive “with”—or “by means of,” or “through”. . .or whatever the word should be. In the country of the blind, who are not as unobservant as they look, the one-eyed is not king, he is spectator.309 Observations of this nature are present in Hughes’s discussion with reporters during a press briefing en-route to Turkey. Hughes describes her interaction with Saudi citizens: There was a real division in the room about whether they wanted me to answer questions or whether they wanted to talk—express their opinions. And so one man very adamantly demanded that I answer his question, and his question was, "What do you want?" And he meant, in terms of going into Afghanistan and going into Iraq, "What do you want?" And I think it's really interesting, as a communicator, after so many years of us talking about our policies and what we are trying to achieve, there's still obviously a great deal of skepticism and just questions about what's the–– one person said we think you have a hidden motive—in terms of the democracy agenda. And I tried to explain that we believe that this is in our national security interests. We believe it's in your best interests, and that's the motive. And that's the agenda.310 Much like Hughes depicts the identity of Saudi women to the Saudi women themselves, here too she professes to understand what constitutes the “best interests” of Saudis and represents that depiction to them. In this manner, Hughes participates in the construction of a subject-position. That is, Hughes situates Saudis within an existing American narrative and then assigns them roles that confirm the narrative. Once one has assumed a particular worldview, they inevitably see the world from that vantage point. And, the particular narratives that stem from this view are not revealed as they may naturally evolve on their own, but rather as how they are constructed and positioned by the individual. 309. Ibid., 58. 310. Saudi-U.S. Relations Information Service, “In Pursuit of Understanding: Karen Hughes in Saudi Arabia,” http://www.saudi-us-relations.org/articles/2005/ioi/050929-hughes-visit.html (accessed October 4, 2009). 147 Observing the Saudi town hall, journalist Fred Kaplan expressed concern, reporting: Let's say some Muslim leader wanted to improve Americans' image of Islam. It's doubtful that he would send as his emissary a woman in a black chador who had spent no time in the United States, possessed no knowledge of our history or movies or pop music, and spoke no English beyond a heavily accented "good morning."311 Similarly, in her remarks with Turkish Foreign Ministry Undersecretary Ali Tuygan on September 28, 2005, Hughes said, “In terms of Iraq, I think we are united, America and Turkey, in what we want, which is a stable, a unified, and a democratic Iraq. So I think our people are in agreement on those policies.”312 Hughes endeavors to validate her position, and thereby what she regards as America’s position, by suggesting that Turks and Americans are in agreement. Furthermore, by including Turks in her insider group, Hughes has constructed a possible reality where, regardless of whether or not such a thing is true, the possibility of it being true can be imagined more easily. Linda Alcoff comments, “When I speak for myself, I am constructing a possible self, a way to be in the world, and am offering that to others, whether I intend to or not, as one possible way to be.”313 Thus, when speaking for “we,” one constructs a possible “we.” Once this possibility has been constructed, the task then becomes leading the other to embrace it. In this case, Hughes injects value- laden language into her narrative—words such as “united”, “stable” “unified” and “democratic.” These words have a positive nuance that situates them in a category of 311. Fred Kaplan, “Karen Hughes, Stay Home!” Slate.com, September 29, 2005. http://www.slate.com/id/2127102/ (accessed September 26, 2009). 312. Karen Hughes, “Remarks with Turkish Foreign Minister Under Secretary Ambassador Ali Tuygan,” (speech, United States Embassy, Istanbul, Turkey. September 28, 2005) http://turkey .usembassy.gov/news_09282005a.html (accessed September 29, 2009). 313. Alcoff, “The Problem of Speaking for Others,” 21. 148 qualities that are desired. It is unlikely that one would admit the desire to espouse the opposite qualities—“divided,” “unstable,” “disjointed,” and “dictatorial.” Thus, as it is common to identify with those defined positive qualities, embracing the reality of a once- imaginary narrative becomes possible. This discourse employed by Hughes is affected greatly by the physical and social locations of the speaker and listener. Alcoff notes: Certain contexts and locations are allied with structures of oppression, and certain others are allied with resistance to oppression. Therefore all are not politically equal, and, given that politics is connected to truth, all are not epistemically equal.314 Some who attend Hughes’s listening tour may view her as being allied with structures of power and oppression while viewing the people of the Middle East as allied with structures that resist oppression. That is not to say that Hughes is oppressing those she interacts with or that she is aligned with oppression at all. Rather, her position as an American diplomat—a representative of American foreign policy in the Middle East— links her to policies that citizens in Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and Egypt may view as oppressive. Speaking to a group of women’s rights activists in Istanbul that same day, Hughes attempted to discuss the role of women in society. Yet during the discussion, she was confronted on United States foreign policy in the Iraq. Hidayet Sefkatli Tuksal, a women’s rights activist with the Capital City Women’s Forum said, “This war is really, really bringing your positive efforts to the level of zero.”315 Fatima Nvin Vargum said, 314. Ibid., 15. 315. Hidayet Sefkatli Tuksal, as quoted in Glenn Kessler, “Turks Challenge Hughes on Iraq,” Washington Post, September 29, 2005, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp- dyn/content/article/2005/09/28/AR2005092801429.html (accessed September 12, 2009). 149 “War makes the rights of women completely erased, and poverty comes after war—and women pay the price.”316 Trying to maintain control of the conversation, Hughes expressed her distaste for war also, saying that while no one liked war, it was sometimes necessary for peace. Hughes faced similar criticism in Cairo. She appeared unaware of the political and cultural climate surrounding Egypt’s first democratic presidential election in September 2005. Speaking to members of the press during a briefing en-route to Cairo, she remarked, “Egyptians have just for the first time gone to the polls and taken out a ballot that had more than one name on it, and for them to choose, now that was a step.”317 Hughes continued to praise the elections, saying that they provided “opportunities to all presidential candidates to freely explain their platforms…” However, she failed to acknowledge the reality of political instability and public unrest that resulted from what many in Egypt believed to be an unfair process. Eight months ahead of the elections, President Hosni Mubarak arrested and imprisoned Ayman Nour, the leader and founder of Egypt’s Hizb El-Ghad (The Tomorrow Party). Considered a threat to Mubarak’s long rule, Nour was charged with forging signatures needed to secure the formation of his party. His arrest, seen as politically motivated, prompted widespread protest including that of Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who postponed a scheduled visit to Cairo upon learning of Nour’s imprisonment. Bending to pressure from the international community, Nour was freed briefly and declared first runner-up in the 2005 elections. Later, on December 24, 2005, Nour was 316. Ibid. 317. U.S. Embassy in Italy, “State's Hughes Visits Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Turkey,” September 26, 2005, http://www.usembassy.it/file2005_09/alia/a5092607.htm (accessed October 4, 2009). 150 re-arrested, convicted of the earlier charges and sentenced to five years in prison318. The White House issued a press release commenting: The United States is deeply troubled by the conviction today of Egyptian politician Ayman Nour by an Egyptian court. The conviction of Mr. Nour, the runner-up in Egypt's 2005 presidential elections, calls into question Egypt's commitment to democracy, freedom, and the rule of law.319 Muhammad Ali Ibrahim, Editor of Al-Gomhouriyya, the Egyptian Daily newspaper wrote of Hughes’s visit: We in Egypt or anywhere else do not need a public relations campaign like the one America is conducting. Egyptians or Saudis or Turks will not suddenly like America because it has set up a television or radio station ... but feelings may change if America changes its whole approach.320 The narrative that Karen Hughes constructs and presents to those she encounters on her listening tour is only as powerful as her physical and social locations. An American layperson speaking from New York on the need for democratic reform in the Middle East would not carry the authority and thereby the sense of truth that an American diplomat speaking from Cairo on the same topic would. Hughes’s position as a diplomat lends itself to influence, just as her close relationship with the Commander-in-Chief of the United States does. This sense of influence is heightened when Hughes travels to Cairo to speak to Egyptian citizens. The result is different than Hughes being outside of Cairo speaking about the same people. In essence, her conversation becomes a direct conversation directed at a “you” group, rather than a distant discussion about “them.” 318. Nour was released from prison in February of 2009, three months before President Obama’s visit to Cairo. Because his arrest resulted in a criminal record, Egyptian law prevents him from running for public office. 319. White House, “Statement on Conviction of Egyptian Politician,” (press release, December 24, 2005), http://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/ news/releases/2005/12/20051224-1.html (accessed October 9, 2009). 320. Reuters, “Egyptian State Paper Attacks U.S. Envoy’s Mission,” RedOrbit.com, September 26, 2005. http://ro-b.redorbit.com/news/politics/251288/egyptian_state_paper_attacks_us_envoys_ mission/index.html (accessed October 17, 2009). 151 Moreover, neither of these cases would prove as meaningful as the dialogue of a Muslim cleric on the future of political organization in the Muslim world. For Hughes, having the ability to speak for and about the “other” in the “other’s” territory configures her in a position of power. Her authority and influence—exercised through her visit as an agent of the United States coming to the Middle East to persuade though—is reinforced by contemporary and historical displays of physical power in the assortment of American military personnel throughout the region. It is not unlikely for one to conclude that Karen Hughes’s message may be received as the next chapter in an ongoing storyline of an American presence in the Middle East. Hughes’s suggestion that she is in the Middle East to listen to the concerns and ideas of the local people places her in another position of influence—the role of listener. By promoting the act of listening, Hughes allows the “other” to speak. It is this point— allowing the other to speak—that is so problematic. The act of listening to another reinforces traditional structures of knowledge and power. To say that “I will listen to you” is to grant the interlocutor the ability to express their ideas. Further, the listener’s role then becomes one of interpreting, processing, and constructing meaning from what is said. Because people view the world through their own cultural lens, their interpretations of the world are processed in ways that are meaningful to their own experiences. Therefore, it is impossible for those who listen to Hughes to interpret the narrative that she deploys in the same way. Hughes’s listening tour prompts many questions: What will she do with what she hears? Why is she listening? Is she in fact, really listening? These examples show that Hughes’s goal in public diplomacy is to change the way Muslims perceive the United States and its policies; Hughes is interested in 152 changing perceptions rather than what leads to the perceptions. Thus, Hughes comes to the conversation with a preconceived idea about how the conversation should evolve. In this manner, Hughes is able to process what is said into an already-existing, self- affirming narrative; she configures the conversation in a way that confirms her position. If this is indeed the case, Hughes’s five-day tour of the Middle East cannot be classified as a “listening tour.” The word listening suggests that in addition to perceiving what is said, one makes a conscious effort to understand the meaning as it is understood by the speaker. Unlike the term “hearing,” which refers simply to perceiving sound, listening involves disengaging one’s mind from the act of formulating counter responses and approaching a discourse objectively—without formulated reactions or ideas about the structure or content of the discourse. And, just as it is important to listen in this manner, it is equally as important, if not more so, to understand the cultural dynamics that comprise the group of people to which one listens. It is the cultural and historical elements of society that often shape contemporary worldviews. It may be said that one objective of Hughes’s listening tour was to identify and embrace moderate Muslim leaders. In fact, during her trip to Cairo, Hughes hailed Muhammed Sayed Tantawi, an Egyptian spiritual leader, as a respected moderate voice, noting that he was among the first to condemn the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.321 Saying that terrorists “are not the true face of Islam,” President Bush assembled an envoy of Muslim world leaders to promote understanding between Muslims and Americans—an effort the media reported as an “appeal to moderate 321. Tantawi died on March 10, 2001. 153 Muslims.” These diplomatic efforts led to various discussions on “moderate Muslims” and “moderate Islam.” As Whittier Law School professor Seval Yildirim points out in her article “Discussing Islam in the Post-9/11 Epistemological Terrain,” the entirety of knowledge production and the creation of a normalized knowledge-base on Islam have changed.322 Phrases like “moderate Islam” and “moderate Muslims” were introduced into contemporary discourses to signify a particular Islam and a particular type of Muslim. And, while these terms have become common and are often deployed in a manner that suggests clarity in their meaning, little attention has been given to the ambiguities that are revealed through critical examination. As Yildirim notes, the terms “moderate” is most often used to denote the presence of its antithesis: “fundamentalist.” The moderate Muslim is labeled as the good type of Muslim while the fundamentalist Muslim is labeled as the bad type of Muslim. Yet, this does not take into account the unit of measurement by which a Muslim may be labeled as moderate or fundamentalist. Yildirim writes: Then, is the moderate Muslim one that internalizes Islam with moderation not entirely, not fully, but only to a certain extent, only so far as it does not contradict or challenge the propositions of the new epistemological terrain, as opposed to the fundamentalist Muslim who somehow figured out the so-called fundamentals or the core of Islam and chooses to practice it fully, internalize Islam?323 The moderate Muslim is understood to be the less-threatening of two possibilities. Labeling a Muslim as “moderate” indicates, he says, that they are compliant with an American agenda. Moderates may be considered as people who are less opposed to an 322. Seval Yildrim, “Discussing Islam in the Post-9/11 Epistemological Terrain,” Pace International Law Review 19, no. 223 (2007): 1. 323. Ibid., 227. 154 American military presence or policies in their region, while those who are outspoken are labeled as extremists or fundamentalists. In the following chapter, we will explore the origins of the more radical Muslims whose voices are part of a discourse of dualism and whose representations of the United States counter American representations of Muslims. The rhetoric of the figures discussed in chapter three reinforces Lewis’s notion of a “clash of civilizations” that results from “the roots of Muslim rage.” CHAPTER FOUR “I HATE THOSE WESTERNERS AND DESPISE THEM” Between the idea And the reality Between the motion And the act Falls the Shadow For Thine is the Kingdom ––T.S Eliot324 In “The Myth of Westerness in Medieval Literary Histiography,” Maria Rosa Menocal writes, “The entity we have dubbed ‘Western’ is clearly a comparative title.”325 According to her, those who describe themselves as “Western” see their identity as deriving from a distinctive culture and history and they suppose that it is in “necessary and fundamental opposition to non-Western culture and cultural history.”326 Discourses on Islam where such bifurcations as “Islam and the West” suggest the existence of two separate, reified, and competing identities or two clashing forces reveals this. Over time, the phrase “the West” has come to mean Europe and the United States. Some in the United States representing this imagined “West” to Muslim-majority countries in the wake of September 11, 2001 reflected on it with pride and affection, proclaiming freedom and democracy as its distinctive values and declaring them to be beneficial to all people. Senior officials in the government promoted these values as the antidote to 324. T.S. Eliot, as quoted in Scofield, T.S. Eliot: The Poems (New York: Cambridge Press, 1988), 145. 325. Maria Rosa Menocal, “The Myth of Westerness in Medieval Literary Histiography,” in The New Crusades: Constructing the Muslim Enemy, ed., by Emran Qureshi and Michael A. Sells (New York: Columbia University Press, 2003), 249. 326. Ibid. 156 terrorism. President George W. Bush, speaking before Arab and Muslim-American leaders at the Afghanistan Embassy in Washington in September of 2002, said: Prosperity and freedom and dignity are not just American hopes, or Western hopes. They are universal, human hopes. And even in the violence and turmoil of the Middle East, America believes those hopes have the power to transform lives and nations.327 Bush, in expressing what he believes to be the deep-seated values of the United States, “the West,” and even the world, commits himself to the idea that these values are universal principles that have the ability to “transform lives and nations.” For Bush and others in his administration, the values of prosperity, freedom, and dignity are real and form the very essence of their identities. As the Declaration of Independence states, these values are “self evident.” In an earlier draft of the Declaration, Thomas Jefferson wrote, “We hold these truths to be sacred and undeniable.”328 It may be said that in addition to considering the values expressed in the Declaration of Independence and Constitution as especially American, they are also seen as being universal. This possibility raises the question: Are values of prosperity, freedom, and dignity American values because they are universal or are they universal values because they are American values? While some Americans may represent the United States as they believe it to be, those representations are not always viewed by others as the reality of what the United States is. As poet T.S. Eliot notes in The Hollow Men, “Between the idea and the reality, 327. White House, “President George W. Bush Holds Roundtable with Arab and Muslim- American Leaders,” (press release, September 10, 2002), http://www.georgewbush- whitehouse.archives.gov/ infocus/ramadan/islam.html (accessed October 12, 2009). 328. Princeton University, “Jefferson’s Original Rough Draft of the Declaration of Independence,” The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, [n.d.] http://www.princeton.edu/~tjpapers/declaration/declaration.html (accessed July 4, 2010). 157 the motion and the act, falls the shadow.”329 The way that the United States is represented—the “idea” of the United States—conflicts with the way that the United States is sometimes perceived. Many in Muslim-majority countries, though aware of the “American narrative” which lauds democracy, freedom, and “inalienable rights,” understand the United States in a different way; they see it through the lens of their experience.. A Pew Research poll taken in 2006 asked citizens of Muslim-majority countries what they believed the goal of the United States’ was in terms of its presence in the Middle East. The results indicate that 63 percent of Moroccans believe the United States desires to control Mideast Oil; 61 percent of Jordanians believe the United States wants to dominate the world; 51 percent of Pakistanis polled say that the United States wants to target unfriendly Muslim governments; and 54 percent of Turkish citizens believe the ultimate goal of the United States is to protect Israel’s interests.330 After September 11, 2001, some Muslims, outraged at the attacks on the United States in the name of Islam, began to express more publicly their beliefs that Islam was not a violent religion at all, but rather, one that promotes peace, pluralism, and understanding. Abdulaziz bin Abdallah Al-Ashaykh, a leading Islamic scholar in Saudi Arabia said: You must know Islam’s firm position against all these terrible crimes. The world must know that Islam is a religion of peace and mercy and goodness; it is a religion of justice and guidance…Islam has forbidden violence in all its forms. It forbids the hijacking [of] airplanes, ships and 329. T.S. Eliot, as quoted in Scofield, T.S. Eliot: The Poems, 145. 330. The Pew Global Attitudes Project, “Europe’s Muslims More Moderate; The Great Divide: How Westerners and Muslims View Each Other,” Report, June 22, 2006, http://pewglobal.org/reports/pdf/ 253.pdf (accessed September 23, 2009). 158 other means of transport, and it forbids all acts that undermine the security of the innocent331 The group Muslims Against Terrorism, a global anti-terrorism NGO whose main goal is to promote Muslim perspectives on terrorism in American and European media, denounced the attacks in strong language saying, “As Muslims, we condemn terrorism in all its forms and manifestations. Ours is a religion of peace. We are sick and tired of extremists dictating the public face of Islam.”332 A fatwa (legal opinion) was signed by more than 500 British Muslim scholars and clerics following the violent 2005 London train bombings. It read in part: Islam strictly, strongly and severely condemns the use of violence and the destruction of innocent lives. There is neither place nor justification in Islam for extremism, fanaticism or terrorism. Suicide bombings, which killed and injured innocent people in London, are haram—vehemently prohibited in Islam, and those who committed these barbaric acts in London [on July 7, 2005] are criminals not martyrs. Such acts, as perpetrated in London, are crimes against all of humanity and contrary to the teachings of Islam.333 Abdulaziz Sachedina, professor of Islamic studies at the University of Virginia, comments on how he believes that those Muslims who engage in gruesome displays of violence towards humanity have misinterpreted the values and teachings of Islam. He writes in his book The Islamic Roots of Democratic Pluralism: I firmly believe that if Muslims were made aware of the centrality of Koranic teachings about religious and cultural pluralism as a divinely ordained principle of peaceful coexistence among human societies, then 331. Al-Ashayk Abdulaziz Bin Abdallah, “Public Statements by Senior Saudi Officials Condemning Extremism and Promoting Moderation,” February 2, 2004. In Kurzman, Charles “Statements Against Terror.” http://www.unc.edu/~kurzman/ terror.htm (accessed February 12, 2010). 332. http://www.muslimsagainstterrorism.org/aboutus.html. 333. Muslim scholars, as quoted in Kurzman, “Statements Against Terror.” 159 they would spurn violence in challenging their repressive and grossly inefficient governments.334 For Sachedina, the faithful, law-abiding, peaceful nature of Muslims contradicts the violent acts that some commit in the name of Islam. Even so, a recent Gallup poll taken in November of 2009 found that 53% of Americans still view Islam unfavorably.335 Additionally, a CNN News/Opinion Research Corporation survey in June of 2009 indicated that 46 percent of Americans have unfavorable views of Islam. This number was up 5 percent from 2002.336 In short, American views of Islam are not based on the tolerance that Muslims see as characterizing their own faith, but rather on the violent representations that were deployed by a small group of 19 hijackers on September 11, 2001. A Pew Research poll released in September of 2007 indicates that 45 percent of Americans believe that Islam is more likely than other religions to encourage violence.337 President Barack Obama pointed out in his famous Cairo University speech in June of 2009 that “Some in my country view Islam as inevitably hostile not only to America and Western countries, but also to human rights.” Yet at the same time, Obama acknowledged that “The sweeping change brought by modernity and globalization led many Muslims to view the West as hostile to the traditions of Islam.”338 334. Abdulaziz Sachedina, The Islamic Roots of Democratic Pluralism (Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2001), 13. 335. Jonathan Salant, “Many Americans Take Dim View of Islam, poll shows,” The Salt Lake Tribune, January 21, 2010, http://www.sltrib.com/faith/ci_14242651 (accessed February 17, 2010). 336. Paul Steinhauser, “Poll: Few Americans Have Favorable View of Muslim World,” CNN.com, June 2, 2009. http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/06/02/ us.muslims.poll/index.html (accessed April 1, 2010). 337. Pew Research Center, “Public Expresses Mixed Views of Islam, Mormonism.” 338. Barack Obama, “A New Beginning,” Cairo University, Cairo, Egypt. June 4, 2009, http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/NewBeginning (accessed November, 4, 2009). 160 Americans represent what they believe to be essentially “American” values to Muslim-majority countries, while some Muslims know America as they see it in their everyday lives—an enduring military presence, long-term supporter of Israel to the detriment of many Muslim co-religionists in Palestine, and a nation obsessed with wealth, material possessions, and an aspiration for global dominance. On the other hand, many Muslims in the wake of violent events, project the essential truths that they believe comprise Islam while many Americans only know Islam as they see it—airplane hijackers, suicide bombers, and enraged gunmen. While “Western” views of Islam and Muslims are widely known and have already been discussed in this thesis in some detail, Muslim perceptions of “the West,” particularly the United States, are less well-known to people living in Europe and North America. Just as American scholars, authors, and politicians have come to create a particular representation of Islam, Muslim scholars, intellectuals, political leaders, and media outlets have constructed an image of the United States that encapsulates feelings and emotions that are evoked by their experiences or understandings of Americans. After September 11, 2001, some Americans inquired about the presence of Islam in the United States. An atmosphere of suspicion emerged that seemed to prompt the question “What does Islam mean to the United States?” However, it is helpful to examine the inverse question: “What does the United States mean to Islam?” Jacques Waardenburg writes in an article titled “Reflections on the West:” It is taken for granted that Muslim views and judgments of the West developed largely in terms of internal exchanges and debates in Muslim countries. The Muslim discourse about the West has been fundamentally 161 a discourse among Muslims, and is part of the social and intellectual history of Muslim societies.339 Few Americans are aware of the rich threads of Islamic history that animate Muslim discourses on “the West” broadly, and the United States and Europe in particular. The discussion that follows will explore some of these various orientations as they have played out in the history of Islam. Additionally, the significance of these discourses in Islamic history will be be discussed in light of their contemporary applications by various Muslims engaged in discourses on “Islam and the West” today. Among these individuals are Osama bin Laden and Ayman Zawahiri. Bin Laden and Zawahiri follow in the path of other influential Muslim leaders, particularly Hassan al-Banna and Sayyid Qutb. Understanding the ways in which these individuals construct and represent “the West” will illuminate a side of this discourse that is often overlooked and show how each has a view of the other that is distinctive. But, each side views itself in a way that conflicts with the view that the other has of it. After the tragic events surrounding September 11, 2001, the question “Why do they hate us?” emerged more forcefully than ever. In the United States, people urgently wanted to understand more about the violent representations of Islam that were displayed on that day. Yet, the answers that emerged from within Muslim communities were often drowned out by the various speculations that some government officials and neoconservatives in the United States were advancing. Many Americans proudly proclaimed that the attacks stemmed from a deep-seated hatred of freedom, liberty, 339. Jacques Waardenburg, “Reflections on the West,” in Islamic Thought in the Twentieth Century, ed., Suha Taji-Farouki and Basheer M. Nafi (London: I.D. Tauris, 2004), 261. 162 democracy, and American values. President Bush, speaking before Congress on September 21, 2001 said: Americans are asking, "Why do they hate us?" They hate what they see right here in this chamber: a democratically elected government. Their leaders are self-appointed. They hate our freedoms: our freedom of religion, our freedom of speech, our freedom to vote and assemble and disagree with each other.340 This claim rejects the notion of self-blame; it is clear that “they hate us” because of “who we are,” and nothing else. This response became quite popular as Americans who felt threatened by the events of September 11th and who believed that “Islam” was responsible wanted a quick answer that confirmed their suspicions. It was rarely considered that the reason for the terrorist attacks and for general feelings of animosity towards the United States had anything to do with American foreign policy or the relationship between the United States government and Muslim-majority countries. The emotionally charged atmosphere in the wake of September 11th did not permit suggestions that the United States was partially responsible for feelings of hatred. Thus, the question “why do they hate us?” continued to gain popularity. No one could know, however, that one year later, the question would be answered in detail by the very mastermind of the deadly attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon—Osama bin Laden—rendered as a mythical evil villain. However, by the time that bin Laden’s speech reached the airways of American television and radio, minds were already settled on the idea that this “hatred” resulted from a difference in inherent qualities—an inherent goodness of the United States and an inherent jealousy of that goodness among many Muslims. Thus, Osama bin Laden’s statement on October 6, 2002 fell on 340. Bush, “Address to a Joint Session of Congress and the American People.” 163 deaf ears, even though he explicitly responded to that pressing question, outlining in detail the reasons for his strong feelings of hostility towards the United States. Bin Laden remarked: Why are we fighting and opposing you? … Because you attacked us and continue to attack us… you attacked us in Somalia; you supported Russian atrocities against us in Chechnya, the Indian oppression against us in Kashmir, and the Jewish aggression against us in Lebanon. Under your supervision, consent, and orders, the governments of our countries which act as your collaborators, attack us on a daily basis… you steal our wealth and oil at paltry prices because of your international influence and military threats…your forces occupy our countries; you spread your military bases throughout them.341 It is doubtful that these explanations would have mollified the anger and resentment that many Americans felt after September 11, 2001. Yet, bin Laden’s narrative does provide a clearer picture of the state of mind of this revolutionary figure. Detailed analyses of his rhetoric were not available to the general public. Rather, bin Laden’s speeches came in fragmented passages that were translated for American newscasts. However, the publication of Bruce Lawrence’s Messages to the World: Statements of Osama bin Laden changed that lack of information, offering translations of bin Laden’s speeches with contextual analysis. Even today, knowledge in the United States of bin Laden or other Muslim leaders seldom goes beyond their representations in the media. Perhaps this absence of detail results from a lack of interest in acknowledging adversarial and controversial voices; it could also be that aside from bin Laden and his radicalized followers, other influential Muslims have not projected their narratives with enough force, repetition, and volume. 341. Osama bin Laden, as quoted in Bruce Lawrence, Messages to the World: The Statements of Osama bin Laden (London: Verso, 2005), 162. 164 Even so, it is necessary to understand that discourses on “Islam and the West” are certainly not one sided. Examining how Muslims participate in this discourse will illustrate how constructions of “the West” are in many ways similar to American constructions of Islam. In this way, the relationship between Islam and “the West” may be considered as an intellectual, ethical, and representational conflict for Muslims and Americans, not a real problem that is caused by the incompatibility of these reified and constructed entities. However controversial and despised he may be, few can argue that Osama bin Laden is among the most prominent of Muslim voices participating in discourses of “Islam and the West.” Within the United States, bin Laden has become a legendary figure—an enigmatic cipher on whom a range of identities are projected. The possibility of multiple identities is possible because for many years now, he has only appeared from remote caves on evening news clips responding to American political events. His language is eloquent and poetic, and his statements over the last ten years have inspired those Muslims subscribing to his ideology to rise to the call of duty. Despite his remote environment, he is aware of the latest proclamations and policies of the United States government, frequently referencing the most current American political stories in his statements. Yet bin Laden is not the first person to explore this territory of Islamism. In fact, as Bruce Lawrence notes, “His views draw on and differ from other strands of radical Islamic thought.”342 Thus, in an attempt to understand bin Laden’s participation in contemporary discourses on “Islam and the West,” it will be instructive to examine some of the historical influences that have shaped his controversial worldview. 342. Ibid. 165 In contrast to the image of the United States as the paradigmatic model of how all societies should be—democratic, technologically advanced and characterized by overall modernity—disparate representations of America were deployed by some Muslim scholars, intellectuals, and political leaders beginning in the second half of the twentieth century. Some of these images depicted it as an irreverent wasteland, obsessed with material possessions, sexual promiscuity, and “abysmally primitive in the world of senses, feelings, and behavior.”343 Among the voices making such claims, none has been more influential than that of Sayyid Qutb (1906-1966). Qutb has been called the “father of modern Islamist fundamentalism,”344 and he is described by his biographer as “the most famous personality of the Muslim world in the second half of the 20th century.”345 In fact, he is increasingly cited as the single figure that most influenced Osama bin Laden and was among the first to distill feelings of hostility towards a vague and imagined “West.” He focused his anger specifically towards the United States. Mohammed Jamal Khalia, a close college friend of bin Laden recalls the influence of Qutb, saying, “We [Khalia and bin Laden] were trying to understand what Islam has to say about how we eat, who we marry, how we talk. We read Sayyid Qutb. He was the one who most affected our generation.”346 Sayyid Qutb was born in the town of Musha in Egypt in 1906. The eldest of five children, his siblings were steeped in the intellectual traditions of Islam and wrote on Islamic topics for various periodicals and newspapers. Attending local schools in Egypt, 343. Kamal Abdel Malek, ed., America in An Arab Mirror: Images of America in Arabic Travel Literature (New York: St. Martins, 2005), 9. 344. Robert Irwin, “Is This the Man Who Inspired Bin Laden?” The Guardian, November 1, 2001, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2001/nov/01/afghanistan.terrorism3 (accessed November 3, 2009). 345. Ibid. 346. Lawrence Wright, The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11 (New York: Knopf, 2006), 71. 166 Qutb exhibited a thirst for knowledge of Islam and by the age of ten, was able to recite the entire Qur’an from memory. From an early age, Qutb was exposed to a mixture of religion and politics. His mother wanted him to attend the revered Al-Azhar University in Cairo, considered to this day to be the center of Arabic literature and Sunni Islamic learning in the world. Qutb’s father, Al-Hajj Qutb Ibrahim, was a member of Mustafa Kamil’s Nationalist Party and held frequent political meetings in his home; those meetings were often tinged with “anti-British Egyptian nationalism.”347 After moving to Cairo, Qutb attended Dar al-Ulum Teacher College and received his B.A. in education in 1933. Hassan al- Banna, an Arab-Islamic leader who Qutb would later join in the Egyptian Brotherhood, also attended Dar al-Ulum.348 Between 1940 and 1948, Qutb worked for the Ministry of Public Instruction in Cairo while honing his skills as a journalist. Qutb wrote short stories and novels during that period, but after 1945 his interests in writing shifted in the direction of politics, social problems, and Egyptian nationalism. The turning point of Qutb’s life came in 1948, when the Egyptian Ministry of Education sent him to the United States to observe American systems of education. In 1948, Qutb studied at Wilson Teacher’s College in Washington, D.C., later at Stanford University, and he eventually moved to Greeley, Colorado, where he attended the Colorado State College of Education, receiving his M.A. in education in 1950. Prior to his arrival in the United States, Qutb finished the manuscript for his first major theoretical work, al-'Adala al-ijtima'iyya fi-l-Islam (Social 347. Albert J. Bergese, ed., The Sayyid Qutb Reader: Selected Writings on Politics, Religion, and Society (New York: Routledge, 2008), 3. 348. Ibid., 4. 167 Justice in Islam). Expanding on his newfound interests in social justice, politics, and Egyptian nationalism, Qutb’s strong convictions that Islam was superior to all other religions was clarified. Additionally, Qutb believed that Islam was the remedy to what he viewed as social illnesses—homosexuality, sexual promiscuity, materialism, and secularism. It is widely asserted that his trip to the United States confirmed his suspicions of a decadent “West” as he witnessed what he perceived as worship of the dollar and “a drought of sentimental sympathy.”349 David von Drehle, a writer for Smithsonian magazine, comments on this in his article “A Lesson in Hate: How an Egyptian Student Came to Study 1950s America and Left Determined to Wage Holy War:” Greeley, Colorado, circa 1950 was the last place one might think to look for signs of American decadence. Its wide streets were dotted with churches, and there wasn’t a bar in the whole temperate town. But the courtly Qutb saw things that others did not. He seethed at the brutishness of the people around him: the way they salted their watermelon and drank their tea unsweetened and watered their lawns. He found the muscular football players appalling and despaired of finding a barber who could give a proper haircut.350 Qutb, upon hearing America’s music—jazz—said, “The American’s enjoyment of jazz does not fully begin until he couples it with singing like crude screaming. It is this music that the savage bushmen351 created to satisfy their primitive desires.”352 Qutb’s perceived distaste for all things American, combined with a heightened sense of nationalism and concern for social injustices led him towards a more radical agenda. However, it was 349. Ibid. 350. David Von Drehle, “A Lesson in Hate: How an Egyptian Student Came to Study in 1950s America and Left Determined to Wage Holy War,” Smithsonian, February 2006, http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history-archaeology/presence-feb06.html (accessed February 12, 2010). 351. In the late 1960s, the term “bushmen” was considered pejorative. Some scholarly circles replaced the term with the more neutral “San,” meaning aborigines in the Khoi language. 352. Abdel Kamal, ed. America in an Arab Mirror: Images of America in Arabic Travel Literature, (New York: St. Martins, 2005), 12. 168 not only the United States that Qutb despised. Rather, it was modernity, which he saw as being characterized by the values of secularism, rationality, democracy, individualism, mixing of the sexes, tolerance, and materialism. Qutb believed that these values had infiltrated and infected Islam as a result of European colonialism. While his time in the United States reinforced his belief that Islam and modernity were incompatible, the germ of his worldview developed prior to his arrival. On a passenger- ship bound for New York from Alexandria, Qutb reflected on the end of the Second World War. The support that the United States government showed to the Zionist cause angered him. At that time, Egypt, along with several other Arab-majority countries, was losing the 1948 Arab-Israeli war. The Arabs were stunned by the strength of the Israeli forces and dismayed by the disastrous decisions of their own leaders. That event led Qutb to say, “I hate those Westerners and despise them. All of them, without any exception: the English, the French, the Dutch, and finally the Americans, who have been trusted by many.”353 Qutb’s hatred of the United States was reinforced at every juncture. One evening while still aboard the ship, Qutb went to his room to pray. As he prayed, he felt a great moral dilemma. He was unsure whether he should cling tightly to his Islamic beliefs or abandon them for the materialism and spiritual depravity of secular America; he wanted to know if he should indulge in ”Western” temptations or resist them.354 His thoughts were interrupted by a knock on his cabin door. Standing outside his room was a young woman Qutb described as “half naked.”355 She asked him if she could be his guest for 353. Sayyid Qutb, as quoted in Wright, The Looming Tower, 11. 354. Ibid. 355. Ibid. 169 the night. When Qutb explained that he had one single bed, she indicated that it was capable of holding two people. Appalled by her candor, he slammed the door. He reflected on this event saying, “I heard her fall on the wooden floor outside and realized she was drunk. I instantly thanked God for defeating my temptation and allowing me to stick to my morals.”356 These events, combined with his experiences in the United States, reinforced his belief that Islam was the solution to “Western” decadence. For Qutb, the separation of the sacred and secular, science and theology, and state and religion, all defied his belief in the oneness of God; he believed that Islam was the final and unyielding word of God. Qutb believed that the world was divided into the camps of Islam and jahiliyya and a complete rejection of secular values was the only hope for returning to a pure state of Islam.357 Seeking an outlet through which to express this new worldview, Qutb returned to Egypt in 1951 and began attending meetings of the Society of Muslim Brothers. It was in the Society, later known as the Muslim Brotherhood, that Qutb found a haven for his beliefs. The Brotherhood was founded in 1928 by Hassan al-Banna, a prominent Egyptian political activist and reformer who was disturbed by what he perceived as increased secularism and a breakdown of traditional moral values in Egypt; al-Banna considered Westernization as the cause of the decline. Reacting to that Westernization, the Brotherhood served as a vehicle for what its members saw as the solution: the return to a pure, unaltered, Islam. As Albert Bergesen notes in The Sayyid Qutb Reader, for Qutb, human political and social structures “whose authority relations 356. Ibid., 12. 357. Ibid., 35. 170 center on human submission to other humans”358 was a usurpation of God’s sovereignty on earth. Bergesen writes, “To submit to anyone other than God is to violate the Oneness of God’s sovereignty. In Qutb’s words, it creates a ‘servitude of servants.’”359 Qutb believed that this usurpation of power from God to man stood in the way of realizing God’s plan for mankind and characterizes this by use of the term jahiliyyah, or ignorance of God. The term jahiliyyah has been primarily used to describe societies of pre-Islamic Arabia who, unlike monotheistic Muslims, worshipped a variety of gods and other idols. While the advent of Islam in seventh-century Arabia ushered in a new era of monotheism, Qutb’s interpretation of the oneness of God seems to have extended beyond the mere belief in one supreme being. Rather, Qutb emphasized that God’s oneness encompassed every dimension of life, including political sovereignty. Oneness according to Qutb is “the Muslim’s way of life and the kind of system established by this way of life.”360 The social and political ills that Qutb observed while in the United States led him to suggest that, based on this disengagement from Islam, an era of jahiliyya had returned. Qutb comments: It [jahiliyya] is now not in that simple and primitive form of the ancient jahiliyya, but takes the form of claiming that the right to create values, to legislate rules of collective behavior, and to choose any way of life rests with men, without regard to what God has prescribed. The result of this rebellion against the authority of God is the oppression of his creatures.361 Qutb’s reflections on jahiliyya and his observations of the United States during his time there seem to suggest a strong sense of despair. Coupled with this despair is an inspiration to correct the shortcomings of society—to put these ideas about jahiliyya and 358. Bergesen, The Sayyid Qutb Reader, 4. 359. Ibid. 360. Sayyid Qutb, Milestones (1964; reprint, Damascus: Kazi Publishers, 1993), 23. 361. Ibid., 9. 171 the oneness of God to work in a revolutionary way. Qutb wondered how he could overcome these jahili (ignorant) societies, obsessed with the acquisition of power, material goods, and in moral decline. He acknowledges that “To fight for Islam is to fight for the implementation of this way of life and its systems… When we understand the nature of Islam, as it has already been explained, we realize the inevitability of jihad, or striving for God’s cause, taking military form in addition to its advocacy form.”362 Qutb’s message is clear: a return to a “pure” Islam means that “God’s authority would prevail in the heart and conscience … and in the affairs of life such as business, the distribution of wealth and the dispensation of justice.”363 Thus, as Albert Bergesen notes, “Qutbian religion, then, is a direct challenge to the established political order.”364 This belief was challenging for the ruling Egyptian monarchy. It became clear that al-Banna—who was advancing these views through the Muslim Brotherhood—was reaching a wide audience. Robin Hallet, author of Africa since 1875, writes, “By the late 1940s the Brotherhood was reckoned to have as many as 2 million members, while its strong Pan-Islamic ideas had gained it supporters in other Arab lands.”365 Consequently, the monarchy banned the group in December of 1948 which led to their eventual disbandment. In the weeks following their split, Abdul Majid Ahmad Hassan, a member of the group, assassinated the Egyptian prime minister Mahmoud an-Nukrashi Pasha. Al-Banna released a public statement condemning the assassination, saying that terrorism and violence were not acceptable within Islam. In 1949, while waiting for a cab 362. Sayyid Qutb, In the Shade of the Qur’an, ed., trans., Adil Salahi (Leicestershire: The Islamic Foundation, 2003), 24. 363. Qutb, Milestones, 24. 364. Bergesen, The Sayyid Qutb Reader, 24. 365. Robin Hallett, Africa Since 1875 (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press), 41. 172 with his brother-in-law, al-Banna was assassinated. At that time, Qutb became the editor of the Brotherhood’s newspaper and was soon the most prominent voice for their cause. He briefly joined forces with Abdul Nasser—Egypt’s second president who led a nationalist movement against the monarchy. Before he became president, Nasser was the Deputy Prime Minister under President Mohammad Naguib. Nasser and Naguib were constantly at odds over how to deal with the Muslim Brotherhood. In a struggle to gain political power, Nasser accused Naguib of supporting the Muslim Brotherhood. On October 26, 1954, while giving a speech in Alexandria, a member of the Muslim Brotherhood fired eight shots at Nasser. Though panic erupted in the audience, Nasser remained calm and continued to speak, energizing the audience. This event was advantageous for Nasser, as his public support soared. He suggested that Naguib was behind the attack, galvanizing a base of support for his takeover of the government. This event marked the beginning of a government crackdown of the Muslim Brotherhood and its supporters.366 Naguib was deposed and sentenced to house arrest in 1954, and many members of the Muslim Brotherhood, including Sayyid Qutb, were arrested as well. Qutb was sentenced to prison for plotting against Nasser. Though released shortly after his initial arrest, Qutb was rearrested and spent over ten years in prison. During this time, he wrote some of his most influential works, including In the Shade of the Qur’an, in which Qutb offers personal commentary on the Qur’an. In addition, Qutb wrote a series of “prison letters” that comprise the latter half of his seminal work, Milestones. In 366. This issue is considered highly contentious in the Nasser historiography. Some suggest the assassination was staged while others suggest it was real. Still, others suggest that it was sponsored by the Supreme Guide while some say it was just lower level brothers acting on their own. 173 this work, Qutb advocates a reconfiguration of Muslim-majority countries, suggesting that they abandon secularism and look to the teachings of Islam as the authority on all matters. Eventually, in 1964, Qutb was released from prison just as Milestones began to gain widespread attention and popularity. In this book, Qutb expresses the belief that he held all along: that all sovereignty on earth belongs to God alone. The book threatened the legitimacy of Nasser’s government, and as a result, Qutb was rearrested in 1965 and eventually sentenced to death.367 In 1966, Qutb was hanged, and though his voice was silenced, he was considered a martyr by many Muslims. The nature of Qutb’s life and death sparked a surge of interest in his writings. In fact, in the introduction to Milestones it is noted that many students, influenced by the work of Qutb, copied the entire book by hand. Qutb’s criticisms of the United States found voices of support over time among other prominent Muslim leaders. Ayatollah Khomeini’s rejection of Western influence expressed in the Iranian Revolution is one prominent example. Additionally, founders of The Islamic Resistance Movement, HAMAS, were influenced by the Brotherhood, initially calling their group “The Palestinian Wing of the Muslim Brotherhood.” Most recently, Osama bin Laden has expressed similar views of “Western” decadence and the abandonment of supreme divine sovereignty. Significantly, bin Laden was friends with Qutb’s brother, Muhammad Qutb, who was a professor at King Abdulaziz University in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. Bin Laden regularly attended his lectures, which promoted the ideas of Sayyid Qutb, and Qutb’s influence is seen in bin Laden’s writings and rhetoric. In October of 2003, bin Laden released a 367. Bergesen, The Sayyid Qutb Reader, i. 174 statement to the people of Iraq. Referring to Muslim-majority countries that called for peaceful democratic solutions to violence through the cooperation with the United States government, bin Laden said: These are people who sapped the energies of the umma368 from neighbors from the righteous men and followed human desires instead; these are the ones who followed democracy, the religion of ignorance [jahiliyya]. By entering the legislative councils these men have strayed far from the truth, as well as leading many others astray. How can these men enter the council of polytheism, the legislative council of representatives, which Islam has destroyed? Such an action destroys the head of faith, and what else do they have? … Islam is the religion of God, and the legislative councils of representatives are the religion of ignorance [jahiliyya].369 Bin Laden’s critique of human government is nearly identical to Qutb’s earlier critiques. Both bin Laden and Qutb suggest that the implementation of systems of government that assign humans to positions of power in some ways delegitimizes the power from God. In order words, because Islam itself is capable of providing solutions to worldly problems, there is not a need to overstep the boundaries of divine rule and employ human systems of political and social order. In an earlier, more direct statement in October of 2002, bin Laden said: The first thing that we [bin Laden and his followers] are calling you [the United States] to is Islam … you are the nation who, rather than ruling by the shari a of God in its Constitution and laws, choose to invent your own laws as you will and desire. You separate religion from your policies, contradicting the pure nature which affirms Absolute Authority to the Lord and your Creator.370 Osama bin Laden views the world in terms of two polarized spheres: “us” and “them,” with his “us” being defined as those Muslims who subscribe to his particular ideology and his “them” being lumped under the broad rubric of the United States of America. 368. Umma, sometimes spelled ummah, is an Arabic word meaning community or nation and generally refers to the world Muslim community. 369. Lawrence, Messages, 208. 370. Ibid., 166. 175 It would seem that the grievances bin Laden has with the United States are actually grievances with policies of the United States government and military, not with the 300 million individuals that make up the entire population. Yet as bin Laden himself admits, individual American citizens “have the ability and choice to refuse the policies of their government, and even to change it if they want.”371 He goes on to say that the American people make up the military that has long had a footprint in the Middle East, and for these reasons, “The American people cannot be innocent of all the crimes committed by the Americans and Jews against us.”372 In short, the American population according to bin Laden is guilty by association. Representing the United States in any other way would not fit the mold of “us and them” that drives much of bin Laden’s discourse. The singular nature of the word “them” demands a singular representation— the “them” that bin Laden refers to are all seen to be part of the same group and exists as a group, not as individuals. To suggest hostile feelings only towards one particular portion of that group (i.e., the American military or government) would require an exception to the simplistic “us and them” dichotomy. Nonetheless, this specificity is unlikely as it is easier to generalize the “other” based on their group identity. In this case, Americans—simply by being American—were grouped into the category of “them” though few can deny that bin Laden’s grievances were likely directed at specific policies of the United States government. Conflating the United States government with the citizens is nothing new. Sayyid Qutb’s “The America I Have Seen: In the Scale of Human Values” exhibits this same tendency. Returning to Egypt in 1951, Qutb published this account of his time in the 371. Ibid., 165. 372. Ibid. 176 United States in the Egyptian magazine al-Risala (The Message). In it, he writes that “America will have added nothing, or next to nothing, to the account of morals that distinguishes man from object, and indeed mankind from animals.”373 It is ironic that Qutb himself, in loathing what he sees as the moral decadence of “America,” fails to distinguish “man from object” in his own writings. Qutb objectifies the United States in a way that separates it from the American people. Through this reification, Qutb is able to describe “America” as capable of acting. Qutb speaks of “America’s role in the world,” “America’s values,” “America’s productivity,” and “America’s emergence from isolation.” Yet despite Qutb’s reification of the United States, in reality, “America” can have no role in the world, no values, no productivity, and cannot “emerge” from anywhere. Rather, Americans can do these things. In addition to his reified representation of “America,” Qutb addresses qualities of Americans as well. He discusses “the deformed American character,” “the American primitiveness,” “the American view on death,” “American girls,” “the American dream boy,” and “the Americans’ nerves.” What results is a representation of the entire American populous that is based merely on his observation of some particular cross- section. Examining a few of these passages in detail will reveal the ways in which Qutb generalizes American citizens. Qutb writes: Despite his advanced knowledge and superlative work, the American appears to be so primitive in his outlook on life and its humanitarian aspects that it is puzzling to the observer.374 It seems the American is primitive in his appreciation of muscular strength and the strength of matter in general.375 373. Malek, America in An Arab Mirror, 10. 374. Ibid. 375. Ibid. 177 Indeed, the American is by his very nature a warrior who loves combat.376 The American is very primitive in his sexual life, and in his material and familial relationships.377 While the recurring theme above is “the American,” it is certain that Qutb is not speaking of any one individual in particular. Yet his representation gives that impression. In addition to use of the singular “the,” Qutb also applies a male gender-specific description to his representation, using “his” as a pronoun referring to “the American.” These clues make it possible to suggest that Qutb had some typical model, some paradigmatic representation in mind and deployed that representation in a way that encompasses all Americans. Thus, “the American” may refer to both the singular, paradigmatic model as well as the larger, collective identity. These representations that Qutb acknowledges depict “the America I have seen” only stem from three years in the United States and in areas that are different from one another: Washington, D.C., Greeley, Colorado, and Stanford, California. Nonetheless, Qutb takes his unique experiences with people in these areas as normative of the entire American population. The America Qutb has seen ignores the diversity of identities that comprise the American population. Additionally, this maneuver situates a nationality— American—in the forefront of his descriptions thereby advancing the idea that primitiveness and fascination with war are simply the result of being an American. Moreover—and as Gabriele Marranci pointed out earlier with regards to use of the term “Muslim”—the term “American” is not used in the agency signifier of the term. 376. Ibid. 377. Ibid. 178 That is, it does not refer to the American people who are capable of acting, but rather to the reified “America” which is an abstraction. The physical makeup of a person cannot be described as “American.” There is nothing about the essence of an American citizen that makes them “American” beyond the fact that “feel” to be American as a result of their citizenship, shared values, and sentiments of allegiance to the United States. This is the case with all nationalities. People themselves are not “Americans,” “Canadians,” or “Mexicans.” Rather, they are human beings who happen to have one particular nationality or another and use that nationality to describe a particular portion of their identity. It is possible to imagine how this process of describing people as their nationalities may become unraveled by considering two cases: those with dual citizenships and a child born to American parents overseas. In the case of dual citizenship, an individual’s identity as a citizen of one particular country or another is fluid and transcends geographic boundaries. While in their country of birth, a particular person may describe themselves by their birth origin yet while in the country in which they residence, they may describe themselves based on that particular nationality. In some cases, people with dual citizenships may refer to themselves in split identities. Some examples include: Irish-American, Afghani- American, Palestinian-American, etc. Additionally, a child born to American diplomats while stationed overseas would be considered an American citizen and may grow up without ever entering the United States.378 It is clear that nationality is only one fluid part 378. While in Tunisia studying Arabic in 2009, I was invited to the home of the United States Ambassador. His daughter, who appeared to me at the time as one of the American students in the group, approached me and introduced herself. As we conversed, she began to ask me about “America” and various topics related to the latest music and movies. I was a bit taken aback. She then explained 179 of an identity that is difficult to box in by descriptions. These representations are not unlike Bernard Lewis’s representation of “the classical Islamic view,” Raphael Patai’s “the Arab mind,” and Karen Hughes’s “the American values,” which reify a religion, an ethnicity, and a nationality respectively and situate them as the agency identifier by which an entire group is defined. Just as Huntington and Lewis generalize Muslims, both Sayyid Qutb and Osama bin Laden participate in generalizing Americans. Yet, while Qutb’s representations refer to Americans in the third person detailing “the American” this or that and are based on his observations of individuals, Osama bin Laden’s October 2002 speech titled “To the Americans” takes a slightly different approach. Still generalizing Americans in much the same way as Qutb, bin Laden employs a more direct tone, speaking to the citizens of the United States directly, describing them as “you.” In effect, the traditional dichotomy of “us and them” becomes “us and you” with “us” being Muslims and “you” being Americans. Some of bin Laden’s comments illustrate this point. He said: You attacked us and continue to attack us.379 You have supported Jews and their idea that Jerusalem is their eternal capital, and have agreed to move your embassy there.380 You have starved the Muslims of Iraq, where children die every day.381 While Qutb’s representations of all Americans were based on observations that he viewed as paradigmatic, here bin Laden employs the same strategy in his language. The “you” of which bin Laden speaks is not any one individual in particular. Rather, it is that while she was technically an American citizen, she was born abroad and had spent her entire life (14 years at the time) living overseas. 379. Lawrence, Messages, 162. 380. Ibid., 164. 381. Ibid. 180 a collective “you”—a reified collective American. But what experiences did bin Laden have with Americans that could lead to his belief that they are worthy of blame for continued attacks on Muslims, the long-term support of Israel, and the starvation of Muslims in Iraq? There must be a point of reference from which bin Laden is able to make such an assessment. It is obvious from his representations that his understanding of Americans is based on his observations of the American military and policies of the United States government. It appears that bin Laden is unable to separate military action and government policy from the larger American population as he indicates that the American people, by electing the leaders that carry out these actions, are guilty themselves. Unlike Qutb, who spent close to three years in the United States during the late 1940s, bin Laden visited the United States for only two weeks in 1979. The details of bin Laden’s time in the United States remained fairly elusive until the publication of Growing Up bin Laden, a recollection of life within the bin Laden family written by bin Laden’s wife Najwa and son Omar. In the book, Najwa bin Laden provides an account of the bin Laden family’s visit to Indiana. She writes: One evening he [Osama] arrived home with a surprise announcement: ‘Najwa, we are going to travel to the United States. Our boys are going with us.’ …I [Najwa] am sometimes questioned about my personal opinion of the country and its people … I came to believe that Americans were gentle and nice, people easy to deal with. As far as the country goes, my husband and I did not hate America, yet we did not love it. There was one incident that reminded me that some Americans are unaware of other cultures. When the time came for us to leave America, Osama and I, along with out two boys waited for our departure at the airport in Indiana. I saw an American man gawking at me. I knew without asking that his unwelcome attention had been snagged by my black Saudi costume.382 382. Najwa Bin Laden, Osama bin Laden and Jean Sasson, Growing Up Bin Laden: Osama's Wife and Son Take Us Inside their Secret World (New York: St. Martins Press, 2009), 26. 181 The Bin Ladens traveled to the United States in order for Osama to meet with his mentor, Abdullah Yusuf Azzam. Najwa bin Laden’s account of her family’s brief time in America and their sentiment towards American citizens during that time do not align with the generalizations and hostile words that saturate her husband’s later discourse on the United States. While Qutb observed the east, middle, and west coasts of the United States, bin Laden’s experiences were less diverse; he witnessed a small cross- section of a much larger American population. Surely bin Laden was aware that the men and women he and his family interacted with during that time were not attacking him or his fellow Muslims in Afghanistan; surely bin Laden was aware that many Americans had no say in whether an American embassy was moved to Jerusalem. Bin Laden must be aware that the Americans he interacted with bore no direct responsibility for starving Muslims in Iraq or elsewhere; he must know that the Saudi government does not represent the views of all Saudis. Yet, bin Laden still lumps Americans into a broad rubric of aggressors and justifies attacks on the American people saying, “God, the Almighty, legislated the permission and the option to avenge this oppression. Thus, if we are attacked, then we have the right to strike back.”383 In this brief review, bin Laden situates his discourse on the United States in terms of a religious confrontation that results from his perceptions of American citizens supporting Israel through their tax dollars and elected officials. Even so, discourse of this type seems not to concern itself with particular political parties, democracy, or even power. Rather, bin Laden appears to focus on a deeper issue that is at the root of all of this: Islam versus jahiliyya. That is, bin Laden—much like Qutb—appears to believe that military attacks on Muslim-majority 383. Lawrence, Messages, 165. 182 countries, financial and military support of Israel, the establishment of American embassies in Jerusalem, and the “starvation” of Muslim in Iraq are all merely disguises for an ideological and religiously-driven conflict. Sayyid Qutb articulates this point: The enemies of the Believers may wish to change this struggle into an economic or political or racial struggle, so that the Believers become confused concerning the true nature of the struggle and the flame of belief in their hearts becomes extinguished.384 As Albert Bergesen comments in The Sayyid Qutb Reader, political power and rule seem less about which particular economic class will predominate than whether God’s law will rule, and “Political struggle seems less and less about tensions between positions defined with the economic divisions of labor (class struggle) and more and more about tensions between believers and unbelievers.”385 By noticing the way that bin Laden situates his rhetoric of “you” versus “us,” this point becomes clearer. Bin Laden seems to present three main actors: “you,” the Americans, “us,” the Muslims, and “them,” the Jews. Of these three actors, the only one not described in terms of religion are the Americans. Further, bin Laden’s elaborations on each grouping explains some action that Americans have committed either against Muslims directly (starvation and attacks) or indirectly through the support of Israel. At any rate, the end result is a conflict which pits Americans against Muslims. It may be said that from a European perspective, the Crusades, though perceived as a religious war, were actually fought on the grounds of political and economic gain.386 That is, while the wars were religiously sanctioned, the reality was the political and economic aspirations of Europe and a quest to reclaim the Holy Land; the 384. Qutb, Milestones, 29. 385. Bergesen, The Sayyid Qutb Reader, 29. 386. Ibid. 183 idea that this conflict was marked by two opposing world religions, vying for global dominance was the illusion. As Bergesen notes, however, Qutb did not see things that way.387 Qutb says, “We see an example of this [illusion] today in the attempts of Christendom to try to deceive us by distorting history and saying that the Crusades were a form of imperialism.”388 To some Europeans, seeing the Crusades as not essentially religious, but rather as economic and political, is to move beyond the façade and reveal potential underlying truths. But to Qutb, the opposite is true: political and economic factors are themselves the façade, while the real conflict exists between religions— between belief and unbelief, Islam and jahiliyya. Qutb observes, “The truth of the matter is that the latter day imperialism is but a mask for the crusading spirit, since it is not possible for it to appear in its true form as it was possible in the Middle Ages.”389 To some leaders in Western Europe and the United States who wish to avoid a dialogue that focuses on religious differences, there appears a tendency to frame discussions on religious violence as “political.” Appearing to prevent the appearance of a Manichaean struggle where sons of light fight sons of darkness in an eternal battle, bipartisan leaders in Washington jumped at nearly every opportunity to declare that the United States was not at war with Islam. Shortly after September 11, 2001, members of the Bush administration made it clear that Islam itself was not the enemy—political Islam, however, was. Speaking before Congress in September of 2001, President Bush said, “The enemy of America is not our many Muslim friends …our enemy is a radical 387. Ibid., 30. 388. Qutb, Milestones, 160. 389. Ibid. 184 network of terrorists and every government that supports them.”390 Later, Bush made it clear that various manifestations of terrorism were politically—not religiously—inspired. George W. Bush said, “This form of radicalism exploits Islam to serve a violent, political vision: the establishment, by terrorism and subversion and insurgency, of a totalitarian empire that denies all political and religious freedom.”391 In 2006, the National Security Council released a statement titled “Today’s Terrorist Enemy,” which reported that “Our terrorist enemies exploit Islam to serve a violent political vision.”392 In fact, the United States government has even described terrorism as “the calculated use of unlawful violence or threat of unlawful violence to inculcate fear; intended to coerce or to intimidate governments or societies in the pursuit of goals that are generally political, religious, or ideological.”393 Even Pat Robertson, Chairman of the Christian Broadcast Network and former Republican presidential candidate said in a broadcast of The 700 Club on November 9: Islam is a violent—I was going to say religion—but it’s not a religion. It’s a political system. It’s a violent political system bent on the overthrow of governments of the world and world domination. You’re dealing with not [sic] a religion. You’re dealing with a political system. And I think you should treat it as such and treat its adherents as such—as we would member of the Communist party and members of some Fascist group.394 390. Bush, “Address to Joint Session of Congress and the American People.” 391. George W. Bush, “President Discusses War on Terror at National Endowment for Democracy,” (speech, Ronald Reagan Building and International Trade Center, Washington, D.C., October, 6, 2005) Transcript available from the George W. Bush Administration White House website, http://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/ news/releases/2005/10/20051006-3.html (accessed October 10, 2010). 392. National Security Council, National Strategy for Combating Terrorism, Report. Washington, D.C., Government Printing Office, September 2006), 5. http://www.cbsnews.com/htdocs/pdf/ NSCT0906.pdf (accessed November 4, 2009). 393. Department of Defense Dictionary of Military and Associated Terms, “Terrorism,” http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/dod_dictionary/ (accessed October 28, 2009). 394. Jillian Rayfield, “Pat Robertson: Islam Is Not A Religion But ‘A Violent Political System,’” TPMLiveWire.com, November 10, 2009, http://tpmlivewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/2009/11/pat-robertson- islam-is-not-a-religion-but-a-violent-political-system.php (accessed November 30, 2009). 185 Thus, the motive behind terrorist attacks is represented as a desire to realize some political vision. And, the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003 as well as the response to the events of September 11, 2001 by way of military action in Afghanistan and Pakistan, were considered to be political in nature. The United States was not deploying a religiously-charged message. Rather, the military campaign was political in that it sought to protect the interests of the United States by eradicating terrorism. While the main target of the American government was bin Laden, another voice proclaiming the need to engage in jihad against Americans emerged from the radical network of Muslim youth influenced by Sayyid Qutb. Ayman Zawahiri, a student of Qutb and the leader of the Egyptian Islamic Jihad movement, is recognized by some as “the real brains of the [Al-Qaeda] outfit.”395 Together, bin Laden and Zawahiri, the figurehead and the main theoretician of al-Qaeda, respectively, have transcended their roles as leaders of this militant group to be revered by their followers as mythic agents of God’s plan on earth. Yet as journalist Scott Bauldaf notes in a 2001 article in The Christian Science Monitor, those who perceive bin Laden as the chief ringleader behind al- Qaeda’s battle with the United States may be mistaken. Interviewing Hamid Mir, a Pakistani journalist who was invited to speak with bin Laden in his secret hideout in the late 1990s, Bauldaf reports that Mir said: Osama is a person who says, “If I have to fight, I’ll fight in the mountains like I fought against the Soviets.” He’ll pack an AK-47, a kilogram of grenades, a kilogram of explosives, and a donkey to carry them all to a cave. Zawahiri has a different kind of experience. He is not interested in fighting in the mountains. He is thinking more internationally, involved in militancy inside Egypt. He was behind the terrorist attacks on tourists [the 395. Scott Baldauf, “The ‘Cave Man’ and Al Qaeda,” The Christian Science Monitor, October 31, 2001. http://www.csmonitor.com/2001/1031/p6s1-wosc.html (accessed March 2, 2010). 186 1997 attack in Luxor left 58 dead]. He is the person who can do the things that happened on Sept. 11.396 In short, though Zawahiri is commonly referred to as bin Laden’s deputy or lieutenant, he is a guiding figure whose leadership and organizational skills create the backbone of the organization. Both the C.I.A. and the F.B.I. link Zawahiri to the assault on American soldiers in Somalia in 1993, the bombings of the American embassies in East Africa in 1998 and the U.S.S. Cole in 2000, as well as the attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon on September 11, 2001.397 While bin Laden has emerged as a modern- day Khomeini-like figure in American representations of Islam, Zawahiri’s image is less well known. Aside from an occasional speech announcing a violent attack on the United States or a televised proclamation reacting to some political event in the United States, his image is rarely seen. Even so, the American government is aware of the effectiveness of his skills as an organizer. Those organizational skills, when combined with bin Laden’s ability to inspire followers around a common religious message, created a mobilized force powerful enough to destroy the towering symbols of America’s economy in midtown Manhattan. Essam Deraz, an Egyptian filmmaker credited with several documentaries about the Soviet-Afghan war, recalls bin Laden’s relationship with Zawahiri: Bin Laden had followers, but they weren’t organized. The people with Zawahiri had extraordinary capabilities—doctors, engineers, soldiers. They had experience in secret work. They knew how to organize themselves and create cells. And they became the leaders.398 In many ways, bin Laden and Zawahiri needed one another. Their plans for a cosmic battle between a divinely sanctioned Islam and a corrupt and godless United States 396. Ibid. 397. Ibid. 398. Essam Deraz, as quoted in Wright, “The Man Behind Bin Laden.” 187 required a mix of vision and organization. Shortly after the dust and smoke had settled in New York and Washington, a videotape emerged showing bin Laden and Zawahiri sitting together on a hill near a river, ruminating over the attacks that took place some 7,000 miles away. They hoped that the marriage of bin Laden’s rhetorical propaganda and Zawahiri’s methodology would ignite a revolution.399 Ayman Zawahiri was born to a highly regarded family in the suburbs of Cairo on June 19, 1950, the same year that Sayyid Qutb returned home to Egypt after spending over two years in the United States. Zawahiri’s father, Rabie, was a professor of pharmacology, and his brother was regarded as an expert on veneral diseases and dermatology. A 1995 obituary published on one of their relatives lists thirty-one doctors, chemists, and pharmacists in the extended family; among the other relatives listed were an ambassador, a judge, and a member of parliament.400 Though the Zawahiri family’s reputation centered largely on medicine, they were even better known for their religious convictions; Ayman’s great uncle, Mohammed al-Ahmadi al-Zawahiri, was the Grand Imam of Al-Azhar University in Cairo, the leading institution of Islamic learning in Cairo. Lawrence Wright notes that “The leader of that institution enjoys a kind of papal status in the Muslim world, and Imam Mohammed is still remembered as one of the university’s great modernizers.”401 Though the Zawahiri family was relatively prominent, young Ayman grew up in a modest environment. He attended public secondary school, and despite the cosmopolitan environment of the late 1950s and early 1960s, Zawahiri stood out. His 399. Wright, “The Man Behind Bin Laden.” 400. Ibid. 401. Ibid. 188 family never seemed to integrate fully into the sophisticated lifestyle of the Egyptian elite. In 1966, at the young age of 16, Zawahiri’s life drastically changed course. That year, Sayyid Qutb was sentenced to death. On August 29th of that year, Qutb was hanged. Zawahiri described Qutb in his memoir titled Knights Under the Prophet’s Banner, saying, “Qutb was the most prominent theoretician of the fundamentalist movements. [He] said, ‘Brother push ahead, for your path is soaked in blood. Do not turn your head right or left but look only up to Heaven.’”402 The day after Qutb’s hanging, Zawahiri joined a clandestine cell of the Muslim Brotherhood, determined to carry out Qutb’s vision of freeing Egypt from political leaders influenced by Europe and the United States and restoring a purely Islamic government in its place. Eventually, Zawahiri became the leader of the group, which would grow to 40 members by 1974. During that time, Zawahiri attended medical school, specializing in surgery. The Brotherhood was a secret part of his life, concealed by his non-Egyptian attire and intense devotion to his studies.403 Dr. Essam Elerian, a colleague of Zawahiri’s and the current leader of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, says, “Ayman never joined political activities during this period. He was a witness from the outside.”404 In 1980, Zawahiri was asked to travel to Pakistan and serve as a doctor in support of Afghan troops fighting the Soviet Army by the director of a medical clinic in the region. If the events of 1966 marked the first major turning point of Zawahiri’s life, his travels to Peshawar and into Afghanistan during the early 1980’s certainly marked the second. Zawahiri writes: 402. Laura Mansfield, His Own Words: Translations and Analysis of the Writings of Dr. Ayman Al- Zawahiri (New York: TLG Publications, 2006), 137. 403. Wright, “The Man Behind Bin Laden,” 5. 404. Essam Elerian, as quoted in Wright, “The Man Behind Bin Laden.” 189 My connection with Afghanistan began in the summer of 1980 by a twist of fate. One night the clinic director, A Muslim Brother asked me if I would like to travel to Pakistan to contribute, through my work as a surgeon to the medical relief effort among the Afghan refugees. I immediately agreed because I saw this as an opportunity to get to know one of the arenas of jihad that might be a tributary and a base for jihad in Egypt and the Arab region, the heart of the Islamic world, where the basic battle of Islam was being fought [sic].405 When Zawahiri arrived in Peshawar, he found a region teeming with young Muslim men who were eager to join the cause of jihad. Lawrence Wright notes that “Young men from other Muslim countries were beginning to hear the call of jihad, and they came to Peshawar, often with nothing more than a phone number in their pockets, and sometimes without even that.”406 Shortly after he returned home, Zawahiri reflected on his experiences and was so inspired by the potential he saw in the region that he returned for another visit. He writes, “I understood the importance of benefiting from this arena. Hence, after I stayed for four months there on my first visit, I returned in March 1981 and spent another two months there.”407 Returning to Egypt inspired by the potential for spreading his particular ideology within Pakistan, Zawahiri was further provoked by the news that Egypt’s President Anwar Sadat signed a peace treaty with Israel. Motivated by this news, Zawahiri became involved with members of the Brotherhood, recruiting Egyptian military officers to attempt an assassination of Sadat. With the plan for a coup d’état derailed, Sadat ordered the military to round up some 1500 people he suspected to be involved in the attempt. However, not everyone involved was arrested and on October 6, 1981 Sadat was assassinated by Lieutenant Khalid Islambouli. Zawahiri, along with countless 405. Mansfield, 28. 406. Wright, “The Man Behind Bin Laden.” 407. Mansfield, 34. 190 members of the Brotherhood, however, were among those arrested and indicted. During his trial, Zawahiri shouted, “We are here—the real Islamic front and the real Islamic opposition against Zionism, Communism, and imperialism!”408 His outcry prompted his fellow Brotherhood members to respond, “We will not sacrifice the blood of Muslims for the Americans and the Jews!”409 During imprisonment, Zawahiri was tortured and beaten endlessly. He described this treatment to the court: We suffered the severest inhuman treatment. They kicked us, they beat us, they whipped up with electric cables, they shocked us with electricity! They shocked us with electricity! And they used the wild dogs! And they hung us over the edges of doors with our hands tied at the back. They arrested the wives, the mothers, the fathers, the sisters, and the sons!410 Montasser al-Zayat, an attorney who was imprisoned with Zawahiri, said, “Ayman was beaten all the time—every day. They sensed he had a lot of significant information.”411 It was clear that Zawahiri suffered both physical and mental abuse during his imprisonment. Beaten by prison guards, he was pressured to give the whereabouts of Isam al-Qamari, Zawahiri’s close friend and the man thought to be the mastermind behind Sadat’s assassination. Reluctant to disclose the information at first, Zawahiri yielded to the pressure as the physical torment became too much too bear. He provided officials with the information only to learn a few short days later that Qamari was found and executed. These experiences heightened Zawahiri’s anti-European and anti- American sentiment; he viewed Sadat’s government as an invasion of European and American influence and power and thereby ultimately responsible for his mistreatment. During his trial, Zawahiri called out the names of fellow members of the Brotherhood 408. Ayman Zawahiri, as quoted in Wright, ‘The Man Behind Bin Laden,” 14. 409. Ibid. 410. Wright, “The Man Behind Bin Laden.” 411. Ayman Zawahiri, as quoted in Wright, “The Man Behind Bin Laden,” 12. 191 who were killed as a result of torture. Denouncing Sadat in the very terms the president used to express his admiration of “Western” values, Zawahiri shouted, “So where is the democracy? Where is the freedom? Where is [sic] the human rights? Where is the justice? Where is the justice? We will never forget! We will never forget!”412 In the Cairo prison, Zawahiri came into contact with a network of young men who, like him, came from privileged backgrounds. The group of young men often included sons of bankers, lawyers, bureaucrats, government officials, and doctors. They were highly educated and motivated individuals who were inclined to the areas of science and mathematics.413 Eddin Ibrahim, a sociologist at the American University in Cairo, notes that the men were “model young Egyptians.”414 Zawahiri was surrounded by men much like himself. In addition their similar backgrounds, they also shared the common experiences of torture and the belief that the repulsive “Western world,” dominated by materialism and hedonism, could be healed by implementing a purely Islamic system. Zawahiri, 34, emerged from prison in 1984 as a “hardened radical.”415 Leaving Egypt, he traveled to Saudi Arabia in 1985 in search of a twenty-eight year old multi- millionaire who had developed a reputation as the chief financial backer for mujahideen resistance groups. Eddin Ibrahim comments on the common thread that linked Zawahri and bin Laden: They were both politically disenfranchised, despite their backgrounds. There was something that resonated between these two youngsters on 412. Ibid. 413. Wright, “The Man Behind Bin Laden,” 15. 414. Eddin Ibrahim, as quoted in Wright, 15. 415. Wright, 15. 192 the neutral ground of faraway Afghanistan. There they tried to build the heavenly kingdom that they could not build in their home countries.416 Yet, in order for Zawahiri to establish a permanent relationship with bin Laden, he needed to sway bin Laden’s allegiance away from Sheikh Abdullah Azzam, bin Laden’s teacher. Initially, Zawahiri strategically placed confidants in key positions around bin Laden. Eventually this influence proved to be effective as bin Laden provided the largest share of his financial support to Zawahiri. This created a rift between bin Laden and Azzam, who unlike Zawahiri, opposed acts of war against Muslim leaders. Still, Zawahiri moved even closer to bin Laden, eventually becoming his medical provider. With the relationship between Zawahiri and bin Laden evolving, Azzam became increasingly frustrated, often engaging in disputes with the two men over the scope of jihad. On November 24, 1989, Azzam was killed by the blast from a car bomb, sealing the bond between bin Laden and Zawahiri.417 Over the course of the next decade bin Laden and Zawahiri worked in concert, organizing various acts of terrorism as the Islamic Jihad organization was incorporated into bin Laden’s Al-Qaeda network. While Zawahiri revered bin Laden’s abilities to finance attacks, he largely viewed the marriage of the two organizations as a necessity. While bin Laden had vision and plenty of money to realize his plans, he did not have the organizational skills of Zawahiri. Additionally, many remaining members of the Islamic Jihad were wary of bin Laden and did not have any interests in organizing attacks outside of Egypt. Nonetheless, the lure of bin Laden’s financial backing proved too strong to resist. Zawahiri’s sais, “Joining with bin-Laden [was] the only solution to 416. Eddin Ibrahim, as quoted in Wright, “The Man Behind bin Laden,” 16. 417. Wright, The Looming Tower, 130. 193 keeping the Jihad organization alive.”418 With this new merger intact, Zawahiri had to concede his efforts to wage jihad against local, Egyptian authorities. Bin Laden believed that the attacks on local governments were too expensive and ineffective. As a result, the time had come to “turn their guns” on the United States.419 In February of 1991, Najjar, Zawahiri’s assistant, described bin Laden’s rhetoric: I heard bin Laden say that our main objective is now limited to one state only, the United States, and involves waging a guerilla war against all U.S. interests, not only in the Arab region but also throughout the world.420 The objective of that message was seen clearly in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, the 1998 attacks on American embassies in Tanzania and Kenya, the 2000 attacks on the U.S.S. Cole, and the attacks on the Pentagon and World Trade Centers on September 11, 2001. These attacks were wrapped in a discourse that divided the world into two unequal spheres: divinely inspired Islam and a United States that is ignorant to that divine plan. Without specific reference to the United States, Sayyid Qutb foretells this division. Qutb writes in Milestones: Islam knows only two kinds of societies, the Islamic and the jahili.421 The Islamic society is that which follows Islam in belief and ways of worship, in law and organization, in morals and manners, The jahili society is that which does not follow Islam and in which neither the Islamic belief and concepts, nor Islamic values or standards, Islamic laws and regulations, or Islamic morals and manners are cared for.422 In effect, the United States became the single “jahili society” Qutb described. On February 3, 2010, the U.S. Director of National Intelligence, Dennis Blair, said that, “The chances of an attempted attack are certain. They’re going to try. We assess that at least 418. Wright, The Looming Tower, 85. 419. Ibid., 261. 420. Ibid. 421. The Arabic word jalahi means “ignorant” and derives from the word jahiliyya, or ignorance. 422. Qutb, Milestones, 93. 194 until Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri are dead or captured, al-Qaeda will retain its resolute intent to strike the Homeland.”423 Zawahiri’s admiration of Sayyid Qutb and his experiences with a Westernized Egyptian government that tortured him formed a specific image of the United States in his mind; his experiences shaped the way he envisioned the United States. The representations that Zawhiri deploys of the United States may be viewed as reactionary. They are responses to the United States as he imagines it to be. Unlike bin Laden, whose face has become a permanent symbol of terrorism and whose words are regularly transmitted through American media, less is known of the writings and representations of Zawahiri. Yet, as Anne Aly writes in “Lessons from the Past: The Historical Roots of Militant Islamic Ideology and Its Influence on Contemporary Jihadist Movements,” Zawahiri is the driving force behind Al-Qaeda’s discourse. Aly writes: Zawahiri’s major contribution to the current jihadi movement, and in particular to the ideology espoused by al-Qaeda, is discourse—a discourse which has gained legitimacy among the Muslim umma, galvanized mass support, and which has regenerative capacity.424 The core message of this discourse is that Islam is under attack. Muslims have become victims of an international conspiracy to undermine Islam as a global religion. At one time it was necessary to conquer the near enemy—local governments delivering an essentially American message. However, the new parameters of battle are defined by 423. Associated Press, “Al-Qaeda ‘to attempt US attack soon,” The Sydney Morning Herald, February 3, 2010, http://news.smh.com.au/breaking-news-world/alqaeda-to-attempt-us-attack-soon- 20100203-nc0v.html (accessed March 4, 2010). 424. Anne Mahmoud Aly, “Lessons From the Past: The Historical Roots of Militant Islamic Ideology and Its Influences on Contemporary Jihadist Movements,” in Doomed to Repeat?: Terrorism and the Lessons of History, edited by Sean Brawley, (Washington, D.C., New Academia Publishing, 2009), 124. 195 the need to conquer the far enemy: the United States itself. As Aly writes, “It is therefore no longer enough to stop the messenger: attentions must also focus on diffusing the message.”425 Exploring Zawahiri’s discourse in some detail will reveal the way in which his representations of the United States and the various acts of violence that he organizes against it are deployed as a response to the particular mental image of the United States that he has constructed. Additionally, examining Zawahiri’s language will reveal how his representations of the United States are also responses to the way that he perceives himself and the image that he constructs of the Muslim community. In his 2001 memoir, Knights Under the Prophet’s Banner, Zawahiri outlines what he calls an “epic battle” between believers and “disbelievers.”426 His title evokes Crusade-like imagery, and he himself confirms that image saying, “I hope to spend whatever is left of my life in serving the cause of Islam in its ferocious war against the tyrants of the new Crusade.”427 His account is a self-described warning to the “forces of evil,” alerting them that “the nation [of Islam] is drawing closer every day to its victory over you and is about to inflict its rightful punishment on you step by step.”428 It is a call to arms and a plea to Muslim youth, galvanizing their support and outlining the parameters for a cosmic war. Within his writings, Zawahiri offers young radicals five principles to guide their fight against America. He suggests that the battle is global, that the only solution is jihad, that patience and perseverance are required, that the community of Muslim 425. Ibid., 116. 426. Mansfield, 21. 427. Ibid., 19. 428. Ibid., 20. 196 fighters must be mobilized like an army, and that every person has a role to play in implementing heaven’s kingdom on earth.429 Zawahiri describes the global nature of this new conflict and the purpose of his memoir: This book was written in an attempt to revive the Muslim nation’s awareness of its role and duty, its importance, and the duties that it needs to perform. The book also explains the extent of the new Crusaders’ enmity to the Muslim nation and this nation’s need to see the dividing line between its enemies and loyal subjects …The battle today cannot be fought on a regional level without taking into account the global hostility towards us.430 It may be gathered from Zawahiri’s description above that a paradigm shift has taken place. That is, there appears to be a fundamental change in the way that the narrative of a battle between believers and “disbelievers” is understood and deployed. Initially, Al- Qaeda, which in Arabic means “the base,” operated as just that—a base, or small project of opposition that launched attacks on regional targets. While its vision was grand, its focus was limited. Yet, Zawahiri’s language suggests a more expansive effort—one that unites “the Muslim nation” through the marriage of grand vision and grand focus. Zawahiri situates his narrative around a shared Islamic identity whereby Muslims would come to see themselves as one seamless community, uniting under the banner of jihad, and defending themselves from a foreign enemy: the United States. Aly comments on this maneuver: In this narrative the imagined nation of Islam is under attack from the West—constructed as the US and Israel—which seeks to destroy it by infiltrating the Muslim world both politically and ideologically. It is a powerful narrative for unifying the masses.431 429. Aly, 124. 430. Mansfield, 120. 431. Aly, 125. 197 One of the ways in which Zawahiri reinforces unity is by referring to Muslims as “the Muslim nation.” This description is unlike the term umma, which denotes a community of Muslims all across the globe linked by common belief. An individual who self-identifies as a Muslim becomes a part of the umma as a result of their personal convictions of faith; their membership in this community is the result of expressing the shahada, or profession of faith. The umma is apolitical and may be understood as simply a religious diaspora. Zawahiri’s construction of “the Muslim nation,” however, is different. Rather than a community of believers, Zawahiri seems to envision a community of believers with a specific role and duty. He represents all Muslims as oppressed victims whose purpose as a faith-community is to restore justice to a broken society. By this discourse, Muslims faith-identity is only secondary to their victim-identity—Muslims are united by their victimhood, not necessarily their faith. This narrative of victim-identity seemed to resonate within communities of Muslims, particularly youth, as their perceptions of hostility against Islam confirmed their preconceptions that they were victims. Discrimination, vilification, staunch U.S. support of Israel, and a history of military conflict between the United States and Muslim-majority countries caused this narrative to become deeply embedded into the identities of those Muslims who eventually took up Zawahiri’s cause. By reconfiguring the Muslim umma as a monolithic nation of victims, Zawahiri struck an emotional chord in his followers. As they came to believe that they were victims, their destiny became clear: fight the victimizer. For Zawahiri, the advantage of this new approach was that al-Qaeda became less concentrated and more dispersed. It could no longer be viewed as a central group with branches extending out into various territories. In fact, al-Qaeda was no longer a 198 group at all. Rather, it was an idea—an ideology that was capable of inspiring people to violence. The group’s constituents, often young Muslim men with hostilities towards the United States, did not necessarily have a relationship with one another. They came from different parts of the world and were united in “the Muslim nation” by their common belief that jihad, represented in a violent way, could restore the world to a pure state of Islam. Jason Burke, author of Al-Qaeda: The True Story of Radical Islam, comments on the transformation of al-Qaeda from a small network of radicals to a global ideology. He says: People are looking for something that is not there. There is no organization with its terrorist operative cells, sleeper cells, so on and so forth. What there is, is an idea, prevalent among young angry Muslim males throughout the Islamic world. That idea is what poses a threat.432 Without a centralized, coherent organization or established rules for membership, anyone could become a “member” of al-Qaeda, simply by adopting the ideology of Zawahiri and bin Laden. This allows Zawahiri to expand the reach of al-Qaeda as the structure of the group became more fluid. However, President Bush did not seem to understand the new nature of the group and continued to speak about al-Qaeda as if they were a centralized organization with tentacles spreading out into various sleeper cells around the word. In an address to Congress on September 21, 2001, Bush said, “Our war on terror begins with al-Qaeda, but it does not end there. It will not end until every terrorist group of global reach has been found, stopped, and defeated …freedom 432. Jason Burke, as quoted in Adam Curtis, “The Power of Nightmares, Episode Three,” The Power of Nightmares,” Episode Three. Documentary. http://youtube.com/watch?v=2sSpXakQ8fM (accessed February 10, 2010). 199 and fear are at war.”433 This statement indicates that Bush may have been focused on the eradicating specific groups rather than an ideology, which is more difficult to identify. To those subscribing to the new global parameters of this conflict, the message from Zawahiri was clear: violent jihad is the only option. Zawahiri writes that, “And in this, the greatest battle, the men of thought and command must be united for the national interest under the flag of Jihad for Allah.”434 The representations that Hassan al-Banna, Sayyid Qutb, Ayman Zawahiri, and Osama bin Laden deploy comprise an important but overlooked counter-discourse to the Orientalist representations of Raphael Patai, Samuel Huntington, and Bernard Lewis. Al-Banna, Qutb, Zawahiri, and bin Laden engage in the reification, generalization and selective representation of “the West.” Similar to their Orientalist counterparts, they present the image of a monolithic “West” and exaggerate particular elements of “Western” society, representing them as normative of the entire population. This process has been called Occidentalism. Hassan Hanafi, professor of philosophy at Cairo University comments that, “The object of study in Orientalism becomes the studying subject in Occidentalism, and the studying subject in Orientalism becomes an object of study in Occidentalism.”435 Hanafi is known for his writings on Occidentalism. His work Muqqadima fi ‘ilm al-istighrab (Introduction to the Science of Occidentalism) begins by suggesting that Arabs and Muslims must make a critical study of Orientalism rather than using it as a means for deriving self-knowledge. However, Hanafi goes on to 433. Bush, “Address to a Joint Session of Congress and the American People.” 434. Mansfield, 243. 435. Hassan Hanafi, “From Orientalism to Occidentalism,” Der Begriff Fortschritt In Unterschiedlichen Kulturen: The Goethe Institute. http://www.fortschritt-weltweit.de/dokumente /aegypten/fortschritt_aegypten_hanafi.pdf (accessed April 7, 2010), 2. 200 suggest that it is the purpose of Occidentalism to “reinforce its [the Occident’s] own positive self image” and that this is achieved by reversing the negative Orientalist stereotypes and generalizations and apply them to “the West.”436 Therefore, just as “the West” defines “the East” as hostile, backwards, autocratic, and barbaric, Occidentalist discourses represent “the West” as materialistic, aggressive, sexually promiscuous, and spiritually disconnected. Through these representations, “the West” becomes the “soulless other” to “the East.” The dominated seek to reassert their identity through the subjection of the dominant.437 To Hanafi, the germ of Occidentalism is the resistance of Westernization. He comments that the marks of Westernization are seen everywhere: culture, lifestyles, art, music, architecture, and language. Hanafi’s view is similar to that of al-Afghani, who loathed what he viewed as “Westoxification.” Both Hanafi and al-Afghani perceive Westernization as an identity crisis to Arab and Muslim societies. Hanafi says that taghrib, or Westernization, “threaten[s] our civilizational autonomy.”438 The hybridity of architectural styles of Arab cities, Hanafi notes, are a paradigmatic examples of taghrib. He calls these cities “identity-less” saying, “They are neither traditional… nor are they modern … and nor are they practical, resulting from environmental requirements.”439 Hanafi comments on how this lack of identity intensifies the struggle for cultural autonomy: 436. Carl Ernst, “The West and Islam: Rethinking Orientalism and Occidentalism,” Ishraq: Islamic Philosophy Yearbook 1. (2010): 8. 437. Larbi Sadiki, The Search for Arab Democracy: Discourses and Counter Discourses (New York: Columbia University Press, 2004), 102. 438. Hassan Hanafi, Muqaddimah fi ‘ilm’l-istighrab, [Introduction to Occidentalism] (Cairo: al-Dar al-Fanniyyah, n.d.), 22. 439. Ibid., 23. 201 [As] the national costume became [almost] absent…reaction [to its absence] began with the Islamic dress, the beard and the jilbab (a long garment donned by males) as forms of reclaiming [Arab-Islamic] identity The more Westernization took hold in lifestyles, the more attachment to national or Islamic dress increased as a reaction [against it] as has happened in the Islamic revolution in Iran and in the contemporary Islamic groups in Egypt; so did attachment to the Prophet’s [natural] medicine as a reaction to modern medicine, and to Qur’anic sciences in response to modern sciences.440 Despite the rejection of Westernization and the reversal of negative stereotypes, Hanafi maintains that it is not the purpose of Occidentalism to assert dominance, hegemony, or control in the way that Orientalism has been deployed. Even in the face of Islamists like bin Laden, Zawahiri, or the actors involved in the Iranian Revolution, Hanafi notes that Occidentalism is defensive—it is a reaction to a long history of Westernization and European and American dominance. He says, “The counter-attack is the best form of defense.”441 The significant difference between Occidentalism and Orientalism is that Occidentalists’ representations of “the West” derive from the long European presence in Arab-majority and Muslim-majority countries: colonialism. Unlike Orientalism, which constructs the Orient from images and representations in art, literature, and now other media, Occidentalism is grounded in nationalism and identity-preservation that results from centuries of European rule and influence. That influence is still perceived today. The ascendancy of European and American products in Arab and Muslim-majority countries may be perceived as an extension of an historical and political presence. While European political systems were represented as being the preferred (and perhaps even the only legitimate) framework for government by colonizers, European products 440. Ibid. 441. Ibid., 30. 202 were regarded by the colonized as symbols of cultural hegemony. It is against this representation that Occidentalists deploy their characterization of “the West.” Fahmi Huwaydi, a well-known Egyptian intellectual and journalist, comments on this theme: Is the aim for Coca-Cola to become the human race’s preferred drink, topping the list [of items] imposed on humans, from hamburgers to jeans and Madonna and Michael Jackson’s songs? In other words, is this the meaning of globalization, [that is] to impose the West’s taste and lifestyle on [the rest of] the world?442 The aversion to “Western” influences is evident in Huwaydi’s writing. As a counter- discourse, Occidentalism aims to break down dominant political, economic, social, and cultural structures in order to change the dynamics of power relations to favor the indigenous group. However, some Islamists have adopted Hanafi’s view of Occidentalism which seeks to redeploy negative stereotypes and generalizations at Europeans and Americans. Diana Lary, author of “Edward Said: Orientalism and Occidenalism,” comments on the dangers of this projection: Occidentalism at its worst is damaging, even virulent, and would probably dismay Said as much as any other closed, prejudiced view of the world would. It shows itself in the militant, angry rhetoric against the West, the most prominent contemporary proponent of whom is Osama bin Laden. It contains a hatred of the secular, materialist West, especially America, and a passion for the soulful, rooted, native culture, usually based on religion.443 Though some Occidentalists like Hanafi suggest that the purpose of Occidentalistm is to resist “the West,” others like bin Laden and Zawahiri aim to not only resist it but to assert power over it. By representing the Occident, or “the West,” as materialistic, spiritually depraved, and sexually promiscuous, bin Laden and his cohorts seek to foster 442. Fahmi Huwaydi, “Didd Kawkaltu’l-‘alam” [Against “Coca Cola-isation” of the World], Al- Ahram, October 10, 1995, 11. 443. Diana Lary, “Edward Said: Orientalism and Occidentalism,” Journal of the Canadian Historical Association 17, no. 2 (2006): 9. 203 support for their positions and advance their particular interpretations of Islam. They seek to establish what they view as the purity of God’s rule across not only Muslim- majority countries, but the entire world. For them, this is the only option. CONCLUSION On October 7, 2001, the United States military launched a massive bombing assault on the cities of Kabul, Kandahar, and Jalalabad in Afghanistan, marking the beginning of the Afghanistan War. At 5:08 PM in the United States, CNN released infrared footage of the strikes, showing city skylines light up in vast displays of yellow. A few days earlier, a videotape was delivered to the Al-Jazeera news network with a special message from bin Laden. Prerecorded, the instructions on the videotape indicated that it was to be aired immediately following the first U.S. air strikes. The tape showed bin Laden wearing a camouflage jacket and a white turban, sitting against a desert rock formation; a Kalashnikov assault rifle was propped up behind him. Speaking into a microphone, bin Laden claimed responsibility for the September 11, 2001 attacks and reflected on the impact of the events: I tell you that these events have split the entire world into two camps: one of faith, with no hypocrites, and one of unbelief—may God protect us from it. Every Muslim must give what he can to help his religion. The winds of faith and change have blown to remove falsehood from the peninsula of Muhammad.444 Two weeks later, bin Laden expressed for the second time his belief that the world is divided into two camps. On October 21, 2001, the American bombing campaign in Afghanistan reached its second week. The Taliban still controlled the majority of the country, and those Americans who believed that the war would be quick were realizing their mistake. At an undisclosed location south of Kabul, Osama bin Laden waited for 444. Osama bin Laden, as quoted in Lawrence, Messages to the World, 105. 205 veteran Al-Jazeera reporter Taysir Alluni to arrive. Alluni was known for his multiple interviews with bin Laden and his unique ability to press him on controversial issues in a candid way. Late in the afternoon, Alluni eventually arrived at bin Laden’s location and their conversation began. In a revealing moment of the interview, bin Laden offered his thoughts about a relationship of conflict between the two world camps he envisioned: Alluni: What is your opinion about what is being said concerning your analogies and the “clash of civilizations?” Your constant use and repetition of the word “Crusade” and “Crusader” shows that you uphold this saying “the Clash of Civilizations.” Bin Laden: I say that there is no doubt about this. This [Clash of Civilizations] is a very clear matter, proven in the Qur’an and the traditions of the Prophet, and any true believer who claims to be faithful shouldn’t doubt these truths, no matter what anybody says about them. What goes for us is whatever is found in the Book of God and the hadith of the Prophet. But the Jews and America have come up with a fairytale that they transmit to the Muslims, and they’ve unfortunately been followed by the local rules [of the Muslims] and a lot of people who are close to them, by using “world peace” as an excuse. That is a fairytale that has no substance whatsoever.445 In that brief moment, bin Laden indicated that he viewed the relationship between Islam and “the West” just as Lewis represented it: a clash of civilizations. For bin Laden, the entire history of Islam—from its advent in the seventh century to its present day dynamics—conflicts with Europe and the United States. He believes that Islam and “the West” constitute dar al-Islam and dar al-harb, respectively and that the realms are irrevocably at war with one another. In 1996, the militant-Islamist magazine Nida’ul Islam (The Call of Islam) published remarks by bin Laden in which he depicted the collective responsibility of the Muslim community against the Judeo-Christian “West:” 445. Ibid., 125. 206 What bears no doubt in this fierce Judeo-Christian campaign against the Muslim world, the likes of which has never been seen before, is that the Muslims must prepare all possible might to repel the enemy, militarily, economically, through missionary activity, and all other areas. It is crucial for us to be patient and to cooperate in righteousness and piety and to raise awareness of the fact that the highest priority, after faith, is to repel the aggressive enemy that corrupts the religion and the world. Nothing deserves a higher priority, after faith, as the religious scholars have declared. It is crucial to overlook many of the issues of bickering to unite our ranks so that we can repel the greater Kufr [a classical Islamic phrase which means “disbeliever”].446 The similarities in the language deployed by bin Laden and Lewis is arresting. In fact, it appears that they are both participants in the same discourse of dualism. They use similar terms, phrases, and discursive practices to represent the relationship between Islam and the United States and Europe as conflicting. Lewis’s claim that “many Muslims are beginning to return to the classical Islamic worldview,” which he sees as a violent “clash” between two opposing spheres, depends on the divisive rhetoric of bin Laden and his cohorts who articulate the same point. Sayyid Qutb also propounded on this type of categorical distinction, suggesting that the world is divided into the camps of Islam and jahiliyya [ignorance]. Qutb turned jahiliyya, a term usually understood to refer to the pre-Islamic culture of Arabia, into a perpetual “Western” threat. Emran Qureshi and Michael Sells comment on this term in their book The New Crusades: This term [jahiliyya] has been spread throughout the Islamic world by the Saudi government, itself based on a particularly radical version of a conflictual definition of religion known as Wahabism, and by wealthy Saudi princes and other individuals where it is taught as the true or authentic Islam.447 446. Bin Laden, as quoted in Ruel Marc Gerecht, “The Gospel According to Osama bin Laden,” The Atlantic, January 2002. http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2002/01/the-gospel-according- to-osama-bin-laden/2376/ (accessed April 4, 2010). 447. Emran Qureshi and Michael A. Sells, The New Crusades: Constructing the Muslim Enemy (New York: Columbia University Press, 2003), 32. 207 Figures like bin Laden and Qutb provide the language that Lewis needs to sustain his claims of incompatibility between Islam and “the West.” Lewis’s suggestion that “many” Muslims” are “beginning to return to the classical Islamic worldview” where dar al-Islam and dar al-harb face off in opposition is supported by Qutb’s claim that the world is divided into two spheres—Islam and jahiliyya; bin Laden’s belief that the world is split into “two camps” also conforms to this view. Qutb’s experiences in the United States, which led him to represent it as a morally decadent, spiritually depraved, wasteland, reinforce the idea that the Islam and “the West” are divided as a result of their essential incompatibilities. For Qutb, only a complete rejection of American values could offer hope for the future of Islam. He made the choice for Muslims very clear: Islam or the death of mankind. The operative concept in Qutb’s writings on this division is that not only are Islam and the United States incompatible but their opposition to one another results from a lifestyle that threatens the values of Islam. Bernard Lewis articulates the same dichotomous relationship between Islam and “the West,” arguing, however, that it results from “the roots of Muslim rage” and a history of things that “went wrong” in early Muslim societies. Lewis’s heightened exposure as an Islamic scholar in the years following September 11, 2001 provided him with a platform to reach the general public with these ideas. The extensive popularity of his books What Went Wrong? and The Crisis of Islam reveals that his views may have influenced those who read them. In August of 2003, Amazon.com listed What Went Wrong? as one of the most popular books in the world. It was the nineteenth most popular book in Italy, the thirteenth most popular book in Denmark, and the ninth most popular book in Savannah, Georgia. Additionally, it was 208 the seventeenth most popular text at the University of Chicago, the fifth most popular book at Louisiana State University, and in January of 2003, as a result of its broad appeal, Harper Perennial Library released a second edition of the book under a revised title: What Went Wrong: The Clash Between Islam and Modernity in the Middle East.448 Lewis’s status as a prolific scholar of Islam gives his thesis a sense of credibility within the general public. Some Americans and Europeans who were unaware of the dynamic history of Islam and who were searching for answers to their questions about the attacks of September 11th found answers in his works, one of which was described as “replete with exceptional historical insight that one has come to expect from the world’s foremost scholar on Islam.”449 Additionally, since 2001, Lewis’s writings in The Wall Street Journal allowed him to move beyond the academy and express his views in a more ideological way. It is in this more public realm that he is able to exert his influence more candidly, commenting on an array of topics related to foreign policy and the Middle East. In a growing discourse of suspicion towards Islam and one that configures it as being diametrically opposed to the systems and values of Europe and the United States, Bernard Lewis stands out to some as an informed voice of reason. His later works influence and reinforce common stereotypes and generalizations about Islam and Muslims. He contributes to the belief that Islam and “the West” are defined by their separation, and he illustrates this by selectively representing key terms and concepts that are deployed by individuals like Qutb and bin Laden, two individuals many Muslims would suggest do not represent mainstream Islam. 448. Sabra, “What is Wrong with What Went Wrong.” 449. As quoted in Lewis, What Went Wrong, back cover. 209 As has been discussed, Lewis’s influence extended beyond the general public and into the inner policymaking circles of the Bush administration. He discussed his role as a White House advisor, saying in 2001 that “I’ve been to Washington six times since the Twin Towers [fell].”450 While Lewis unpacked and diagnosed “what went wrong” in the Middle East for various members of the Bush administration, Bush sent Karen Hughes to the Middle East with a remedy. Pulitzer Prize winning author Ron Suskind recalls a meeting with Hughes at her home: Thump, thump down the stairs. The portico fills with purple: Karen Hughes, smiling a little nervously, and dressed nicely, conservatively, such that her clothes are not an issue. Her thick, silvery hair, same as the president's, is neatly brushed back. Her eyes are blue, dimples deep. She is attractive, and softer than she appears on TV. Jerry [Hughes’s husband] wants to finish the story about the line at motor vehicles, so Karen lets that proceed, and then she mentions that Jerry is looking for work but that "it's so hard with the conflict-of-interest laws.” I look at them both, and they look at me, and then all of us seem to look at the glass coffee table, where Muslim scholar [sic] Bernard Lewis's What Went Wrong? is atop a stack of must-reads. Then no one says anything.451 Hughes was the face of the United States in the countries that she traveled to on her listening tour. While her goal was to improve the image of the United States within Muslim-majority countries, her position as a diplomat and Bush’s closest advisor prevented her from being detached from the policies that so many citizens of North African and Middle Eastern countries despised. At each stop along her “listening tour,” Hughes was confronted with skepticism, concern, and even anger about the war in Iraq—a war that Bernard Lewis had endorsed. When confronted about the policies of the United States at a meeting with Turkish women in Istanbul, Hughes said, “You’re 450. Jay Tolson, “A Sage for the Age,” USNews.com, December 31, 2001, http://ontology.buffalo.edu/smith//courses01/rrtw/Tolson.htm (accessed April 3, 2010). 451. Ron Suskind, “Mrs. Hughes Takes Her Leave,” http://www.ronsuskind.com/articles/ 000005.html (accessed April 9, 2010). 210 concerned about war, and no one likes war. But to preserve the peace, sometimes my country believes that war is necessary.”452 A human rights activist, Feray Salman, shot back, “War is not necessary for peace. We can never, ever export democracy and freedom from one country to another.”453 Though audience members attempted to steer the question and answer session in the direction of American foreign policy, Hughes was often evasive and unwilling to openly discuss controversial topics like the Israeli- Palestinian conflict or the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Rather, Hughes attempted to avert potentially controversial topics by sharing biographical stories and suggesting that she shared common values with the Turkish audience. “I am a mom,” Hughes said. She continued: I am a working mom. You’ve heard my title, but that’s the fancy stuff. I am really a mom. My most important job is mom. I still have to pinch myself when I am sitting in a meeting with the king [of Saudi Arabia] and realize that I’m there representing our country.454 At a joint press conference in Turkey, Hughes said, “I am a mom and I love kids. I love all kids. And I understand that is something I have in common with Turkish people.”455 Jonathan Karl of The Weekly Standard comments on Hughes’s trip to Saudi Arabia, where her mispronunciation of the Arabic word “Imam” created an atmosphere of confusion and suspicion. He writes: Even when she talked about Muslim religious leaders, instead of saying “Imam,” she would say, “I-mom.” All this “I-mom” diplomacy left some people a bit mystified. When it came time for a photo op with the Saudi information minister, the TV cameras picked up this exchange: Saudi information minister: “Tell me what you are seeking to hear—.” Hughes (interjecting): “I’m really here to listen.” 452. Kessler, “Turks Challenge Hughes on Iraq.” 453. Ibid. 454. Jonathan Karl, “Karen of Arabia,” The Weekly Standard 11, no. 4 (2005): 4-7. 455. Ibid. 211 Saudi minister: “I’m not sure what it is.”456 Hidayat Tuskal, an activist with the Capital City Women’s Forum, said that she was “feeling wounded, feeling myself insulted here” by Hughes’s responses.457 What emerges from these exchanges is that Hughes’s “listening tour” involves more than listening. Rather, Hughes’s aims to influence attitudes and cultivate the support of foreign governments and citizens for American policies. Just as Hughes served as a message crafter for Bush’s presidential campaigns in 2000 and 2004, her role as Undersecretary for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs was similar: she was responsible for carefully crafting and selling a message promoting the United States and its policies to disenchanted foreign audiences. Knowing that the United States’ image had declined precipitously and that a public relations campaign selling America to the world would be seen as insensitive and even arrogant, especially in the midst of two unpopular wars, Hughes’s “listening tour” offered a softer, more subtle approach. It suggested that focus was on the concerns of the citizens in the countries she visited, not on an American sales pitch. The event, however, was not perceived in this way. Her interlocutors were carefully selected, and Hughes did not waver from her script. A September 2005 USA Today column noted, “[Hughes’s] trip has been much like a political campaign: She delivers a message to select audiences.”458 In October of 2005, the Los Angeles Times published a reaction to Hughes’s trip: Meeting with handpicked audiences and repeating canned messages fails to create the robust dialogue that should be at the core of public diplomacy. Tried-and-true presidential campaign tactics such as holding 456. Ibid. 457. Ibid. 458. USA Today, “Sales Pitch Falls Flat," USAToday.com, September 28, 2005, http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/editorials/2005-09-28-our-view_x.htm (accessed April 10, 2010). 212 babies for the cameras come off as forced, even macabre, when they follow a discussion of women and children dying in Iraq. As one advisory panel stated: "We want to be clear: 'Spin' and manipulative public relations and propaganda are not the answer. Foreign policy counts." Implicit in this message is that making foreign policy is inseparable from selling it.459 Hughes was perceived by her Muslim audiences as an out of touch politician who would listen, but who would likely not take seriously any expressions of disapproval for American policy. Though she presented her trip as “listening tour,” Hughes was able to control the structure of the discourse in a way that always kept her in the role of “speaker.” Audiences were selected, tickets were printed, admission was limited, scripts were prepared, and time was tightly monitored. By controlling the overall nature of the “listening tour,” Hughes was able to deploy her message in a particular way: she emphasized all of the characteristics and details of American culture that portrayed it in a positive way and de-emphasized all of the information that portrayed the United States in a negative way. While Hughes’s initial goal was to change the negative perceptions that some in North Africa and the Middle East had of the United States, her presence in the region may have actually reinforced those perceptions. To some, Hughes was simply another voice promoting policies that many viewed as disastrous; she was a reminder of a dominant American presence in the region and an American government that was unwilling to listen to dissenting opinions. Hughes’s lack of knowledge about the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood and recent elections in Egypt was obvious. Her well-intended but demeaning comments about women’s ability to drive in Saudi Arabia and her insistence that “if they just understand us they will like us” rang of 459. Los Angeles Times, “Policy Before PR,” October 3, 2005. http://articles.latimes.com/2005/ oct/03/opinion/ed-hughes3 (accessed April 11, 2010). 213 American superiority. Sidney Blumenthal writes that Hughes appeared as one of the pilgrims that Mark Twain satirized in his 1869 book Innocents Abroad. Twain writes: None of us had ever been anywhere before; we all hailed from the interior; travel was a wild novelty…We always took care to make it understood that we were Americans, Americans! The people stared at us everywhere and we stared at them. We bore down on them with American greatness until we crushed them.460 Asharq daily newspaper in Qatar commented on Hughes’s “listening tour” saying, “The Arab world is tired of U.S. Hurricanes. It hopes that Hurricane Hughes will be the last one.”461 Despite President Bush’s insistence that the “war on terror” was not a war of religions, religious language was prevalent in the upper echelons of his administration and was even deployed by Karen Hughes. In Egypt, Hughes said, “Many people around the world do not understand the important role that faith plays in Americans' lives.”462 When an Egyptian opposition leader asked her why Bush mentions God so frequently in his speeches, Hughes said, “Previous American presidents have also cited God, and our constitution cites 'one nation under God.’”463 The Egyptian leader expressed his displeasure with her answer saying, “Well, never mind.”464 Karen Hughes frequently cited Matthew 5:14 from the Bible, where Jesus, in his Sermon on the Mountain, tells his disciples that they are the light of the world and a shining city on a hill that cannot be hidden. Speaking at the “Shell Distinguished Lecture Series” in March of 2006, Hughes 460. In Sidney Blumenthal, “Bin Laden’s Little Helper,” The Guardian, September 30, 2005. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2005/sep/30/usa.religion (accessed April 8, 2010). 461. Steven R. Weisman, “Diplomatic Memo; On Mideast ‘Listening Tour,’ the Question in Who’s Hearing?” The New York Times, September 28, 2005, http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/28/ international/ middleeast/28hughes.html (accessed September 22, 2009). 462. Blumenthal, “Bin Laden’s Little Helper.” 463. Ibid. 464. Ibid. 214 said, “America must continue to be that shining city on a hill that President Reagan spoke of.”465 Robert Pape, a political scientist at the University of Chicago who has conducted extensive research on the motives of terrorists, comments on Hughes’s use of religious language, saying, “It is stunning to the extent Hughes is helping bin Laden. If you set out to help bin Laden, you could not have done it better than Hughes.”466 Pape continues, commenting: If you read Osama's speeches, they begin with descriptions of the US occupation of the Arabian Peninsula driven by our religious goals and that it is our religious purpose that must be confronted. That argument is incredibly powerful, not only to religious Muslims but also secular Muslims. Everything Hughes says makes their case.467 Hughes recalls the evening of September 11, 2001. The night before, she and her husband celebrated their wedding anniversary and upon learning of the terrorist attacks, she returned quickly to Washington. When Hughes reached her office, she discovered an email from her pastor Doug Fletcher. He attached some notes he wrote while meditating on Psalm 23. Hughes writes: Doug’s notes talked about how Psalm 23 had been prayed during the destruction of Jerusalem; in foxholes and at deathbeds; by those who were very afraid, and those who knew where to turn their fears. “Christian faith doesn’t suggest that life is easy,” he wrote, “The empty cross, a symbol of victory, is also a reminder of evil and violence. There are valleys, some of them dramatic and some of them less so. We do need a shepherd in those valleys. And we are not simply promised safe journey. We are promised a banquet. It is one thing to live bravely underestimating the danger. It is another fully to understand the dangers and live with the confidence of faith in the promises of Him who promised never to leave or forsake us.”468 Hughes reflected on her pastor’s comments: 465. Hughes, “Remarks at the Shell Distinguished Lecture Series.” 466. Blumenthal, “Bin Laden’s Little Helper.” 467. Robert Pape, as quoted in Blumenthal, “Bin Laden’s Little Helper.” 468. Karen Hughes, Ten Minutes From Normal, (New York: Viking Press, 2004), 244. 215 Psalm 23 should be a part of the president’s remarks that evening, I realized, and started looking for a Bible … we [Hughes and Bush] met and revised the speech, and the president noted the odd wording of Psalm 23 on the draft: “What’s this—you need to get a good translation,” he told me.469 Hughes stood outside the Oval Office as Bush addressed the American public in a live broadcast that evening. He said: Tonight I ask for your prayers for all those who grieve, for the children whose worlds have been shattered, for all whose sense of safety and security has been threatened. And I pray they will be comforted by a power greater than any of us spoken through the ages in Psalm 23: "Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear no evil, for You are with me."470 While bin Laden and his followers framed American foreign policy in terms of a religious war between Americans, presumed to be Christians, and Muslims, their claim was largely one-sided; they were not able to point to examples of rhetoric among members of the Bush administration indicating that they indeed viewed the relationship between the United States and Muslim-majority countries in this way. However, on September 19, 2001, speaking about the response to the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon, Bush said that “This crusade, this war on terrorism, is going to take a while.”471 In an unguarded moment, speaking off-the-cuff and without the presence of teleprompters or a carefully vetted speech, Bush unwittingly read directly from the script of a radical group of people who were waiting for an opportunity to frame this conflict in terms of religion. While Bush was evidently unaware of the resonances the term “crusade” would have for Muslims, it resounded in terrorist training camps in 469. Ibid., 245. 470. Cable News Network, “Text of Bush’s Address,” (speech, The White House, Washington, D.C., September 11, 2001), http://archives.cnn.com/2001/US/09/ 11/bush.speech.text/ (accessed April 12, 2010). 471. Cable News Network, “Bush vows to rid the world of ‘evil-doers.’” 216 Afghanistan and Pakistan, giving bin Laden and his followers a renewed sense of purpose in the battle of ideologies—proof that their battle on earth was, as Reza Aslan writes in How to Win a Cosmic War, actually taking place in the heavens.472 If the conflict between the United States and Osama bin Laden’s radical, violent network was not framed in terms of religion before, it certainly was now. In an Al-Jazeera interview on October 20, 2001, Osama bin Laden acknowledged the gift of words that Bush provided to bin Laden’s radical network: Bush has declared in his own words: “Crusade attack.” The odd thing about this is that he has taken the words right out of our mouth [that this war is a crusade]. Some people also believe what is said about us, like the [Saudi] Minister’s words, that we declare other Muslims to be unbelievers—we seek God’s refuge from this. But, when Bush speaks, people make apologies for him and they say that he didn’t mean to say that this war is a Crusade, even though he himself said that it was! So the world today is split in two parts, as Bush said: either you are with us, or you are with terrorism. Either you are with the Crusade or you are with Islam.473 For Bush, use of the term “crusade” was said to be an off-hand reference. It appeared to be accidental—a split-second where a subconscious thought was revealed, delivering unintended but real meaning. James Carroll, columnist for the Boston Globe and author of Crusade: Chronicles of an Unjust War, writes that “His [Bush’s] embarrassed aides suggested that he had meant to use the word only as a synonym for struggle.”474 Yet what initially appeared as a Freudian slip came again five months later in an address to troops in Alaska. Bush spoke of the “War on Terror,” commending the support of Canadian allies saying, “I want to tell you something, we've got no better friends than 472. Reza Aslan, How to Win a Cosmic War: God, Globalization, and The End of the War on Terror (New York: Random House, 2009), 5. 473. Bin Laden, as quoted in Lawrence, Messages, 121. 474. James Carroll, “The Bush Crusade,” The Nation, September 2, 2004. http://www.thenation.com/doc/20040920/carroll (accessed August 28, 2009). 217 Canada. They stand with us in this incredibly important crusade to defend freedom, this campaign to do what is right for our children and our grandchildren.”475 Bush’s second use of the word “crusade” to describe the military mission in Afghanistan and Pakistan did not go unnoticed. Carroll comments on the significance of the term “crusade” and its representation to Arabic-speaking countries: Here is the relevance of that mental map: for the crusaders were going to war to rescue the site of the salvific death of Jesus, and they displayed their devotion to the cross on which Jesus died by wearing it on their breasts. When Bush's remark was translated into Arabic for broadcast throughout the Middle East, the word "crusade" was rendered as "war of the cross."476 And, this was precisely Osama bin Laden’s perception of Bush. For bin Laden, Bush was not just the Commander-in-Chief of the United States. More importantly, he was the commander of the Christian crusaders, armed with a cross, fighting for limited space in heaven. Bin Laden himself affirmed that representation, commenting: Bush’s image today is of him being in the front of the line, yelling and carrying his big cross. And I swear by God Almighty, that whoever walks behind Bush or his plan has rejected the teachings of Muhammad, and this ruling is one of the clearest rulings in the Book of God and the hadith of the Prophet.477 While the outcome of military conflict between bin Laden, al-Qaeda, and the United States is yet to be determined, it appears that bin Laden was successful in framing the conflict in his own terms: a religious battle between an ignorant Christian-majority United States and Islam. Robert Pape suggests that terrorism is not necessarily a byproduct of Islamic fundamentalism but that it can arise from independent, highly specific circumstances. He comments: 475. Bush, “President Rallies the Troops in Alaska.” 476. Ibid. 477. Bin Laden, as quoted in Lawrence, Messages, 122. 218 Of the key conditions that lead to suicide terrorism in particular, there first must be the presence of foreign combat forces on the territory that the terrorists prize. The second condition is a religious difference between the combat forces and the local community. The religious difference matters in that it enables terrorist leaders to paint foreign forces as being driven by religious goals.478 Bin Laden, relying on the influence of Qutb who once proclaimed that “the Crusader spirit runs in the blood of all Westerners,” steered the meta-narrative of “Islam and the West” in the direction of two religious entities that are opposite to one another and in perpetual conflict. Bush, Lewis, and Hughes all confirmed bin Laden’s narrative by fulfilling the roles he had configured for them in his discourse. The language they deployed created their reality: a world divided into two opposing camps—Islam and “the West.” Minutes before Sayyid Qutb was hanged on August 29, 1966, his sister, Hamida, pleaded for him to appeal his sentence. Qutb responded, noting the impact that language has on reality, saying, “Write my words. My words will be stronger if they kill me.”479 • • • It is time to move beyond the rhetorical universe embedded in “Islam and the West” and embrace a framework for understanding our relationships with our global neighbors that is based on commonalities, not differences; it is time to establish critical distance between our own ideology and the language that we deploy to express it. Tariq Ramadan writes in an article titled “Manifesto for a New ‘We:’” 478. Robert Pape, as quoted in Blumenthal, “Bin Laden’s Little Helper.” 479. Sayyid Qutb, as quoted in Wright, The Looming Tower, 36. 219 These political discourses [“Islam and the West”] play upon deep-seated apprehensions, perpetuate confusion over the terms of debate, and promote a binary approach to socio-political issues. The implicit terms of the debate are often reduced to a distinction between two entities: “We Westerners” and “They, the Muslims,” even when citizens are Muslims …Our societies are awaiting the emergence of a new “we.”480 One of the ways in which we can achieve this is by attempting to be more specific with the language we use to describe the relationship between the citizens of Europe, North America, and Muslim-majority countries. While it is tempting to reach an understanding of the relationship by latching onto simplistic preconfigured frameworks, such as “Islam and the West,” “the Arab world,” “the Muslim world,” and “the West,” doing so only reinforces the divisions implied by that language. For example, if we wish to discuss the events of September 11, 2001 in relationship to the dynamics of the United States during that time, the phrase “Islam and the West” is too broad of a category to do that. 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