Paris 2015 & Islamophobia

By Izeth Hussain –November 21, 2015

Izeth Hussain

My basic purpose in this article is to counter the possible, or rather probable, increase of Islamophobia in Sri Lanka as a consequence of the horrors perpetrated by the IS in Paris on November 13. It is something on which every Muslim should declare his position, and should do so unequivocally. Mine is that it was a manifestation of savagery. It was not a lapse into savagery but the manifestation of the savagery of an essentially savage movement that has perverted Islam to find a transcendental justification for its drive for power, savage power. I refer to Wahabism in its pristine militant form. What happened in Paris was not a manifestation of Islam but of anti-Islam. This is what Wahab wrote in the eighteenth century about those who rejected the tenets of Wahabism: “Those who do not conform to this view should be killed, their wives and daughters should be violated, and their possessions confiscated”. The IS has been putting that injunction into practice. It is impossible to reconcile that with Islam. Wahabism in its pristine militant form is anti-Islamic There is much kinship between the three Abrahamic religions, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, which is why they could co-exist peacefully in harmony in Spain for several centuries under Muslim rule. It should not be altogether surprising if a group of perverted Muslims backslide into Judaism, and that seems to be precisely what has happened in the case of the IS – as pointed out by a brilliant poster put out by Muslim Outreach.

I must now make some clarifications which should help in enlisting the support of decent Sri Lankans in checking our indecent Islamophobes – with whom our last Government was in joyful cahoots. Because Mecca was the birthplace of the Prophet and is the center of Islam there could be a widespread misconception that Wahabism, which is the state religion of Saudi Arabia, is orthodox Islam in all its pristine purity. Actually Wahabism was concocted in the eighteenth century by Abdul Wahab, drawing his inspiration from the thirteenth century theologian ibn Taymiyya who represented a backward puritanical strand in Islam. The important point is that ever since its inception Wahabism has been regarded by the wider Islamic world as an aberration. It will surprise the reader that in Saudi Arabia itself no more that forty per cent avow themselves as Wahabis, and as for the Saudi ruling class they are world notorious for their sybaritic life-style which is miles removed from Wahabism. In the wider Islamic world Wahabism remains a minority cult despite all the billions of dollars spent by the Saudi Government to propagate it. The mainstream Islam of today, what I would call liberal Islam, had its origin in the reform movement started by Jamaldin el- Afghani, and it is the form of Islam most widely current, certainly far more than aberrant Wahabism.                                    Read More