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Section I
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Government Exhibit 27: “BOYD states ‘this book’
(Quran) is about jihad and how to deal with hypocrites.
BOYD states there is no du'a (personal request to God)
without Jihad.”
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Government Exhibit 27: “BOYD discusses the Meccan
period of Islam. BOYD states Muslims are not in the
Meccan period. BOYD talks about several scholars and
what they have in common. The scholars are all
majahideens (a person that engages in Jihad). BOYD
quotes a Muslim scholar: For those who make Jihad in
the name of Allah we will guide them to our path and
there is Allah with the majahideen.”
• Outside forces are attempting to physically
subjugate Islam and undermine its moral fabric.
• Grave situation: existential conflict.
• The only proper response is violence—violence
not only to defend Islam, but also expand it.
• Political reasons, but also religious ones.
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Major metropolitan powers gained access to parts of the world
from which they could derive wealth and power.
– They would typically make deals with local elites.
– The variety of colonial experiences range. Some were violent, others were
political agreements. In every instance, the relationship was initiated by the
West (Western Europe), designed to produce benefit to the West, and
developed with the presence of significant power disparities.
– Western powers came in and changed the political and social
dynamics of the colonized countries.
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Influence over local elites. The colonial powers needed to
influence key elites and cadres to be supportive. Thus, some of
the colonized received significant benefits: in India, for example,
the British opened a number of schools to develop elites who
could help the colonial power.
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Ottoman Empire had been the seat of the
caliphate (unified leadership of Muslim
world).
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Following the Ottomans’ defeat in World
War I, the Brits occupied its territory. After
leading the resistance in Turkey’s war of
independence, Mustafa Kemal
(akaAtatürk) abolished the caliphate on
March 3, 1924. He replaced it with a
secular system.
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The European nations said they would
create nation-states out of Ottoman
areas. But they wanted weak states, to
maintain their influence.
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In the 1920s through 1940s, colonial
powers set up governments that would
depend on them for support, and would
reflect the Western countries’ values
(allowing missionaries, capitalism, and
development). The colonial powers felt
that monarchies were the best way to do
this.
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A few distinct social movements emerged in response to the colonial
experience. They were nationalist, communist, and Islamist.
– Example: The Baath party (communist and nationalist).
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Islamist movements. These movements were attempting to answer
the question “what went wrong?
– Islamist movements argued that what was missing was religion,
and a sense of justice.
• Precursor to contemporary ideologues.
• Born in 1263 AD, lived at a time when the Mongols
had conquered the core of the Muslim world.
• Though the Mongols claimed to be Muslims, they
used their native system of laws in place of sharia.
• Was warfare against the Mongols acceptable?
– Taymiyya faced an obstacle to declaring war: Sunnis
traditionally hold that even a bad Muslim ruler is better than
fitna.
– He argued that Islam requires state power. By failing to rule
according to sharia, the Mongols were infidels rather than
true Muslims. They should be fought and killed.
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Name derived from the Arabic term
for “pious predecessors.”
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Contemporary Salafi movement
provides a religious answer to a
political question: How did the
Muslim world fall from glory?
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Salafism defines Islam’s ills as
rooted in straying from the original
practice of the faith, and tries to
correct this by returning to earliest
religious practice.
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Muhammad Abduh (b. 1849)
thought that Europe had “Islam but
no Muslims.” Movement became
increasingly anti-West over time.
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Born 1906 in Egypt, founded
Muslim Brotherhood 1928.
Anti-royalist protests; British
crackdown.
Overthrowing the
government was difficult
because of power
imbalances.
Dawa. Al-Banna urged
Muslims to return Islam to its
rightful place by starting at
the bottom.
– Salafi outlook
The Brotherhood’s dawa
efforts.
– Social services.
– Classes at mosques and
in civic groups.
– Courts.
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Once enough Muslims returned to true Islam, the faith
could be spread through jihad.
“Jihad is an obligation from Allah on every Muslim
and cannot be ignored nor evaded…The
weaknesses of abstention and evasion of jihad are
regarded by Allah as one of the major sins, and one
of the seven sins that guarantee failure.”
“We will pursue this evil force to its own lands,
invade its Western heartland, and struggle to
overcome it until all the world shouts by the name of
the Prophet and the teachings of Islam spread
throughout the world.”
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After Egyptian Prime Minister
Nuqrashi Pasha was
assassinated by a MB member
in 1948, Egyptian police killed alBanna, dissolved Brotherhood.
The was a widespread reaction
against the Egyptian regime.
Support for Islamists and other
anti-regime elements grew, as
did Egyptian nationalism.
Gamal Abdul Nasser and his
men (the Free Officers)
executed a military coup in
1952. The ideology that he
promotes is socialist nationalism
that is in many respects antiWestern.
Free Officers and Brotherhood
cooperated before the coup, but
had irreconcilable views of the
role of religion in society.
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Born in 1906 in Egypt, Qutb
became an influential MB
leader after al-Banna’s
death.
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Prior to becoming an
influential MB leader, Qutb
studied in the U.S. for two
years (NYC; Greeley, CO).
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Disturbed by racism and
licentiousness—even church
dances.
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After returning to Egypt, Qutb became a leading member of the MB.
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Qutb changes the Brotherhood’s strategy:
1. The world’s dominant sociopolitical system is that of jahiliya.
2. It is the duty of Muslims to revive Islam, to transform jahili society
through proselytization (da’wa) and jihad—an active struggle that
includes violent means.
3. The transformation of jahili society is the task of a dedicated
vanguard of Muslims.
4. Once this vanguard is assembled, the goal is the establishment of
God’s sovereignty on earth—ensuring that the laws and norms of
Islam are followed. Top-down vs. bottom-up.
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Nasser set out to shut down the Muslim Brotherhood. He threw
most of them into prison.
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The incarcerated Islamists spent a lot of time speaking with each
other. Rather than containing the movement, Nasser’s decision
fostered the development of a like-minded cadre of Islamists who
were introduced to Qutb’s ideas.
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Lawrence Wright notes in The Looming Tower that “[s]tories about
Sayyid Qutb’s suffering in prison have formed a kind of Passion
play for Islamic fundamentalists.”
– Qutb wrote his classic works Milestones and In the Shade of
the Qur’an while imprisoned.
• The conditions under which Qutb was
imprisoned had a serious effect on him
– He was frail, with a weak heart, delicate
stomach, and chronic pains.
– He was held for hours in a cell with vicious
dogs, and was beaten.
• Qutb concluded that his jailers had
denied God by serving Nasser. Thus,
they were not Muslims.
– Takfir.
“It may happen that the enemies of Islam may
consider it expedient not to take any action
against Islam.... But Islam cannot agree to this
unless they submit to its authority by paying
Jizyah, which will be a guarantee that they have
opened their doors for the preaching of Islam and
will not put any obstacle in its way through the
power of the state.”
-Sayyid Qutb, Milestones
“Islam requires the earth, not just a portion, but
the entire planet... because the whole of mankind
should benefit from Islam, and its ideology.”
-A. A. Maududi (Pakistan)
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“Arab Afghan” presence.
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Like Egyptian prisons, a
large number of Islamic
extremists were in close
proximity to each other—
faith on the battlefield.
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Osama bin Laden, Ayman
al-Zawahiri. Brought
together Saudi and
Egyptian extremist groups,
Afghan militants.
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Bin Laden expected to return
home a hero following the
Afghan-Soviet war, but instead
was treated with suspicion;
Prince Nayif confiscated his
passport.
Travels to Sudan, Afghanistan
(Taliban).
Terrorist attacks culminating in
9/11: Somalia, E. Africa
embassy bombings, U.S.S.
Cole.
Al-Qaeda’s regeneration in
Pakistan.
Increasingly sophisticated
messaging.
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Shia terrorist groups (Hizballah)
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Other religiously inspired terrorism (Christian Identity, Jewish
extremism)
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Political terrorism (far right, far left, anarchist)
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Nationalist terrorist groups (ETA, PKK, Tamil Tigers, IRA)
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Racist terrorist groups
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Single-issue terrorism (eco-terrorism, anti-abortion terrorism)