Forum agrees attacks on America were political but disagrees on nature of Islamism

Cilina Nasser
Daily Star staff

Violence carried out by Islamic movements against American targets is politically motivated, and not a manifestation of a clash of civilizations, according to an expert on Islamic movements.
“The problems between us and the United States are political and economic, not cultural and religious,” said Radwan Sayyid, a professor of Islamic studies at the state-run Lebanese University (LU).
“Even (Osama) bin Laden who talks about (faith and infidelity) gave two reasons ­ both of which are political ­ for carrying out his attacks against the US: the aggression against the Palestinian people and the futile attempts (by weak Arab and Islamic states) in seeking help from international institutions,” Sayyid said during a seminar held at the Marriott Hotel Wednesday.
The one-day seminar was organized by the Lebanon-based Center for Strategic Studies and was entitled, Islamic Movements in Lebanon: The Reality and Challenges.
Sayyid explained that when Arab Islamists had criticized the US before the Sept. 11 attacks, “they had been actually criticizing the rulers governing (them) that had allied themselves to the United States.”
He pointed out that Islamic movements had struggled to change local regimes. Citing Egypt as an example, Sayyid said the Gamaa Islamiya and the Islamic Jihad there regarded the Egyptian regime differently, and consequently were divided over their position toward their own government.
“Islamic movements achieved no successes as a result of their conflicts with the regime. Instead, there were many splinters in these movements,” he continued, “so what bin Laden did was a smart move in which he moved the battle directly to the United States, despite the fact that many respectable movements did not consider what he did legitimate.”
His statements drew criticism from some participants, who included some 30 Muslim clerics and researchers. Hassan Banna, an Egyptian sociologist, said there was still no concrete proof that bin Laden had carried out the Sept. 11 attacks.
Sayyid said the Islamic political phenomenon “has ­ in one of its faces ­ extremist fringes, (which reflect) an expression of the Arab national state’s inability to absorb (the problems of the society) due to the lack of a general cultural and political plan.”
“Following Sept. 11, there has been an increase in the negative approaches toward Arabs and Islam from the side of cultural and political elites in the United States,” Sayyid said.
Sayyid said this increase was the result of the use of a “new Orientalism” ­ a term used to describe reductive scholarship on the region.
“Some of these ideas were adopted by the US administration in its speeches addressed to the Arabs,” he said.
Another speaker, LU history professor Hassan Jaber, shed light on mistakes researchers make in examining Islamic movements.
“The study of Islamic movements as a political phenomenon encounters problems of tremendous complexity, in which ideology interlocks with politics, social components and development crises,” Jaber said.
He added: “We hardly find a successful study that contains a diversity in the angles (it covers) and that encompasses all the factors that lead to the emergence of this phenomenon and its expansion.”
Almost all the serious scientific studies, Jaber continued, did not delve deep enough into the subject, but still regularly came out with decisive assumptions. “It would have been better if (researchers) were humble and declared that there were gaps in (their studies).”
Although all Islamic movements have a common goal ­ to embrace Islam ­ Jaber said that they did not originate from the same environment. “Is it enough to be satisfied with the study of one phenomenon in order to know the other phenomena, which might have a disparity in its views?” he asked.
Others who spoke highlighted the development of the Islamic movements in Lebanon, such as Hizbullah, the Association of Islamic Philanthropic Projects, the Islamic Tawhid Movement, Al-Jamaa Al-Islamiya, the Amal Movement and the Pious Resistance.

Copyright © The Daily Star