It's Not About Religion by Harms Gregory

Author:Harms, Gregory [Harms, Gregory]
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: Publishing, Perceval Press, Viggo, Islam, Foreign Policy, Gregory Harms, History, Viggo Mortensen, Middle East
Publisher: Perceval Press
Published: 2012-12-10T00:00:00+00:00

Adding insult to injury, Israel’s defeat of Egypt, Syria, and Jordan in the 1967 Six-Day War displayed the weakness of those regimes, spelled further hardship for the Palestinians who were now under Israeli (viewed as Western) occupation in the West Bank and Gaza, and revealed the United States’ true colors in its sponsorship of Tel Aviv’s belligerence. (The Six-Day War experience, we should bear in mind, added to preexisting Arab resentment of Israel dating back to the state’s establishment and expansionism in 1948—Zionism was by and large deemed merely another instantiation of Western colonialism.) “However it was interpreted,” says Gilles Kepel, professor of Middle Eastern politics, “the 1967 defeat seriously undermined the ideological edifice of nationalism and created a vacuum to be filled a few years later by Qutb’s Islamist philosophy, which until then had been confined to small circles.”59

The 1970s saw a resurgence in Islamist activism together with an increase in some of its adherents’ militancy and readiness to use violence. As the nationalist leaders saw their credibility dip, they too began turning toward religion in an effort to reassert legitimacy. Nasser’s successor, Anwar Sadat, though a secular nationalist himself, appealed to Egypt’s religiosity by assuming the mantle of Believer-President; he also released Muslim Brotherhood members jailed by Nasser’s regime and welcomed back those who had been exiled. Among the reasons for Sadat’s shift was the creation of a counterbalance to leftist elements on university campuses who were disgruntled by the country’s economic woes and might pose a challenge to the leadership in Cairo.

In addition to the Muslim Brotherhood resuming its activities and expanding, new Islamist groups emerged. Radical organizations such as Islamic Jihad and the Islamic Group (Gamaa Islamiyya) were among those arising in the university context. Among the Islamic Group’s campus-based activities was providing practical services like transportation for women while stipulating “Islamic dress” (veils and long cloaks called a jilbab) and gender segregation.60 The most extreme among them espoused a return to the Islamic caliphate, war against all infidels (Christians, Jews, and even some Muslims), and terrorism as a justified method in these pursuits.

In the region’s general drift toward Islamicization, state actors such as Saudi Arabia also played a significant role in the furtherance of religious activism and conservatism. In the 1973 Yom Kippur War, Egypt and Syria attacked Israel on the territory Israel had occupied in 1967. They met with a technical loss but a psychological victory due to the Arab armies performing well in the conflict. Seeking Israeli withdrawal from the territories it still occupied, Saudi Arabia and other Arab oil producers led an oil embargo against the United States in protest, for the first time connecting the issue of petroleum with Arab–Israeli affairs. The boost in status gained from taking a stand against the West—as well as the wealth resulting from skyrocketing oil prices—created the perfect moment for the House of Saud to establish regional prestige as a spiritual beacon. Arab leaders competing for general stature was (and is) a common occurrence, and Riyadh sought entrance into the fray.

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