The sectarian weapon of mass distortion

Empowering Weak & Oppressed

Abu Dharr

Safar 07, 1433 2012-01-01

Opinion

by Abu Dharr (Opinion, Crescent International Vol. 40, No. 11, Safar, 1433)

The world is babbling with news about Iran being on the threshold of going nuclear, in a military sense. Israeli words are coming out of American mouths. US Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta told CBS news that Iran could build a nuclear bomb in a year or less (music to Israeli ears).

The world is babbling with news about Iran being on the threshold of going nuclear, in a military sense. Israeli words are coming out of American mouths. US Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta told CBS news that Iran could build a nuclear bomb in a year or less (music to Israeli ears). That was quickly followed by US Pentagon General Martin Dempsey, Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, who verbally raised the threat level by saying: “Iran is playing a dangerous game that could ensnare the Middle East (he means the Muslim East) and others into conflict and a renewed arms race.” Don’t push it. And to score big with the Israeli masters he added: “America is sharing intelligence with Israel.” These are gourmet statements meant to satisfy the war appetite of the belligerent politicians in the occupied Holy Land: nihilist Netanyahu, lowlife Lieberman, and their men in suits and uniform.

American friendly politicians with an Islamic veneer are in communication mode with officials of the American empire. Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki visited Washington and exchanged diplomatic pleasantries with his boss in the White House. He may have communicated some diplomatic gestures from Teh-ran to Washington, most likely concerning Iran’s uranium enrichment process. Washington’s pro-Israeli officials were probably all ears and willing to raise the diplomatic body temperature provided Islamic Iran disposes of its strategic relationship with (secular) Syria. During the same time-frame the Yahudi war minister Ehud Barak was in Washington circling like a vulture around any dead meat resulting from an Iran breaking away from anti-Israeli commitments and alliances.

Another recent development causing political hiccups in Washington and some European circles is the health of the Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan. Some reports say that he is suffering from rectosigmoid cancer. This we cannot confirm, but what we can confirm is the edginess in the political circles of America and Europe about a private Muslim and a public-secular’s health.

The threat to the Muslim East does not come from an Islamic Iran… [but] from a pseudo-Islamic Saudi Arabia that has groomed pliant members of the Islamic movement to unleash their sectarian venom… While the Saudi sectarians do not have a choke-hold on the Ikhwan, they have their Salafi Trojan Horse, which they can use to channel the Ikhwan and line them up behind Washington’s grand policies in the area: namely an irreconcilable position with Tehran…

As the “Islamic” politicians were talking it out in Washington and elsewhere, Moscow-supplied Yakhnot (SSN-26) shore-to-sea missiles were deployed along Syria’s Mediterranean shore. Three million face masks were shipped from Russia to Syria in anticipation of any chemical or biological warfare that may break out in the months to come. Add to that the Russian Admiral Kutznetsov strike group was on its way from Russia to the Syrian port of Tartus on the Mediterranean. As US war secretary Leon Panetta was arriving in Ankara, Syrian Vice-President Faruq al-Shar‘aa was arriving in Moscow.

In the meantime US troops being transferred out of Iraq are being repositioned in Jordan opposite Syrian tank deployments across Jordan’s northern border. Some reports say that some of these American military units are being stationed at the King Hussein Air Base of al-Mafraq.

Its head swollen by the petroleum bonanza in Libya and in anticipation of petro-dollars flowing to its coffers, France has begun to beat its own war-drums against Islamic Iran.

All of this, so far, is to be expected. Does anyone expect the united imperial states of America and Europe with their colonial and racist history to act otherwise? Does anyone exclude the incognito Israelis from lurking closely behind? Anyone with even an elementary education about the Muslim East knows the immediate answer. But what readers of Crescent International should be aware of is the political chemistry that is brewing inside the Islamic movement, which, if it continues, will result in deadly and potentially catastrophic consequences. What we mean by that is the sectarian bomb.

The threat to the Muslim East does not come from an Islamic Iran working its way up through the technology channels and obtaining nuclear technology as all other up-and-coming nations have done. The threat to the Muslim East comes from a pseudo-Islamic Saudi Arabia that has groomed pliant members of the Islamic movement to unleash their sectarian venom at the appropriate juncture in regional and world politics when the headmaster in Washington motions them to do so. Sectarianism is a weapon of mass destruction. It is manufactured in the bigoted minds of Sunnis and Shi‘is alike. No one, just because he calls himself a “Shi‘i” or a “Sunni”, is immune from this infection and transmission. The geo-political incubators of this virus are both Iraq and Syria. In Iraq we have a class of “Islamists” who have come to power due to the American neoconservative war of March 2003. These “Islamists” (or the majority of them) are either patsies or are practicing their taqiyah. Whatever the case may be, they rule by American fiat. And most of these Islamists are “Shi‘is”. And, mind you, they pride themselves on having toppled a Ba‘thi regime — a tyranny if ever there was one.

To this end, absent the bug of sectarianism, what is good for the goose is good for the gander. And so, if Iraqi Islamists are permitted to play the American officials for the fool, then why isn’t it acceptable for the Syrian Islamists to play the American officials for the fool? Up to here it would appear fair and balanced to grant the Islamists of Syria the same scope of action as that granted to the Islamists of Iraq. But there is an unspoken difference between the two sets of Islamists, and the difference is that the Iraqi Islamists are (in due time) in the orbit of Islamic Iran. That is why there is fear in Washington and Tel Aviv that Iraq’s future will be one that integrates into a larger “Islamic Republic”, consisting of Iran and Iraq, and perhaps even Afghanistan and other areas surrounding the current Islamic Republic of Iran. The sectarian danger is rearing its ugly head from under the Saudi cloak and with a Saudi dagger. The gloss of this new dispensation is the fascination of Islamic figures in Tunisia, Egypt, and Morocco with the Turkish model of Islamic rule.

Rachid Al-Ghannoushi, head of the Islamic al-Nahdah party is reported on numerous occasions to have said that he is not a Khomeini, that he is impressed with the “Islamists” of Turkey, and that the Tunisian beaches will remain open for European tourists. In December, when the above developments were unfolding, he came to Washington, DC to assure the imperialist emperors that they should have nothing to worry about Islamists assuming government positions in Tunisia. He even gave the Friday khutbah on Capitol Hill! Al-Ikhwan al-Muslimun have been nursing bruises to their ego in both Iraq and Syria. Their leaders are shuttling back and forth between Istanbul, Cairo, al-Doha, and Riyadh, places where the Americans call the shots. Al-Ikhwan al-Muslimun in Jordan boycotted the iftar invitation from the ambassador of the Islamic Republic of Iran on the last Jumu‘ah of Ramadan which is the International Day of al-Quds. Their excuse was that they object to Iran’s position vis-à-vis the Syrian government and its crackdown and crimes against the Syrian people.

While the Saudi sectarians do not have a choke-hold on the Ikhwan, they have their Salafi Trojan Horse, which they can use to channel the Ikhwan and line them up behind Washington’s grand policies in the area: namely an irreconcilable position with Tehran and a passive position vis-à-vis Tel Aviv.

Washington and Tel Aviv worked on draining the Islamic movement of its revolutionary spirit by bleeding it to death via al-Qaeda and then financially strapping it to death via the Arabian cash-cows. The larger scheme that is at work here is to move the worldwide Islamic movement from its affinity with the Islamic Republic of Iran into a cozy position with the imperialist Republic of America. The price for Islamists in power in the Arabian states is high indeed.

This American compatible Islam gives a new meaning and dimension to the words of Imam Khomeini and Sayyid Qutb when they spoke about an “American Islam”.

“Have they, then, never journeyed about the earth, letting their hearts gain wisdom, and causing their ears to hear? Yet, verily, it is not their eyes that have become blind — but blind have become the hearts that are in their breasts! (22:46).”

Privacy Policy  |  Terms of Use
Copyrights © 1436 AH
Sign In
 
Forgot Password?
 
Not a Member? Signup

Loading...