The "War on Islam" is a concept advocated by some Muslims to denote what they perceive as a concerted effort by non-Muslims and "false Muslims" to harm, weaken, or annihilate Islam and Muslim society around the world. This effort is described as consisting of any level of military, economic, social, or cultural interference in the affairs of Muslim-majority countries, accompanied by negative portrayals of Islam in the media. Though the idea itself was put forward by some Muslim scholars centuries ago, it became particularly widespread in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks and the beginning of the global war on terrorism in 2001. Generally, the themes of the "War on Islam" mostly concern the issues of modernization and secularization in Muslim society, as well as current international power politics. Many Islamists who have asserted the "War on Islam" theory have cited the Crusades as the earliest manifestation of an ongoing organized campaign to destroy Islam.
The phrase or similar phrases have been used by several notable Muslim figures, such as Egyptian political theorist Sayyid Qutb; Iranian revolutionary Ruhollah Khomeini, who led the 1979 Islamic Revolution; Yemeni-American cleric Anwar al-Awlaki; Saudi-born militant leader Osama bin Laden, who founded al-Qaeda in 1988; Chechen warlord Dokka Umarov; British-Pakistani cleric Anjem Choudary; and Palestinian-American ex-soldier Nidal Hasan, who perpetrated the 2009 Fort Hood shooting. The concept has also been repeatedly invoked by a number of jihadist groups, including al-Qaeda and the Islamic State. The English-language political neologism of "War on Islam" was coined in Islamist discourse in the 1990s and gained significant popularity as a conspiracy theory after 2001. While the "War on Islam" theory primarily and most frequently targets the Western world and Israel as the perceived orchestrators, it has also been used to antagonize a variety of other societies and countries, namely India, Russia, and China, as well as the governments of Muslim countries that are seen as subservient to the aforementioned non-Muslim orchestrators' interests.
American author Jonathan Schanzer has argued that the historical Muslim indifference to the Western world turned to "alarmed dislike" with the beginning of Western military and economic superiority in the 17th century. However, since the end of the era of Western colonialism, the rage among Islamists towards non-Muslims and the governments of Muslim-majority countries stems not from alleged non-Muslim aggression and enmity, but from frustration over the unrelenting encroachment of non-Muslim culture, technology, economies, and from a yearning for a "return to the glorious days when Islam reigned supreme."
Usage of the term and concept
The most influential Islamists who have alleged a broad malicious conspiracy against the societal system of Islam are:
Sayyid Qutb
From the background of the Muslim Brotherhood organization and ideology, Sayyid Qutb, possibly the most influential Islamist author, often described as "the man whose ideas would shape Al Qaeda",PBS program America at the crossroads "Qutb, founder of the Muslim Brotherhood, visits America in 1948" also preached that the West was not just in conflict with Islam but plotting against it. In his book Milestones, first published in 1964, he wrote:
The Western ways of thought … [have] an enmity toward all religion, and in particular with greater hostility toward Islam. This enmity toward Islam is especially pronounced and many times is the result of a well-thought-out scheme the object of which is first to shake the foundations of Islamic beliefs and then gradually to demolish the structure of Muslim society.Qutb, Milestones, (1981) p.116
Olivier Roy has described Qutb's attitude as one of "radical contempt and hatred" for the West,Roy, Olivier, Globalized Islam : the Search for a New Ummah, Columbia University Press, 2004, p. 250. and complains that the propensity of Muslims like Qutb to blame problems on outside conspiracies "is currently paralyzing Muslim political thought. For to say that every failure is the devil's work is the same as asking God, or the devil himself (which is to say these days the Americans), to solve one's problems."Roy, Olivier, The Failure of Political Islam, translated by Carol Volk, Harvard University Press, 1994, p.19-20
Among the early books following Qutb is Qadat al-gharb yaquluman: dammiru al-Islam, ubidu ahlahu (Western Leaders Are Saying: Destroy Islam, Annihilate All of Its People) written by Jalal `Alam and published in 1977.Cook, Understanding Jihad, (2005), p.137
Ayatollah Khomeini Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the Shia Islamist leader of the 1979 Iranian Revolution and founder of the Islamic Republic of Iran, preached that Western imperialists or neoimperialists sought to make Muslims suffer, to "plunder" their resources and other wealth, and had to undermine Islam first because Islam stood in the way of this stealing and immiseration.Khomeini, Islam and Revolution (1981) p.34 Khomeini claims some of the alleged Western plots being not recent but hundreds of years old.Khomeini, Islam and Revolution (1981) p.139Some speculate that the figure of 300 years may come from the date of farthest advance of Muslim armies. On September 11, 1683, the king of Poland began the Battle of Vienna, where the army of the Ottoman Empire under Grand Vizier Merzifonlu Kara Mustafa Pasha was defeated. In the next two centuries the Ottoman Empire was militarily rolled back and economically overshadowed and by Western Christian military power and technology. see: Wright, Lawrence, Looming Tower, (2006), p.171
[Europeans] have known the power of Islam themselves for it once ruled part of Europe, and they know that true Islam is opposed to their activities. (...) From the very outset, therefore, they have sought to remove this obstacle from their path by disparaging Islam (...). They have resorted to malicious propaganda (...).Khomeini, Islam and Revolution, (1981) p.140 The agents of imperialism are busy in every corner of the Islamic world drawing our youth away from us with their evil propaganda.Khomeini, Islam and Revolution (1981) p.127 They are destroying Islam! Agents – both foreigners sent by the imperialists and natives employed by them – have spread out into every village and region of Iran and are leading our children and young people astray.Khomeini, Islam and Revolution (1981) p.128
Osama bin Laden From a Salafist perspective, Osama bin Laden emphasizes the alleged war and urges Muslims to take arms against it in almost all of his written or recorded messages.bin Laden, Messages, (2006) In his 1998 fatwa where he declared the killing of "Americans and their allies—civilians and military—is an individual duty for every Muslim who can do it in any country in which it is possible to do it," bin Laden listed three reasons for the fatwa: the presence of US troops in Saudi Arabia, the increase in infant mortality in Iraq following US-supported sanctions there, and US aid to Israel.
All these crimes and sins committed by the Americans are a clear declaration of war on Allah, his messenger, and Muslims. What bears no doubt in this fierce Judeo-Christian campaign against the Muslim world, the likes of which has never been seen before, is that the Muslims must prepare all possible might to repel the enemy (...).published in Islamic magazine from Australia, Nida'ul Islam (The Call of Islam), October–November 1996 Every day, from east to west, our umma of 1200 million Muslims is being slaughtered (...)bin Laden, Messages, (2006), p.153, from December 2001 statement recorded for release to al-Jazeera, shown on al-Jazeera December 26. We (...) see events not as isolated incidents, but as part of a long chain of conspiracies, a war of annihilation (...).bin Laden, Messages, (2006), p.133, from Letter to al-Jazeera's Kabul Bureau November 3, 2001, 10 days before the Northern Alliance entry. The West (...) will not be able to respect others' beliefs or feelings. (...) They regard jihad for the sake of God or defending one's self or his country as an act of terror.Transcript of Osama bin Laden's audiotape , dated April 23, 2006, "Aljazeera"
Allegations relating to the supposed war against Islam
Islamic tradition and history According to scholar David B. Cook, a religious studies professor at Rice University, what some believe is scriptural evidence for the existence of the alleged "War against Islam" is found in a popular hadith, one that supposedly prophesies a war against Islam is the "Tradition of Thawban":Cook, Understanding Jihad (2005), p.143 The Messenger of God said: The nations are about to flock against you [the Muslims] from every horizon, just as hungry people flock to a kettle. We said: O Messenger of God, will we be few on that day? He said: No, you will be many in number, but you will be scum, like the scum of a flash-flood, without any weight, since fear will be removed from the hearts of your enemies, and weakness (wahn) will be placed in your hearts. We said: O Messenger of God, what does the word wahn mean? He said: Love of this world, and fear of death.Abu Da'ud, Sunan, (Beirut, 1988), IV, p.108 (no. 4297) quoted in Cook, Understanding Jihad - Abu Dawood declared some of Hadiths (including the above) in his book to be unauthentic (2005), p.143Others maintain the hadith or similar ones are authentic. Cook claims that the idea of a Western war against the societal system of Islam is a belief "at the heart of the radical Muslim and especially the globalist radical Muslim;" a factor "binding globalist radical Muslims together." A factor that "connects the stupidity of extremist Muslims who interfere in world affairs to listen to the words of a person claiming to be a liar under the pretext of Islam, otherwise Islam itself does not have any such offensive statements."Cook Understanding Jihad, 2005, p.136
Western supporters of the belief in ingrained Western hatred of – or hostility towards – Islam include historian Roger Savory, and Boston-based novelist and author James Carroll. According to Savory, Christendom felt threatened by Islam and its march into Europe (the Muslim Umayyad Caliphate advanced into Europe as far as northern France before being defeated at the Battle of Tours in 732; the Muslim Ottoman Empire attempted to conquer Vienna twice, laying siege to the city in 1529 and 1683), and thus became hostile to it. Therefore, the domineering actions of the kings of the time were blamed on Islam and forced Christianity to be at enmity with Islam, even though both of them were divine religions and introduced a way to live in peace, and were in harmony and development with each other.Savory, R.M., Christendom vs Islam: interaction & co-existence, Introduction to Islamic Civilisation, p.127Savory, R.M., Christendom vs Islam: interaction & co-existence, Introduction to Islamic Civilisation, p.128
Legacy of the Crusades