Everything about Islamist Terrorism totally explained
Islamic terrorism (also known as
Islamist terrorism or
Jihadist terrorism) is
religious terrorism by those whose motivations are rooted in their interpretations of
Islam.
Statistics gathered for 2006 by the
National Counterterrorism Center of the United States indicated that "Islamic extremism" was responsible for approximately 25% of all terrorism fatalities worldwide, Terrorist acts have included
airline hijacking,
beheading,
kidnapping,
assassination,
roadside bombing,
suicide bombing, and occasionally
rape.
Perhaps the most resonant incident of Islamic terrorism was the
9/11 attack on the United States. Other prominent attacks have occurred in Iraq, Afghanistan, India, Israel, Britain, Spain, France, Russia and China. These terrorist groups often describe their actions as Islamic
jihad (struggle). Self-proclaimed sentences of punishment or death, issued publicly as threats, often come in the form of
fatwas (Islamic legal judgments). Both Muslims and non-Muslims have been among the targets and victims, but threats against Muslims are often issued as
takfir (a declaration that a person, group or institution that describes itself as Muslim has in fact left Islam and thus is a traitor). This is an implicit death threat as the punishment for
apostasy in Islam is death under
Sharia law.
The controversies surrounding the subject include whether the terrorist act is self-defense or aggression, national self-determination or Islamic supremacy; the targeting of noncombatants; whether
Islam ever could condone terrorism; whether some attacks described as Islamic terrorism are merely terrorist acts committed by Muslims or nationalists; how much support there's in the Muslim world for Islamic terrorism; whether the
Arab-Israeli Conflict is the root of Islamic terrorism, or simply one cause.
"Islamic" terrorism
"Islamic terrorism" is itself a controversial phrase.
Bernard Lewis emphasizes that there's nothing in Islam that conduces terrorism. Islam condemns the maltreatment of the innocent, like other religions, and has laid down
rules for the humane treatment of noncombatants during war. Today, "Islamic terrorism" is an importation from the West.
Jamal Nassar and Karim H. Karim contend that, because there are over a billion adherents of the religion, the phenomenon is more precisely regarded as "Islamist terrorism" because
Islamism describes political ideologies rooted in interpretations of Islam. In this vein, describing terrorism as "Islamic" may confirm "a prejudicial perspective of all things Islamic".
Karen Armstrong contends that "fundamentalism is often a form of nationalism in religious disguise", and that using the phrase "Muslim terrorism" is dangerously counterproductive, as it suggests those in the west believe that such atrocities are caused by Islam, and hence reinforces the viewpoint of some in the Muslim world that the west is an implacable enemy. Armstrong believes that the terrorists in no way represent mainstream Islam, and suggests the use of other terms such as "
Wahhabi terrorism" and "
Qutbian terrorism".
Formed by bin Laden and Muhammad Atef in the aftermath of the
Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in the late 1980s, Al Qaeda called for the use of violence against civilians and military of the United States and any countries that are allied with it. Since its formation Al Qaeda has committed a number of terrorist acts in
Africa, the
Middle East,
Europe, and
Asia. Although once supported by the
Taliban organization in Afghanistan, the U.S. and British governments never considered the
Taliban to have been a terrorist organization.
Europe
Major lethal attacks on civilians in Europe credited to Islamic terrorism include the March 11
2004 bombings of commuter trains in Madrid, where 191 people were killed and 2,050 wounded, and the
7 July 2005 London bombings, also of public transport, which killed 52 commuters and injured 700.
Russia
Politically-motivated attacks on civilians in Russia have been traced to separatist sentiment among Muslims in its Caucasus region, particularly Chechnya. Russia's two biggest terrorist attacks both came from Muslim groups. In the
Nord-Ost incident at a theater in
Moscow in October 2002, the Chechnyan separatist "Special Purpose Islamic Regiment" took an estimated 850 people hostage. An estimated 300 Russians died in an attempted rescue. Whether this attack would more properly be called a
nationalist rather than an Islamist attack is in question.
In the September 2004
Beslan school hostage crisis 1,200 schoolchildren and adults were taken hostage after "School Number One" secondary school in Beslan, North Ossetia-Alania was overrun by the "Caucasus Caliphate Jihad" led by
Shamil Basayev. As many as 500 died, including 186 children. According to the only surviving attacker, Nur-Pashi Kulayev, the choice of a school and the targeting of mothers and young children by the attackers was done in hopes of generating a maximum of outrage and igniting a wider war in the Caucasus with the ultimate goal of establishing an Islamic
Emirate across the whole of the
North Caucasus.
Turkey
Hezbollah (Turkish)
Unrelated to the more famous
Shia Hezbollah of Lebanon, this
Sunni terrorist group has been credited with the assassination of Diyarbakir police chief Gaffar Okkan, and the November 2003 bombings of two synagogues, the British consulate in
Istanbul and HSBC bank headquarters, killing 58 and wounding several hundred.
Iraq
The area that has seen some of the worst terror attacks in modern history has been Iraq as part of the
Iraq War. In 2005, there were 400 incidents of one type of attack (suicide bombing), killing more than 2000 people - many if not most of them civilians. In 2006, almost half of all reported terrorist attacks in the world (6600), and more than half of all terrorist fatalities (13,000), occurred in Iraq, according to the
National Counterterrorism Center of the United States. The insurgency in Iraq against the US and Iraqi government combines attacks on "Coalition troops" and the Iraqi security forces, with attacks on civilian contractors, aid workers, and infrastructure. Along with nationalist
Ba'athist groups and
criminal, non-political attacks, the insurgency includes Islamist insurgent groups, who favor suicide attacks far more than non-Islamist groups.
They include the
Abu Musab al-Zarqawi's al-Qaeda affiliate; Al-Faruq Brigades, a militant wing of the Islamic Movement in Iraq (Al-Harakah al-Islamiyyah fi al-arak);
Jamaat Ansar al-Sunna; the Mujahideen of the Victorious Sect (Mujahideen al ta’ifa al-Mansoura); the Mujahideen Battalions of the Salafi Group of Iraq (Kata’ib al mujahideen fi al-jama’ah al-salafiyah fi al-‘arak); the Jihad Brigades/Cell; "White Flags, Muslim Youth and Army of Mohammed" ;
Ansar al-Islam, a Taliban-like, jihadist group with ties to Al Qaeda. At least some of the terrorism has a transnational character in that some foreign Islamic jihadists have joined the insurgency.
Lebanon
Fatah al-Islam
Fatah al-Islam is an
Islamist group operating out of the
Nahr al-Bared refugee camp in northern
Lebanon. It was formed in November 2006 by fighters who broke off from the pro-
Syrian
Fatah al-Intifada, itself a splinter group of
Fatah, and is led by a Palestinian fugitive militant named
Shaker al-Abssi. The group's members have been described as militant
jihadists, and the group itself has been described as a terrorist movement that draws inspiration from
al-Qaeda. Its stated goal is to reform the Palestinian refugee camps under
Islamic sharia law, and its primary targets are
Israel and the
United States. consider it, or a part of it, to be a terrorist group responsible for blowing up the
American embassy and later its annex, as well as the
barracks of American and French peacekeeping troops and a
dozens of kidnappings of foreigners in Beirut. It is also accused of being the recipient of massive aid for its Persian Shia Neighbor Iran, and of serving "Iranian foreign policy calculations and interests,"or serving as a "subcontractor of Iranian initiatives" Hezbollah denies any involvement or dependence on Iran.
In the Arab and Muslim worlds, on the other hand, Hezbollah is regarded as a legitimate and successful resistance movement that drove both Western powers and Israel out of Lebanon. In 2005, the Lebanese Prime Minister said of Hezbollah, it "is not a militia. It's a resistance."
Hezbollah's simultaneous suicide attacks on US and French barracks in Beirut and the withdrawal of American peacekeeping troops shortly thereafter the bombings proompted is thought to have "made a profound impression on bin Laden."
Israel & Palestinian Territories
Hamas
Hamas, ("zeal" in Arabic and an acronym for Harakat al-Muqawama al-Islamiyya), began support for attacks on military and civilian targets in
Israel at the beginning of the
Intifada in 1987. As the Muslim Brotherhood organization for
Palestine its leadership was made up of "intellectuals from the devout middle class,... respectable religious clerics, doctors, chemists, engineers, and teachers.
The 1988 charter of
Hamas calls for the destruction of
Israel, and it still states its goal to be the elimination of Israel. Its "military wing" has claimed responsibility for
numerous attacks in Israel. Hamas has also been accused of sabotaging the Israeli-Palestine peace process by launching attacks on civilians during Israeli elections to anger Israeli voters and facilitate the election of harder-line Israeli candidates. For example, "a series of spectacular suicide attacks by Palestinians that killed 63 Israelis and led directly to the election victory of
Benjamin Netanyahu and his Likud party on May 29, 1996."
Hamas justifies these attacks as necessary in fighting the
Israeli occupation of Palestinian territory, and as responses to Israeli attacks on Palestinian targets. The wider movement also serves as a charity organization and provides services to Palestinians.
Hamas has been designated as a terrorist group by the
European Union,
Canada, the
United States,
Israel, the
United Nations Commission on Human Rights and
Human Rights Watch. Opponents of this view claim that Israel isn't a legitimate state because of the conditions of its establishment after
World War II.
Islamic Jihad
Islamic Jihad is a militant Palestinian group Islamist group based in the Syrian capital,
Damascus, and dedicated to waging jihad to eliminate the state of
Israel. It was formed by Egyptian Fathi Shaqaqi in the Gaza Strip following the
Iranian Revolution which inspired its members. From 1983 onward, it engaged in "a succession of violent, high-profile attacks" on Israeli targets. The intifada which "it eventually sparked" was quickly taken over by much larger the
PLO and
Hamas. Beginning in September 2000, it started a campaign of suicide bombing attacks against Israelis. It is currently led by Sheikh Abdullah Sheikh Abdullah Ramadan.
The PIJ's armed wing, the Al-Quds brigades, has claimed responsibility for numerous militant attacks in Israel, including suicide bombings and the group has been designated as a terrorist group by the several countries in the West.
North Africa
Armed Islamic Group
The Armed Islamic Group, active in Algeria between 1992 and 1998, was one of the most violent Islamic terrorist groups, and is thought to have
takfired the Muslim population of Algeria. Its campaign to overthrow the Algerian government included civilian massacres, which sometimes wiping out entire villages in its area of operation (see
List of Algerian massacres of the 1990s; notably the
Bentalha massacre and
Rais massacre, among others.) It also targeted foreigners living in Algeria killing more than 100 expatriate men and women in the country. The group's favored technique was the kidnapping of victims and slitting their throats although it also used assassination by gun and bombings, including car bombs. Outside of Algeria, the GIA established a presence in France, Belgium, Britain, Italy and the United States. In recent years it has been eclipsed by a splinter group, The Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC), now called
Al-Qaeda Organization in the Islamic Maghreb.
South Asia
Lashkar-e-Toiba
Pakistan based
Lashkar-e-Toiba is a militant group that seeks the Indian state of
Jammu and Kashmir's accession to
Pakistan. It has committed mass militant actions against Indian troops and civilian
Hindus.
The Lashkar leadership describes
Indian and
Israeli regimes as the main enemies of Islam, claiming India and
Israel to be the main enemies of
Pakistan. Lashkar-e-Toiba, along with
Jaish-e-Mohammed, another militant group active in
Kashmir are on the United States’ foreign terrorist organizations list. They are also designated as terrorist groups by the
United Kingdom, India,
Australia and
Pakistan.
Jaish-e-Mohammed
Jaish-e-Mohammed (often abbreviated as
JEM) is a major Islamic militant organization in
South Asia. Jaish-e-Mohammed was formed in 1994 and is based in the
Islamic Republic of Pakistan. The group's primary objective is to separate
Kashmir from
India, and it has carried out a series of attacks all over India.
The group was formed after the supporters of
Maulana Masood Azhar split from another Islamic militant organization,
Harkut-ul-Mujahideen. It is believed that the group gets considerable funding from Pakistani expatriates in the
United Kingdom. The group is regarded as a terrorist organization by several countries including
India,
United States and
United Kingdom. Jaish-e-Mohammed is viewed by some as the "deadliest" and "the principal terrorist organization in
Jammu and Kashmir". The group was also implicated in the kidnapping and murder of
American journalist
Daniel Pearl. The organization was officially banned in
February 2005 after attacks on
NGOs, but struck back in August when 300 bombs were detonated almost simultaneously throughout Bangladesh. Dhaka international airport, government buildings and major hotels were targeted.
Afghanistan
In Afghanistan,
Taliban and
Hezb-e-Islami Gulbuddin forces, are reported to have "sharply escalated bombing and other attacks in 2006 and early 2007" against civilians. During 2006 "at least 669 Afghan civilians were killed in at least 350 armed attacks, most of which appear to have been intentionally launched at civilians or civilian objects. An additional 52 civilians were killed in insurgent attacks in the first two months of 2007."
Southeast Asia
Abu Sayyaf Group
The
Abu Sayyaf Group also known as
al-Harakat al-Islamiyya is one of several militant
Islamist separatist groups based in and around the southern islands of
the Philippines, in
Bangsamoro (
Jolo,
Basilan, and
Mindanao) where for almost 30 years various Muslim groups have been engaged in an insurgency for a state, independent of the predominantly
Christian Philippines. The name of the group is derived from the Arabic ابو,
abu ("father of") and
sayyaf ("Swordsmith").
Since its inception in the early 1990s, the group has carried out
bombings,
assassinations,
kidnappings,
rapes, and
extortion in their fight for an independent
Islamic state in western Mindanao and the
Sulu Archipelago with the stated goal of creating a pan-Islamic superstate across
southeast Asia, spanning from east to west; the island of Mindanao, the Sulu Archipelago, the island of
Borneo (
Malaysia,
Indonesia), the
South China Sea, and the
Malay Peninsula (
Peninsular Malaysia,
Thailand and
Myanmar).
The
U.S. Department of State has branded the group a terrorist entity by adding it to the list of
Foreign Terrorist Organizations. This tactic is used against civilians, soldiers, and government officials of the regimes the terrorists oppose. The use of suicide bombers is seen by many Muslims as contradictory to Islam's teachings; however, groups who support its use often refer to such attacks as "
martyrdom operations" and the suicide-bombers who commit them as "
martyrs" (Arabic: shuhada, plural of "shahid"). The bombers, and their sympathizers often believe that suicide bombers, as martyrs to the cause of jihad against the enemy, will receive the rewards of
paradise for their actions.
Hijackings
The hijacking of passenger vehicles such as cars, buses, and planes has also become a hallmark of Islamist terrorism, particularly as a result of the simultaneous hijacking of the four passenger jets utilized in the September 11th terrorist attacks as well as the hijacking of a Belgian airlines jet during the 1972
Munich Olympic Massacre.
Kidnappings and executions
Along with bombings and hijackings, Islamist terrorists have made extensive use of highly-publicised kidnappings and executions, often circulating videos of the acts for use as propaganda. Notable
foreign victims include
Nick Berg,
Daniel Pearl,
Paul Marshall Johnson, Jr.,
Eugene Armstrong,
Jack Hensley,
Kim Sun-il,
Kenneth Bigley,
Shosei Koda,
Fabrizio Quattrocchi,
Margaret Hassan. One Iraqi victim was
Seif Adnan Kanaan. The most frequent form of execution by these groups has been decapitations, often committed while shouting the Islamic chant, "
Allahu Akbar" (Arabic for God is greatest). While some targets are military, or seen as supporting the anti-Islamist forces, victims are also as varied as the Red Cross, the Iraqi education ministry, and diplomats.
Motivation, ideology and theology
Motivation
To what extent Islamic terrorists are motivated by religious belief is disputed.
Robert Pape, has argued that at least terrorists utilizing suicide-homicide attacks -- a particularly effective form of terrorist attack -- are driven not by Islamism but by "a clear strategic objective: to compel modern democracies to withdraw military forces from the territory that the terrorists view as their homeland."
Critics of Pape's theory argue it doesn't account for the lack of suicide bombings in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank in Israel for nearly 30 years after the occupation began, for the targeting of native, non-combatant Shia by jihadi bombers in Iraq, the prominence of British-born Pakistanis in bombings in London, or of North Africans, and especially Moroccans, in the second wave of al-Qaeda attackers.
In particular, scholar Scott Atran, points out that the massive increase in suicide bombing has meant most suicide bombings have occurred after Pape's study ended in 2003. "Roughly 600," suicide attacks occurred in just two years, 2004 and 2005, more "than in Pape's entire sample," - and the overwhelming majority of these bombers have been motivated by the ideology of Islamist martyrdom.
Some supporters of
Palestinian political violence have claimed that citizens of Israel are legitimate military targets because Jewish adolescents are required by law to serve in the country's military.
Former
CIA analyst
Michael Scheuer's view is that Islamic terror attacks against America are motivated by the perception that
U.S. foreign policy is a threat to Islam. He has further condensed his argument down to the phrase "They hate us for what we do, not who we are." By this, Scheuer acknowledges that American culture and religion are offensive to many Muslims, but claims these factors have very little role as motivators of Islamic terrorism. Rather, he cites the following U.S. foreign policy actions as fueling Islamic terror:
Bergesen and Lizardo wrote "Crenshaw (2001:425) argues that 'terrorism should be seen as a strategic reaction to American power,' an idea associated with Johnson's (2000) 'blowback' thesis. In this view, the prescence of empires - both at the end of the last century and today - and the analogous unipolar military position of the United States today (Brooks and Wohlforth 2002) provoke resistance in the form of terrorism. Johnson (2000) notes that the Russian, Ottoman, and Habsburg Empires - which controlled multiple ethnic, religious, and national peoples - led to a backlash, or blowback, by Serb, Macedonian, and Bosnian terrorist organisations (the Black Hand, Young Bosnia, Narodnaya Volya). By analogy the powerful global position of the United States, particularly in its role of propping up repressive undemocratic regimes, constitutes something of a similar condition with Arab-Islamic terrorism as a result. The causal mechanism here's that the projection of military power plants seeds of later terrorist reactions, as 'retaliation for previous American imperial actions' (Johnson 2000:9)"
Profile
Lawrence Wright and Olivier Roy have mentioned the characteristic of "displacement" of members of the most famous Islamic terrorist group, Al-Qaeda.
What the recruits tended to have in common - besides their urbanity, their cosmopolitan backgrounds, their education, their facility with languages, and their computer skills - was displacement. Most who joined the jihad did so in a country other than the one in which they were reared. They were Algerians living in expatriate enclaves in France, Moroccans in Spain, or Yemenis in Saudi Arabia. Despite their accomplishments, they'd little standing in the host societies where they lived. ...."
Another author, forensic psychiatrist and former foreign service officer Marc Sageman, made an "intensive study of biographical data on 172 participants in the jihad," in his book "Understanding Terror Networks". He concluded "social networks", the "tight bonds of family and friendship" rather than behavioral disorders "poverty, trauma, madness, [or] ignorance" inspired alienated young Muslims to join the jihad" and kill.
What may be an indication that this profile is changing comes from a 2007 study of 110 suicide bombers in Afghanistan, by an Afghan pathologist Dr. Yusef Yadgari. Yadgari found that "80%" of the attackers studied had some kind of physical or mental disability. The bombers were also "not celebrated like their counterparts in other Arab nations. Afghan bombers are not featured on posters or in videos as martyrs."
Ideology
Tenets of Islamic terrorism have been summarized by Dale C. Eikmeier as being:
A belief that Muslims have deviated from true Islam and must return to “pure Islam” as originally practiced during the time of the Prophet.
The path to “pure Islam” is only through a literal and strict interpretation of the Quran and Hadith, along with implementation of the Prophet’s commands.
Muslims should interpret the original sources individually without being bound to follow the interpretations of Islamic scholars.
That any interpretation of the Quran from a historical, contextual perspective is a corruption, and that the majority of Islamic history and the classical jurisprudential tradition is mere sophistry.
Transnational Islamist ideology, specifically of the militant Islamists, assert a Western polities and society are actively anti-Islamic, or as it's sometimes described, waging a "war on Islam". Islamists often identify what they see as a historical struggle between Christianity and Islam, dating back as far as the Crusades, among other historical conflicts between practitioners of the two respective religions. Osama bin Laden, for example, almost invariably describes his enemy as aggressive and his call for action against them as defensive. Defensive jihad differs from offensive jihad in being "fard al-ayn," or a personal obligation of all Muslim, rather than "fard al-kifaya", a communal obligation, which if some Muslims perform it isn't required from others. Hence, framing a fight as defensive has the advantage both of appearing to be a victim rather than aggressor, and of giving your struggle the very highest religious priority for all good Muslims.
Many of the violent terrorist groups use the name of Jihad to fight against Christians and Jews. An example is Bin Laden's Al-Qaeda, which is also known as 'International Islamic Front for Jihad Against the Jews and Crusaders'. Most militant Islamists oppose Israel's policies, and often its existence.
The historic rivalry between Hindus and Muslims in the Indian subcontinent has also often been the primary motive behind some of the most deadly terrorist attacks in India. According to a US State Department report, India topped the list of countries worst affected by Islamic terrorism.
In addition, Islamist Jihadis, scholars, and leaders opposed Western society for what they see as immoral secularism. Islamists have claimed that such unrestricted free speech has led to the proliferation of pornography, immorality, secularism, homosexuality, feminism, and many other ideas that Islamists often oppose. Although bin Laden almost always emphasized the alleged oppression of Muslims by America and Jews when talking about them in his messages, in his "Letter to America" he answered the question, "What are we calling you to, and what do we want from you?," with
We call you to be a people of manners, principles, honour, and purity; to reject the immoral acts of fornication, homosexuality, intoxicants, gambling's, and trading with interest ... You separate religion from your policies, ... You are the nation that permits Usury, which has been forbidden by all the religions ... You are a nation that permits the production, trading and usage of intoxicants ... You are a nation that permits acts of immorality ... You are a nation that permits gambling in its all forms. ... You use women to serve passengers, visitors, and strangers to increase your profit margins. You then rant that you support the liberation of women. ...
Accusations of apostasy
Justification for terrorism against other Muslims by militant Islamists, in particular against Muslim regimes they consider non-Islamic, is often based on the contention that the targets are apostates. Osama Bin Laden, for example, maintains that any Muslim who helps "infidels over Muslims" is no longer a Muslim,
... the believer ... should boycott the goods of America and her allies, and he should be very wary that he doesn't support falsehood, for helping the infidels over Muslims -- even with a single word is clear unbelief, as the religious scholars have decreed.
and that Taliban-ruled Afghanistan (deposed in 2001) "is the only Islamic country" in the world. Islamic law traditionally designates death as the penalty for apostasy (converting) from Islam.
Opinions within the Muslim community vary as to the grounds on which an individual may be declared to have apostatized. The most common view among Muslim scholars is that a declaration of takfir (designation of a Muslim as an apostate) can only be made by an established religious authority. Mainstream Muslim scholars usually oppose recourse to takfir, except in rare instances. Takfir was used as justification for the assassination of Egyptian President Anwar Sadat.
Interpretations of the Qur'an
The role played by the Qur'an, Islam's sacred text, in opposing or in encouraging attacks on civilians is hotly disputed.
Mohammed Reza Taheri-azar, an Iranian-born American citizen awaiting trial for nine counts of attempted murder, cited a number of verses from the Qur'an in justifying his attempt to kill civilians, including:
Fighting is prescribed for you, and ye dislike it. But it's possible that ye dislike a thing which is good for you, and that ye love a thing which is bad for you. But Allah knoweth, and ye know not.
The punishment of those who wage war against Allah and His Messenger, and strive with might and main for mischief through the land is: execution, or crucifixion, or the cutting off of hands and feet from opposite sides, or exile from the land: that's their disgrace in this world, and a heavy punishment is theirs in the Hereafter;
But when the forbidden months are past, then fight and slay the Pagans wherever ye find them, and seize them, beleaguer them, and lie in wait for them in every stratagem (of war); but if they repent, and establish regular prayers and practise regular charity, then open the way for them: for Allah is Oft-forgiving, Most Merciful.
Fight those who believe not in Allah nor the Last Day, nor hold that forbidden which hath been forbidden by Allah and His Messenger, nor acknowledge the religion of Truth, (even if they are) of the People of the Book, until they pay the Jizya with willing submission, and feel themselves subdued. The Jews call 'Uzair a son of Allah, and the Christians call Christ the son of Allah. That is a saying from their mouth; (in this) they but imitate what the unbelievers of old used to say. Allah's curse be on them: how they're deluded away from the Truth!
Marmaduke Pickthall, a Western convert to Islam and Islamic scholar commented on verse, references verse, and interpreted these particular verses to mean that fighting isn't optional when done in defense of the oppressed and the weak.
Pickthall goes on to say that “Nowhere does the Qur’an approve a spirit of revenge” and situates verse in the context of a defensive war. Ibn Kathir stated that the Quran clearly commands believers to prefer forgiveness over retaliation wherever possible.
Michael Sells and Jane I. Smith (a Professor of Islamic Studies) write that barring some extremists like Al-Qaeda, most Muslims don't interpret Qura’nic verses as promoting warfare; and that the phenomenon of radical interpretation of scripture by extremist groups isn't unique to Islam.". According to Sells, "[MostMuslims] no more expect to apply [theverses at issue] to their contemporary non-Muslim friends and neighbors than most Christians and Jews consider themselves commanded by God, like the Biblical Joshua, to exterminate the infidels.". Following the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks in New York, Pennsylvania (and Arlington), Shaikh Abdul-Azeez Aal ash-Shaikh (the Grand Mufti of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia President of the Committee of Major Scholars and centre for Knowledge based research and verdicts) made an official statement that "the Islamic Sharee'ah (legislation) doesn't sanction" such actions.
A Salafi or "Wahhabi" "Committee of Major Scholars" in Saudi Arabia has declared that "Islamic" terrorism, such as the May 2003 bombing in Riyadh, are in violation of Sharia law and aiding the enemies of Islam. .
Criticism of Islamic terrorism on Islamic grounds has also been made by anti-terrorist Muslims such as Abdal-Hakim Murad:
Certainly, neither bin Laden nor his principal associate, Ayman al-Zawahiri, are graduates of Islamic universities. And so their proclamations ignore 14 centuries of Muslim scholarship, and instead take the form of lists of anti-American grievances and of Koranic quotations referring to early Muslim wars against Arab idolaters. These are followed by the conclusion that all Americans, civilian and military, are to be wiped off the face of the Earth. All this amounts to an odd and extreme violation of the normal methods of Islamic scholarship. Had the authors of such fatwas followed the norms of their religion, they'd have had to acknowledge that no school of mainstream Islam allows the targeting of civilians. An insurrectionist who kills non-combatants is guilty of baghy, “armed aggression,” a capital offense in Islamic law.
One counter-terrorism scholar, Dale C. Eikmeier, points out the "questionable religious credentials" of many Islamist theorists, or "Qutbists," which can be a "means to discredit them and their message":
With the exception of Abul Ala Maududi and Abdullah Azzam, none of Qutbism’s main theoreticians trained at Islam’s recognized centers of learning. Although a devout Muslim, Hassan al Banna was a teacher and community activist. Sayyid Qutb was a literary critic. Muhammad Abd al-Salam Faraj was an electrician. Ayman al-Zawahiri is a physician. Osama bin Laden trained to be a businessman.
Yemeni Judge Hamoud Al-Hitar has also attacked the Islamic intellectual basis of terrorism using hujjat or proof "in theological dialogues that challenge and then correct the wayward beliefs" of terrorists or would-be terrorists.
Iranian Ayatollah Ozma Seyyed Yousef Sanei issued a fatwa (ruling) that suicide attacks against civilians are legitimate only in the context of war. The ruling didn't say whether other types of attacks against civilians are justified outside of the context of war, nor whether Jihad is included in Sanei's definition of war.
On the other hand, Fethullah Gülen, a prominent Turkish Islamic scholar, has claimed that "a real Muslim," who understood Islam in every aspect, couldn't be a terrorist. There are many other people with similar points of view such as Karen Armstrong, Prof. Ahmet Akgunduz, and Harun Yahya
Muslim attitudes toward terrorism
Muslim popular opinion on the subject of attacks on civilians by Islamist groups varies. While most Muslims living in the West denounce the September 11th attacks on the US, Hezbollah's rocket attacks against Israeli civilian targets are widely supported in the Muslim world and regarded as defensive Jihad by a legitimate resistance movement rather than terrorism.
A Sunday Times survey taken in UK shortly after the 9/11 attack "revealed that 40% of British Muslims believe Usama bin Laden was right to attack the United States. About the same proportion think that British Muslims have a right to fight alongside the Taliban. A radio station serving London's Pakistani community conducted a poll which 98% of London Muslims under 45 said they wouldn't fight for Britain, while 48% said they'd fight for bin Laden."
A 2005 Pew Research study that involved 17,000 people in 17 countries showed support for terrorism was declining in the Muslim world along with a growing belief that Islamic extremism represents a threat to those countries. A Daily Telegraph survey showed that 6% of British Muslims fully supported the July 2005 bombings in the London Underground.
A 2004 Pew survey revealed that Osama bin Laden is viewed favorably by large percentages in Pakistan (65%), Jordan (55%) and Morocco (45%). In Turkey as many as 31% say that suicide attacks against Americans and other Westerners in Iraq are justifiable.
The Free Muslims Coalition rallied against terror, stating that they wanted to send "a message to radical Muslims and supporters of terrorism that we reject them and that we'll defeat them."
Abdel Rahman al-Rashed, a Muslim and the general manager of Arab news channel, Al-Arabiya has said: "It is a certain fact that not all Muslims are terrorists, but it's equally certain, and exceptionally painful, that almost all terrorists are Muslims." Statistics compiled by the United States government's Counterterrorism Center present a more complicated picture: of known and specified terrorist incidents from the beginning of 2004 through the first quarter of 2005, slightly more than half of the fatalities were attributed to Islamic extremists but a majority of over-all incidents were considered of either "unknown/unspecified" or a secular political nature. The vast majority of the "unknown/unspecified" terrorism fatalities did however happen in Islamic regions such as Iraq and Afghanistan, or in regions where Islam is otherwise involved in conflicts such as the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, southern Thailand and Kashmir.The methodology employed by the Center is sometimes disputed and the center has been accused of responding to political pressure from the Bush administration to show a decline in terrorism.
In 2006, Palestine voters gave the group Hamas - which is designated as a terrorist organization in Israel, United States, Canada, and the European Union - a majority of the seats in its parliament. though there's question as to whether whether the election results represent support for the organization's militia tactics, support for the organization's social programs, or dissatisfaction with the previous government which was widely seen as corrupt and incompetent.
Fred Halliday, a British academic specialist on the Middle East, argues that most Muslims consider these acts to be egregious violations of Islam's laws.
Daniel Chirot said "Not many people in the world, either in Islamic countries, or Christian ones, or Hindu, or Buddhist, or anything else, really want to live a life of extreme puritanism, endless hate, and suicidal wars. Extremist leaders can take power, and for a time, be backed by much of their population hoping to redress past grievances and trying to find a new utopia. But as with the most extreme Christian warriors during the European wars of religion, or with the Nazis, or the most committed communist revolutionaries, it eventually turned out that few of their people were willing to go all the way in their struggles if that meant permanent violence, suffering, and death. So it'll be with Islamic extremism."
Examples of attacks
4 September 1972 - Munich Olympic Massacre.
18 April 1983 - April 1983 U.S. Embassy bombing in Beirut, Lebanon. 63 killed.
26 February 1993 - World Trade Center bombing, New York City. 6 killed.
13 March 1993 - 1993 Bombay bombings. Mumbai, India. The single-day attacks resulted in over 250 civilian fatalities and 700 injuries.
24 December 1994 - Air France Flight 8969 hijacking in Algiers by 3 members of Armed Islamic Group and another terrorist. 7 killed including 4 hijackers.
25 June 1996 - Khobar Towers bombing, 20 killed, 372 wounded.
14 February 1998. The 1998 Coimbatore bombings occurred in the city of Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu, India. 46 people were killed and over 200 were injured in 13 bomb attacks within a 12km radius.
7 August 1998 - 1998 United States embassy bombings in Tanzania and Kenya. 224 dead. 4000+ injured.
12 October 2000 - USS Cole bombing, 56 killed
11 September 2001 - September 11, 2001 attacks 4 planes hijacked and crashed into World Trade Center and The Pentagon by 19 hijackers. Nearly 3000 dead.
13 December 2001 - Suicide attack on India's parliament in New Delhi. Aimed at eliminating the top leadership of India and causing anarchy in the country. Allegedly done by Pakistan-based Islamist terrorist organizations, Jaish-E-Mohammad and Lashkar-e-Toiba.
3 March 2002 - Suicide bomb attack on a Passover Seder in a Hotel in Netanya, Israel. 29 dead, 133 injured
9 March 2002 - Café suicide bombing in Jerusalem; 11 killed, 54 injured.
7 May 2002 - Bombing in al-Arbaa, Algeria. 49 dead, 117 injured.
24 September 2002 - Machine Gun attack on Hindu temple in Ahmedabad, India. 31 dead, 86 injured.
12 October 2002 - Bombing in Bali nightclub. 202 killed, 300 injured.
16 May 2004 - Casablanca Attacks - 4 simultaneous attacks in Casablanca killing 33 civilians (mostly Moroccans) carried by Salafaia Jihadia.
11 March 2004 - Multiple bombings on trains near Madrid, Spain. 191 killed, 1460 injured. (alleged link to Al-Qaeda)
3 September 2004 Approximately 344 civilians including 186 children, are killed during the Beslan school hostage crisis.
2 November 2004 - Ritual murder of Theo van Gogh (film director) by Amsterdam-born jihadist Mohammed Bouyeri.
4 February 2005 - Muslim militants attacked the Christian community in Demsa, Nigeria, killing 36 people, destroying property and displacing an additional 3000 people.
7 July 2005 - Multiple bombings in London Underground. 53 killed by four suicide bombers. Nearly 700 injured.
23 July 2005 - Bomb attacks at Sharm el-Sheikh, an Egyptian resort city, at least 64 people killed.
29 October 2005 - 29 October 2005 Delhi bombings. Over 60 killed and over 180 injured in a series of three attacks in crowded markets and a bus, just 2 days before the Diwali festival.
9 November 2005 - 2005 Amman bombings. Over 60 killed and 115 injured, in a series of coordinated suicide attacks on hotels in Amman, Jordan. Four attackers including a husband and wife team were involved.
7 March 2006 - 2006 Varanasi bombings. An attack attributed to Lashkar-e-Toiba by Uttar Pradesh government officials, over 28 killed and over 100 injured, in a series of attacks in the Sankath Mochan Hanuman temple and Cantonment Railway Station in the Hindu holy city of Varanasi. Uttar Pradesh government officials.
11 July 2006. Mumbai, India. 11 July 2006 Mumbai train bombings were a series of seven bomb blasts that took place over a period of 11 minutes on the Suburban Railway in Mumbai (formerly known as Bombay). 209 people lost their lives and over 700 were injured in the attacks.
U.S. State Department list
Abu Sayyaf, Philippines
Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigade, Gaza Strip and West Bank
Al-Gama'a al-Islamiyya, Egypt (also known as The Islamic Group)
Al-Qaeda, worldwide
Ansar al-Islam, Iraq
Armed Islamic Group (GIA), Algeria
Army of Ansar al-Sunna, Iraq
AZF, France
East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM), China
Egyptian Islamic Jihad, Egypt
Al-Gama'a al-Islamiyya, Egypt
Great Eastern Islamic Raiders' Front (IBDA-C), Turkey
Hamas, Gaza Strip and West Bank
Harkat-ul-Mujahideen al-Alami, Pakistan
Hezbollah, Lebanon
Islamic Movement of Central Asia, Central Asia
Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, Uzbekistan
Jaish-e-Mohammed, Pakistan and Kashmir
Jemaah Islamiyah, Indonesia
Lashkar-e-Toiba, Pakistan and Kashmir
Lashkar i Jhangvi, Pakistan
Moro Islamic Liberation Front, Philippines
Moroccan Islamic Combatant Group, Morocco and Europe
Palestinian Islamic Jihad, Gaza Strip and West Bank
Tawhid and Jihad (Al-Qaeda in the Land between the Two Rivers (Iraq)), Iraq
Further Information
Get more info on 'Islamist Terrorism'.
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