The
Prime Minister
10 Downing Street,
London, SW1A 2AA
28 September 2004
Dear
Sir,
I
admire your candour in accepting that the Iraq intelligence
was wrong and I believe it important that you take
a closer look at the reasons for this global meltdown
in the quality of intelligence leading up to the
war in Iraq. If root causes, as you put it, should
be addressed, then the focus should not be restricted
to Madrasas, khutbas and Wahabism, sadly reflecting
the rhetoric of the neoconservative warmongers across
the Atlantic. I believe there is a need to look
at the entire spectrum of arguments that were formulated
in that fog of 'spintelligence' that has
led to the current state of world affairs.
Wahabism
You referred to uncompromising Wahabism. We are
given the impression that "Wahabis" are
a people full of hate, following a brand of Islam
with which one cannot - under any circumstances
- expect to have a negotiated dialogue or cooperation.
Their only aim, we are told, is to destroy Western
civilisation and the only solution is to invade
their lands and brainwash their children with Western
values. I suggest that this argument be subjected
to historical scrutiny. Muhammad Abdul Wahab died
in 1792. Over the past two hundred years, the British
and other Western governments have maintained a
constant dialogue and close relationship with followers
of Abdul Wahab in the House of Saud. The cooperation
exists not only at the governmental level but even
among the masses. I am sure you are aware of the
fact that two decades ago the West, via the secret
services of Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, recruited
thousands of people to fight in their cold war with
the Russians in Afghanistan. Sincere Muslims from
all over the world who went to fight in Afghanistan
saw it as a legitimate jihad but in the wider context
they also recognised that they were fighting on
the side of a Christian West against an atheist
Russia. They accepted direct help and cooperation
from the United States - one need only read about
the effective use of American made Stinger Missiles
in that conflict. It is very difficult to reconcile
this history with the new perspective that is being
painted: that of a people who are devoid of the
capacity to negotiate.
Taliban
The same goes for the Taliban, who were drawn out
of their seminaries by well-briefed intelligence
agents and turned into warlords. The Deobandi madrasas
have been in existence since 1867 and have always
been far removed from anything to do with violence
and military persuasions. It is not unreasonable
to be suspicious of the coincidence that several
Deobandi madrasas in Pakistan spontaneously became
militant precisely at the time when the West was
eager for a pipeline through Afghanistan. Everyone
seems to have forgotten that several Taliban delegations
were invited to the United States for discussions
about the pipeline. We are now told that the Taliban
were out to destroy the West and they were not open
to any discussion. Yet no one can explain why Mullah
Muhammad Ghaus headed a delegation to Houston in
November 1997, where they were put up in five star
hotels and taken on sight seeing trips, including
to the NASA Space Center. They dined at Marty Miller's
residence and had discussions with officials of
the State Department (Caroline Lees, 'Oil barons
court Taliban in Texas', Sunday Telegraph 14
December 1997).
I
hope you can appreciate the feeling of insult being
added to injury that Muslims experience when they
are told that the reason for this upsurge in violence
is due to their curricula, which teach hate and
disunity. These curricula have not changed. They
were the same when the West was recruiting from
the Arab world to fight its Cold War in Afghanistan.
The curricula were the same when the Taliban were
visiting the USA to discuss oil pipeline projects.
And the curricula were the same when the armies
of Sharif Hussein were manipulated to march with
T.E. Lawrence on Aqabah.
Role
of Madrasas
In every culture, there are institutions and groups
of people who serve as preservers of the core elements
of that culture. In Judaism, the Orthodox traditions
and religious schools serve that function in preserving
text, norms, practices and jurisprudential rulings.
Using the logic of this new perspective on Madrasas,
it would be extremely easy for me to cherry pick
from those Jewish traditions to paint a picture
of hate mongering fanatics in the same way that
Islamic scholarly traditions are being portrayed
in recent times. However, if I do so I am sure I
would be urged to remember that an expression of
difference, however harsh it may seem, does not
necessarily translate into hate. It is simply a
way to affirm one's own identity.
Most
of the people who inspire fear with their WMD ambitions
today were not schooled in madrasas. If curricula
are to be scrutinized then perhaps some attention
should also be given to the curricula of intelligence
agencies that teach their employees how to become
provocateurs and how to manipulate the simple-minded
into becoming pawns in their global political games.
The world is now too small for big games.
If
I live in a drought-stricken desert and the man
living on the oasis is happy to sell me water; and
allows me to run pipelines from his well so that
I can grow crops and build my own oasis, I would
not support bandits who are plundering the property
of this man's children. This is just one perspective
from the other side. A change of curricula in all
the madrasas of the world would not have prevented
the first suicide bomber in Palestine. He was a
Christian who became desperate. We must not forget
that there are people who are keen to create and
sustain tension between the Islamic and Christian
worlds. This I believe may have played a part in
the intelligence failures you have had to apologise
for today. Please do not allow another argument
based on a preponderance of spin to lead you and
your colleagues into another course of action for
which you may have to apologise in the future. Madrasas
are preserving the core elements of our culture
and the survival of our cherished heritage lies
therein.
I
come from a scholastic tradition (Nadwatul 'Ulama)
that has been promoting the gradual development
of madrasa curricula to provide an appreciation
of the modern world for over a hundred years. I
strongly believe that it would be very ill advised
for the West to set out on a course of uprooting
the entire system - and thereby detaching a people
from their heritage - simply to conform to a flawed
logic. Attacking the madrasas will only exacerbate
the problems of our increasingly shrinking world.
Yours
sincerely
Shaikh
Riyad Nadwi M.A., PhD.
OCCRi
28th September 2004
