Two sides of political Islam

Depending on one's viewpoint, global political Islam is either at its strongest or weakest. But the real unwinnable wars are between Islamic states

For a moment, take your eyes off the destruction in Gaza, the disruption in the Red Sea, and the Iran-Pakistan tit-for-tat bombings, followed by an incredible equivalent of brotherly pappi-jhappi (hugs and kisses).

Take a deep breath instead and look beyond the day’s headlines. Depending on which way you look at it, global political Islam is either at its strongest or weakest.

For the greatest clarity, let’s say upfront that this is not an argument about Islam, the faith. This is about political Islam, where the faith serves as the state religion, defines a nation and/or sustains its mostly unelected leaders in power and determines their strategic responses.

Muslim communities and leaders in India, Bangladesh, Indonesia, Malaysia and several others are, therefore, excluded. Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Qatar, and other Gulf nations, along with Iran, Pakistan, Turkey and many others in Asia and Africa, constitute the dominant universe of political Islam we are talking about.

Further, there are many non-state actors. Some of them, like the Houthis and Hezbollah, flaunt arsenals bigger than most regular states. In fact, both are bigger than most European countries in terms of armed (even uniformed) manpower, missiles, drones, and, in the case of the Houthis, tanks. There are also many smaller ones.

It is this larger group, comprising both state and non-state actors, governed in the name of Islam and exerting pan-national influence, that we define as the world of political Islam for this argument.

This Islamic power has challenged and destabilised the world as never before in its history. There was the oil shock after the Yom Kippur War in 1973, the two Gulf Wars, 9/11, al-Qaeda, ISIS and the many Intifadas. Each was limited in its geographical spread, strategic reach, and intensity of violence.

The unlikely rise of sanctions-hit Iran as a regional and sectarian power is a key point. Its influence now goes way beyond West Asia, as even the Russians court it desperately for arms shipments. Hamas, Hezbollah and the Houthis are state-sized Iranian proxies. The reason it’s rising is mostly because this world of political Islam had been leaderless and powerless for decades. The 9/11 attacks, al-Qaeda and ISIS weakened it as these gave America a justification to move in militarily.

In their respective heydays, both al-Qaeda and IS attempted to wrest the leadership of this universe. The Arab Spring, initially welcomed and backed by the Western powers and liberal establishment, rose in this continuing maelstrom.

The idea of a move away from dictatorship to elected democracy was heady. But as the Muslim Brotherhood or its equivalent was elected in one country after another, the Western-liberal enthusiasm evaporated. The result is the “welcome” return of dictatorship and the old normal in Egypt, and almost so in Tunisia, the broken nation-states of Syria and Libya, and the flood of refugees to Europe.

In parallel, a great deal of such destabilisation took place in Africa as well. The Western power became so overstretched and exhausted that Barack Obama, after killing Gaddafi and breaking Libya, began talking of leading from behind.

All of this created a great vacuum in state, strategic and moral authority. Iran moved into that space. Its non-state proxies are bigger than the armies of most of the other nations in this grouping of political Islam. The Houthis, for example.

We are all familiar with that slogan “from the river to the sea”, which so energises the Palestinians and enrages the Israelis. For today’s geopolitics, it will need to be something like “from the Mediterranean to the Arab Sea through the Red Sea…” and beyond.

The hard fact is that today, all the American-led Western powers, with varying support from friends including India, are not able to keep their most critical sea lanes safe. This while they’re building military strength and alliances vowing to keep the Indo-Pacific and South China Sea free. This rise of diverse but aligned Islamist challenge has exposed the limitations of big-power militaries.

This isn’t just about Iran in this space. Other powers are rising too, with Qatar being the most pre-eminent. It is a remarkable entity in that it is an indispensable state for the US, Iran, Hamas and the Israelis all at the same time. Egypt’s Abdel Fattah El-Sisi has found new ballast too, making top American diplomats wait (without him, the Rafah crossing from Gaza won’t open) and winning what he called an election without a whimper from Washington. All of this adds up to the strongest challenge to the Western power since the end of the Cold War.

How, then, do we build the counter-argument that this world of political Islam is at its weakest ever? First, however long this fighting and disruption goes on, it will eventually end, and the “Islamist” group will not win. Disruptive firepower apart, it simply does not have the cohesion to win.

Once we rule out a win by Iran and its proxies, only the Gulf states and Turkey remain in this particular Islamic world. They’re weaker than before, unable to choose sides with clarity over Gaza and attacked as American lackeys.

Recep Tayyip Erdogan has repositioned Turkey as a deal-maker and a deal-broker, like a mega Qatar, with no oil or gas. That he now searches for influence in the Indian subcontinent underlines the limitations to his ambitions.

Therefore, the real unwinnable wars in this universe are between its own Islamic states. The Iran-Pakistan fireworks are only the latest spectacle.

After General Zia-ul-Haq, democracy had given Pakistan — with a small but modern, educated elite — the option to break away from Islamisation and rebrand itself like Indonesia, or learn from Bangladesh. It built its own unique hybrid — but essentially Islamised — state. Count it among the losers in this ongoing tussle for global influence.

And finally, a category we do not talk about enough. Most of the world’s Muslims living in permanent peace belong to nations outside this grouping: Malaysia, Bangladesh, Indonesia, and India. Islam is the state religion in the first two, but they eschew militant pan-Islamism. Muslims in these and other such states add up to nearly a billion. These Muslim communities are winners too, and without fighting anybody.

Their blessing is the relative non-politicisation of their faith. That’s why it is such an incredible irony that, while Washington didn’t bat an eyelid over Egypt, loves the Gulf dictators, cheers on the Pakistani army as it fixes elections, the only thing giving it a stomach ache is an imperfect election in Bangladesh. Which, by the way, does not proclaim itself an Islamic Republic, despite a Muslim majority of over 90 per cent.

By special arrangement with ThePrint