KHUTAB IV: 11. THE LOW AND HIGH TIDES IN ISLAMIC HISTORY

11.  THE LOW AND HIGH TIDES IN ISLAMIC HISTORY

(ANUMA 23.01.09)

Brothers in Islam,

          Everyday we witness through mass media the low tide of the conditions of Muslims almost everywhere. This keeps us wondering, what is wrong with us, and what is wrong with the world. Humiliation after humiliation, disaster one after the other, either natural or human made. Is the world becoming crazy? Many Indonesians realize this and say, “Dunia jadi gila” (The world is getting crazy). What is going on with us and with the world? Here are some answers:

1.    This is the vicissitude of life. Like waves and tides, the life of a nation, a community, even an individual, has its ups and downs. Many creatures depend on low tide and high tide for their survival without which they will perish. Without suffering there will be no patience, forbearance, sympathy, compassion and generosity. In Islamic history we have witnessed its golden age, such as during the

Umawi (Umayyad) dynasty in Andalusia (Muslim Spain) from 756 till 1031, and the reign of Hārūn al-Rashīd from 766 till 809. On the other hand we had the lower tide in Islamic history when Baghdad was attacked by the Mongols under Hulagu in November 1257, and on 10 February 1258 the Caliph al-Mu‘tasim surrendered and the city

of Baghdad was pillaged, sacked and destroyed. However, Hulagu’s great grand-son Ghazan (who reigned from 1295 to 1404), became a Muslim and made Islam the official religion of his realm. The high tide of Islamic history appeared again with the emergence of the Ottoman Empire (1683-1913) which controlled Asia Minor, North-East Africa, and Southeast Europe. Its capital was Constantinople. It was the superpower at that time.  The low tide came again with the colonization of many Muslim countries by the British in the Indian sub-continent and the Malay peninsula, the Dutch in Indonesia, and the French in North and West Africa. Although many of them obtained their independence in the 20^th century, the British wanted to keep its tie with its former subjects in the British Commonwealth of Nations, an association or 48 independent countries that recognize the British monarch as the symbol of their free association. Its members hold periodic prime ministers’ conferences. In one of these conferences, held in Malaysia, the members were welcomed by the host (probably Dr. Mahathir, 1925-), who said, among other things,  “Welcome to the Commonwealth where wealth is not common.” The conditions of Muslims keep deteriorating with the occupation of Palestine and the creation of the Jewish-Zionist national state of Israel in 1948, where many Palestinians had to abandon their land and even became refugees; the massacre of 8.000 Muslims in Bosnia Herzegovina known as Srebrenica Massacre (Srebrenica Genocide) on July 1995 by the army under General Mladic; the invasion of Chechnia (Chechnya) by Russian Federation on 26 August 1999 where about 50 000 people died or went missing, mostly civilians; then the eight year war between Iraq and Iran (1980-1988) with Muslims killing Muslims, about half a million of them died. To the benefit of whom? Of those who sell heavy arms to both sides, so that their armaments factories keep running, sucking the blood of Muslims. They are the capitalist countries who became richer, whereas the poor Muslims became poorer because of this war. The motto of the imperialists in the past and up till now is “divide and rule” in Arabic فَرِّقْ تَسُد . We have to remember that the Prophet said

كُفْرٌ (رواه البخاري والترمذي)  سِبَابُ اْلمُسْلِمِ فُسُوْقٌ وَقِتَالُهُ

“Insulting the Muslim is iniquity (sinfulness)

and fighting him is ungratefulness (infidelity).

(Reported by Bukhari and Nasa’i).

Then Bush came to power doing worse than what Hulagu did earlier with Baghdad, devastating the whole country, worse than earthquakes and hurricanes combined together, polluting its land and water, killing over half a million people and over four million Iraqi people became refugees. Most of the world refugees nowadays are Muslims, not economic refugees, but political refugees. George Bush the Junior was following in the footsteps of his father Bush the elder who invaded Panama on 20 December and deposed the dictator General Manuel Noriega, ending the war in 31 January 1990, with 5000 Panamanian casualties, mostly civilians. The US casualties: 24 soldiers killed, and 325 wounded.  Both General Noriega and Saddam Hussein were dictators, but Iraq was invaded on wrong assumptions and misinformation. Iraq is not Panama, it has oil, without which nothing could move, from motorcycles to airplanes. It was necessary to invade this oil rich country. Recently we witnessed the massacre of the Palestinians by the Israeli tanks and war planes, and the people could not go anywhere to take refuge, as they are being imprisoned in their own country, and the Muslim world is too weak to do anything except demonstrations and protests. But we should not lose hope. One day the Muslims will rise again.

2.    We do not stick to the teachings of Islam. Our faith is not strong enough. We are supposed to be the most intelligent nation, as Islam orders us to seek knowledge, even from the cradle to the grave. If we have sophisticated technology that can disturb and confuse the enemies’ radars and systems of communication they might mistakenly shoot their own warplanes and tanks instead of shooting at us. But, alas, we are too far behind. We cannot even produce our own heavy arms, we have to import them.  We are supposed to be united in one Muslim nation. Yet we are still fighting each other. The Kurdish people are suppressed for seeking their independence. The Arabs, although having their organization called جَامِعَةُ الدُّوَلِ اْلعَرَبِيَّة  (The Arab League) established in Cairo on 22 March, 1945, still had armed conflicts among themselves: Egypt and Saudi Arabia over Yemen, Algeria and Morocco over a disputed border, and Iraq and Kuwait over a disputed oil well. Out of

frustration they say to each other اِتَّفَقْنَا أَنْ لَا نَتَّفِقُ (“We have agreed to disagree.”). In one of its recent conferences, the Libyan leader Mu‘ammar Qaddafi, as a guest speaker, said in his short speech, that the French people have their own country France, and the Spanish people have their one country Spain, but the Arab people have many countries, not one country. The second largest Muslim community, the Malay people who speak the same Malay language, are divided into Brunei, Malaysia, and Indonesia.

Wth regard to the Palestinian issue, the solution is not in Jerusalem, but in Washington that keeps supporting Israel with aid including heavy arms. A long time ago an American senator called Henry Jackson (1912-1983), said that the U.S. and Israeli relation is like a dog and its tail, but it is not the dog that wags its tail, it is the tail that wags the dog. The Jewish lobby is very strong in the U.S. congress to support Israel. The late Ahmad Deedat said one day that if the Black Muslims, the Bilalians, are strong enough they could one day neutralize the Jewish influence in the U.S. Congress. Another “solution” proposed by a Pakistani friend to a Jewish rabbi in Montreal in 70s, “Let your daughters marry the Palestinians.” The rabbi did not like the idea, because if this happens their children will become Muslims.

 May Allah guide and unite us the Muslims our leaders and protect us from our enemies, amin!