Islamic Unity: Bin Ladin’s Version v. Khameini’s

Usamah bin Ladin’s September 2007 video address has been analyzed five ways from Friday: as an anti-capitalist screed; yet another indictment of Bush administration Middle East policy; a coded go-ahead for another attack on the U.S.;  vindication of Noam Chomsky and Michael Scheuer; and even as a fashion statement (journalists have not been so agog over a beard since Lincoln ran for President).  But considering that Bin Ladin is in effect one of two global poles of authority for anti-Western Islam, it would be useful to take the analysis in another direction and compare his latest fulmination to similar statements coming, lately, out of Tehran. 1  Bin Ladin and the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI) government, most obviously Ayatollah Sayyid Ali Khameini, seem to be engaged in a parallel (if not quite complementary) quest for leadership of the Islamic world that has global ramifications.

One of Bin Ladin’s favorite ongoing tropes is that President Bush is fomenting Muslim disunity by, among other things, “working with the leaders of one [Muslim] sect against another….”2  Khameini agrees but goes further, alleging that America and “the Zionists,” following the example of Britain, continue “making divide [sic] among Islamic denominations.”3  Britain is of course the bugbear of Iranian conspiracy-mongering, where ayatollahs are not the only ones to see James Bond behind every Iranian problem.  Bin Ladin, rather, focuses on today’s, rather than yesterday’s, Great Satan.

Bin Ladin also denounces the Great Satan’s political system, trumpeting that the American failure in Iraq demonstrates the “failure of your democratic system, despite it raising the slogans of justice, liberty, equality and humanitarianism.”  He also needles Americans in general for having  “permitted Bush to complete his first term, and stranger still, [having] chose[n] him for a second term, which gave him a clear mandate from you…to continue to murder our people in Iraq and Afghanistan.” Bin Ladin also goes after Democrats in particular, because “you elected the Democratic party [to end the war], but the Democrats….continue to agree to the spending of tens of billions to continue the killing and war….”  Similarly, Khameini lumps “Western liberal democracy” with its “deceitful nature” on the ash heap of history along with “imported and controversial ideas such as Socialism and Marxism….”4 

America’s domestic sins are bad enough; but Bin Ladin, like Iran’s Supreme Leader, brands the U.S. as the greatest oppressor (and hypocrite) on the international stage: “It is time for humankind to know that the talk of the rights of man and freedom are lies produced by the White House and its allies in Europe to deceive humans, take control of their destinies and subjugate them.” Here is a partial litany of the world’s woes that can be laid at the Americans’ door: “Iraq and Afghanistan and their tragedies; and the reeling of many of you under the burden of interest-related debts; insane taxes and real estate mortgages; global warming and its woes; and the abject poverty and tragic hunger in Africa.; all this is but one side of the grim face of the global system.”  Khameini wholeheartedly agrees, while managing to work Israel into the mix:

The cancerous networks of Zionism and the rogue war mongering U.S.  are today the main and most dangerous centers of global arrogance….A glance at the frightening crimes of the usurper Zionist regime in Palestine carried out with full support of the U.S. government and a study of the occupier’s crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan reveals….[t]hey commit the most heinous crimes while claiming to fight against terrorism. In the name of freeing nations, they impose dictatorships and plunder the countries they invade.5

Bin Ladin envisions “the collapse of the American empire,” much as what happened to the Soviet one.  Khameini is even more optimistic, opining that “America has been through a weakening trend so that it no longer enjoys its previous grandeur and power”6 and that the “Islamic Ummah with its natural wealth and the great cultural and historical heritage, its wide ranging geographical and demographical advantage will not allow the colonial powers to continue sucking its blood and violating its honor and sanctities as they have been doing for the last 200 years.”7 

There are a few major points of divergence between the Sunni and Shi`i worlds’ major frondeurs against the global democratic capitalist system, however.  Bin Ladin says that there are two ways for the war to end: with American defeat, or by mass American conversions to Islam: “It is imperative you…search for an alternative, upright methodology….the methodology of Allah.”  He states it even more baldly toward the end of his video: “I invite you to embrace Islam.”  Then he tries to ecumenically sweeten the pot by reminding American Christians that “the name of the Prophet of Allah  Jesus and his mother…are mentioned in the Noble Quran dozens of times, and that in the Quran there is a chapter whose name is ‘Maryam’….”  Iran’s ruling ayatollah has never held out conversion to Islam as an alternative for Americans, to the best of my knowledge.  Perhaps Bin Ladin is laying the groundwork for another catastrosphic attack by offering conversion, because as Michael Scheuer (and others) have observed the Islamic traditions concerning hudnah, or “truce,” mandate that an enemy be offered the opportunity to embrace the faith of Muhammad.  He may be, in effect, covering all his bases with his own constitutents before trying to replicate (or surpass) 9/11. 

Alternatively, there are some ideas emanating from Tehran’s side that don’t seem to resonate with (or are downright detestable to) Bin Ladin, such as: the need to revitalize the Organization of the Islamic Conference [OIC] and for closer cooperation between Islamic governments;8 a need for Muslims to embrace “Gnosticism9 and spirituality, as well as “mysticism coupled with social activities [action], as well as self-humility towards God coupled with jihad.”10  Bin Ladin, coming as he does from a puritanical Wahhabi/Salafi milieu—yet nonetheless from outside the Islamic body politic—no doubt sees the OIC as corrupt and run by false Muslims, the Islamic governments as incapable of cooperation and worthless in any case, and the mystical proclivities of Iranian Shi`ism as anathema.  So Bin Ladin and Khameini are not totally simpatico.  In fact, there is a veiled criticism of al-Qa`idah by the latter in a recent Iranian strategic document aimed at Islamic unity: “religious scholars and thinkers who strive to bring unity among Muslims should do all what they can [sic] to avoid expressing views that could cause incitement among their followers….If they express divisive views…then definitely their role won’t be regarded as a unifying one.”11

Bin Ladin’s September 2007 declaration seems to be aimed both at the entire Muslim world and at the  American domestic political scene; it’s chock-full of specific references to modern American history and appeals to American Christians; and it contains that beguiling invitation to come to Mecca.  Khameini’s approach, as distilled from several of his speeches and publications, is aimed squarely, and solely, at the Islamic world; it’s more ideological and less concrete; and, rather counterintuitively,12 is more anti-Israel.   However, on the strategic level, the two de facto candidates for world leader of Muslims agree to a large extent, for both see the U.S. in decline and the Islamic world ascendant; reject Western-style democracy; and blame nefarious Western intelligence agencies (rather than indigenous political, religious and cultural differences) for keeping Muslims divided and leaderless.  Both Bin Ladin and Khameini desire, above all, Islamic unity leading to the destruction of the United States—and  no doubt each man thinks he’s the one to achieve both and thus, even, to restore the caliphate. 

NOTES

1 As such, I will focus in my analysis on those aspects of Bin Ladin’s video statement which echo those being disseminated by Tehran’s al-Majma` al-`Alami lil-Taqrib bayna al-Madhahib al-Islamiyah, or “The World Assembly for Reconciliation between the Islamic Denominations”—referred to by the IRI as the “World Forum for Proximity of Islamic Schools of Thought,” http://www.taghrib.ir/tmain_en.aspx?lng=en

2 As of this writing, no complete Arabic text of Bin Ladin’s missive is available, so all of the quotes here are from the text at http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/i/msnbc/sections/news/070907_bin_laden_transcript.pdf

3 “Supreme Leader: The Intelligence Bodies of Enemies  Preventing the Unity of Muslims,” August 20, 2007, available at www.taghrib.ir/tmain_prn.aspx?lng=en&mode-prn&artid=5172

4 “Islamic Awakening from the Viewpoint of the Supreme Leader,” May 18, 2007, available at www.taghrib.ir/tmain_prn.aspx?lng=en&mode=prn&artid=4112

5Ibid.

6 “Supreme Leader: The Intelligence Bodies….”

7 “Islamic Awakening….”

8Ibid.