V
Fertile Grounds for Fundamentalism
Iran's Islamic revolution has awakened all the Islamic countries. . . . Islam recognizes no borders. We cannot put off establishing Islamic governments and administering the divine laws. The objective of the Islamic Republic and its officials is none other than to establish a global Islamic rule. . . . Political means and methods may differ, but no revolutionary Muslim ever forgets the objective.
-Ahmad Khomeini, January 11, 19921
In the course of his much publicized visit to Khartoum in December 1991, Iran's President Rafsanjani gave glad tidings to his Sudanese hosts: "The Islamic revolution of Sudan, alongside Iran's pioneer revolution, can doubtless be the source of movement and revolution throughout the Islamic world."2
Although Khomeini's heirs differ, as his son Ahmad puts it, in their "political means and methods," they have never abandoned "the objective": to impose their hegemony over the entire region and ultimately monopolize the leadership of one billion Muslims worldwide. Pursuing a carefully planned strategy, the Iranian regime seeks to combine an assortment of diplomatic, cultural, propaganda, subversive, and military activities into a powerful network of proxy groups and followers in all Islamic countries. Such a "Fundamentalist International," with Iran at its centre, is expected to realize the regime's objectives and interests.
This strategy was laid out in a top secret analysis, drafted by experts of the Supreme National Security Council as part of a policy paper in January 1992, following Rafsanjani's trip to Sudan:
Climaxing the political and propaganda pressures brought to bear on Sudan by the West and Egypt, a U.S. State Department official warned the government of Sudan: The United States will spare no effort to prevent Sudan from becoming a centre for terrorist activities. The U.S. has already begun contacting those countries neighbouring Sudan and in the region about adopting appropriate decisions.
The analysis goes on to argue that this pressure is motivated by geopolitics:
The Arab Republic of Sudan in Africa is one of the largest African states and is second only to Egypt in Arab population. Its Red Sea coastline and proximity to the Suez Canal lend it enormous geopolitical importance. Thus, the presence of any regional power, such as the Islamic Republic [of Iran], in Sudan would be of great significance, especially in view of the regional rivalry between the Islamic Republic, Egypt and [Saudi] Arabia, and the rapid growth of Islamic movements in the area. In light of recent political developments in the Horn of Africa and the decline of Ethiopia, Somalia, and Kenya as regional powers, leaving Sudan as the dominant player, the added influence of the Islamic Republic of Iran in Sudan and the expansion of bilateral security and military ties will certainly affect the other countries in the region, specifically [Saudi] Arabia, and Egypt. Overall, the consolidation of relations between Tehran and Khartoum will contribute greatly to revolutionizing the Islamic tendencies in North Africa and enhancing Iran's political stature in regional contests.3
What are the bases for this "rapid growth of Islamic movements in the region," that is, expansion of fundamentalism? Several important regional and international factors provide a fertile ground for the spread of fundamentalism.
The Islamic world includes very different societies and tribes, stretching from Southeast Asia to North Africa. Muslims comprise over 85 percent of the populations of Afghanistan, Algeria, Bangladesh, Egypt, Indonesia, Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, Tunisia, Turkey, and most of the newly independent republics of Central Asia and the Caucasus. In Albania, Chad, Ethiopia, and Nigeria, Muslims make up 25 to 85 percent of the population; and India, Myanmar (formerly Burma), Cambodia, China, Greece, Yugoslavia, Thailand, and the Philippines have significant Muslim minorities.
Despite their ethnic, cultural, and social variety, these societies share striking similarities. Ernest Gellner, a specialist on Islam, has written:
For all their indisputable diversity, the remarkable thing is the extent to which Muslim societies resemble each other. Their traditional political systems, for instance, are much more of one kind than were those of pre-modern Christendom. At least in the bulk of Muslim societies, in the main Islamic block between Central Asia and the Atlantic shores of Africa, one has the feeling that the same and limited pack of cards has been dealt. The hands vary, but the pack is the same.4
The political and economic objectives of most Muslim societies today are to achieve democracy and freedom, economic growth, and improved living standards. Relatively high birth rates and shorter life expectancy have meant a persistent decline in the average age of the citizenry in most of these countries. The impact of such global developments as the collapse of communism and the growing influence of the international mass media on the younger generation, better informed and less apathetic than their forefathers, will have far-reaching repercussions, and the demands for freedom will become more vociferous.
Given the profound religious roots prevalent in Muslim societies and the absence of any other viable alternative, the quest for democracy and struggle against dictatorship often assumes a religious, and specifically Islamic, character. Hence religious reactionaries and fundamentalists endeavour to exploit Islam in directing political and social development toward their own ends. They cite "alienation from Islam" as the cause of every problem in Islamic societies, and a "return to pure Islam" as the undefined cure-all. This lack of specifics allows the fundamentalists to impose their own views and policies under the banner of "Islam" while benefiting from the legitimacy religion grants them in the hearts and minds of the Muslim masses. The most obvious example of such manipulation is Khomeini's usurpation of the leadership of Iran's antimonarchic revolution in 1978-79.
For the millions of Iranians who took to the streets in 1978 to vent their anger and frustration against the shah's dictatorship, the word azadi (freedom) had a magic ring. Freedom had been denied them for more than half a century by the shah and his father before him. The demand for freedom unified a wide spectrum of the populace and soon acquired a religious connotation. In the eyes of the average Iranian, the brutal repression and endemic corruption of the royal family and court reflected the ruling regime's antipathy toward Islam and basic Iranian values. Despite the iron-fisted controls imposed on the society through the dreaded secret police, SAVAK, virtually everyone had heard rumours of the fabulous wealth of the shah and his entourage in Iran. Even Iranians only nominally Muslim were offended by the ruling elite's moral corruption. It was, therefore, natural for the anti-shah movement to take on a religious tone when it ultimately surfaced in the streets.
In the minds of Iranians, Islam has traditionally been synonymous with struggle against dictatorship, despite the Shi'ite clergy's record of having served the interests of the court. For the general public, Islam was symbolized by such figures as Imam Hussein, the Prophet's grandson. Vastly outnumbered, Hussein was slain in 680 with seventy-one of his companions at Karbala in a revolt against a corrupt ruler. This epic struggle has profoundly influenced the Iranian social psyche. For centuries, people in every town and city gathered on the anniversary of Hussein's martyrdom to follow a white horse out of the city as part of the symbolic ceremonies honouring his memory. These rites often had a political theme directed against the contemporary rulers. During the antimonarchic revolution, Imam Hussein's defiant revolt against injustice was a prominent symbol for millions of Iranians, both devout Muslims and secular intellectuals, who praised his struggle for freedom from dictatorship in their writings.
The compatibility of Islamic beliefs and democratic struggle in Iran is considered by many to be symbolized by the political and social movement of the People's Mojahedin Organization. Particularly after 1971, some of the most prominent and popular opponents to the shah's regime belonged to this movement. Muhammad Hanifnejad, the organization's founder, was among the leading Mojahedin members sentenced to death and later executed by a military tribunal.5 Massoud Rajavi, the Mojahedin's leader, was among the leaders of resistance under SAVAK's torture. That the Mojahedin, an anti-shah, Muslim, independent movement, rapidly gained widespread support among the people shows the degree to which the anti-dictatorial struggle in Iran derives from the democratic precepts and traditions of Islam.
In 1978, the Iranian masses thus sought in Islam democracy and an end to dictatorship. They demanded freedom of political parties, political prisoners, and the press. It was only in the second stage of the revolution that Khomeini and the mullahs succeeded in taking advantage of the popular religious sentiments to usurp leadership and move Iran toward an "Islamic Republic."
The Iranian experience is not unique, however. The socio-political awakening of Muslim societies began with colonialism's decline in the 1950s and early 1960s. The end to the Western empires' domination of the Islamic world set the various countries on different paths, which nevertheless converged in the political revival of Islam.
From an economic perspective, for example, so long as they were dominated by the European colonists, these lands were used as sources of raw materials for European industries. After their independence, the new governments moved towards industrialization, building factories and workshops. For various reasons, including mismanagement, inadequate planning, weaknesses in the infrastructure, and political instability, the process of industrialization was generally a failure, with disastrous repercussions: unchecked urban migration resulting in the destruction of agriculture and the helter-skelter expansion of urban centres. Cairo, Istanbul, Tehran, Jakarta, and Lahore became magnets for millions of peasants deserting their ancestral homes in search of a better life. The cities of dreams, however, held nothing for the vast majority but shantytowns and poverty. Isolated from their traditional culture and shunned by the new, alien civilization of well-to-do city dwellers, many urban immigrants sought both solace and a means of freeing themselves from their misery and destruction in Islam.
The trend toward independence also brought fundamental changes in the educational system. The colonial administrators had often excluded courses from the curricula that would have acquainted the younger generation with their pre-colonial national, cultural, and religious identity in a bid to prevent the growth of pro independence sentiments. In Algeria, for instance, school children learned French rather than their own language until 1962. But this attempt to blot out the Islamic heritage failed. In fact, it made the people in many countries want to learn more about Islam once independence came.
Different third world countries chose different paths to resolve their mounting problems. Successive failures in the Arab world caused their governments to veer between ethnic nationalism (Pan-Arabism) and state nationalism. Many Muslim countries, such as Egypt, Turkey, and Indonesia, experimented with various types of capitalism and socialism; yet neither brought them out of crisis and socioeconomic misery.
The failure of imported forms of government convinced Muslim laymen, especially the intelligentsia, that these systems could not respond to the complex problems of the Islamic world. Starting in the 1960s, this growing awareness led many to turn their attention to Islam. According to American scholar and researcher Daniel Pipes, "After a generation of experimentation, the time had come to try something different."6 A consensus was reached by Muslims that no imported political philosophy, however credible or crucial to the freedom and well-being of Muslims, could successfully mobilize the masses in harmony with their spiritual consciousness.
This search for a compatible system that was "something different" was not in essence fundamentalist or reactionary. Muslim communities' rejection of emulating the West and Western forms of government liberalism, socialism, and so forth-was never meant to imply that they shunned such universal values as democracy and freedom. The message, rather, was that a new formula must be used to fulfil their yearning for democracy and economic growth while conforming to their cultural, traditional, and religious--in other words, Islamic-beliefs and values. Such a formula would achieve the kind of political stability, economic prosperity, and social freedoms and equity for which the Muslim masses yearned.
This has been the basis of the philosophy advocated by the People's Mojahedin in Iran since the movement's inception in the 1960s. The Mojahedin believed that no imported ideology could alleviate the problems plaguing Iranian society, pointing to the failures in twentieth century Iran of nationalism, Marxism, and liberalism. Similarly, the Mojahedin denounced fundamentalism and reactionary interpretations of Islam, rejecting the calls for a revival of the Ottoman Empire. The organization emphasized that a governing regime in Iran must be suited to the particular culture and religion of the Iranian masses while remaining committed to the cause of democracy. Theocracy must be avoided at all costs.
Throughout the history of Islam, from the early decades to recent times, the Iranian intelligentsia has played an active role in shaping the policies and cultural identity of Islamic societies. The current rulers of Iran have used this historical legacy to their own advantage, but to the disadvantage of other Islamic nations.
In the mid-seventh century, the Arabian Peninsula had converted to Islam. Only a decade after Prophet Muhammad's death, the army of Umar, the second caliph (the second successor to Muhammad), conquered Iran following the battles of al-Qadisiyah (Iraq) in 636-637 and Nahavand (western Iran) in 642. When a Muslim delegation sent by Umar was given an audience before the battles began by the last of the Sasanid kings, Yadegerd III, the Muslims described their mission as breaking the shackles of bondage and setting free the masses from oppression.7 Though rejected by the king, this message had enormous appeal to ordinary Iranians. Although Iranian society was significantly more advanced than that of her Arab neighbours, Iranians quickly accepted Islam's message of peace and equality as a welcome alternative to the despotic rule of the Sasanid dynasty. Islam's appeal explains in part the embarrassing defeats of the Sasanid's much larger and better, equipped armies at the hands of a small, poorly trained, but motivated Arab contingent. In the al-Qadisiyah battle, for example, the 30,000man Muslim army succeeded in crushing the Iranian force, which was four times larger.8
Despite their defeat, the Iranians displayed a remarkable resilience. They used the newly found religion to shape and formulate Islamic culture and civilization and to advance the ideals of the Prophet Muhammad and the Quran. Iranians wrote the four major Shi'ite books on Hadith, considered the primary source on the traditions of the Prophet after the Quran and Nahj-ol Balagah. The six source books on Hadith in the Sunni sect were also written by Iranians.9
In philosophy, logic, mathematics, medicine, astronomy, chemistry and other sciences of the era, the Islamic world led the way. And within the Islamic world, Iran was often at the forefront. Iranian contributors to the quest for knowledge included such scientists as Avecinna (Ibn Sina, 980-1037) a renowned physician and philosopher whose books were translated into English and French and were taught in Western universities; Fakhr-e Razi, a twelfth-century philosopher from Ray (a southern district of present-day Tehran); and Zakariya-ye Razi, the famous fifteenth-century chemist and mathematician from Ray.
Many of the leading interpreters of the Quran and Islamic history were Iranians as well, including Qazi Bayzawi, from Shiraz, who wrote Anwar ol-Tanzil va Asrar ot-T'avil (The Rays of the Quran and Secrets of Interpretation). Iranians soon mastered the art of Islamic teaching and jurisprudence. The first Arabic grammar was written by Sibevayh, the author of al-Ketab, who lived in the seventh century in Shiraz in Fars Province. Many of Arabic literature's greatest works were written by Iranians; and many of the great Shi'ite jurists were Iranians, as were many early Sunni jurists. Bu'l-Fazl-i Bayhaqi (995-1077), one of the most renowned Muslim historians, wrote the first major prose work in New Persian, Jame'ot-Tawarikh (A Comprehensive History). Muhammad Jarire Tabari (died 953), the author of Jame' ol-Bayan (A Comprehensive Statement) and Tarikh ol-Omam-e val Molouk (The History of Nations and Kings), was another famous Iranian historian from northern Tabarestan (now Mazandaran) Province. Zamakhshari, who lived in the eleventh century in Khorassan Province (northeast Iran), wrote Tafsir-e Kashaaf (A Comprehensive Interpretation) and Assass ol-Balaghah (The Fundamentals of Eloquence(.
The rise of the Ummayads led to the massacre of the Shi'ites, who had branched off from the majority after the death of the Prophet. (See Chapter I.) Muhammad's followers and descendants sought refuge in Iran, where they were warmly welcomed. They led many Shi'ite rebellions against the ruling caliphs. Iran thus became a centre of rebellious popular movements against oppressive regimes and the status quo. Thousands of relatives of the Prophet and Ali, the first Shi'ite Imam, were buried in Iran, and Iranians still worship at their shrines. Shahrbanoo, the wife of Hussein (the third Shi'ite Imam), was the daughter of the last Persian king, Yazdegerd III.
The reign of the Abbasid caliphs, who ruled the Islamic world from Baghdad for five centuries, was strongly influenced by Iranians from the mid-seventh to the thirteenth centuries. The Abbasids' interest in fostering Islam in the East prompted the new caliphs to employ the methods and procedures of governance used by their Iranian predecessors. Many top officials brought into the caliph's court came from the ranks of influential and well-known Iranian families. For instance, the Abbasid caliph Harun ar-Rashid (ruled 786-807) drew into his service prominent members of the Iranian Barmakid family. For all practical purposes, the Abbasid caliphs functioned in a largely ceremonial role, while the day-to-day governing was conducted by Iranian rulers, such as the Ghaznavid (tenth century) and the Khwarezm-Shah (1077-1231) dynasties.
The enormous impact of Iranians on science and other areas of knowledge, particularly during the first seven centuries, and their attempts to restore the spirit of equity and tolerance, two original teachings of Islam, gave Iran long-lasting prestige in the eyes of all Muslims. Iran, in fact, is unique in this sense; no other Arab or Muslim country could exert the same influence. As a result, when the mullahs try to spread their dogmatic philosophy beyond Iran, they carry with them the credibility earned by the remarkable contributions Iran has made to Islamic civilization. This credibility enhances the mullahs' appeal among the Muslim and Arab masses.
The mullahs, exploiting the Iranian legacy, are attempting to turn Iran into an Umm ol-Qura of fundamentalism (see Chapter IV). Thus, in spreading fundamentalism, Tehran has come to play the same role Moscow played in spreading communism.
The decline of Arab nationalism or Pan-Arab ism--which was for several decades a source of tremendous strength for Arab countries and their governments--has also contributed to the growth of Islamic fundamentalism. The absence of an attractive democratic alternative caused many political groups throughout the Arab world to turn away from Arab nationalism and toward Islamic fundamentalism. (See Chapter XIV.(
In non-Arab Muslim countries, nationalism is also succumbing to the mounting wave of religious fundamentalism. Even in Turkey, where a fiercely secular government has ruled since the 1920s, religious fundamentalism poses a serious challenge. While a wave of ethnic nationalism and regionalism has engulfed the European countries of the former Eastern Bloc, deep-seated Islamic tendencies in the Muslim republics of the former Soviet Union have raised concern about the expansion of fundamentalism even after seventy years of religious repression.
The Persian Gulf region has 65 percent of the world's total oil reserves. Of the 3.1 billion tons of oil on the market in 1990, some 843 million tons were produced in the Middle East. To appreciate the importance of oil in preparing the ground for the Khomeini regime's export of fundamentalism one need only imagine how much less attention Islamic fundamentalism would have received had Khomeini seized power not in Iran, but in another third world country located far from the Middle East.
Under the shah, Iran was the second largest exporter of oil in the world. It also had great geopolitical importance, because it was seen in the West as a buffer between the Red Army and the world's largest oil reserves. These factors made events in Iran front-page news in the West. Through Western news agencies and media, therefore, Muslims around the world learned in minute detail of the shah's overthrow and Khomeini's rise to power.
Oil also provided the funds with which Khomeini and his heirs exported their revolution and fundamentalism. The huge oil revenues paid for the extensive political and propaganda campaigns abroad, funded the worldwide networks created to recruit and train fundamentalists, provided the financial and logistical support for Khomeini's allies and surrogates throughout the Islamic world, and enabled the clerics to bestow gifts of free oil to certain countries to increase influence. Between September 1991 and February 1992, for example, Rafsanjani's government "spent more than $500 million and sent out 1,300 Islamic fundamentalist preachers to influence the newly independent Muslim republics of Central Asia."l0 On the average, the mullahs have spent $100 million annually in recent years to reinforce and maintain their operatives in Lebanon.
Looking at the region as a whole, oil has also indirectly paved the way for fundamentalism's growth in the Middle East. Since 1975, of the thirteen members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) all except two (Ecuador and Venezuela) have been Muslim countries. Six (Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates) are located in the Persian Gulf region and two (Algeria and Libya) in Muslim North Africa. Indonesia's population is over 90 percent Muslim. Half of Nigeria's population is Muslim, and most of the time a Muslim has ruled the country. Although Muslims are a minority in Gabon, President Omar Bongo converted to Islam in 1973. Hence any major change in oil prices has extensive economic repercussions that may act as political catalysts in these Muslim countries.
In 1955, Arabian light crude was posted as high as $2.08 a barrel. In 1961, the price dropped to $1.80, where it stayed for most of the 1960s, prompting Western industries to switch from coal to oil as their main energy source. At the same time, OPEC members signed new contracts with smaller oil companies, strengthening their position vis-a-vis the major oil consortiums. In 1970, declining oil production in the United States and Venezuela, the explosion of the Saudi pipeline to the Mediterranean, and rising demands caused by the severe oil shortage led to a new surge in oil prices. After several increases, the price of oil rose to $2.01 per barrel in September 1973. Then the Arab-Israeli War inspired two price hikes, in October 1973 and January 1974, and oil-producing countries were suddenly earning $9.27 per barrel, 4.5 times the previous rate. This new rate remained stable for several years, until the fall of the shah, when prices again shot up, to $34 per barrel.
Meanwhile, many countries had also been boosting their production. Saudi oil production jumped from 3.5 million barrels a day in 1970, to 7.3 million in 1973, to 10 million barrels per day in 1980. Saudi revenues rose accordingly, from $1.2 billion in 1970, to $29 billion in 1974, to $101 billion in 1981.11 This enormous wealth, of course, brought political power incomparable with the past, and raised these countries' international prestige and presence overnight.
The flow of petro-dollars, however, was a two-edged sword. The rapid oil price increases meant equally rapid energy price increases in oil-importing countries, such as Turkey, Pakistan, and Egypt. The consequent economic problems fomented social turmoil, and the resultant rising tensions provided fertile ground for the growth of fundamentalism.
For the oil-producing countries, the situation was worse. The flood of petro-dollars and consequent economic upheavals quickly led to the unravelling of these countries' social fabric. The newly acquired wealth created havoc with people's daily lives. Corruption, bribery, extravagance, greed, and-most importantly-the widening rift between the very rich elite and the poor majority in countries such as Iran brought fundamental changes to societies whose social structure had remained essentially unchanged for decades. A Nigerian political analyst's description of the situation applied to all the oil-producing countries: "There is unprecedented indiscipline in Nigeria these days. . . . There is smuggling, there is corruption, money permeates society."
The corruption accompanying the enormous wealth worked to the advantage of the fundamentalists, who declared that the only solution was to seek refuge in the "Islam" they represented. Such simplistic answers attracted the deprived masses to the fundamentalists' fold. Iran provides a classic example.
Iran's oil revenues rose from $4.4 billion in 1972-73 to $9.6 billion in 1973-74, and then to $20.6 billion the following year, where they levelled off until the shah's ouster. "12 The new income meant tremendous wealth for a very few, while the many were left out. The flood of money in 1973-75 also raised the general public's expectations; but when the prices stabilized in the following years, the shah's regime suddenly found itself short of funds to continue its ambitious plans. Inflation soared, and villagers' migration to the shantytowns skirting the major cities changed the urban environment. Economic discontent rose sharply among the populace, already chafing under the political repression. Meanwhile, the Pahlavi family and those entrepreneurs with connections to the court deposited billions of dollars of oil revenues in their foreign accounts and spent lavishly in Iran.
After 1976, the shah was forced by international pressure to loosen the grips of repression. Khomeini jumped at the opportunity to exploit the widespread social discontent and political vacuum created by the brutal clampdown on organized opposition. Relying on religious demagoguery and a nationwide network of like-minded mullahs, Khomeini hijacked the leadership of the antimonarchic revolution.
It should be emphasized, however, that although economic and social factors play an important role in the growth of fundamentalism, it is a misperception to view the phenomenon as merely a product of social destitution or the unfair distribution of wealth. True, Khomeini and his followers took maximum advantage of the poverty and deprivation in Iran to advance their own political interests. But fundamentalism also has historical, cultural, and social roots which do not necessarily grow out of economic factors. All of the material components of the present crisis-poverty, bureaucratic corruption, and so on--existed in the region in the 1960s and '70s, but fundamentalism's appeal remained limited to small religious sects until the mullahs took over in Iran. After 1979, Khomeiniism was exported; fundamentalists were organized and nourished morally and financially by the Iranian mullahs. Had Khomeini not assumed power in Iran, "Islamic fundamentalism" would not have been the issue of global concern it is today.
The restructuring of the world in recent years has also meant great turmoil and change for the Middle East. Topping the list is undoubtedly the collapse of the Soviet Union and its aftermath. The sudden end to the Soviet presence in the Middle East, where it had been a key player for several decades, created a vacuum felt throughout the region, upsetting the balance of power. The Soviet and Eastern European trends toward democracy could have contributed to a similar process in the Middle East. Instead, conditions have benefited the fundamentalists. Again, the primary cause has been the absence of a credible democratic alternative.
The interest of the former Soviet Union (and its predecessor, the Russian Empire) in its neighbours to the south has a long history. In the years following World War II, Soviet foreign policy in the Middle East focused on the Arab- Israeli conflict. Moscow initially went along with the idea of a State of Israel, and from 1949 to 1954 the Soviet delegation to the United Nations abstained in all key votes on the Arab-Israeli dispute. Before long, however, the Soviets came out in favour of the Arabs. The shift was motivated in part by Moscow's concern at the emergence of nationalism in Egypt and Gamal Abdel Nasser's rise to power, as well as military pacts like the Baghdad Pact (later called CENTO) signed between the United States, Britain, and their regional allies.
The Soviets soon became the main suppliers and source of political support for a number of Arab countries. Although relations with some of these countries, such as Egypt, were occasionally stormy, Moscow succeeded in establishing itself in the Middle East in the 1960s and '70s. Under Leonid Brezhnev, important political, military, and economic pacts were signed with South Yemen, Libya, Algeria, and Morocco, among others. At this time, the Soviet Black Sea fleet was transformed from a coast guard force into an awesome naval power in the Mediterranean and Arabian seas. Friendship accords were signed with Egypt, Syria, Iraq, South Yemen, and Afghanistan. To advance its political goals in the region, the Soviet government gave priority to economic assistance to Middle Eastern countries over other regions of the third world. Between 1954 and 1979, eight of the ten major recipients of Soviet aid were Middle Eastern countries: Turkey, Morocco, Egypt, Afghanistan, Iran, Syria, Algeria, and Iraq.
Throughout the Arab-Israeli War in 1956, the Six-Day War in 1967, the October War in 1973, and the Israeli occupation of Lebanon in 1982, the Soviet Union was perceived by the Arab masses as being on their side. Despite some major Soviet setbacks in the region, the Soviet Union enjoyed considerable influence among the Arab nations. Even on oil related issues, the Soviet Union's policy was diametrically opposed to that of the Western governments. As the world's largest oil producer and a major exporter since 1974, the Soviets gave their full support to OPEC's measures to increase oil prices.
Moscow's influence in the Middle East began to wane in the early 1980s. By the middle of the decade, the effects of the Soviet decline had surfaced in virtually every country. This process coincided with the 1979 military invasion of Afghanistan, a Muslim and non-aligned country, as well as the establishment of a fundamentalist government in Tehran. The most important catalyst, however, was the Soviet Union's own internal collapse. Just as the reactionary mullahs of Iran were preparing to export their fundamentalism to the farthest corners of the globe, the Soviets began their rapid exit from the Middle East (and indeed the world arena), leaving the field to Khomeini and his supporters, who were claiming "Islam is the only solution."
Khomeini's famous letter to Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev in January 1989 (see Appendix), although preposterous on the surface, had a message for the targets of the Khomeini regime's fundamentalist propaganda in Islamic countries. Khomeini sought to implant the idea that with the Soviet departure from the international scene, only his ideology and form of government could stand up against the remaining superpower and offer a solution for the harrowing problems of the Islamic world. Khomeini wrote:
If you intend to untie socialism and communism's difficult economic knots by seeking refuge in the arms of Western capitalism, you will not only fail to cure the ills of your own society, but will oblige others to come and compensate for your mistakes. Today Marxism has reached a practical impasse, economically and socially. The Western world is also entangled in a different way in similar problems. . . . In conclusion, I declare with frankness that the Islamic Republic of Iran, as the largest and most powerful base of the Islamic world, can easily fill the ideological void of your system.
While Soviet influence in the Middle East was, for a time, considerable, the indigenous communist parties never attracted significant support among the Middle Eastern peoples, despite profound political and social discontent and other factors that could have contributed to the spread of communism much as in post-war Europe. In addition to the majority of these parties' total dependence on Moscow, the most important cause of their failure to attract followers was the unshakable faith of the Muslim masses in Islam.
With the exception of South Yemen, which ultimately decided to dismantle its Marxist government and merge with its non-Marxist northern neighbour, no Middle Eastern country took the "non-capitalist path of growth" advocated by the Kremlin for the third world. The Soviets had hoped that the ruling regimes of Egypt and Sudan would adopt such a strategy and gradually move toward socialism by means of state control over production. It never happened. The rise of state capitalism in these countries did not impede their change of foreign policy toward the West. Anwar Sadat's sudden expulsion of the Soviet advisors in Egypt in June 1972 was a bitter pill. Shortly afterwards, Egypt opened its doors to foreign investors.
* * *
Appeasement: An Ominous Policy
When Neville Chamberlain gave in to Hitler's demands in Munich in September 1938, the word "appeasement" took on new meaning. The attempt to conciliate Hitler instead of confronting him only emboldened the German dictator to go further.
The policy of appeasement which the West, notably Western Europe, has adopted toward the Iranian government is not unlike the Munich approach. It has similar effects. Whenever the mullahs see that their support for fundamentalism beyond Iran's borders does not meet with an adverse reaction, they are encouraged to do more. Western leniency towards Tehran, especially after the Persian Gulf War, so emboldened the mullahs that in private meetings with European officials, they even requested help in promoting Islamic fundamentalism abroad. French Foreign Minister Roland Dumas was asked in a February 1991 meeting by his Iranian counterpart, Ali-Amber Velayati, for France's support for the fundamentalists in Jordan, Algeria, and Tunisia. Such a policy of placation has been opposed by a wide range of Western politicians, who have repeatedly warned of grave consequences.
A firm approach, on the other hand, means decisively and unambiguously confronting the main exporter of religious fundamentalism, the Iranian regime. This approach calls for close cooperation among all the antifundamentalist forces throughout the Islamic world. If those countries which supported peace, human rights, and democracy do not target the heart of fundamentalism, world peace and the modern era will be in danger. Left unchecked, fundamentalism misuses democratic processes to democracy's detriment. In Algeria, for instance, the Iranian regime exploited domestic problems to advance its policy of export of fundamentalism. Ironically, the Algerian government had opened its doors to the onslaught from Tehran by establishing close ties with the mullahs' regime over the past ten years. In other words, Algeria played right into Khomeini's hand, preparing the ground for the crisis that has befallen the country. Its experience should be a warning to others.
Fundamentalism and Islam's Great Schism
Some analysts have expressed doubts as to whether Shi'ite Iran could act as a center for export of fundamentalism to a Muslim world dominated by Sunnis.13 Although the spread of Khomeiniism in the Sunni countries of North Africa and Central Asia has resolved such doubts, a few points still need to be made.
Most of the key Shi'ah-Sunni disputes have changed little over the centuries. According to the late Iranian scholar Hamid Enayat, the debate is essentially over the issues argued between Hilli and Ibn Taymiyah, renowned jurists of Shi'ism and Sunnism respectively, in the fourteenth century.14 The issues can be divided into two broad categories: those that deal with the prominent personalities of early Islam, and those regarding religious rites and decrees.
The differences are basically rooted in the issue of the Prophet's succession. Shi'ites believe that before he passed away, Prophet Muhammad publicly designated his son-in-law and cousin, Ali ibn Abi Talib, as his successor. Ali had been one of the Prophet's closest disciples and confidants from the onset of his mission. During a stopover on his return to Medina from what came to be known as the Prophet's "Last Hajj," Muhammad turned to the thousands of Muslims accompanying him and declared that whoever followed him should also follow Ali. The Shi'ah view this incident as a formal proclamation of Ali as successor to the Prophet. After the Prophet's death, however, the Muslim dignitaries who gathered to resolve the succession issue ultimately chose Abu Bakr, one of Muhammad's close companions and his father-in-law, as their leader. The decision split the community. Those later to be known as Shi'ites established an independent identity as defenders of "the violated right to leadership" of Ali and his progeny. They gradually grew in numbers to become Islam's largest minority sect.
Over the years, the Shi'ite-Sunni dispute over the succession evolved to include religious ceremonies, laws, and theology. In the mid-nineteenth century, however, a new wave emerged in Islamic religious circles, and the Shi'ite-Sunni barriers began breaking down. Jamal ad-Din Assad Abadi and Muhammad Abdoh, distinguished scholars from Iran and Egypt, contributed greatly to religious tolerance and did much to remove the deeply rooted prejudices and mistrust among Muslims. Shi'ite authors of the past few decades have noticeably toned down their criticism of the first three caliphs (Abu Bakr, Umar, and Uthman) in a bid to bring the Shi'ites and Sunnis closer. Prominent Shi'ite scholars noted for their efforts in this regard include Abdul- Hussein Sharafoddin Al-Moussavi (died 1958), leader of the Lebanese Shi'ites, and Muhammad-Hussein Kashef Al-Qeta' (died 1954), famous for his conciliatory approach in discussion with Sunnis.
In February 1959, Sheikh Mahmoud Shaltout, dean of Al-Azhar University of Cairo, issued a decree sanctioning the teaching of Shi'ite fiqh (jurisprudence) in the university, and formally declaring Shi'ism equal in status to the four recognized schools of law in Sunni Islam. Sheikh Shaltout's decree, printed in the official publication of the university's mosque, ended a 900-year ban on the teaching of Shi'ite jurisprudence at Al-Azhar University. The decree's impact extended far beyond a simple reform in the university's curriculum. It represented an important psychological change in the Sunni perception of Shi'ism. It is said that friendly correspondence between Shaltout and some senior Shi'ite scholars in Iran and Iraq prompted the sheikh's decree.
Strained relations between the government of Gamal Abdel Nasser in Egypt and the shah's regime in Iran inadvertently also led to greater intimacy between the Shi'ites and Sunnis in later years. In July 1960, Egypt broke off diplomatic ties with Iran in protest to the shah's de facto recognition of Israel. The common denominator between the shah's opponents in Iran (the great majority of them faithful Shi'ites) and Arab nationalists supporting Nasser laid the grounds for closer ties between the two sects. In August 1960, some 150 Sunni scholars issued a statement in Cairo calling on the world's Muslims to wage jihad (holy war) against the shah and his pro- Israeli policies.
By the time Khomeini seized power in 1979, the old hostilities between Shi'ites and Sunnis had to a great extent subsided. With the exception of extremists on both sides, who slandered each other as apostates or heretics, the majority of Muslims lived in a new atmosphere of mutual understanding and reconciliation. Khomeini exploited this new harmony to try to extend his religious leadership beyond Shi'ism, portraying himself the qualified leader of the entire Muslim world. Early on, the regime's official propaganda referred to Khomeini as the Leader of the World's Muslims. Keenly aware that the Shi'ite-Sunni rift would be the first ideological obstacle to his dream of reviving the Ottoman Empire, Khomeini always tried to stand above factional infighting and adopt a "patriarchal" posture. His early speeches were filled with generalized, vague emphases on unity between Shi'ites and Sunnis, calling upon both sects to seek "unity of word" (i.e. one voice). Khomeini preached that "there are no privileged peoples in Islam, be they Shi'ite or Sunni, Arab or Persian, Turk or non- Turk. . . . We are brothers with the followers of Sunnism."15
At the same time, Khomeini attempted to provoke the Muslims of various countries to revolt against their "oppressive rulers" and establish an "Islamic government" modeled after his own and subject to Iranian hegemony. To this end, his regime embarked on a campaign to create, organize, and strengthen various groups of religious fundamentalists, both Shi'ite and Sunni, in different countries.16
Within Iran, however, Khomeini's treatment of Sunnis was both discriminatory and brutal. In Kurdistan, the north-eastern regions inhabited by the Turkoman tribe, and Baluchistan, Iranian Sunnis opposed to Khomeini's rule were harshly repressed. In practice, the mullahs revealed that the calls for Shi'ite-Sunni unity were rhetorical, intended to enhance their influence and prepare the ground for the export of fundamentalism.
When Khomeini's book Islamic Government was published in 1970, many Shi'ite scholars dismissed the concept of velayat-e-faqih as contrary to the principles and traditions of Shi'ism. After the Iranian revolution in 1979, Khomeini again tried to inject the velayat-e-faqih idea into the debates surrounding the drafting of the new constitution, outraging secular intellectuals and democratic Muslim forces. A broad spectrum of clerics and theology students at Iran's seminaries also protested.
This Shi'ite opposition to Khomeini's version of the Ottoman Caliphate came from two very different groups. The first were Shi'ite traditionalists, who controlled the majority of the religious schools and seminaries. Despite their acquiescence to the status quo, they dispute Khomeini's interpretation of Islam. These traditionalists rejected the velayat-e-faqih as a fabrication inspired by some Egyptian Sunni fundamentalists and alien to Shi'ism. Even the Quranic verse used by Khomeini to legitimize his theory, "O ye who believe! Obey God, and obey the Apostle, and those charged with authority among you," has been often used throughout Islamic history by Sunni jurists to legitimize contemporary regimes.17 Shi'ite traditionalists contended that the velayat (guardianship) is confined to the twelve Shi'ite Imams, and in the absence of the "hidden" Twelfth Imam, or Mahdi, neither Khomeini nor anyone else had the right to declare himself Imam and claim absolute guardianship. They also accused Khomeini and his followers of neglecting the essence of the Shi'ite concept of velayat, meaning the protectors of the Prophet's family and the children of Ali ibn Abi Talib.
Initially, Khomeini opted to appease the Shi'ite traditionalists, who wielded great influence in the clerical hierarchy, and gave them a share of power to enlist their support. As the conflict intensified, Khomeini began to lash out, calling the traditionalists "dogmatists." One such group, the Hojjatieh, was subsequently dissolved, despite its previous alliance with the Khomeiniists. But the debate continued. In the final year of Khomeini's rule, the traditionalists made headway in attacking his decrees and theory of government, especially after Khomeini was forced to drink the "chalice of poison of a cease-fire" at the end of the Iran-Iraq War, and his authority decreased dramatically. After Khomeini's death, the traditional clerics never submitted to Khamenei's leadership. As a result, Khamenei has never been able to establish his credibility as the country's spiritual leader in the seminaries and theology schools.
It was, however, the second group, namely the Shi'ite modernists, who waged the most effective opposition to Khomeini's theory of velayat-e-faqih. They argued that Khomeini's theory was basically a mantle which fit only him and had nothing to do with Islam or Shi'ism, being merely a philosophical justification for religious despotism. Citing the traditions and sayings of the Prophet of Islam and the Shi'ite Imams, the modernists reasoned that the "absolute guardianship of the jurist" and Khomeini's other theories of government blatantly contradicted the magnanimous methods, collective decision making, forbearance, and religious tolerance of the historical Shi'ite leaders. These views were compiled and advocated most extensively in contemporary Iran by the People's Mojahedin Organization
