The controversy over terrorism terminology
A shift has been taking place in UK government ministries as to the terminology used to describe the terrorist threat faced by Britain. The Foreign Office has advised ministers to abandon the use of terms such as 'war against terror', 'Islamic terrorism' and 'Islamist terrorism'. The idea is that these terms antagonise the British Muslim community and increase tensions with the wider Muslim world. Using military terminology is seen as counter-productive, contributing to the isolating of communities from each other. According to proponents of this shift, such terms imply a conflict of religions and link Islam, the religion of peace, with terrorism and radicalism. They hold that the widespread use of such terms serves only to alienate and radicalise more Muslims who would otherwise be happy to integrate into a cohesive British society. Terrorists, they believe, use the sense of crisis engendered by the discourse on a 'clash of civilisation' and a 'war against Islamic terrorism' to recruit supporters who feel that Islam is being attacked and that Muslims must defend themselves. Abandoning such terms, according to the Foreign Office, will avoid empowering the terrorists' narrative and weaken the trend to radicalisation.
Another strand of thinking, expressed by Sir Ken Macdonald, Director of Public Prosecutions, is that it is better to see acts of terrorism as being carried out by individual criminals. These can be efficiently handled by the police and courts and need no special terminology or methodology to deal with them. Macdonald sees a danger that contemporary terrorism might tempt Britain to abandon its values in a “fear-driven and inappropriate” response, leading to the abandonment of respect for fair trials and due process of law. According to Macdonald,
London is not a battlefield. Those innocents who were murdered on July 7, 2005 were not victims of war. And the men who killed them were not, as in their vanity they claimed on their ludicrous videos, 'soldiers'. They were deluded, narcissistic inadequates. They were criminals. They were fantasists. We need to be very clear about this. On the streets of London, there is no such thing as a 'war on terror', just as there can be no such thing as a 'war on drugs' . . . The fight against terrorism on the streets of Britain is not a war. It is the prevention of crime, the enforcement of our laws and the winning of justice for those damaged by their infringement.
In a Radio 4 “Start the Week” programme on 2 July 2007, the philosopher John Gray and the historian Eric Hobsbawm agreed that it was wrong, dangerous and unfair to use the term “Islamist” because it implied a strong link to Islam.
Evidence of this new approach was present in the first Commons statement of the new Home Secretary, Jacqui Smith on 2 July 2007. While stating that Britain would not be intimidated by acts of terror she rarely mentioned Muslims, preferring to say “community leaders” for leaders of the Muslim community and “communities” for the Muslim community. This was interpreted as part of the deliberate change of language by ministers.
The new Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, in an interview following the attacks in London and Glasgow in late June, also avoided mentioning British Muslims, preferring to talk about al-Qaeda. His spokesman said the Prime Minister would avoid using the phrase “war on terror”. A European Commission guide for government spokesmen has recently been published which says that words such as “jihad”, “Islamic” or “fundamentalists” should be avoided in statements about terrorist attacks. It is thought that as a result, Brown asked Cabinet members not to mention the words “Muslim” and “terrorism” in the same context.
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Ex-Islamist radicals call for the reformation of Islam
Several Muslims who were involved in radical Islamist groups have recently rejected the radical ideologies. Ed Husain came out of Hizb ut-Tahrir and Hassan Butt left al-Muhajiroun determined to warn the public of the dangers of Islamist groups and their ideology. Both see Islamism as an outgrowth of classical Islamic theology. They attack the position that Islam has nothing to do with terrorism, arguing that denial blocks the possibility of reform. Muslims, they say, must acknowledge that there is a violent streak in Islam and that classical Islamic theology is a main engine of violence. They argue that the unwillingness of mainstream Islam in the UK to discuss the issue of violence within Islam allowed radical preachers to seize the high ground and recruit many young Muslims to their cause. Mainstream Muslims repeated the mantra that Islam is peace, denied the violent aspects of Islamic theology, and hoped the problems would disappear, thus leaving the field open for radicals and their ideologies. Muslims must cease ignoring the passages in Qur'an and Hadith which speak of killing unbelievers and challenge the centuries-old theology of jihad. Muslim scholars must refashion Islamic theology creating a reformed Islam for Muslims living in what Butt calls the land of co-existence. They must develop a new set of rules of rights and responsibilities which will enable Muslims to liberate themselves from ancient theological models that legitimised killing in the name of Islam.
Muslim journalist links Islamism with terror
The well known Muslim journalist Adel Darwish, editor of The Middle East magazine, has come out strongly against Muslims who object to the use of the term “Islamists” to refer to terrorists and their atrocities. Darwish claims that it is right to call them Islamists because they justify their atrocities by referring to Islam and the Qur'an. In his opinion, there is no term more appropriate for referring to them.
Analysis
While it makes sense to be sensitive to the Muslim community and its worries, the new terminology will not achieve its aim of reducing radicalisation. The reason is that it fails to see the connection between aspects of classical and traditional Islamic theology, Islamist ideology and the radicalisation that leads to terrorism. Of course it is possible that the government is practising its own version of dissimulation (Islamic taqiyya), recognising the reality of violence in Islam but suppressing its public discussion in order to mollify the Muslim public in its efforts to win hearts and minds.
This new strategy could prove counter-productive. Whilst it may carry the support of the wider community of Muslims who do not want to see their religion demonised, or of the wider British community which is sick of apocalyptic terrorism, it may end up empowering the Islamists and conservative Muslims because it allows them to continue unchallenged and furthermore to have their position strengthened by the rejection of the link between violence and their religion.
The new policy will also further marginalise the growing numbers of Muslim reformers and liberals who are just beginning to articulate their critique of the links between classical Islamic theology and violence. It could end up by alienating this important group who are rejecting the conservative and Islamist position and are calling for a reformation of Islam. Increasingly they are going to be distrustful of a government that now plays to the Islamists and conservatives and does not support the reformers and liberals in their endeavour.
The likely consequence of this policy will be an entrenched conservative Islamist position issuing in much greater violence. The government's strategy is a high risk one. Only time will tell whether it succeeds or whether it fails, perhaps dramatically. The real test of its success will be if the broad Muslim community and its leadership in Britain will publicly and privately reject all forms of violence attached to their religion and will embrace modern, Western values such as freedom, equality, human rights and religious liberty, and a loyalty to Britain and her values and way of life.
Finally, Muslims in Britain must face up to the strands of violence and intolerance in Islam if they are to isolate and suppress the continual emergence of radicals in their midst. While a number of Muslims have recently acknowledged these roots, politically correct talk and spin from the government will only encourage the Muslim community to ignore and deny the problem and continue to marginalise those within their community who can most help to find a solution. The real answer to the problem of radicalisation and violence among Muslims is a reformation of Islam that embraces the separation of religion from state and politics and that accepts a core of basic Islamic values, distilled from the Islamic source texts, as spiritual and moral norms that override coercive political and social interpretations. Such a reformation must reject traditional Islamic concepts about non-Muslims, violence and jihad.
Copyright © 2007 Barnabas Fund | The controversy over terrorism terminology
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