Whether they are religious or secular in nature, ideological movements are always characterized by a very rigidly defined world view and a utopian longing to build that one, ideal society. The problem they all face, however, is how to implement their ideals once they are in power. The tactics initially employed come down to efforts to win the ‘hearts and minds’ of the population they have conquered, but in practice these exercises soon deteriorate into suppression and violence because most people’s ideas on how things should be organized tend to differ from those of the ones in power.
In the Reports from the Islamic State (IS) series, the split between ideology and practice is the central theme. ThePostOnline has come into contact with bloggers from the Syrian city of Raqqa, the would be capital of the Islamic State since January 2014. These bloggers include 23-year-old medical student Ibrahim al Raqawi, who was forced to flee from Raqqa and who is now living in another place, and with Abou Mohammed who still resides in Raqqa. They are two of the people behind the website Raqqa is being slaughtered in silence. Based on the interviews with Abou Ibrahim and Abou Mohammed, this series paints a picture of daily life in IS-conquered territory, each time focusing on a different theme or issue.
The editor of the series is Jan Jaap de Ruiter. ThePostOnline has copies of all the chat sessions, which were conducted in English and in Arabic. Today we are presenting Episode 4: ‘IS also needs to be governed – for a while they even had an ombudsman’. Click here for part 1 (on education), here for part 2 (on women), here for part 3 (on Christians) and here for part 4 (Islamic state also needs to be governed). Today part 5: The Fate of Infidels.
Westerners tend to naturally assume that in the eyes of supporters and fighters of the Islamic State infidels are people who are not Muslims, such as Jews, Christians and Yazidis. Nothing could be further from the truth. In the ideology of the Islamic State, the concept of ‘infidel’ is defined very broadly. It turns out that it applies mainly to fellow-Muslims
The core aspect of the belief lying at the basis of the concept of ‘infidel’, or kufr as it is called in Arabic, is the conviction that God, Allah is one and indivisible. There is nothing strange about this conviction in itself, certainly not for Western Christians. They too believe in one God, even though this God mysteriously consists of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. But in principle the Christian God is one, as is the God of the Jews. The spiritual leaders of IS, however, adhere to a very strict interpretation of the consequences of God being one and indivisible. Sharia emanates from God and therefore is a divine law. Respecting Sharia therefore means respecting the oneness of God. If you live according to other laws than Sharia, this means you are breaking the oneness of God. It means you are serving two laws, two Gods, and the penalty for that is death. That is how simple things are for IS (and for other Jihadist movements as well for that matter).
If you are in the service of any organization that implements rules or laws – democratic ones, for instance – which are not in accordance with Sharia, this means that the organization consists of kafirs, infidels, all of whom should therefore be punished by death. As you can see, you are an infidel before you know it, as is the case with Abou Ibrahim’s fellow-activists, some of whom have been arrested, all of them charged with ‘kufr’. Ibrahim mentioned the names of his arrested and sometimes murdered comrades in a previous column. Let us take a closer look at three of them.
Muhand Haj Obaid
‘Muhand Haj Obaid was a very energetic activist during the revolution against Assad. Everybody in the city loved him. When Daesh (the Arabic name for IS) had occupied the city, a meeting was organized in one of the coffee houses to discuss the developments. Muhand was very outspoken and uttered severe criticism, not knowing that there were Daesh spies present there. The next day he was kidnapped in broad daylight in the center of the city. Not much later his body was found in the country. Handcuffed and blindfolded, he had been shot through the head twice. This was done to get the message across that Daesh had eyes and ears everywhere, and made no bones about arresting and killing young activists.’
Human Rights lawyer Abdullah al-Khalil
‘Equally tragic is the fate of human rights lawyer Abdullah al-Khalil, who during the Assad regime defended activists who were in prison. Besides this, he was the only candidate running against Assad in the Syrian Presidential Elections in 2007. Not much later, he too was thrown in the dungeons of Assad, only to find himself locked up in the same dungeons now as a prisoner of the Daesh regime.
‘The saddest story is perhaps that of the activist couple Samar Saleh and Mohammed al Omr, two young people. They were working for a charitable organization offering food and help to the poor. Mohammed was also active in media training and journalistic training courses. On their way to Aleppo one day, they were arrested and taken by Daesh. Samar’s mother begged in vain for their release’.
Mohammed al Omr and Samar Saleh
What Daesh accuses these people of is ‘kufr’, their being ‘infidels’, in all cases. Activist Muhand uttered severe criticism of Daesh, no doubt prompted to do so by the devil. After all, anyone in their right mind cannot but come to the conclusion that the Islam as propagated by IS is the one and only truth. Abdullah al Khalil, whichever way you turn it, even if he opposed Assad, is still guilty of ‘kufr’ simply by acting in service of the non-divine Syrian laws. The two young people were working for non-religious organizations, which from the IS perspective is equal to committing ‘kufr’ since no organization is allowed to exist outside the banner of Sharia.
Earlier episodes in this series already showed how monochrome black the Islamic State is. Its extreme interpretation of the oneness of God takes away virtually all human and thus societal variation: children, women, Christians, all are to live by the consequences of this conviction cast in concrete. There is no room even for well-meaning people who consider themselves Muslims but who also want to serve others and in other connections. Daesh takes away their right to do so and thereby takes away their lives.
Translated by Hans Verhulst
