TURMOIL IN THE WORLD OF ISLAM.

Mohan Guruswamy

I. The World of Islam.

The wars in Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Libya, the campaigns of terror in Nigeria, Philippines, Indonesia, India and Xinjiang, all together accounting for most of the turmoil spanning the globe are centered in the Islamic world. One would not be far off the mark if one suggests that the world faces its greatest crisis due to this turmoil

Islam is the world's second largest religion after Christianity. According to a 2010 study, Islam has 1.62 billion adherents, making up over 23% of the world population. Islam is the predominant religion in the Middle East, in Sahel, in the Horn of Africa and northern Africa, and in some parts of Asia. Large communities of Muslims are also found in China, the Balkans, and Russia. Other parts of the world too host large Muslim immigrant communities; in Western Europe, for instance, Islam is the second largest religion after Christianity, where it represents 6% of the total population.

There 49 Muslim-majority countries. Around 62% of the world's Muslims live in South and Southeast Asia, with over 1 billion adherents. The largest Muslim country is Indonesia, home to 12.7% of the world's Muslims, followed by Pakistan (11.0%), India (10.9%), and Bangladesh (9.2%). About 20% of Muslims live in Arab countries. In the Middle East, the non-Arab countries of Turkey and Iran are the largest Muslim-majority countries; in Africa, Egypt and Nigeria have the most populous Muslim communities.

The Islamic crescent is a wide arc from Pakistan in the east to Morocco in the west. There are four broad socio-cultural and two deep sectarian divides that characterize the region. The second biggest country in the world that Muhammad created, Pakistan, and the current epicenter of the jihadi terror that has been unleashed on the rest of the world is the only South Asian country in this tumultuous world. The other broad region consist of the Turkic countries of Central Asia and Turkey itself, then the Arab countries and Iran – all by itself.

The other major divide, and this is a horizontal one, is the Shia/Sunni divide. There are far more Muslims in all in other regions such as India, Bangladesh, Indonesia, north Africa, but it is the Islamic crescent that is the motherland of the theological and political anger that keeps the Islamic world in continuous tumult and angry with the world. This area, excluding Pakistan and Afghanistan, is also known as West Asia and North Africa (WANA) or Middle East and North Africa (MENA) in government dovecotes world over.

Western Asia is the term that describes the westernmost portion of Asia. The term is partly coterminous with the Middle East, which describes a geographical position in relation to Western Europe rather than its location within Asia. Due to this perceived Euro centrism, international organizations such as the United Nations, have replaced Middle East and Near East with Western Asia. The population of Western Asia is over 300 million. The most populous countries in the region are Iran and Turkey, each with around 75 million people, followed by Iraq with around 32 million people. The major languages are Arabic, which is an official language in 14 regional countries, followed by Turkish, and Persian. Islam is the major faith in Western Asia.

The economy of Western Asia is diverse and the region experiences high economic growth. Turkey has the largest economy in the region, followed by Saudi Arabia and Iran. Petroleum is the major industry in the regional economy, as more than half of the world's oil reserves and around 40 percent of the world's natural gas reserves are located in the region.

Central Asia remains largely insulated from this turmoil by the successor dictatorships and strongmen who came to inherit the Soviet mantle. Turkey insulated itself by westernizing. Even its political conservatives are less driven by religion and more by the broad Islamic nationalism that is a consequence of Israel and its continued occupation of the West Bank.

WANA is the oil rich area and its WANA money that gives militant Islam its logistical and ideological impetus. Islam began as an Arab religion and all its folklore and mythology is set in the deserts of Arabia. It is this subscription to a uniquely regional dogma that gives the Arab world its dominant influence on the bigger world of Sunni Islam.

Sunnis are a majority in most Muslim communities in Southeast Asia, China, South Asia, Africa, most of the Arab World, and among Muslims in the United States (of which 85-90% are Sunnis). Shia’s make up the majority of the Muslim population in Iran (around 90–95%), Azerbaijan (around 85%), Iraq (around 60-65%) and Bahrain (around 65%). Minority Shia communities are also found in Yemen, around 30% of the Muslim population (mostly of the Zaydi sect), and about 10-15% of Turkey are of the Alevi sect. The Shia constitute around 20% of Kuwait, 45-55% of the Muslim population in Lebanon, 10% of Saudi Arabia, 15% of Syria, and 10-15% of Pakistan. Around 10-15% of Afghanistan, less than 5% of the Muslims in Nigeria, and around 3% of population of Tajikistan are Shia.

Iran challenges this supremacy being the largest Shia country in the world, the home of Shia theology study and with a comparable oil wealth. While the Arab countries, with the possible exception of Egypt, have all been relatively poor and backward till the oil boom of the early 1970’s, Iran has traditionally been a more westernized and developed region in WANA. The Shia/Sunni divide almost equally divides WANA in terms of numbers, because there are sizeable Shia populations in Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Syria, and Lebanon and more importantly in the scattered Palestinian communities in the West Bank, Jordan and Lebanon.

The Shia/Sunni competition that has its roots in the succession struggles after the death of its founder Muhammad is now exacerbated by a competitive militancy over Israel and its political patron- the USA. Iran has sought to extend its influence in the largely Sunni Arab world by espousing a more trenchant anti-Israeli and anti-American activism. It seems to have served it well so far and has given it much influence in neighboring countries. Shia’s control Iraq and the Alawites control Syria. The Iranian supported Hezbollah commands good support in Lebanon, Gaza and the West Bank. Henry Kissinger once said in the context of Israel that it was not possible to have war without Syria just as it was not possible to have peace without it. Syria is now not in a position to make war let alone be at peace. It would seem that Kissinger’s postulate now applies to Iran.

Needless to say this vast area is a cauldron of passions and the most byzantine politics. With the exception of Turkey, which now has a well-settled democratic system in place, none of these West Asian countries can qualify to be a democracy in the known sense of the term. After the so-called Arab Spring many new governments sprang up in deference the wishes of the people who took to the street. Tunisia and Egypt have had transitions to slightly more freely elected governments, but stability eludes them. Libya has lapsed into disorder and Iraq has its traditional deep divides more exacerbated.

The big question is how will this region settle down?

II. The Turmoil in the Islamic World.

Other regions in the world often seem just as troubled. But it is West Asia, which concerns the world most because of it contributes over 20% of world oil supply. According to IEA top 10 countries produced over 63% of the world oil production in 2011. They are (in Mt): 1) Saudi Arabia 517 (12.9%), 2) Russia 510 (12.7%), 3) United States 346 (8.6%), 4) Iran 215 (5.4%), 5) China 203 (5.1%), 6) Canada 169 (4.2%), 7) United Arab Emirates 149 (3.7%), 8) Venezuela 148 (3.7%), 9) Mexico 144 (3.6%), 10) Nigeria 139 (3.5%), Rest of the world 1 471 (36.6%), World 4 011 (100%).

Further, since most of this production is mainly in sparsely populated countries the trade surpluses pile up in western banks as investments and reserves. The seven countries of the oil rich Arabian Peninsula together have a population of just 64 million and a combined GDP of nearly $1.5 trillion. All of them except the poorest one among them, Yemen, have monarchies and support huge expatriate populations. The two other large West Asian oil producers, Iran and Iraq, are bigger countries. Iran, which has a GDP of $357 billion, has a population of 78.8 million; while Iraq that has a GDP of $ 144 billion has a population of 33.6 million. West Asia also has five of the world’s top ten proven oil reserves. Saudi Arabia has the world’s fourth largest foreign exchange reserves with $680 billion invested in western banks.

Clearly the world has much riding on the stability of West Asia and in particular the countries of oil rich Arabian Peninsula, Iraq and Iran?

The region is awash with huge numbers of small arms and several arms races. The one that causes most concern is the Iran and Saudi Arabia arms race. Iran is on the verge of acquiring nuclear weapons. It already has nuclear capable intermediate range missiles. If and when Iran tests, it is very clear that Saudi Arabia, under the terms it has financed the Pakistani nuclear program, will “buy” itself a nuclear deterrent.

So the question of how this situation could play out is uppermost in the minds of strategists and forecasters all over the world?

The likely fault-lines are the Shia-Sunni division and tensions, the clamor for democracy or greater peoples participation in government against the more rigid monarchies, and there is always the Palestine issue, an issue that unites the entire Muslim world, getting out of hand with some violent terrorist act sparking off an even more violent Israeli reaction.

Would Israel be able to absorb a Bombay kind of terrorist attack without retaliation upon the country from where it emanated? Suppose it came from Jordan or Iran? Would India be able to absorb another major strike by Pakistan based terrorist groups without retaliation?

Suppose there is another seizure of the Grand Mosque of Mecca as it happened in 1979. The Grand Mosque Seizure on 20 November 1979, was an armed attack and takeover of the Al-Masjid al-Haram in Mecca, Saudi Arabia, the holiest place in Islam by Islamist dissidents. The insurgents declared that the Mahdi, or redeemer of Islam, had arrived in the form of one of the insurgent leaders, Mohammed Abdullah al-Qahtani, and called on Muslims to obey him. The seizure shocked the Islamic world as hundreds of pilgrims present for the annual hajj were taken hostage, and hundreds of militants, security forces and hostages caught in crossfire were killed in the ensuing battles for control of the site. The siege ended two weeks after the takeover began with militants and the mosque was cleared. Following the attack, the Saudi state implemented stricter enforcement of Islamic code.

Suppose Saudi Arabia concludes that this attack emanated out of Iran? Saudi Arabia is among the worlds most controlled states. Its internal control makes it almost totalitarian replete with midnight knocks and disappearances. It also has a profligate and somewhat corrupt royal oligarchy ruling it. How long can it stave off impulses for democracy? In 1979 the violent fallout of this was the torching of the US Embassy in Islamabad while Pakistani forces stood by watching.

Countries like Syria, Iraq, Yemen, and Algeria have full blown civil wars and/or insurgencies dividing them. These insurgencies are driven by radical Islamic impulses, tribal and sectarian divisions as we saw in Libya and now see in Iraq and Syria. Algeria’s military supported regime battles a radical Islamic movement after it won political power in Algeria’s last free general election. This then is the true dilemma of West Asia. The cry for democracy is often just a Trojan horse for radical Islam. Take Egypt for instance, where the Islamic Brotherhood had come to power in an election. Or Algeria where a military coup had to take back government from a radical Islamic party.

Iraq now seems headed for a defacto partition along ethnic and sectarian lines. In the north the Kurds run a virtually autonomous state, while in the Arab parts Shia’s and Sunnis wage war upon each other. Iran already exercises much influence in Iraq with its Shia majority. In Bahrain the Shia majority’s aspirations for a say in government now lies dormant after a Saudi backed royal crackdown.

Within Saudi Arabia the oil producing Eastern Province is a Shia majority area. The Eastern Province is home to most of Saudi Arabia's oil production. The province is also home of the City of Jubail, which hosts the Jubail Industrial City, a global hub for chemical industries. The province is also a regional tourism area because of its location on the coast of the Persian Gulf and the variety of entertainment activities available across the province. There have been low-level protests for more than a year in the Qatif region of the oil-rich Eastern Province where most of Saudi Arabia's Shia minority live. Approximately 15% of Saudis are Shia.

The oil-rich Eastern Province is home to a Shia majority that has long complained of marginalization at the hands of the Sunni ruling family. Protests erupted in the region in March 2011 when a popular uprising in neighboring Bahrain, which has a Shia majority and a Sunni royal family, was crushed with the assistance of Saudi and other Gulf troops. Human rights groups say there is systematic discrimination in Saudi Arabia against Shia Muslims in education, employment and justice. Saudi Arabia follows the puritanical form of Sunni Islam known as Wahhabism, and many Wahhabi clerics regard Shia Muslims as unbelievers.

Clearly the region is very troubled. What will be the proverbial straw that breaks the camel’s back?

First, most certainly would be a major terrorist strike against Israel.

Second would be a Shia –Sunni civil war that leads to the partition of Iraq and demands for “democracy” in Saudi Arabia, as we saw in Bahrain last year. If Iraq is partitioned the oil reserves and production in the West Asian Shia nations will exceed that of the Sunni Arabs. This will almost certainly intensify the Shia struggle for greater freedom in the predominantly Shia Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia.

This situation is fraught with some more possibilities. Suppose Iran abandons its nuclear program and consequently loses its pariah status in the West? Will it then be freer to pursue its program of greater “democracy” in the Muslim world?

There is always the possibility of Arab nationalist’s seizing the Al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem. Al-Aqsa Mosque also known as Bayt al-Muqaddas is the third holiest site in Islam and is located in the Old City of Jerusalem. The site on which the silver domed mosque sits, along with the Dome of the Rock, also referred to as al-Haram ash-Sharif or "Noble Sanctuary," is the Temple Mount, the holiest site in Judaism, the place where the Temple is generally accepted to have stood. Muslims believe that Muhammad was transported from the Sacred Mosque in Mecca to al-Aqsa during the Night Journey. Islamic tradition holds that the prophet Muhammad led prayers towards this site until the seventeenth month after the emigration, when God directed him to turn towards the Ka'aba.

We now wait to see where God directs the Islamist radical next?

Mohan Guruswamy