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What Drives Jihad?
Dr. Tawfik Hamid holds a boxed lunch in one hand and offers me his book, The Roots of Jihad, with the other. A Muslim, he wears Western clothing. Still, I refrain from extending my hand. We walk back to the conference room. No photographs of Dr. Hamid are allowed. For security reasons, says the doctor, who looks younger than his 45 years.Dr. Hamid fled his native Egypt because he espouses a peaceful interpretation of Islam based on the Koran. Today he is one of the leading authorities on the Islamic texts (Sulafi) which are responsible for the wildfire spread of jihad in the Arab world. As I listen to his articulate scholarship, his bitter condemnation of his own people, Icatch myself staring. Before he embraced this new way of seeing, Dr. Hamid was an ideological extremist on the fast track to becoming a real live terrorist. I was eight when I first heard the teaching that says, When you die a martyr, you are not dead you are alive, says Dr. Hamid, who was raised in a secular Muslim family. Dying for Allah was the only guarantee that we would not go to the grave. For us, the grave was frightening. Sulafi Islam teaches that only punishment awaits us in the grave. So to me, and many kids around me, the idea of dying for Allah and going to Paradise was wonderful. For me, a child, that meant eating lollipops and candy and chocolate. Believe me. This was my dream! Later, the dream changed. During medical school, Dr. Hamid joined JI (Jaamma Islameia), an outlaw fundamentalist group calling for jihad against Muslims who have abandoned their faith (apostates) and non-Muslims. He met Dr. Aiman Al-Zawaheri now Al Qaidas second in command under Osama bin Laden in JI. Asked what Al-Zawaheri was like, Dr. Hamid does not hesitate. (And any Muslim who hesitates even for one second when answering a question is being deceptive, he later stresses.) Al-Zawaheri was a very nice man on the personal level, he says. He was very dedicated to the concept of jihad against the US. He often came to the mosque I went to. We prayed together. We talked. I need to know why Dr. Hamid is no longer an extremist. What happened? At first I followed the teachings of Sulafi Islam. Ichanged into a person that justified the killings of innocents. I thought in a totally distorted manner. I became like a beast. When it came time to go forward and commit certain acts I was invited to go Afghanistan, to train for jihad, to die for Allah I felt this struggle between my conscience and the religious teachings. I started to think. And this word, thinking, probably is what saved me. I began to question. You see, at the theoretical level things seemed OK. But at the practical level, when I was about to act . . . A friend introduced me to another form of Islamic thinking that was relatively peaceful. I say relatively peaceful, compared to the other kind. This sect was primarily based on the Koran. I began studying Koranic verses in a totally different manner. There are many verses in the Koran that praise Bnai Yisrael; that grant the Israelis the land. Soon I started to preach this new understanding. One day, he was called to preach at the mosque. I gave a lecture, and people listened peacefully. It was good. But afterward, some fundamentalists surrounded me. They said, if you come here again we will kill you. Then they attacked me, and my friend. We ran. But soon they began stoning me. Dr. Hamid looks at me with pained and furious eyes. Unfortunately, this resistance to peaceful teaching is not limited to fundamentalists. It is now at the level of the people. Rest at link. Posted by: ed 2006-10-24 |
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