Al-Qaeda - Religious or Political?
Patrick Dancoes
POL-357
Prof. Shirk
Blog – Al Qaeda
4/23/18
Religious vs Political Terrorism:
The aims of Al-Qaeda were forged from Osama Bin Laden’s Islamic beliefs. The manifestation of these beliefs produced a targeted goal of bleeding American resources dry. Al-Qaeda hoped to drive the US into bankruptcy, and in-turn force the US to withdraw from the Arabian Peninsula and cease Israeli aid. Al-Qaeda’s ambitions seem to be economical and political in regards to their terrorist motivation; however, the group’s tactics which implored the use of devastating violence speaks more to their core ambitions as religious terrorists. Al-Qaeda cloaked legitimacy over its activity by deeming actions their divine duty, carried out in direct response to their Islamic imperative. This makes it clear that the motives of Bin Laden, and in essence Al-Qaeda stem from a religious foundation. Being so, I will argue that Bin Laden and Al-Qaeda carried out their actions as religious terrorists; that is, the group’s religious motivation is apart from the motives of many political terrorists that we have studied in the past.
Firstly, to eliminate Bin Laden from being a political terrorist, it is crucial to recognize that he did not see himself as being part of a social system worth preserving. Mostly, this was due to America's military actions and the non-response from Muslims to it. He didn’t feel the current order had any merit worth upholding because of rising non-Muslim mitigation over Islamic territory, which had diluted his ideal of Islamic despotism. Bin Laden felt this to be the ultimate theological imperative – preserve Islamic rule by any means necessary.
Another critique of Bin Laden’s religious motivation and terrorism is the notion of being an outsider to the current system. Outsiders in this sense see themselves bound to rules not limited by any existing system. This is interesting because Bin Laden and the members who joined Al-Qaeda saw America as the clear outsiders, as America is not prescribing to Islamic rules. However, it would be more precise to say that Al-Qaeda, being forming on religiously extreme merits warrant them to be the real ‘outsider’ group, and its members the real ‘outsiders.’ This is mainly because Al-Qaeda actions are violently odd, something consistent with outsider groups and because America is too large to an outsider anything.
Bin Laden sought to bring fundamental change to the Muslim world and did so by applying spectacular violence. The destruction from this violence, for instance, the 9/11 attacks, can only be carried out by people who ignore common bureaucratic and realistic barriers. These type of terrorists are very alienated from their present environment. And it is this alienation and disassociation from the existing system that enabled Al-Qaeda to consider far deadly and more destructive terrorist operations than previous political and secular terrorists. It also allowed them to accept a far-greater category of enemies to battle, meaning they accept a fight against the entirety of the non-Muslim world, and specifically America. This is a goal that would be outside of a political terrorist’s purview because the practicality of attaining that goal is likely zero.
Essentially, terrorism is a dimension of enlightened superiority in the eyes of Bin Laden and the members of Al-Qaeda. This religious shield consequently makes these perpetrators of terrorism unrestrained by most political, moral, and practical restraints that limit other terrorists. The role religion assumes is that of the motivating determinant for Al-Qaeda and Bin Laden. This religious factor is stressed by their lack of conventional morals and political constraints while executing operations. Religious motivation was also acknowledged by Bin Laden when he got the chance to explain himself, as he repeatedly cited Islamic proverbs to explain Al-Qaeda’s terrorism. These religious rationales, taken from Islamic writing dated centuries ago, is what demarcates Bin Laden and Al-Qaeda as religious terrorists and separate from other political terrorists.
I like how you acknowledge that Al-Qaeda’s ambitions seem to be economical and political at first glance, but that their tactics are actually used more for their core ambitions as religious terrorists. Though members of Al-Qaeda are most likely justifying their actions by arguing that they are religious in nature, this is not to say that what they are doing is okay or by any means justified. I think that a lot of the times people try to use religion and religious motivations as a barrier to protect themselves from receiving the same punishments that those acting with a political goal would receive, and this is an unfair way of attempting to cheat the system especially when the acts being committed are extremely violent in nature and are causing immense harm; no motivations should be able to justify that.
ReplyDeleteI think that you make a very interesting argument here. I agree, that the overarching structure of Al-Qaeda seems to be much more religiously oriented than politically oriented. However, I wonder if the broader structure of Al-Qaeda should be the only thing considered. Al-Qaeda had many branches, and many organizations that they were associated with. One of these was the Boko Haram, which only recently decided to switch its support to back ISIS. While the Boko Haram is made up of religious fundamentalists, their actions seem much more political to me. Honestly, I think that it is hard to fully separate religion from politics. This is something we even struggle with in the United States. Some political parties and ideas are based off of religious morals. Take the extreme controversy over planned parenthood. I guess I wonder whether the two are always against one another, or whether they are really intertwined.
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