Tarek Fatah - Chasing a Mirage: The Tragic lllusion of an Islamic State

Advance Reviews

Tarek Fatah has dared to question the received wisdom about the centrality of the Islamic State to the destiny of the universal Muslim community. He shows through painstaking, meticulous research that the sooner the Muslims rid themselves of the deadweight of wasteful and vain centuries of tribal and clannish feuds and sectarian strife in the name of true Islam and the Islamic state the greater will be their chances of getting out of the rut of obscurantism and fanaticism. Like all other civilized religious communities of the world the Muslims too need to adopt secularism and pluralism as an integral part of their social and political orders. I am sure this book will generate much-needed critical discussion on political Islam.

Ishtiaq Ahmed, Ph.D.

Professor of Political Science, University of Stockholm, Sweden.

Visiting Senior Research Fellow at the Institute of South Asian Studies (ISAS), SingaporeChasing a Mirage should be required reading for the Left in the West who have mistakenly started believing that Islamists represent some sort of anti-imperialism.

Tarek Fatah convincingly demonstrates that the Islamist agenda is not only medieval and tribal, it is misogynist and reactionary and has been a serious threat to progressive forces throughout history. The agenda of the Muslim Brotherhood and the Jamaat-e-Islami must never be confused with the struggle for social justice, equality and enlightenment. Chasing a Mirage is an extremely valuable contribution to the fi ght by progressive Muslims against Islamist fascism.

Farooq Tahir

Secretary General

Pakistan Labour Party

In Chasing a Mirage, Tarek Fatah takes a unique look at Islamic history, one that may cause some discomfort among the orthodoxy. The book provides an amazing insight into the power struggles that have plagued Muslim society for centuries and how Islam has often been used as a political tool, rather than as a religion. Fatah also addresses internalized racism within the Muslim community and the role it continues to play in confl icts like the one in Darfur. The book is a valuable contribution to the on-going debate within the Muslim community about how it reconciles with modernity.

Senator Mobina Jaffer

Parliament of Canada, Ottawa

Tarek Fatahs is a voice that needs to be heard. Canada needs a healthy, reasoned debate about the issues he is raising, and indeed so does the world. He is never afraid to speak his mind, and he refuses to shrink quietly into the night. The questions he is posing are critical.

Bob Rae

Former Premier of Ontario, Toronto

This book focuses on the internal debate within the Muslim world of today and the rise of political Islam from the viewpoint of a critique of Muslim historiography and hagiography. The author reminds us that the sacralisation of Muslim politics and the canonisation of Islamist political thinking was the direct result of centuries of centralisation of power (both political and representational) at the hands of right-wing Muslim demagogues and ideologues whose own politics can only be described in present-day terms as Fascist and intolerant.

Dr. Farish A. Noor

Centre for Modern Oriental Studies, Berlin; andSunan Kalijaga Islamic University, Jogjakarta, Indonesia Tarek Fatah rightly explains that the decline of the worlds Muslims does not come from the absence of a puritanical Islamic state. It is the result of the state in which the Muslims currently fi nd themselves. He also calls for making a distinction between pietistic Muslims and those pursuing power in Islams name. Some of his views, especially in relation to U.S. policies and the war against terrorism, are bound to generate controversy, and not everyone who agrees with his diagnosis will necessarily agree with his prescription. But Fatah joins the expanding list of Muslim authors challenging Islamism and demanding that Muslims should revert to Islam an essentially spiritual and ethical belief system instead of stretching history to present Islam as a political ideology.

Professor Husain Haqqani

Director of Boston Universitys Center for International RelationsCo-Chair of the Islam and Democracy Project at Hudson Institute, Washington D.C.

Fatah writes with a startling knowledge of and empathy for his religion and its adherents. He argues with biting intelligence for a genuine and cleansing understanding of Islams history and how it should be understood in the modern world. His analysis of the difference between a state of Islam and an Islamic state is vitally important.

This is the best criticism; based in love.

Michael Coren

Columnist, Toronto Sun

This fascinating work by brave and brilliant Tarek Fatah is simultaneously thought-provoking, instructive and enlightening for laymen and scholars, Muslim and non-Muslim. This wonderful combination of knowledge, wisdom and foresighta progressive and honest Muslims cry from his heartis an invaluable and rare addition to the corpus of Islamic literature in the post-9/11 world, a bold step towards Islamic Reformation and Enlightenment.

Dr. Taj Hashmi

Professor, Asia-Pacifi c Center for Security Studies, Honolulu

Chasing a Mirage

Chasing a Mirage

The Tragic Illusion of an Islamic State

Tarek Fatah

Copyright 2008 Tarek Fatah

All rights reserved. No part of this work covered by the copyright herein may be reproduced or used in any form or by any meansgraphic, electronic or mechanical without the prior written permission of the publisher. Any request for photocopying, recording, taping or information storage and retrieval systems of any part of this book shall be directed in writing to The Canadian Copyright Licencing Agency (Access Copyright).

For an Access Copyright licence, visit www.accesscopyright.ca, or call toll

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Care has been taken to trace ownership of copyright material contained in this text; however, the publisher will welcome any information that enables them to rectify any reference or credit for subsequent editions.

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication Data

Fatah, Tarek, 1949

Chasing a mirage : the tragic illusion of an Islamic state / Tarek Fatah.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-0-470-84116-7

1. Islam and state. 2. Islam21st century. 3. Muslims. 4. Islamic countriesPolitics and government. I. Title.

BP163.F38 2008 297.2'72 C2008-900614-3

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1 2 3 4 5 FP 12 11 10 09 08

For

Benazir Bhutto

and

Daniel Pearl

A Muslim and a Jew,

both victims of terrorism.

The Taliban are the expression of a modern disease, symptoms of a social cancer which shall destroy Muslim societies if its growth is not arrested and the disease is not eliminated. It is prone to spreading, and the Taliban will be the most deadly communicators of cancer if they remain so organically linked to Pakistan.

Eqbal Ahmed