Progress through the reformation of Islam

Thomas Friedman has an interesting take on the evolving struggle in the Muslim world.

My friend Raymond Stock, the biographer and translator of Naguib Mahfouz and a longtime resident of Cairo, argues that we are seeing in Baghdad, Cairo and Riyadh the modern incarnation of several deeply rooted and interlocking wars. These are, he said, the war within Islam between Traditionalists and Rationalists, which dates back to Baghdad in the ninth century; the struggle between ardent Sunnis and Shiites, which dates back to succession battles in early Islam; and the confrontation between Islam and the West, which dates back to the Arab conquests of the seventh century and the Crusades.In the modern incarnation of each of these struggles, members of the Sunni-Traditionalist-jihadist minority are losing. And the more that becomes evident, the more violent they will become - because their whole vision is in danger of being repudiated by fellow Arabs and Muslims.

Islam is one of the only "unreformed" religions in the world. What we may be witnessing, as the suicide bombings and other violence has been turned toward fellow Muslims in Iraq, Egypt and Saudi Arabia, is the beginning of that reformation. As Friedman points out, the battle between the traditionalists (or jihadists) and the rationalists is no longer being waged externally, but is being waged internally. More modern, rationalist Muslims are finally repudiating them and their tactics, and it has brought the Muslim world, at least in the middle east, to a religious flash point.

The biggest repudiation to the jihadist faction came in the form of the Iraqi election.

The Iraqi election was a total shock to the militant jihadist forces in the Arab-Muslim world," Mr. Stock noted. "They warned Iraqis that 'you vote - you die,' and instead millions of Iraqis said back to them, 'We vote - we decide.' " And the thing they are deciding on is not to be pro-American, not to be pro-Western, but to try to build their own Arab society in a way that will be open to modernism and interpretations of Islam that encourage innovation, adaptation and progress.

The jihadist forces hate this notion. They see the struggle for democracy in Iraq as anathema to everything they stand for: a literalist interpretation of Islam, unsullied by modernity, adaptation, women's rights or political and religious pluralism.

We also see an increased struggle in Saudi Arabia which, for years, was the source of most of the jihadist doctrine spread throughout the world with its support of the Wahabbist sect of Islam. Wahabbism is probably the most extreme and violent of the jihadist sects of Isalm. SA, apparently, has finally realized it has sown the seeds of its own destruction and is trying to kill the crop before it becomes fully mature.

And with the protracted struggle in Iraq faithfully reported by al Jezera and other media in the area, people in the area are finally contemplating the alternatives. Extremism or freedom. That, of course, does not work to the benefit of the extremists:

The jihadists "know that if democracy comes to this part of the world, the Zarqawis and their ilk are done," Mr. Stock said. "Because the majority of people do not buy their methods or most of their message. They don't want to live like the Taliban. If democracy manages to spread in the Arab world, it will not necessarily be pro-American, but it will definitely be pro-living, not pro-suicide. It will not be a cult of death, but a culture of life." A recent cover of a popular Egyptian magazine, Rose el-Youssef, Mr. Stock noted, shows two well-known female Arab pop singers under the headline: "Stronger than Extremism."

All this to say, yes, the forces of "rationalism" in Islam and freedom are winning, but the process ahead remains a slow and long one in which we'll see set-backs and failures. Right now, of course, the best way to aid the rationalists and ensure the eventual demise of the extremists is to plod on in Iraq:

So yes, this is a big, deep struggle in Iraq. Yes, the forces of decency and pluralism are slowly winning. But it is not over - not by a long shot. The U.S. Army and the first freely elected Iraqi government still do not control all the terrain there. Unless we can help the Iraqis create a secure environment in their country, and unless their new government can find a way to integrate the more pragmatic Sunni Baathists, and even dejected jihadists, who want to be part of a better future for Iraq, that nation will not see self-sustaining democracy. The bad guys won't win, but neither will the good guys, and all we will have produced is a bloody stalemate.

Final thought: It does feel good to be back home.