“Islamo‐Fascism” as an ideological discourse

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Notes

¹John Maynard Keynes, The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money (Harcourt Brace Joranovich, San Diego, 1991) 303.

²This paper originated from a panel discussion at DePaul University in October 2007 on the topic of war with Iran. The panel, War with Iran?, was part of a national “Islamo‐fascism Awareness Week.” Also speaking were Robert Spencer of Jihad Watch and Amir‐Abbas Fakhravar, an Iranian dissident.

³Tony Blair, ‘A battle for global values’ (2007) 86(January/February) Foreign Affairs 79–90.

⁴George Bush, speech to the Religious Broadcasters Convention in Nashville, TN, March 11, 2008. Available at http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu

⁵Norman Podhoretz, World War IV: The Long Struggle against Islamofascism (Doubleday, New York, NY 2007).

⁶President George W. Bush, address to the National Endowment of Democracy, 6 October 2005.

⁷The term “overseas contingency operations” appears to have supplanted “War on Terror” as an official description of American military operations; Scott Wilson and Al Kamen, ‘“Global War on Terror” is given a new name’ (2009) 25 March Washington Post.

⁸Karl Popper, The Open Society and its Enemies, Vol. I: The Spell of Plato (Princeton University Press, Princeton, NJ 1971).

⁹President George W. Bush, address to a Joint Session of Congress, 20 September 2001.

¹⁰Susan Sontag, ‘Reflections on September 11th’ in Micah Sifry and Christopher Gerf (eds), The Iraq War Reader: History, Documents, Opinions (Simon & Schuster, New York, NY 2003) 215.

¹¹Hasan al‐Banna, for example, was critical of Western cultural influence in the areas of education, which he likened to the “colonization” of the Arab mind; Ibrahim Abu‐Rabi, Intellectual Origins of Islamic Resurgence in the Modern Arab World (State University of New York Press, New York, NY 1995).

¹²For example, Fawaz Gerges, The Far Enemy: Why Jihad Went Global (Cambridge University Press, New York, NY 2005).

¹³Osama Bin Laden, “Jihad against Jews and Crusaders”, World Islamic Front Statement (23 February 1998). Also Osama Bin Laden, “Declaration of war against the Americans occupying the land of the two holy places (expel the Infidels from the Arab Peninsula)” (23 August 1996).

¹⁴Charles Krauthammer, ‘Voices of moral obtuseness’ (2001) 21 September Washington Post.

¹⁵Here there is an important distinction between the Sunni and Shia tradition. In the latter, the direct rule by religious clerics is sanctioned both by the prominence of the Imam in the Shia tradition and in the notion of the velayyet‐I‐faqi (rule of the Just Jurist) articulated by Ayatollah Khomeini. In the Sunni tradition, there is a less prominent role of the cleric in political matters. However, Islamist interpreters have long argued the modern state must be the enforcer of Islamic law (sharia), and, to that end, the capture of state power has been central to the Islamist agenda. For more on this distinction, see Johannes Jansen, The Dual Nature of Islamic Fundamentalism (Cornell University Press, Ithaca, NY 1997).

¹⁶Popper, Open Society and its Enemies 4.

¹⁷Erich Fromm, Fear of Freedom (Routledge, New York, NY 2001).

¹⁸Popper, Open Society and its Enemies viii.

¹⁹Martin E. Marty and R. Scott Appleby (eds), Fundamentalisms Observed (University of Chicago Press, Chicago, IL 1991) 22–3.

²⁰Samuel Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order (Simon & Schuster, New York, NY 1998).

²¹Bernard Lewis, What Went Wrong?: The Clash Between Islam and Modernity in the Middle East (Harper Perennial, New York, NY 2003). Also Bernard Lewis, The Crisis of Islam: Holy War and Unholy Terror (Modern Library, New York, NY 2003).

²²For example, Robert Spencer, Religion of Peace? Why Christianity is and Islam is Not (Regnery, Washington, DC 2007). Also Robert Spencer, The Truth about Muhammad: Founder of the World’s Most Intolerant Religion (Regnery, Washington, DC 2007).

²³Fauzi M. Najjar, ‘The debate on Islam and secularism in Egypt’ (1996) 18(2) Arab Studies Quarterly. Also Muhammad Said al‐Ashmawy, Islam and the Political Order (The Council for Research in Values and Philosophy, Washington, DC 1994). This latter text was originally published in Arabic as Al‐Islam al‐Siyasi [Political Islam] (Dar Sina, Cairo 1987).

²⁴This was reflected in the alliance between theologically conservative Protestants, the Catholic Church, and Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood in their opposition to the issues of family planning discussed in the 1995 Cairo Population Conference.

²⁵For more on this trade‐off, see Thomas Carothers, ‘Promoting Democracy and Fighting Terror’ (2003) 82(January/February) Foreign Affairs 84–97. Also Scott Hibbard and David Little, Islamic Activism and U.S. Foreign Policy (United States Institute of Peace Press, Washington, DC 1997).

²⁶The Patriot Act expanded domestic intelligence operations and surveillance. It also expanded the power of the Immigration and Naturalization service to detain and deport immigrants or non‐citizens. It also allowed the government to detain non‐citizens indefinitely without charge. It also allowed the government to freeze the assets of anyone under investigation, and to use “secret evidence” to defend its actions.

²⁷The Presidential Executive Order signed on 13 November 2001 is of particular interest because it gave the Department of Defense power to arrest, try, and imprison non‐citizens accused of terrorism. It also created the designation of “enemy combatants,” which stripped individuals of any constitutional protections, allowed for the indefinite detention without charge. Such enemy combatants would be tried in secret before military tribunals without a judicial review. The question remained whether or not the President could extend this designation to citizens, a question which was to be resolved by the Supreme Court in Padilla v. Bush.

²⁸John Yoo, The Powers of War and Peace: The Constitution and Foreign Affairs after 9/11 (University of Chicago Press, Chicago, IL 2005).

²⁹David Cole, ‘Uncle Sam is Watching You’ (2004) 51(18 November) New York Review of Books, a review of Samuel Dash, The Intruders: Unreasonable Searches and Seizures from King John to John Ashcroft (Rutgers University Press, New Brunswick, NJ 2004); also Jeffrey Rosen, The Naked Crowd: Reclaiming Security and Freedom in an Anxious Age (Random House, New York, NY 2004).

³⁰Andrew Bacevich and Elizabeth Prodromou, ‘God is Not Neutral: Religion and U.S. Foreign Policy after 9/11’ (2004) 48(Winter) Orbis 43.

³¹‘World proved reserves of oil and natural gas’ (2007) US Energy Information Administration.

³²For example, Charles Krauthammer, Democratic Realism: An American Foreign Policy for a Unipolar World (American Enterprise Institute Press, Washington, DC 2004).

³³Andrew Bacevich, The Limits of Power: The End of American Exceptionalism (Metropolitan Books, New York, NY 2008) 9.

³⁴For an excellent analysis of the socio‐economic basis of Islamist politics, see Mark Tessler, ‘The Origins of Popular Support for Islamist Movements: A Political Economy Analysis’ in John Entelis (ed.), Islam, Democracy and the State in North Africa (Indiana University Press, Bloomington, IN 1997) 93–126.