Islam and Political Conflict in the World Today

In Chapter i, we considered Bruce Lincoln’s theory regarding the potential of religion to facilitate violent conflict. And as nearly every chapter in this book shows, individuals, groups, and states have invoked religion to engage in or to justify warfare, colonization, and other forms of violence.

In the early 2000s, ISIS was established as an umbrella movement for al-Qaeda in Iraq and other Sunni insurgent groups. In 2014, ISIS leaders claimed to have established a “caliphate” in northern Iraq and to be applying Islamic law. However, ISIS has taken an extremely violent approach to dealing with adversaries (both Muslim and non-Muslim) and even journalists. Muslims worldwide have denounced ISIS, just as they did with al-Qaeda. And although al- Qaeda and ISIS claim to be founded on Islamic principles, it is important to understand the rise of such groups in their historical and political context. Many political scientists think that the war in Iraq, launched in 2003, further destabilized an already precarious state, exacerbated Sunni and Shi‘a tensions, and contributed to the devastating conditions under which ISIS arose and gained support.

Muslims around the world have expressed dismay and frustration at the use of Islam to facilitate or justify violence, contending that terrorist attacks are antithetical to the teachings of Islam, which prohibit the killing of innocents. Muslims cite scriptural evidence for this stance in a Qur’anic verse (5:32) that equates the killing of one innocent person to the killing of all of humanity.

In the twenty-first century, numerous political conflicts around the globe have oppressed and imperiled Muslims. In Buddhist-majority Myanmar, a Muslim-minority ethnic community known as the Rohingya has faced severe persecution from the state since 2017. Rohingya are denied citizenship, and many have been killed and displaced from their homes. Hundreds of thousands of Rohingya have fled as refugees, mostly to neighboring Bangladesh. In 2018, a United Nations report called Myanmar’s military assault on Rohingyas as having “genocidal intent.”

In China, an ethnic-minority Muslim community called the Uighurs currently faces persecution and detention in western China’s Xinjiang region. Since 2016, up to 1 million Uighur Muslims have been detained without charge in so-called reeducation camps. The Chinese state’s position has been that it is combating religious extremism, although journalists report that Muslims are being detained for basic religious practices like prayer and modest dress.