Zionism in Arab discourses

Uriya Shavit, Ofir Winter

• Publisher: Manchester University Press
• Year: 2016
• ISBN:
  9781784998141
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Islamic Studies
• Index: Social Sciences

Zionism in Arab discourses presents a ground-breaking study of the Arab-Israeli conflict. Through analyses of hundreds of texts written by Arab Islamists and liberals from the late-nineteenth century to the 'Arab Spring', the book demonstrates that the Zionist enterprise has played a dual function of an enemy and a mentor. Islamists and liberals alike discovered, respectively, in Zionism and in Israeli society qualities they sought to implement in their sown homelands. Focusing on Palestinian, Egyptian, Syrian and Jordanian political discourses, this study uncovers fascinating and unexpected Arab points of views on different aspects of Zionism; from the first Zionist Congress to the First Lebanon War; from gardening in the early years of Tel Aviv to women's service in the Israeli Defence Forces; from the role of religion in the creation of the state to the role of democracy in its preservation. This study presents the debates between and within contesting Arab ideological trends on a conflict that has shaped, and is certain to continue and shape, one of the most complicated regions in the world.

1

Islamism, Zionism and Israel:
a war of no compromises
and compromises during war

Since its inception and through to the present time, one of the appeals of Islamism has been its ability to crystallize complex theological and political ideas into simple and catchy formulae. Accessible to all, these formulae masquerade as clear-cut, unwavering, undeniable truths that are not up for negotiation; their authority originates from divine revelation and is supported by the lessons learned from reality itself. Another appeal of Islamism, particularly from its mainstream wasati political and intellectual branches, is seemingly the reversal of this clear-cut approach. Some Islamist leaders have been willing to agree to pragmatic solutions, which in turn are rationalized by the same theological platform that forms the basis of the ‘unwavering truths’. This ideology–practice duality has manifested itself in the tension between the uncompromising demands of Muslim Brothers’ factions to establish rule by shariʿa law, on the one hand, and their readiness to cooperate with regimes that have failed to answer this call, on the other. Muslim Brothers factions have even participated in elections whose results have led them to serve in parliaments that were not subordinated to the word of God, a practice justified as promoting the foundational objectives of Islamic law and the eventual triumph of Islam.

The relationship of the main Islamist movements to Israel and Zionism represents another facet of this duality. Islamists perceive all of Mandatory Palestine as waqf land, an inseparable limb and an indispensable link in the future unity of the Muslim nation. According to Islamist views, the Jewish takeover of Palestine was an act of usurpation and Jewish sovereignty over any piece of its land is illegitimate; therefore, peace with Israel and even acknowledging its existence are considered fallacious. Furthermore, each and every Muslim has a personal obligation to wage jihad against Israel until its destruction, which can be attained only when faith becomes the guiding light that reawakens the Muslim world. However, despite this ideological stance that leaves little room for compromise between Israel and the Arab world, the actual policy of Islamist factions is more complex. In addition to their participation in violent campaigns against Israel since the 1940s and their spearheading of efforts to foil negotiations with Israeli governments, Islamist movements have also taken more pragmatic approaches. These approaches include the willingness to avoid the immediate cancellation of peace treaties and to negotiate short-tem ceasefires, as well as the suspension of the struggle against Israel in favour of other struggles.

This chapter offers a chronological overview of the Islamist ideological opposition to Zionism. It portrays the main characteristics of and driving forces behind this resistance and explores the different pragmatic approaches toward Israel that have developed in the various epochs of Islamist thought, particularly in relation to previously signed agreements with Israel.

Islamism, Zionism and Israel: a chronological panoramic view

Islamist opposition to the Zionist idea is as old as Islamism itself. Hasan al-Banna established the Muslim Brothers as a reaction to Western political and cultural control over the Muslim world and he envisioned an Islamist state that will unite Muslim societies. The Jewish ambition to build a national home in the land of Israel (i.e. in the heart of the Muslim world) was in complete contradiction to the Islamist vision for the future of Muslims. The origins of the resistance to the establishment of a Zionist state in Palestine are therefore simple enough: for the Islamist dream to live, the Jewish one had to die.

Al-Banna was interested in the subject of Palestine even before he established the Muslim Brothers. As early as 1927, he sent a letter of solidarity to the Mufti of Jerusalem, Hajj Amin al-Husseini. During the Muslim Brothers’ formative years, they prioritized efforts to defend the holy places in Jerusalem, prevent the acquisition of Arab lands by Jews and curb Jewish immigration. In August 1935 two delegates of the movement were sent to spread its teachings in Palestine, marking the first time that the Muslim Brothers had ventured outside of Egypt.¹

At the height of the Arab Revolt in Palestine in May 1936, the Muslim Brothers formed an aid committee to Palestine, led by Hasan al-Banna himself. The committee embarked on a wide-scale operation in support of the Palestinian cause that included collecting donations for the Arab Higher Committee in Palestine, informational activities in mosques and schools and even composing a special prayer for the salvation of the people of Palestine and the defeat of their enemies. The Palestinian issue had become a symbol of the Brothers’ resistance to the government and to British control over the Middle East. In July 1937, in the light of the publication of the Peel Commission report that supported the partition of Palestine, the Muslim Brothers escalated the struggle through the publication of a special edition of the movement’s journal dedicated to Palestine, political leaflets distributed at universities, stores and cafés, and banners depicting the terror in Palestine that were hung from the walls of buildings and mosques. The anti-Zionist activities also promoted bans on Jewish businesses in Egypt – claiming that they were assisting Zionism – and anti-Semitic sentiments blaming Egyptian Jewry for the crisis that had transpired. On 2 November 1937, in commemoration of the twentieth anniversary of the Balfour Declaration, al-Banna sent a letter to the British ambassador to Egypt demanding a halt to Jewish immigration to Palestine and the establishment of an Arab state in which Jews would be granted minority rights. He warned Britain that if it did not comply it would lose the friendship of the Muslim world for all eternity. At the same time, al-Banna called on the Egyptian government to solve the Palestinian problem and prevent aggression toward Palestine’s Arab population. The Muslim Brothers’ criticism of the British and Egyptian governments continued with their distribution of tens of thousands of copies of the booklet al-Nar wal-Damar fi Filastin (The Fire and the Ruin in Palestine), which described British crimes against the Arab rebellion. The distribution of the booklet led to the arrest of al-Banna.²

On 2 February 1939, with the decline of the Arab Revolt, al-Banna delivered a comprehensive policy speech at the Brothers’ Fifth Conference, where he intensified his criticism of Britain. He concluded that Muslims must unite to banish any aggression against one of the Muslim states, expressly warned Britain to cease attacking the people of Palestine and infringing their rights and noted that Palestine was the land of every Muslim by virtue of its being a Muslim country that was home to the prophets and is the home of al-Aqsa mosque. In his speech he conveyed his belief that Egypt would never gain independence and freedom from imperialistic rule unless it used the ‘language most understood’, the language of power. His focus on the Palestine issue demonstrated that, in his eyes, it had become inseparable from the struggle against Western domination of the Muslim world.³ On 15 September 1939, al-Banna issued another letter to the Egyptian Prime Minister ʿAli Mahir, in which he called on him to demand the British to stop Jewish immigration to Palestine, to recognize the independence of Palestine as an Arab and Muslim state and to pardon all prisoners, exiles and Arab fighters.⁴

The Muslim Brothers’ opposition to Jewish sovereignty over any part of Palestine intensified after the decision by the United Nations to partition the land on 29 November 1947. In a demonstration of half a million people in Cairo following the decision, al-Banna called on Egyptian youth to join a jihad to prevent the implementation of the decision.⁵ Initiated by the Syrian branch of the Muslim Brothers in 1947, the National Covenant also conveyed total resistance to the partition of Palestine and called on the Jewish immigrants to return to their countries of origin and give back their land and possessions to the Arab population. On 31 December of that year, the Syrian Muslim Brothers presented Syrian President Shukri al-Quwatli with a memorandum that demanded a fight against the partition plan, collection of taxes to fund the struggle against Zionism, a boycott of Zionist products and the imposition of sanctions on Jews in Syria for their collaboration with the Zionist movement.⁶

Al-Banna’s essay on jihad, published in 1948 in the context of the war over Palestine, constituted a call to arms and a song of praise to sacrifice one’s life on the altar of Islam’s struggles. At the core of the essay was a discussion of jihad and its terms, through which al-Banna asserted the personal obligation (fard ʿayn) of every able Muslim to fight an aggressor who conquers a Muslim land. Since this obligation is a personal one, a woman does not have to seek her husband’s permission to go to war, nor do slaves from their masters, sons from their fathers or debtholders from their creditors. In this essay al-Banna refuted the argument that the Prophet believed that one’s struggle against oneself and one’s desires constitutes the greater jihad, while the jihad against the enemies of Islam is secondary to it.⁷ While the essay was not a direct call to wage war against the Zionist enemy, the Jewish–Arab conflict overshadowed every syllable of it.

Several hundred Egyptian, Syrian and Jordanian Brothers volunteered to fight in their countries’ armies in the campaign over Palestine.⁸ In a pamphlet published by the Egyptian Muslim Brothers in the midst of the war, they called upon Arab and Islamic governments and nations to persist with the jihad until the land of Palestine was freed, offering to serve as ‘a vanguard of jihadist warriors’. They rejected any diplomatic solution that recognized the State of Israel and warned Arab rulers that accepting a ceasefire or international custody over Palestine would be considered an ‘act of treason’ and possibly lead to a public uprising against them.⁹ On 25 July 1948, the founder of the Syrian Muslim Brothers, who had commanded a platoon during the war, Mustafa al-Sibaʿi, called on Arab countries to end the lull in fighting, devote all of their resources towards the campaign in Palestine and recruit the masses until victory was achieved.¹⁰

Historical research assigns limited significance to the role that the Brothers played in the war of 1948;¹¹ however, contemporary Islamists venerate this role as a turning point in Middle Eastern history. According to a common narrative in Islamist writing, the Muslim Brothers in Egypt, Syria and Jordan quickly identified the Zionist threat, prepared accordingly and won significant achievements in the battles they took part in, while Arab regimes betrayed their duty, neglected appropriate war preparations and prevented thousands of Islamists from participating in the fighting.¹² According to another, more radical Islamist narrative, the courage that the Brothers demonstrated on the battlefield caused concern among the Jews; fearing that the Brothers would rise to power and endanger Israel, the Jews hatched a scheme with the United States to bring to power the secular Jamal ʿAbd al-Nasser.¹³

When the results of the war became evident, the Brothers attributed the military defeat to the secular nature of Arab regimes, blaming Arab governments and armies for the failure and even accusing them of conspiring with foreign powers against Palestine. In December 1948, the Egyptian Prime Minister, Mahmud Fahmi al-Nuqrashi, outlawed the Brothers and ordered the arrest of al-Banna. In response to the decision to dismantle his movement, al-Banna declared that international Jewry, communism, colonialist countries and atheists were supporting King Faruq and viewed the Brothers as an obstacle to achieving their ambitions.¹⁴ Al-Sibaʿi accused ‘Arab officials who are connected to imperialist countries and subordinate to them’ of treason that had led to the disaster in Palestine. He claimed that the Arab Liberation Army had been formed by the Arab League only for the sake of quieting the discontent of the Arab publics, but not to prevent the fall of Palestine into Jewish hands. He testified that the Syrian government had prevented the movement’s volunteers from enlisting in the war and had refused to supply them with weapons and ammunition.¹⁵

The Free Officers Revolution in Egypt in July 1952 did not change the fundamental principles of the Muslim Brothers with regard to Israel. Representatives of the movement in Egypt, Syria, Jordan, Morocco and Iraq gathered in December 1953 for a General Islamic Conference in East Jerusalem and drafted a unified position. They defined the jihad to defend Palestine as the personal duty of every Muslim, objected to any recognition of the Jewish occupation of Palestine, rejected the option of signing a peace treaty or other diplomatic arrangements between Arab countries and Israel and warned that the internationalization of Jerusalem...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Acknowledgements
• Preface
• Introduction: Islamism and liberalism in the Arab world: some theoretical remarks
• 1 Islamism, Zionism and Israel: a war of no compromises and compromises during war
• 2 ‘At Basel I founded an ideal for the Muslims’: Zionism and Israel as role models in Islamist writing
• 3 Arab liberals between the struggle against despotism and the war against Zionism
• 4 The West within the East: Israel as a role model in liberal thought
• Conclusion
• Bibliography
• Index