Mail & Guardian reporters
This week’s spate of revenge attacks against Afghanistan by the United States and its allies have fuelled talk of a “holy war” between Muslims and the “infidel West”.
This has exposed the fault lines within the local Muslim community with believers torn between respecting the laws of South Africa which expressly forbid citizens to render mili-tary assistance abroad, and fulfilling their duty as followers of Islam, which call for a sacred defence of Muslim lands under threat.
The call by alleged terror mastermind Osama bin Laden for Muslims to rise up in defence of their faith has produced mixed reactions among local Muslims.
These have ranged from caution the website of a local Muslim body, the Jamiatul Ulama, widely regarded as “pro-Taliban”, urged restraint by local Muslims, and called on them to respect South African law to overt calls for military action by at least two prominent organisations in the Western Cape, including the controversial Qibla Movement.
Judging from the rhetoric, virtually every Muslim male in South Africa would be ready to be drafted for the holy war. Some told the Mail & Guardian an attack on any Muslim state is by proxy an affront to all Muslims, and must necessarily be supported by all adherents of the religion.
Suleiman Selebi, a Johannesburg-based da’ee or propagator of the faith, holds this view. He says the US was just using the attack as a smokescreen to further its plans of global domination.
“The Western world and its surrogate, Israel, is using the World Trade Centre attack to achieve this objective,” he says, adding that the attacks against Afghanistan were “absolutely satanic and an affront to the Muslims.
“We too are saying: ‘You are either with us or with them’,” says Selebi. “We are duty-bound and prepared for war against America and its allies irrespective of what South African laws say. We follow the laws of the Creator and not man-made ones.”
Writer and poet, and associate editor of the Sowetan newspaper, Don Mattera, gave a more guarded response. He said the “siege” of Aghanistan was no different to similar ones that the US and its allies visited on other countries around the globe. Mattera said suffering knew no religious, ethnic or political boundaries.
“I don’t differentiate between the siege in Afghanistan and that in Libya; or the one in Iraq where people continue to be bombed and where 7 000 people have been killed from diseases and hunger.
“What we are witnessing is something that will never end unless the global capitalists and the people who vote for them wake up to the reality that peace and compassion are far greater weapons than bombs.”
Contrary to their fiery rhetoric during protests leading up to the US strikes on Afghanistan, the University of the Witwatersrand’s Muslim students Association (MSA) appears far from ready to jet off to Kabul.
In principle, most members say, they are opposed to war, but some went on to add that it was “impractical” to go to fight in Afghanistan. Mohammed Cajee, president of the MSA, says: “We all sympathise with the people who died in the US, but they are using it as an excuse to get into the region.”
He dismissed suggestions that planeloads of youth from South Africa were heading to Afghanistan to fight.
“Some may go in their private capacity but most will not,” he says, pointing out that Muslims in South Africa should be more open to fight against all forms of oppression, as opposed to fighting for only Muslim causes.
Cajee says it is important to distinguish between supporting Muslim brethren, and supporting the Taliban criticised for its narrow, rigid and archaic brand of Islam. “I would not go to fight,” he concludes.
Rafiek Fredericks, a first-year engineering student, relies heavily on Islamic cosmology to explain a decision to go and fight or not. “If it’s in your taqdeer [destiny] then you will fight. Your faith has to be really strong to fight.”
Mohammed Nanabhay, a final-year computer science student, says he would not go to Afghanistan to fight either. “It is an emotive time for all, but we can show our support by giving humanitarian aid or praying for them.” He agrees with Cajee that the majority of Muslim students on campus do not support the Taliban.
“We do not support them ideologically but will support them in brotherhood,” he says.
The government says it will not sound alarm bells over rumours that locals are enlisting to fight for the Taliban in Afghanistan.
Referring to widespread reports of “jihad training camps” operating on South African soil priming recruits to go to the central Asian country to fight against US, a senior Department of Foreign Affairs official said the talk was little more than “hot air”.
He said the local Muslim community is “well-known” for threatening to take up arms in conflicts in Muslim countries, but this seldom, if ever, translated into concrete action.
Another source close to the African National Congress said the government is engaging with key local community leaders to get them to channel their humanitarian assistance to the region through bigger aid agencies. He said this would avoid potential embarrassment to the government later on if the organisations were found to be indirectly aiding the Taliban.
The “paper tiger” image of local Muslims was not, however, entirely dismissed. The Department of Foreign Affairs said this week it would be “unfortunate if we ignore the reported threats” by organisations calling for a holy war.
Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Aziz Pahad said local groups conscripting Muslims to fight abroad would face the full might of the law. In terms of the Foreign Military Assistance Act of 1998, no South African citizens or permanent resident may offer or attempt to render military assistance to any foreign state or organ of state unless authorised to do so by the National Conventional Arms Control Committee. Pahad warned that anyone who contravenes the Act is liable to a fine or imprisonment.
The Cape-Town based Muslim Judicial Council this week scoffed at the government’s warnings, saying the government did not have the legi-slative power to proscribe the movements or activities of South African Muslims.