Iraqi writer whitewashes reputation of Islamists in France in Qatari-printed book

Nahla Abdel Moneim

There are definitional differences between the terms “Islamism” and “Islamic” as different synonyms related to religion, which has currently stoked a major crisis in French society that has reached an intellectual battle between President Emmanuel Macron and Muslim leaders at home and abroad, also reaching social classes in the Middle East and Islamic world. In this regard, Waleed Kassid Al-Zaidi, an Iraqi researcher at the School for Advanced Studies in Social Sciences (EHESS) in Paris, discusses the different views of the French on the two terms in his book “Extremist Islamism in Europe: A Study of the Case of French Jihadists in the Middle East”.

Iraqi writer, Qatari book

The book was published in 2016 by the Arab Center for Research and Policy Studies, a Qatari institute run by Azmi Bishara, who is in charge of most of the Brotherhood-funded political research centers in Qatar. It provides various definitions about Islamism and the confusion between it and Islam in terms of French perspectives, that is, according to French researchers. Zaidi also provides a theoretical view on the Islamist situation in the country, the dimensions of its spread, the nature of its recruitment status in terms of the factors driving some French to join extremist movements, and the reasons for the escalation of attacks against Paris.

Mixing definition and identification of the Brotherhood

Zaidi presented the French dictionary definition of the term Islamism as “a religious political movement that seeks to Islamize all aspects of life or unify the currents of Islam under a single militant model.” He added that some French writers have found that the separation between Islamic and Islamism is not characteristic, since the two are one, which has caused, in his point of view, media professionals and politicians to currently be floundered regarding the separation of the two terms.

The author argued in his book that at the end of the nineteenth century, or in parallel with the weakness of the Ottoman state and its sluggish caliphate, the Islamic world began to issue movements expressing the link between the past and the present and trying to preserve identity in the face of modernity, in implicit reference to the Brotherhood and its role in crystallizing Islamism, which many see as relying on religion and its popularity in order to gain power.

This means that the author intended, in one way or another, to export the Brotherhood or the currents that were created at that time as an intellectual reference trying to address the fall of the caliphate without a political or intellectual overthrow of the current status and the religious investment it reached for clear political dimensions.

Islam and Islamism in France

Zaidi wrote about the migrations of Muslims, mostly Moroccans or from the Middle East, who have traveled to France since the First World War, where they began to grow in number and spread. He also discussed the transformation of some to extremism in the second and third generations and referred to isolationism and the identity crisis. From his point of view, France imposes the model of the single culture that sees pluralism as a threat to its national security, unlike Britain, which is based on multiculturalism as an intellectual enrichment for society.

In Zaidi’s opinion, this raises the concerns of Paris and escalates the discussion of extremism there, as the Islamic community is no longer just a group in society, but has started to spread fear in parallel with the media coverage of the Taliban in Afghanistan and the ugliness of ISIS in Syria and Iraq.

This vision illustrates various problems. Firstly, the writer stating that pluralism is present in Britain, unlike France, which has been affected by extremism, seems illogical in terms of influence. London has also suffered from Islamist extremism, and it topped the rates of attacks and victims in Europe. In addition, the author neglected the political role, meaning he limited the drive to terrorism to the identity crisis in European societies, ignoring the driving policy of Islamist groups, including the recruitment of youth.

However, Zaidi could not deny Turkey’s role as an important bridge that ultimately led to the transfer of extremists from France to Syria and Iraq to join ISIS. These extremists gained ideological and combat training that could seriously harm Paris if they returned, meaning that Ankara, from the author’s point of view, played an important role in crystallizing terrorism in the European continent, especially France.