Ed West Ed West

Isis are just very un-progressive Open Border fanatics – we need an Atatürk to fight them

If you haven’t already seen it, I recommend reading this fantastic essay by the Atlantic’s Graeme Wood on What Isis Really Wants. He takes the time to look into the theology of the ‘so-called Islamic State’, as the BBC insists on calling them (I can’t remember ‘so called Irish Republican Army’), and there is no doubting the theological link. To single out just one passage:

‘Many mainstream Muslim organizations have gone so far as to say the Islamic State is, in fact, un-Islamic. It is, of course, reassuring to know that the vast majority of Muslims have zero interest in replacing Hollywood movies with public executions as evening entertainment. But Muslims who call the Islamic State un-Islamic are typically, as the Princeton scholar Bernard Haykel, the leading expert on the group’s theology, told me, “embarrassed and politically correct, with a cotton-candy view of their own religion” that neglects “what their religion has historically and legally required.” Many denials of the Islamic State’s religious nature, he said, are rooted in an “interfaith-Christian-nonsense tradition.”’

The depressing conclusion is that, as well as a long war in the field, Isis’s Muslim enemies need to arm themselves theologically against such fanaticism, because Isis really is Islamic, even if just one interpretation.

But what can the rest of us to do to help the good guys in the Muslim world? (And considering the group are now just 300 odd miles from Italy I’d have thought this should be considered with some urgency.)

There is one way we can combat the idea on a secular level. Isis are recruiting followers from across Europe, supporters who are driven by one aspect of Islamic extremism very appealing and accessible to young westerners from a globalised world – open borders. As Wood points out, ‘accepting any border is anathema, as stated by the Prophet and echoed in the Islamic State’s propaganda videos’.

Already a subscriber? Log in

Keep reading with a free trial

Subscribe and get your first month of online and app access for free. After that it’s just £1 a week.

There’s no commitment, you can cancel any time.

Or

Unlock more articles

REGISTER

Comments

Don't miss out

Join the conversation with other Spectator readers. Subscribe to leave a comment.

Already a subscriber? Log in