Jihad-e-Ramzan
By Sazzad Hussain
02 July, 2015
Countercurrents.org
The month in Islamic lunar calendar of Ramzan is a holy one as it embodies one of the five cardinal elements of that faith—fasting, called Roza here (regions influenced by Persian heritage). In Arabic it is called Sawm, meaning refrain. However fasting during Ramzan in the Arabian Peninsula predates Islam as the Jews and Christians there too observed it before the Prophet. The Holy Quran says, “O ye who believe! Fasting is prescribed to you as it was prescribed to those before you, that ye may (learn) self-restraint." This fasting, a dawn to dusk one, is not only a state from not taking food and drink, but a condition to refrain from all types of habitual and reprehensible activities and to reign over all the impulses and vices—from telling a lie to show anger, temptations, senses of physical pleasure etc. Islam says that its followers should lead a life of complete withdrawal from worldly affairs and concentrate on reading or reciting the holy Book, prayers and alms giving. Muslims around the world follow this with great sincerity and reverence which culminates in the festivities of Eid-ul-Fitre. But sadly what has been done and committed by the so-called up-holders of Islam during this holy month is not only shocking but completely out of the synch of what Islam has primarily told about its practice and particularly during Ramzan.
In the early years of Islam’s history, there were battles and conflicts faced by the Prophet. But there was always a complete halt of hostilities during Ramzan with few exceptions. Wars and aggressions, conflicts and disputes were pushed to the corner during this month of fasting so that people can have a life without disturbance to engage themselves with their required commitments to divinity. There were instances, in 630 AD, the Battle of Tabouk where the soldiers of Islam, under the leadership of Prophet Muhammad, established a training and fighting camp in Tabouk during the month of fasting against the Byzantines. The Byzantine army showed no aggression so the Prophet’s army returned peacefully without fighting. On October, 1973, the secular governments of Egypt and Syria launched the Yom-Kippur war against Israel to recapture Sinai Peninsula and Golan Heights during Ramzan. We have also seen the eight years long war between Iran and Iraq (1980-88) continuing during Ramzan months. Recently in 2000 Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee stated that India would initiate a unilateral cease-fire in observance of the holy month of Ramzan as a step towards peace in Kashmir. Significantly no such moves by any state leaders of the so-called Islamic world have been seen in recent times calling for end of hostilities during Ramzan.
The armed groups that presently galore in the Middle-East and West-Asia have not spared the holy month to be free of violence and bloodshed for their mad rush to establish the Kingdom of God which they call Jihad. Recently the dreaded IS attacked 38 innocent British tourists in Tunisia, attacked a factory in Lyon France, Shia mosque attack in Kuwait during Friday prayers and military check posts in Sinai, Egypt. Its daily atrocities on innocent civilians, prisoners and foreigners continue in occupied Iraq and Syria. On 25th June, the beginning of the second week of Ramzan fasting IS militants massacred 140 civilians, including women and children in the besieged Syrian city of Kobani on the Turkish border. Following macabre death dances by IS like drowning, burning, beheading have been on throughout the Ramzan days by IS across this troubled region where western military superpowers and regional Arab states, that symbolize Islamic power, remain unmoved. The most bewildering and paradoxical part of these reign of terror by these Jihadist was the bombing of a Shiite mosque in Kuwait killing hundreds during Friday prayers during this holy month. It has become hard to believe what Islam that these Jihadist are trying to project before the world by turning the holy month of Ramzan to a hell of bloodshed in smoke. The collective failure of our Ulema, the religious authority of Islam in the so called Islamic world to make a clear position on such unholy activities have been fuelling unrest among the so-called upholders of the faith that are bent upon in destroying our civilization.
It is very strange that the US, which is revisiting to troubled Iraq and its Gulf allies, including Jordan and Egypt is yet to achieve any military success against an resurgent IS. It is widely believed that the Sunni powerhouse of Saudi Arabia and Qatar are behind all the logistic and financial help to IS to topple the Bashar al-Assad regime in Syria, who is an Alawite Shia. They have similar objectives to contain Iran by weakening a Shia leaning Iraq and the Shiite military-political group Hezbollah in Lebanon—who stands for inclusive nature of that state with Sunni, Shia, Christians, Druz and Armenians. All this has been favouring Israel as it considers the present Syrian regime, Hezbollah and Iran as a trinity of terror. The role of Turkey, a Sunni majority NATO country, also appears to be dubious as it has been allowing western recruits to enter the IS held territory in Syria through its border for the last two years. The Islamist leaning Turkish President Racep Tayyip Erdogan is making its military to be a mute spectator on the IS atrocities across the border in Syria, as the victims are Kurds—an ethnic group that has been in tenterhooks with Ankara over territorial secessionism. The condition of other minorities—Christians, Yazidis etc. are also in wretched condition because of this paradoxical realities in the Arab and Islamic world.
Thus geopolitics to ensure uninterrupted energy supply for fuel hungry western world has been keeping Islam as hostage in the Middle East for the last five decades and the menace of the IS is only the latest development. So we have an unchecked Jihad in the month of Ramzan—a holy month that demands the most intrinsic Jihad, to wage a war against temptation, falsehood, lechery and other vices. (The writer is a freelance writer based in Assam)
(The writer is a freelance writer based in Assam, India. E-mail:[email protected])
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