PRIVATE REPORT: OFF-THE-RECORD INSIGHTS, A PERSONAL VIEW
From William Morris, Secretary General, the Next Century Foundation
PRIVATE REPORT:
Dateline: Friday 11 June 2015
These personal notes are for senior members and patrons only – they are not for
general circulation.
Keeping it in the Family
NCF Trustee Ambassador Mark G Hambley and NCF Secretary General William
Morris have been in Cairo enlisting the support of al-Azhar, Sunni Islam’s
foremost university, in setting up a Religious Affairs Advisory Council. The
following personal view is from William Morris alone and does not represent an
NCF perspective.
Egypt is the most populous country by far in the Arab World. It has a population of
around 100 million (official figures are lower but a lot of children go unregistered in rural
areas). To that add a 3% population growth. For a time Suzanne Mubarak managed to
drive this down to 2.5% with her family planning initiative but now it’s back up again. It
means one million new entrants to be accommodated in the jobs market each year.
And Egypt has been through the mill of late. Despite a higher vote in the post-revolution
election for Ahmed Shafik, pressure was put on the establishment by the Muslim
Brotherhood who threatened blood on the streets if Morsi wasn’t allowed to win.
Furthermore US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said “give them a chance”.
And the Muslim Brotherhood are a force to be reckoned with. During the Revolution, 27
security headquarters were attacked at one time in one day in one hour. This was
reminiscent of the infamous Black Saturday of January 1952 in which almost 700 British
affiliated buildings were torched simultaneously by the Muslim Brotherhood, an incident
which was followed some six months later on 26th July by the Military Coup organised
by General Naguib Pasha and Gamal Abdel Nasser which overthrew the monarchy.
Al-Azhar in Cairo, an edifice in bold and monolithic stone sprawls vast and dusty in the hot,
spring sun, a river of cars and a cacophony of noise cutting into its heart. And it is grand,
bustling, wondrous, and somehow far removed from reality.
How can academics touch and feel the vibrant, throbbing heart of the Middle East where Daish
(ISIS) chops heads like children clipping flowers, and Sunnis and Shiites are fighting the
bloodiest civil war ever seen in Islam since the battle of Karbala and far worse in terms of mere
loss of life and human suffering then anything the Arab and Islamic world has ever seen?
And Daish (ISIS) demands our attention.
WILLIAM MORRIS
4 Vincent Square, London SW1P 2LX UK Tel: 44.207.821.6566
E-mail: NCFPeace@aol.com
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PRIVATE REPORT: OFF-THE-RECORD INSIGHTS, A PERSONAL VIEW
From William Morris, Secretary General, the Next Century Foundation
Daish is itself worse than the organisation that we call al-Qa’ida (“The Base”) and calls itself
“the World Islamic Front against the Jews and the Crusaders” and is known by so many names.
Jebbat al-Nusra is its Syrian incarnation. But al-Qa’ida is tame when compared to Daish.
Perhaps it is helpful, this emergence of Daish. We in the West always like to have a clear and
present enemy on which to focus our ire. The Soviet Union was once our enemy. Still is in a way
with its new cold war created by its snatching back of Crimea and parts of Eastern Ukraine,
which might otherwise have become our own backyard. Certainly the Grand Sheikh Al Azhar
thinks it serves Western purposes. In respect of Daish, His Eminence Dr Ahmad Al-Tayyeb
recently told a conference on terrorism attended by the world’s high and mighty that it was far
from far-fetched to view, “our present sufferings as nothing other than the result of a conspiracy,
wrought by the enemies of the Arab and Islamic East, for the benefit and in the interest of the
State of Israel . . .”
And now, or so Alain Bauer the former Head of French intelligence tells us, “For the first time in
history, our enemy’s enemy is our enemy.”
But we should be grateful. We are at risk of defining this war between Sunni and Shiite Islam as
a war between The West and Islam, but were we to do so we would be doing exactly what Daish
would have us do.
“Daish (ISIS to you and me) is not a terrorist group”, says our friend Alan Bauer, “it is an army
of 35,000 men with more tanks than Britain and France combined.” Actually, I disagree with him
on that point. Daish is quintessentially a terrorist group but the point is, it is also a well
organised, well managed, efficiently commanded army.
Daish is an army commanded by former Ba’athist generals. And they are good. The old Ba’athist
groups like Izzat al-Douri’s “Men of the Naqshbandi” are irrelevant now. They have passed into
history. Daish is the new kid on the block and it has swept all before it.
Daish have an ideology. In the early days of Islam the world was divided into Dar al-Islam (the
world of Islam), Dar al-Harb (the world of war) and Dar al-‘Ahd (the world of the oath, or
literally “the house of truce” which was to include non-Muslim minorities who were subject to a
Muslim ruler). The Saudi ideologue Yussef al-Ayeri (who was killed in a gun battle with Saudi
intelligence in 2003) was an advocate of an approach that abolishes Dar al-‘Ahd. Exceptions
may be made at the whim of their Caliph such as those initially in regard to a few of Mosul’s
Christians who were forced to pay draconian taxes or die. But by and large, Daish does not
believe in Dar al-‘Ahd and demands subject minorities convert (the alternative being
enslavement or death). The NCF is soon publishing a private report on Daish ideology so we will
leave this subject aside for the moment. Suffice to say Daish is uniquely ruthless.
And why has Daish garnered such support? In large part it is because of a perception on the part
of the local community that they are oppressed. An impression reinforced by the cruel DeBa’athification laws imposed by Bremer in the aftermath of the liberation of Iraq, laws that have
still not been repealed. A messy and utterly useless compromise is being attempted by which
WILLIAM MORRIS
4 Vincent Square, London SW1P 2LX UK Tel: 44.207.821.6566
E-mail: NCFPeace@aol.com
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PRIVATE REPORT: OFF-THE-RECORD INSIGHTS, A PERSONAL VIEW
From William Morris, Secretary General, the Next Century Foundation
they become provincial rather than national laws (so you can be held to account for past party
membership in Najaf but not in Anbar) which will confirm Sunnis in their belief that the central
government of Iraq is unredeemably sectarian.
And where do Daish recruits come from? Well the hard core are of course those former Iraqi
Baath Sunnis with a huge chip on their shoulders. But then there are others. The next big chunk
are the young man from the Syrian refugee camps who cannot bear the squalor and misery of
those self-same camps and go back home to fight and die with dignity. And there are the
internationals, young hotheads from countries like Syria, Libya and Sudan who see this as a
cause celebre. Then there are the volunteers from farther overseas – 2,000 from Britain, 3,000
from France and so forth, willing to fight and die to help liberate their Sunni brethren from Shiite
oppression.
It is our sincere belief that an alternative ideology would be worthwhile and some of us at the
NCF have been exploring the possibilities of exploiting the Moral Rearmament Movement, an
organisation that is virtually extinct in the West, but remains a force in Lebanon with its
currently Muslim leadership and its belief in absolute purity and the Sufi practice of listening to
God.
There may be other alternatives, but there is certainly a need for more than bombs to deal with
Daish. This is a long-term problem, and part of the long-term answer could be the setting up of
some sort of transnational truth commission for post conflict Iraq and Syria. A cross between
Bahrain’s Truth Commission and the South African version capable of delivering the kind of
clean slate that the Northern Ireland Agreement managed to deliver for the UK. Without that
there is no future but decades of war.
The same applies on the battlefield. Our once and future allies, President Bashar of Syria and
Hadi al-Amri of Iraq’s Badr Brigade and Qassam Suleimani of Iran’s al-Quds Brigade must be
persuaded to stop killing all their prisoners. This might be some incentive to Daish soldiers not to
fight to the death, in an environment where capture currently does indeed mean certain death.
The Kurdish forces have begun to set an example by actually taking prisoners and our Shiite and
Allawite allies should now start to do the same.
There is of course much more that could be done. More effort could be made to bring Turkey,
NATO’s rogue state and a key nation in covert alliance with Daish, back into the fold. All the
multitude of international volunteers, including those from Middle East nations like Libya and
Sudan, travel through Istanbul International Airport and in due course present their passport at
Turkish border crossings into Syria to go and fight and die.
Oddly, just about the only world state doing its best to put pressure on Turkey is Egypt which is
entering a regional alliance with Greece, Cyprus and Israel to exploit Mediterranean gas without
Turkish interference; and another alliance with Putin to block Turkey from the North.
And what of Egypt? What of al-Azhar the centre of learning for the great nations of Sunni Islam?
Well Egypt like her neighbours, Libya to the West and Gaza to the East, has become far more
WILLIAM MORRIS
4 Vincent Square, London SW1P 2LX UK Tel: 44.207.821.6566
E-mail: NCFPeace@aol.com
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PRIVATE REPORT: OFF-THE-RECORD INSIGHTS, A PERSONAL VIEW
From William Morris, Secretary General, the Next Century Foundation
Islamist in culture. Few women now dare step outside without a well tucked in headscarf. If one
does, men in the street will mutter, “Shame” or “cover up”. This was never the case before. In
Egypt it started in Morsi’s time when men would bang on the doors of liberal homes and shout,
“Wear the veil! Wear the veil!” And yet now the street support for General Abdel Fatah Sisi
seems firm. This despite ongoing multiple bombings with IEDs in train stations and busses by
groups associated with the Muslim Brotherhood. Indeed there has now been the very first
demonstration by Egyptian women against the veil, so perhaps things may yet improve.
And al-Azhar? I don’t think they knew what to make of us. Perhaps they are not really geared up
for discussing spiritual matters, not those we talked to.
To be fair, the Sheikh tried. Our meeting was with Sheikh Abbas Shouman, reputedly the most
Salafist of the senior Al Azhar Sheikhs, but he was so interrupted by the others present and his
words so bowdlerised by a translator who gave his own opinions rather than the Sheikh’s that
any sense of comprehension there might have been was well and truly lost.
However, the impression I was left with was that al-Azhar, like much of Sunni Islam, views this
conflict through a sectarian lens as all the fault of Maliki and the Shiites. And perhaps they may
have a point.
They have a similar dubious attitude when it comes to the recent bloody history of inter-religious
strife in Egypt (a country with a 20% Coptic population – though official figures are half that).
“Our Imams train with Coptic priests”, they say. “We live side by side but we must be separate.
We have no problem. We keep it in the family.”
At least Egypt’s President Sisi is not so complacent. He has a vision of an Egypt that is less
sectarian. Speaking to journalists, prior to his election, he even said: “I would like to see a
Synagogue active again. There was one close to my home when I was a boy.”
Attitudes of denial are dangerous. The Muslim world is riven with sectarian strife and
internecine war, bloody enough to greatly distress the Prophet Mohammed, peace be upon him.
And the West pours petrol on the flames and from the ashes has emerged a terrible dragon.
Maybe, just maybe, it is not too late to strangle that dragon at birth . . . and that dragon’s name is
Daish.
/ Ends
WILLIAM MORRIS
4 Vincent Square, London SW1P 2LX UK Tel: 44.207.821.6566
E-mail: NCFPeace@aol.com
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