BACKGROUND I'

'Moslem Manifesto' Spells Out
Attitudes Toward West, Jews

HELEN DAVIS

Foreign Correspondent

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FRIDAY, JULY 20, 1990

A

s the East-West con-
flict blows itself out, a
new challenge is ris-
ing to meet — and, perhaps,
unite — the traditional pro-
tagonists on both sides of the
divide. For the threat that
now confronts both the
Western world and the
Soviet Union is that of ag-
gressive, militant Islamic
fundamentalism.
An estimated 60 million
Moslems inhabit the region
of Soviet Central Asia,
which has already become
the battleground of bloody
intra-communal strife and
which is slated to become the
next major headache for the
beleagured Mikhail Gor-
bachev.
Amid all the uncertainties
posed by the post-Cold War
era, Soviet specialists are
convinced that the single
island of certainty is the
imminent campaign for se-
cession by the Moslem re-
publics of the Soviet Union;
a campaign which they are
convinced will be driven by
the engine of fundamen-
talism and which will prove
to be irresistible.
This process, moreover, is
certain to reverberate far
beyond the diminishing con-
fines of the Soviet empire,
producing a combustible arc
running from the Middle
East, through North Africa,
Europe, the Soviet Union
and into China.
The questions currently
exercising the minds of polit-
ical scientists are precisely
what form the new Islamic
revolution will take, how it
will affect the established
order and how the host
societies will meet this ex-
traordinary new challenge,
particularly from the
estimated nine million
Moslems who live in Britain,
France and Germany.
At least some of these
questions were answered in
London last weekend when
the influential pro-Iranian
Moslem Institute opened a
window into the mind of
Moslem activists by unveil-
ing a 40-page "Moslem
Manifesto," bearing the
ominous sub-title, "A
Strategy for Survival."
It is a document that
reflects the dominant think-
ing among many leading
Moslem activists and its
broad political agenda could
have far-reaching implica-

Above all else is the holy war.

tions for the West in general
during the coming years.
The manifesto is, in fact,
no less than a declaration of
war against what is perceiv-
ed as the decadent,
degenerate culture of the
West, providing ample
evidence that the fires of
fundamentalist fervor are
being vigorously stoked even
as Marxism suffers its final
death throes.
"After the collapse of
Communism," notes the
manifesto, "the intellectual
encounter of the future is
likely to be between the
West and Islam."
The manifesto maintains
that Moslems must obey the
laws of the non-Moslem
states in which they live, but
only "so long as such obe-
dience does not conflict with
their commitment to Islam."
It then proceeds to list a
range of laws "that are in
direct conflict with the laws
of Allah," i.e., usury, abor-
tion, gambling, the sale and
consumption of alcohol,
homosexuality, promiscuity
and the abolition of capital
punishment.
"Moslems," it declares in a
key paragraph, "can neither
agree with, nor condone, any
part of a legal and social
agenda which so flagrantly
violates the laws of nature
and of God . . . We are
Moslems, first and last."
Western leaders are
perceived as hatching an in-
sidious plot aimed at subver-
ting Islam, and the
manifesto warns Moslems
throughout Europe and Nor-
th America to make a con-
scious effort not to absorb
"the moral laxity" prevalent
in Western society: "The
time-honored assumption
that the generally liberal,
open and tolerant ethos of
the West would guarantee

the survival of Islam and
Moslems is no longer
tenable."
Leading political figures
who demanded that
Moslems assimilate, it says,
have attitudes similar to the
ancient Crusaders: "Their
strategy remains the same;
only their tactics have
changed. Moslems living in
the West have to adjust to an
environment that is far more
hostile than had been
assumed."
Islam, it stresses, was es-
tablished as a political spr-
ingboard and Moslems today
should not accept
"subservience as their in-
evitable and permanent
condition." At the same
time, however, the offer of
integration or assimilation
"must be firmly resisted and
rejected."
Above all, Moslems must
cleave to the injunction of
jihad [holy war]. As a colo-
nial power in Moslem lands,
the British rulers attempted
to excise the concept of jihad
from Islam, and this process,
warns the manifesto, is con-
tinuing today.
"Jihad is a basic require-
ment of Islam, and living in
Britain does not absolve the
Moslem from his or her duty
to participate in jihad. This
participation can be active
service in armed struggles
abroad or the provision of
material or moral support
for those engaged in such
struggle anywhere in the
world."
The document is equally
emphatic about the role of
Moslem women in Western
society. It is, quite simply,
quite categorically, incom-
patible:
"Women," it says, "are
more oppressed and ex-
ploited in the allegedly lib-
erated and emancipated
West today than was the
case in the traditional
Islamic, or even non-Islamic,
societies of Asia and Africa.
A sea-change in the lifestyle
and social role of Moslem
women is inevitable . . . The
fact is that a Moslem woman
cannot be a Western
woman."
The glue for consolidating
and cementing the various
communities of Moslems is
the overarching issue of
Zalman Rushdie, author of
The Satanic Verses, who has
been in hiding in Britain
since the late Iranian leader,
Ayatollah Ruhollah Kho-
meini, declared the novel to
be blasphemous and issued a

