VIOLENCE AND STRATEGIC CHOICES: THE CASE OF ISLAMIST MILITANCY

Abstract

Much has been written since September 11 in particular about the threat posed by Islamist militancy and strategies to confront it. Like other groups that rely on violence to pursue their political objectives, militant Islamist groups that have been active on national and international levels refused to make any distinctions between the combatants and noncombatants, military and civilians, those who are likely to be guilty and many who are decidedly innocent. Creating a climate of gripping fear and uncertainty to paralyze their opponents through violent means has become the key objective for such groups. Like other violent groups, they are keen to justify their strategy and actions under the category of the “absence of alternatives.” In essence they insist that those in positions of power and dominance on the level of states as well as on the level of the international system will never really respond to peaceful marches, legal petitions, political practices, humanitarian appeals, or merely eloquent statements. They have to be eradicated through a violent or insurrectional approach. For them, the fundamental feature of the setting in which their “struggle” is launched is not the abundance of options but the utter absence of alternatives to violence. However, a successful strategy of confronting Islamist militancy that came to the center of international attention lately requires understanding the defining characteristics and logic of strategic action by these militant groups. The fact that they claim to act in the name of religion does not mean that analysts should look for clues primarily in religious texts. Such search for the so-called essence of Islam or “essentialism” regarding that religion itself, I would argue, is an exercise in futility. Arguments about whether this or that political or militant action belongs or does not belong to a certain essence of Islam is beside the point and I am surprised that many have devoted so much time and effort in hashing and rehashing such arguments. The truth is that “Islamic arguments” can be used to justify and also to critique diametrically opposed positions. Islam has in fact generated over many centuries a vast body of religious texts, scholarship, and authoritative judgments through which anyone can search and find support for contradictory positions on war and peace, violence and co-existence. Militant groups use parts from the Qur ’an to legitimize their actions in their own societies, but as to be expected, their stands are contested by other Islamist thinkers as misguided and distorted. More important than looking at some religious texts for