June 29, 2008

Yet another addition to the mass of judgmental literature, mainly of the post-9/11 variety, churned out by young, western — chiefly American — writers and journalists on Islam with an ineluctable anti-jihadist orientation. Children of Jihad reminded me irresistibly of a similar work entitled A Verdict on India by Beverly Nicholas, a British journalist, which stormed the market on the eve of Partition.

The very title of Nicholas’ book reflected his sheer imperialist arrogance: daring to pronounce a ‘verdict’ on a country as vast, diverse and complex as India. The problem with young western journalists is their unfortunate penchant for using racy travelogue as substitute for a chronicle based on serious, objective and painstaking research.

Books are funded by various foundations and set to a given theme for or against any phenomenon of a global dimension just like the raging anti-Islam debate to serve the ends of diplomacy and politics. Most of the work produced is overwhelmingly propagandistic in nature with little respect for the truth.

Yet another sedulously contrived flaw of such work arises from the loose literal translation of certain Arabic texts or expressions into English. Hizbollah for instance, is translated as the Party of God, something so hurtful to the Muslim psyche that it may well be viewed as blasphemous.

A proper noun, Hezbollah defies an exact translation into English or any other western language as most Islamic names originating in Arabic do. Hizbollah means the party in the path of Allah dedicated to the glorification of His divine message and faith, and not simply the Party of God.

Jared Cohen views Hezbollah as one of the world’s ‘most notorious terrorist organisations’. He describes it as an ‘Iranian-backed’ extremist Shia movement that sought to ‘expel’ Israel from Lebanon.

His idea of a ‘liberated’ Iran is one that might be an extension of America. He paints a vivid picture of young couples seeking the ‘privacy’ of ‘nearby’ bushes for passionate cavorting and kissing. As for the rest of that great ancient land he dismisses it as ‘one of the world’s most repressive countries’.

The author’s propensity for trivialising people and covering up obscenity thinly with a turn of the phrase comes into full play. At one place he uses ‘Ayatollah Assahola’ for ‘Ayatollah Ruholla’, the title of Imam Khomeini, something inexcusably rude and offensive. Most of Cohen’s Iranian interlocutors happen to be young student taxi drivers and women. None of them were willing to ‘commit’ their futures to the clerical establishment. Some claimed that they would join the ‘underground’ opposition, while others will go abroad. Isn’t that part of the brain-drain phenomenon the world over?

Half-tourist, half-spy, Cohen snoops around Iran’s nuclear facilities, particularly the uranium enrichment plant at Nantanz. He says he was ‘hassled’ by the Iranian intelligence services for conducting unauthorised surreptitious interviews and ‘violating protocol.’ He was on the ‘radar screen’, but that didn’t stop him from ‘pushing his luck.’

The author has cashed in on the fascination of Iranian youth (like youth elsewhere) for America. The nuclear issue first came up with a group of architecture students in Shiraz. They looked ‘busy but not unapproachable’ and would soon be crowding around him to let ‘small talk’ turn into a discussion of Iranian politics, economy and sociology. ‘A young woman in the midst of an admiring assembly of the Iranian youth, struck a dissident note in support of Iran’s right to develop nuclear weapons stating, ‘America has them, China has them, India and Pakistan have them, Israel has them, so why not Iran?’

Cohen is part of the typical American response reflecting both the deep American paranoia and a strong anti-Iran sentiment. He fears that nuclear weapons will help keep mullahs in power, as well as ‘worsen’ Iran’s economy and prevent democracy.

He goes on to train his guns on President Ahmedinejad whose popular support, in Cohen’s perception, is based on little more than his rhetoric. Nevertheless, even if Ahmedinejad’s rhetoric does not resonate with all Iranians, it resonates with anti-American populations from Venezuela to Lebanon and Pakistan.

Just as support for President Ahmedinejad, in the author’s opinion, is essentially rhetorical in nature, the faith of the so-called ‘true believers’ also is either patently opportunistic or plainly hypocritical. ‘Among the true believers, there are also those who are the kin of the inner circle of the ruling elite’. In addition to the true believers, the impoverished are ‘key components’ of the regime.

Overall, Cohen takes a highly tendentious view of the Muslim Middle East. What struck him most about an ‘absolutely modern city’ like Beirut was that ‘most’ nightclubs’ owners know that if they ever let Saudi men in, they would ‘never’ see another Lebanese girl come into their club.

In Palestine he comes across graffiti that reads: ‘America is the biggest imperialist and the only thing I want is to see America destroyed.’ Hate for America originates in its support for Israel’s killing of innocent Palestinians. This is a moment of truth for the American establishment and scholars: the ‘Ugly American’ of the 1950s is now uglier and murkier than ever.
 

Children of Jihad
By Jared Cohen
Gotham Books, NY
Available with Paramount Books, Karachi
ISBN 0-14-303898-6
278pp. Rs1,808