Is Islam Responsible For Global 'Islamist' Terrorism? (Part I)

Islamist terrorism in recent years has emerged as a stumbling block to the fortunes chalked at globalising the world. In the passed few weeks we have witnessed an unfortunate upsurge of extremism in Manchester and London which claimed the precious lives of twenty-eight and hundred others affected.

The muslim world is gradually becoming a scarecrow to the rest of the world and people of islamic suasion have been bundled and put under a general fearsome suspicion the world over. The sound of the bells of this reality intensified when President Donald Trump, a week into his administration, restricted the entry of citizens from seven major islamic countries into the United States.

Judaism, Christianity and other major faiths have also had their fair shares of strayed believers and terrorist in their inner circles in the distant past. The Christian Klu Klux Klan uprising in 1960's in America and the Bosnia Herzegovia muslim massacre are cases in point. But what makes this distinct is that they were able to whip in line those strayers. Islam has struggled in vain to distinct, disown and excoriate them as well as outlaw their dastard acts as acts which has nothing to do with islam.

Islam in principle requires the acceptance of the islamic doctrines without validation of evidence. Call it Faith! This explains why these islamic monsters would act on a scriptural provision without absolute, whole understanding of the beliefs of the islamic faith. It is not Islam; it is these people who misinterpret extracts of the holy books to an extreme, practising the beliefs of this confusion from the text.

Indeed the Quran( 5:32) states explicitly that 'If anyone slew a person...it would be as if he slew the whole humankind: and if any one saved a life, it would be as if he saved the life of the whole humankind." Religious cumpulsion is dismissed outrightly by the Quran and islamic clerics across the globe. Jihad is therefore not a war to force islamic faith on others, as many people think of it.

It should never be interpreted as a way of compulsion of the belief on others. It is a struggle for ones well-being. Prophet Muhammad (S.A.W) after migrating to Madinah in 622 AD framed a constitution to govern Madinah and inherit in this constitution was the rights and freedoms of infedels or non-believers. In the face of all this, isn't these maimings, bombings and murders unislamic? Your guess is as good as mine.

It is also instructive to note that the pioneers (Sayyid Qutb and his Muslim brotherhood) of these terrorist acts did not spark it on the wings of islamic provisions but nationalism, poverty, intolerance, political oppression, cultural domination, economic exploitation, ethnic discrimination and religious persecution are active factors that fuelled the insurgences.

It was when the world including muslims began to breath heavily on them that they ran behind the cloaks of the Quranic provisions. In the terrorist attacks all over the world we can boldly say Islam is not responsible for the mass slaughters and the destruction; but Al-Shabab, Al-Qaeda, Boko HARAM ISIS, and Taliban are.

Bottom-line, Islam does not sanction those attacks. Islam is a religion of peace and virtues and must be seen as such.