Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback T demand,nothing could match the tapes of Friday Shiite cleric. In the marketplace of inspiration-on- cassettesbreakinga ofsalesvoiceofbearing the Center at Tel Aviv University. 1998inHebrewin aas page). A slightly expanded version was published and the study, with notes, can be previewed at to the paper version for the 324 footnotes. Much of University of Chicago Press, 1997), pp. 83-181. Refer Fundamentalist Leaders in the Middle East R. ScottR. Appleby, ed., Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid East Martin Kramer on the Middle Google Books ayd uamd uan alla, in Fadlallah,” Husayn Muhammad Sayyid by Martin Kramer, “The Oracle of Hizbullah: his is the full text (excluding notes) of the study http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ (also embedded at the foot of this Spokesmenfor theDespised: monograph The prerecorded aetna na Palestinian of tapes pular mesl po immensely by dominated the 1970s it was In fever. city’s measures of the sensitive the more of one is market of Beirut audiocassette h record- the market share to their lost these Le weekly,banese a to ding accor 1980s, mid- the in But tionalist hymns. bytheDayan (Chicago: Amazon - - - - world’s attention beginning in 1982. Obscure men a movement of Lebanese Shiites that captured the Fadlallahspoke for Hizbullah, “the party of God,” mand doubled the price of many tapes. centers of the Lebanese Shiite diaspora. States, UnitedHeavy the de and Africa West from arrived thousand copies throughout Lebanon. Orders also hundred a than more soldhave toclaimed neur sermon each week from the pulpit. The entrepre mosque in a poor Shiite quarter of Beirut, Fadlallah’sneighborhoodtapedofthe in cassettestore the HusaynFadlallah.vendor,a Oneoperating from sermons delivered by Ayatollah Sayyid Muhammad movements. Islamic fundamentalism is deeply roo gence and transformation of contemporary Islamic Fadlallah personified the role of leaders in the emer forming resentment into resistance. interpreted and justified Hizbullah’s deeds, trans- ownpulpitwidertotheworld. Fadlallah’s words Fadlallah’s words, carrying his voice far beyond his for mutual gratification. Hizbullah’s deeds amplified dividual and collective needs so obviously combine secret space. But in no other single instance did in cise boundaries of his role ran through Hizbullah’s place in the movement eluded definition; the pre internationallyfamous and infamous. Fadlallah’s alone among the faces of God’s partisans, became countenancethat, a in combinedspectacles and diators,assassinsand todoor.his Turban, beard, movement, a supposition that drew diplomats, me world. His very ubiquity suggested that he led the of Hizbullah’s conscience and its spokesman to the aloft on a wind of words, he made himself the sermons voiceand lectures, on tape and in print. Borne who processed the rage of Hizbullah into speech, inhostage takings. But it was the ubiquitous Fadlallah renowned—suicide bombings, airliner hijackings, carried out the acts of violence that made Hizbullah 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 1 ------Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback scarred deeply by religious doubt, especiallythereligiousdoubt, by deeply scarred Qur’anic,appealedtheytheanddirectly thoseto new leaders was a combination of the Cartesian empowered.andwouldthem beto theselogic of The Islam would prevail, and believers who held tightly lengedby their own adherents. The certainties of the preeminent values of the West would be chal but a leap forward into a postmodern world where that a return to Islam meant not a step backward, people ofconvincedmasses They it.puncture to and who knew enough of the discourse of modernity leaders who had mastered the power to persuade, additional Islamic movements gained momentum— absence of such leadership: ted the failure of earlier Islamic movements to an essay on “The Return of Islam” in 1975, he attribu vements. When Bernard Lewis wrote his prescient intodiscipline, and the creation of organized mo a necessary condition for the forging of discontent the appearance of dynamic leaders has constituted as the achievement of a few individual leaders. YetNorth Africa, and its power cannot be understood rwhelmed so many peoples of the Middle East and ted in the social and economic crisis that has ove As the 1980s unfolded,leadersemerged1980sasmore the As narchy and established a regime of divine justice. launched a movement that swept aside Iran’s mo Ayatollahpersonofthe RuhollahKhomeini, who in later years several appeared leadership Such The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East “ kind of leadership emerges. a powerful domestic political force if the right tiveas alimiting factor and may yet become contenders for power. But it is already effec tedreligious movements from being serious so far restricted the scope of Islam and inhibi lack of an educated and modern leadership has dership and a readiness to respond to it. The countries of the deep yearning for such a lea there is ample evidence in virtually all Muslim sibility of a more convincing leadership, and been so unconvincing. This still leaves the pos- thatthosehavewhoattempt themade have “ Onereason for their lack of success is http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ ------years, these leaders came to stand at the head ofhead theyears, atstandleaders thesetocame evermorenumerous young. theInspanfewof a have evolved without the omnipresence of Fadlallah. Yetdifficultisit imagineto how Hizbullah would the fragmentation of Lebanon’s Shiites themselves. banon. It benefited from the indulgence of Syria andwho suffered as a result Israel’s 1982 invasion offrom Le Islamic Iran and won a following among those civil war. It received inspiration and direct supportendemic poverty and the collapse of civil society frustrationShiiteuponwithintodiscontents.drew It Hizbullah arose in Lebanon from a fusion of many political power. mass movements, well positioned to bid for ultimate majority from Iran, others from Iraq, Lebanon, the assembled from throughout the Shiite world—the learning.Great ayatollahs, scholars, andstudents renownedseminariesShiiteofmost the of some of purposeful travel, for alongside the shrines were beggars.NajafButalsoencouraged anotherkind communion with God and fed the city’s hoards of grims from throughout the Shiite world, who soughtpil with teemed Iraq dominantlyofsouth Shiite gatewaypre thispeace,theprosperity toandof Muhammad’s cousin and son-in-law. In past times reveredProphetthetheAli,Imamis tombthe of south of Baghdad. At the heart of kilometersthis 150 plaincitybaked a ofEuphrates, on gish domes pursue religious learning. Najaf sits astride the slug thevillage of Aynata in South Lebanon in 1928 to from migratedthereFadlallah,al-Ra’uf had Abd ofNajaf on16November 1935. Hisfather, Sayyid ShiiteIraqishrinecityFadlallahthe inwasborn survival—and together they wrote history. movement and the man guaranteed one another’s them from following paths to self-destruction. The rallied the masses to the movement, and then kept fedby an unfathomably deep well of wisdom. He oracle—a fount of infallible (if ambiguous) guidance, movementbore his mark. For he was Hizbullah’s Others may have made Hizbullah’s choices, but the Precocious Poet 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 2 - - - - Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback didnot always know tranquility, but a succession brought for burial to speed them to the next.were theythere Najaf and world, this injusticesof the Husayn. There Shiites came as pilgrims to lament Najafin andKarbala, theburial places ofAliand completelysuspendedas so seem temporal time Nowheredid hiding.into gone had itselfhistory for the expansion and defense of Islam. For them, Muslimsfalse bywaged wars the atscoffed and grievances,theirnursed martyrs,mournedtheir the end of eschatological time. The partisans of Ali ditiondidnot expect wrongs to berighted before did the usurpers suppress truth that the Shiite tra forced underground by a false Islam. So thoroughly theirandsupporters. Theytheirandtruths were violations against the just claims of Ali’s descendants divine right to rule. There followed a succession of they slew Ali’s son, Husayn rather than recognize crimehis of disobedience with that of murder, when at its helm. Later the usurpers would compound the specific instruction that his son-in-law Ali be placed the death of the Prophet by those who ignored his of Islam had been run aground immediately after temporal Islamic history. In the Shiite view, the outoftime.Shiism hadsurvivedship negationaas of Upon entering the city, pilgrims and scholars stepped who dwelled within it. all attested to the city’s tenacious hold upon those teachersfilled many memoirs of life in Najaf, but deprivationand hunger suffered by students and others spent lifetimes in the seminaries. Stories of eventuallyreturned to their own lands to preach; learning in conditions of the utmost austerity. Some small stipends which allowed them to pursue pious notuition, teachers received no salaries; all drew ved from throughout the Shiite world. Students paid seminaries through donations and alms, which arri masters presided. The ayatollahs maintained their ternal academic authority. No presidents, deans, or free of government control and submitted to no methodsex of the Islamic seminary. The schools were philosophy, according to the medieval pedagogical nent. In Najaf they studied sacred law, theology,Afghanistan,Gulf,Arab Indiansubcontithe and and The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ - - - - who were believed to possess the Prophet Muhammad through the Imam Husayn, guished lineage. They were forwhomacquired learning compounded distin those who already claimed authority by descent and learned. But Najaf exercised a particular pull upon someof the prestige traditionally accorded to the study in Najaf, one might become a shaykh and the gain mountainous south of Lebanon. Through some ped the imagination of young Shiites in Jabal Amil, The sacred space on the Euphrates traditionally grip around the city. racter and granted immunities that formed a wall of Sunni Islamic empires recognized its sacred cha social preeminence. sake and as a credential of spiritual authority and Najaf. Thus learning was pursued both for its own Such titles could only be acquired through study in tollah might be accorded by informal acclamation. could accredit others as mujtahids, the title of aya one’slearningforbecamegreat enoughthatone Islam in binding ways for believers. When respect of in the law of Islam might earn one the formal title and sermonizer in a mosque. More protracted study aspire to the title of Through a short period of study in learning.Najaf, with associated titlesone prestigious moremight the world by the color of one’s turban, there were Beyond the hereditary title of sayyid, affirmed for to wear black or green. lineage wore white turbans, sayyids were entitled due to the Imam. While shaykhs of undistinguished in return, they laid a recognized claim to the alms were much in demand in all forms of religious graceritual; that infused their blessings with potency. They mujtahid, one empowered to interpret the law of imam and sayyids, khatib, baraka, When Sayyid Abd His family were expected of washim. what did ted for Najaf, he depar al-Ra’uf 14/12/2010 00:04 descendants of prayer leader an inherited Page 3 - - - - - Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback dlallah through his mother), the latter an Azeri. Yetsim Kho’i—the former an Arab (and related to Fa wereayatollahs Muhsin al-Hakim and Abu al-Qa these veneratedof most Theteachers. esteemed most Najaf’s undertheologylawlearningandin he progressively advanced to the highest stages of contemporaries,his andfromdistinguished him writtenliterary journal.mastery Hiswordtheof somefriendshandandten,ofheevena out put age the At precocious. and gifted wasFadlallah of speaker over listener. vated in seminary and mosque, affirmed the power and the Imams. These conventions, rigorously culti Qur’an and the sayings of the Prophet Muhammad ned with appropriate and precise quotation of the classicalcombiArabiccontrollanguageofwere formalizedthis ofelements power.Thesocial of all others; the mark of learning was an instrument tions of speech set a Najaf-educated man apart from language and power. A mastery of formal conven preciation for the relationship between formalized deep-rooted ap study.emphasisreflected a This grammar,logic, and rhetoric inthe early years of whichstressedtime,passageunalteredofthe by curriculuma masterto Fadlallah younghad the scholasticmateofpiety. fellow hisLikestudents, formativerarifiedpassed hiscli Najaf’s yearsin Fadlallah, Husayn Muhammad Sayyid son, His the first to be resurrected on the appointed day. sacred center of rebirth, so that he might be burialamong in Najaf, far from his place of birth buthe diedat thein 1984, his body was flown back tolarly Iraqways for of the shrine city did not leavesouth him.Lebanon When in the summer of 1956, but the scholars from Iran, Iraq, and Lebanon. He returned to city, and taught a generation of aspiring young hisschoown studies under the leading teachers of the man, and held him close for thirty years. He finishednary. Najaf captured Sayyid Abd al-Ra’uf as a youngmost clerics in the district, supervised a local semi Lebanon and Palestine; his father, one of the fore whichsat astride the then-open frontier between mostthenotable sayyids villagetheof Aynata,of The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ ------daring willingness to defy convention, even while a athinted verseFadlallah’s free compositionof mic themes. several books of collected verse, almost all on Isla his spare time and on plane flights, and published laterIn lifewouldhe continue towrite poetry, in Lebanesestirredcommentthejafsomepress.in the time.” As a result, the young prodigy from Na astonishedat“which peoplepoem arecited and the occasion wearing the turban of a learned man leadinga Shiite cleric.teenager The appeared on banontoattend commemorationa ceremony for In 1953, at the age of sixteen, Fadlallah visited Le recited verse. meet in sŽéances where they exchanged gossip and the public baths, students and teachersto visit aalike orprayer AfterwouldNajaf. ofscholars staid originalform of expression among the ostensibly in poetry, which constituted the most intimate and mastery of language to original use. He first did so talentaforstretching convention, forputtinghis from the outset, Fadlallah demonstrated a will and Shiites with the ideological messages of Arabyoung generationofnatio new thebombarded power grip,contendersstatetighteneditstheforWhile its control over the autonomous Shiite shrine cities. the centralizing nationalist state sought to establish dent in 1932, and again after the revolution of surpass1958, it. When Iraq became nominally indepen Najaf as a center of Shiite rivallearning,to come thusand had Qomwould 1920. occupationin later English theagainst rebellionfailed supportinga Shiite clerics had fled to the city of Qom inthe Iran,rule afterof British unbelievers. Many of the leading arrivedthere1928,in thecity was already under thetumult ofthisworld. WhenFadlallah’s father had breached the walls that separated Najaf from poralworld. Thecollapse oftheOttoman Empire temtheassumptionsShiism inofrole theabout throughscatteringNajaf,blewchangetimeworn the practical tools of a scholar and jurist, winds of testing the limits of convention. While he acquired mastering its complex forms. But he was not alone in 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 4 ------Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback own acts. fateof God’s creation depended solely upon their redemption, but must plan for it now, as though and the now. They should not wait passively for proclaimed;divine Muslims had a duty to pursue it here mic state. Justice could no longer be deferred, they government, Islamic economics, and the ideal Isla think, lecture, and write on such subjects as Islamic liberation. The best young talents of Najaf began toout, from a creed of pious resignation to a sloganbegan theof revolution that would turn Shiism inside to preach patience and damn politics as hubris. So continuenot couldClericsjustice.economic and mic response to their yearnings for political, social, young would go elsewhere unless given a Shiite Islation only if it became a theology of liberation. The remain relevant to the needs of a doubting genera great preoccupation of Najaf’s clerics. Islam would chy in 1958, confronting communism became the lah recollected that after the fall of the Iraqi standing,monar their autonomy, and their survival. Fadlal Younger Shiite clerics understood the threat to their messianism, and join the struggle for liberation. clerics to their redemptive suffering and dogmatic not wait, proclaimed the new ideologies. Leave the tion from oppression, alienation, and poverty need nalism, Arab socialism, and communism. Redemp The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ ------clandestinenetwork thatbecameknown Hizb as so the clerical theorists of an Islamic state wove a reached through learned articles in journals. And be not could These cities. Iraq’s forcountryside the left had who masses Shiite displaced the to wished to take his message beyond the seminaries, convention without breaking it. But Baqir al-Sadr ofhisintellect, andabove allhisability tostretch These essays conveyed the vitality and originality to Islamic studies among the scholars themselves. circumstances and called for a more open approach maketheteachings ofIslam relevant to changing to need the Fadlallah’switheditorialsdealt own the two young scholars collaborated on a journal. of contemporary Shiism’s leading families. Together Muhammad Baqir al-Sadr, a brilliant scion of one contemporary, Sayyid Najaf his bypresentation particularlyandIslam, itsreadingof new this to Fadlallah later said. He felt an irresistible attraction rebelled against tradition and all familiar things,” “My studies, which were supposed to be traditional, 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 5 Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback Musa al-Sadr, a Shiite cleric about seven years his a mark; before Fadlallah lay the example of Sayyid non, an enterprising young cleric could also make not for Shiism’s theologians of liberation? In Leba unwelcome everywhere else in the Middle East. Why banon had become a sanctuary for ideas and people government cajoled or threatened Shiite clerics. Le occasionally over the years. He knew that there no maintained his ties to the country and had visited At it the same time, Lebanon beckoned. Fadlallah had inviolability of the clerics themselves. mostfundamental ofall immunities, thephysical encroaching state seemed poised to throw out that ever- The exile.imprisonment orwith members in the network’s new preaching and threatened its regimewellTheunderstood dangerstheimplicit dation of leading Shiite clerics and their disciples. regime began to show a heavier hand in the intimisanctuary. With the emergence of Al-Dawa, the Iraqi the brewing battle, the seminaries could not offer avoidto preferred who those for Evenenemies. dauntingbesiegedbyIslam ansurvival ofthe to commitment that would bind him—a commitment tion and secularization. In Najaf Fadlallah made a waragainstIslam, waged forces thebyalienaof had matured on the brink of a war—an undeclared the higher faculty of an esteemed seminary. But he Fadlallahand couldhave laidclaimplacetoon a academicscholar. Such standing had its rewards, vedinexorably toward recognition asfirst-ranka Najaf. In any other generation, he might have mo to personify the great tradition of the seminaries ofhis beliefs, his understanding of the world. He came all of these left their mark on Fadlallah’s character,chers, the growing repression by the Iraqi regime— sies which raged there, the inspiration of great tea The electrifying atmosphere of Najaf, the controver network of Al-Dawa. the togetherin joined had wholaymen and rics its own legitimacy and began to intimidate the cle committed activism as an impertinent challenge to regarded this passage from arid intellectualism to al-Dawa—the “Party of the Calling.” The Iraqi regime The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ ------whohadbeenIran.bornQominin Sayyid Musa senior,whoseNajaffamilyrootsbutdeepinhad the landed families in south Lebanon, whom he whomLebanon, south infamilies landed the rising star. Sayyid Musa had antagonized many of by those who wished to bring down Sayyid Musa’s move to Lebanon may also have been encouraged Fadlallah’sButbirth. foreign hispolitics,despite how Sayyid Musa had become a maker of Lebanese test against the policies of the Shah of Iran. He saw Lebanon,in andhelped Sayyid Musadraft pro a Sayyid Musa’s success. In 1962 Fadlallah visited Tyre, Fadlallah’s decision might have been influenced by acclaimed the Imam Sadr by his supporters. considerablea wonfollowing.wouldbe he Soon Musa did so in 1959, and by the mid-1960s he had al-Hakim, one of Fadlallah’s own mentors. Sayyid persuadedtogo to Lebanon byAyatollah Muhsin had spent four years studying in Najaf, and had been thought and free expression. “There was room for particular,hadbecome byworda for provocative tual freedom; the American University of Beirut, in creating an island of secular tolerance and intellec heart of Beirut, the Arab world came the closest to tion.Yet theywere both cities undersiege. theIn commerce, journalism, literature, art, and revolu citadels declared the supremacy of secular man, in of God and submission to his will; Beirut’s concrete 1960s. Najaf’s domes professed the sublime nature the inBeirutirreconcilable andNajaf thancities difficult would apparentlybemore Itfind two to erode what remained of their privilege. whose call for internal social reform threatened to groom one of their own as a counter to Sayyidvernment Musa,minister. They would have been eager to mentary deputy from Bint Jubayl and then as a parlia go a Fadlallah’sasinstalling unclematernal and elbowed their way to respectability, eventually landed Bazzi clan of Bint Jubayl. They had bought grandfather had been the baron of the powerful and community.happened,itAs Fadlallah’s maternal accused of exploiting and misrepresenting the Shiite First Pulpit 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 6 - - - - - Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback could not be addressed by the corrupt and obscu confusionTheirfaith.their even ways ruraland city,youngpeoplemovingwereaway theirfrom for their children’s sake as well. In the crush of the learning. Community leaders welcomed Fadlallah son, who had all the right credentials of descentnativebrilliant thisaccepted readilycommunity and Nabaa, as in Bint Jubayl itself, and the transplantedket. There were as many people from Bint Jubaylshoe factories whichin supplied Lebanesethe mar craftof shoemaking and established anumber of and its vicinity brought with them their traditional whocamefrom thesouthern town ofBintJubayl nedworkshops andsmall factories. Those Shiites Hammud and Nabaa, Shiite entrepreneurs had ope were joined by Palestinian refugees of war. In BurjShiite arrivals squatted in neighboring Nabaa, and wars by Armenian refugees. Poorer and more recentworld thebetween settledHammud, Burjferred tofeel unwelcome inSunni West Beirut, had pre pursuit of economic opportunity. The Shiites, made when Shiites first began to leave the countrysidecity’s in Shiite communities, dating back to the 1940s, neighboring Burj Hammud, one of the oldest of the in East Beirut. Nabaa was the poor relation of the the mixed Shiite-Palestinian shantytown of Nabaa arenahis selected asand 1966 inBeirut rivedin appreciated.mostwouldbe arart wherehis He knew Najaf from cleric unconventional slightly ancestralhistocomeLebanon, eloquent the and to Fadlallah decided When words. ofnipulation likeAndNajaf, Beirut rewarded talentedthe ma Like Najaf, Beirut saw its defenses crumbling. despair and deprivation that surrounded the island. tralizing state, but from masses of refugees from hadthe come under relentless pressure, not from a cen by“respect for differences.” Yet like Najaf, Beirut and conventional patriots.” The city was governed self-centered Bohemians and steadfast chauvinists radicalsardentandconservatives, foot-loose and puritansgracelesspiousandhedonists, left-wing free-wheeling ambience: “the devout and heathen, everyone,”remembered observeroneBeirut’s of The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ ------Institute went on to Najaf for further studies. al-Sharial-Islami). studies called the Islamic Law Institute nics,youth clubs, and amiddle school for Islamic Fraternity Familyof the asassociation culturalknown and social establisheda he ThereHusayn. Imam the gathering where Shiites mourn the martyrdom of lam. He opened a deem them through a socially aware reading of Is- themselves from religious belief, and set out to re confused young men and women who had distanced Fadlallah immediately identified the malaise of the before Fadlallah arrived. rantist shaykh who presided over the neighborhood the most obvious departure came at the end, in thediffered manyin subtle ways fromsermon, a but oflecturing for youth clubs and groups. A lecture Fadlallahsimultaneouslystylefreer developed a allusions of immense suggestive power. into a dense and intricate carpet of quotations and pulpit,theartistdeftlyonlike an weaving words a mind racing past safe limits. Fadlallah performed his high forehead with a handkerchief, as if to cool verish; in an arresting mannerism, he would wipe by the present. At this point, his speech became fe from his broad theme to the trying questions posed the sacred to the temporal, as Fadlallah descended colloquialArabic.transitionthecameHere from break would occur, signified by his passage toa arather moreformal brilliance. But in sermons, a clear further,leaving thereader with animpression of Inmany of Fadlallah’s written pieces, he went no traction in the formal cadences of classical Arabic. his general theme, discussed on a high level of absmaster- of the sacred text. Then he would introduce state of attentiveness, and confirm his authority asto a cast a spell. This would draw the audience intotions a from the Qur’an, intoned sonorously as though gin his sermons with formal invocations and quota conventions he had acquired in Najaf. He would be Fadlallah now made excellent use of the sermonizing (Usrat al-Ta’akhi), husayniyya, The best of the studentsthebestofThe the at which supervised cli a place of communal 14/12/2010 00:04 (al-Mahad Page 7 - - - - - Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback liberation.Buttheethos of Arabism hadfailed to Arab strugglefor the in unityemphasisupon its denythe values of Arab nationalism, particularly not did Fadlallah theorists, Islamic some Unlike the basis for a viable struggle against imperialism. Arabism was a false god; only Islam could serve as politically,militarily, byallavailable means.” But endeavorstoweaken poorpeoples economically, terests and break its spine, exactly as imperialism had to be fought “in order to weaken it, limit its in and for Arabism he substituted Islam. Imperialism FadlallahArabs,thefor substituted Muslims, the the prevailing discourse in this important respect: victims. But Fadlallah’s formulations diverged from and cultural imperialism sucking the lifeblood of its There was nothing original in this idea of economic products it offers us.” feeding ourselves with the thought and consumer sufficiency. It wants us to continue sitting atthe itsMuslims table, act through economic and political self- intellectual self-reliance and it cannot bear having ofpremise a having proceedMuslimsfrombear volution. Fadlallah held that “imperialism cannot borrowed heavily from the vocabulary of Arab re the paramount obstacle to self-fulfillment, and he imperialismremainedthatbelieved too, dlallah, Arabadvancethe toward trueindependence. Fa independence,disguisedimperialisma thwarted the belief that, despite the coming of formal politicalladin of pan-Arabism. These ideas revolved around championed by Egypt’s Gamal Abdel Nasser, the pa had been nurtured on the ideas of Arab revolution The young generation that Fadlallah sought to touch fashionable rhetoric of anti-imperialist nationalism. combination of traditional Islamic themes and the Fadlallah’swords derived their power from their ficult dilemmas that other clerics preferred to avoid. who were eager for dialogue and wrestled with dif talent, and it endeared him to the inquisitive young,quotations from Islamic sources. Fadlallah had that impromptu questions and summon the necessary couldthinkquickly enoughfeethison toanswer question-and-answer period. Not every sermonizer The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ - - - - - expense of Shiite bystanders. Should the Shiites turn Israel retaliated with uneven accuracy, often at the and began to attack Israel across Lebanon’s border. lestinian armed organizations relocated to Lebanon on Shiite ground. Expelled from Jordan in 1970, Pa Shiites was the emergence of a Palestinian resistance The searing issue of the early 1970s for Lebanon’s Islamic conceptualization of struggle and sacrifice. the Arabs could be hastened only by returning to in an the first place, and the liberation of Palestineof Arab and nationalism had been derived from Islam lure to liberate Palestine. Most of the positive deepestvalues commitment was demonstrated by the fai unify the Arabs. Nationalism’s incapacity to stir the to additional misery and deprivation.” longer extends to actions which expose our people in private conversation in 1973, “Our sympathy no should bear the burden of their struggle. As he notsaid believe that the Shiites, did alone butamong dispossessed, all been Arabs, had Palestinians the sympathized with Palestinian aspirations because reprisals upon the villages of the south. Sayyid Musapense and bore responsibility for the hellish Israeli pursuingtheirwarliberationof Lebanon’sat ex widespread in Lebanon, that the Palestinians were view,Shiitesfewsharedthe againsta Israel. Not attacks forplatform a as region the used which the emergence of an armed Palestinian resistance, battlegroundafteronly transformeda intobeen frontier between Lebanon and Israel. The south had all, peace had prevailed for a generation along the sufferingsurroundedPalestinians.thatthe After dreadedtheinclusion oftheShiites theinringof solidarity, he of pull the felt he Whilequestion. Palestinianownstraightforwardtheir to answer a Shiites give never could al-Sadr Musa Sayyid also armed themselves. ding those in Fadlallah’s own Nabaa quarter—had in Beirut, where their Palestinian neighbors—inclu only in the south, in places like Bint Jubayl, consequences?but also This dilemma confronted Shiites not lidarity by facilitating the attacks and sharing the their backs on the Palestinians or demonstrate so 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 8 - - - - - Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback rsre ter at i Lbnn Bt Fadlallah But Lebanon. in faith their preserved He appealed to those who clung to their Shiism Lebanon’sand recognition of their place in the mosaic. For Sayyid Musa, the salvation of the Shiites lay in Arabism, which Sayyid Musa never fully mastered. al-Sadr. Its premises lay deep in the discourse Thisof pan-argument set Fadlallah apart from Sayyid Musa grow like a cancer unless it was excised. eventualdisplacement, byanIsrael which would listeners,Fadlallah conjuredanotherfear—ofup regard to the agents of Israel.” So to embolden his Israel’ he trembled in fear, as many of us did with psychological defeat that if any of us heard theand wordespecially the Arab world, experienced such a element in 1967,” he later said. “The Islamic world, entire Islamic world and appeared as the invincible taking a stand against Israel. “Israel frightened the gain more. Fadlallah understood the Shiite fear of Fadlallah,wouldandprovoke yetanother warto territory in each of the previous three wars, declaredthe south and wished to possess it. Israel had takenonly in reaction to Palestinian attacks. Israel coveted temporary anesthetic.” Israel did not strike the south istalk for thesake oftalk, anachronistic words, a fedayeenfromregionthewillsolve problem,the some others, that the departure of the Palestinian in Bint Jubayl in 1972. “The claim of politicians Palestinianand problem,” he said in a lecture delivered timization. “The problem of the South is part of outthe of this conflict, for they too were slated for vic world. The Shiites, Fadlallah warned, could not opt Palestine, but between two blocs contending for the south was not a problem between Jews and Arabs nate in the Arab and Muslim worlds. The conflict towas the the instrument of a wider Western plot toshared the Arab nationalist domi conviction that Israel another in spinning words on Palestine. Fadlallah ries of Islam. Najaf’s poets also had vied with one of that language and its translation into the categoneration of Najaf clerics had been the appropriation socialism. The whole enterprise of the younger ge language of Arab unity, Arab liberation, and Arab Arabtheworldinmed 1950s,theofknewthehe Fadlallah understood the dilemma differently. For The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ - - - - - reachof Sayyid Musa, those who scoffed not only beyondweretheShiitesyoung whothe to spoke fury of the Palestinian attacks on Israel. The Shiites,This did not mean that Fadlallah endorsed the wild the spirit and name of Islam. brace the cause of Palestine, he urged, but do so in offered the alternative of an ecumenical Islam. Em ning to identify with anything but Shiism, Fadlallah Palestinian organizations. To the young Shiites year offered their services to the leftist militias and the reasonto cling to a sectarian Shiism, they instead revolutionarynothe themselvesSeeingmass. in espousing causes larger than both they might lose at Shiism but at Lebanon, and who believed that by plans, on the basis of present and past experience.futureenemy’s the at profoundlook a taking by Arabs had to set aside their daydreams and begin without a people for a people without land a a sloganland.’”the homelandsunder our fromThe us of our country and our resources, and then remove sors unfolded their multistage plan “to gain control and avoided long-term planning, while the aggres- The Arabs primed themselves to expect a quick fix, This emotionalism was the bane of the Arab world. in the West, the United States. challenge an Israel supported by the greatest power quarrelingtheandder Arabregimes,orderto in people had to overcome of effects of the feudal or face the limitations imposed by their situation. The the Palestinians, and the Arabs as a whole, had to “ but this has never solved a problem. ragesuppressionand throughexplosion, an wayreleasetoa bemight Thisaroundhim. feel the urge to destroy himself and all that is emotional states and in certain situations, may solution.a Perhapsindividual,an certainin toroad the resultonany youbring not will revolting against your situation, but this alone otion might push you towards thinking about the local level at a given moment in time. musterEmoncan forceswe the of basis the on “ The problem is what we are able to do, 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 9 - - - - Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback proclaimed him the most Arab of Arabs. Arabicflowing effortlessand his acolyte.But an short and stocky, and could be readily Fadlallahwasmistakenroots.foreign betrayed his Arabicfor thatpedigree, for when hespoke, his Persianized of the most noble descent. He relied heavily upon dignity that reflected the self-confidence of someone The physically towering Sadr possessed an informal the same turban, but the differences were profound. which still gripped particularitythe Shiite community. of sense Both strong men the wore to rectly voicecarriedmuchfurther, becausespokedihe fewBeirut neighborhoods. Sayyid Musaal-Sadr’s But Fadlallah’s message did not resonate beyond a challenge to Israel. paramounttheas obstacle effectiveit anto Arab Arab revolutionaries and intellectuals denounced theologyIslama liberationof momentaat when will not yield to temptation?” Fadlallah proclaimed sesses profound faith and moral fortitude, so that individualhe advance this fateful cause, unless he pos- who will fly the plane. Tell me, by God, howwithin. will“It the is the individual who will grasp the ofgun, the necessity of individual transformation from to spell out a precise plan of action. He spokemilitary insteadlife accordingly.” Fadlallah was too cautious “We should then plan our political, economic, and The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ - itself. Among these followers, young Shiites who had lestinian problem as fateful for the Shiite community larly with Shiites who shared his reading of the pastPa his own neighborhood. He won favor particu a much narrower appeal, which did not extend far contemporary Shiite culture in Iran. Fadlallah had ofseat the world,to leadershipArab beyondthe in identity, they were not embarrassed to look for authority.ShiitestronglyoutsideStill to defer to self-confidence, the Shiites of Lebanon were eager spokeaccented Arabic hardly mattered. Bereft of the loyalty of many of Lebanon’s Shiites.won imaginationand Thatthecaptured hope Sadr of sage mes- manner,deportment,andwinninglineage, The Shiites showed their preference. Sayyid Musa’s a vast chasm. The dilemma which had faced the facedhad whichdilemma Thechasm. vast a Beirutdivideda city, the two halves separated by line. An earthquake now began which would leave it turned out, rested squarely upon Lebanon’s fault armed redoubts in the eastern part of Beirut.Palestinianstheir from theexcise campaigntoNabaa, a the Maronite-dominated Phalangist militia began The battle began in 1975, and in the following year its descent into civil war. theme would soon prove timely as Lebanon beganTheforce. of use the torelationshipIslam theof the Qur’an, and he began work on a second, about length book, about methods of propagating Islam in full-first wrotehisalsopoor.suffering the He of spentlayingthem“foundations” sharingandthe heFadlallah years,thattheseduringsaid did he hisscholarly credentials. Later, when asked what locallevel,mostbolstersupporttothehisandat der and savior. Fadlallah used his time to cultivate Sadr,Lebanon’smanyhailedofbyShiites lea as Imam the became Musa Sayyid while shadows, Butthey were too few. Fadlallah remained thein their presence in Palestinian ranks. asthe cleric whose words most perfectly justified positions of some prominence, looked to Fadlallah joined Palestinian organizations, and even risen to A Logic of Power 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 10 - - - Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback of Lebanon’s other communities. Amal promised to victimized, that they must arm themselves, as did allthe Shiites must no longer allow themselves to be withsectarian violence. Sayyid Musa argued that of Shiite interests and lives in a Lebanon gone narrowlymad conceived theirdefensepurposetheas militiaAmal.knownYetas foundersthe Amal of steps toward the arming and training of the Shiite Musa al-Sadr and his followers had taken the first tion of the Shiite community was underway; Sayyid Islam.ofWhenFadlallah wrotemilitarizatheit, systematicpolemic favorin oftheempowerment and the Logic of Power Fadlallah wrote a book, mostly by Nabaa,of candlelight.siege long the during fellshells the As did not return the call. clinicwhich hadsponsoredhe thequarter.in He overture concerned the possibility of reopening a bepresident of Lebanon. Fadlallah knew that the mander who had taken Nabaa and who would later message from Amin Gemayel, the Phalangist com not return to Nabaa. Later he received a telephone lation negotiated by Sayyid Musa. Fadlallah would so outside the framework of the demeaning capitu labor of a decade. However, he claimed to haveperhaps donea hundred thousand others, abandoning the view, he did not voice it publicly. He left of defeatismNabaa andwith betrayal. If Fadlallah shared this cuation agreement reached by Sayyid Musa smacked Among those Shiites who favored resistance, the eva the remnants of Palestinian resistance. ture, the Phalangist militia overran Nabaa, crushing Shiites out of the neighborhood. Upon their depar Phalangist militia that allowed safe passage of the fateofthecommunity andstruckdeal withathe Palestinians, but Sayyid Musa al-Sadr feared for the wouldhavefought theirforhomes alongside the to Palestinian demands for solidarity. Some Shiites caught between two ruthless opponents and subject shantytown. In 1976 the Shiites found themselves the shellingand blockading Nabaa, inlestinians Beirut.ThePhalangist militia laid siege to thePa Shiites of the South suddenly confronted many in The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ constituted Fadlallah’s most Islam ------in a comprehensive confrontation with unbelief. Fadlallah saw the armed Shiite as an asset sects.other ofwith parity sought whichsect, Islam his of defendera Shiiteasarmed theSayyidsaw Musa uses to which emerging Shiite power shouldthe over MusaSayyidbe Fadlallahwithdiffered put. so confrontation between Islam and imperialism. And global the in point flash areally wasstrifenon’s threatthebyaggressivean of imperialism; Leba act, Fadlallah said, because Islam was endangered with error, disbelief, and imperialism. Shiites must of a sect, but those of all Islam in its confrontation that the acquisition of power must serve not the Fadlallah’sends book made the very different argument little more. guarantee Shiite survival among the wolves—and wedded to sober calculation. It had to be conceivedeffective violencecould onlyproceed from belief Palestinians into their pitiful corner. Legitimate thebacked hadand asviolencereckless wantonand Fadlallahtime,same the warnedAt againstsuch most powerful adversaries. themselvesbreaststheirthewouldoffearstirin rewardinthe hereafter. Once they believed, they their cause and have faith that martyrdom brings turn required that Muslims believe in the truth of empowermentinfear; thissettingofasidewas a such to precondition The power. of forms were trations,civil disobedience, preaching—these too tive advantage or physical force. Strikes, demons- wielded, but power did not reside only in quantita instruments of oppression and war that imperialism exploitation.haveMuslimsnotsameThedidthe defeated,unbeliefberesteduponand because it lism enjoyed over Islam was temporary and could book, Fadlallah said it was not. The powerhis InIslam? allimperia defense ofLebanonmounting a imaginedispossessedthe deprivedand Shiitesof Lebanon’sother sects. Was it not sheer fantasy to Shiiteswould fortunatebe tomatch thepower of the face of common sense. They thought Lebanon’s For many Shiites, Fadlallah’s vision seemed to fly in 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 11 - - - Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback and West Africa saved the town from hunger. rity These of Bint Jubayl’s native sons in distant Michigancreatedterribleashortage cha cash.Onlytheof payment for the tobacco crop by the state monopolypricesskyrocketed.and six-monthA delaythe in pendedcompletely theiruponbrethrenfood,for families slept out in the open. The new vacation.Many summerarrivals for emptied dehad which familieswith no place to stay lived inthe schools, hundred two overflowing. Some to filled houses sand.Families took indestitute relations, and the swelled from thirteen thousand to twenty-four thou Jubayl who had fled Nabaa did the same. Thefather.supporthistheofand natives The town’sBint of upon the patronage of his mother’s powerful clan tedto Bint Jubayl in the south, where he fell back After the debacle of Nabaa, Fadlallah briefly retrea master others. had struck that balance. The self-master could now skepticism.andNabaatime fell,FadlallahtheBy ambition, belief sacrifice and emotion,and logic phical balance—between persuasion and violence, politics as in poetry. This required an inner philoso between these two voices—a seamless harmony, in of virtue was the achievement of a perfect balance tocarefullya considered planof action. Hisideal zealous and harness their willingness for sacrifice crifice. With another voice, he sought to restrain the doubting that they could acquire power through sa With one voice, he worked to convince the weak sionFadlallah’sin and thought found fullexpression. In signaled weakness. producedandnothingunguidedthatemotion of of the actions of the Palestinian resistance as spasmstheatrical acts of violence. But heregarded many Palestinians’ the by inspired Shiites were there FadlallahPalestinianknewunderlinedviolence. against the surrender to emotion and impulse that the warning first made in his Bint Jubayl lectures, as part of an overall plan of liberation. He repeated The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East Islamandthe Logic ofPower, http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ Starting Anew thedynamic ten ------to Beirut’s southern suburbs, the Dahiya. Fadlallah exodus began, carrying almost the entire population a market-day crowd, killing seven people. A mass series of incidents, Israeli shells fell in the midst of overflowed into its streets. In October 1976, after a empty as the war between Israelis and Palestinians of the south. More important, Bint Jubayl began to message of power did not resonate among the hills perament of a provincial cleric, and knew that his started again in Bint Jubayl, but he lacked the tem professionalFadlallah.havesetbacktomight He andpersonal congregationa washis of loss The the first refugees of Lebanon’s civil war. Shiites,includingFadlallah, ofbecomesome had orphans and others driven from their homes than Lebanon. Who better to understand the suffering of name. and he named Fadlallah his representative in non, to be supported with funds collected in Kho’i’s committee to create charitable institutions in Leba Kho’i asked that Lebanese Shiite clerics establish Noworphaned. a werechildren many and homes Lebanon, as increasing numbers of Shiites lost their shiftedfollowingcivilwarinoutbreakthe theof prioritiesButworld.Shiite the elsewherein and in Najaf was supported by donations from Lebanon pledged their allegiance to Kho’i, whose seminary At that time, both Fadlallah and Sayyid Musa rulingsal-Sadr of Ayatollah Abu al-Qasim Kho’i as binding. LebaneseShiitesrecognizetochosereligiousthe sinal-Hakim haddiedNajafin 1970, in andmost benefit of some additional support. Ayatollah Muh beginning,newmakingthisFadlallah In the had style perfectly suited its new denizen. cing husayniyyas of the Dahiya, and its outspoken much more confident structure than the self-effa of glass admitted light. The place of worship was a with a high ceiling and a balcony in the rear.Rida A mosque wall was a modern and spacious structure funds to expand an existing mosque. The Imam al- when a wealthy Shiite ŽémigréŽ provided him with began to raise a congregation. Good fortune shined ling in the crumbling Bi’r al-Abd neighborhood, and again joined the wandering flock, eventually sett 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 12 - - - - - Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback Lebanon,” Fadlallah later recalled. “I was with him friend and a schoolmate long before he arrived in openly.themair “Sayyidnot al-Sadrwasa Musa wouldbut differencesSayyid Musawithhis had his precise fate has never been determined Fadlallah Libya. He was quite probably murdered there, but Sayyid Musa al-Sadr disappeared while on a trip 1978,messageaudible. toIn hismakingvantage in Yet another development worked to Fadlallah’s ad in his expanding enterprises. own protégés, whom he could reward with positions to Bi’r Hasan in the Dahiya. Fadlallah now had his lah had founded in Nabaa, which had since moved found their place in the Islamic Law Institute Fadlalthe Qur’an recital class in Fadlallah’s school. Others Some appear as teachers in that same photograph of minaries absorbed them as teachers and students. to return to Lebanon, where a number of new se the Shah’s regime. Many aspiring clerics preferred been disrupted by the escalating confrontation with but learning in the religious seminaries there had Lebanese Shiites. A few proceeded to Qom in Iran, foreignstudents, including morehundredthana its grip on the seminaries by expelling many of the out in Najaf in 1977, and the Iraqi regime tightenedlogical students from Najaf. Serious disorders broke the return to Lebanon of a group of able youngAt the theo same time, Fadlallah greatly benefited from among the inhabitants of the hard-pressed Dahiya. a base from which to rebuild his influence, thisphans. time Fadlallah’s relationship with Kho’i gave or himteachersof forcourses includebroadenedto In subsequent years, the activities of the institution graduates of the school’s first Qur’an recital class. of 1978 shows Fadlallah surrounded by youngsters, rolled 275 students; a photograph from the summer school, and mosque. In its first year, the school en al-Duha,of whichgrewtoinclude orphanage,an ritable institution In Kho’i’s name, Fadlallah established a large cha contributions made to Kho’i’s Lebanese accounts. pointment made Fadlallah the trustee for the sizable a guardian who also had lost everything? The ap The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ (mabarra) in the neighborhood ------doings and sayings of the spell-binding Imam Sadr. beheard above thenoisy preoccupation with the must have understood that his own voice could notfurther in speaking about those differences. Yet he nionbetween us.”andFadlallahhim never went return, “although there might be differences of imminentSayyidMusa’sopi about rumor ofrounds turn,” Fadlallah declared during one of the feverish sa’s undeniable popularity. “We hope Sadr will re also would have been impolitic, given Sayyid Mu of collegiality that governed Najaf’s seminaries. It disagreementwouldhave breached etiquettethe this did not affect our friendship.” Public airing of we did not agree on particular points or methods, forfour years inNajaf, during ourstudies. When Lebanon’s foremost Shiite clerics sought the good Lebanon and the stirring slogan of an Islamic state. choosebetween thebattered idea of confessional riescompelled Lebanon’s leading Shiite clerics to Therevolution andthearrival ofIranian emissa To the poor, they began to dispense money. Imam Khomeini, to preach the new dispensation. countries. Many came to Lebanon as emissaries of their revolution and apply its lessons to their own fellow Shiite clerics in the wider world to acclaim summonedtheystate,Islamicproclaiming an In power on a wave of popular revolutionary fervor. in the seminaries of Qom and Najaf were swept to dies of clerics. Now men who had spent their lives abstraction,discussed theoreticaltheonlyin stu remote a been had stateIslamic the of ideal the non’s Shiites immediately. Until Iran’s revolution, affectedremotemostandIslamcornersofLeba Theepicenter lay in Iran, but the shock jolted the moved under the pillars of power and hishad ground the ownsensationthat thecreating Iran,feet. own metaphor for the Islamic revolution that swept Then the “earthquake” struck. This was Fadlallah’s and his message. itwas, opened agate of opportunity for Fadlallah The disappearance of Sayyid Musa, tragedy though Revolution of Islam, Party of God 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 13 ------Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback Imam Khomeini now plastering the walls of the ofwalls plasteringthe nowKhomeini Imam the oficons mute the captionstoprovideArabic leaders, and might be drawn to his flame if hemonstrators couldanswered establishedthetononeof demanding an Islamic state in Lebanon. These de thatfilled the streets of West Beirut in April 1979, spontaneousdemonstrationsShiitethe seen had And many Shiites now felt the same way. Fadlallah binding him to an ecumenical and universal Islam.Lebanon,frontiersof allegiances thecrossed his religious councils.” Fadlallah claimed instead that philosopyhiswas “differentformula theoffrom sinceelected,” be tomyselfnominate not would played no role there: “I said I would not elect and and “others who differed from him.” But Fadlallah was first created, mediating between Sayyid Musa scholars regarding the issue of the Council” when it worked to find a consensus among the various evenShiiteclaimedHe haveto thosewhoof“onebeen was a member of the Supreme Islamic Shiite Council.cal establishment. Like any cleric of his standing, heBut Fadlallah did not hold any title in the Shiite cleri nium. to forfeit tangible assets for the promise of a institutionsLebanon.millenofTheynaturally hesitated derivedestablishedincomewerethefromShiite of ritual and legal functionaries, whose status and balan. They presided over an elaborate hierarchy ShiiteMuftiLebanon,of Shaykh al-AmirAbd Qa Shaykh Muhammad Mahdi Shams al-Din, and the SupremeIslamicShiiteCouncil,theChairman of great deal to leading Shiite clerics such as the tion Acting accorded them by the state. Titles still meant anda compel disavowal of the institutional recogni wouldsever their link to the confessional system, office and privilege. A demand for an Islamic state no less—and no more—than their rightful share of petitioners of the Lebanese government, demanding Sayyid Musa. Under his leadership, they had been by them for institutions, won theirfirst for state jeopardizing the formal recognition of the Lebanese the Imam Khomeini, but balked at the prospect of will of Islamic Iran and made formal obeisance to The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ - - - - - semiofficial emissaries who began arriveto from establishmentexasperatedofficial manyand the Lebanon’scoynessShiiteofDahiya.thewhile So rageintheconsolidation ofmovementa orstate. of role understoodthe also heYetcriticism. this expressionblindprobablytherage,heof shared to aversion Fadlallah’s Given threat.” American constitutedan“emotional student reaction to the it thatand aims, its to planningaswithout done [Islamic]movement” thathostage-takingthe was Khomeini.” He noted the criticism “by some in the studentsclaiming tofollow the“lineof the Imam ding of American diplomats hostage in Tehran by controversialhol thesanctioned Fadlallaheven the state. wasthedutyofevery individual, thesociety, and temporaryrevolutiona thebasis.”spreadofThe “Itcannot limitedbe specifictoa place except on universalmessagevalidtime:athroughout allit “Islamicdemocracy.” revolutionThe borewithin Western-inspiredof thenotion compromised by revolutionariesofpurgingearly the praised and Islam,”forlabor is lifewhosethose all ofdream great “the as revolution the cheered He Shiites. kening of Islamic consciousness among Lebanon’s revolution and hailed its crucial role in the reawa proclaiming the moral debt of all Muslims to Iran’s Iran, Fadlallah rushed headlong into their embrace, leading the charge against Iraq’s presence in LechargeagainstpresenceIraq’sleadingthein by emissaries Iran’s delighted FadlallahFinally, tified the means. consolidation of the revolution. His authority jus- had sanctioned the move, in order to promote the nation.”theofother words,In Khomeini himself dent content of the revolution in the consciousness to Islamic planning, in order to deepen the indepen I think that the issue of the hostages was medsubmitted to follow the line of the Imam. In light of this, alltheplanning doneby those students whoclai say that the leadership was not far removed from in Iran, Fadlallah saw a purpose: “I am inclined to higher purpose. And so behind the hostage-taking Raw emotion could be controlled and harnessed to 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 14 - - - - - Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback condemnationsenemies,pronounceditsallof in Fadlallah’s endorsements of the revolution and his to the still-obscure cleric. Rafsanjani—ademonstrative gesture of gratitude parliament,Iran’sspeakerof Ali-Akbar Hashemi hereceived personala visit inhishome from the failedassassination 1980,attemptin against him the Husayn.AfterSaddam of regime theagainst emissaries, as did Fadlallah’s continued preaching onLebanon’s soil. Yet its outcome gratified Iran’s a sideshow, one of the countless little wars waged banese Shiite struggle against the Iraqi regime was lowed its influence in that country to wane. Thehopelessly Le exposed and outgunned in Lebanon, al killing the ambassador and many of the staff. Iraq, bomb,car IraqiembassyBeiruta with theinled December 1981 Iraq’s opponents in Lebanon leve Beirut.In buildingsoftopplethe to beganlution distantend,thetheIn earthquake Iran’sofrevo bodyguards. years, and Fadlallah began to surround himself with several more attempts on his life over the next twohis turban, but he emerged unscathed. There were Fadlallah’s gunfire.withbullet car even A struck ber 1980 armed assailants in a passing car sprayedsystemgovernmentNovem theofIraq.”Into in the Iraqi Bath Party, as the result of my opposition soon found himself targeted by persons “backed by campaign against the Iraqi regime in Lebanon and frontier.Fadlallah played admittedan rolethein countries replicated the war waged on their common and pro-Iranian elements, as the embassies of both an arena of small-scale clashes between pro-Iraqi became Beirut 1981, early and 1980 late During foundations of the revolution made by the clerics. 1980, Iraq invaded Iran, in a bid to undermineSeptember In the death.to putsecretly it whoSadr, deatharrestingand Sayyid Muhammad Baqiral- by punishable Al-Dawa in membership making against the Shiite seminaries in Najaf and elsewhere, now reached their culmination. The regime moved ricshad suffered at the hands of the Iraqi regime banon. The long years of repression the Shiite cle The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ ------neededtranslatedtobe interpretedand Le fora side of a linguistic and cultural divide. Its message Lebanese Shiites, but it had occurred on the other emissaries.Thetriumph ofthe revolution moved a flawless Arabic, were music to the ears of Iran’s Many longed for a voice to lift them out ofLebanon asthe little morerubble than a broken abstraction. they had grown to maturity in a civil war,They and were knew potentially receptive to the ideas.message, ofemporiumLebanon’s in wordsfor of mers the newly literate and educated classes—avid consu vorshanded out by Iran’s representatives. Not so posters of Khomeini, or swayed by the material fa and slums might be won by the symbolism of mutebanese Shiite audience. The despised of the villages appearedgreaterwithfrequency after 1980,and yearsof publication, but his sermons and articles gured only occasionally in the journal in its firstwhich twofirst appeared in 1978. Fadlallah’s name fi intellectualjournal, an ofblication audienceputhroughwider far a reachedit But room in the quarter of Al-Ghubayri, in the Dahiya. readingweeklyandhallownlecture its series in began by organizing conferences, seminars, and a giesamongShiite university students. UnionThe 1970s to counter the temptations of secular ideolo was created with the support of clerics in the early Lubnanilil-talaba al-Muslimin). Lebanese Union of Muslim Students Fadlallahreached outtothem partly through the tuted an untapped resource for the cause of Islam. dents in the city’s several universities, who consti particularwaya Shiitehadstuwithfashion. He each new wave of millenarian fad and ideological young, refining his message of Islam to respond to over a decade he had worked with the disillusionedperfectly.problemFor Fadlallahtheunderstood in the style and content of a message. demanded a particularly Lebanese sophistication finesse sway needed educatedto the young, who resolveit. Nor could they employ Arabic with the notfathom the depths of their dilemma, let alone revolutionary ideals. But emissaries from afar could and reconcile the claims of Shiite identity with their This organization 14/12/2010 00:04 (al-Ittihad al- Al-Muntalaq, Page 15 ------Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback party.Farbetter, Fadlallah thepreachargued, to since many Shiites would not or could not join thera newShiite organization would split the Shiite camp, were affiliated with Amal, and the creation of ano togetherin a disciplined framework. Most Shiites distinct organization to bring these disparate souls day when he privately opposed Iran’s creation of a Fadlallah lost an important battle very early in the volunteered their services as militiamen for Iran. Lebanese Shiite clerics, and zealous strongmen who He had to share it with Iran’s men on the Fadlallah’sscene, other franchise, however, was never exclusive. the revolution. kindoffranchisehima forinvoking thenameof securityto airline travel. And above all, it offered him an array of important services, from personal supported institutions under his control and offered Iran’sagents.claimwasthe Butmisleading. Iran byrallied clerics the amongdependenceunique financial in ofdegree a resources,assuringhim world, including Iran.” Fadlallah did have his own or semi-financial relationship with any state in the agency in the world to prove that I have a oft-repeatedfinancial challenge he defied “any intelligence owehisdaily bread to Iranian bursars, andinan vided him with material support. Fadlallah did not and unencumbered use of their symbols and pro in Lebanon; the emissaries allowed Fadlallah free gness to work to awaken the latent potential broughtofwith him his own Islamfollowing and a willin between Fadlallah and Iran’s emissaries. The cleric Mutual need lay at the foundation of this partnership revolutionary juggernaut. to harness Fadlallah’s talent of persuasion to their value of educated cadres, grew ever more anxious Beirut. Iran’s emissaries, who well understood the AmericanUniversitytheof atAssembly Hall the of secular education, including the inner sanctum, also began to speak on campus, in the very citadelsmosques. But as Fadlallah became better known, he students who frequented libraries rather more than Muntalaq finally as the lead pieces in nearly every issue. The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East proved important to Fadlallah in reaching http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ Al- - - - - comparable result.” parties in the Islamic world have never achieved a party,revolution.theIslamicmanyamade “The adherence.” Furthermore, in Iran, the masses, not are rejected. This contradicts the nature of religious are then acknowledged, and those who do not, who those who meet the conditions of membership, distinguishwhobetweenparty the thatrequiresThis adhere to its teachings, and live fully as members. fully selects the people who are devoted to its idea, opento all, whereas movementa ofpartya care call of Islam. Islam, he proclaimed, open“is thefollowingthrough a mass movementa toappealing partyto seize power—a select “party ofGod”—or choiceclandestinebetweenpositingbuildingaa dlallah raised his objection as a matter of principle, withincreatecompetingthana organization. Fa cause of Islam in an attempt to transform Amal from nique for advancing the revolution or acquiringrevolution or advancingthe for nique necessary that party organization be the only tech But he did so with a sense of resignation: “It is not closest followers to join the newly createdown reluctantlyhisparty,Hizbullah.permittingseparate a finally acquiesced in the fateful decision to establish derstood the determination of Iran’s emissaries and ground marked off by Sayyid Musa. Fadlallah un the in rooted firmly remainedmovement the of Amal. They could break off branches,over hold firm but a gainingthe ofdespaired trunk had Syria But by this time, Iran’s diplomats in Lebanon and 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 16 - - - - Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback which eventually accorded him a regular interview reported at length in Hizbullah’s weekly newspaper,wereremarks HisHizbullah. of groundmeeting Fadlallah made it, his mosque had become the great connection to Hizbullah: Fadlallahnis. repeatedlythusformal deniedany the long-standing divide between Shiites and Sun both sides of the incipient fissure and even across non, he sought to build a personal constituency on lah’s creation would fragment the Shiites of Leba the bounds of Hizbullah. Anticipating that Hizbul Yet Fadlallah preferred to remain formally outside impose. menand women to a belief which no party could summonedwhoothers, of that and role own his Fadlallah thus insisted that the new party respect the community level, in mosques and public fora.” and neglect general action for promoting Islam at the traditional way of presenting Islam as religion rolea toplay, provided diditnotseek “to abolish in the Eastern and Western worlds.” Hizbullah had in the successful experiences of many of the states no one can deny the value of the party in method this for regard, bringing one onlyabout it progressive within hold change. not doesBut life forpower, It was a typically evasive statement. By the time typicallyevasivethestatement. Bya was It The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East “ is then linked to every incident. try to nail it on a specific person, whose name political figure speaking out for Hizbullah,prominentnospokesman, they no scene, the on influence. So, when they cannot see anybody of Hizbullah? Obviously, he is the one who has might have confidence in me. Who is the leader Hizbullah live with us in the mosque and they many of those who are considered to be part of theydecided to settle on me. It could be that Islamicfield, the activewasin I that served figure to pin this label on, and when they ob that when they could not find any prominent leader of any organization or party. It seems the not am I untrue.and baseless is bullah “ Theclaimthat theleaderamI ofHiz http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ - - - - - their separate ways, Fadlallah stating one thing andin agreement. But when they disagreed, they went tions and statements when they found themselves ted,of course, and carefully coordinated their ac that length. Fadlallah and Iran’s emissaries consul Hizbullah, then Hizbullah’s patrons would double Fadlallah preferred to remain at arm’s length from exclude him from the movement’s inner councils. If ries felt free to withhold information from him and be narrowly identified with Hizbullah, Iran’s emissa sition was not a bluff. Since Fadlallah did not voice wish their to aspirations. But the denial of formal po their gaze upon a single visible leader who would hailed him as “the Sayyid,” for they too sought in everyto issue. Thefix movement’s followers already identified in Lebanon and abroad as mentor of Hiz Yet it was inevitable that Fadlallah would become was simply known as “the Sayyid.” could do him considerable harm. In Hizbullah he nition, since no definition did him justice, and most ever-cautious Fadlallah preferred to elude all defi would not promise to omit the ubiquitous tag. The interviewan leadingtoa newsagency because it gnationof spiritual guide. Fadlallah once refused titleleader,theof evenbutlessdecisivethe desi only not denyFadlallah toled distance formal a even if he is a communist.” This desire to maintain and whoever is correct, I appreciate his correctness errs,criticizeI hiserror evenoneofours,ishe if unarmed group that operates in the arena. Whoever notresponsible for thebehavior ofany armed or was not all dissimulation when he declared: “I am andbear responsibility for operative decisions. It hispowers ofsuggestion, yetallow others totake safest course was to stand slightly aside—to use all force, he might have to bear the consequences. The he were ever linked to actual decisions to employ of resorting to force in desperate circumstances. If just as well, for he had already argued the necessitydecision making in Hizbullah. For Fadlallah, this certainwasintimacya ofcostprocessthethe with of Fadlallah thus preserved his independence, but at Hizbullah often doing quite another. 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 17 ------Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback appearedaspeace broker andeased both thePa then fixed their gaze upon the United States, which betrayed that hope, but many of Lebanon’s Shiites tedsouth.Israel’s conductLebanonin ultimately libera a securitytoand restorepeace anditself, to hope that Israel would save Lebanon in spite of nians fell upon deaf ears. Indeed, most Shiites dared Fadlallah’smessage ofsolidarity withthePalesti the summer of 1982 to finish off the PLO. Israel took to the roads and the skies of Lebanonand in Beirut. And Shiites remained bystanders when the Palestine Liberation Organization in the south grownsointense that Amal took uparms against ment against Palestinian hegemony in the south had months prior to the Israeli invasion, Shiite resent lence between Israelis and Palestinians. During the nowrefused the bill for the spiraling cycle of vio had lost their claim to Shiite sympathy; the Shiites the Palestinians. The Palestinians by their arrogance Shiites gave up even the pretence of solidarity withcleric to the Palestinian cause, at a time when His manyposition had drawn him closer than any Shiite his most trying moments since the siege of Nabaa. the Dahiya and West Beirut, Fadlallah experienced Israeli forces rolled through the south and then intoby the “holocaust” of the Israeli invasion in 1982.The As “earthquake” of Iran’s revolution was followed embracing, they began a dizzying ascent to success. mutual dependence; as the man and the movement Hizbullah.ofPartnershipthose evolved hadinto thatfortuneshis fate andwereinseparable from complexitytheand role,hisfactofremainedthe Despiteirregularthe boundaries influence hisof jurist, strategist, tactician, spokesman, and mediator. Iran’s emissaries and Hizbullah’s clerics as adviser, their own predicament. And at times he did serve first interpretto Fadlallah movementlookto did despised and aggrieved who filled the ranks of the and he also had admirers beyond Hizbullah. Yet theTrue, he did not serve as mentor to all in Hizbullahbullah. And this was not so inaccurate as to be a libel. The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ Out of Obscurity - - - - - munity,Fadlallah remainedwaitedsilent.Hefor While hopes ran feverishly high in the Shiite com sentry just outside the Dahiya. the solution of Lebanon’s strife. Their troops stood ready to commit their moral and material force to Beirut. The United States and France now seemed ofLiberation lestineoutOrganizationIsrael and Hizbullah, took the initiative against the “American March 1983, Islamic Jihad, the clandestine arm of Israelisecurity, moreShiites turnedagainst Init. behindportclaimsChristiantheof privilege and came a party to Lebanon’s feud, throwing its sup it was not long in coming. As the United States be disillusionment to seep under the new order—and their trust in America. “the mad Israeli shelling,” the people of Beirut placedreached hadsinisterits culmination. Battered by of complete control over the region.” Now the plan the arena, to secure political gains for the purpose called for,” in an attempt to “create new realitiesto extendin its invasion “beyond what the Israeli Lebanonplan from Israel; rather, it had prompted Israel rican presence. The United States had not “saved” to explain the “secret of secrets” behind the Ame Only a few blocks from the Marines, Fadlallah began American role for what it was. Americans. Now the time had come to expose the the U.S. Embassy in West Beirut, killing seventeen medcredit forimmensean explosion thatgutted Marine patrol. In April 1983, the same group clai occupation army,” with a grenade attack against a “ a psychological situation favorable to its poli which worked to multiply the panting, toAmerica, afterpanting thecreate began Soforces. a bit, then assuring the withdrawal of foreign Palestinians, then bringing around the Israelis food or water, then guaranteeing the exit of the diator,workingsupply securetoorfuela of me a ofrole the uptake tobegan then rica people of water, food, and medications. thedeprived Ame had whichsiege, the in pause “ hy atd fe ay leito or alleviation any after panted They 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 18 ------Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback or if demands for vengeance overrode considera gained sufficient credence in Washington andaccusation Paris,the mattered. hardly If it attacks. But tablishing Fadlallah’s direct involvement in the two and no irrefutable evidence ever came to light es- The accusation could not be proved or disproved, Fadlallah achieved worldwide notoriety overnight. the in appearedeffect this martyrs”theoneve oftheir operation. storyA to “self- two the blessed Fadlallahhad that mation inforthe out Phalangistputparty the ofservice life. For within days of the attacks, the intelligence dual—aquest that irrevocably altered Fadlallah’s Americanand French quest for a culpable indivi the mass destruction initially provoked a feverish the Dahiya was far more than they could bear. But United States and France that the cost of patrolling hundred lives, and would eventually persuade the self-sacrifice. The two bombings claimed over three their enemies in two combined acts of sacrifice and foreigntheforces, blasting apartthemselves and explosive-ladenbarrackstrucksintothehousing ber 1983. In both instances, nameless youths drove and French paratroopers on one morning in Octo ring operations” directed against American Marines It was that spirit which inspired the two “self-marty sacrifice—and the spirit of martyrdom.” powereffort,thefromofwithinbypatience and no alternative to a bitter and difficult jihad, borne articlepublished middlethein1983.of “There is an inannounced surprises,”he holdsfuture the others were opening to his truth. “We believe that the essential unity of imperialism. Now the eyes of Americanitsaftermath confirmed concept his of invasion Israeli and Fadlallah, the For ends. fish Israel’s existence and used Israel to pursue its sel meant servility to that very power which guaranteed All illusion, said Fadlallah. Submission to America The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East beautiful white stallion at the break of dawn. them with a magical solution, delivered by a to America” for protecting them and providing cies. . . . The people began to recite “Praise be http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ WashingtonPost and ------he soon learned otherwise: “I told the reporter from hoped the newspaper would retract the story, but internationalcounterthewith Perhapspress.he journalistthefrom A meeting was arranged between Fadlallah and a language other than Arabic. spokenoword theeasy,master of thebe for not sing responsibility for the attacks. The task would doubt in the minds of foreigners charged with asses- begancampaigna to sow the seeds of reasonable his very life depended upon them. And so Fadlallah mastery of words and his aura of credibility. Now man. In the past, his influence had rested upon his tions of evidence, Fadlallah would become a hunted his audience that he had warnedyoungaudiencemenhadthe his hethat first Friday sermon after the attacks, Fadlallah told hisreading ofIslamic law. From hispulpit, hisin suicidalto tacticspoliticalin action,” based upon nounced that he had “reservations about resorting cal improbability, but a moral one as well. He an faithful?”involvementHis logistionlyawas not blessesPopethethe blessedlike themand it, for operation, met the persons that prepared themselves haveMarinesbarracks,visitedtheplannedtheI red it with further denials. “In my situation, could Once this seed of doubt was sown, Fadlallah nurtu or the resources to handle such an operation alone.” ting whether Fadlallah or his followers had “the unnamedskill diplomatic sources were quoted as doub resources to counter the charges” against him, and “ambitious but obscure holy man” possessed “scant a “shabby seventh-floor walkup in the slums.” The interviewer found him living in a “dank tenement,” were enhanced by their surroundings. His American apartment on the morning of the attack. The denials methodtheinofsuicide bombings; washehis in mystifiedtobe charges;the by believenot did he their own weight. And he made them: he professed langists.’” Fadlallah’s denials would have to carry sources that published the accusations were the Pha informationcredibility,thethat said because we you.’ He answered: We maintained our journalistic the WashingtonPost: WashingtonPost, Perhaps I’ll file suit againstPerhapssuit file I’ll 14/12/2010 00:04 his first en first his Page 19 ------Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback Islamic law. Such acts could be validated only of ifunholy violence,they well beyond the perimeters of suicide and sacrifice, and both belonged to the realm that they perished with the enemy hinted deeply atintruders, posed the only moral dilemma. The fact thedeaths ofthebombers, not the deaths of The still some other groups.” to others, or conditionally accepted or rejected by controversial—“acceptable to some, unacceptable a legitimate act of resistance, even if the method gion.” was The driving out of foreign forces represented a strategic base for U.S. political influence in thefaçade re hiding the intention to convert Lebanon into plan of introducing foreign forces “was a deceptive applauded. The justification was simple. The whole but he also proclaimed that the deeds deserved to that be he did not play any personal role in thepowerful. repeatedlyHe attacks;proclaimed totheworld fearsomethe blowspowerlessdealt theby tothe the tremendous popular gratification derived from between himself and the attacks, he distancealso a put tounderstood needunderstood the he as Just proceeded to sanction the bombings after the fact. Fadlallahforstill,artful more was dodge Yet the Damascus, and ultimately Tehran. for the masterminds of the disaster—to the Bekaa, and French, who increasingly looked beyond Beirut throwing off the worst suspicions of theFadlallahorder, in succeededshortAmericans In Beirut. of University of Beirut, and the American University LebaneseUniversity,thestudentsfrom Arab the paid him a visit. So, too, did a delegation of Muslimconnection with the attacks. A group of engineers home to denounce the very mention of his name behalf.Delegationshisforwardin hisflocked on to sess them as well.” Respectable friends also stepped you have no monopoly on such means; others pos- with these explosions and assassinations, because against political assassination, and we do not agree sistancetoimperialism, insistedbut that“weare end this way.” He urged economic and cultural re believe that our war against America or Francenot do situation,”will“we“exploding againstfor the The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ - - outside the conventions created by the powerful: war successfully, necessity demanded that they act Muslims had no conventional means to wage their procedures of war, and the other does not.” Sincedeath; the except that one fits in with the conventional the end he will be killed. The two situations lead to from that of a soldier who fights and knows that in be part of a jihad. Such an undertaking differs fightlittle by conventional means, then his sacrifice can litical impact on an enemy whom it is impossible If to the aim of such a “self-martyr” was “to jihad.have And a here,po too, Fadlallah provided justification. were admitted by learned opinion as sacred acts of to specific acts or techniques of violence. The wallin Lebanon of would directly link clerics like himself prestige. Acts committed on the basis of fatwas considerationsgiven of personal immunity and personal Fadlallah’s judgement was molded by the conflicting based on Islamic law—sanctioning the acts? Here fatwa—anFadlallahopinionaissue didwhy not martyrdom” was justified from a legal point of view,Yet the artful evasion went still further. For if “self- self.” dying with a gun in your hand or exploding your gun in your hand. There is no difference between yourself into a living bomb like you struggle with Muslimsa believe that you struggle by transforming distancefrom the attacks—but affirmed that “the selfup”—he never neglected toestablish hisown Fadlallah denied he had told anyone to “blow your “ domineering powers. imperialistworld’sand thewarfareagainst terrorism.We view this as religiously lawful tional means to confront aggressor powers as of the world do with primitive and unconven oppressedwhatregardMuslimsnot do and aggressorthese fight methodto nations,nal the right of nations to use every unconventio special means of their own. . . . [We] recognizeEuropeand have. Theymustthus fight with technology and destructive weapons America “ The oppressed nations do not have the 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 20 - - - - - Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback may have taken the decision, it was Fadlallah who somecalled suicide operations.” While Khomeini example,intheself-martydom operations, which horizonsthearoundexpandyou—as,all andfor so you can call upon all those things buried within,reality deliveredrequiresshock,a violence,with you have to take risks,” he said years later, “when “Sometimesyoumay find some situations where plied that he had the authority to do so if authorized“self-martyrdom,”he wished.consistentlyhe im And while Fadlallah consistently denied that he had dom,” but only from the unsuitability of candidates. rule did not arise from a repudiation of “self-martyrfavor of me.” This implied that Fadlallah’s refusal me toto reverse my decision, as if they were asking a cause they do not meet all the conditions, they beg which they cannot escape death. When I refuse be authorizing them to launch military operations in and women, who have asked me to provide fatwas circumstances. “I have received young persons, reservationsall menhisto appliedthat mean not did it known that while he had not issued a fatwa, this not have sufficient authority to write one. He “self-martyrdom,”made admissionanas or that didhe his fatwa to be interpreted as a legal repudiationNevertheless, of Fadlallah did not wish the absence of the necessary fatwa—from the safe distance of Iran. to Hizbullah’s clerics, Khomeini himself had issued plicit ruling would have been redundant. According made his position dangerously clear. Anyway, an thoseex points in a systematic way, which would points.”fatwaA have wouldhave forced tohimweigh of this action, I believe that there are many fatwas.negative Despite the positive points which come out ofthose who stood against all this commotion for prudence by principle. “On the contrary, I am one operations and up to now,” he declared, justifying notissued any fatwa since the beginning of these havesayIthat canruling.legal “I abombings in refrained from formalizing his endorsement of the then others can assassinate you.” And so Fadlallah is a two-edged sword: If you can assassinate others, to vengeful reprisal. As he well knew, “assassination plausible deniability would collapse, opening them The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ - - - - touched down within view, to survey the hadscenes Mitterrand �François presidentof French and helicopters of American vice-president George Bush drawn the attention of the world to the Dahiya.collapse The of the American and French barracks had obscurityknownhadheprior toattacks.the The intentionhadno ofsinking backinto therelative All became entangled in his words. Fadlallah now enemiesand stardust inthe eyes of his admirers. formed brilliantly, scattering dust in the eyes ofintellectual anto histightrope Yetact. Fadlallah per withholding formal while religious valid religiouslyvalidation as amounted attacks the Justifying in a subtle claim to comparable authority. wound up taking the risk, and he found his reward accessibility, so unlike the remoteness of Iran’s re easy largelyHisFadlallah’swasdoing. Thisown heard or read his words. in Lebanon who had not seen his photograph and mediastar. Soontherewould hardly persona be non for his swift emergence as a political forceprepared Leba hadFadlallah’stoil andofyears long innothing pretended.LebaneseenemiesButhis withhisphotograph. wasHe never obscureas as occasionally in the influential daily Fadlallah’sappearedsermons of gist the forfar, look to hadhave not would It him.” tographsof pho newspapersfor local oflibraries searching security knew so little about him that “it has been with the bombings, reports claimed that Lebanese world.When Fadlallah was named inconnection the andShiitecommunityitself tothe despairof cast for the role of oracle, interpreting the angerstarted and talking, he never stopped. He washe onceeager; perfectlybut ready only Fadlallahnot was vided he was prepared to talk. could claim his place in the theatre of Beirut, pro thoughts on terrorism and imperialism. Fadlallah hisunderstanding ofLebanon’s predicament, his were interested in hearing about his vision of Islam,had known little or nothing of Fadlallah suddenly disaster. An opportunity presented itself. People who 14/12/2010 00:04 Al-Nahar, along Page 21 - - - - - Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback characteristic exchange: spoke in Delphic telegraphy, demonstrated in this of the most persistent journalists. At other times hethe simplest question, wearing down the resistance vered long and winding monologues in response to two methods of evasion. When it suited him, he drivedeli journalists to distraction. Fadlallah perfected purpose. Often it did not, and his elusiveness could But Fadlallah was lucid only when lucidity served onlyinLebanona butinthe region andthe world. play, not at forces the estimate of keen a flected intricate and brilliant pieces of analysis, which re tantive, and detailed expositions.” Often they were His interviews once were described as “lucid, subs- lest he be misquoted. Fadlallah would speak—always to a tape recorder, ver far away. Then, from deep within his armchair,Bodyguards armed with machine pistols were ne Khomeini,of whobrooded overproceedings.the side table or the wall there reposed a large portraitappropriately Persian rug provided the decor. On a in a sparsely furnished sitting room, lit by neon. providedAn by the house. Fadlallah received his guests scarf,chadorusuallywerefullarequired donto beserved tea. Here, women who did not come in and kept waiting in an anteroom, where they wouldsee him. Arriving interviewers might be searched up a front office, which scrutinized all requests to tablishedan aura of dignity and authority. He set encounters, Fadlallah instituted routines which es- nalistsdoor.histo To enhanceeffect thetheseof strongmen,andsteadyjour broughtstreamofa ticent emissaries and Hizbullah’s suspicious clerics The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East “ “ “ is becoming gray. toward the United States? Lebanoninlahcould eventually friendlybe “ “ “ Interviewer: Fadlallah: Interviewer: http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ My belief is that the situation Do you believe the Hizbul But are you optimistic? - - - - - noneof them at the same time,” hereplied. “This Islamicstudent movement. “Iamallof these and washe“spiritualthe guide”Hizbullahof theand the same time. A journalist once asked him whether ted him to appear to know everything and nothing Fadlallah’sat public performances, and which permit sense within the self-imposed rules that governed been pulled through the looking glass, made perfect Such exchanges, which seemed as though they had and claiming the resistance for Islam. agreement, encouraging the struggle against Israel toward blocking the implementation of a security violentresistance.toFadlallah efforts histurned the south resorted first to civil disobedience and occupationthen loomed larger, the Shiite inhabitants of drawal. As the prospect of indefinite and onerous government of Lebanon, in return for further with stillformalsoughtasecurity agreement withthe IsraelBeirut, left hadforces its Whilesouth. the IsraeliShiiteoccupationresistancegingthetoof hedevoted the better part of his time to encoura AlthoughFadlallah parleyed withjournalists,the could not be led by the tongue. parted with a journalistic scoop on tape. Fadlallah for more than one truth, and no interviewer ever roomampleleft lines betweenthespace the But truth.” the find to lines thebetween read to has to accuse of something. With Master Fadlallah one wants to say, and points indirectly to those and he frankly,”wants wrote another, “he alludes to whattable he enigma.” “Although he does not speak openly above the fray, yet no detail escapes him . wrote. .one . journalist.a veri“Imperturbable, he would be astonishing man knows how to cultivate his myth,” “ “ “ do not see clearly. mistic signs in reality. “ “ “ Fadlallah: Interviewer: Fadlallah: Resistance Leader When the issue isgray, you I am realistic. I look for opti What does that mean? 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 22 - - - - - Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback impossible, since “peace for Israel represents only a agreement could prevent it. Peace with Israel was dispossessedexpandinganby Israel, thatandno be tolineargument Shiitesin nextwere thethat his to returned Fadlallah vindication, Claiming leave.toplans clear no hadIsrael occupied,and that Israel coveted the south. But now the south beforewas Israel’s systematic incursions into Jubayllectures,BintLebanon, his inargued, had he when herently expansionist. Few had believed Fadlallah submittedhe secondcharge,a thatIsraelwas in wouldrestorethatmenttranquilitysouth, theto Palestinians—inexchange fornegotiated a settle Israel its original sin—committed, after all, against Israel. And to those in Lebanon prepared to forgiveTheft of the land constituted the first count against or fifth-class citizens in comparison to the Jews.” Palestinians who remained in Palestine as “fourth- part of the majority group and Israel treated those whites of South Africa, had driven out the greater in Palestine was worse, since the Israelis, unlike tothe dominate the majority by force. But the situationIn Palestine, as in South Africa, a minority had as come we cannot deem alcohol or adultery to be legal.”cannot for a moment recognize Israel’s legality, just Muslims, if we wish to be in keeping with our leavefaith, Palestine, which was usurped by them.” “Wesuddenly as become Muslims, we would ask them to could not do so, and indeed, “even if the Jewsrael.The United Nations shouldcould not doso; the PLO people.” No process could confer legitimacy on Is- worldlivePalestinetoanotherinruinsof the on meration of people who came from all parts of the as a legal presence, considering that it is a conglo any other state in the region. We cannot see Israel a state with the right to security and peace just likewas sacred to Islam. Israel could not be viewed “as dispossessed were Muslims, and the usurped land upon dispossession and usurpation; moreover, the timacy from the point of view of Islam. Israel therested point of Israel’s absolute and unalterable illegi Islamic principle. Time and again, he drove home with Israel drew partly upon his understanding of Fadlallah’s stand against any negotiated agreement The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ - - - - “We find that the struggle against the Jewish state, complete subordination and eradication of Islam. would then proceed to their ultimate objective: the Israel’sFromexpandedterritorial Jews thebase, spreading their economic and cultural domination.” the world to this region, to make it the nucleus for very purpose of Israel was to bring “all the Jews in Islamic culture or what some call Arab culture.” The wants to establish Jewish culture at the expense of a state at the expense of a people. It is tinians;a groupit waswhich “not merely a group that established that Israel did not simply seek to displace the EuphratesPales - to the Nile.” Muslims had to understand stage” in pursuit of its “ambitions to extend fromtransitional the stage preparatory to jumping to another Although the United States had greater interestsgreater had States United the Although rican peace, he is threatened with an Israeli war.” gest war, so that if anyone rebels against the Ame . . America suggests peace and leaves Israel to sug diplomatically and tells Israel to move militarily. . Fadlallah, functioned in this manner: “America acts UnitedtheStates.” relationship,The accordingto interestseconomicstrategic,of political,andthe into a U.S.-Israeli zone of influence, as required by States was “aimed at turning the entire United theregion and Israel“connection”betweenhere The rael’s role in the service of American imperialism. Thethird count in Fadlallah’s indictment cited Is - order to continue its further expansion. infuture,” the inproblem revivingthisfor tions security arrangement, Israel would “find justifica ment over the south. Regardless of the terms of believeany that Israel would be satisfied with an agree and consumption.” In this light, only the naïve couldproductioneconomic potentialresources,inand Islam’scontrol to effort aneconomically, andin place;oneIslam’sblockmovementthan more at topressures bringingPalestine;politically, byof tion of Jerusalem; geographically, on the question positions of actual power—spiritually, on the ques- Jewishmovement working to deprive Islam ofits conspiracy against Islam.” There existed a “world of the old struggle of the Muslims against the Jews’ in which the Muslims are engaged, is a continuation 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 23 - - - - Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback and bring about a withdrawal.Fadlallaha answeabout bring and and get the United States to somehow satisfy Israel ter to speak the language of diplomacy with Israel, resist would be akin to “stoning a mountain.” Bet Arab armies, both collectively and individually. To point in resisting Israel, which had defeated so manyscale? Fadlallah heard people say that there was or no artillery, do about a conspiracy on so massive a weapons,nuclearjets, possessedno Shiites, who as illegitimate.” But what could Lebanon’s presencepatheticIsraeli whole theconsider rather must the question as merely incursions on the South, but ourselvesinto a society of war. We must not view solution was to “confront the problem by converting rael over the south was worse than useless. The In only this panoramic perspective, negotiation with Is- to leave. United States, Iraq, Yemen, wherever—would have hadcomefrom elsewhere—the Soviet Union, the indigenous to Palestine could remain, but those who eventualdismantlement of Israel, Jews who were Islamic symbol for all of Palestine.” Following the rating Jerusalem represents, since Jerusalem is the the map completely. This is what the slogan ofIslamic libe worlds. It must, therefore, be removed from whichrepresentsgreat dangerandArabathe to Palestine is illegal and that it is an imperialist base jihad,which “insists that the presence of Israel in Fadlallah offered only one answer: the strategy of oppress the region as a whole. anddominate imperialism,to ofinterests the in Israellongasexisted,As would itcontinue toact certainly not inclined to exert pressure on Israel.” king in complete harmony, and the United States existenceis and security. The two countries are wor is ready to fight the whole world to defend Israel’s a mere extension of the former. The United States betweentheUnited States andIsrael; thelatter is differenceno is States.believeUnitedthere“We wedgetheycoulddrivebetweena the Israeland believeto Arabs forfantasy a was it Thus oil. to served to keep it in line, assuring America’s access in the Arab world, that world was unstable. Israel The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ - - - - red by claiming to haveuncoveredclaimingtoIsrael’sbyweak red sermonsrecordedaudiotape theby vendors. But pulpitin the Imam al-Rida Mosque in Bi’r al-Abd, Fridays were reserved for preaching from his own round of speaking throughout the Shiite community. This was the message Fadlallah carried in an endless banish their fear. weaponsstrategicor parity. Theyneededonlyto Lebanon’sout,sophisticatedneedShiites notdid Israel force inflict. To primitivecouldresistance could be undermined by Israeli casualties that even American-assigned role. Israel’s resolve in Lebanon sacrifices demanded by its own ambitions and its point. Israel was unprepared spiritually to make the rica’s behind-the-scene role. Despite the occasion, agreement with Israel, but dwells at length on Ame no rally. Fadlallah again speaks against a security rarilyadorn the walls for the occasion, but this is front row. A few photographs of Khomeini tempo the fill whoclerics the behindseated studentsis intentofaudience An Beirut.Universityof Arab well-lit university lecture hall on a the issetting campusThe south. the ofin campprison theAnsar the in Israel by helddetainees four of death the for Prisoners of Ansar. The occasion is a year since lectureattheinvitation oftheIslamic Committee dayslater,few Fadlallah A evening addressesan that might be construed as recognition of Israel. of clerics; he speaks last, condemning any measure tering and leaving. Fadlallah is seated with a thegroup portal of the mosque, to be trampled by resolve.those en A banner with the Star of David demonstratetoandeagerangeris and itsyoung is spread on a security agreement with Israel. The Shiite crowd his own mosque to protest Lebanon’s negotiation of As the week begins, Fadlallah presides over a rally in his campaign: ofheight theNovember daysatin1984,ten ring Consider the range of audiences he addressed du the open air through microphones and bullhorns. in lecterns,and andpulpits mosqueday, from a during the week Fadlallah often spoke several times 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 24 - - - - Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback the practice and join the Islamic Resistance: 1985, he called upon self-flagellants to desist from of resistance to Israel. On the occasion of Ashura to in harness this spirit of self-immolation to the longestcause tradition in Lebanon. Fadlallah now sought Nabatiyya in the south, where the practice had the hospital,especiallyinin themlanded Ashura on self-flagellationritual for zeal whose some were tionsinreleasing the pent-up ritual fervor. There commemoratheseKarbala,outstrippedofat all of mourning for the martyrdom of the Imam Husayn ded by the Shiite religious calendar. Ashura, the tion.day But he did not neglect the opportunities provi were contrived for the purposes of mass mobiliza Fadlallahwhichoccasionsspokeon the of Many rise up against the occupation of the land. pittedthatisagainst urgesIslam, heandthemto front-lineaudience he emphasizes that it is Israel university.employedthejust athas hethis With withthe discourse on American imperialism that time for theory, and Fadlallah does not distract in theman Israeli raid. The Islamic Resistance has little der of the Islamic Resistance, who later will be battle.killed Among the speakers is a renowned comman posters,photographskilledinand youngmen of in flak jackets. The walls are plastered with banners,white headdresses, and bearded young militiamen In the circle are turbaned clerics, rural notables in Fadlallah are seated in an intimate circle on forththe tofloor. operations in the south. The audience and against Israel, and it is from here that the fightersIslamic Resistance, go Hizbullah’s arm in the struggle seminary in Baalbek. The event is organized by the a gathering in the mosque attached to the Islamic But a week later he omits this theme in addressing Israeli affair.” entry into Beirut was “more an American than an mented Lebanon’s civil war, he tells them; Israel’s imperialism. Fadlallah obliges: Henry Kissinger fo relationship of the Israeli occupation to American than with Israel, and want to know about the thestudents preciseare more preoccupied with America The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ - - - - - in that they demonstrated a willingness to sacrifice Resistance who felt that such operations had value, raeli casualties. Still, there were those in the Islamictions became less effective, producing few, if any,forces Is- took prudent countermeasures, such opera ten-to-one ratio could not be guaranteed. As Israeli successes, however, it soon became clear that this ofspateinitial anAfter all.distinction real at no saw distinction fine of artist The them?” killing the field to kill ten and knowing you will die after between setting out for battle knowing you will die in the south against Israel. “What is the difference States and France in Beirut, were being employed havingsuccessfullyusedbeen againstUnitedthe sanctioned the tactics of “self-martyrdom,” which, readingtionsIslamichisforoflaw. therefore He implica had these whenever ResistanceIslamic to fashion the strategies and even the tactics of the Fadlallah not only called for struggle, but also sought gious observance made it advantageous to do so. invokedwhichhe whenever calendarthereliof tery of the peculiarly Shiite symbols of martyrdom, rhetoric of resistance, but possessed a complete mas- Fadlallah not only knew how to speak the modern “ killing ten[of the enemy], andsetting outto fering of Husayn and Zaynab. Those who suffer Bint Jubayl, they are the ones who feel the al-Khiyam,suf arrested by Israel in the region of are detained in [the Israeli detention camp in] swords, they are our fighting youth. Those who themselves with flog Nabatiyya.who Those true self-flagellants, not the self-flagellants of believing resisters in the border zone are the heaccepted his own blood and wounds. The his son, and the spiritual joy of Husayn when Husaynlived when heaccepted the blood of kill and be killed, and feel the spiritual joy South.that You can be wounded and inflict wounds, Ashura, in their prison cells. markwho ones theliberates, arethatthese waya inheads beatingscheststheir andon Thensettingtheready: is Karbala the theof “ o o wn t sfe wt Husayn? with suffer to want you Do 14/12/2010 00:04 while Page 25 - - - - Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback by which the weak demoralized the strong: of suicide bombs. Fadlallah described the process through ambushes, roadside bombs, and the threat began to claim success, wearing down Israeli forces to gather recruits. Gradually the Islamic Resistance fight, and inspired them with the words they used touch with the clerics and commanders who constantled in remainedResistance. HetheIslamic the his seemingly and limitless energy did agreat persistencedeal to fire daunting own Fadlallah’s Resistance, but to guide it. Fadlallah’s determination not only to fuel the Islamic whichlargely carriedday,the demonstrated and of the person who carries them out.” It was a view should not be encouraged, if the price is the death casualties (on the enemy) and destroy one building tions anymore, and attacks that only inflict limited the present circumstances do not favor such opera thatin they significantly harmed the Israelis. But “successfulforcesIsraelioperationsagainst past of the “self-martyrs” had passed. Fadlallah deemed late 1985, he did not hesitate to opine that the day believerscannottransgressByGod.”ofrules the the and rules, bygovernedobligations legal but Self-martyringaccidentsfatalnotoperations are will equal or exceed the [loss] of the believer’s believersoul. cannot blow himself up unless the results can convulse the enemy,” Fadlallah declared. “The self-martyring operation is not permitted unless it springof1985, openlyhe expressed doubts. “The military tactic into a sacrificial rite. Already in the stronglytransformationfailingopposedthisa of alterstruggle.thetheyoungofonmen Fadlallah The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East “ tanks and airplanes. It appeared in every place, which the enemy could not confront with its nerves, of war a and force smallemployed becausethe implements were lacking. But it be expressed in the classical means of warfare, could be employed in new ways. It could not power that power, and with suddenlyfilled chargehere, and abullet there. People were explosivean with killed, now wasdefeated “ h Irei oie wo ol nt be not could who solider Israeli The http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ - in part because its consensus ended at the border, toodthat Israel was vulnerable in south Lebanon unders- he south, thecoveted Israelthat argued ofthe Islamic Resistance inthe South. Even ashe selfothersor about themeaning ofthesuccesses UnitedStates.” Yet Fadlallah never deceived him an irresistible power even if it is supported by the sible in the future on the grounds that Israel is not was meant to “make confrontation with Israel pos- The struggle of the Islamic Resistance in Lebanon an infallible moral and political compass. of those in the Islamic Resistance, he had become his sheer ability to conceptualize conflict. For many any precision. Yet no one in Hizbullah could match they preached—that Iran’s revolution had switched createdespair. IranianTheagents believed what might redemption a remote too promising that between Fadlallah and Iran’s emissaries, who feared Just how much more became a point of disagreement The ultimate liberation would take much more time. way of the resistance in South Lebanon.” post-Israeli withdrawal phase, differently from differentlythethink theabout we why is Thatdom. Lebanon would become “mere acts of self-martyr Without such a plan, operations against Israel from broadasa “Arab-Islamic plan for confrontation.” ofanIslamic resistance inPalestine itself, aswell cious Israel had struck root, required the emergence heartland. The liberation of Palestine, where a tena greater; Israel would stiffen over the defense of farits beJerusalem wouldtoborder the fromroad the obstacleson concerned.”The operationis of liberationofSouth Lebanon asfar as themethod rencebetween the liberation of Palestine and the security plan, guarantees. There was thus “a diffe Israelis began to look for a way out—a timetable, a and that from the moment Israel entered Lebanon, to Israel could not be isolated and measured with Fadlallah’s contribution to the growing resistance defeat Israel and all the forces of tyranny. theSouth discovered their power, and could and in more than one way. Thus our people in 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 26 - - - - Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback hopelessly small country had to be reconciledthe on claimswerewhose parties thematter,. Among militarilty,indigenousby forces—was differenta non—free of foreign intruderes but contested, often battleabsolutes.Lebasentedofresta the But againstsouth repre conflictthe Israel,the forin discourse his obstructed clouds No say. to ficult Islam to resolve the country’s deadlock? It was dif by Israel’s retreat, and how precisely did he expect How did Fadlallah envision the Lebanon left behind pay closer attention to his vision of Lebanon itself. entered a stalemate, Fadlallah’s audiences began to resolve.Islamicthestruggleas But against Israel He continue to preach against Israel with an even in1985, establishing securitya zone inthe south. not become discouraged once Israel dug in its heels by the early gains of the Islamic Resistance, he did And because Fadlallah did not become intoxicated they or their children might regain lost Jerusalem. steer them from the worship of false gods, so that Instead he sought to purify the young generation andFadlallah did not expect to enter the promised land. operational sense for the liberation of Jerusalem.” periods of time.” There was now “no strategy in connection,”thisgreatadmitted,ofthink he “we the generations.”“Infuture in “only done be would dream he shared—but the liberation of Jerusalem blic its dream and aspiration of destroying Israel”—a years.” Fadlallah did not wish to “take from theJews pu sought to reach Jerusalem, even if it took the as fifty “just years, fifty necessary.”perhapsifOr ten years,” but might require “one hundred years elimination could not be achieved in “one, two, or years, decades, generations, even centuries. Israel’s tomorrow or the day after.” But usually he sayspoke thatof Israel will cease to exist, this does accommodatednot mean those short of patience: “When we bane of the Arabs. At times, Fadlallah’s ambiguity viewing hopes of quick persistence, victory encouraging as withthe perennial concerned the more Muslim history to fast-forward—but Fadlallah was The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East Balm of Lebanon http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ - - - - e we pesd o xli hw sa would Islam how explain to pressed when Yet harmony, regardless of their religious affiliation. Lebaneseliveincould frameworkallwhich in a legalorder. Islam, declared Fadlallah, constituted tion of a comprehensive Islamic political, social, and commodated with equity through the implementa different religious groups. But they could all be theseac ofclaims reconcilethe ever formulacould ting confessional system nor any other confessional Itwas obvious, hedeclared, that neither theexis - brought his talent for advocacy brilliantly into play.addressingIn questionthe Lebanon,of Fadlallah Greek Orthodox Christians, Armenians, and Druzes. Shiite Muslims, Sunni Muslims, Maronite Christians, the illusion that parts of Lebanon had been incor possibilities.” Iran’s emissaries had sought to create state irrelevant from the point of view of objective the Muslims now live . . . have made theFadlallah’s single worldview, “modern developments with which thatsuch politya might ever emerge was slim; in sorption into a great Islamic polity. The likelihood and beyond its frontiers, stood in the path of itsimminent. ab Too many obstacles, within the country But Fadlallah did not believe Lebanon’s demise was Lebanon’s disappearance into a “great Islamic state.” lysisadopted byIran’s emissaries, whopromised destined to disappear. This was certainly the ana foisted on the Muslims from the outside; both were differ significantly from Israel as an idea. Both wereregion.” In this respect, Lebanon as an idea did notto survive; neither will many other entities inthe Lebanonregionchanges,unlikelytheisonly not disappearance:non’spolitical thesituation“If in LebaultimatepromiseoftheFadlallah out held external political interests, need not be preserved. Thus Lebanon, an entity that existed only to satisfydominatesurroundingtothenue world.Muslim create a bastion from which the West could conti great powers. . . . as the result of “bya tailored arbitrarilypolitical were deal” borders Lebanon’s to Fadlallahbelieved itself. Lebanon ofdissolution he seemed to predicate Islamic redemption on the achieve this, Fadlallah let ambiguity reign. At times, 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 27 ------Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback unitycould only be achieved by alleviating Sunni could never win a majority if the Muslims split, hadand no legitimacy. But the idea of an Islamic state confessionalequationthe of side Muslim the on communitySunni the of primacy the thatargue Sunnistwo to one. Now assertive Shiites began to for Shiites, although Shiites had come to outnumber ment were reserved for Sunnis and only nineteen longer justify. For example, twenty seats in no parliacouldnumbers their that state the of share a guaranteedSunnis alsoconfessionalsystem The warehouses in the Dahiya were owned by Sunnis. themselves: most of the prospering industries and education, and the professions. Shiites could see this ding Sunni Arab world and the West, in commerce, profited from their mediation between the surroun awaytheirsupremacy overShiites.the They had phic and political tide of Shiism threatened to sweepPalestinian allies in 1982. Now the rising demogra war,plummetedfollowingtheirexpulsion of the which had declined since the outbreak of the civil the existing confessional formula. Their fortunes, Sunnis, there were many with a vested interest in theamong Shiites.Andbetween Sunnisand ded ofLebanon were not of one school but were divi first Theobstacle layfact thatthe Muslimsthe in obstacles that a revolution cannot eliminate.” and, Fadlallah acknowledged, “sometimes there are But such homogeneity did not obtain in Lebanon, regime.” this fight tosolutionwasonly The rule. that had become an obstacle in the way of Islamic only, which accepts the line of Islam, and a regime Iran, there was “a population composed of Muslims primarily from Lebanon’s confessional diversity. In Fadlallahprofoundsawdifferences, whicharose uponthesimilarities between Iran andLebanon, vulnerable transplant. While Iran’s emissaries dwelt soil of Lebanon, and the idea of an Islamic statemediately, was fora confessionalism constituted the hard Yet even this limited goal could not be achieved im the separate implementation of an Islamic state. another. The best that Lebanon might hope for wasporated into Iran, but illusion was one thing, reality The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ - - - - - anxieties. As Fadlallah noted, “the majority of the point of gross exaggeration, where Muslim openly Muslimsofone another.” Ithad now reached the effect on the emotional content of the view held by nism of Islam, he announced, had left “a profound denial that prevented dialogue. The inner sectaria was to admit that the problem existed, to avoid the mistrust between Shiites and Sunnis. The first stepgrowing the dispel to Fadlallahout thereforeset law occur, they are bound to feel insecure.” especiallyinfractionswhenviolationstheand of people,armed with faced areunarmed are who there is no real Sunni armed presence. When people armed elements within West Beirut are Shiites, and to give his assurances the weight of his personahis ofassurancesweight givehistheto appeared in person before Sunni audiences, also Heincleric. Shiite a orderby spoken werethey that difficult to tell from the texts of his regularHusayn, sermons he usually chose the former; it was often between an allusion to the Qur’an or to the Imam intendedmotivatetoonly people.choiceGivena Shiite audiences. Such rhetoric, he explained, was the Shiite religious calendar, and before exclusively on the anniversaries and commemorations set by of Shiite symbolism. He did employ a Shiite rhetoricSunni trust. His own discourse was remarkably free mula, his ecumenical style did build a measure of While Fadlallah offered no ecumenical magical for in a scholarly way so as to reach a solution.” intellectual problem, to be examined by transformed“anresearchers intobe could theydeclared; he them. They were not theological but philosophical, while others magnified them, he sought to minimize offered no precise solution to these differences. But rests differ from the interests of the other.” independentFadlallah from the other and finds that its inte two,Sunni and Shiite, inwhich each takes stands sectarian reality has divided Muslim societies into “The belief. fundamentaldifferencesin as them theological “details,” Muslims had come to regard nal disagreement over law or the interpretation of of seeing sectarian differences as matters of margi accused Muslim of unbelief and polytheism. Instead 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 28 - - - - - Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback level of the Islamic world. We have excellent rela not work on a Lebanese level alone but also at the Fadlallahinanunusually boastful moment. “Ido Lebanon,inShiites,”amongSunnis wellasas he Sunnisimpactandalike.viewshave“Myan had the two communities might form, as guide to Shiites Shiite cleric to emerge as linchpin of any coalition any ofchanceFadlallah bestBut themered. had and the mistrust between Sunnis and Shiites sim The understanding Fadlallah promoted was fragile, for sectarian strife. ning of the chasm within Islam borre the potential ritual universe of Hizbullah, its recalling of the opeHusayn’s martyrdom played an essential role in the WestBeirut. Whilecommemorationthe Imamof the Shiite Ashura processions from the Dahiya into sought to prevent the extension into West Beirutyear,misplaced sameresultThatzeal.”ofhethe of an act of mischief, and believe it might have been quick to condemn the violence: “We regard this as refusal to issue them pilgrimage visas. Fadlallah wasconsulate in Beirut in 1984, in protest against a when Saudi Lebanese Shiites sacked and burned the Saudi fortunes from their Saudi connections, shuddered of the Lebanese Sunni elite, who had built personal efforts to defuse sectarian powder kegs. Members Suchperformances were augmented by personal and the common ground on which they stood. about the need for the unity of Shiites and Sunnis passion, he worked to assuage their fears, speaking a seat on the dais. In measured tones and without Beirut. Fadlallah read his prepared remarks from croachmentmassesWestShiitetheofonofpoor establishment, who felt most threatened by the en pillarsSunnitheprofessionalof commercialand folded across their jackets and ties. These were the ofmeans, mustached, white-haired orbald, arms graph shows an audience of respectable older men Beirut’sphotocommerce.ofchamberheadof A minister,primetheparliamentary deputies,and former alawyers,engineers,compriseddoctors, alumni of a prestigious Sunni school; the audience lity. In a typical instance, Fadlallah lectured before The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ - - - - - belief,law, culture,resources, security,and were ly Muslims had their differences, but their shared to banish one fear by evoking a greater one. nantlyCertain Shiite Islamic state? Again, Fadlallah sought among many, rather than a minority in a predomi not the Sunnis better off remaining one confession despite the presence of a large Sunni minority. declaredWere Twelver Shiism to be the religion of state, They saw how Iran’s revolutionary constitution had would follow him down the ecumenism—road histo byan impressedIslamic those nis—evenstate. But Fadlallah could never be certain that any Sun groups and the Sunnis in Tripoli and Beirut.” Amal members, as well as with Islamic non-Shiite tions with the Hizbullah group and with most of the that they had an identity and an ethos of theirthan own,those of the Sunnis. Fadlallah also understood theirprivileges, which were even more extensive for the tattered confessional order that guaranteedIslam of rulesubstitute attempttheto any resist nis. Fadlallah knew that Lebanon’s Christians would But that diversity hardly ended with Lebanon’s Sun banon’s diversity. in Iran. Concessions would have to be made to Le implementationfundamentallydifferitsto from tationIslamicanof state Lebanon in would have To accommodate Lebanon’s Sunnis, the implemen agreeable to any Islamic logic, opinion, or school.” law,completeits control. “And thatwouldbenot all Muslims.” Unbelief would establish its rule, its will extend its injustice to Islam as a whole, and to tyranny,which unbelieving “subjugationto was among them. For the alternative to an Islamic stateof Islam and tolerate the long-standing differences locatethecommon ground shared bythe schools Qur’an as its constitution. The state would have to believersstate,ofdrawingbysucha theuponin find a formula which would guarantee the freedom clerics and the leaders of Sunni movements had to ShiitegreatIslamicthought.”positionTheof the state,any the Muslims “strive for the establishment of a state,threatened by unbelief. That threat demanded that which will counter these threats fromthreats thesecounter will which 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 29 ------Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback Fadlallah understood that they were afraid, and afraid,were theyFadlallahunderstood that but perhaps they could be cajoled, coaxed, seduced. Christians could not yet be forced into submission, tians insecure—and susceptible to persuasion. The thatthelonginterm, thismade Lebanon’s Chris - Fadlallahregion.believedthe in friendsMuslim minorityatoddswith America’s morenumerous the entire Islamic world and had no need of aties. small But America, the heir of Europe, had penetrated when Europe pursued a policy of cultivating minori Maronites had been a European project, at a time pecially the Maronites, were growing weaker. The YetFadlallah believed that theChristians, andes - Lebanese labyrinth. the from exitpossible every for lookingalready couldbreakoverextendedthe Israelis, whowere it Lebanon’sChristians.Butresolve of the break grievance,IslamicResistancethenotsincecould where will the tail’ be?” This was an astute shift of Fordefeatyouifhead,’Israel,theoff chop you if the south. “Confront Israel and leave the tail’ aside.should not take precedence over the liberation of whether liberation of all Beirut from the Christians Christians constituted the “tail.” Once he was asked that Israel represented the “head,” and Lebanon’s displacedbe onto Israelis,the withargumentthe Christians the against rage Shiite that urged he tanglementcould avoided.be AsIsrael retreated, en suchChristians, ifthe withtangle to notwas Fadlallah’s straightforward advice to his adherents stop losing ourselves in conjecture.” Neither can remove the other; that is why we must country in which both Muslims and Christians live. with a vengeance. As he once put it, “Lebanon is a and ambushes. They would simply return the same banon and would not flee in the face of car bombs unlike the Jews, they were rooted in the soil of Le Like the invading Jews, they were unbelievers; but neverunderestimated the Christians of Lebanon. Nabaa. Unlike many of Iran’s emissaries, Fadlallah seen them at their most tenacious and ruthless in largely formed in opposition to Islam, and he had The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ - - - be alleviated, might not their will be eroded? that fear stiffened their will. But if that fear could between Muslim majority and Christian minority, stillupheld thedhimma idealanas arrangement religiousapartheid.Fadlallahof kind jugation,a they remembered as a discriminatory system of sub bound by the provisions of a pact, or they had lived under Islam as protected inferiors, Ottomanperiod,thethrough Rightstate.Islamic Fadlallah on the status of Christians in any future journalists for these publications inevitably pressed were published and widely read by Christians. The interviews to the newspapers and magazines which banese media. Fadlallah went out of his way non’sto Christians—conductedgrant at first through the Le Thus began Fadlallah’s remote dialogue with Leba dlallah saw no reason why a man of religion could asacandidate for the presidency of Lebanon. Fa handbill circulated in West Beirut naming a 1987lateIslamist.Fadlallah In an and Muslim a both be he is not acceptable.” The president would have to of infidel regimes and arrogant powers, in our view time, “if the president is a Muslim, but a supporter “the president should be a Muslim.” But at the thesame Muslim majority in Lebanon,” he announced, to members of the religious minority. “Because of officesstate all openwouldIslam, of lines broad the negotiatedwithinwhileagreement, an Such thaq, Fadlallah could envision an additional pact, or further,stillPressed state. Islamic the topolitics respectcustomsfortraditions,and while leaving Such a treaty would guarantee cultural rights and viously, but also, for example, with Kurds or anyTurks. kind of minority—with Christians and Jews, ob The Islamic state could conclude such a treaty with Islamic state, the muahada was a bilateral contract. Unlike the dhimma, which was a concession by the concluded precisely this kind of treaty with the Jews.The prophet Muhammad, on coming to Medina, had treaty, or imagine it to be.” But he suggested an alternative:oppressive a or inhumane system that some people and argued that on close examination, it was not “the between the state and its religious minorities. muahada , between majority and minority. 14/12/2010 00:04 dhimma , which Page 30 mi ------Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback sermon commemorating “the sufferings of Jesus,” “confessional Islam.” One Easter he gave a mosque Islam” was far closer to Christianity than Lebanon’s Christianrelations,arguing“fundamentalist that Muslim- todevoted interviewlengthy a gave he him from conducting a monologue. preventOnenot didChristmas this discussion.” Still,frank a at that politics posed “serious obstacles to any attempt religious dialogue took place, and Fadlallah admitted Muslimscholars.” LebanonIn itself, however, no Fadlallah. “It was as though I was conversing with there was any problem during our talks,” claimed Vatican’s Secretariat for Non-Christians. “I never felt Damascus and the cardinal who presided over the Orthodox churches, as well as the papal nuncio in Syrian and Catholic, Greek Orthodox, Greek the ofpatriarchs interlocutorsthe includedHis cus. Damas- in met he whom figures Christianof list interest, and Fadlallah held discussions with a long His growing reputation certainly piqued Christian majority in favor of an Islamic state. might be tapped later to build a multiconfessional did seek to build a reservoir of Christian trust, he which could persuade all of Lebanon’s Christians, but he of Islam, not to impose it. Fadlallah did not Muslimsimagine were duty-bound to present the alternative of government they want with complete freedom.” our people to decide their fate and choose the toform include a passage that called for “allowing all of lah’s programmatic “open letter” of February 1985 Fadlallah who prevailed upon the drafters of Hizbul wouldhave acceptabletobe majority.toa wasIt theright to decide their own future. Any solution averred,toppled.Lebanon,peopleofheThe had demandofIran’s emissaries that the“regime” be to impose it by force. He distanced himself from lution,the but he assured Christians that he did not Fadlallahseek thus offered a comprehensive Islamic so hardly do otherwise. presidencystill reserved for a Maronite, he could ofhisnameattemptanas toharm him. With the tion with the handbill and denounced the floating not hold such an office, but he denied any connec The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ - - - sought to talk the differences away. logy.” As with Sunnis, so with Christians, Fadlallah concurwithChristians certainon details oftheo one of Islam’s prophets, even though “we may not could never be just in an Islamic sense, but it callcould for a humane state for everyone.” Such a state we should not stop in our tracks. Instead, we must limsfailtoachieve Islamican state foreveryone, law. That was no reason to despair. “If we as Mus- create a state led by a Muslim and toimpossible basedit diversitymadeLebanon’son rhaps Islamic social and economic justice for the oppressed. Pe compromisesolution. Above all, Fadlallah sought In these circumstances, Fadlallah did not rule out a banese still rejected the creation of an Islamic state?And if, despite Fadlallah’s efforts, the majority of Le the protection afforded by his Islam. They couldThey Islam. his protection affordedbythe privilege—political, social, economic—in return for concealednothing. expectedHe themto sacrifice they would constitute the main course. But Fadlallah piece of deceit, meant to lure them to a feast Christianswhereand Sunnis who viewed his vision as a were there course Ofprincipled. and pragmatic his plea for the despised, Fadlallah remained both state, then settle (for now) for a “humane” state. In but settle (for now) for the south; demand an togetIslamicsomething reasonable. DemandJerusalem, for more than was reasonable, it was usually innable orderobjectives. And if Fadlallah sometimes asked an Islamic state, but he actively pursued more attaiFadlallahcontinued to talk about thenecessity of fornication and then stoned the adulterer. theft and then cut off the hand of the thief, bia, practicedFadlallah decried Arab regimes that practiced guarantee justice. In a veiled allusion to Saudi Ara Fadlallah pointed out that this did not automaticallywho demanded the implementation of Islamic law, the treasury of the nation and its future.” To those presidents, “who steal the funds of the Muslims, and other states headed by Muslim kings, princes, and on a Muslim head of state, Fadlallah noted thatdespised wereand downtrodden. To those who insisted be humane, provided it alleviated the distress of the 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 31 - - - - - Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback believeinexporting therevolution, butthere isa patiently explained his own concept of change. “We banon in a fundamental way.” To them, Fadlallah we had abandoned the slogan of Islamic rule in inLe Iran whom we venerate, who had concluded that suspicion. “There were a few of the leading clerics subjectviewssomebecamethehiscause,of and turn, questioned Fadlallah’s devotion to the common emissaries,TheIran.decisionfromin makers in indicted Iran’s emissaries for concealing the truth following one trip to Tehran. The words implicitly aware of the situation in Lebanon,” he announced scholars and some officials who are perhaps not fully of Iran’s own emissaries. “There are some Iranian His technique was to cast doubt on the competence Lebanon stood on the brink of Islamic revolution. Tehran,in lobbiedhe hardagainst theclaim that alternative of Islam in Lebanon. During his sojourns conviction that he alone knew how to promote the But Fadlallah remained absolutely unshaken in his mand an Islamic state. for three years because of Fadlallah’s refusal to leaders,de Khomeini refused to meet with Fadlallah Sadiq al-Musawi, the most hardline of Hizbullah’s and sometimes with Khomeini. According to Sayyid attended conferences and met with leading figures, he fall in line during his visits to Tehran, where he ambassador.IranianthatdemandedtheThey to on him in Damascus when he paid obligatory visits on this maddeningly obstinate client. They leaned they lost no opportunity to bring pressure to bear simply repeat their slogans, not interpret them, and cionable. They would have preferred that Fadlallah bargaining away of high principles seemed uncons- To many of Iran’s emissaries, Fadlallah’s apparent confessions. livelyintellectual debate,adherentsamongall of cit threat—the idea of an Islamic state provoked a largely to Fadlallah’s subtle advocacy—and impli a future upheaval by a less forgiving Islam. Thanksaccept his offer now, or gamble losing everything in The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East Critics and Assassins http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ - - - alla md ti agmn persuasively. He argument this made Fadlallah and in the immediate stages to follow.” Lebanesetheexistin reality presentthe at stage, hranthat conditions forthe rule of Islam “donot of emissaries, Fadlallah told his interlocutors in Tethe passage of time.” Dismissing the upbeat reports country, some of which could only be changed “withtive and actual circumstances” of the “importing” the power of the “exporting” state and “the objec results.” The process, he maintained, was limited by export as parts,’ since only this will bring us actual nature of the actual circumstances necessitates its unit’ and exporting it as parts.’ We believe that the difference between exporting the revolution as one Rafsanjani “undoubtedly the thinking head of the gacious choice. As early as 1986, Fadlallah declared politics reassured Fadlallah that he had made a sa politics. Rafsanjani’s own mastery of Iranian power shiftingIranianthefactionalsupportofsands in had won the confidence of Rafsanjani, his pillar of Iran’s decision makers were divided, but Fadlallah Lebanon cannot bear any more suffering.” In truth, democracy or democracy of the majority because throughsolvedbe shouldproblemLebanese the inthe Iranian model. At present they believe that thinking about an Islamic republic in Lebanon, not kingofficials I sensed that they are not at present myrecent meeting withthe Iranian decision-ma medto have won them to his own views: “During became Fadlallah’s quarry, and he eventually clai of the Majlis, Ali Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjani. They speaker theadventurism—had aroundgathered tials—realistic,patient, calculating, averseand to group of revolutionaries with impeccable creden a understoodthatsoon revolution. He the vided rivalriesdithewhich carefullymeasureoftook of division in the conduct of Iran’s emissaries, and within the revolution’s leadership. He saw the signs ownhisbykeenappreciation factionalismtheof won him a following, but he strengthened his hand own emissaries. Certainly the force of his argument to the intricacies of the Lebanese sideshow than theirin high places regarded him as a more reliable guidequickly built a constituency in Tehran, where some 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 32 ------Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback Arrangements for his personal security grew ever larger in the imagination of Hizbullah’s adversaries. Still, as Fadlallah’s visibility increased, he loomed sea of zeal, ambition, violence and intrigue. an acute feel for the requirements of survival in a his exacting command of language, combined with thought.”Fadlallah earned that freedom through methods of political work, and the lines of political haveownourviews even internationalin issues, dlallah boldly declared to anyone who asked. “We when speaking to Iranian brothers and others,” Fa to have our own views on special Lebanese affairs clarations of independence. “We have the freedom the emissaries could only shrug or simmer at his a de political art. Depending upon their temperament, in Persian as heel; he possessed too much of that wiliness known emissariesever found away to bring Fadlallah to “70 percent of justice,” he estimated. None of Iran’sof the Iranian revolution: Iran had achieved only forces.” He also refused to apologize for the excessesIslam and which complements all the Islamic world’s tryingto implement my policy, which is based on “I am not an agent for anybody’s policy. I stiffenedam simplyhis neck while bowing, always insisting thattheforces ofeviltheworld.”in invariablyButhe thatso willitgain strength sufficient defeatto all We believe we should support it with all our might pillar of all the pure Islamic movements in the circumstances,”world. Iran’s revolution represented “the his freedom to think and act, he allowed that his“in debtall to Iran’s revolution; even while trumpeting badgeof integrity. Hedid not fail to a acknowledge as autonomy hard-won his up held Fadlallah sely the manner championed by Fadlallah himself. nue, “but in a studied and rational manner”—preci Iran’s “struggle against imperialism” would conti criticized by Iranian hard-liners. Under Rafsanjani, arms—dealing American for hostagesAmerican lah also gave his backing to Rafsanjani’s trading of domestic opponent. On the same occasion, Fadlal Iran’s most adventurous emissaries and a dangerous state,” for having vanquished Mehdi Hashemi, one of The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East zerangi, http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ a guile he raised to the level of - - - - - media, and would have become utterly dependent been cut off from his reservoirs of support and the himto the Bekaa Valley. But there hewould have coax emissariestoIran’s allowedhave might he threats. Had he been concerned only for his safety, more elaborate as he became the subject of death Over 250 persons were injured. It was a familiarpersonsOver250wereinjured.wasa It buildings demolished by gas lines which exploded. eightylives, including theresidents ofapartment mission. A car bomb intended for Fadlallah claimed ration of Fadlallah as a man in the service itsof effect,divine however was to deepen the popular vene1985, an attempt against his life almost succeeded; the risks he ran grew with his reputation. In Marchupon Iran. He chose to remain in the Dahiya, where cemetery. in a communal grave in the Rawdat al-Shahidayn over the service for those victims who were buried of the dead. Fadlallah, bullhorn in hand, presided in an outpouring of sentiment during the funerals such intense collective grief and emotion, expressed sersby. The Dahiya had never known a moment of membered limbs, howling ambulances, dazed pas- Beirut nightmare come to life: buckled concrete, dis- 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 33 - Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback claim. repeated in Lebanon’s press, worked to buttress his done in the past. But the supposed corroboration, damaging charge against him tomorrow, as it a had print might newspaper same the for dication, awry.Fadlallah did not hold up the report as vin to an American “counterterrorism” initiative the gone LaterWashington Post claim. Fadlallah’s represented cally lished building, which read “Made in USA,” demographi a stretchedacrossbanner imperialism. A portance that the deed confirm the malevolence of paramountwaswasofrequired,noneitim and United States. Fadlallah had no solid evidence, but by laying responsibility for the bombing upon the partially redeem lost lives. He began immediately ted, the deaths could be given meaning that would consolidation of the movement. Properly towardsinterprethe step a intohorror transforming the Fadlallah immediately appreciated the necessity of The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ claimed to have traced the bombing - - - - - some in Hizbullahsomein might strike indiscriminaout that concerned Fadlallah was time, same the At the demand for vengeance had to be appeased. YetbereavedultimatelyDahiya.the And ofpassions wasIt difficulta distinction maintainto amid the a renewed resolve to defeat imperialism. truction.” Fadlallah demanded not vengeance, but distantfrom theapparatus ofespionage anddes - We... will not unjustly treat Americans who are donot agree with the policy of their government. American people; in America there are many who policy.We must know that we are not against the imperialistdowncomprehensivebring to a plan in “butdeclared,way,”emotional hean in react ged that there be no revenge. “The people will not of its own innocents. So Fadlallah immediately ur higher moral ground gained through the sacrifice innocentAmericans would lose for Hizbullah the that the United States be blamed, violence against tely against Americans. While it served his purpose among students and intellectuals knew that his es- reach by preaching alone. Fadlallah’s constituency aura,especially amongthose whomcould henot Fadlallah’s narrow escape also enhanced his own outsiders may have thought of it. inhabitantstheDahiya,denceof the of whatever while clandestine, undoubtedly inspired the confi judgedandwere faithful elements.” process,The himself, but he declared that “those who investigated injustice. Fadlallah claimed not to have intervened of Islamic law in creating an island of justice amid Lebanese police. And they established the efficacy gence service could solve that crime that baffled the control.proclaimedTheyHizbullah’sthat intelli vengeance,whichotherwisehavemight escaped brilliant maneuver. They appeased the demand for execution. The secret trials and executions were a their videotaped confessions and announced their the bombing and, a year after the bombing, released arrestedeleven Lebanese for their alleged role in Islamic law. Hizbullah soon announced that it had zation of innocents, but through the application of it was done in Fadlallah’s way, not through victimi 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 34 - - - - - Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback move could not guarantee his safety, for shells fell dedby a ten-foot wall and two dozen guards. The mile from his mosque. The complex was surroun of Harat Hurayk in the Dahiya, a little more than a spacious residence in the formerly Christian a toquarter apartmentblock run-down his frommoved The closing off of his street no longer sufficed. He an escort of ten cars and forty armed bodyguards. 1987, he made a condolence call in West Beirut sayyid;a walkingwithaand occasiononestick.On in of turbanblack the grayingbeard; a cloak;dark would emerge: a stout man in an would take up positions around his door. Then he bodyguards, armed with automatic rifles and pistols,bearded destination,many his a arriveatwould he When Fadlallah. carried automobilesplated potentialarmor-assailantsthewhichknowof to The smoke-tinted windows made it impossible for along crumbling roads to the Bekaa and the south. strewn streets of the Dahiya and West Beirut, and Mercedes limousines swept him through the rubble- any location a memorable event. His motorcade of him enhanced his stature, and made his arrival at increasingly stringent security which surrounded had to assume responsibility for his protection. The Hizbullahwould have no voice, so the movement sapproved of his independent spirit. di Without him who those among indispensability, even his The near loss of Fadlallah also served to underline and not otherwise.” PraisetobeGodthat the carnage endeddid,itas plosion. “He would have been lost to all the saidMuslims. one man whose daughter was killed in the ex “Praisebe to God that the Sayyid was preserved,” those who had lost family members in the bombing. now. Nowhere was this more evident than among to doubt his special grace, it was confirmed forpreaching them and elliptical writings. If they had cause could not always follow the thread of his intricate the despised poor of the Dahiya and beyond, who But the meaning of his miracle.survival a was of beneficiary self-evident the to as himselfpresent capewasmatter a ofcoincidence, didnotandhe The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ aba, a full-sleeved - - - lowed the expansion of his activities far beyond increased thedonationsThe coffersflow of his al to tangible evidence of Fadlallah’s new prominence. The growth of his new enterprises provided the most a bomb in his mosque. by persons in his own entourage, who had planted sibility, as dark rumors surfaced about a foiled alongplot the route. And betrayal also remained a pos- car rigged with a hundred kilograms of dynamite Hizbullahannounceddiscoveredhad it parked a his mosque also remained dangerous: late in 1989, eastern side of the city in 1989. The approaches to Amalin 1988, and again during shelling from the on the house during clashes between Hizbullah and a noted American journalist, claiming to have had ofthemanycharges leveled against him.1987In always, it was impossible to determine the veracitydenials became an integral part of his repertoire. numberAs of deliberate attempts to discredit him and As Fadlallah’s visibility increased, he faced a growing trust a son. Khomeinihimself,ages, oneonlythatcanoneas from Lebanon’s old warlords, and from the distant pulpit during his absences. Fadlallah had learned the assumeto man young theallowingcleric, of Fadlallah groomed one of his sons, Ali, for the role South.eyethetowardWithhalfanin future,the name of the Imam Kho’i. A cousin acted on his be institutes in Beirut established by Fadlallah in the A brother-in-law ran his office. A nephew ran the ofmoney collected andspent under hisauspices. family,whocouldtrustedbe withlargethe sums lah’s enterprises were reserved for members of his drivers, and servants. Important positions in Fadlal office personnel, financial managers, bodyguards, to employ several hundred persons, including front- without supervision. His household eventually grew banon. Such operations obviously could not be run twenty-five hundred Shiite families throughout Le provided financial and medical assistance to nearly assist needy families. Within five years, it regularly heestablished anew bureau for social welfare to care of orphans and the schooling of clerics. In 1983 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 35 - - - - Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback time, members of Fadlallah’s family were reportedly sameLebanesedollarthevis-à-vis thepound.At a (temporary) decline in the value of the American Fadlallah’s operatives had pressured them to reversethat police changersallegedlythe complained to supposedlywere smuggledabroad.moneyLocal dollars of Millions Dahiya. the and Beirut West currency,evenanddominatingof thatmarket in accused by Amal sources of speculating in foreign In 1990, Fadlallah’s brother-in-law and sons were tions of trust also gave rise to rumors of Fadlallah’scorruption. placement of family members in posi charges against Fadlallah were omitted. fendingbookappeared Arabic intranslation, the by American money would not stick. When the of thecharge that Fadlallah hadbeencompromised had done before winning American notoriety. But he lectureUnitedtours,Statesasthe onvisit not was all the more important now that Fadlallah experiencedcould through Wayne State University. This interpretcouldanotherAmericawhoasreal the not only one son who could preach in his stead,his but stature as a master of all possibilities. He of needed a son in an American university only confirmed not bother to answer this accusation: the presence for study, which was indeed the case. Fadlallah ven did children had been admitted to the United StatesAmericans, another report noted that one of his ele buttress the claim that Fadlallah had sold out tocalled the the report a “cheap trick” to discredit him. proveTo that such aid was provided to us.” His office corruption: “I challenge anyone or any side who can mented. Fadlallah vigorously denied the charge of Saudi ambassador to Washington reportedly com the him,”kill to than himbribe to easierwas “It and education expenses for some of his followers. preferred to receive the payment in food, medicine, ties.” Fadlallah was said to have agreed, althoughfor terroristhe attacks on Saudi and American facili lars if “he would act as their early warning system assassination attempt and offered two million dol had been approached by the Saudis after the failed telligence Agency, reported in a book that Fadlallahconversations withdirectorthe Centraltheof In The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ ------by Fadlallah, they began to talk with Shams al-Din. sought new avenues of influence or felt frustrated powers of appointment. Whenever Iran’s and funds substantial emissaries of control of him assured at the summit of the Shiite clerical establishment, the Supreme Islamic Shiite Council. This position, Shams al-Din, the white-bearded man whoMahdi Muhammad Shaykhheaded of form the in lenge Fadlallah faced a more subtle but substantial chal many Shiites wished him well. clearly wished—and they what believed People dangerous and corrupt? Moderate and principled? accusations of complicity in violence. Was Fadlallah the corruption charges had no more effect than the buying up extensive properties in the Dahiya. But attachment, which sometimes surfaced in drama their of depth fairly reflect the it neitherdid But by the emotional residue of their childhood bond. disagreements,theirofdepth the complicated so was confined to “tactics.” That hardly did justice to rivals, and affirm that the scope of their differenceswithShams al-Din, declare thatthe twowere not work to reconcile them. Fadlallah would then meet between the two leaders that mediators often had Shiiteto trust.” Such talk so strained the relationship tion of the Council is not such as to inspire Islamic of the Shiite Council, we believe that the composi matically:“Withallduerespect totheleadership politicalcards.” Fadlallah delivered the jab diplo various associations, but it did not control “all the clerics, Shiite members of parliament, and heads of gree” of representative authority, since it included council, Fadlallah remarked, enjoyed “a certain de al-Din’slever influenceof community.the in The counted the Supreme Islamic Shiite Council, Shams colleague-in-turban.a FadlallahBut publicly dis- publiclywithargue toignoblewas rivalry; itthe between the two men. Fadlallah invariably denied personalconflictpersistentofspoke reportsand Fadlallah,by made claim theprecisely was This throughout the Shiite community. respectwidestenjoyedthewhoShiitecleric that He also visited Iran, where he presented himself as 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 36 - - - - - Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback in their support. The hooded hijackers, surrounded Hizbullah even organized an airport demonstration whichAmericaraisedhasagainsthijackers.” the much more important than the humanitarian aspect political dimension of the detention of hostages is of the weak and oppressed. We announce that the with the hijackers: “We stand with them in defense unfolded, Hizbullah openly expressed its solidarity instead against a soft civilian target. As the hijackingto fill, and Hizbullah’s impatient strongmen moved prevailing circumstances, this was a very tall order force the release of the Shiite detainees. But in the capture Israeli soldiers than to kill them, in order that to occasion, he had declared it more important to made to take Israeli soldiers hostage in the south. thehijacking On had publicly urged that an effort be of Shiites detained by Israel, and only weeks beforehad sensed the growing despair among the families Lebanese Shiites held in an Israeli prison. Fadlallah TWA airliner to Beirut, and demanded the release Hizbullahof strongmen organized the hijacking of a moveaIn that riveted theattention oftheworld, life. his attempton the aftermonths three 1985, June in authoritycamemoral his challengeto A even acted in direct contradiction to his teachings. on the proper conduct of Islam’s struggle, and who whodid not regard him as the ultimate authority Hizbullahdecisionmakersinwere there fact, In bear the full weight of their supposed significance. himself and Hizbullah, his words could not always cause Fadlallah had preserved a distance between ascentbroughtalsoquicklyhimlimits. histoBe been sudden and unexpected. But the speed of his had Fadlallah formidable the of emergence The the legacy, Fadlallah’s ambition could not fly. so long as Shams al-Din claimed an equal share of at his side. They were brothers in all but name—andcondolences at Beirut’s airport, Shams al-Din stood body was returned to Najaf and Fadlallah accepted was Shams al-Din who spoke the eulogy; when the ways.ticFadlallah’s When it1984, fatherindied The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East Hijackers and Hostages http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ - do anything to Israel that would make possible the safe return of their relatives, they “felt helpless the to for anxious families”; detainees’ the among beingbadly treated, andthishad “created unrest Word had come out that the Shiite detainees were those who had hijacked the plane found themselves. hand, Fadlallah understood the “tight spot” in which of Hizbullah in support of the hijacking? On the hijacking.one Did he subscribe to the declared position was pressed for his verdict on the admissibility of ofbodyguards; this Fadlallah denied. Butthen he ted that one of the hijackers came from his Fadlallah’sentourage name inevitably surfaced. It was repor mosque. assembled in the open square in front of Fadlallah’stors in chants. One wing of the demonstration first by a group of Hizbullah’s cleric, led the demonstra with.” or land—should be safeguarded and not tampered transport—ofair,seaof meansbelievethat who thoseamong am politicalaction.I ofmeans a as out American policy. . . . We are against hijackings “hijackings do not solve anything and do not wipe withusincertain cases?” Fadlallah declared that they are citizens of countries who have interfered criminalsbecausecalled be “toaircraftthese on had moral objections as well. Were the passengers his objection limited to the fear of retribution. He tomorrow you are the one who is hijacked.” Nor politicalof slogans.was Today hijackeryouaare and means of transportation in the world at the mercy this method. There is no basis for our trying to put congregation. “We must not be enthusiastic about are more numerous,” Fadlallah angles told his Friday “negative prayer hijacking’s Nevertheless, to Israel’s perfidy. in Israel, and opened the eyes of some Americans world attention to the problem of Shiite detainees sults.” It unified the ranks of the believers, directedin retrospect, the hijacking had “many positive re release.” Theirs too was a humanitarian cause. And 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 37 - - - Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback were held against the release of hostagesrelatives,all not course terrorism.” Ofand on “war some a composure, exploiting the hostage holding to declare further suffering.” Instead the United States lost its ended and its file would have been closed without Fadlallah believed the hostage holding “would have an exchange “according to the Lebanese practice,” then responded in “a practical way,” by accepting not be described as terrorism. Had the Americans ners elsewhere, he held, efforts to free them could tages were held for the release of Hizbullah’s priso conspired in the taking of the hostages; when hos- saries and the Hizbullah strongmen, who together emisFadlallahIran’s- motivesunderstoodof the differentCertainly,verdict.acalculation yielded But in the different circumstances of Lebanon, his accept the holding of American hostagesto him inled hadTehran. logic Hiscause. moral advancea might acts, immoral producing passion, vented embassyin Tehran, Fadlallah had witnessed how ration of Palestine. In the seizure of the American Justice Organization, and Islamic Jihad for the Libe namesIslamic Jihad Organization, Revolutionary the bearing groups by 1987, and 1984 between king of foreign hostages. Most of them were taken perpetuala challenge posed bythesystematic ta Apart from the hijackings, Fadlallah’s suasion faced for his comfort. logic, defined the limits of his influence too clearly resort to hijacking, in clear repudiation of Fadlallah’sfrom being repeated inFadlallah’s backyard. The TWApreventedepisodetherethe land to planes refusal of air controllers in Beirut absolutetothe only allowand come, toyearsseveral hijackedfor Hijacking would be used by Hizbullah’s strongmen such episodes, for the TWA hijacking had worked. the deadlock. Nor did they prevent a recurrence of mented Rafsanjani’s efforts, did not suffice to break detainees. Fadlallah’s arguments, while they comple hijacking to an end and securing the release of sanjaniShiite who proved decisive in bringing the TWA who had endorsed the action. Ultimately, it was eitherRaf with the hijackers or with Hizbullah’s clerics, Fadlallah’s careful calculation was not in harmony The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ - - - - - knowthatforeignembassies intelligence,in deal “Weus?” among from not they are South, the in spies. What of those who serve Israeli intelligence True. But among ourselves there are thousands of tise. Some will say, There were spies among them.’ lost much medical, scientific, and technical exper foreigners,kidnappingofwethe services.“With intelligenceforeign of plots the frommovement the argument that the hostage taking defended the by moved Fadlallah was benefited Nor Muslims. that institutions” social and medical cultural, in werepersonally innocent, but were “participants governments’ guilt. Many of the hostages not only centforeignerstheirburdenof thebeartomade innosituationanother”—applyingofthe of to it burdened soul should be made to bear the burden citeda verse from the Qur’an which said that “no In support of his argument, Fadlallah consistently punishment and contradicted the teachings of Islam. seizureofinnocent persons constituted wrongful his opposition to hijacking. In his understanding, the sophy of Islam, and drew upon the same sources wasas couched in ethical terms and the moral philo ran against hostage taking. His opening argument Yet when all was said and done, Fadlallah’s opinion also might have certain “positive results.” abductions,negativeThesedespitetheiraspects, the United States and France to alter their policies. such as was sanctioned by Iran as a means to forcetely discount the value of political hostage holding, carried a political price. Fadlallah did not comple whatever the negative aspects may be.” we should help journalists in their task to inform, believeconcluded,“we movement; therefore,he somewerespies, they were sorely neededtheby if Evenpress. thegranted tohe access ready the burgeoningownhis reputation muchtoowedso larly resentful of the abduction of journalists, since ways.”otherespionageFadlallah in particuwas rather will produce negative results. We can fight that kidnapping will achieve the goal it seeks, but as do many of the journalists. But we do not believe 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 38 - - - - - Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback over fifty times. have appealed directly for the release of hostages Anderson’srelease.1989,FadlallahIn claimedto affirming that he was doing all in his powerandsympathyregret replied,expressinghisand to secure Fadlallah. Anderson’s sister wrote to Fadlallah; he dayafter hehad interviewed me,” acknowledged by the Islamic Jihad Organization in March 1985—“a respondent of the Associated Press, who was seized Anderson, an American and chief Middle East cor ther hostage who had a claim upon him was Terry detention” and calling for his “prompt release.” Ano of Muslim leaders protesting Seurat’s “unjustified Shiite figures, leading and among Fadlallah support even greater signed ona petition count could everything possible to try to find him.” No hostage wife during her audience. “You know I have done Fadlallahhusband’sbehalf,”Seurat’sSyriantold peoplethewhohave already intervened youron Islamic Jihad Organization in 1985. “Countless are Palestinianthe waskidnappedcausethewho by regarded student of Islam and ardent supporter of was the French sociologist Michel Seurat, a highly could lay a special claim upon his conscience. One evenHe took theupcause fewofahostages who besiegedhis office and beseeched him for favors. his door. For a time it was flattering, as petitioners mediators, and Western ambassadors beat a path to of persuasion, would prevail. Families of hostages, against hope that his influence, and that his power IslamicJihadOrganization.” first many hopedAt understood the nature of the Islamic thought of the tersely put it on one occasion, “We have actually“inhumaneirreligious.”takingandastagehe As not Fadlallah thus rejected the practice of political hos- The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ - - Fadlallah hoped his writ would run, that his preachi information to himself. Fadlallah would not threa with the doings of the hostage holders, he kept his although his sources would have kept him holders:hostagecurrent the withconspire did he sense, volvedkidnapping,theonein neck.”In tohis up lying; Seurat’s wife bitterly concluded he was “in his moral influence. Some believed he was simply about Fadlallah’s own credibility and the extent of red. The continued hostage holding fueled doubts Itwas not only the reputation of Islam that suffe tion of Anderson the longest of any hostage. detention meant death, and it made the incarcera Seuratevenwhen fellthatillhesocontinuedhis this practice.” That force prevented the release of awall because there is a mysterious force behind paths.” Elsewhere he explained, “I stumbled against in this direction, but I have come across many can confirmclosed that I have done a great deal of work couldI influence the people involved,” he said. “I lations. Fadlallah had to admit as much. “I wishpletely that unmoved by his moral and practical calcu inconsultation with Iran’s emissaries, were com suffice, and those who actually held the hostages, the holding of hostages was wrong. But this did students,succeeddidnotfosteringhe in sense that a who venerated Fadlallah, especially the university Hizbullahadherentsof among And masses.” the would bring pressure that to situation psychologicalbear on a the “createkidnappers would via ng 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 39 ------Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback forfact.a anyIn event, Fadlallah didnotactively for such services, but no one seemed to know this It was sometimes suggested that he exacted tribute mediating governments, especially that of Algeria. Iran’s leaders and emissaries, and diplomats from municate confidentially with the hostage holders, vernments and the hostage holders. He could com windingchains of mediation between foreign go sitions,constitutedforheseveral ofone linkin a back-channelthe transmission negotiatingof po the publicity was welcome. He also had a hand in the in headlines and his photograph in West should do next, incidentally getting his name often obliged, issuing pronouncements on what the exercise of his own influence indirectly. Fadlallah Rafsanjani, who preferred to name the price for the press. Occasionally he followed the cue of his ally case in videotapes, telephone calls, and letters to script,the forcing the hostage holders to make their ownders. Quite theopposite: Fadlallah wrote hisown reciting lines in a play directed by the hostage hol actorfaçade,”an a Fadlallah than“littlemore as racteristic instance, a foreign journalist dismissed analytical abilities of many an observer. In a cha exquisiteThedefeatedrole anomaliesthistheof I had anything to do with them.” statement that “I would not have any self-respect to if the hostage takings. Sincerity shone through his his role, Fadlallah did not regard himself as a biguityparty as a virtue. But however others interpreted their release? Mediation, by its nature, held up am whoheldhostages,the withthoseorwhosought Fadlallah. Was this complicity on his part with deaththose threat out of “appreciation and respect” for a awayfrombacked had it announcedhostages typicalainstance, inButgroup holdinga French rence to Fadlallah, dictated the cycle of ultimatums. were token gestures, since cool calculation, not defe backeddownfrom threats tokillhostages. These theywhen hands stayingtheir for creditinghim theycouldtoreputation,shorehis up sometimes had failed. In return, the hostage holders did what ten betrayal simply because his powers of suasion The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East New York Times, http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ and Time magazine. As always, Washington Post, ------seek this role, and sometimes he dodged it, as in as dodgedit,sometimes heandrole, this seek into striking relief. Or did they? In the end, altogether,his view brought the boundaries of his influence choreographed releases, which excluded Fadlallah in 1991; and the last Germans, in 1992. The carefullywere freed in 1988; the last Americans and British, and full-time mediators. The last French hostages alwayshostages,governmentsittoofwent lease whencredit was shared out for the successful re really crucial negotiations circumvented him, and to me, especially the question of the hostages.” The the subjects raised by Jimmy Carter are unrelated “I rejected this proposal,” said Fadlallah, “because reportedlyexpressed interestan meetingin him. 1990 when former American president Jimmy Carter had a bloody record in dealing with Islamic move and it did not include an Islamic state. Indeed, ButSyriasecular Syria had its own vision for Lebanon, dramatic success. Islamic revolution, and the partnership produced the indispensable link in the import-export trade in pendedpassedthroughSyria. Damascus became ney, weapons—everything on which Hizbullah de the foreigners. Iranian Revolutionary Guards, mo saries, who were invited to inspire resistance against ted by opening Lebanon’s back door to Iran’s emis- deployment had disrupted Syria’s plans; Syria reac Damascus. In 1982, Israel’s invasion and of America’sorbit the intoLebanon bring painstakingly to thenSyrian President Hafiz al-Assad had worked intervention in Lebanon began in 1976, and since return to the Lebanese chessboard. Syria’s military creditthereleases,mostofforthe confirming its however,thing,garneredSyriacertain:One was no one could say this for certain. sively had this debate never taken place, although taking would have been practiced even more exten primacyofIslamic law. Itispossible that hostage constituency that mattered: Muslim believers in the onlydocketbeforethe moral the holdersintage prevailed. The debate he prompted had put the hos- Syria in Lebanon 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 40 ------Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback o ae ht oprto pltbe Fadlallahconciliatorytooka Arabnationalism,viewof palatable,the cooperation that make To pulpit and behind the scenes. cooperationpreciselypersuasively,and thefrom could rely on him to communicate the message of limitsFadlallah’stheknewof influence, they but SyriansDamascus.The in Asasdpersonally with intelligence in Lebanon. More rarely, Fadlallah met calls from Ghazi Kanan, the head of Syrian military infiltrated Beirut, Fadlallah received more courtesy naries of Hizbullah. But as Syrian agents and forcesve mundane dealings with Damascus to the functio become a supplicant at Syria’s door, preferring to squeezed lea into the Israeli corner.” Fadlallah did not warned Fadlallah, “the Muslims would have been toignore. “Ifrelations withSyria werenegative,” Hizbullah,thisbutwastruthtoofaradangerous of the Muslims must have grated on many ears in Israel.” Fadlallah’s description of Syria as protector Muslims and spares them forced cooperation with Fadlallah concluded in 1985. “It protects Lebanese save it. “Syria plays a positive role which at benefitsIsrael’s us,”mercy—and Iran would be powerless to without Syria’s steadfastness, the country would be not abandon its attempt to dominate Lebanon, and in retreat, but appearances deceived. Israel would be toappeared domination.Yes,IsraelIsraeli of dangerimminent the faced still both they when aims those over quarreled they if disastrous be aims of Syria and Hizbullah diverged. But it would ultimaterealism.theFadlallahthatdeny not did Once again, his answer demonstrated a finely-honed for an answer. chance to entrench itself? Many turned to Fadlallah Whynot resist the return of Syria, before it had a spoils from Islam’s victory over Israel and the West.thestrongholds of Shiism. Syria would collect the gainingholdonLebanon,uponofall a including sicallyopposed toIslam? Now Syria seemed bent theArab nationalist, Bathist creed of Syria intrin vement in Tripoli into submission in 1985. Wasn’t to dust earlier in 1982 and shelled the Islamic mo ments, having pounded its own Islamic opposition The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ - - - - nalism which drew upon Marxism and socialism, Fadlallah rejected only that variety of Arab natio alsoinspiredvidedit action against imperialism. could serve as an acceptable basis of identity, pro great-poweroff argued.domination,Arabismhe shake Palestineliberateand to sought both lism nationaArabFadlallah. activismandIslamicso and bankrupted by the 1967 Arab-Israeli war. Not secular self-worship, inspired as by foreign nationalism example Arab against railed clerics lah’s Hizbul of Most Syria. Bathist of creed declared obscured the conflict between Islam and Arabism, words of ideological ecumenism, which deliberately from Muhammad rather than God. These smooth and which dismissed Islam as something that issued thinkable, of course, that the Syrians would allow beattributed to undisciplined soldiers. Itwas un couldepisode painful the suggestedthat it since committedtheoutrage. This was anartful dodge, demanded the trial of those Syrian troops who revenge,heforhadcalling insteadofmassacre.” But shot was fired at the Syrians. It was a cold-bloodedone Hizbullah: “Notof claim Fadlallahthe made shouting, “Death to Kanan!” thousand persons attended the funerals of the dead,fifty some rage; Dahiyawith filled barracks.The whom they alleged had resisted the takeover of theirtroops killed twenty-three members of Hizbullah, mething went awry, and, in a violent clash, Syrian Hizbullah—toevacuate so there.basestheirBut ultimatum to all of the armed factions—including troops entered West Beirut in force and issued an and the Palestinians. Some seven thousand Syrian disorder, where fighting then raged between Amal extend its hold to West Beirut, symbol of Lebanon’sserious occurred in February 1987: Syria decided to derstanding between Syria and Hizbullah. The most gementof several crises that tested the broad un mana the in rolecrucialFadlallah playeda also between Hizbullah and Syria. above all, they served to lubricate the relationship the diminished ranks of the Arab nationalists. But eased Fadlallah’s efforts to recruit supporters from 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 41 ------Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback in Lebanoninforever, thatSyriaorwants annex to do not think that there is a Syrian decision projectedto remain this view upon the Syrians themselves: “I two states should remain separate entities. He then special relationship; by “realistic,” he meant that the meant that Syria and Lebanon should be bound by replya of great precision. By “distinctive,” Fadlallah the code of Lebanese political discourse, this was a countries“shoulddistinctivebe realistic.”and In Syria,Fadlallah replied thatties between thetwo possibilityoffuture union between Lebanon and of Lebanese independence. Once asked about the Israel,becameparadoxicalmostthehe defender Fadlallah advocated cooperation with Syria against vement might be strangled in its infancy. So while became a virtual province of Syria, the Islamic mo Babel, the voice of Islam could also speak. If Lebanonlogies and political schemes. But in Beirut’s tower usedof Lebanon as a launching pad for imported ideo independent Lebanon. Granted, the West may have Syria, and he began to enumerate the merits of an into the hands of those who favored annexation to perialism. But for Fadlallah, such talk merely playedimperialism,im“geometric createdbox,”byfor a as LebanondenouncedroutinelyHizbullah in movement’sthe independence Syria.fromMany Yet Fadlallah still found an ingenious way to assert with Syria. There would be no more uncontrolled “differences”conscientiousmanner.”and mature a incontrol but we believe these matters can be brought under few months later. “Naturally, differences do occur, astrategic view of relations with Syria,” he said a skill as a navigator of treacherous waters. “We resolve,take and Fadlallah had again shown his unfailing forgotten. Hizbullah had learned not to test Syrian that “the incident is closed.” But its lessons were a not gesture of reconciliation, and Fadlallah announced thenreceived Hizbullah’s leaders in Damascus in Assad Hizbullah. mollifying of effectimmediate admissionstheLebanonerrorhad thatthisinof that an “error” had occurred. So rare were Syrian along with Fadlallah, admitting in an elliptical way any of their soldiers to stand trial. But they played The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ - - - that now prevail in the region.” conditionsunrealistictheisbecause inanditso, parts of Lebanon, because Syria has no need to do this would be lost if Lebanon disappeared.” So, too,is greater than that of any other Arab country. All in this region, and its openness to the outside environentworld which exceeds that of any other country wealth and variety give it an ability to influencefew its democracies,” he warned. “Lebanon’s cultural the Arab region would be deprived of one of manyitsadvantages. very “If Lebanon were overthrown, Fadlallah began to explain to Hizbullah the country’s better. As the prospects for Lebanon’s revival grew,And this, in Fadlallah’s view, was very much for the the war, Fadlallah had preached that foreign in foreignthatpreached war, Fadlallahhad the nation.” It was a stunning shift. Before and during the ofessentialstrength the aboutsomething us able to erase Lebanon from the map. This must tellNoteven all these terrible convulsions have been ground.stillpresentthestateison a Lebanon as thateven after fifteen or sixteen years of conflict, factthe Lebanesefrom“hopedrewpatriot. a He wound down, Fadlallah sounded increasingly like Lebanesewarcivilinhabitants.the itsservedAs an American interest, its continued existence also economicaffairs.” and evenButLebanonif serve did political administrative, to regard in even governed by America, even in the smallest details, is Lebanonview, our “InLebanon: ran America Fadlallah still had to pay deference to the idea that fertile mind. vices, suddenly flowered into virtues in asHizbullah Fadlallah’sin many bycountedopenness, and roadthetopower were fewer. Lebanon’s variety ments in other countries,” where the obstacles on the Lebanese Islamists can support Islamist move Islamic republic impossible in the near term. “But an heterogeneity made Lebanon’s True,freely.” activities political their continue to opportunity organize. “This gives the Islamists in Lebanon the region,Lebanon freehadapress andfreedom to the in countries other Unlike Islam. of message would Lebanon’s potential as an amplifier for the 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 42 - - Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback taken as “a sign for those who thrive on fanaticism Fadlallah bit back: Birri’s words, he said, would be presented a frontal assault on Fadlallah’s immunity. Birri’s remarks, for all their apparent subtlety, re zealous supporter of Amal and a sharp critic of muftiIran. of Lebanon. Qabalan also happened to be a al-Amir Qabalan, officially recognized as the Shiite the state recognized only the fatwas of Shaykh everyoneout:Shiitespelltoitthe cleris, ofknewAbd from each confessional community. He did not have authorizedtolay downthelaw Lebanon,”in one theologian. . . . There are only five religiouson leaders a turban, like a religious man, so as to become clericsa who led Hizbullah: “It is not enough to put disappearance.There Birri letloose barba at the markingninthanniversarythe al-Sadr’s Musaof ment, came to Tyre in the south to address a rally tember 1987. Nabih Birri, head of the Amal move The conflict percolated upward in August and Sep kidnapping between Hizbullah and Amal. scale violence erupted, in the form of gunfire and On more and more occasions, in local settings, small- the south, the center of gravity of Lebanese Shiism.“security zone,” the two movements began to contest feuds. And after Israel withdrew to its self-declared and to Hizbullah by Iran, added new volatility tomassive old influx of arms, provided to Amal by Syria butitalso played upon distrust of neighbors. The towns. Hizbullah preached resistance to foreigners, neighborhoods,families,andShiitevillages split Amal, Hizbullah had stirred up old resentments that ofHizbullah. To win men and women away from thepotential for Shiite strife inthe establishment fromAmal.Fadlallahlah alwayshad understood Much more treacherous waters separated Hizbul knew just when to tack his sail. through storm and strait—the master navigator, who was Fadlallah once again steering the ship of Islampeople had willed it—and that they were right. Here that Lebanon had survived the war because its owntrigue perpetuated Lebanon.announcedNowhe The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ The Shiite Fitna - - - - ofsacred war—pitting brother against brother in that Higgins was a CIA spy, and Fadlallah withsanctioned a local Amal chief in Tyre. Hizbullah claimed Higgins was seized as he returned from a meeting south. the in Organization(UNTSO)Supervision TruceNations United the ofcommander deputy U.S.Corps Marineofficer and WilliamHiggins,a 1988, when Hizbullah abducted Lieutenant Colonel The situation deteriorated dramatically in February was too busy to do so, and so was he. differences.theirFadlallahout Birri thatreplied montha laterandBirri heifhadmetto hammer lines that could not be crossed. Fadlallah was allasked the wearers of the turban.” The exchange drew to give free reign to their attacks and insults against necessarily reflect direct American inspiration,” and Fadlallah eventually admitted that the strife did “notbelieved that foreigners had fomented the conflict. who witnessed the sheer cruelty of the warring sidestransformed red lines into green lights.” But no one buting the fighting to “agents of darkness who haveFadlallah groped for anexplanation, atfirst attri violence that threatened to gut the Shiite community. Amal slid into waged between Shiite and non-Shiite. Hizbullah and of such ferocity that they matched any past battle in battles between the two Shiite factions—clashes Fadlallah was wrong. In April, the south exploded sure,” he replied. Amalwouldfight?not “I’m hundredone percent shedding Shiite blood. Was he sure Hizbullah and againsttaboo strong its mediation,and of nisms understand the Shiite community, its many mecha he declared. Those who predicted fighting did not neverwillwhencomeShiites another,” fight one tained that fighting would not break out.“The day seemed imminent. Yet Fadlallah steadfastly main centers searching for Higgins, and a Shiite civil wargry Amal militiamen stormed Hizbullah’s southern fiance of Amal, on its own ground in the south. An civilian.” But the kidnapping had been done in de between his abduction and the abduction of a plain his kidnapping, arguing that “there is a difference fitna —internal strife, the antithesis 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 43 - - - - - Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback dignified manner of a man above politics, by recei not reply to “insults.” He answered his critics in war.the That would have been undignified; he would counterchargesaccompaniedthatShiitecivilthe fulnot to descend into the morass of charges and themtogether Tehran.in ButFadlallah was care refused to meet with Birri when Iran tried to bring called for dialogue, he became so enraged that he Fadlallah, especially in its press. Although Fadlallah ponded by multiplying the personal attacks against assertedthatHizbullah didnotstartit.Amal res - counseledHizbullah to end it quickly. But he also Fadlallah denounced the “reckless, crazy war,” and matter.” Trying to position himself above the fray, thesecircumstances, he said, was not a “practical mal fatwas against internecine killing. Doing so in Fadlallahdid not test his influence by issuing for frankly admitted that his appeals had no effect. And vilians.Stop thismadandfutile carnage.” heBut yourselves, but you are not free to fight among ci among fight battlefield. to free a are not You are want as a force to fight Israel. The residentialinadmissible. areas Many youths are falling—youths we innocent civilians, children, women, and elderly, is continuation of these destructive battles, which kill 1988, when the killing swept across the Dahiya: to“The the strife. He made his strongest appeal in May issuedheand several general appealsend foran fighting,theagainstpulpitpassionately his from supposed following in Amal? Fadlallah did preach Fadlallah’sfamous powers of persuasion, and his trend. It was also a personal setback. Where were ver its outcome, represented a defeat for the Islamicbodies of the dead. For Fadlallah, the fighting,peatedly whate published photographs of the bullet-torn The weekly newspapers of the two movements re years, claiming the lives of over a thousand Shiites.continued with varying intensity for and more well, Dahiya as than the swept two soon fighting The Lebanese. otherpassions assame infectedthe been byhad race unto themselves, he concluded ruefully; they a not disputes.”wereShiites“local originated in The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ ------wounded hearts. it,forbypassedit mindsandappealed directly to all his persuasive powers, could do little to banish ever-presentshadowShiites.theof Fadlallah, for the deepest of these sentiments, and it became the due to the conflict can be erased.” Vengeance was allthe residual negative sentiments that surfaced he also admitted that “some time is needed But before Amal. and Hizbullah the betweentablished sivecooperationcoordination”es- beenand had remained. In 1993, Fadlallah claimed that “exten tiated by Syria and Iran in late 1990. But the scars tedcease-fires, and finally an in agreement nego The successive rounds of fighting ended in media over Shiite Lebanon to show their support for him. ving delegations of admirers who arrived from all important business of building a workable Islamic mind,it was time for Iran to advance to the more decisionthesoberofactcalculation. anas Tohis accepted a cease-fire, but Fadlallah quickly praised carry Islam to victory. They were shocked when awaitedIran an imminent Iranian offensive that would of the war, at a time when many in Hizbullah still read as a prediction. He wanted to suggest the 1988. futilityBut Fadlallah did not intend his remark to onlybe nine more months, until the cease-fire of July 1987.“I share his opinion.” In fact, the war lasted nue another twenty years,” he announced in October war. “One journalist has said that this war Hewill certainlyconti seemed to be wrong about the Iran-Iraq be wrong. fascinated the journalists, even when he proved to and he obliged, offering intricate commentary that Fadlallah to decipher the meaning of these events, Soviet Union dissolved in 1991. Hizbullah turned to collapsed in 1989. The Berlin Wall fell in 1990. The The Iran-Iraq war ended in 1988. The Eastern bloc economics, old conflicts moved toward resolution. Shiite. Old ideologies buckled under the weight of battledShiitewhilestillstand not didworld The Islam and World Order 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 44 - - - - Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback of influencing publishing houses against the book. thor. The fatwa, he announced, had the desired skirtedeffect Khomeini’s demand for the death of the au Khomeini did not err in his ruling Imamfatwa—after defendedfashion.“Thethe a three weeks in Iran and a meeting with Khomeini, with death. Fadlallah, who had just returned from they burned British flags and threatened Rushdie tasy, filling the streets of Beirut and Baalbek, whereWest. The zealots of Hizbullah entered a state tacleof toecs - any “normalization” between Iran and the The Satanic Verses, Salman Rushdie, the Indian-born British author of phase? Khomeini’s fatwa of February 1989 against But could Khomeini make the transition to the next more to Hegel than to Husayn. Marx, to thanMuhammad to lessowed perhaps suggestedthatFadlallah, politicalas philosopher, revolution—asplan—history,divinehumannot Islamicrevolutiontheotherof anyTospeak like malization of relations with the rest of the world.” new phase which should now be reached is the norand independence from the superpowers. [But] the living, with the aim of winning Muslim autonomy mobilization, a new religious way of thinking and thattime, it served to create a state, it produced a realistic line at first,” he lectured his listeners. “At Revolution,theIslamic Revolution didnot have a early zeal. “Like all revolutions, including the French that perspective, a revolution was bound to shed addressingits a class in comparative revolution. were Fromhe though as times,modernrevolutions of dlallah preferred analogies to the great ideological evoked the suffering of the Imam Husayn. But Fa the Prophet Muhammad’s triumphs, their setbacks history of Islam. Their victories were analogousearly theto toanalogy some bystruggle own their bullah explained the course of Iran’s revolution and was itself revolutionary. Most of the clerics in Hiz country.” Fadlallah’s idea of revolutionary rebuildingpeaceandofcurrent onethe phaseis and building the Revolution,” he announced. “The order at home. “The previous phase was one of war hdie, either in its form or its timing.” But Fadlallah The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ threw up a sudden, massive obs- [hukm] on Rus- phases - - - - block improved relations with Iran, since Khomeini argued that the West should not allow the fatwa to of one billion Muslims. In the meantime, Fadlallah and would remind the West to respect the feelings Thefatwa thus represented anactof self-defense sacred.the defamation ofthe for not butdebate of human rights, which entailed a respect for free theIslamic world.” Islamdifferent hada concept into rights human of ideas infiltrate its “to book world. It only mattered that the West used Rushdie’san apostate, for there were plenty of apostates outin theor isn’t.” It did not even matter that Rushdieman is was killed or isn’t, whether the decree is carriedwas executed or not. “The issue is not whether this But beyond that, it did not matter whether Rushdie policies. If the Islamic movement showed a friendly West and sticking to criticisms of specific American done by avoiding wholesale condemnations of the of moderation, not fiery fatwas. This could best be like Hizbullah. They had to be cultivated with evenwordsprepared tomakeapologies formovements who longed for a reconciliation with Iran, and West,analysts,intellectualsincludingtheandwere in Fadlallah preferred the soft line. There were some only six months later. employed while [Khomeini] lived,” said Fadlallah, toemploy new and different methods from those liftedFadlallah’sfrom necessaryshoulders.is “It 1989, it almost seemed as though a weight had beenhigher Shiite authority. After Khomeini’s death in a judgmentofsuddenlythedefend compelled to could be pinned down by surprises from Iran, and monstrated that as long as Khomeini lived, Fadlallah elegant getaway. In the end, the Rushdie an affairfor roomde little too left textunambiguous ni’s escaping from intellectual cul-de-sacs, but Khomei Fadlallah visibly squirmed. He had made an art of hedare to contradict Khomeini. And so, for once, didneithernovelist, butthe ofdeath the forcall ofcasuistry. Fadlallah would never have issued a smackedRushdie Fadlallah’s on fact,position In not as the leader of Iran. world’stheleaderalltheof Muslims, issuedas it 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 45 - - Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback the world through its media,” observed Fadlallah, “newworldbuilda order.” U.S.“Theengulfing is in Beirut, announced that the United States would sited the smoldering ruins of the marines barracks American president, who as vice-president had vi failed to defeat in eight years of war. Thepower, victorious quickly crushing an Iraqi army that Iran KuwaitUnitedhad1990,the Statesin showed real its lookedlikeminorskirmishes. AfterinvadedIraq America,thefamous bomb attacks inBeirut now against tide the turningexponentially. from Far power, and its influence over the Middle East grew Soviet Union left the United States as the sole great cans seemed stronger than ever. The collapse of Hizbullah’sandtionthe heroicsacrifices, Ameri the very different vision. A decade after Iran’s revolu But to his Muslim audiences, Fadlallah provided a began to mount. Westerntestimonials toFadlallah’s “moderation” interests.” This seemed reasonable enough, and the our right not to allow their interests to destroy our have no wish to jeopardize their interests, but it is other countries have their interests in the world. had Weinterests too: “We appreciate that the U.S. Muslimsandunderstoodthat simplyWest the if ved world’s countries.” Those relations could be impro world,shouldhave positive relations withtheall stressed.“We,community a as thatpartthisofis negative view of relations with the big powers,” he East policies of their government. “I do not take a among Americans who already opposed the Middle Fadlallahevenadmirersmore abroad, especially those of the American people.” Such statements won been the root cause of many of our problems and oppose the U.S. administration’s policy, which has habitants a naturally good, tolerant people. Yet we have many friends in the U.S., and consider its in contrary,thewe audience.American“On an for people,” he wrote in an article prepared especially conciliatory tone. “We are not against the American foreignforconsumption,mosthis couched inall Fortheirbenefit, Fadlallah wrote several articles favored the appeasement of its political demands. face,thiswould bolster allthose theinWest who The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ - - - - - “saying that it is master of the world.” There were by domestic divisions of race which exploded from UnitedStates faced economic crisis, compounded oreconomic strength.” Like theSoviet Union, the power is not supported by commensurate political substance. It possesses great military power, but that largeworld,thein “its shadow greateris than its exaggerated,” he declared. While America loomed unrivaled strength of the United States are greatly “We believe that reports about the multifaceted and that he did not count himself among them. of American power. Fadlallah made it perfectly clearneed to come to an accommodation with the “reality” some, even Islamists, who talked despairingly of the power previously and we have now the foundations the U.S. has,” Fadlallah admitted. “But we had the poweractualhavethenot “We right.might own enoughgreatthemtoqualifyofpoweraits as in believedlah thatIslam eventually wouldacquire tangibleFadlalpowerconferredarms.thetoby Strength of spirit—wedded, so Fadlallah imagined, What would it take to realize the potential of Islam? immense. “We are powerful,” declared Fadlallah, building of Islam’s own potential. That potential powergreatrequiredtheagainstwas a uprising But we can penetrate these chinks and enlarge them.” see the chinks in the armor of the United States,possible,” and Fadlallah concluded. “Here and there we therefore believe that the fall of global arrogance tarily,is and diseases wracked their bodies politic. “Weanalysis they were both swollen politically and mili Soviet Union and the United States, but in the final time to time. There were differences between the “ situation—but we strive to weaken ourselves. in our capabilities, powerful in our geographic sources, powerful in our numbers, powerful the world, we are powerful in our natural re and we give the enemy power. As Muslims in we squander our power with our own hands, power, how to amass it. We are powerful, but “ but we do not knownotdowebuthowto moldour 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 46 - - - Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback “Power is not the eternal destiny of the powerful,”Islam.favorof worldpowerin damentalof shift he termofgenerationa ortwo, heenvisioned funa of American policy in the Middle East. In the longertherefore went far beyond any simple modification of Islam. Fadlallah’s idea of Islamic empowerment times the destructive power of the combined forces in which “global arrogance” commanded millions of Islam and the West, superseding the abnormal state a true normalization—a balance of power between Khomeini.) And proliferation would finally create on the mere promise of normalization, sold arms to a pattern of acquisition, as when the United States, in the atom. (There was ample precedent for such make, buy, or steal the keys to the power tical conditionsstill in whichlocked Islam, led by Iran, could contradictory. “Normalization” would create poli complementary,proliferationandaszation” not wasobviousFadlallahthatIt regarded“normali ways to restore, and extend, their power. ned the power of the Muslims; they now had topeople.” find The destruction of these weapons had drai are not the tyrant’s property, they belong to “Wethe opposeIraqi the tyrant of Iraq, but Iraq’s weapons destruction of Iraq’s weapons after the Iraqi defeat: Saddam Husayn as a criminal, he still rejected the mass destruction. And so while Fadlallah regarded intimidation, Muslims needed their own weapons of beforeweeven enter battle.” To stand toupsuch a nuclear one, an argument “intended to defeat us Muslimswiththreats thatthenext war would be intimidatecouldIsraelthe UnitedStatesand the that would strengthen it.” In the present situation, power to prevent this state from acquiring weapons hasthem, thearrogant usealltheir pressure and weapons to defend itself against nuclearanother wants state country Islamicthat an that reported is it problem,”Fadlallahwhencomplained. “But states have nuclear weapons, and it poses no great littledoubtthatfavored he “Weit. that seemany for an Islamic nuclear capability, and Fadlallah left that power.” This could only be read as an 20, 30,argument or 40 years before we will be able to attain to develop that power in the future. We might wait The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ - - - - The West’s own vision had to be resisted—and the order” resting on a gross disequilibrium in its favor.allowed to end history now, or becreate not couldWesta The others.dominate“newto have world fend itself; if it were to realize its destiny, it would were to avoid being destroyed, it would have toreturn de to its proper status as a world power.of Ifnormalization, Islam he nurtured the vision of Islam’s power in contemporary Islam. Beneath the soft line Fadlallah had become the foremost philosopher of the spirit of rejecting “global arrogance.” powerif,deepwithin themselves, theykept alive destiny of the weak.” The weak would obtain that reminded his followers. “Weakness is not the eternal the Islamic Resistance back on course and ready forFadlallah1991, springofaccord.the By declared in late 1990, after Hizbullah and Amal reached an Israelis.Thestruggle against Israel resumed only sistance launched only sporadic attacks against the to1990 Shiites shot atShiites, andthe Islamic Re The attrition proved anything but steady. From 1988 created by Israel to patrol the “security zone.” the SLA—the South Lebanon Army, a client militia by a steady war of attrition against Israeli forceswithdrawal and from the Sinai.” This was forreturn toin do tobehad Egypt return,as achievedinIsrael from southern Lebanon without having to recognize next objective: “We want the Israelis to withdraw following year, Fadlallah clearly stated Hezbollah’s of guerrilla attacks by the Islamic Resistance. The most of south to a “security zone,” largely as of a the Shiites.result In 1985, Israel had withdrawn from did not seem to be beyond even the limited power task of driving Israel from Lebanese territory. This gance,” Lebanon’s Muslims had the clearly defined confrontationtheLebanon. In “globalarrowith of the day, he kept one ear firmly to the ground of WhileFadlallah explainedgreatworldthe issues the abnormality known as Israel. first test would be the West’s attempt to “normalize” The Threat of Peace 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 47 - - - Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback corrupting the land and its people.” Recognitionpeople.”its and land corruptingthe over the South and the Bekaa in absolute freedom, the Resistance, you would see all the Jews swarmingupon Lebanon’s innocent Shiites: “Were it not for Israel’s war, for it would unleash a plague of Jews tion. Israel’s peace was far more threatening than hungry not for territory but for economic domina Again he conjured up images of a voracious Israel— Thetask ofpersuasion fell squarely onFadlallah. began to see Israel in its full complement of colors. Israel—at the very moment when many Arabs had bullah had to paint the blackest possible picture of retaliation by Israel? To argue that itoccupationand thanworse would be reallyIsrael be,with Hiz resistance.Wouldpeaceof point the question to attacks against it, the war-weary of Lebanon began the resolution and dealt out retribution of fire for teralIsraeli withdrawal. But when Israel rejected Security Council resolution that called for a unila security guarantees, invoking a 1978 United Nations all of Lebanon in exchange for a peace treaty and previously rejected Israeli offers to withdraw from also questioned the logic of resistance. Lebanon had callous disregard for their suffering. Other Lebanese these villages charged the Islamic Resistance with to Islamic Resistance fighters. As a result, some in sheltergave wheneverthey zonesecurity the of north justvillages the upon downshells raining rence. Israel also rediscovered the power of artillery, sualties did not mount fast enough to make a diffe forces, absorbed most of the attacks, and Israeli ca “securitytheBut zone”Israeliheld.SLA,notThe into the SLA and rise up against occupation. habitants of the security zone to reject recruitment nextpagehistory.theof imploredheAnd inthe Resistance that they, not the diplomats, Islamic the wouldof fighters thepromised writeHe suasion. per hispreachforceresistanceofto the all with operations.”From his pulpit, Fadlallah continued Resistanceofresult a as 1985 and 1983between as the Israelis withdrew from the rest of the South enemy as to force him to pull out of the zone,’ just IslamicResistance could inflict such losses on the its mission. “It is not impossible to suppose that the The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ ------wouldrush in. The Islamists had to oppose peace IsraelIsraelcrack,andofwoulddoora openthe Iran quickly summoned a conference to oppose negotiations.peacethedirect in Lebanon,including ning breakthrough: Israel sat down with Arab states, tober 1991, the United States orchestrated the stun But history lurched in a different direction. In Oc against Israel. sums of money to help the villages stand steadfast to sacrifice, while Hizbullah promised ever-larger to shoulder the burden. Fadlallah called upon them of Islam in this struggle for survival, and they had voice.” The villages of the south were the front linewith Israel “even if they remain the last rejectionist gradually changed: the forcible expulsion of Israel Fadlallah’sfollowedround1992,anotherin tone negotiatingone As zone.security its fromIsrael tain a guerrilla war susthat- had to any impossible chance became of it driving operations, armed dictatedtalksthecadenceHizbullah’sof thethat limiting attacks during the negotiating rounds. Now it imposed more and more restrictions, especially Islamic Resistance from launching operations, but preventthe not didSyria peace. for landcupied oc of tradepossible discussingthe Israel, posite negotiatingthelowers.at optablesatSyria also fol hishimself—or delude not FadlallahYetdid the Islamic nation as tion of the Palestine problem in the consciousness ofand foil it by active means, which force the recrea cumstances was clear: “We need to encircle this world.plan Thedutyofthe believers theseindire cir Arabentire the ofpoliceman the becomewould Islamic—recognitionofitslegitimacy. Israel then would receive Arab and Palestinian—perhaps even would be reduced to a national minority, while allIsrael stay with the Jews.” In the end, the Palestinians tion, but defense, security, and foreign affairs will West Bank and Gaza will get municipal administra peace talks: “The Golan will remain occupied, the to paint a grim picture of the likely outcome of the this and every other opportunity, Fadlallah rushed talks, which Fadlallah attended and addressed. On the central Islamic problem.” 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 48 ------Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback forced to make peace with Israel: still had avital role to play, even if Lebanon were inescapable. But Fadlallah did not despair. Hizbullah to Fadlallah might conclude that he thought peace through negotiations.” Adepts who listened closely observed.he phase“Thisnormalizationofoneis dialogue,” continuous this through Israel accept mentalitytoArab conditionthe toorder in pace med stalemated. “The talks are moving at a snail’s no solace in the fact that the Syrian-Israeli talks with see Lebanon will also be achieved.” Fadlallah took a peace agreement with Syria,” he warned, “peace pressure to make concessions, and “if Israel signsunder come also wouldSyria not.” or it like we strongest facts on the international scene, whether undisputed fact on the ground, indeed, one of the a growing resignation. “Israel has now become an evendarker, Fadlallah’sand statements reflected mid-1992, the cloud of peace over Hizbullah grew AfterIsraelielectionnewthegovernmenta of in of divine intervention. only a few years earlier now required nothing short baseour life onmiracles.” What seemed possible instructed us to act according to His law, and are not a topeople who believes in miracles, but God has performsmiraclea andshows Hispower. We.. . Godruefullyconcluded,“unless capabilities,”he Resistance cannot expel the occupier in its present from the south faded into the distance. “The Islamic The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East “ issued against purchasing Israeli goods and re normalization.be Fatwascombatshould to ploytheir Qur’anic and Islamic legal culture de Islamistsmustschemes.The future and way, concerning both their historical conduct the Qur’an speaks about the Jews in a negative relying on the literal text of the Qur’an, because need to awaken the consciousness of Muslims, the Qur’an, Islamists have ofmuch vocabularyof what the they In security. and nomics, personlimtoIsrael,politics, in culture, eco against the subjugation of the Arab and Mus- battle the be will Israel reconciliation with “ The battle which will commence after http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ - - - - Israel,” he consoled them, “this will not mean they Islamiststhe freezetheir military actions against Hizbullah not to despair when that day arrived. “If bullah to lay down its arms altogether. But in he future,urged Fadlallah expected they would force Hiz after a massive Israeli bombardment of the south; Hizbullahto stop the rocket firings against Israel, the Syrian and Lebanese governments did compel return for American and Israeli concessions. In 1993, thosecards,restraining IslamictheResistance in Syrian and Lebanese governments would play just cards to play.” Fadlallah expected that one day the give“thedelegations conducting thenegotiations best they might drain Israeli resources, and perhaps eyeexchanges would never liberate thesouth. At will also be killed by one of our rockets.” ourBut civilianseye-for- is killed by its rockets, a Jewish . . civilianIt must be made clear to Israel that when one of elderly and shells our villages while it sits in timizationsafety. of civilians: “Israel kills our children and civilian targets. But Hizbullah did not initiate the he vic had reservations about the use of rockets againstrael in retaliation for Israeli shelling of villages. Hizbullah’sTrue, decision to fire rockets into northern Is- backed a major escalation. In 1992, he sanctioned Fadlallah still preached Islamic Resistance, and even between peoples. peace between governments from becoming peace social action against normalization—to prevent the bullah would adopt a new strategy of political and Hiz did, itworld. WhenArabthe regimes ofthe cobbling together agreements between Israel and rebodingthatUnitedthe States wouldsucceed in expectationsregardingfoarmedstruggle, a and dwindling his Fadlallah’sreflected vive.thought Nowseemedit essential Hizbullahif were tosur with Israel would have been considered defeatist. past,planningtheIneventuality thefor peaceof become a natural member in it. of the effort by Israel to encircle the region committedand to Islam. But this will hamper much complete success, because not all Muslims are ceiving the Israelis. The Islamists may not enjoy 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 49 - - - - - Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback Lebanon, and its leaders shuddered at the prospect flourished like weed the a untendedin garden of viewed it with apprehension. The movement had agreement,thetoandparty Hizbullaha wasnot been held since 1972. by general parliamentary elections, which had not The legitimacy of the new order was to be amountedconfirmed to a shadow protectorate over Lebanon. all militias, in return for a privileged standing that of the agreement, which included the disarming of Christian parity. Syria guaranteed implementation a revamped confessional order, based on Muslim- foreignforces. Butthe interim stage provided for nonconfessional,democratic allLebanon, offree Ta’if so-called Accord The envisioned Ta’if. the eventual of creation town of a resort Saudi the in survivingparliamentarians tosign agreementan Lebanon’s of majority a persuadedthey 1989 in and the United States all sensed the exhaustion, andtheir livesmakemoney.and Syria,SaudiArabia, rebuild to longedthey militias; ofarrogance the toloosen their grip. People were tired of war and had held the country in their thrall since 1975 tobegan an end. The political and sectarian passions that InLebanon, too, anera of domestic conflict drew parliamentary politics. Hizbullah threw its turban in the ring of Lebanese tory would come—and that it would come sooner if Fadlallah also assured the believers that their vic But minds. forstruggle a intoresistanceIslamic movement would have to translate the concept of gimesmakeIslamictopeaceIsrael,withtheand miracle,aUnited the States wouldforce Arabre this clearly and spoke it frankly. Unless God workedcould it survive to fight another day. FadlallahIslamicmovementthe sawchangeadapted ifto Only situation changes.” confrontation, even in a narrow margin, until the every opportunity, however small, to continue the have sheathed their swords. It means they will seek The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ Ballots for God - - for the country’s partition. plan: it “cancelled” the war and put an end to calls Fadlallah saw only two positive achievements in theched Lebanon’s “corrupt confessional framework.” of the Lebanese people, and their deal had entren who met at Ta’if represented only about a quarter theatrics.”Fadlallah’s“mereBy reckoning,those weresurrounded negotiationsithad plexwhich an Arab headdress and a Lebanese fez.” The com portrayed it as “an American project which needed voice to Hizbullah’s denunciations of the accord. He veto over the Muslim majority? Fadlallah added his if the Christian minority were guaranteed a virtual nalism. How could an Islamic state ever be created Furthermore, the agreement perpetuated confessio of a strong government in Beirut, backed by Syria. a form of governmentformof a that“accordsmajoritythe rule.” Therefore, Islam could not be reconciled with Godwhoisprescribedit thegeneral precepts for gative of God. It is God who appointed the Prophet;to Islamic thought, because rule in Islam is a ideaprero of popular sovereignty’ is an idea that is findingforeign that the two could not be reconciled.“The principles, general contrasting the Islamic ideal considered with democracy and first Fadlallah tions—and turned to Fadlallah. tions drew nearer, Hizbullah agonized over its op democracy? As Lebanon’s own parliamentary elec throughpower for reachIslam not mightfailed, against them. Now that revolution in Lebanon had despite the fact that regimes often rigged elections impressivescoredresults,movements had these resultingthein parliamentary elections. Someof and Islamic movements had decided to participate regimes toward half-measures of democratization, Arab countries, pressures from below had pushed rehabilitated state. Others pointed out that in other the movement should have nothing to do with the electionsit called for? Some in Hizbullah thought parliamentarythe boycott Hizbullah should But bullahtodaredblocktrynotimplementation.its Syria’sdeterminationHizaccord,enforcethe to Of course, such criticism could only go so far. Given 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 50 ------Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback movementswere themost effective means ofpo considerably. and Parties limits those narrowed people.”freedomtimes,ofhowever,At Fadlallah protect the Islamic line, while not infringing on the by allowing this pluralism, “within limits that will that were intended. Islam would be better served nial of pluralism produced effects oppoiste to those pointedhistoricalthat,inout experience, de the lam had to be protected from debate, but Fadlallahconciled with Islam. Some Muslims argued that Is- development of thought, he said, and could be re times suggested. Political pluralism promoted the Howmuch freedom? Quitebit, aFadlallah some strategies and tactics. have to allow freedom for those advocating differentThey were not to be regarded as infallible, and mic would lines” and would be accountable to the people. These elected leaders had to act within president. “broadof office waythethrough theIsla all Iran, tative council could be elected by the people, as in rules.” In Fadlallah’s view, members of the consul administration in relation to general Islamic legal to examine new matters of economic and political to investigate the Islamic laws at their sources, counciland is not to legislate,” Fadlallah stressed, “but on such consultation. “The role of the consultative An Islamic system of government had to be based oath of allegiance—a vote of confidence, as it were. him to do so, the Prophet requireasked not the didMuslims God for although an Andcompanions. action of war or peace without first consulting his shura, Theinstrument for filling the gaps was known as whichIslamleaves administrativeto discretion.” andsocial questions orfilling gaps in Islamic law hadto“develop modeforadealing withpolitical Still,therewasrole fora peoplethe to play. They to God’s law.” would allow the people to legislate in contradiction turally we are not democrats, in the sense that we overturn the will of God, as codified in His law.parliamentaryNo majority, “Na however large, could the right to legislate in opposition to Islamic law.” The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East or consultation.orProphetno took theEven http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ ------to the content of Islamic thought.” not mean unlimited choice. Rather, it is restricted gives the nation “the right to choose, but this does be permitted—but only if they were Islamic. Islam liticalorganization of the people, and they would democracy by Islamists principledrejectionofthe even Thus, worse. far There were many forms of government that were forobjective justice, and the rejection of tyranny. some positive content: respect for others, the search Fadlallah, democracy was deeply flawed. But it had mocracy could be made palatable. True, observed thesecircumstances,direinmenu.And evende it was the Islamic state that did not appear on the world,realthe inIslamic ideal.Butwasthe This retofore varied political diet to that of Islam. we all eat.” But he would restrict the country’s he lah once declared: “Freedom is the table from which Lebanon without freedom had no meaning, Fadlal “ “ lam, and to allow unbelievers and the arrogant the Islamic order, to weaken the appeal of Is- wouldmean granting freedom to overthrow that they should enjoy freedom, because that in thought, law, and way of life. It is becausenot theynatural represent an alternative to Islam will of the majority. Islamists would have no the cause of Islam or achieve total control by and rally the people around it, and so advance revivefreedomtheirspreadandIslamtoit, rejected, because Islamists can then exercise tyranny and chosen be should Democracy of choosing between democracy and tyranny. character has no Islamic content, if it is a tingmatter positively with democracy in states whose means. Islam cannot permit this on principle. tellectual and political struggle, all by “legal” to infiltrate the Islamic nation and end its in no role in Islamic society or the Islamic state, zations, the Islamic view is that they can have “ “ As for non-Islamic parties and organi should not prevent them from coopera 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 51 ------Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback party’s platform would be the welfare of the disparty’swelfare- platformthetheof would be political party, its clerics to become candidates. The Fadlallah urged the “party of God” to become a for real Islam there.” A decade after Hizbullah’s creation, can pass a law for Islam here, and secure a ganda position podium for the Islamists. . . . In this Islam:way, “Parliament you represents an advanced propa and protected platform for carrying the message of Lebanon’s national assembly provided a powerful the parliamentary elections. Fadlallah believed that context of Lebanon, this meant full participation in encirclement of Islamic resistance and jihad. In the politics, as the only way to break out of there”?theFadlallah growingfavored complete immersion in or herepower take to them forway the clear to seats, waiting for the Prophet to send down angels their in opponents“sitpropose?To his did what plans.” And since the road of jihad was blocked, ofthis liberation, just according to their own political fruit the harvest would others but example, for political dimension, “we would liberate the South, sion became stepping stones for others. Without a that jihad movements that had no political dimen Fadlallah strongly disagreed. History demonstrated enjoyed widespread support in the Bekaa Valley. Hizbullah,who in clerics senior most the of one view was championed by Shaykh Subhi al-Tufayli, politicking.Thispollutionof avoidthe and jihad concentrateAlgeria.Bettertohappenedin on as a parliamentary majority, they would be crushed, ment legitimated a non-Islamic state; if they gained a parliamentary minority, their presence in parlia way they could win total control. If they remained toriouspoliticalarguinggame, wastherethatno recoiled Hizbullahatthe very idea ofjoining Lebanon’s no in Some reality? to Accommodation The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East to contest one another. (alongsidenon-Islamicmovements)vement tothefreedoms accorded totheIslamic mo or practice. It is accommodation to reality, and Islamists of democratic rule, either in thoughtthe recognitionby mean not doescertainly such freedom under a dictatorial regime. This http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ - - - - - political leaders, from communists to Phalangists. of rangeremarkablywide a with meet to began politics also meant coalition politics, and Fadlallah possessed and rejection of peace with Israel. Party forces—Syrian and Israeli—they might not be held were postponed until the withdrawal of all foreign But by summer he had changed his mind. If electionsthat Syria would allow a freer contest at a lationlater of thedate. polls, Fadlallah apparently presumed conducted only after 1994. Wary of Syrian manipu free of any pressure,” he announced, they should be of 1992, Fadlallah hesitated. “If elections are to be Syriabegan to press for elections for the summer Still, Fadlallah was in no rush to the ballot box. When parliament. bullah had the firmest foothold in the resurrected Birri, but these remained unstable groupings. Hiz around one or another personality, such as Nabih ria. There were rival blocs of deputies who formed of deputies who were personally subservient to Sy largest single party in a parliament formed mostly ted to the 128-member body, making Hizbullah the and Tyre. All eight Hizbullah candidates were elec andHirmil, and took the most votes inNabatiyya impressive. Hizbullah’s candidates swept Baalbek limitations of the electoral system, the results were Islamic parties, and several independents. Given the theProgressive Socialist Party (Druze), two Sunni lavishlystruckandpre-election deals withAmal, moneyspent Tehran.Tammany Itcativethan of ral machine mounted a slick campaign, more evo Hizbullah’selectoareas.Shiite all candidatesin movementthethat,fieldingjustand1992, didof parliamentary elections scheduled for the summer Iran joined him in urging Hizbullah to contest the This time, Fadlallah’s persuasive power prevailed. never in its entire history had such elections. mination, Fadlallah pointed out that Lebanon had could have free and fair elections under Syrian do those in Hizbullah who asked how Lebanon possibly forHizbullah tofight the peace parliament.in To anArab-Israeli peace accord. Itwould betoo late for four or five years, by which time there might be 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 52 ------Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback red by the state of Lebanon; or to head theor Supremeotherwise, of Hizbullah; to hold any office confer He did not want to be regarded as the guide,This claimspiritual suggested the direction of his ambition. world and perhaps in Europe, America, and Africa.” not the Lebanese, and I have Islamic ties in ofthe Lebanon:Arab “I am concerned with the Islamic level, pointed to followers far beyond the narrow country,”heboasted.frontiers thisonceAndto came he I Lebanon 80 percent of the Islamic condition since show. “I am the one who established and set up in show humility. Yet on rare occasions his pride did alwaysGod of conventionman ademanded that do so would have been considered bad form, contemporarysinceToShiism.in standing own his of pantheon of grand ayatollahs. Fadlallah never spoke tical club,” Fadlallah positioned himself to join the HizbullahAs took itsplacetheLebanesein “poli own ambition to encompass the globe. narrow its ambition to Lebanon, he expanded his paradoxically, while Fadlallah urged Hizbullah to oftheirobjectives. allmadeIteminent sense. Yet work within Lebanon’s institutions to achieve some IslamistswereLebaneseas anyone, as couldand “unstable,” torn among conflicting visions. Still, the for the foreseeable future, Lebanon would remain ties in Lebanon could make the country in its image;create an Islamic republic. None of the existing par elections. So too was the idea that the Islamists power could in Lebanon,” Fadlallah said bluntly after the “Itunrealisticis totalk about achieving complete his personal view of those who clung to old slogans.rences within Hizbullah, but he left no doubt about discussed the increasingly frequent reports of diffe militant principles, he maintained. Fadlallah never interviews. The movement had lost touch with its tohishometheinBekaa Valley tosulk andgrant his position on the consultative council and returned tating an open rift in the movement. Tufayli resignedresults. But no decision ever came so close to Hizbullahprecipi had every reason to be pleased with the The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East The Grand Ayatollah http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ - - - - - lingson contested or ambiguous questions. Some minaries.Believers referred backtothemforru right,usually after a lifetime of study in Shiite se sourcesbecame sources of guidance in their own for“source.” Afew clerics who best knew Islam’s as known rity theleading him,Shiite clerics hadexercised autho Beforean tradition. bent also had Khomeini it to his own advantage. of shape that he himself could dare to manipulate by his time, that tradition had been bent so far out so, he had to play by certain traditional rules. But grandayatollah.assumetomantleathe of Todo in Fadlallah’s long preparation had positioned him of believers from London to Lucknow. Everything passionatevenerationunlimitedandrespect the commandedShiism, ofpinnacle the atesconced lah was born and bred in a world where a clericsfew whomen, could claim a universal following. Fadlal recognition as one of the handful of leading Shiite Islamic Shiite Council. Instead he aspired to winning and the insane. Khomeini, however, argued that the clerics should serve as guardians for the orphaned tationheld that the Prophet merely intended that guardianship of clerics? Traditional Shiite interpre precisely did the Prophet intend to place under the this one was open to multiple interpretations. Who known as vestedclericsthewithanother authority,kindof saying attributed to the Prophet Muhammad which leave government to others. He based himself on a jaf,who challenged the notion that clerics should Na inexile ofyearsKhomeini,was hisduringIt tually absolute. one or another cleric, whose However, at times a wide consensus formed around marjaiyya wereacknowledged thattheguides,widely soas tial rulers. There were usually several clerics who of Islam, but they did not see themselves as poten They admonished rulers to adhere to the precepts did not claim the authority to govern, only to of guide.these questions might be political, but the clerics wilaya, need notbeconcentrated inonehand. marjaiyya, or guardianship. Like all sayings, rm h Aai word Arabic the from marjaiyya 14/12/2010 00:04 became vir Page 53 ------Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback tures appeared in a Beiruta 1979,editionandturesappearedain in divided Lebanon’s Shiites as well. Khomeini’s lec dividing issue of contemporary Shiism, which soon Najaf for Beirut. But he could not escape the great Fadlallahdebatebegan,leftthis timehad the By supported by tithes from his followers worldwide. ronto, London, Islamabad, Bombay, and Beirut, all presidedoverinstitutes NewYork,in Detroit, To foundationKho’i’sNajaf:in just notporters, and purity. Kho’i’s traditional stand also had many sup affairs.Hisbest-known treatises dealtwith ritual Iraqavoidingand commentallcontemporary on refraining from any involvement in the politics of generations. Kho’i himself set a personal example, serve the inherited knowledge and learning of pre todutypast a hadseminaries,Shiitethey where Jurisprudentsargued.theKhomeini belongedin no business exercising mundane political power, as that it conformed with the law of Islam. Clerics washad to supervise government from afar, to assure doclericmight maintainedKho’ia mostthethat own teacher, Kho’i, who continued to teach in PerhapsNajaf. his most worthy opponent was Fadlallah’s with Khomeini’s expansive view of their authority. leadingShiiteclericstheconcurredof Yet all not seminaries for the highest positions in government.their leftstudentsforemost His Iran. of“leader” phed, he emerged as the constitutionally empowered the Shah’s regime, and when the revolution trium nally led the political struggle for the overthrow of Khomeini personified his own doctrine. He perso existinglegitimacynyingallgovernments.theof his premise became active claimants to power, de in Najaf in 1970. Those Shiite clerics who accepted systematically in lectures delivered during his exile tion to Shiite thought. He presented his views most al-faqih, guardianship of the jurisprudent, known as Muslim jurisprudent, the argued, but also government by the most qualified ted not only the implementation of Islamic law, he entirethe community believers.of Islammanda Prophet enjoined clerics to claim guardianship over The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East became Khomeini’s revolutionary contribu http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ faqih. This expansion of the wilayat ------fication with Iran’s revolution had made him into in politics bound him to Khomeini, and his identi a prominent place. Yet Fadlallah’s own immersion empireinfluence,of whichin Fadlallah occupied Beirut. His aged teacher presided over a far-flung Kho’i, and officially represented the Najaf cleric in lahfaced adifficult choice. He had studied under bookthatargueda opposing the position. Fadlal publishedquicklyscholarShiiteLebanese noted years his seniors. by Khomeini and Kho’i, who were some thirty-five definition of Shiism, and it could only be conducted dlallah—the debate over his followers began to address him as grown—after1985,Ayatollah hadstature his hisAlthough Fa an influential player and an international celebrity. stated gingerly, thesame matters. “But there isanother view,” he chaos, as different clerics might rule differently on bility that a multiplicity of leaderships might create corner of Islam. Fadlallah also admitted the possi hadbeen entitled to exclusive obedience in every whoImams, the ProphetMuhammadand the of the unity of leadership, particularly the examples Muslimworld. Fadlallah knew the arguments for kind of authority as Khomeini, in other parts of sibilitythethat otherclerics could exercise same the retical principle, Fadlallah did not rule out the pos- inspire “high esteem.” Indeed, as a matter of theo was not the sole authority, and other clerics could by choice, not by obligation. In his eyes, Khomeini Fadlallah accepted Khomeini’s general authority, but “ a deputy of the Imam. rule] are plentiful, so that each one of them is jurists, among whom these qualifications [to principlethatappliedbecan to manytheof dianship, but instead speaks about a general exclusive, comprehensive dimension of guar about fromthe theory, since the text which speaks ring the absence of the Imams is not a deviation “ wilayat al-faqih which holds that multiplicity in rule du wilaya does not speak about the involved the very 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 54 ------Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback supporterslet itbe known that their man did not While Fadlallah formally welcomed the choice, his at the time of his election, at the tender age of fifty.nary credentials, but he was not even an ayatollah Iran’s “leader.” Khamenei had impeccable revolutio Khomeini’s most trusted student, to succeed him as Assembly of Experts elected Sayyid Ali Khamenei, Khomeini died in 1989, at the age of eighty-six. lived,Iran’stheyalone defined the terms the debate.of however, knowing that while Khomeini and Kho’i He put forth no comprehensive theory of his own, contemporaryShiism.in issueburning most the Fadlallah thus gave himself room to maneuver on an unseemly public debate over Fadlallah’s ideas. the better judgement of Iran’s emissaries prevented and sought to refute and rebuke him publicly. OnlyHizbullah werescandalized Fadlallah’sby views, inclusion in a vast “central Islamic state.” Some in sion to Khomeini and promised Lebanon’s eventual of Iran’s emissaries, who insisted upon total submis- Such an argument clearly contradicted the message Shiitecommunity.”thereligiousthree leaders in or two are generationthereevery “in order,for tiplicitysuchauthorityof constituted naturalthe jurisprudent.learnedmulmosttheIndeed, a of their own, provided he combined the qualifications “guardian.” They were free to choose a guardian of Lebanon’s Muslims need not follow Iran’s chosen were self-evident. If his argument was admissible, far-reachingThe implications Fadlallah’sof view multiplicity of leaderships.” the states,andmultiplicity ofthe impediment to of the juristic data in our hands, we do not learned.”find Fadlallahany thus concluded that “on the basis community in agreeing on the definition of the most argument:weakthispointin difficultythe the of anduniversal authority, Fadlallah emphasized “a exclusivetoentitledwas cleric learned most the with rule over their affairs.” As to the argument personsamequalities,thewhohas vest andhimthat Muslims of another land could agree on a different qualified person their ruler, “at the same time the In other words, if the Muslims of one land made a The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ - - consensusmeaningoftheabout self was quick to point out again that there was no regard Khamenei as his better. And Fadlallah him seminaries. Such a consensus soon emerged around informalthebyconsensusShiite the clerics ofin quiteindependent oftheIranian state, conferred wider question of the hostagetualIraqiregime.theofopened This the Kho’i died in 1992, at the age of ninety-three, a vir contraction. the frontiers of Iran. He obviously welcomed that wilaya clearly expected that with Khomeini’s passing, the especially on the point of its universality. Fadlallah “doing harm to all Islam.” Others lingered on as lingeredon OthersIslam.” all to harm“doing clerics,studyintoworldwentyearsouttheasin contemporary needs. Persons who spent only two behind the times and their structure no longer met pointview,of academiesthe werefourcenturies Islamics,homiletics.and organizational Froman buted to Muhammad), theology, philosophy, general as the Qur’an, Hadith (sayings and traditions attri not offer proper instruction in such basic subjects prudence and its methods ( in Najaf and Qom, he complained, taught only juris- seminaries as irrelevant to leadership. The schools tial of any great in Najaf or in Qom, had been the customary credenmarjaiyya. Shiite seminaries, the traditional incubators for the He began by leveling criticism at the state of the great positioned himself to provide an original answer. probably in no more than a few years. Fadlallah the nowquestion of the rity.” But Golpayegani’s advanced years assured that strongly” said Fadlallah, “and we support his autho did not hesitate: Golpayegani’s name had “emerged cleric’soldcamp.the WhenKho’idied,Fadlallah positioningIran,squarelyhimselfinto visits his Golpayeganirespectstohis payon tobegun had sembled those of Kho’i. Even before this, Fadlallah Qom, also ninety-three, whose views on politics re Ayatollah Sayyid Muhammad Reza Golpayegani of of his electedsuccessorhiscontractwould of to The headship of such a seminary, either marja. marjaiyya marjaiyya, Fadlallah now dismissed the furu would be posed again, and a form of authority wilayatal-faqih, 14/12/2010 00:04 usul ). They did Page 55 ------Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback The multiplicity of clerical authority constituted an clerics, since they affected the entire Islamic world. social issues—these could not be dealt with by local relations with other religions, the great political and bal scale. The tensions between Islamic schools, the challenge facing Shiism could only be met on a gloonce made them—but now he determined that the argumentstheknewmultiplicity—he forHe had sed his position on the “multiplicity of leadership.” that Khomeini and Kho’i were gone, Fadlallah rever Sucha leader would have a global mandate. Now every issue related to the general welfare of Islam. politicaltakewouldIslamiconstandslaw. toHe would not simply issue rulings on matters related mitted to him or direct experience.” And the to the smallest details, either through reports sub a person aware of events as they unfold dailyas Islamdown is open to the world. He would have to be marja theimaginethat seminary:“I the of life the only couldtherole fulfilledbe scholar a by who knew world affairs “down to the last nuance.” No longer person would have to possess a commanding grip of personality of the new conditions for the elements that make up the nated throughout Shiism. “It is necessary to specify nounced on politics. And few of their names reso proneverhad whopeople seminarieswere the at hand. Future candidates for the role of clerics, and were not up to the political task raries, had differed with Khomeini over the active ning great ayatollahs, Khomeini’s aged contempo world politics. Fadlallah pointed out that the remai nuancesof Islamic law, but in the complexities of the in only figure versed, not a handledby be to questions that faced Shiism were political and had importance in the exercise of the kinds of questions “which no longer have great In Fadlallah’s view, the seminaries had specialized in examinations, and formal graduation. reform: admission standards, curriculum reform, perpetualstudents. Fadlallah favored sweepinga The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East would have toopenbe to the entire world, http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ marja,” Fadlallah concluded. This ijtihad marjaiyya .” The burning marja from ------sadors. Fadlallah then drew a remarkable parallel: various countries, who would function like ambas- specific problems. He would have representatives in assistedby experts who would prepare studies of speak to people and open their minds. He would hisbe seat, but would travel throughout the world,at remainto not would He off.predecessor left his so that the new ments of all the rulings of the previous incumbents, headquarters. It would house a collection of permanentdocu a institutionwith single a as blished Fadlallahuniversalenvisioneda tages, the disadvantages are greater.” obstacle to a unified approach:“With all its advan often proposed the unattainable in order to achieve Shiite lingering nonagenarian. This transformation of the only be filled by a vital man in his prime, not by a obviously demanding role of a traveling rationfor a leader with a global mission. And the Certainly Beirut, not Qom, was a better dialogue?baseexperiencein his journalism, ofand and ope diplomacy incontacts his affairs, current of dge clerical candidate surpass Fadlallah in his knowle themarja strongly resembled his own. Could any coincidence that the “personality” he envisioned for a providenotonlydiddetailThe washe suchhow Islamicprecedent.haveanmight suggestit dare sharp a break with Shiite tradition that he did not the of Fadlallah’s idea marja “ such as Islam, Judaism, Buddhism, and so forth. Christian denominations and other religions, concern internal affairs or relations with other there are Catholics or Christians, whether they all the questions that arise in countries where representativesthroughwith actsdeal who comprehensive religious character. The papacy cultural, and social positions in accord with its example of the papacy, which thetakes political, of role the imagine I marjaiyya would beselected. Butperhaps itwas no “ hn lo fr n xml o how of example an for look I When marja seemed far-fetched. But Fadlallah could begin precisely where marjaiyya marja, ersne so represented marjaiyya, 14/12/2010 00:04 marja I find the find I could esta Page 56 - - - - - Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback too would become a sacrifice. At some point, in the avoid preparing himself for the possibility that he apparent moment of their triumph, so he could not seen other men of ability and ambition perish at crificethe before yielding the ultimate reward. He had Lebanon had a way of demanding the ultimate sa guided him. Fadlallah, of course, knew otherwise. light divine a that impression the createddeath Fadlallah’s own seemingly miraculous escapes from away from the precipice. him to lead them. Sure of foot, he would steerthe despisedthem would seize Fadlallah’s robe, imploring in pitch darkness. At those moments, the hands of times,the believers would have to grope forward It offered no panoramic views of God’s kingdom; at That road was winding and sometimes treacherous. long road toward the distant goal of Islamic power.a steady mix of appeals for action and caution, minenton a redemption. His own preaching represented in Hizbullah to conjure up messianic visions of im persuasion to this quality. He allowed other clerics in illusions.” Fadlallah owed his immense powers of reality. I learned to be pragmatic and not to drownFadlallah ofhisearly years, “butthat thecause is “I learned that the slogans are not the cause,” said would be its acknowledged master. of the Dahiya as the new citadel of Arab Shiism.transplant He from Najaf, personified the emergence of civil war, seemed poised to flourish. Fadlallah, a ravaged. Beirut, emerging from the desperate years ning under the weight of the Iraqi Bath, had been redistributionofauthority inShiism. Najaf, groa personal triumph, but would confirm the geographic still closer. His success not only would represent a thedemise ofeach elderly ayatollah brought him talentdrivetheandconquertosummit,this and layoutsideFewIran.doubtedFadlallah that had sing Lebanon and the half of the Shiite world that leading lights, in a sphere of influence encompas- eventual recognition as one ofat aimShiism’s to seemed twohe case, thisor attainable.In threethe The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East A Leader in Islam http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ - - - though prepared for martyrdom, I prefer that it “AlbeChurchill’s adage:subscribedtohave would precaution.Fadlallahpossibleevery take to and advanceslowlytoprudent only was itdangers,” by bounded“road a uponembarkedhaving But surface appearances. their fromjudged accurately be not could depth faith—reservoirswhoseandambition, vision, of death. This he did by drawing upon inner reservoirs fear, and above all the fear of violent, unexpected against fear,” he had to suppress and banish hiswill neverown go back.” In order to lead the “rebellion placed myself on a road bounded by dangers and asto threaten: Ido not fear death, because Ihave waysuchasayanyone totalksinwhoI me. to it martyrdomgranttoyetthirtyforyears.has God had chosen not to flinch. “I have readied possibilitymyselfthefacedsuddenhaddeath ofand he for aftermath of one or another assassination attempt, did this at the University of London or the theSorbonnemodern criticism ofreligion andIslam. Some ted it, recreating their faith through a dialectic withappealed to tradition. They themselves had repudia vokedthe name of Islam. Their leaders no longer dershipcontemporarythein movements thatin alsohadcomeHetopersonify kindnewleaofa to personify the ambiguity of Hizbullah. it. By the very ambiguity of his pose, he had come Shiites to reach out for power, he attempted despised,to he grasphoped to guide them. By callingthe uponfor speaking By others.control to sought he that dam. By demonstrating exemplary self-control, the service of a higher purpose. Fadlallah would be dam were erected to manage its waters prudently,raging flood of infervor would spend itself unless a elemental emotions. Yet Fadlallah warned that the grievance,vengefulness, and ambition—the most a whole. Hizbullah drew upon great tributaries of And he urged the same caution upon Hizbullah as as closely as his bodyguards protected his person. word, might spell disaster. He guarded his tongue and every utterance, for a mistaken step, a wrong postponed.” Fadlallah deliberated over every move 14/12/2010 00:04 Page 57 - - - - Printed with joliprint Click here to send your feedback of Arabic press materials. A first draft was written mentation Center for guaranteeing the steady flow University.gratefulDocuamitsof I toHaimGal for Middle Eastern and African Studies at Tel Aviv I researched this study at the Moshe Dayan Center Acknowledgments of Islam would be beyond measure. of Islam. If it did not, the loss sustained by the the rewardfaith would be great indeed for the domain tremendous sacrifice would propitiate God. If it did, in its reach. Fadlallah gave every assurance that paring this effort to mobilize every resource and symbol last chance to regain power in the world, by similaran unsmovements,- thus offered Islam perhaps its discarded altogether. Fadlallah, like the leaders of Thesewerereworked,God.with downplayed, or intimacyof senseheightenman’s to only served Othertraditions rituals,and especially Shiism,in Islam.”“truebecame struggle contributedthe to inspire Muslims to battle? Those bits of Islam that ser to power? Every ritual was reexamined: did it to one exacting criterion: did it bring Muslims clo at almost any cost. Every tradition was submitted of this power bred a deep yearning to repossess it, preoccupied with the pursuit of power.identity,political a The as Islamremainedabsence there lah, Islam? For these leaders, and above all for Fadlal Butin the absence of tradition, what remained of modernity they had successfully acquired. students, whose egos had been battered by the very polemic had a particular appeal for young Muslim journals of the Western academy. This postmodern borrowedfrom thefaculty lounges andscholarly attacked the West by replaying its own self-criticism,disowning large parts of Islam’s tradition. And they med the devastating modern criticism of Islam by andall familiar things.” These new leaders disar supposed to be traditional, rebelled against tradition jaf, as Fadlallah attested: “My studies, which were But it could even be achieved in the seminaries pursuedNa doctorates in Western law and philosophy. theorAmerican University ofBeirut, where they The Oracle of Hizbullah: Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlallah Martin Kramer on the Middle East http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/reader/archives/oracle-of-hizbullah-sayyid-muhammad-husayn-fadlallah/ - - - - - during a year spent as a fellow at the Woodrowthe atfellow a as spentyear a during the Sayyid. Wright, who shared with me their impressions of derson,NoraBoustany, George Nader, Robinand Finally,I learned much from talks with Terry An completion to the gentle proddings of Scott Appleby.study’sowetheSciences, andIArts demyandof the Fundamentalism Project of the American Aca revisions, I benefitted from a close association with investigation of religion and violence. During final Colvard for including this project in the Foundation’swriting stages, and I am especially grateful to KarenFoundation provided support at the research and andSamuel Wells. The Harry Frank Guggenheim my friends on its staff, Robert Litwak, Walter WilsonReich, Center’s director, Charles Blitzer, and theencouragement fromfrommuch drew I D.C..ton, Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washing

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