Hizb Ut-Tahrir: Islam's Political Insurgency
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HIZB UT-TAHRIR Islam’s Political Insurgency Zeyno Baran The Nixon Center December 2004 About the Nixon Center The Nixon Center is a non-partisan public policy institution established by former President Richard Nixon shortly before his death in 1994. Committed to the analysis of policy challenges to the United States through the prism of the American national interest, the Center is a substantively and programmatically independent division of the Richard Nixon Library and Birthplace Foundation. Major programs of The Nixon Center include the Chinese Studies Program, Immigration and National Security Forum, International Security and Energy Program, National Security Program, Regional Strategic Program, and U.S.- Russian Relations Program. Topics addressed by the Center’s programs range from U.S. relations with China and Russia to energy geopolitics in the Persian Gulf and Caspian Basin and European security issues. The Center is supported by the Nixon Library and Birthplace Foundation endowment as well as by foundation, corporate and individual donors. Copyright 2004 The Nixon Center. All Rights Reserved. “Hizb ut-Tahrir: Islam’s Political Insurgency” By Zeyno Baran The Nixon Center 1615 L Street, N.W., Suite 1250 Washington, DC 20036 Phone: (202) 887-1000 Fax: (202) 887-5222 E-mail: [email protected] Website: www.nixoncenter.org Editing, Layout and Design by Thomas M. Rickers Order from the Richard Nixon Library and Birthplace Foundation 1-800-USA-8865 INTRODUCTORY NOTE This Nixon Center monograph, Hizb ut-Tahrir: Islam’s Political Insurgency, breaks new ground in exploring the danger posed by the spread of radical Islamist ideology. The focus of this monograph is Hizb ut-Tahrir al-Islamiyya (The Islamic Party of Liberation), which has successfully sown the seeds of an ideology encouraging a clash of civilizations in over forty countries. HT takes advantage of the open societies of the West to spread its strongly anti-American and anti-Semitic ideology. HT thereby provides terrorist networks such as al- Qaeda and the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan with ideological cover. The findings and recommendations of this monograph are crucially important to ensuring long-term U.S. security. Zeyno Baran, Nixon Center Director for International Security and Energy Programs, has termed HT a “conveyor belt” for radicalism and terrorism, and suggests that “the tolerance of intolerance is no longer acceptable if we are to win the battle of ideas.” Her focus on this battle of ideas as the essential part of the War on Terror makes an important contribution to the ongoing debate on how best to secure America’s future position. Her recommendations are both visionary and realistic if we are to succeed in what she calls “our generation’s existential struggle.” Forthcoming Nixon Center monographs include one by David M. Lampton and Travis Tanner of the Chinese Studies Program. The monograph will appear this spring and will examine the impact that Taiwan's March 2004 presidential elections and December 2004 Legislative Yuan elections will have on cross-Strait relations. Dimitri K. Simes President The Nixon Center CONTENTS EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 1 CHAPTER 1 7 The War of Ideas CHAPTER 2 16 The Party of Liberation CHAPTER 3 48 Global Threats CHAPTER 4 67 The Battle for Central Asia CHAPTER 5 94 Government Strategies CHAPTER 6 130 Recommendations ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This monograph is based on personal interviews with Western and Central Asian government officials, political scientists, policy analysts, theologians, historians, sociologists and representatives of non-governmental organizations as well as with Hizb ut-Tahrir members. It also incorporates the findings of a number of Nixon Center workshops held on the subject of Hizb ut-Tahrir since 2003. The papers presented at the Nixon Center workshop entitled, “The Challenge of Hizb ut-Tahrir: Deciphering and Combating Radical Islamist Ideology” in Turkey in February 2004 were published as a conference report, which is available in print and online at www.nixoncenter.org. It would not have been possible to complete this project without the assistance of a number of people who are committed to winning the war of ideas—our generation’s existential struggle. First, Matthew Bryza and Hedieh Mirahmadi have given me tremendous intellectual and personal support. Evgueni Novikov helped me to coordinate my research in Central Asia. At the Nixon Center, my colleague Fritz Ermarth has given me valuable insights. Program assistant Jarod Krissman and associate Emmet Tuohy have also contributed greatly through their research, writing and editing. Program interns Ben Schwarz and Katherine Winkler helped with research. Liz Coleman contributed to the monograph during summer 2004. Tom Rickers edited and formatted the monograph. My purpose in writing this monograph is to shine light on a group that is acting as the intellectual vanguard of the radical Islamist movement. I believe, as children of Abraham, Muslims, Christians and Jews, all need to move towards building a global civilization based on shared values of freedom, justice and human dignity. Zeyno Baran Washington, DC December 2004 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY The United States began its War on Terror immediately following the 9/11 attacks. Yet, more than three years later, it still has not sufficiently grasped the enemy’s nature and ultimate goals, and thus has not developed effective strategies to combat it. So far, the main tools used against the terrorists have been the military, the intelligence agencies and the nation’s law enforcement personnel, which have carried out a range of operations from the invasion of Afghanistan to the reduction in financial flows to terrorist organizations. Though such methods will reduce the ability of the terrorists to hit the U.S. and its allies again, they do not address the existential problem of the spread of an ideology that is fundamentally in contrast to the democratic capitalist system and the Western conception of freedom. This ideology exploits certain Islamic teachings to unite the global Muslim community, or umma, to bring down the existing world order. While our attention over the last three years has focused on well-known terrorist organizations such as al-Qaeda, Hizballah, Hamas and Jamaat al- Islamiyya, we have not paid sufficient attention to the ideological and theological aspects of their challenge to the West. The 9/11 Commission Report concluded that the enemy is “not just ‘terrorism’, but is the threat posed specifically by Islamist terrorism, by Bin Laden and others who draw on a long tradition of extreme intolerance within a minority strain of Islam that does not distinguish politics from religion, and distorts both.” The report’s emphasis on ideology, rather than on specific terrorist tactics, as the primary threat to the United States is indeed the correct one. Terrorism itself is only a tool; one must look at the political objective for which it is being utilized. This monograph is the result of one year of research on a group that is winning the hearts and minds of Muslims, in pursuit of radical political objectives. It is doing so by using the rhetoric of democracy and a message of non-violence to mask its more radical objectives. But these objectives can only be achieved through violence. This research focused on Hizb ut-Tahrir al-Islamiyya (HT), the Party of Islamic Liberation, which effectively combines Marxist- Leninist methodology and Western slogans with reactionary Islamic ideology to shape the internal debate within Islam. HT was founded in East Jerusalem in 1953, and over the subsequent half century has become a global network with headquarters in Jordan and London. It spreads a radical Islamist ideology that is fueling anti-American and anti-Semitic sentiments. While HT as an organization does not engage in terrorist activities, it has become the vanguard of the radical Islamist ideology that encourages its followers to commit terrorist acts. While HT is active in most parts of the Muslim world (where it aims to overthrow governments) and in the West (where it aims to unite the Muslims 1 around their Islamic identity and thus prevent their assimilation), its most significant operations take place in the strategically vital region of Central Asia. Of the five post-Soviet states of Central Asia, the main battleground is Uzbekistan, in which HT strives to replace the secular regime, by force if necessary, with an Islamist state, or Caliphate. Uzbekistan’s poor human rights record has certainly helped HT’s recruitment. HT’s extremely undemocratic nature and its puritanical interpretation of Islam challenge America’s goal of bringing freedom and stability to Central Asia. Historically, the United States has not paid a great deal of attention to Central Asia; the region has only occasionally been viewed as important. However, it was the key prize of the “Great Game” between Russia and Great Britain of the 19th and 20th centuries and is still highly sought after by both Russia and China. While the U.S. is officially opposed to the revival of such competition, its energy and security policies are indirectly playing into this contest of influence. The main American achievement in Central Asia has been the establishment of military cooperation, which bore great fruit after 9/11. The Uzbekistani government permitted the U.S. Air Force to use the Karshi-Khanabad (K2) base in southern Uzbekistan, a facility that proved crucial to U.S. operations in neighboring Afghanistan. The Kyrgyzstani government made its Manas base available, while Kazakhstan and Tajikistan provided other valuable assistance. The importance of the military support of Uzbekistan was aptly demonstrated during the Afghan War. With the largest population in the region, Uzbekistan could in the future become even more strategically important in the fight against the growing presence of anti-American Islamic ideology in the region. Although today’s repressive political environment gives few clues to indicate this, for centuries Uzbekistan was the center of an enlightened, tolerant and spiritual Islamic culture.