Naval Academy Foreign Affairs Conference 2001
Terrorism: Old conflicts in new clothing?

"Terrorism in the name of Allah"

Islamic fundamentalism as sign of the "Clash of civilizations"?

OFR z.S. 

Sebastian Hergott

University of the Armed Forces
Munich, Germany

Table of contents

1) Introduction

2) Characterizing Terrorism

3) Characterizing the Islamic fundamentalism

4) Why is religious fundamentalism dangerous?

5) Conclusion

1) Introduction

"On 26th February 1993, at approximately 12.18 p.m., an improvised explosive device exploded on the second level of the World Trade Center parking basement..."¹ Killing five people and injuring a couple of hundred people, the World Trade Center bombing still is present in the USA. "On Wednesday, 21 December 1988 at 7:03 pm GMT a Boeing 747 airliner owned and operated by Pan American World Airlines and cruising at 31,000 feet exploded above the small town of Lockerbie. Pan Am Flight 103 had taken off from London Heathrow some 38 minutes before and was en route to JFK Airport in New York. Aboard the aircraft were 243 passengers and a crew of sixteen. None survived.", another tragic moment in world history .² What do these two incidents have in common? They are both acts of international terrorism. But they share another common characteristic. They are religious motivated acts of terrorism. And this is quite important. In my personal opinion this kind of terrorism is rapidly increasing.

It isn′t easy to talk of terrorism in general. You have to distinguish between different types of terrorism and different intentions. Anyhow, the most incidents of terrorist attacks are religious motivated. Mostly they result out of Islamic fundamentalism. But one will find those patterns of terrorism in almost every religion. As Shireen Hunter says, "Despite legitimate Western fears of terrorism, it is also time to recognize that there is nothing unique about Islam when it comes to the choices of war or peace, pluralism, or authoritarianism. Judaism, Christianity, Confucianism, Buddhism, Taoism, and Shintoism have all had periods in which some in their midst utilized repressive religious laws or theological principles to commit unspeakable acts of brutality and terror. Indeed, this is one of the critical foundations of the Western drive to the secular, democratic state." (Hunter 1998, 9)

The IRA fighting in Northern-Ireland refer to a Christian background. In Israel you′ll find Zionist settlers which refer to their religion in order to use violence. All these terrorist acts are religious motivated and there are much more examples to find all over the world. They share one common goal, trying to destabilize their political system in order to gain influence. They are mostly a threat to the world security. The Islamic fundamentalism however, in the sense of another kind of terrorism, refers to a religion as well. Of course fundamentalism doesn′t have to end in a terrorist act. In a lot of cases however it does. Whenever I′m talking of Islamic fundamentalism in this paper, I′m talking about this fundamentalism in a sense of violence, in a terrorist sense.

This kind of terrorism is seen as a major threat for western societies. Samuel P. Huntington even states that the major conflict in the near future will be the clash of the West and Islam. "The principal conflicts of global politics will occur between nations and groups of different civilizations. [...] The West′s next confrontation [...] is definitely going to come from the Muslim world. [...] On both sides the interaction between Islam and the West is seen as a clash of civilizations." (Huntington 1993, 32)

In this paper I′d like to point out why the West fears the Islamic Fundamentalism. I will try to describe the characteristics of this type of terrorism. What are its motives? What is the danger for Western civilizations? And finally, does the West really have to fear the Islamic world?

[...]

1 Compare to URL: http://www.interpol.int/Public/Publications/ICPR/ICPR469_3.asp (3-21-01)

2 Compare to URL: http://www.thelockerbietrial.com/from_lockerbie_to_zeist.htm (3-21-01)