Intro: The real mind boggling threat is that Muslim boys and girls are romanticising violence in the name of Jihad and are heading to Iraq and Syria.
Hardly a day passes when sympathisers of Islamic State (IS) are not intercepted or caught while attempting to join the barbaric force of IS in Iraq and Syria. Young Muslims are travelling to Iraq to join and fight along the IS terrorists. In India, we often read and hear, adolescents run away from their homes to go to Mumbai to become film stars. But what is mind boggling is that Muslim boys and girls are romanticising violence in the name of Jihad and heading to Iraq and Syria. Recently three young British Muslim girls left their families and are believed to have joined the IS, knowing very well the treatment meted out to captured Kurdish, Yazdis and Christian women and girls as young as 6-7years old by the IS terrorists.
Back home, many Muslim boys inspired by the IS have left the country to join the ever growing army of the faithful. Four youths from Klayan—Arif, Fahad Shaikh, Saheem Tanki and Amaan Tandel went to Iraq to join IS. Mehdi Masroor Biswas, who operated IS Twitter account was arrested from Bengaluru. The account was a source of incitement and information for new ISIS recruits.
The brutality of IS militants has created awe amongst the Iraqis, which is reminiscent of Mongols yore. The same onslaught people of Indus Valley Civilisation had experienced when Muslim invaders ransacked cities after cities, plundered, looted and destroyed temples, killed men and enslaved women and children, imposed Jaziya tax on Kafirs (Hindus). But the leftists and secularists in India have denied these facts on the ground that carbon dating is not available to prove horrendous acts of violence by the Muslim invaders against the people of Indus Valley Civilisation.
Islamic State justifies its actions based on Hadees and Quran. In its digital magazine Dabiq, IS explicitly justifies enslaving captive women as mentioned in Sharia “If one were to deny or mock, he would be denying or mocking the verses of Quran and the narration of the prophet and thereby apostatising from Islam”. Whereas, according to books of Sunni traditions, “The prophet forbade mutilation or maiming of bodies. Several Sunni Muslim scholars believe tattooing is a sin because it involves changing the creation of God—It is seen as an attempt to beautify that which was already perfected.
Outside Iraq and Syria, IS has carried out executions of the minorities. In Libya it recently released a video showing execution of 21 Coptic Egyptian Christians from Egypt at a beach in Libya. IS had also released a disturbing video where it set afire captured Egyptian air force pilot. It has carried out the execution of US journalist James Foley and Japanese journalist Kenji Goto. Every day, we read new ghastly acts perpetrated by the IS not only in Iraq and Syria, but in Libya also. In Iraq, fighters after capturing Al-Baghdadi, located near Ain al-Asad airbase believed to have burnt 45 people. In another development, 90 Assyrians were kidnapped after IS fighters overran the villages of Tal Shamiran and Tal Hermez. Islamic State militants in northern Iraq have ruined a priceless collection of sculptures and statues from the ancient Assyrian era. Similarly, al-Qaeda whose writ once ran in Afghanistan had destroyed the statues of Lord Buddha. In Kashmir Valley hundreds of Hindu temples have been destroyed, encroached and converted into commercial properties. Same is true in Sunni Pakistan where Shias’ Mosques are attacked by suicide bombers killing hundreds of Shias.
The question is how come Islamic militants, al-Qaeda or Kashmiri separatists understand peaceful Quran in the same manner. What is in Quran that inspires hundreds of youths to join terrorist organisations from Iraq, Syria, Chechnya, Pakistan to Bangladesh, and indulge in unimaginable violent acts? Now Chinese government claims that at least 300 people have joined IS from its remote Xinjiang region. Many Muslims were detained at different airports in Europe as they were suspected to join the IS, and Britain is mulling the idea of introducing a law to try to stop airlines carrying passengers who may be travelling to join IS in Syria and Iraq. But will such racial profiling be enough to stop the motivated Muslims?
Manoj Sharma (The writer is a senior columnist)
