The Muslim Ummah has rejected the destiny that was once decided for her in faraway European capitals. A future that was concocted in the West over hundreds of years to make her abandon Islam, tear down the shield of the Khilafah State and to think and behave as others do. What now remains of the West’s edifice upon the Ummah is also weakening day by day as the Muslim world fully awakens from the disasters of the past century.
Assessing where the Ummah is at this point in time is not difficult. Multiple opinion polls and surveys all indicate the same desire for unity, and even if one was to cast doubt about the polls, there is enough evidence from the Muslim world, that the citizens are openly rejecting the west and its agents and demanding Shari’ah and Islamic government. The aim of the foreign presence in Muslim lands is to sow discord and suppress the call for Khilafah.
The last decade and a half has confirmed that calls for greater westernisation of the Muslim lands are proving hollow. Western intervention via the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq will forever be associated with the indiscriminate killing of wedding party guests or the hooded images of prisoners in Abu Ghraib. For western values we can read-across to the cartoon insults against the Prophet (SAW) and the united reaction to defending the Prophet’s (SAW) honour whether in the streets of Karachi, Rabat or Jakarta.
In earlier times, some may have dabbled with socialism and Arab nationalism as a way forward, but they never had any traction amongst the masses. A message to deny Allah (SWT)’s existence or divide Muslim from Muslim with artificial lines in the sand was never going to work. These and other ideas failed for the simple reason that they contradicted the belief of millions of Muslims and ran counter to fourteen hundred years of Islamic civilisation.
The western colonialists came to the Ummah like a second rate salesman, desperately trying to convince a potential customer that his present car is no good, is too old, does not work and needs to be scrapped. And that the new, shiny car on offer is actually the ‘dream car’; worth lots of money and is perfect for his lifestyle. The Khilafah State was sent to the breakers yard in 1924 and replaced with the ‘shiny new car’ the colonialists gave us. And many from amongst the Ummah were at first keen to look after it, sit in it, show it off to others and were convinced it looked great.
Within a few years though, the paint was peeling, the windows were cracked, the tyres were bald and the engine spluttered. The model the colonialists left behind led to occupation, corruption and injustice in our lands. No matter who was in the driving seat or how much it was repaired the Ummah suffered repeated breakdowns and failures. Soon the reality of the decrepit ‘rust bucket’ car that the West gave us was plain to see. Nothing but a total replacement, a new vehicle, would bring back the Ummah’s dignity, glory and destiny.
Rejecting foreign ideas alien to Islam over the years has been easier than removing the vice-like grip the western backed tyrannical rulers have held on Muslim societies. Despite the brutal attempts by the state apparatus to quell the Ummah by torture, oppression and imprisonment, she has remained steadfast.
The struggle against the regimes for Islam and Shari’ah is seen in the thousands that are held in the jails of Damascus, Amman and Baghdad. Many more within these lands are spied upon and harassed by the security forces for daring to challenge the authority of the tyrants. The defiance of the Ummah in holding on to her Islam has been inspiring; witness the underground masajid in places it was a ‘crime’ to regularly pray; those that spoke out against the rulers until their tongues were literally cut out; the yearning for Islamic knowledge, after years of Communism, the patience of our mothers and sisters in preserving their modesty, in far-flung places it is difficult to pronounce.
The demands of the ‘Arab Spring’ in the last few years were a manifestation of the Ummah’s resistance and perseverance. Their cries of “As-Sha’b yureed isqaat an-Nizam”/“the people demand the fall of the regime!” were not only chanted in the streets and squares of the Arab world, but echoed throughout the Muslim world. Though the thousands who came out of their houses to demonstrate against the Pharaohs of Tunisia, Egypt and Syria have not seen their ultimate aim achieved, this is not a failure, but merely the beginning of the end of the West’s chosen leaders’ grip upon the Ummah.
In all this time the Ummah’s love and solidarity with their brothers and sisters in Palestine, Kashmir and other places has remained true. Money, aid, medicines and much more besides have all made their way to those in need showing that when one part of the Ummah suffers, the rest responds.
Let us be those who are part of the rewriting of history, by working to establish the Khilafah. Through our efforts and struggles we can put capitalism in the dustbin of history and give rise to the only civilisation fit for humanity.
