by Kim Wright
While the immediate concerns of ISIS are twinned with the fate of nationals in Iraq and Syria, India would appear not to be under threat from the influence or concern of ISIS. Presently the group seems focused on its fight for a Sunni caliphate along the Iraqi-Syrian border and in the Middle East. However, as ISIS has stated its global ambitions of an Islamic World Dominion, India is revealed as both a target and opportunity for the radical Islamic group.
After the declaration of the caliphate, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was reported as stating, “Muslims’ rights are forcibly seized in China, India, Palestine, Somalia, the Arabian Peninsula, the Caucasus, the Levant, Egypt, Iraq, Indonesia, Afghanistan, the Philippines, Ahvaz, Iran, Pakistan, Tunisia, Libya, Algeria and Morocco, in the East and in the West. Prisoners are moaning and crying for help. Orphans and widows are complaining of their plight. Women who have lost their children are weeping. Masajid are desecrated and sanctities are violated. Terrify the enemies of Allah and seek death in the places where you expect to find it. Your brothers, on every piece of this earth, are waiting for you to rescue them” [sic].
Al-Baghdadi explicitly identifies India as a prime target for ISIS.
Claims of persecution, intolerance or social injustices aside, India's failure to modernise its 150-million strong Muslim minority creates an environment that perceivably could foster ISIS mantra and influence. Unlike in the West, where one law for all citizens is a cornerstone of secularism, India allows its Muslims to follow Sharia in matters of marriage, divorce and inheritance. Ultimately, ISIS, just like al Qaeda, is fighting to impose its interpretation of Sharia on the world and by ceding to Sharia at home India has inadvertently met ISIS halfway.
News reports from India also indicate that Indian Muslims are signing up to fight with ISIS in Iraq. Last week, one of them, a 22-year-old engineering student named Arif Majeed, was reportedly killed in a US airstrike. The Wall Street Journal writes that he left behind a letter to his family in which he explained his reasons for travelling from his home outside Mumbai to Iraq: "It is a blessed journey for me, because I don't want to live in this sinful country."
Consequently, security forces within India are faced with the potential growth of a troubling phenomenon: Muslims that manage to slip under the security radar and return home from ISIS involvement and fermenting trouble given their exposure to the radical, extremist and apocalyptic narratives of the group. The powerful, yet misguided theological narrative of ISIS ideology being true to religion will be as deceptively attractive to Indian Muslims as it has proven with other Sunni groups.
For ISIS, India remains a target for the growth of its terrorist organisation and as a human resource pool for jihadists.
http://www.obs.com.mt/news/291/1/ISIS--The-Islamic-State-threat-to-India
While the immediate concerns of ISIS are twinned with the fate of nationals in Iraq and Syria, India would appear not to be under threat from the influence or concern of ISIS. Presently the group seems focused on its fight for a Sunni caliphate along the Iraqi-Syrian border and in the Middle East. However, as ISIS has stated its global ambitions of an Islamic World Dominion, India is revealed as both a target and opportunity for the radical Islamic group.
After the declaration of the caliphate, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was reported as stating, “Muslims’ rights are forcibly seized in China, India, Palestine, Somalia, the Arabian Peninsula, the Caucasus, the Levant, Egypt, Iraq, Indonesia, Afghanistan, the Philippines, Ahvaz, Iran, Pakistan, Tunisia, Libya, Algeria and Morocco, in the East and in the West. Prisoners are moaning and crying for help. Orphans and widows are complaining of their plight. Women who have lost their children are weeping. Masajid are desecrated and sanctities are violated. Terrify the enemies of Allah and seek death in the places where you expect to find it. Your brothers, on every piece of this earth, are waiting for you to rescue them” [sic].Al-Baghdadi explicitly identifies India as a prime target for ISIS.
Claims of persecution, intolerance or social injustices aside, India's failure to modernise its 150-million strong Muslim minority creates an environment that perceivably could foster ISIS mantra and influence. Unlike in the West, where one law for all citizens is a cornerstone of secularism, India allows its Muslims to follow Sharia in matters of marriage, divorce and inheritance. Ultimately, ISIS, just like al Qaeda, is fighting to impose its interpretation of Sharia on the world and by ceding to Sharia at home India has inadvertently met ISIS halfway.
News reports from India also indicate that Indian Muslims are signing up to fight with ISIS in Iraq. Last week, one of them, a 22-year-old engineering student named Arif Majeed, was reportedly killed in a US airstrike. The Wall Street Journal writes that he left behind a letter to his family in which he explained his reasons for travelling from his home outside Mumbai to Iraq: "It is a blessed journey for me, because I don't want to live in this sinful country."
Consequently, security forces within India are faced with the potential growth of a troubling phenomenon: Muslims that manage to slip under the security radar and return home from ISIS involvement and fermenting trouble given their exposure to the radical, extremist and apocalyptic narratives of the group. The powerful, yet misguided theological narrative of ISIS ideology being true to religion will be as deceptively attractive to Indian Muslims as it has proven with other Sunni groups.
For ISIS, India remains a target for the growth of its terrorist organisation and as a human resource pool for jihadists.
http://www.obs.com.mt/news/291/1/ISIS--The-Islamic-State-threat-to-India
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