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The term "Islamofascism" is a controversial political epithet used to suggest that certain variants of Islamism have fascist or totalitarian aspects. "Fascism" has been traditionally invoked to describe the merger of state and corporate power under a totalitarian government.

Origins of the term

Although the exact origins of the term are murky, it appears to have been coined either by Khalid Duran, Stephen Schwartz or Christopher Hitchens. The coining or popularisation of the term is frequently attributed to Christopher Hitchens, a prominent critic of Islamic Fundamentalism, based on his article in The Nation immediately following the 9/11 attacks, where he used the phrase "Islamic fascism". . Hitchens also used the phrases "Islamic fascism" and "theocratic fascism" to describe the fatwa declared against Salman Rushdie for writing The Satanic Verses.

After the 9/11 attacks, the concept of "Islamic fascism", later shortened to "Islamofascism", took root in the blogosphere, where it was used by right-wing bloggers to describe the ideology of the Islamic terrorists who attacked the World Trade Center. It remains a popular term on neoconservative blogs such as Little Green Footballs.

Application of the term

Some people have used the term "Islamofascism" to refer to Wahhabi or Salafi Islam, which they suggest displays aspects of fascism or totalitarianism. They claim that these sects:

• Promote the establishment of a global Islamic nation-state under Sharia law.
• Propose the inevitability of violent conflict between Dar al-Islam (Muslims) and Dar al-Harb (non-Muslims), which will end with the eventual victory of Muslims over the infidels.
• Promote terrorism and violence to further their goals.
• View Jews, Israel and America as implacable enemies of Islam, which must be subjugated or destroyed.
• Reject political concepts such as intrinsic human rights, egalitarianism, and democracy.

It should be noted that, whether or not the above allegations are true, they have little or no connection to the generally accepted definition of fascism.

Some applications of the term "Islamofascism" specifically refer to the Muslim Brotherhood and similar movements in Sunni Islam inspired by the writings of Sayyid Qutb while others use it to refer to all politicized strains of Islam, including Shi'ism as practised in Iran. A more common and less loaded term for these politicized strains of Islam, which seek to replace secular governments in Muslim countries with Sharia law, is Islamist. Note, however, that Islamism is a diverse political category, which covers also political movements such as Turkey's Justice and Development Party, which do not seek to overthrow secular constitutions. (See also Islamic democracy.)

Critics of the term claim that "Islamofascism" is simply a derogatory epithet directed towards Islam as a whole, and not a real political concept or ideology. They claim that the term attempts to conflate the neutral concept of Islamism with the negatively perceived concept of fascism. They further suggest that those who use the term rely on a politically unsophisticated understanding of "fascism", which simply understands it to be synonymous with totalitarianism. They also point to the fact that the fascist-derived ideologies in the Middle East such as the Kataeb Party and the Syrian Social Nationalist Party have been violently opposed to Islamism and have been supported by mainly Christian populations.

Supporters of the term contend that the fusion of oil wealth within governments that are arguably totalitarian is consistent with the definition of fascism. In Saudi Arabia and Iran the oil industries are nationalized (operating as Saudi Aramco and National Iranian Oil Company respectively) and are significant sources of government funding. However, those who reject the term "Islamofascism" contend that nationalized oil wealth, particularly as found in the Middle East, is only distantly related to the system of corporatism implemented under actual fascist regimes such as that of Benito Mussolini.

Most Muslims feel that the comparison of Islamic extremism to ideologies such as Nazism or other forms of fascism is offensive and nonfactual. Some former Muslims such as Ibn Warraq feel that Islamism represents a a threat to the ideals of western democracies in the 21st century equal to that of fascism in the 20th century Some moderate muslims such as Tariq Ramadan, point to democracies in Turkey and Indonesia, (both major nations with large Muslim populations and Islamist movements), as proof that Islam itself is compatible with democracy and is not an inherent threat to democracy in any part of the world.

Commentators on Islamofascism

• Andrew Sullivan — U.S. journalist and blogger has used the term several times in his blog.
• Christopher Hitchens — British journalist based in the US has written about what he calls "Islamic fascism".
• Joseph Sobran — Conservative Catholic commentator who writes, "Islamofascism is nothing but an empty propaganda term. And wartime propaganda is usually, if not always, crafted to produce hysteria, the destruction of any sense of proportion. Such words, undefined and unmeasured, are used by people more interested in making us lose our heads than in keeping their own."
• Clifford May — president of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies. "What we have to understand is ... this is not really a war against terrorism, this is not really a war against al Qaeda, this is a war against movements and ideologies that are jihadist, that are Islamofascists, that aim to destroy the Western world."
• George Orwell — the British essayist and novelist writes "...the word ‘Fascism’ is almost entirely meaningless. In conversation, of course, it is used even more wildly than in print. I have heard it applied to farmers, shopkeepers, Social Credit, corporal punishment, fox-hunting, bull-fighting, the 1922 Committee, the 1941 Committee, Kipling, Gandhi, Chiang Kai-Shek, homosexuality, Priestley's broadcasts, Youth Hostels, astrology, women, dogs and I do not know what else."
• Juan Cole, professor of modern Middle East and South Asian history at the University of Michigan writes "it is hard to see the difference between the bigotry of anti-Semitism as an evil and the bigotry that Medved displays toward Islam. It is more offensive than I can say for him to use the word "Islamo-fascist." Islam is a sacred term to 1.3 billion people in the world. It enshrines their highest ideals. To combine it with the word "fascist" in one phrase is a desecration and a form of hate speech. Are there Muslims who are fascists? Sure. But there is no Islamic fascism, since "Islam" has to do with the highest ideals of the religion. In the same way, there have been lots of Christian fascists, but to speak of Christo-Fascism is just offensive."
• Richard Webster — Author of A Brief History of Blasphemy: liberalism, censorship and 'The Satanic Verses'. He wrote in the New Statesman "The idea that there is some kind of autonomous "Islamofascism" that can be crushed, or that the west may defend itself against the terrorists who threaten it by cultivating that eagerness to kill militant Muslims which Hitchens urges upon us, is a dangerous delusion. The symptoms that have led some to apply the label of "Islamofascism" are not reasons to forget root causes. They are reasons for us to examine even more carefully what those root causes actually are." He adds "'Saddam, Arafat and the Saudis hate the Jews and want to see them destroyed' . . . or so says the right-wing writer Andrew Sullivan. And he has a point. Does the western left really grasp the extent of anti-Semitism in the Middle East? But does the right grasp the role of Europeans in creating such hatred?"

See also

• Islamism and Islam as a political movement — Islam as a political movement.
• Islamic democracy
• Islamophobia

External links

• Andrew Sullivan Interview from INDC Journal
• The Islamofascist Agenda by Deroy Murdock in National Review
• How the right played the fascism card against Islam — The Guardian (4 February, 2005)
• What is Fascism?, by George Orwell

• Articles for deletion using wrong syntax
• Pejorative political terms
• Islam
• War on terror