Which story line sounds the more credible – that linking the rebel movement ISIS (the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria) to policies pursued by Iran or that linking the Sunni extremist force to Iran’s adversary Saudi Arabia?

In June this year, fighters belonging to ISIS – a rebel movement that had previously established its foothold in the oil-rich areas of north-eastern Syria – succeeded in capturing Mosul, a city surrounded by oil fields in northern Iraq. Ever since, commentators in the world’s media have been speculating on the origins of the dreaded organisation’s military success.

It is admitted that the occupation of Mosul and vast tracts of the Sunni-dominated portion of Iraq would not have been possible except for the fact that ISIS forged a broad grassroots’ alliance expressing deep discontent by Iraq’s minority Sunnis with the policies of Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Al-Maliki’s government. Nor would Mosul have fallen but for the dramatic desertion by top-officers of Iraq’s state army.

Peter Custers

Yet various observers have meanwhile focused on the political economy behind the advance of ISIS. Some experts from U.S. think tanks have discussed the likely sources of ISIS’ finance, pinpointing private donors in Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states. Other writers instead have connected ISIS’ reliance on black market sales of oil in Kurdish territory with Iranian exports of crude, described as “illegal”.

I propose putting the spotlight on the methods of war financing used by ISIS, but first it is necessary to highlight the movement’s complete sectarianism.

Soon after the occupation of Mosul, rebels blew up and bulldozed shrines and mosques in the city belonging to Shia Muslims. Pictures on the demolition of these buildings were circulated widely by the world’s mainstream media. Unfortunately, few Western journalists cared to draw attention to the role which destruction of shrines has played in the history of Islam.

Contrary to Catholicism, the veneration of saints at Sufi and Shia tombs and shrines basically reflects heterodox tendencies within the Islamic faith. On the other hand, Sunni orthodoxy and especially its Saudi variety, Wahhabism, either condemns intercession or, at the least, considers the worshipping of saints at tombs to be unacceptable. Islam’s minority of Shias, and its mystical current of Sufism, freely engage in such worship – and this throughout the Muslim world.“ISIS is … a ‘religiously inspired’ Sunni extremist organisation with an utterly secular objective: to control the bulk of oil resources in two Middle Eastern states in order to re-establish acaliphat, an all-Islamic state-entity guided by a central religious authority”

ISIS’ work of demolition in Iraq can in no way be equated with practices of Iran’s Shia rulers. Instead, they express the extremist movement’s affinity with policies long championed by Saudi Arabia. Ever since the founding of the Saudi state, numerous Shia and Sufi shrines have been rased to the ground at the behest of this country’s Wahhabi dynasty.

What does the political economy behind ISIS’ military advance in Syria and Iraq tell us about the organisation’s affinities? First, in one sense, the ISIS strategy might be interpreted as rather novel.

Whereas the extraction of raw materials is a war strategy pursued by numerous rebel movements in the global South – see, for example, UNITA’s extraction of diamonds in the context of Angola’s civil war, and the trade in coltan by rebels in the Democratic Republic of Congo – rarely has a Southern rebel movement succeeded in turning crude oil into its chief source of revenue.

Indeed, whereas ISIS originally relied on private funders in Saudi Arabia to build up a force of trained fighters, the organisation has consciously targeted regions in Syria and Iraq harbouring major oil fields and (in the case of Iraq) oil refineries. By laying siege to the oil refinery at Baiji, responsible for processing one-third of oil consumed in Iraq, ISIS hoped to undermine the state’s control of oil resources.

Further, some 450 million dollars was stolen by ISIS fighters from a subsidiary of Iraq’s central bank after the occupation of Mosul. This reportedly was all income from oil extraction. Some observers put the cash income which ISIS derives from smuggled oil at one million dollars a day!

ISIS is thus a ‘religiously inspired’ Sunni extremist organisation with an utterly secular objective: to control the bulk of oil resources in two Middle Eastern states in order to re-establish acaliphat, an all-Islamic state-entity guided by a central religious authority.

Yet though ISIS’ methodology of reliance on oil for financing of its war campaigns is novel for a rebel movement, such use of oil is not unique in the context of the Middle East. Ever since the 1970s, most oil-rich countries of the region have squandered a major part of their income from the exports of crude by (indirectly) exchanging their main natural resource against means of destruction – weapon systems bought on the international market.

And while Iran under the Shah was equally enticed into opting for this form of trade in the 1970s, – it is the Wahhabi kingdom of Saudi Arabia which all the way through from the oil crisis of 1973 onwards and up to today has functioned as the central axe of such a trade mechanism.

Witness, for instance, the 1980s oil-for-arms (!) ‘barter deal’ between the Saudi kingdom and the United Kingdom, the so-called ‘Al Yamamah’ deal, and the 60 billion dollar, largest-ever international arms’ agreement between Saudi Arabia and the United States clinched in 2010.

Forward to 2014, and an Iraq desperately struggling to survive. A section of the world’s media has already announced its impending demise, predicting a split of the country into three portions – Sunni, Kurdish and Shia. On the other hand, some commentators have advised that the United States should now change gear and line up with Iran, in order to help the Iraqi government overcome its domestic political crisis.

Yet the United States and its European allies for long, too long, have bent over to service the Wahhabi state. Even as Western politicians loudly proclaimed their allegiance to democracy and secularism, they failed to oppose or counter Saudi Arabia’s oppression of, and utter discrimination against, Shia citizens.

For over 40 years they opted to close their eyes and supply Saudi Arabia with massive quantities of fighter planes, missiles and other weaponry, in exchange for the country’s crude. Playing the role of a wise elderly senior brother, the United States has recently advised Iraq’s prime minister al-Maliki, known for his sectarian approach, that he should be more ‘inclusive’, meaning sensitive towards Iraq’s minority Sunni population.

But has the United States’ prime Middle Eastern ally Saudi Arabia ever been chastised over its systematic discrimination of Shias? Has it ever been put to task for its cruel oppression of heterodox Muslims? And has the United States ever pondered the implications of the trading mechanism of disparate exchange it sponsored – for the future of democracy, food sovereignty and people’s welfare in the Middle East?

*  Peter Custers, an academic researcher on Islam and religious tolerance  with field work in South Asia, is also a theoretician on the arms’ trade and extraction of raw materials in the context of conflicts in the global South. He is the author of ‘Questioning Globalized Militarism’. 

Scattered across 17,000 islands on the Indian and Pacific oceans, the world’s largest Muslim country has found its own blend of Islam: equal parts religion, secularism and contradictions.

Add to that an extract from the Quran that says, “To you your religion, and to me mine,” and you have Indonesian Islam in a nutshell.

Dr. Abdul Mu’ti of the Central Board of Muhammadiyah – the second largest Islamic civil society organisation in the country, embracing 30 million people – told IPS that Indonesian Islam is completely unique to the country, and does not easily find comparisons in the Muslim world.

When the holy Ramadan fast began on Jul. 21, it arrived almost unnoticed in the country. Loudspeakers that usually blast prayers starting at dawn have been turned down as a courtesy to believers of other faiths; there are no ostentatious displays of piety, and eating in the streets is not prohibited, as it is in most other Islamic countries.

In a nation of 240 million where 90 percent are Muslims and most observe the fast, many customers are still seen sipping cafe lattes at Starbucks outlets in Jakarta’s glitzy malls, or bustling around food courts at lunchtime.

This is a completely different scene than in ultra-conservative Saudi Arabia, where officials have warned non-Muslim expatriates that eating, drinking or smoking in public during the holy month risks deportation.

The Indonesian government has, however, imposed some restrictions in an effort to ensure that Muslims comply with the principle of sexual abstention during Ramadan by blocking one million Internet porn sites.

“We’ll intensify (efforts to) block porn websites,” Communications and Information Minister Tifatul Sembiring told local media.

Still, “Indonesia has a maritime culture which is more democratic, open and very different from the Arab culture of the desert,” Dr. Nasaruddin Umar, Indonesia’s Vice Minister of Religious Affairs, told IPS.

“(I believe) Indonesia has the right to interpret the Quran according to its own culture,” said Umar, who based his doctoral thesis on a study of gender equality in the holy books, and firmly believes that the Quran prescribes parity between men and women.

“The Arab cultural interpretation of the Quran has been very dominant. But, according to the Quran there is no need to use chador (a robe that covers women from head to toe) or jilbab (a headscarf many women wear in Indonesia),” he told IPS.

Indonesia’s public space has a distinct flavour that sets it apart from most other Muslim countries: Indonesian girls in miniskirts walk together with others wearing headscarves, men and women hold hands in public and concerts and television programmes often feature women in headscarves dancing in a very suggestive manner.

Contradictions abound

However, there are limitations to religious acceptance. On official identity cards, Indonesians are forced to choose between only six accepted religions in the country.

Also, atheism is illegal according to the country’s constitution and just last June an Indonesian man was sentenced to two and a half years in jail for propagating his atheism on the Internet.

Blasphemy, also considered a felony, earned a Shiite cleric a two-year prison term in July for causing “public anxiety” because his teachings deviated from the mainstream Sunni Islam practiced in Indonesia.

His arrest came amid anti-Shiite attacks that rights groups say were led by Sunni Muslims.

Members of the minority Ahmadiyah sect who, contrary to mainstream Muslims, do not regard Muhammad as the last prophet, are often attacked.  The most recent incident took place last month when a mob attacked the homes of six members of the Ahmadiyah community while a group of journalists was attempting to shoot a documentary about them. Four people were injured in the brawl.

Some Christian churches have been forced to close under pressure and last May a group of radical Muslims in West Java prevented a Christian congregation from holding a service by hurling sewage and frogs at them, according to a parishioner quoted by a local newspaper.

“On paper, Indonesia respects and protects the religious and ethnic diversity of its citizens. But this beautiful ‘social contract’ between the state and its people unfortunately means almost nothing on the ground,” Bona Sigalingging, spokesman for the Yasmin Indonesian Christian Church (GKI), told IPS.

“It is a manufactured image being sold to the international community,” he added.

Umar insists the government is working very hard to prevent similar incidents of communal and religious strife.

“The Ministry of Religious Affairs has deployed a special task force to contain radicalism,” said Umar, author of a book on the radicalisation of Quranic interpretation.

He says radical Islam, which peaked with the 2002 bombings on the resort island of Bali that killed 202 people, mostly Western tourists, has largely been brought under control following a police crackdown on perpetrators and a process of re-educating extremists.

“The Government has 60,000 penyuluh, or religious advisers, distributed all over the country and their function is to (educate) on the moderate aspects of Islam. They use my books and programmes,” Umar noted.

And though Indonesia has introduced 79 Islamic laws since the beginning of its democratic process in 1999, many of them have never been enforced, Mu’ti told IPS.

“Shariah or Islamic laws are a product of political propaganda by local leaders who do not represent the aspirations of all Muslims (here). So, many laws passed by local administrations are not fully implemented,” he stressed.

Only in the autonomous province of Aceh, which is believed to be the place where Islam was first established in Southeast Asia, is there mandatory implementation of Islamic laws such as caning for imbibers or flogging for adulterers.

But few officials want to see this practice repeated throughout the country.

“I disagree with attempts to establish a Muslim state in Indonesia because it will exclude other religions,” said Mu’ti, hinting at the fact that Christmas, the Chinese New Year and a host of other religious holidays are today celebrated throughout the country, particularly in the larger cities.

Despite optimism, tensions in some regions continue to boil over. This patterns of intolerance, if allowed to continue, could risk souring Indonesia’s unique blend of Islam.

A week after the start of Ramadan a bar in South Jakarta was ransacked by a mob of more than 100 people for serving alcoholic drinks, local media reported.

The local news website kompas.com quoted the mob’s alleged leader, Habib Bahar (33), as saying, “It is usual for me and my followers to raid sinful places during Ramadan.”

(END)