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WASHINGTON: A huge survey of the world’s Muslims released earlier
this week challenges Western notions that equate Islam with
radicalism and violence.
The survey, conducted by the Gallup polling
agency over six years and three continents, seeks to dispel the
belief held by some in the West that Islam itself is the driving
force of radicalism.
It shows that the overwhelming majority of
Muslims condemned the attacks against the United States on September
11, 2001 and other subsequent terrorist attacks, the authors of the
study said in Washington on Tuesday.
“Samuel Harris said in the Washington Times
[in 2004]: ‘It is time we admitted that we are not at war with
terrorism. We are at war with Islam,’” Dalia Mogahed, co-author
of the book Who Speaks for Islam, which grew out of the study, told
a news conference here.
“The argument Mr. Harris makes is that
religion in the primary driver” of radicalism and violence, she
said.
“Religion is an important part of life for the
overwhelming majority of Muslims, and if it were indeed the driver
for radicalization, this would be a serious issue.”
But the study, which Gallup says surveyed a
sample equivalent to 90 percent of the world’s Muslims, showed
that widespread religiosity “does not translate into widespread
support for terrorism,” said Mogahed, director of the Gallup
Center for Muslim Studies.
About 93 percent of the world’s 1.3 billion
Muslims are moderates and only 7 percent are politically radical,
according to the poll, based on more than 50,000 interviews.
In majority Muslim countries, overwhelming
majorities said religion was a very important part of their
lives—99 percent in Indonesia, 98 percent in Egypt, 95 percent in
Pakistan.
But only 7 percent of the billion Muslims
surveyed—the radicals—condoned the attacks on the United States
in 2001, the poll showed.
Moderate Muslims interviewed for the poll
condemned the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington because
innocent lives were lost and civilians killed.
“Some actually cited religious justifications
for why they were against 9/11, going as far as to quote from the
Koran—for example, the verse that says taking one innocent life is
like killing all humanity,” she said.
Meanwhile, radical Muslims gave political, not
religious, reasons for condoning the attacks, the poll showed.
The survey shows radicals to be neither more
religious than their moderate counterparts, nor products of abject
poverty or refugee camps.
“The radicals are better educated, have better
jobs, and are more hopeful with regard to the future than mainstream
Muslims,” John Esposito, who co-authored Who Speaks for Islam,
said.
“Ironically, they believe in democracy even
more than many of the mainstream moderates do, but they’re more
cynical about whether they’ll ever get it,” said Esposito, a
professor of Islamic studies at Georgetown University in Washington.
Gallup launched the study following 9/11, after
which US President George W. Bush asked in a speech, which is quoted
in the book: “Why do they hate us?”
“They hate. . . a democratically elected
government,” Bush offered as a reason.
“They hate our freedoms—our freedom of
religion, our freedom of speech, our freedom to vote and assemble
and disagree with each other.”
But the poll, which gives ordinary Muslims a
voice in the global debate that they have been drawn into by 9/11,
showed that most Muslims—including radicals—admire the West for
its democracy, freedoms and technological prowess.
What they do not want is to have Western ways
forced on them, it said.
“Muslims want self-determination, but not an
American-imposed and defined democracy. They don’t want secularism
or theocracy. What the majority wants is democracy with religious
values,” said Esposito.
The poll has given voice to Islam’s silent
majority, said Mogahed.
“A billion Muslims should be the ones that we
look to, to understand what they believe, rather than a vocal
minority,” she told Agence France-Presse.
Muslims in 40 countries in Africa, Asia, Europe
and the Middle East were interviewed for the survey, which is part
of Gallup’s World Poll that aims to interview 95 percent of the
world’s population.
-- AFP
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