In my travels through the Greater Middle East for the Afterparty book project, I went out of my way to meet Muslims. I visited mosques in Abu Dhabi, Dubai and Sharjah in the United Arab Emirates, met with the leading Afghan Islamic scholar at his mosque in Kabul between afternoon prayers, discussed religion with secular, Shia and Sunni Muslims in Iraq. Interviews with Muslims, from army officers and a hospital CEO to a former mujahedin fighter and a frustrated Afghan housewife, permeate the Afghanistan and Iraq chapters. In the final chapter, I explore the notion of Islam as a violent religion. Here is an excerpt from the closing chapter of “WAR: The Afterparty.”
Islam is not the problem.
Unequivocally, the Muslims I encountered during my trip insisted on the peaceful intentions and practices of their religion, and fiercely insisted that ISIS, the Taliban and al-Qaeda were violators of Islamic tradition. It’s a personal choice to embrace tolerance and non-violence, or to provide a rich education for one’s children, regardless of gender. Hate, anger and domination are part of the human condition, free to breathe inside or outside of religious tradition, tribe or nationality.
If you’re looking for scriptural justification for violence, that’s easy to find.
As the United States prepared to invade and occupy Iraq, I accompanied my ex-wife, Paula, and my daughter to the Auburn Parkside Church of the Nazarene. Andrea, 16, had been “witnessed” to by a friend and so spent some months exploring Parkside’s fundamentalist brand of Christianity. Paula’s Brazilian Presbyterianism preached a less austere but no less faithful practice. Her fiercest complaint was that the music sucked, understandable for a music-obsessed Carioca.
As I fidgeted in my church pew, I was already perplexed by the stated mission of the impending Iraq adventure. Sitting in my car in the parking lot of Jerry’s Deli in Marina Del Rey some days prior, I heard President George W. Bush articulate seven separate reasons as to why we were going to war. Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz said after the invasion, “The truth is that for reasons that have a lot to do with the U.S. government bureaucracy, we settled on the one issue that everyone could agree on, which was weapons of mass destruction.”[i]
Jews have a habit of skipping to the back of the book; Hebrew scripture goes from back to front. Parkside’s pastor focused his sermon on war. He exhorted us to pray for the troops (no prayers for the soon to be slaughtered and displaced Iraqis), imploring the congregation to be “prayer warriors.” To complete the martial framing of the sermon, the reverend quoted from the Book of Joshua. There is a YouTube video with rosy-cheeked pre-teens singing “Joshua Fought the Battle of Jericho.” A commenter on the video page objected to the warlike implications of the song, and another responded, “God was responsible for blessing the Israelites. They wouldn’t have been successful without God. God loved. The Israelites listened. Joshua led them.” The Israelites circled Jericho, the Lord exhorting His people to blow down the city walls with trumpet blasts and, then . . . what? Skipping ahead of the pastor’s liturgical reading of chapters four and five, here is what the One True God demands of His chosen people in Joshua, Chapter Six.
Verse 20. When the trumpets sounded, the army shouted, and at the sound of the trumpet, when the men gave a loud shout, the wall collapsed; so everyone charged straight in, and they took the city.
Verse 21. They devoted the city to the Lord and destroyed with the sword every living thing in it—men and women, young and old, cattle, sheep and donkeys . . .
Verse 24. Then they burned the whole city and everything in it, but they put the silver and gold and the articles of bronze and iron into the treasury of the Lord’s house . . .
Verse 27. So the Lord was with Joshua, and his fame spread throughout the land.
The choice of scripture, God’s injunction to commit genocide in Jericho, stayed with me through the years of Iraq’s subjugation, humiliation and devastation. As I visited museums and historical landmarks in western Europe on my way to Serbia, I noticed a similar claim of divine providence inspiring the British, French, Belgian, Dutch and German colonial empires. Justification for wanton violence, for the mission civilisatrice, by those chosen as exceptional by providence, whether historical or divine, goes something like this:
God has chosen us,
to bring our superior values, code and way of life,
to inferior races, cultures or political systems,
justifying the overwhelming application of violence,
and the looting of the treasury on behalf of the chosen.
We Americans see others as having diabolical aims, and see our own instincts as noble. In Sven Lundqvist’s travel classic, “Exterminate the Brutes,” he documents the disgust of British colonials at the rapacious behavior of the Spaniards in the Americas. Over 90 percent of the population under Spanish rule was extinguished in a hundred years. But, in bringing Christian civilization to new lands, the outcome was no different in “El Norte.”
In 1492, Columbus arrived in America. The extent of the so-called demographic catastrophe that followed has been estimated differently by different scholars. Certainly it was without equivalent in world history . . .
About five million of the indigenous American population lived in what is now the United States. At the beginning of the nineteenth century, half a million still remained. In 1891, at the time of Wounded Knee — the last great massacre of Indians in the United States — the native population reached rock bottom: a quarter of a million, or five percent of the original number of Indians . . . When the same phenomenon occurred as a result of Anglo-Saxon occupation of North America, other explanations were required. “Where the English come to settle, a Divine Hand makes way for them by removing or cutting off the Indians, either by Wars one with the other or by some raging, mortal Disease,” Daniel Denton wrote in 1670.[ii]
Abrahamic religions have endorsed wholesale murder in the name of God since Abraham himself nearly slaughtered his son Isaac to slake the divine will. When communism was ‘just cause’ for global power projection and expanded military budgets, we heard little of Muslims as an existential threat due to a millennium-old mandate to convert the world. When the Soviet Union revealed itself to be a crippled economic basket case, politicos and broadcasters replaced the worldwide communist conspiracy with the global plot to create a caliphate and impose Sharia law.
[i] Packer, G. (2005). The Assassins’ Gate: America in Iraq. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, p. 60.
[ii] Lindqvist, S.& Tate, J. (1997). “Exterminate All the Brutes”: One Man’s Odyssey into the Heart of Darkness and the Origins of European Genocide. New York: The New Press.
To support the Afterparty project and to read full chapters, interviews and new book-related content, go to www.patreon.com/briangruber.
“X” is a cybersecurity and programming staffer in the Afghan government. We agreed to meet for pizza near Shar-e-Naw Park and to keep his identity anonymous in the interview. He is known in Kabul IT circles as a ‘White Hat Hacker.’ This interview was transcribed by Afterparty editor Anaka Allen.
Brian: So what about your personal stance as an Afghan and patriot and and educated smart guy who could probably find great opportunity elsewhere. US forces leaving, Taliban wants to take control again. What do you see for 2015, how worried are you about your own security and the security of the country? Putting network stuff aside.
WHH: Well as I told you the other day, in Kabul everyday something is happening. And the day after that something else happens. (A teenager blew himself up at a school play at Kabul’s Lycee Esqetlal school).
BG: A few days before the suicide bombing, I went by there and took pictures. It’s very centrally located.
WHH: Security is our every worry.
BG: How worried are you that it will get much worse and that the Taliban can take over the country again?
WHH: Well if the system goes like this, like now, definitely there may be some side effects. But, they are not powerful so much that they would take over Afghanistan.
BG: Cause a lot of people are sick of what they saw when they took over. My sense is that there was civil war, fighting and finally here’s these nice Islamic fellows who just want to teach the Quran and create peace, so there was some maybe suspicion but people said, hey, give them a chance. And then they saw these guys are fucking the worst.
WHH: It’s not about Islam. In America we have Muslims, in India we have Muslims, in France we have Muslims. They are living peacefully. It’s a political game. It’s not Islam. They are Pakistani far-side groups. They have support of other countries. It’s not about Islam, they’re just using Islam.
BG: What percentage of Taliban fighters, activists, genuinely believe they are conducting a holy jihad, they are God’s chosen force.
WHH: The people who are on the lower level. Uneducated. The ones who bomb these things, they’re injected with some kind of material. They don’t know what they’re doing.
BG: I mean come on, 16 years old.
WHH: If you check his blood, in a lab, check it out, there might be some kind of chemical.
BG: Some kind of methamphetamine, something, drugs.
WHH: I don’t know, something.
BG: Someone said to me yesterday, the guy has got to be Pakistani or educated at the madrassas there, because an Afghan would not do that.
WHH: Might be true. But our intelligence is not quite good.
BG: Why do you think the United States allows an ally to work against its interests that aggressively over many years? Is it fear of nuclear weapons control? Is it that we need Pakistan for an ally? I’m reading one book by Steve Coll called Ghost Wars. He’s writing about the Pakistan covert involvement with the Taliban 15 years ago. With the United States pushing all this money through ISI, through Pakistan. So why do you think the U.S. puts up with that?
WHH: In the first, there were Russians in Afghanistan. I guess the US created this project.
BG: Cold War.
WHH: Cold War. Created Al Qaeda to fight the Russians.
BG: Created a monster.
WHH: But then this monster went rogue. America wasn’t able to control it anymore. Because they were uneducated people. Suddenly they changed their decision and said I’m not following your orders anymore.
BG: So what you said is what I hear uniformly, which is that Taliban are too weak and too despised by too many people to take over all of Afghanistan again. Having said that, is the threat that they will simply destabilize and create misery for a long time?
WHH: The big problem in Afghanistan is that it’s a house that doesn’t have walls around it. So they can destabilize sometimes, create some kind of incident which would show that Afghanistan is destabilized, but it won’t be critical.
BG: Among your friends, people your age, level of education, professionals, what’s the attitude towards this 13 year occupation? I mean certainly no one wants to be occupied, no one wants foreign military in their country, historically Afghans don’t like foreign military. Occasionally, there is a civilian killing, there’s frustrations with not enough money going to poor people, and to average Afghans. So in your community, your social network, what’s peoples’ attitudes towards these 13 years of occupation or intervention? Good things? Stay longer? Americans go home? Thank you very much for what you’ve done, now go home?
WHH: I would say like we have some improvements. We’re thankful now. We still need some support. I’m not saying only Afghans are dying, Americans are also dying here. They have parents, they have family. I will just tell you a small answer. NSA is able to create like a (unclear). There are some other agencies behind these people, the Islamic radical people, that America cannot fight that country directly. Like Pakistan…it will create like an international mess. So it is like chess, it’s like an international game. That’s not part of Islam.
If you’re the guy leading the Islamic groups, you are everyday sending e-mail…you can find his router in like a millisecond. You don’t need to send a force to him, you can get him with a drone. But, you cannot do it because there are some kind of supports behind him.
BG: You’re saying, if the United States NSA is so strong and so smart, that they can get through.
WHH: I believe the NSA can crack anything in the world. Why? You didn’t ask me why.
BG: Why?
WHH: If you’re creating something, you are the owner, you know everything about it. The internet was created by DARPA…defense project right? They can crack anything.
BG: Yea, that’s a nice advantage to have. From a hypothetical point of view, what you say makes sense to me. Now I’m trying to drill down to the specifics. So you think the United States can’t go to Pakistan and say, “Hey motherfucker, our soldiers are dying, you’re destabilizing the world, we’re giving you all this money, time to come to some agreement…”
WHH: I believe they can. America can do that. But something bigger will happen if they go there and tell them, “Hey motherfucker, don’t do that.”…but some powerful countries…they would start by saying, “Don’t touch our friends,” then at the end what would happen? World War III would happen. That’s why I guess America is avoiding to make this bigger.
BG: Because Afghanistan’s important, but World War III is more important. Afghanistan security at this restaurant is important, but avoiding Pakistani nuclear weapons hitting New York is more important….
WHH: But I hope there would be politicals talking with them so they could solve it by talking with each other.
BG: Well, they’ve been talking a long time. How long do you need to talk? [Laughs]
What do you think is the state of the Afghan army and police force? Do you think that they are going to do a credible job next year of keeping security in the country?
WHH: Well, you don’t only need troops to do the job. You need to have some accessories like you need good guns and good armor. You need good surveillance. Surveillance first to find out what the enemy is doing.
BG: Which I think the general sense is, the United States is not going to stop providing that, so I think surveillance, hardware…
WHH: United States has given them everything, but there is not capacity. I’m telling you for 13 years America is trying to make us something, but the middleware is trying to kill it.
BG: And by middleware, you mean middle people.
WHH: So Americans try and America is giving money.
BG: Do you have friends or people you know who have a really different attitude than you, and they’re saying, “American imperialists, infidels occupying our country, get them out of here, we want them gone completely, we can do fine on our own?” Do you have any friends who have that point of view?
WHH: No, because my friends that I talk to are educated.
BG: So educated professional people do not have that point of view? Like I told you this guy from Herat, 65 years old, former mujaheddin, really wonderful smart guy, but probably uneducated, certainly doesn’t have the modern education that you do. He says that it’s time for Americans to go, we can actually do better with security without the United States, and he says the United States is behind the Taliban. The first part you probably wouldn’t agree with, the second part is, he said, “America is behind the Taliban,” which I found too strong a statement without context, because, he said, “If America really wanted to find the Taliban, really wanted to shut down the Taliban they could do it overnight. They’re providing them with funding.” And I thought, really? The United States is directly funding the Taliban? I can’t imagine any strategy that would make sense to drive that.
WHH: I wouldn’t exactly agree with him. I guess the other parties put in Taliban, but because America cannot fight with them directly, that’s why these guys are not fighting with them.
BG: What was your impression of Massoud? Do you think Massoud would have been a good leader?
WHH: He was a great leader.
BG: Heroic guy.
WHH: He was not corrupted…he was a good leader.
BG: I stayed up one night studying Massoud. It’s an incredible story, of course, tragic. Incredible personality, and I don’t know if it’s true, but the things he wrote about his vision for Afghan culture…about women’s rights, freedom of speech, open culture…he was a bright guy.
WHH: They killed him.
BG: Two days before 9/11.
WHH: Everything is a plan.
BG: My understanding is, because Bin Laden knew that he needed Mullah Omar’s protection, then he’s going to say, “I’m going to do this for you, and then you protect me.” Do you think that was the quid pro quo, or no?
WHH: I don’t know. I’m not going to say directly. [laughs]
I worked with Shahid Butt at Charter Cable years ago, a smart, congenial fellow and accomplished marketer. As I posted interviews from my swing through the Islamic world, and pointed remarks about Pakistan’s role in the emergence of the Taliban, he offered some unique insights. I talked with Shahid over Skype one night from my guesthouse room in Kabul. We began by talking about Pakistan’s role in supporting the mujeheddin jihad against the Soviet invasion in the 1980’s. The interview was transcribed by “War: The Afterparty” book project editor and intern Anaka Allen.
Shahid: In Pakistan right around that time, you could rent AK47s by the hour, there were just so many weapons. There was a military parade in one of the Arab countries; I think it may have been Qatar. As part of that military parade there was these weapons that were on display and as the U.S. was there, you know they were invited.
Brian: Sure. And they were like, those are our fucking weapons. [laughs]
S: And they were trying to figure out where did these come from? And they realized, oh shit, this is stuff that was supposed to go to Pakistan to go over next door to fight the Soviets. And when they found that trail, all of a sudden in Rawalpindi, there was a huge explosion where the munitions dump, in the garrison where people were living. This had to be, Brian, in 1981, yeah. And so people were just syphoning off weapons and selling them to anybody else.
B: You put that many weapons out in the world over so many years, and so many conflicts and the world just becomes a much more violent place.
S: WWII was the only war after which the factories that were converted to make wartime stuff, didn’t go back to making what they were making before. So, now you have this huge production capacity making stuff and if you want to keep people employed you have to sell the stuff and then they have to use the stuff; that’s why we will have wars, otherwise it’s jobs.
Here’s what so bizarre for someone like me, and you know, being a marketing guy, I try to break it down, I try to re-orient the issue. As I see it, we have a branding problem. Because if you look at the brand of Pakistan, the white part of the flag was put there on purpose, I think it’s two-fifths of the flag, to represent that there are minorities in the country who are equal citizens. And what we have basically done is, we fuck with all kinds of — pick a minority, we fuck with it now. So that’s off-brand. If you look at our version of the declaration of independence, I think there’s 230 words in there, and 40% of the words talk about protecting minorities and, again, we’re fucking that up. So, you got that issue off-brand. Second, if you say that the country was created to help the Muslims of India achieve economic prosperity, it was an economic need for a group of people, it wasn’t a religious need. And we’ve moved off of that and become this Islamic state, which is not what we’re supposed to have been. We were supposed to have been a place where the Muslims of India could have economic equality and prosperity and get access to jobs and bank loans and all that kind of stuff, education, so we fuck that up. The third thing is, if you even do convert their thinking to, hey, we’re an Islamic state, the concepts of Islam, you know we’re supposed to, let’s say, follow the teachings of the prophet. The prophet married a business woman, right? An educated, working woman, and if that’s supposed to be who we’re emulating then what the fuck? [laughs] Why do more women not have opportunity to go to school, to work in the workplace? So, we’re off target there.
B: Is that a more of a cultural, national thing than a theological thing?
S: You look at Saudi Arabia, they’re the worse at it. Because at least we’ve had a prime minister who is a woman, at least we’ve had women in parliament. Part of it is cultural, pre-Islam, and part of it is another way to keep minorities down. Women are minorities, let’s keep them down. Number two, if you look at the religion, the first interaction, according to tradition, that the prophet had with Gabriel; the first words that were said to the prophet were, “Read.” And the prophet said, “I can’t read.” The angel Gabriel again said, “Read.” And the prophet said, “I can’t.” So this went back and forth a couple of times and then he was inspired with the ability to read. And again the tradition is supposed to reinforce how important education is and if you look at our federal budget, and the amount of money we put towards education, it’s totally contradictory to the concept of how important education should be in the religion. So, on so many different levels we have missed our brand, we’re just off-brand, and that’s what’s causing some of these problems. And now, this blasphemy law that we have, where if I have a beef with my neighbor, I can go down to the police station, and say, “I heard him say something bad about the prophet,” and the cops have to come up and arrest me.
B: I heard a lot of stories of NATO and coalition troops in Afghanistan selecting certain people as partners, and those people would accuse neighbors or friends as a way to revenge or a competitive business advantage.
S: Exactly! And so the correlation to what you’re writing about, even though the U.S. didn’t directly attack Pakistan, the impact of the Soviet-era U.S. involvement and then how right away, right after the Soviets pulled back, all the funding stopped. Right, Charlie Wilson couldn’t even get a billion dollars anymore, or even 100 million dollars. It just stopped. So you have this country now, completely decimated, no money, the only infrastructure, the only crop that they have is poppy. And then the Afghans, I love those people, but they are brutal to each other as well. They just massacred each other. And then what happened in Pakistan is the blowback of the mujaheddin, the weapons, the drug trade. We may as well have been attacked.
B: Don’t you also acknowledge that there was some opportunism there, where, both at the time of the mujaheddin and then during the rise of the Taliban, there were people in the ISI and the Pakistani military and one or two of your leaders, who saw it as an opportunity to not only make some money, but to dominate Afghan politics and to use that conflict to their own advantage?
S: So, two things. What happens is, so you have a leader like, let’s say Zia with the Soviet problem, and then Musharraf with the 9/11 problem, who, both unpopular, both overthrowing a civilian government, now have lucked into the fact that the U.S. needs Pakistan’s help to go into Afghanistan. And so, these two leaders and their top-level ISI staff or generals, they all did whatever they could to stay in power. It’s all a matter of a few people staying in power. So if that means we fuck up the country with all these weapons, so be it, but we will stay in power. So that clearly happened, there was opportunism there. And then I read somewhere recently that the reason why the Pakistanis are so pro-Taliban in Afghanistan, or the ISI has been, is because they’re Pashto-speaking, we are Pashto-speaking, and the Indians were supporting the Uzbeks and Tajiks from the north. And since they were funding those guys, we felt we had to counterbalance that, who knows what came first, but there was a counterbalance to the support of the other ethnic groups to the north that the Indians were supporting. So to keep India’s control out of the western border, we needed to have the Taliban on our side.
B: Right, it’s a messy situation. What’s your sense of that whole border area with Waziristan and the whole Pashtun area? Is this another situation where Western powers like the British carved up things illicitly and illogically, and you basically have a nation or a tribe of people that, as I understand it, are ⅔ in Pakistan and ⅓ in Afghanistan, and that ultimately, those borders are so porous and the rule of law there is so thin, that you have this perpetual political issue that has been going on for a long time?
S: You have to go find the exact data point, but I think that the British guy who helped create the borders of Pakistan and India, for the new countries, I think he got there, he created the borders, never having been there before, and within 6 weeks he created these borders, and this is without Google. He did not know what he was doing. And so that is exactly why you have these tribes split by a line created by England. That’s exactly what happened.
B: And by the way, why would he know what he was doing? How in the world can any Brit understand 500 years of history and what’s happening in tribes where no Brit has ever walked the earth?
S: There were British folks there for a couple hundred years, right. So, there could be some people who knew, or provided input, but, I don’t think they were used.
B: I’m asking a lot of questions certain provocative passages in the Quran and certain provocative behaviors on the part of groups that are claiming them to be true believers, from the Islamic State to the Taliban, etc. Every Afghan I meet says Islam is a religion of peace, here is the way it teaches me, I don’t want to hurt a fly, here’s all the specific ways that our religion respects other religions and people and forbids bad behavior.
S: I think you have to put a lot of this stuff, in the Quran, into some kind of historical context. Yeah, there were some brutal, bloody battles, but if you look at it in context of what else is going on during those times, this was pretty mild. And, I think you can read the bible, and come up with how violent it is. You can read the Quran and come up with how violent it is. But at the end of the day, that’s not really the teaching, they’re just some stories that happened along the way. The teachings are very similar: peace, don’t hurt your neighbor, that kind of stuff. So the teachings are all really really similar. My father always used to joke, Do you ever wonder why Judaism, Christianity, Islam all came to that little strip of land in the Middle East? And I said, “No Pops, why?” He goes, “They’re the ones that need the most help.” [laughs] But the teachings are all so similar. People, throughout history I’m sure, have taken religion out of context to kill other people and to create fear. It’s just humans being humans.
Another interesting thing that I always try to struggle with is, when the prophet was dying, and he was trying to choose his successor, he could have chosen someone who was his relative, but he did not. He chose someone who was well-experienced, was older, and the learning from there is, leadership is not hereditary. Leadership is based on ability. But, when you look at all of these kingdoms, they are totally repugnant to that teaching. And even when you look at Pakistani politics, the political parties are not really parties. They are family club mafias, really. They keep on passing down from one to the other…it’s a mafia. Again, totally repugnant to that example that we were supposed to follow.
Akbar hawked cheap jewelry and trinkets in front of the City Center. Each time I passed, we stopped and talked. Our running joke was, get me a girlfriend, I’ll buy the jewels. I bought some prayer beads. He weaved a fantastic and implausible story of how they were Afghan stones, polished in India and packaged in China. I paid him full price ($10) for the quality of his storytelling.
Among the worrywarts who warned me not to spend my month in Afghanistan, two bits of advice prevailed:
Don’t say you are an American and don’t say you are Jewish.
God knows I tried. But except for one moment, surrounded one night by a group of unfriendly males, I always said I was American. And, as Muslims went to great lengths to demand respect for their acceptance of all religions, a spirit of inquiry required that I test that on occasion by adding, an American Jew.
Muslim tolerance of all paths, I found conditional. When pressing the UK-born female tour guides in Dubai and Sharjah mosques, it was suggested that all religions were honored. “What about Hinduism and Buddhism?” In both cases, the previously pollyanaish guides bristled and said those were not real religions, with all their deities and whatnot. Ah, so someone gets to decide.
Opinion is fine. Opinion doesn’t matter. What matters is tolerance. You can think that failing to give that mendicant an extra shekel will encourage the wrath of Kali or Shiva, or that you have a good angel on one shoulder and a bad one on the other, or that God brought down the walls of Jericho so that the Israelites could murder every man, woman, child, ox, sheep and goat. But don’t impose it on me.
The skinny fellow standing next to me in the shower at the Kabul swimming pool went on about the caliphate and how all will one day live under Sharia law but it’s all cool because all religions will be respected, even though mine has EXPIRED since the revelation of the Holy Quran. I reminded him that we Jews INVENTED all that shit about the Chosen People and the Prophets, and exclusive ownership of the Word of God, and that American evangelicals want their brand of religion spread worldwide, the difference being that Americans have much bigger guns and a lot more of them, so be careful what you wish for.
——–
My very generous hosts during my Kabul stay. Javid on the left, Farshid on the right. Opening night in their office, a karaoke competition. Briefly, I gained an appreciation for why the Taliban banned music in Afghanistan.
Leaving Kabul is the most security-intensity experience you will ever have. I lost count, but I think there were ten separate frisks, security scans, interrogations. Farshid kindly insisted I stay for lunch and allow his driver to take me to the airport, which left ninety minutes to flight time. By the time of the final pass through of my backpack, it was getting too close enough for comfort.
I had no contraband so had no reason to be delayed, but a suited security officer grabbed my bag and walked me over to a table. “Where are the stones?” he demanded. “What stones?” I had no idea what he was talking about. My mujeheddin friend from Herat tried to convince me to market gems back in the States but I declined to take any samples.
“The stones?” he said, angrily demanding that I open my backpack. And there they were. Three sets of prayer beads. One, bought from Mohammed, the carpet man. One, from my friend in front of City Center who kept trying to sell me jewelry “for your girlfriend.” And the third, a beautiful gift from the staff of the Wazir Akbar Khan mosque.
Some airports have kids’ drawings of rainbows and unicorns. The centerpiece of Kabul Airport is a downed Soviet jet.
“What religion are you?” he demanded. I already queered my India visa application by refusing to answer that same question. In Other, I penciled in, Pastafarian. With minutes to go before my flight to Delhi, this was no time to explain the theology of the Flying Spaghetti Monster. But after a month of no menorahs, no Christmas trees, no Santa Claus, and a few “We’re Number One!” parochial Islam rants, I answered,
“That’s none of your business.”
He bristled. “I’m a Muslim. It is my business.” He waited for my answer.
I could have told him that I received the beads as a gift from the most honored mullah in Afghanistan, who spent two hours with me discussing life, devotion and peace. I could have given him a variation on Gandhi-ji’s answer. “I am a Jew. I also a Christian, a Muslim, a Buddhist and a Hindu.” But he just walked away.
One night, in Kabul, an Indian friend of Farshid’s needed a place to stay, so we set up a mattress, blanket and pillows on the floor of my room. He shared his little Indian treats with me, and described his faith. He was from Gujurati, in a town called Rajkot. Gandhi was a Gujurat, and Jainul Musani was a Muslim but lived largely as a Hindu (vegetarian meals were sent up to our room), belonged to a sect called Dawoodi Bohra and invited me to his town to visit the Vipassana meditation center, a tradition practiced by my San Francisco Bay Area (Marin County) Buddhist center Spirit Rock. You following me?
Mohammed, I am told is the Very Last Prophet, because, you know, in the last millennium of mass slaughter, cultural upheaval, scientific enlightenment, globalization, why would the Divine care to leak out any new material? But if I were an apostate, easier now that I am out of Afghanistan, and could add a prophet to the approved constellation (the Koran claims 120,000), then I would add Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi. While British troops were murdering and repressing Indians, Gandhi goes right to the belly of the beast, to London’s Kingsley Hall in 1931, and lays this on the world:
“There is an indefinable mysterious power that pervades everything, I feel it though I do not see it. It is this unseen power which makes itself felt and yet defies all proof, because it is so unlike all that I perceive through my senses. It transcends the senses. But it is possible to reason out the existence of God to a limited extent. Even in ordinary affairs we know that people do not know who rules or why and how He rules and yet they know that there is a power that certainly rules.
“In my tour last year in Mysore I met many poor villagers and I found upon inquiry that they did not know who ruled Mysore. They simply said some God ruled it. If the knowledge of these poor people was so limited about their ruler I who am infinitely lesser in respect to God than they to their ruler need not be surprised if I do not realize the presence of God – the King of Kings.
“Nevertheless, I do feel, as the poor villagers felt about Mysore, that there is orderliness in the universe, there is an unalterable law governing everything and every being that exists or lives. It is not a blind law, for no blind law can govern the conduct of living being and thanks to the marvelous researches of Sir J. C. Bose it can now be proved that even matter is life. That law then which governs all life is God. Law and the law-giver are one. I may not deny the law or the law-giver because I know so little about it or Him.
“Just as my denial or ignorance of the existence of an earthly power will avail me nothing even so my denial of God and His law will not liberate me from its operation, whereas humble and mute acceptance of divine authority makes life’s journey easier even as the acceptance of earthly rule makes life under it easier. I do dimly perceive that whilst everything around me is ever changing, ever dying there is underlying all that change a living power that is changeless, that holds all together, that creates, dissolves and recreates. That informing power of spirit is God, and since nothing else that I see merely through the senses can or will persist, He alone is. And is this power benevolent or malevolent ? I see it as purely benevolent, for I can see that in the midst of death life persists, in the midst of untruth truth persists, in the midst of darkness light persists. Hence I gather that God is life, truth, light. He is love. He is the supreme Good. But He is no God who merely satisfies the intellect, if He ever does. God to be God must rule the heart and transform it. He must express himself in every smallest act of His votary. This can only be done through a definite realization, more real than the five senses can ever produce.
“Sense perceptions can be and often are false and deceptive, however real they may appear to us. Where there is realization outside the senses it is infallible. It is proved not by extraneous evidence but in the transformed conduct and character of those who have felt the real presence of God within. Such testimony is to be found in the experiences of an unbroken line of prophets and sages in all countries and climes. To reject this evidence is to deny oneself. This realization is preceded by an immovable faith. He who would in his own person test the fact of God’s presence can do so by a living faith and since faith itself cannot be proved by extraneous evidence the safest course is to believe in the moral government of the world and therefore in the supremacy of the moral law, the law of truth and love. Exercise of faith will be the safest where there is a clear determination summarily to reject all that is contrary to truth and love. I confess that I have no argument to convince through reason. Faith transcends reason. All that I can advise is not to attempt the impossible.”
——–
The security guy at Kabul Airport glared at me and walked away. I looked after him. I had to catch my flight. As he returned to his security station, he turned to me in disgust and yelled, “Go! Go!” You take your small victories where you can.
I was talking to her uncle Murray, at ninety, a very successful businessman, smart, educated, a man of the world. Like me, a New York Jew. Names changed here to protect the complicit.
He encouraged me to read the Wall Street Journal more often. I told him I admired its history of long form quality reporting, found its ownership by Murdoch’s News Corp a stain on its independence, and…
“I never read The New York Times,” he proclaimed. “It’s a rag.”
“Really?” I asked, surprised. I imagined every well-read Jewish New Yorker spent every Sunday morning surrounded by sections of the Times, ink-stained fingers grasping a fourth or fifth cup of coffee. I could understand someone differing with Times editorials, disliking a certain columnist, preferring someone else’s sports coverage, but…”Surely, there’s something in the paper worth reading?”
“Nothing. It’s all biased. I haven’t picked it up in years.”
“I’m quite impressed. None of the international coverage? The business reporting? The Sunday Times magazine? The coverage of fashion, theater, film?”
Murray was adamant. And Karen was not amused. Really, Brian, her demure stare seemed to suggest. Are you getting into a political argument with my sick, old uncle? Well, yes, I was.
“Five percent of Muslims are terrorists,” Murray proposed, with the air of a finance officer just completing a carefully managed audit.
“You’re joking. Really? Five percent, is it?”
“That’s right. They’re not all terrorists,” he offered in a magnanimous gesture of tolerance. “But five percent are.”
I stared at his face. He was aged, but well preserved for a ninety year old. He was lucid, thoughtful, a man whose mental sharpness drove a hugely successful business through years of struggle, depression and war. He was a man worthy of intellectual and moral deference.
I work out the math with him. “So, if there are say, one and a half billion Muslims in the world, I have no idea, just a guess, representing roughly a quarter of the world’s population, you’re saying that five percent or seventy-five million people are terrorists. Seventy-five MILLION people, none of whom you’ve met are accurately defined as violent, murderous activists out to destroy all you hold dear?”
Murray, a learned man, considered my question. We both looked away at the idyllic surroundings on this balmy New York evening.
He changed his mind. “No. No, I think the number is one percent. One percent of Muslim are terrorists.”
“Ah,” I said, “Thank you for that clarification.” I looked around for my censor, the beautiful and elegantly dressed Karen. “So, really, you’ve decided that the five percent number was something you just pulled out of your —, but ONE PERCENT, now that number has some empirical rigor to it. One percent, or (the cocktails were affecting my ability to execute third grade arithmetic), uhhhh….fifteen million people are on a mission to terrorize the world, wreaking havoc and slaughtering innocents?”
“Yes, that’s right.” Murray seemed relieved that his original calculation was revised. The honor of a business professional. Must get the numbers right. He seemed happy with the new number. Yes. One percent. That must be it.
“You do realize,” I suggested, “that people have used that precise logic to victimize and persecute Jews for centuries. Adolf Hitler calling Jews war profiteers. Americans saying we were unpatriotic for putting our religion first, that we were not real Americans, but swarthy, money-grubbing, second-class citizens. That we were the Other, non-Christians, grouped together into foul, simplistic stereotypes? Didn’t you live through those days, through the slurs, the anti-semitic jokes, barred from country clubs, through the Holocaust?”
And, then, Karen intervened. Blond hair, professionally coiffed that very morning, in a stunning blue dress, a glass in her hand, her moist lips curled in a smile, her eyes glowing. I calculated the value of continuing my debate with Murray and its potential effect on this romantic, starry night. I asked Karen, “May I get you a refill?”
——–
In every conversation with the hundreds of Muslims I’ve met in the Arabian emirates and Afghanistan, I’ve asked variations of a few basic questions, the most frequent being: Is Islam a religion of peace? Does the Koran justify violence against non-believers? Is the growth of radical Islam simply a fundamentalism strain of the religion?
And, in one hundred percent of my encounters, I get the same answers. I even probed, pushed a bit harder, looked for cracks in the thinking, but, no, always, the same answer. Commonly, with a fierce sense of insistence or pride. They often took it personally. The London taxi driver from Somalia. The Sharjah mosque staffer. The Kabul businessman. The Afghan Army colonel. The esteemed Islamic scholar. The restauranteur, the teacher the mother, the teenager, the carpet salesman.
Javid, the week that he won the award as the nation’s premiere IT innovator, quoted me verse 5:32 ‘Al-Maidah’ from the holy Quran. There are different interpretations, and some even use it as a justification for killing, but it is the quote most often shared with me. It is usually shared quite emotionally, from a people who love their faith and their heritage. After all, the greeting you hear all day long in the Muslim world is, “As-Salaam Alaikum.” Peace be upon you. The gist of the quote is this: If you kill one human being, you kill all humanity.
There are exceptions for self-defense. Afghans I talked to despise the Taliban, al Qaeda, Boko Harama, ISIS and the various other vicious scumbags wandering Muslim lands raping and enslaving women and torturing anyone less-holy-than-they. “They are not Muslims. This is not Islam.”
I had a few tense moments when I might remind someone that the reason he was Muslim had less to do with successive generations struggling with theological questions and selecting Islam as the final prescription for mankind, and more to do with hordes of better-equipped, better-manned armies rampaging through the steppes of Asia, forcing people to convert or die.
When the United States was about to invade Iraq, illegally, for its oil, lying to its citizens, convincing eighty-five percent of a largely undereducated, video-game addled teenage Army that Saddam Hussein was responsible for 9/11, I went to the Auburn Parkside Church of the Nazarene with my (now ex-) wife Paula and daughter Andrea. If Andrea’s interest in evangelical Christianity was partly a subconscious act of rebellion to her liberal, rarely-practicing Jewish father, she soon lost interest as I dutifully accompanied her to church.
The music was bad. The religion was, well, fundamental. The people were polite. And the sermon was martial. We were told we had to be prayer warriors. To pray for our troops. Suggestions were made that we were sending our young soldiers off on a providential mission. And to bolster the biblical support for the entreaties to God to allow for maximally efficient destruction of the Muslim evil-doers, there was a reading from the book of Joshua.
Bored, and a little appalled at the war-mongering in a house of worship, I paged ahead. And here is what I found in Joshua, chapter six.
Lesson number two: When you take over a town for the Lord, kill every man, woman and children. Oh, and kill the ox and the sheep and the ass. With the edge of the sword. The SHEEP? What the fuck did the sheep do wrong??
Yes, pilgrims, it’s the MUSLIMS that are violent. The American overthrow of the democratically elected Iranian president Mossadegh in 1953, our support of the overthrow of Gadaffi resulting in violent militias throwing Libya into chaos, our invasion of Iraq, support of brutal dictators in Egypt and Saudi Arabia, our drone attacks on Afghan weddings and villages, all that, pilgrims, is God’s providence.
You want to know what a vengeful desert God-king does when his Prophet is insulted? Consider this story of the Jewish prophet Elisha, from the book of Judges.
Let’s recount. A bald dude gets mocked by a bunch of little kids. God, royally pissed, sends two she-bears out of the woods, who rip them to pieces. Forty-two murdered children. Then, Elisha goes on his merry way.
Want to look for Koran verses justifying stereotyping of Muslims? You can find them. But scratch the surface of violent Islamic warriors and you’ll find a lot less acolyte and a lot more undereducated, underemployed sociopath. And if you want to see how early we train our freshly scrubbed Christian soldiers, the celebration of violence is just a church bell away.
Me and Fawad on the historic Chicken Street in the Shar-e-Naw area of Kabul, my home for my month in country. Fawad is a devout Muslim who never missed an opportunity to promote Islam’s virtues to me.
I met the imam though the usual string of serendipitous connections. Afterparty backer, college friend and Amsterdam host Forrest Wright introduced me to his sister Leslie who introduced me to her friend and Afghanistan workshop facilitator Shaira, who introduced me to Fawad, who just happens to go to school with the imam’s son.
I visited mosques in Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Sharjah on the Arabian peninsula, and sought out English-speaking mullahs in Afghanistan. I was in the Netlinks office with CEO Farshid and chief of operations Javid when I mentioned that Fawad got me an appointment at a local mosque. Farshid insisted I was wasting my time, that whoever I talked to would be uneducated and talk outdated nonsense and that who I should really see was Imam X (unnamed by mutual agreement until he sees the copy). Javid agreed, singing the praises of this esteemed fellow. When I called Fawad, I sheepishly suggested that, gee, after we see his imam, could we try to get an appointment with this other fellow? Fawad answered, that’s exactly the guy we’re going to see.
Part One of our discussion, ranging from the precepts of Islam to American support of Zionism can be seen here:
After leading late afternoon prayers, the imam comes back in the meeting room. I cut to the chase, “Two final questions.”
He interrupts. He has more to say about American politics and says:
In President Obama’s first presidential speech in Cairo, he pointed out some important things and he said that US policy was wrong toward Islamic countries and promised changes. I still remember that speech. i had so much hope when I heard that Preisdent Obama won the election and he got to the White House, but unfortunately, he failed. He didn’t fulfill his promises.
I wish and I hope that the US will stop solving problems from a military basis. This is not the solution. I wish that America comes to discuss with us in a diplomatic way, that it invites these radical groups to the stun is not about solution and fighting way, it is to discuss to sit together to solve it in a political way, not by assassinating or creating bloodshed.
Islamic countries are not only countries, they are a union of all Muslims and the world and America must change its policy toward Islamic countries because what they are doing is totally wrong.
He asks me, Why did Obama not fulfill his promises?
First, I am not an apologist for Obama or for the American government. Obama withdrew troops from Iraq, as promised. He has now withdrawn almost all troops from Afghanistan. He chose not to invade Syria. He helped rebels in Libya but did not occupy or invade the country. He resisted political pressure to bomb Iranian nuclear facilities. So there has been some reconsideration of attitudes toward Muslim countries.
We must have a new look and resolution to today’s problems. That was President Bush’s fault, that he made a grave mistake in Iraq. We and Obama must have a new look and we have to have a new approach for these problems. It is not all about fighting battles.
A few final questions. Should the US, once al Qaeda was pushed out and the Taliban removed from power, should the US have left Afghanistan? Were there positive affects from 13 years of the US presence here? And should the US now leave Afghanistan completely?
As far as al Qaeda, America will never be able to defeat al Qaeda. Al Qaeda is an international reaction to policies, and the only way to defeat or destroy al Qaeda is not the way of bullets. It depends on the Afghan people. Now, I ask you, America came here with the aim of destroying terrorism and the Taliban, and in one day they bombed and pushed out the Taliban. They came for security. Can you say that America was successful in its aim?
No.
Then what is the benefit of America to stay here when the US cannot defeat terrorism? (He laughs, warmly). So why stay? That will not solve problems. That will create more problems.
One final question, as you are Afghanistan’s most revered Islamic scholar, what message do you want to give to the American people?
My message is it’s not about Americans or Spanish or Afghans, we are a universal family, we are one, so as a brother, my message to the American people is to do not be the victim of wrong policies of the US government, and the people of America should not be the victim of the wrong policies of Israel. For Israeli and Zionists, wrong ideas and policies, American youth mustn’t be killed in war in Afghanistan. All these things go back to Israeli and Israeli policies. Not Iraq or Afghanistan or Syria.”
——–
We take a picture together, which he asks me not to publish, and we walk together to the door. He embraces me and says, “You must become a Muslim, and move to Afghanistan.” I answer, “If I do that, then you have to find me a nice Afghan girl to marry.” He laughs and takes his leave. His son, who translated our discussion, invites me to stay and hang out at the mosque for the evening, but I have another interview at the City Center. He tells me that I am welcome back to the mosque any time, and I quite believe him.
My 15 year old friend Fawad Mohammedi goes to the same school as the imam’s son. So, after several attempts, he arranged the meeting. I spent six hours at the mosque, talking to staff, sharing lunch, receiving a gift of black prayer beads.
First, I agree to a few ground rules. I will not use the imam’s name until he has a chance to read the interview. I will give him a chance to remove anything that is too risky to put in print. The picture we took together, which I greatly value, will not be published, nor the audio of our talk.
I have met my share of charismatic/ annoying gurus and religious leaders in my day but rarely have I met someone throwing off this much warmth. He greets me at the entrance to the prayer hall with a small entourage, thanking me for my visit. In the course of six hours, I meet a steady stream of mosque clergy and staff. One, in a particularly stylin’ outfit and headdress tells me that there is greatness in my face, and that I must come to Islam. Flattery will get him everywhere.
After the imam leads Friday prayers and counsels families, a weekly tradition, he joins me along with his son, my friend Fawad, his media producer and several staff. Maybe it’s a sort of learning moment for them as well. An American Jew in Kabul, wanting to know about Islam.
The imam admired my hat. “This is a Chitrali cap. You went to Chitral?”
After an exchange of pleasantries, we begin our hour together.
It is a great privilege for me to speak with you, imam. For you, what is the most important teaching of Islam?
We welcome you as an honest and honorable guest. Islam consists of 4 main parts, or columns (pillars). First, faith and belief. Worship and prayers. Moral attitude. And social life, how to build relations with other people. So, it’s not just belief.
The way you live your life, the way you walk in the world.
Yes, Islam has a message for each of these four parts. How we build a connection with Allah, with God. But our sense of worshiping means keeping Him always in mind, having a deep relation with Him.
Personally, how does Islam bring beauty and happiness to your life?
I didn’t follow Islam like a blind man without any research. I have researched other religions, I have compared mine with others and then I came to the conclusion that Islam is the best religion that we can apply in every part of our life. Economic, political, family, social life, psychological life. When I accepted Islam, I felt like I don’t have to worry about anything in life, no stress, no worries. Islam brought calm and happiness to my life. Being kind to any creature in the universe, animal or human.
So a theological question, as a follow up. If your faith is the one true faith, how do you respect other spiritual paths if you believe that in effect they are inferior, not the true path? (He asks his media producer to start recording video and asks if that’s OK with me.)
Humankind from the creation of the universe has passed through many phases. At the beginning, life was simple. Human life was all about feeding ourselves and staying alive. It’s like when someone gets a simple sickness, we need simple medicine. Allah’s books, scriptures and messengers are like doctors and medicines for humanity. In a specific period in history, there was a specific illness, so that prophet was sent to help the people to solve that problem. It’s like when you go to a doctor, he gives you a prescription with a…
…an expiration date.
And when you go back to the doctor, you get the new prescription, and the old ones are no longer usable to you. Allah sent messengers for different periods in history for different problems. Humankind’s problems are like diseases that need deep resolutions and solutions. When someone gets a really serious disease and he goes to a doctor, the doctor doesn’t write all the prescriptions at one time. He instructs the patient to use this medicine for ten days and then come back. After that, he writes another prescription and he says you can’t use the first medicine anymore. After this short period, he writes the permanent prescription that you should use forever. And the last prescription must be complete. And other religions and Islam are like this, the prescriptions that Allah gave to us. And then when the last religion came, the other religions are expired. And this is the new complete prescription.
I met Mohammed while waiting for the imam. He is the media producer for the mosque and produces telecasts of imam’s talks. He downloaded and programmed the Quran Explorer iPhone app for me and then proceeded to clean up some settings. Yes, I came from Silicon Valley to a Kabul mosque to get my technology sorted out. I was the first American he ever met.
Humankind’s problems are getting more serious day by day. If we look at the Christian’s bible, you cannot find resolution on the use of drugs. Or Hinduism, Buddhism, Judaism. Islam has a resolution for preventing use of drugs and solving this problem in human society. In Koran, in the speech of prophet Mohammed, in Sharia. So we need a religion, a complete religion for our daily life. In the Koran, there are verses about science and technology. The Church, when Galileo spoke about his theory of the motion of the earth…
Yes, they killed him….
But in the Koran, there are verses that indirectly address the motion of Earth. In Europe, in the French Revolution, people were forced to separate law from religion. They left religion just in the framework of a church, nowhere else.
The Enlightenment. Imam, may I say, at that time there were hundreds of years of religious wars, Catholics and Protestants killing each other, and one of the reasons for the Enlightenment was to stop those wars and allow freedom of religion. Do you see any benefit in that or is that an apostacy?
In the noble Koran, Allah said there is no pressure to force someone into Islam. (The imam starts to speak in English and his son interrupts him. I congratulate him on his English and say he’s doing fine). It is totally wrong that people in the West believe that Muslims only want Islam on Earth. That is a totally wrong idea. Islam has two kinds of citizenship. One is for Muslims who live in an Islamic state and the other is non-Muslims who live in Islamic states and those who live outside Islamic countries. The policy of Islam and its citizens is equal about their rights and laws, for Muslims and non-Muslims. An example of this equality is if a Muslim kills a non-Muslim, he will be punished according to the laws of Islam and he must be killed. Muslims and non-Muslims must be treated with respect.
There are radical Islamist groups in the world now, the Taliban, the Islamic State, Boko Haram, al Qaeda that seem to justify violence against non-believers or Muslims who don’t measure up to their standards. Why does this kind of radical, more violent understanding of Islam seem to be spreading?
You started our conversation by asking me about Islam. Islam totally differs from what these Muslims are doing today. Those Taliban, radical groups, they have their personal ideas, you should ask them why are they doing such things. Is what they are doing in the Koran, did Allah say so, to kill people, to murder non-Muslims? You should ask them. (I am not looking forward look forward to that opportunity…) It’s all a reaction against global policies. For example, I ask you, do Palestinians have the right to live in their territories?
Yes, and I think there is a similar issue with Jewish fundamentalism, Jews in Israel saying something very similar to Muslim fundamentalists. There is a song, Exodus, that goes, “This land is mine, God gave this land to me.” They believe that God gave this land to them. So they owe Palestinians nothing, This seems a big problem in the world, where people are saying I have the truth and you don’t, so I have a divine right to oppress you.
The world accepts that Palestinians should live with them, they should make a state, Germany agrees with them, France, England, Russia, but the United States doesn’t accept them. The US accepts and supports Zionist policy. Why are they doing so? If they are doing so, Muslims must react. When the US attacked Iraq, what was the reason that they destroyed the Iraqi government? And now, they are seeing the reaction (ISIS) to what they did. There is no problem in the world between people and religions. The problem is the wrong ideas and the wrong policies against Muslims, against humanity.
What change would you like to see in US foreign policy, in terms of the way the US approaches the world?
The Afghan nation is thankful for the help and support the United States gave in its struggle against the Soviet Union. During the Soviet-Afghan war, American had a goal of defeating the Soviet Union but after the battle was finished, the US policy toward Afghanistan changed. For example, Osama bin Laden was traveling to Pakistan and Islamic groups were active. America was supporting them. But after the US achieved its goals, why did US policy change and become against Muslims around the world?
Many Americans think the US made a mistake by failing to assist Afghanistan in the years after the Soviets were driven out. You said two things, One, you said the US should have continued to help Afghanistan. Two, I’m curious as to why you believe the US was against Muslims. Is that because of the Iraq war? I don’t think American policy changed toward Muslims. The Persian Gulf is a major source of oil, and when Iraq invaded Kuwait and threatened Saudi Arabia, many Muslim countries opposed Iraq. The second Iraq war is widely viewed as an inexcusable mistake.
Protesters demand that Egyptian President Mohamed Mursi resign at Tahrir Square in Cairo July 1, 2013. REUTERS/Mohamed Abd El Ghany
That was all about the battlefield, the field of war. But in the political field, with American policy in Algeria, there was a democratically elected government. Islamists were elected to run the government. Why were America and European countries opposed? The same in Egypt, when Mubarak fell, there was a peaceful and democratic election, why did the the US support Sisi, Israel helped the government and the Muslims were ruined there. Why did America do that?
Well, you are talking about Algeria and Egypt. In Egypt, I agree that it is problematic to promote democracy and then bring down the democratically elected government. But while the US provides military aid, it did not invade Egypt. The Egyptian people felt there was chaos and Morsi was bringing the country to a bad position, they protested in the streets and wanted him out and there was an undemocratic solution, and yes, the US did not prevent it, but this was Egyptians coming to a political resolution in their country.
The muezzin begins the call to prayer. The imam apologizes that he must go and asks me if I need more time. I tell him I have a few more questions. The final part of our discussion will be posted shortly. And, for an excellent interactive look at the Egyptian revolution, check this out from Al Jazeera: http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/interactive/2013/07/20137493141105596.html
Staying with Farshid begat my meeting with Mr. W which begat my meeting with Will Everett. Mr. W prefers to stay anonymous. When I engage Afghans publicly, as I’m here to harvest interesting stories, Mr. W says to me, “Not a good idea.” I trust Mr. W as he has been here a dozen years.
I am weirdly out of shape. I walk a lot. And as alcohol is largely verboten here, lots of calories unconsumed. The occasional surprise showing of mead, homemade rose wine, rum, Johnnie Walker Double Black. I am looking forward to Southeast Asia beaches and yoga.
Will works for Roots for Peace, one more extraordinary Non-Governmental Organization here, quietly doing transformative work. http://rootsofpeace.org/programs-page/afghanistan Demine-replant-rebuild. They clear landmines, provide farming resources such as seedlings, fertilizer and tools, and offer training to increase crop yields. Mines to Vines.
I share that with you because Will, a former NPR reporter, says he doesn’t give a shit about anonymity. Will arrives at the Kabul Serena Hotel lobby, where he recognizes me, a westerner pecking away on a MacBook Air. The other people in the lobby are either behind the reception counter or carrying automatic weapons.
At Ghazi Stadium Saturday. I left my sunglasses in the taxi on the way. Or in the hideous men’s toilet with non-operational plumbing. The Taliban used the stadium for public executions back in the day.
Mr. W arrives and we dine at the Asian fusion restaurant Wild Rice. The food is great. Nasi Goreng, Teriyaki Chicken and Sweet sand Sour Fish. The Thai soup is excellent as well, but doubles the cost of the entree, so, a strategic error. Will suggests a possible trip to Mazar-i-Sharif, where US and Northern Alliance forces began their drubbing of the Taliban in 2001. I suggest my interest in Panjshir Valley. He promises to keep me posted on his plans. And he mentions his neighborhood swimming pool, which sounds splendid. I need a place to work out. Near the City Center, there is a huge banner advertising a kickass gym on the second floor. When I climbed the stairs, there was rubble, and a fellow with a gun telling me to get lost.
Mr. W buzzes my phone as he rolls up to the house. I say goodbye to the guard, and get in. He has a Skype call with clients and asks if I’m willing to be late. We call Will, who informs that he has to be off to dinner by 8, so I get out for a taxi, and agree to meet W later. The taxi driver claims to know where we are going but stops to check with passersby every twenty yards to get new directions. I finally have Will’s building guard walk him though it. Great. He hangs up and asks someone for directions on each block anyway. My dad, Sol, was a New York taxi driver for two decades. I prefer to think he knew where the fuck he was going most of the time.
! have tea with Will and his colleague Hamid, and we truck off to the pool. I’m excited, less so after Will suggests that the pool is heated, kinda, but after a minute of temperature shock, the water is just fine.
——–
The place is jammed. Do I need to mention that Afghan pools are not co-ed? I was going to take my swimsuit. Will said it’s not needed as one is provided, which did not sound appetizing. “Bring your own unless it’s eurotrash bikini in which case leave it home.” I assure him, “I aspire to euro trash, but till then, my swimsuit is, sadly, rather conventional.”
Photo from the days when the Taliban terrorized Kabulis with public shaming and murder at Ghazi Stadium. Because, you know, God told them to.
The rundown on getting in: Register at the front desk and get a blue swimsuit and locker key. Trade your shoes for slippers. I ask if there are any Afghan customs regarding changing and he answers, helpfully, “Just don’t show your junk.” There is an odd changing station in the midst of each locker area, a three-sided, waist-high wooden structure allowing for modest changing. There is lots of noise and humidity. Mr. W shows up to join us.
I am the only one in the house wearing goggles and, to minimize the torment, i jump right in the pool. It’s not that bad! The bigger problem is that laps are problematic. The pool is full of mostly young guys—did I mention there are no women?—and Kabulis can’t swim. It is a landlocked country and swimming pools are a hot new thing, or so I’m told.
I am not a good swimmer. I love swimming but am not good at it. Kind of like dancing. LiAnne Mattheney, who trained for the Olympics back in the day, gave me a few tips last summer. Maybe because she noticed that I am not a good swimmer. Nevertheless, by putting one arm before the other, kicking once a while, and, most importantly, by wearing goggles, I am an immediate celebrity. I hope this doesn’t sound racist, but everybody looks the same to me through my fogged goggles. Central Asian complexions, wet black hair, blue swimsuits and flailing arms. A Russian-looking fellow, stout and thirty-ish, let’s call him The Tajik, sheepishly floats my way and asks for a lesson. I laugh, loudly. Listening to cues for English comprehension from the way he phrases his question, I insist, “I’m a terrible swimmer. I have nothing to teach you. You must be thinking I’m someone else.” Disappointed, he makes small talk and I swim away.
An everyday sight in Kabul: a drone floating over the stadium. From this distance, it can recognize your face.
A skinny younger guy, with a wide toothy grin, maybe early twenties (he had wet hair, a Central Asian complexion and a blue swimsuit) excitedly swims up and declares, “You are very good swimmer. Teach me.”
“I can’t teach you. I am a very poor swimmer.”
“Then, how can I learn?” he asks, perplexed, still smiling.
I offer a solution, “Hire a teacher,” then swim away.
I’m such a wimp that the aimless splashing and colliding in the deep end motivates me to swim in the middle of the pool, hugging the cable divider. I come up for air and three men surround me. The Tajik, Toothy Grin and a snarky teenage guy (let’s call him Kabul Wiseguy). They have come to petition me for a swimming lesson. I see Mr. W and wave, but Will is nowhere to be seen, nor Hamid. I offer another solution. “You know, there are hundreds of videos on YouTube,” I suggest. “I would suggest you watch and learn, one lesson at a time.”
Toothy Grin has a better idea. “No, I watch you. You are a master swimmer. I want you to teach me.”
All three wait patently, and then, i remember LiAnne’s three tips. Don’t take your head out of the water when you breath. Cup your hands. I forget the third, but do remember something I learned from a Tim Ferriss post about extending your body.
They are enthralled and go splashing away. The Tajik calls out at me, completely ignoring everything I showed him. “Look, look at me,” he shouts, excitedly as he plunges his way to the other side of the pool.
“You’re doing great,” I shout back, raising thumbs up in the locally accepted sign of American approval.
Me and Afghanistan’s national football coach at the Herat-Mazar match at Ghazi, which proves I’m, you know, a sportsman. Herat, Assef’s team, loses 1-0. Boo.
I am now the pool’s Great American Master Swimmer. An athletic, caramel-skinned good-looking teenager challenges me to a race. I haven’t raced since I knew I could beat my young daughters. But I agree and we race across the pool. I suddenly am very serious about this and swim my heart out. It’s a tie. He is very proud of himself. “Again?” We take a minute and race again. Half way through i feel a collision and when i arrive, The Tajik and his two friends are up in arms.
“He cheated,“ The Tajik yells at Caramel Handsome and a crowd gathers, laughing and jostling. There is a lot of physical roughhousing in the pool area. I rest from my olympian racing effort and chat with a small group of guys. “Afghans are good people, very friendly,” says The Tajik. And, then, because I can’t resist, I ask the three guys before me what they think of the US presence. There are the usual answers: We love Americans. Thank you for your sacrifices here. We want you to stay.
One fellow works for the Ministry of Finance. “Really?” I ask. “So what happened to that $900 million that went missing?”
He snorts, “What do you think happened? Someone took it.”
“Did Karzai have anything to do with it?”
“Of course he did.”
A few feet away from our small group of eight or nine is a tightly wound muscular fellow sitting cross-legged on the lip of the pool. He is saying something to me in Dari and snickering to his four or five friends. He isn’t happy.
The Tajik says, “I told you. Most Afghans are good, but some bad. Forget him.”
I ask Angry Buddha’s friend what he is saying. A thin, pale, earnest fellow in his late twenties tells me, “He says Americans are murderers. You kill many people in Afghanistan.”
I wade closer. Angry Buddha is brooding and does not speak English. “Ask him if he thinks all Americans should leave the country.”
Pale Earnest translates in Dari. “He said you are on Muslim land and soon we will have a caliphate.”
I’ve spent weeks developing a liberal-minded narrative as to how the whole caliphate idea is a paranoid construct of Fox News and AM Radio.
Pale Earnest is speaking to my right. He seems quite nice and studious and proceeds to tell me that everything’s all good, as there will be a worldwide Muslim caliphate under Sharia law, but that all religions will be respected as Islam is a religion of peace and tolerance. Angry Buddha wants to know where I’m from. I lean in, and say, “San Francisco. California.” Then, for no particular reason, “I’m an American Jew.”
Buddha stops speaking. He doesn’t know what to say. I’ve confused his neural circuitry. We have drawn a crowd. I suspect my swim is over. Mr. W walks by and gives me a look, though I am not sure what to make of it. I elaborate, helpfully:
“Tell him i have a question for him. If Islam is a religion of peace and tolerance, what is its view on Judaism and what is his personal attitude toward Jews?”
Angry Buddha goes on a long rant, translated roughly as, we don’t want Americans here, Mohammed is God’s last prophet, other religions are tolerated but they have expired.
——–
A gift of prayer beads graciously gifted from the mullah’s staff during my visit to the Wazir Akhbar Khan mosque.
The next day, during my visit to the mosque, the mullah uses the same word. Expired. It was explained to me this way: when you are sick, the doctor gives you a series of prescriptions and then there is one final prescription. That final prescription is Islam. God has sent many prophets, but Mohammed is the last one and the Koran and its related scriptures are now all you need.
I pressed him. “You didn’t answer my question. What is your attitude toward Jews?”
No answer. Pussy.
I submerge for a few seconds and swim a few yards, then return. “Many American Jews and Israelis want justice for the Palestinian people. But, don’t you see? Jewish fundamentalists believe the same thing you do. That they’re the chosen people. That God gave their land to them. And that since God gave them the land, they can fuck you up if you try to take any of it back. There’s a song called ‘Exodus.’ You ever hear of it?”
Blank stares all around. I sing the opening verse. “This land is mine, God gave this land to me. This brave and ancient land to me…”
Pale Earnest interrupts and tries to explain, no, that was the religion of the old prophets, the one that EXPIRED, but with Islam, we have the final revelation and…
“I heard this before.” I realize I’m getting upset and in brief moments of lucidity realize that the way we do debate where I grew up is different from the way things are communicated in public here. “The Jewish fundamentalists say they own the truth. And you don’t. In my country, Christian fundamentalists say they are saved and if you don’t believe what they believe that God will torment you forever. That means every Muslim, every one of you in this pool, God will roast you for all eternity because of what you believe. Don’t you see? You people have been fucking killing each other for three decades without end. Yes, the Americans killed civilians and…”
“Do you think America is an occupier?” challenges Angry Buddha, seeking rhetorical supremacy in front of his semi-literate friends.
Trick question. “Of course I do. We are occupying your country. The difference between Iraq and Afghanistan is that, we invaded Iraq based on lies, mostly motivated by its oil, and caused the violent unnecessary deaths of over one hundred thousand civilians. Here at least we have been invited to stay.”
“We don’t want you to stay,” says Angry Buddha’s friend, standing in the pool next to me. “Karzai said he wanted you to go.”
“Bullshit,” I say. “That’s bullshit. That’s for domestic politics. If Karzai or Ghani and Abdullah and most Afghans say we want you out now, we would leave. Your government, imperfect and corrupt as it may be, wants us for our security presence.”
“We want you for your money,” says Finance Ministry guy.
“OK, then for our money. I have no doubt that my country has military interests here, regional political interests here, economic interests here. But you’re missing the point, you’re not listening to me.”
——–
The crowd is now two or three layers thick. I don’t see Mr. W or Will anywhere.
“The Uzbeks kill the Tajiks who unite with the Turkomen to kill the Pashtun who claim Sunni is the one true faith while they kill the Hazara Shia. When do you have enough? Forget the caliphate. Believe what you want, and respect and love your brother. This tribal bullshit, claiming God is blessing your misery and slaughter is killing the world.”
Angry Buddha’s three friends pull him up and away and two others throw Pale Earnest into the pool. Innocent homoerotic fun.
I think, time to leave and lift myself out of the pool. Will had said he was going to the salt bath. I walk in the direction he had pointed and find a door and a young man with a shovel. There’s no one inside. I walk in, and it’s a small room, like a cave, with two rows of lights, three small orange bulbs to a set. Two young men in swim trunks enter.
“What do I do?” I ask.
“There’s a charge, says the younger one.
“Yeah, whatever, what do I do?”
The shovel guy digs a rectangular foxhole for me. “Looks like a grave,” jokes the older, twentysomething guy.
I’m buried up to my head in salt, and they both leave. I’m not sure what a salt bath does, but it better do something good because it starts to sting after a while, on my shins and under my thighs. After an indeterminate stretch of time, what feels like twenty minutes but is likely ten, I decide that being buried in salt in an isolated room is not necessarily good for my health, so I lift myself out and walk to the shower outside the room. The hot water feels delicious as the salt melts into and off my skin.
In the shower room, carefully honoring Will’s admonition not to show my junk, I walk under the shower in my ancient swimsuit next to, of all people, Angry Buddha. He glowers but says nothing and ignores me. Pale Earnest takes up the shower space to my right and goes on about the caliphate again. Because, you know, this time he’s gonna convince me what a swell idea it is. “The world will one day realize the truth and become Muslim.”
I turn to him, and see the sincerity in his face. “No, it won’t. Everyone thinks they have the truth and the world is exhausted from people trying to lord it over each other, trying to impose their will and their ideology by violence. And, I gotta tell you, pal, my country has been doing it for years because we think that WE are the instruments of divine providence, and we got much bigger weapons than you do and lots more of them.”
We banter back and forth and continue the conversation at my locker. Several of my pool pals swap Facebook, email, mobile and web site information with me.
——–
Later, Mr. W admonishes me. “Not a good idea.” He gives me some specific instructions. “If you meet any of them, meet in a public place, like City Center, where there is plenty of security. Don’t tell them where you are staying or when you are leaving. And don’t use my name or Will’s in any conversations.”
I protest that I did not intend to incite trouble.
“You’re probably fine because you’re leaving. The rest of us have to live here.”
At that moment, for the first time, I think, maybe it’s time to go. But finding what grievances and truths lie in the fierce Afghan heart seems worth the effort.
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Reading time: 15 min
Brian Gruber is an author, writing coach, and marketing consultant living on the Thai island of Koh Phangan. He has spent 40 years studying, leading, and founding new media companies and projects.
In my travels through the Greater Middle East for the Afterparty book project, I went out of my way to meet Muslims. I visited mosques in Abu Dhabi, Dubai and Sharjah in the United Arab Emirates, met with the leading Afghan Islamic scholar at his mosque in Kabul between afternoon prayers, discussed religion with secular, Shia and Sunni Muslims in Iraq. Interviews with Muslims, from army officers and a hospital CEO to a former mujahedin fighter and a frustrated Afghan housewife, permeate the Afghanistan and Iraq chapters. In the final chapter, I explore the notion of Islam as a violent religion. Here is an excerpt from the closing chapter of “WAR: The Afterparty.”
