The secular western world is incapable of fully understanding the
threat of a “reawakening of Islam” in the Middle East, according to an
Iraqi bishop beset by radical movements in his own archdiocese.
In an interview with the Italian bishops' SIR news agency, Archbishop
Louis Sako of Kirkuk, Iraq, called the Middle East a “scary volcano”
because of the possible consequences of widespread unrest.
“There are Islamic forces and movements that wish to change the
Middle East, creating Islamic States, caliphates, in which Shariah (law)
rules,” he warned.
Radical groups present in Iraq such as al-Qaida and Ansar al Islam
are calling on citizens in other Middle Eastern nations to inject an
Islamic influence into otherwise general protests in places like Tunisia
and Egypt.
For Archbishop Sako these calls have “the clear intention of fueling ... a total religious change” in the area.
“They are voices that could find fertile ground in Egypt and
elsewhere and therefore should not be underestimated, also because there
are regional powers whose leaders have defined these revolts as the
'reawakening of Islam',” he said.
In practice, the goal of these fundamentalists is “to create a void
to be able to fill it with religious themes, convinced ... that Islam is
the solution to everything.”
In Egypt, protesters insist that the widespread protests are not
driven by religion or ethnicity, but rather a universal grievance
against extremely poor social and political conditions.
Some fear, however, that organized Islamic associations such as the
Muslim Brotherhood are in an optimal position to take advantage of the
confusion for political benefit.
Because unrest could be manipulated by fundamentalist opportunists, Archbishop Sako called the Middle East “a scary volcano.”
Should Egypt becoming an Islamic state, he said, it would be “a
problem for all” and have “undeniable, negative aftershocks for
Christian minorities.”
According to the archbishop, Europe and North America are blind to the possibility of such an “Islamization” of the Middle East.
“The western mentality does not allow it to fully comprehend this risk,” he said.
He explained that politics and religion are interwoven in the Middle
East, whereas there is “a tremendous void” between them in western
nations.
This results in two extremisms, he said. The Middle Eastern mentality
is dominated by Islam, while a secularism that denies its Christian
roots and relegates Christian values to the private sphere reigns in the
West.
Although “material violence” does not appear in the West, the general
privatization of Christianity is “against democracy,” he said. “In the
East, however, it is the opposite: religion pervades all.”
He called the future of the Middle East “unknown and scary” and said
the international community is “incapable of moving” in reaction to the
recent turn of events.
Iraqi Christians – plagued by violence and a lack of security – look
to the Egyptian crisis with “sadness,” he told SIR news. They are afraid
that the North African nation might fall into the same ethnic and
religious division.
Archbishop Sako's own archdiocese has been struck hard by extremist
violence. Nine Christians have died and another 104 have been injured in
Kirkuk.
The fear the survivors have about Egypt, said the Church leader, is that it will become “a new Iraq.”