Islam: Encountering a Contemporary Challenge

Islam’s encounter with the Jewish state has been the most intense and actively hostile. The Muslim Middle East has mounted armies to wage war, sponsored terror attacks by Islam-inspired “martyrs” [“shuhada” in Arabic], supported maneuvers in international organizations to undermine Israel’s legitimacy, and preached from the pulpits of mosques to stir up the faithful against the Jewish state. Islam is divided into major and minor schisms, with Sunni as opposed to Shi’a the most pronounced, but it has been far more unified in its opposition to Zionism than Christianity. Not having undergone a reformation, renaissance, and Enlightenment, nor having confronted secularization to the extent that has taken place in the West, Islam’s rejection of Israel is traditional and consistent with its historical experience as the dominant religion and culture in the region for the past fifteen centuries. The emergence of a Jewish polity in its midst is thus construed as a challenge to Islam’s hegemony and basic beliefs. Moreover, since Israel is identified as a product of the “West,” the antagonism towards it is enmeshed in the resentment and hostility towards Europe and America, and the civilizational challenge Christianity has posed for Islam.