A Sharia Revolution from Africa to the Caucasus?

The media may need to dump the term “Arab Spring“. The term was used by the media to romanticize the young Arabs demonstrating for “democracy” in Tunisia, Libya, and Egypt. In short order the demonstrations evolved into revolutions, which were predictably hijacked by the better organized Islamic extremist. The extremist, the Muslim Brotherhood and their enforcers, al Qaeda, were not interested so much in democracy as they were in establishing Sharia law and jihad throughout all Muslim nations; not just Arab Muslim nations. While the media and the world are focused on the current machinations of this Sharia Revolution playing out in Syria, they have ignored the fledgling Sharia revolution that has been going on for decades way to the north, in the Caucasus.

After the breakup of the former Soviet Union, The Caucasus countries south of the Greater Caucasus Mountain range (see this map), running from the Black Sea to the Caspian Sea, became independent nations: Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan. But, those north of the mountain range remained part of Russia (see the map below).

This Reuters article from August of last year explains what has been happening in Dagestan, a Caucasus state in Russia.

For centuries, the Muslim communities of Russia’s Caucasus mountains practiced Sufism, a mystical form of Islam whose practitioners chant prayers in circles. There was little of the formal Islamic legal scholarship that prevails across much of the Sunni Muslim world.

But

In the two decades since the fall of the officially atheist Soviet Union, many Caucasus Muslims studied abroad in Saudi Arabia, Egypt or other parts of the Middle East. When they returned, they clashed with the religious establishment, demanding a “purer” Islam uncorrupted by local Sufi customs.

Government figures show 8,872 people are now studying Islam in institutions of higher education.

Islamic extremism was never only the purview of the Shi’a in Iran. The Sunni Muslims have always had their extremist as well. Most notable among the Sunni extremist have been the Muslim Brotherhood; seemingly funded by the Saudi royal family  and more recently , al Qaeda. The so-called Arab Spring was just the Sunni extremist not letting a crisis go to waste.

Here are some more quotes from the Reuters article.

In the first half of 2012 alone, the Caucasian Knot website recorded 185 insurgency-related deaths and 168 wounded, making Dagestan one of the deadliest places in Europe. The number of men seized by security forces as suspected militants so far this year, tracked by Russia’s leading rights group Memorial, has already exceeded last year’s total.

{…}

In the streets of the sun-drenched Caspian Sea city, government banners proclaim: “We are against terror”. Residents say they have become desensitized to near daily sniper and bomb attack on police.

“Not a day goes by without the killing of either a terrorist or a policeman. We’re so used to it, we think that’s the way things ought to be,” said taxi driver Nabib Abdulvagabov, 35.

{…}

The influence of religious conservatism can be seen not only in remote villages but also on the streets of Makhachkala, Dagestan’s Caspian Sea coastal capital. The Salafi community has its own media outlets, charities and even a football league.

A sex-segregated school that opened this year already has more than 250 students.

“Five years ago, there were no Islamic clothing shops. Now every other girl wears a hijab,” said Fatima Ramzanova, 19, feet curled under her on the sand of a new women-only beach in a full, black Islamic dress she wears against her mother’s wishes.

In spite of Putin’s policy of  ”backing for mainstream clerics and cracking down hard on religious radicalism”, local Russian authorities are not having much success in controlling the Sharia Revolution in Dagestan. One would have to assume that at some poit, Putin will send in his troops.

But, it is not just the Russian Caucasus that are seeing jihad to enforce Sharia law.

In early April, Azerbaijani authorities carried out a massive crackdown on presumed Jihadi cells in the northern areas of Azerbaijan (Qakh, Zaqatala, Sheki, and Qusar districts) along with Baku and the republic’s two largest cities after the capital city, Ganja and Sumgait. According to official sources, Ministry for National Security troops detained up to 20 members of the infamous Jihadist group “Forest Brothers.” The operation raises questions about the growing appeal of Jihadist ideology in especially Azerbaijan’s north, as well as the forceful measures applied by the authorities to tackle the problem. (Source)

What is the objective of the Sunni led Sharia Revolution? Does the Muslim Brotherhood dream of a confederation Sunni caliphates extending from the Caucasus in the north to central Africa in the South?

It seems clear that, when the US pulls its last troops out of Afghanistan, that the Taliban will return with a vengeance.

What about Pakistan? How long could the fractured and weak government of Pakistan stand up to a Sharia Revolution? We rightly worry about a nuclear Iran. But,Pakistan is already a nuclear power.

President Barack Obama has proven himself to be an Islamic sympathizer and he holds the Muslim Brotherhood in high esteem. Therefore, for th next four years, at a minimum, we can not expect much in the way of leadership from the United States in the face of this Sharia Revolution, can we?

The tag line at Asylum Watch reads: Because it’s a crazy world out there and we have to live in it. As this Sharia Revolution  continues, the world will become even more insane.

Well, now you know what I’m thinking. What are your thoughts?

Tagged: Arab Spring, Azerbaijan, Caucasus, Dagestan, Muslim Brotherhood, Russia, Sharia Revolution, Sunni, Sunni Caliphate

Posted in: Sharia Revolution