The Smith Auditorium in the Meadows Museum was packed Friday for Julian Brazier’s lecture on Wahhabism, Islam and the Middle East.
Brazier, the minority whip for the British House of commons, came to SMU as part of a stateside lecture tour.
He traced the history of Islam from the split between Sunnis and Shiites over the succession of Mohammed to the creation of the Wahhabi sect of Sunnism to its ramifications in current events.
Nina Flournoy, a senior lecturer in the Corporate Communications and Public Affairs department, said she’s met Brazier in her trips to London with the SMU-in-London program.
“I bring students to see him every summer in Parliament,” she said.
According to Brazier, the recent conflict in Israel and Lebanon has its roots in events surrounding the First World War.
The Balfour Declaration, signed in 1917, set the stage for the creation of a Jewish state in Palestine and was part of the reason President Woodrow Wilson decided to ignore his opposition and enter the war on the side of the Allied Powers.
But the declaration also promised rights to individual Arabs.
Brazier said that Arabs “saw Arab brethren being treated increasingly as second-class citizens,” and that there was “widespread anger at the emergence of a Jewish state in the middle of the Arab world.”
The situation only grew worse during World War II when “Nazis fed Arab fears of Jewish immigration,” said Brazier.
He also credited the Arab world with sustaining the Allies in the Second World War.
“Had the Arabs turned against us,” he said, “it could’ve cost us the war.”
After the war, when the 300,000 Jews in Palestine received “all the best fertile areas” of the country while the 600,000 Arabs “were to be left the rocky half of the country,” anger grew.
Brazier described Israel’s subsequent actions as ethnic cleansings.
When Palestinians fled Israeli persecution and relocated to northern neighbor Lebanon, matters only got worse.
Lebanon, the “civilized and democratic jewel of the Middle East,” was “overrun in the 70s by Syrians,” said Brazier. Hezbollah, a militia group whose name translates to “party of God,” took root in Lebanon.
“Lebanon only got rid of Syria and its absolutely brutal regime last year,” said Brazier, when Hezbollah decided to contrive a border incident.
“Israel reacted by trashing the entire country,” he said, bombing every seaport and virtually every community, but Hezbollah achieved several victories.
According to Brazier, “Israel largely failed – two-thirds of the areas it said it would capture, it didn’t.”
Brazier emphasized that the key to winning moderate Arab opinion is the West’s attitudes toward Palestine.
“The mess in Iraq” and around the Muslim world, Brazier said, “is good for Wahhabists.”
Wahhabism is the branch of Islamic fundamentalism to which Osama bin Laden and al-Qaida adhere.
In an analogy, Brazier compare Wahhabi Muslims to Puritans – they strictly adhere to the word of the Quran, following literal interpretations and leading ascetic lives.
“It was a new, allegedly purer form of Islam based entirely on the written word,” said Brazier, “but it was never accepted by most Arabs.”
The only place Wahhabism really took hold, he explained, was in the kingdom of Saudi Arabia. The House of Saud came to power there in the beginning of the 20th century at the same time the Hashemite family came to power in Jordan and Iraq.
Now, says Brazier, American actions are feeding the terrorism machine.
“The Wahhabist party has always thrived on oppression,” he said, adding that westerners should be concerned that the Wahhabist party Hamas won a democratic election in Palestine.
“Al-Qaida stretches from Kashmir to Chechnya to Palestine, and the regime in the Sudan is more and more Wahhabist each day,” he said.
The powerful Saudi Arabia, head of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries and a U.S. ally, continues to be a problematic source of fundamentalists, said Brazier.
But there are things the United States can do to alleviate problems.
Brazier emphasized the need to build alliances with moderate Muslims and to show equal concessions for all people.
“We must distinguish between support of Israel as a state and unconditional support of its government,” he said.
He added that the West must realize that “there are other ways to apply pressure than military force.”
If America had more troops on the ground and fewer air strikes, he said, it would improve its image.
“Pictures of dead Arab women and children guarantee al-Qaida fresh recruits,” he said, adding that recognizing Russia as a crucial force in the area is vital.
Above all, he said, “the West must learn once again to combine resolve with patience and justice.”
After a few heated questions from audience members, one accusing Brazier of ignoring the role of British imperialism another calling Afghanistan “destined for failure,” Brazier spoke with students one-on-one.
He said in his experience, American students were “bright, vibrant, lively, [and had] lots of challenging questions.”
Flournoy, who directs SMU’s London program, said the program was great in terms of educating the public.
“We really need to hear more at SMU and as Americans” about the Middle East, she said. “We need to be more aware.”
