Daily Times

It is always heartening to see the resilience of the Muslim ummah that is capable of withstanding turmoil, bloodshed, killings and what not. From a full-blown civil war in Syria to an impending one in Lebanon, from the killing of Egyptian border guards to drone attacks in Waziristan, from turmoil in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia to massacres of Muslims in Assam, has there been anything to feel good about in recent times?

Fortunately, this year, Eid passed without a major incident in spite of the fact that there was a lot of apprehension of a major terrorist strike in Pakistan, fuelled by the statement of Interior Minister Rehman Malik of a strong possibility of such an attack based on intelligence input. We as Muslims have become sensitised to these otherwise gruesome events and therefore they do not seem to have any effect on us anymore. We have become apathetic and do not seem to react any more to such events. So is our celebration a reflection of this apathy? As long as this does not affect us directly, why bother about it or even if it does, as we cannot do anything about it, let’s just forget it. Apathy is not a trait of a Muslim who because of his firm belief in the Mercy of Allah is always optimistic. You have to look for some signs of His Mercy even under dire circumstances; once you find them, it is your duty to spread them so that your fellow Muslims do not fall into this state of general apathy and do not become despondent of His Mercy.

The event of 9/11 can rightly be considered as a watershed event in contemporary Muslim history because it changed the rules of the game and Muslims have been at the receiving end since then. Many of my Muslim brethren believe that the Americans have failed to achieve what they aimed to achieve at the start of their so-called ‘War on Terror’. They have reasons to say so; after all, they have been forced to quit Iraq, they are on the verge of defeat in Afghanistan and their intervention has been a stimulus for a ‘Muslim Renaissance’ in the form of the so-called Arab Spring. This has seen many pro-western dictators such as Bin-Ali of Tunisia, Mubarak of Egypt and Gaddafi of Libya toppled and being replaced by Islamist forces.

I believe that while all of the above is true, the American invasion seems to have had a potentially devastating effect on the Muslim ummah in the form of fanning the fires of mutual mistrust and hatred between the two major denominations of the ummah — the Shias and the Sunnis. This I believe is the single most important factor that has the potential of negating all our achievements and I feel it is my moral duty to share my apprehensions with my brethren even if they may disagree.

One dangerous trend is the rise of sectarianism. What has been the reason for this is an entirely different matter but the fact is that this is a reality that we need to accept and confront. I believe that this is the single most important problem facing Muslims presently and the one that has a potential to negate all our achievements, turning us into a community of perpetual infighting in which we light the fire while our enemies only have to ensure that they pour some oil from time to time. I believe that every single Muslim has a role to play in this by simply following one principle of Professor Muqtadar Khan that aptly says, “A Muslim should be intolerant of intolerance.”

This is not to say that sectarianism is a recent phenomenon. It has been there for ages but there have been two recent changes in this phenomenon that are particularly worrying. One trend is it is becoming more generalised and gaining a foothold in the general public rather than a small minority, which is evident by the results of the recent PEW survey, showing a marked rise in mutual hatred in Muslim communities, particularly in the Middle-East and North Africa. The other dangerous trend is the display of intolerance, which often leads to violence. The dialogue has become increasingly vitriolic, often reaching the levels where even Takfeer is being used against one another in the form of open fatwas. This, my dear brethren, is a dangerous situation, which needs to be recognised, confronted and opposed with all the resources available to us at all levels — be it individual, family, social, educational, or legal. I believe that we are at a crossroads and this is not the time to push negative tendencies under the carpet; it is time to take them head on. This is not the time to play any blame game. It is clear that there are extremist tendencies on both sides of the sectarian divide and it is the responsibility of all of us to identify them, confront them, oppose them and bring back the Islamic ethic of tolerating difference of opinion.

With this background, I pay tribute to the unsung heroes of Babusar. Babusar is a remote place in Pakistan on a road leading from Rawalpindi to Gilgit. A couple of days before Eid-ul-Fitr, it was the site of a massacre of 20 Shia Muslims at the hands of extremists. When I read the news, I felt a deep sadness at this act of sectarian madness. Those 20 people who were going to Gilgit possibly to celebrate Eid with their families were dragged out of the bus, identified as Shias by their national identity cards or in some cases by marks of zanjeer-zani on their back, and shot and killed at pointblank range. This was the repeat of a similar event that took place earlier at Chilas. As usual, social networking sites were abuzz with curses from both sides by those for whom such events are an opportunity to increase hatred and drive the wedge in further. For people like me it was another incident generating a sense of shame, disgust and depression.

But in all this state of depression I received news that filled my heart with a sense of joy and pride. There was a news report and an eyewitness account that four of those killed in the attack were Sunnis; what was most moving for me was the fact that their killing was not a case of mistaken identity. They were not killed because the killers mistook them as Shias. They were killed with the full knowledge that they were Sunnis but ones who refused to identify their Shia brethren, showing the moral courage to protest against the killings and hence paid the price. News channels and media that reported the event took no notice of this. For them this was not big news but for me, this was of the greatest significance. For me it was the greatest Eid gift I could have received. For me these were the real but unsung heroes of Babusar and just to ensure that their act of courage and sacrifice does not go unnoticed I decided to share this with my Muslim brethren.

What is important is that those four Sunni men were not some western-educated, so-called emancipated individuals who learnt the ideals of tolerance, justice and non-violence in universities. They were simple Muslims who had imbibed the real values of Islam simply by living them. They were Muslims who knew that difference of opinion could not, under any circumstances, be made a justification of violence in any form. They are part of a long tradition where differences of opinion are acknowledged and tolerated. These people are part of a long tradition wherein differences are discussed but where the Islamic ethics of disagreement are strictly guarded. My salute to these unsung heroes who by their sacrifice brought some warmth and happiness in what would otherwise have been another gloomy, sad and depressing Eid-ul-Fitr.

The writer is a consultant in the Department of Cardiology, Fortis Hospital, New Delhi and can be contacted at hakimyasir@hotmail.com