Dispelling myths of constant warfare

Palestinian suicide bombers in Israeli streets, the 9/11 attacks on the Twin Towers, the Madrid bombings, the 7/7 London atrocities and the continual news barrage about insurgents in Iraq, Taliban militants in Afghanistan and al-Qaeda training camps in Pakistan all reinforce the Western perception that Islam equals violence equals terrorism.

Of course, these are not baseless fears, as the list of aggression in the previous paragraph shows. Firebrand preachers such as Mullah Omar incite hatred of the West amongst young people who have grown up as European citizens. The new head of al-Qaeda, Ayman al-Zawahiri, has lost no time in decrying the imperialist American evil and promising retribution and more bloodshed.

But the problem with fear is that it extends past the known and likely and spreads to every part of our thinking. Millions of ordinary Muslims who for years have lived their lives peacefully in the West now find themselves the subject of reactions that come from fear. A Muslim guy with a beard is assumed to be a religious fanatic, and so he finds it hard to get a job. A Pakistani youth who boards a train with a sports bag may receive concerned looks; some passengers may move away from the carriage he is in, fearing the bag contains not his cricket gear but a bomb timed to go off soon.

Even Indian women in saris or men in turbans report experiences of negative behavior, as some in the West fail to distinguish between Hindu and Sikh and Muslim and base their reactions and prejudices on skin color. These European citizens are often just viewed, sadly, as the enemy within.

This in itself breeds a reverse fear in the Muslim community: the fear of being thought to be a violent threat and the fear of the consequences. Nearly 15 years ago, the Muslim Council of Britain was launched with the aim of tackling some of these issues. Their spokesman said: “The overwhelming majority of British Muslims are intent simply on living their lives without interference: faithful adherents of their chosen religion and at the same time loyal citizens of their chosen country. But the problems they face here are intensified by some of the acts committed in the name of Islam by people who most Muslims disown.”

Looking back at history from our current vantage point, where Islam and the West seem to be in crisis, it is very easy to portray the last 1,400 years as a clash between the two whenever they have come into conflict. Crusading knights and marauding Central Asians are perceived as the forerunners of Western troops and Taliban fighters. Starting with the invasion and conquest of Spain and Portugal by a Berber Arab tribe known as the Moors, the Islamic scimitar has struck terror into European civilization. Images of Genghis Khan and Tamerlane and Saladin as warrior leaders follow. The Barbary pirates were a paralyzing threat to shipping in the Mediterranean.

Even the history of Turkey, when condensed into a few sentences, seems to reflect the perception of Muslim invasion and attack on Christian peace and security. The fall of Constantinople was seen as the darkest day in Christendom, and the Turks reached the gates of Vienna.

Just as the reality in England today is far from the superficial perception that all British Muslim citizens are fanatical supporters of violence perpetrated in the name of Islam, so the reality in the 14th and 15th century Byzantine Empire was very different. Jonathan Harris opens our eyes to this in his detailed social history of the last hundred years of this great empire: “The End of Byzantium.”

It is true that the storm clouds were gathering around the glory that was Byzantium, but the first mortal blow was struck not by the Muslim East but by the Christian West, when the Crusaders of the Fourth Crusade sacked Constantinople and took most of its wealth and glory back with them to Rome, France and the rest of Western Europe.

The weakened empire became vulnerable to siege and attack from Turkish tribes that had recently set their sights on its land. But these tribes were equally weak; they had yet to fully establish themselves, and fighting between each other was as much part of the power struggle of the age as fighting with the Byzantines. The tale that Harris tells so expertly is a story of years of pact and peace, interspersed with years of conflict and struggle.

It is a story of how Greeks and Turks lived together. Or, as Harris puts it: “In reality, whatever the ideological or religious differences between Christian Byzantine Greeks and Muslim Turks, they were not necessarily natural enemies. On the contrary, on an everyday basis Greeks and Turks interacted quite peaceably for much of the first half of the fifteenth century. They were neighbors and trading partners and noticeably adopted aspects of each other’s customs and language. Although they might disagree over whether Jesus Christ was God incarnate or simply a prophet, even in the Middle Ages that was seldom the kind of issue over which people went to war. What created the conflict were the policies pursued by those in power, whether ambitious Ottoman sultans who sought to promote themselves from leaders of a tribe to rulers of an empire, or meddlesome Byzantine emperors who believed they could improve their precarious position by ill-judged stratagems.” This is a highly readable account of the hundred years of the 15th century. Harris breathes life into characters we only know from golden mosaics and frescoes adorning Byzantine monuments: Manuel II, John VII, Demetrius, Helena and Constantine XI. Unlike many Byzantine historians, he also has sympathy for the Ottoman leaders Murat and Mehmet.

The Byzantines did not have just one Turkish group on their soil. The leading tribe seemed to be the Ottomans, but they were relative newcomers on the stage, and other groups such as the Karaman and Seljuk, as well as the forces of Tamerlane, would cause difficulties for them. Succession amongst the Ottomans was not clear cut, leading to plenty of opportunities for political power games within, when there was no threat from without. During this period, “the Byzantines fished in the troubled waters of Ottoman domestic rivalry as often as they could to ensure that no one Ottoman prince succeeded in coming out on top and reuniting the domains of Beyazıt.” For a long time they succeeded in this aim, until Murat II became the clear successor.

In the meantime, there was constant everyday interaction between Byzantine and Turk. They were neighbors, trading with each other. In parts of Anatolia and Europe at times one was ruler, at times the other. They learned each other’s culture. For example the horsemen Turks had come from inland and had no knowledge of seafaring. This they learned from the Byzantines, and in turn taught the Greeks archery. The Ottomans were superior militarily, but they learned a lot of the arts of the city-state -- architecture and governance -- from the Byzantines, and this influence was to last many years.

The advice given by the Venetian Senate in 1423 as they sent out ambassadors to Adrianople (Edirne) to the court of the newly enthroned Sultan Murat II reflects this period: “You should explain to the Lord Turk that as he knows, a good friendship and peace used to flourish between his father and our government. … We greatly desire that our citizens and merchants may travel in his territories and his cities, for the preservation of a good relationship, and to increase the good will between the two sides.”

Good advice that should be heeded by those seeking to break down the Muslim/Western divide today.