Islam organizations were US allies before the 1979 Iranian Revolution

Evidence

The relationship of the United States to “Islam”—that is, Islam as a social construct rather than a reflection of the religion and its adherents—is contradictory and flows from its foreign policy. Readers unfamiliar with this history might be surprised to learn that movements and organizations that interpret Islam in various ways to advance political goals were not always seen as enemies. There was no “Islamic threat” in the form of non-state or state actors in the early Cold War era. Until the 1970s, the US political elite allied with some of the forces seeking to project various interpretations of Islam on the political stage, such as the Saudi monarchy. In the 1970s, this approach changed in response to various factors, including the Iranian Revolution of 1979, which brought Ayatollah Khomeini and his Islamic Republican Party to power. After this, the US political class had it both ways: the parties and movements of political Islam were enemies in some cases, but not in others. Politics scholar Mahmood Mamdani coined the term “good Muslim, bad Muslim” to capture the duality of how those who support or oppose US imperial ambitions are understood. — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 389

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: The US once allied with Islamist forces before treating them as enemies; US policymakers treated Islamist movements as allies before the Iranian Revolution. — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of…, 473; US allied with Saudi Islamization while praising authoritarian Shah Iran — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of…, 394 (+14 more)

Broader Connections

• The 1979 Iranian Revolution shifted US policy from promoting Islam to denouncing it #corroborates (0.85) — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 407
• Political Islam was not uniformly seen as an enemy before the Iranian Revolution #corroborates (0.85)
• Iran’s 1979 events made Islamism the coming Green Menace for the US. #corroborates (0.85) — Green, Todd H, The Fear of Islam_ An Introduction to…, 254
• Islamist groups are labeled allies or terrorists based on US interests #expands (0.82) — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 400
• Iran’s 1979 revolution shifted the frame from Arabs to Islamism #corroborates (0.80) — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 455
• Iran’s 1979 revolution redirected US fear from secular nationalism to Islamism #corroborates (0.80) — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 246
• The Islamic threat emerged only after the 1979 Iranian Revolution #corroborates (0.80)
• Cold War logic led the US to fund Islamists even after Iran’s revolution #corroborates (0.80) — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 247
• Western scholars saw Islam as withering until the Iranian revolution changed minds #corroborates (0.80) — Robert Irwin, For Lust of Knowing, 478
• The American public first linked Islam with terrorism only after the Iranian Revolution. #corroborates (0.80) — Sahar F. Aziz, The Racial Muslim, 669
• The Iranian Revolution moved political Islam to the top of global media agendas #corroborates (0.78)
• An intercivilizational quasi war between Islam and the West developed after 1979 #corroborates (0.75)
• The Iranian Revolution blindsided US Cold War planners. #corroborates (0.75) — Sahar F. Aziz, The Racial Muslim, 670
• American Muslim organizations actively assimilated into the postwar Protestant-Catholic-Jew consensus #expands (0.72) — Carl W. Ernst, Islamophobia in America_ The Anatomy of…, 283