Orientalist scholars supplied the transhistorical ‘Islamic terrorism’ narrative at the 1984 conference

Evidence

Lewis argued at the conference that the term “Islamic terrorism” was apt because “Islam is a political religion” and Mohammad, in contrast to other religious leaders, had “founded a state and governed it.” Lewis explained that it was “inevitable that when the Islamic world confronts the problem of terrorism, that problem, too, assumes a religious, indeed in a sense an Islamic, aspect.” Elie Kedourie began his speech by stating that there is “a prevalent—and justifiable—impression that an appreciable part of terrorist activities today originate, and frequently take place, in the world of Islam, and particularly in its Arab portion.” He then cherry-picked historical examples from various Muslim kingdoms, starting with the assassination of Ali, going on to the Assassins of the tenth century, and up to Khomeini’s Iran, which “exemplifies the idea of a ‘terrorist state,’” to knit together a narrative of transhistoric “Islamic terrorism.” He ended by raising the alarm that “terrorism in modern Islam is unlikely to prove a flash in the pan.” These two conferences were instrumental in the development of the ideology of a racialized terrorist threat. — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 444

Lewis argued at the conference that the term “Islamic terrorism” was apt because “Islam is a political religion” and Mohammad, in contrast to other religious leaders, had “founded a state and governed it.” Lewis explained that it was “inevitable that when the Islamic world confronts the problem of terrorism, that problem, too, assumes a religious, indeed in a sense an Islamic, aspect.” Elie Kedourie began his speech by stating that there is “a prevalent—and justifiable—impression that an appreciable part of terrorist activities today originate, and frequently take place, in the world of Islam, and particularly in its Arab portion.” He then cherry-picked historical examples from various Muslim kingdoms, starting with the assassination of Ali, going on to the Assassins of the tenth century, and up to Khomeini’s Iran, which “exemplifies the idea of a ‘terrorist state,’” to knit together a narrative of transhistoric “Islamic terrorism.” He ended by raising the alarm that “terrorism in modern Islam is unlikely to prove a flash in the pan.” These two conferences were instrumental in the development of the ideology of a racialized terrorist threat. — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 456

Categorization

• XREF: Core evidence for the MOC thread: Lewis’s ‘Islam is a political religion’ claim is the exact ideological bridge converting geopolitical enemies into an essentialized religious-racial category. — connects to: The 1984 conference fused Israeli, neocon, and Orientalist voices into a terrorism ideology — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of…, 443; Orientalists fabricated a transhistoric Islamic terrorism narrative from cherry-picked cases — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of…, 456; The War on Terror recycled pre-existing Orientalist academic discourse into state violence — Khaled A. Beydoun, The New Crusades_ Islamophobia and the…, 267 (+3 more)
• corroborated: 3 independent passages support this claim — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of…, 444; Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of…, 456

Broader Connections

• Orientalists fabricated a transhistoric Islamic terrorism narrative from cherry-picked cases #corroborates (0.90) — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 456
• Orientalism supplied the pre-existing tropes that the War on Terror redeployed against Muslims #expands (0.85)
• The War on Terror recycled pre-existing Orientalist academic discourse into state violence #expands (0.80) — Khaled A. Beydoun, The New Crusades_ Islamophobia and the…, 267
• Terrorism experts constructed the category linking Islam to irrational terror #corroborates (0.80) — Saher Selod, Forever Suspect_ Racialized…, 32
• The War on Terror draws its ideology from Orientalism’s invented past #expands (0.75) — Khaled A. Beydoun, The New Crusades_ Islamophobia and the…, 280