Mahathir's speech : A challenge wrapped in a controversy
International Herald Tribune
October 22, 2003
Eliot Cohen

Malaysia's prime minister, Mahathir Mohamad, made headlines last week by declaring "Jews rule the world" in a speech to the Organization of the Islamic Conference.

That tired lie at the heart of anti-Jewish propaganda stole attention from the many worthwhile points Mahathir raised in a speech just as controversial among Muslims as Jews. More importantly, Mahathir's ill-considered invective camouflaged the key problem with the Islamic world's current agenda.

Mahathir has cultivated a reputation for outspokenness, and his efforts to live up to his billing often overshadow his admirable words and achievements. During his 22 years in power, Mahathir has built Malaysia into a modern, prosperous and tolerant Muslim nation featuring a democratic system that, while imperfect, compares favorably with any in Southeast Asia and the rest of the Muslim world. Although more Malaysian women wear the hijab, or headscarf, now than when I first visited in 1994, they have opportunities outside the home; no information age society can afford keeping half its brainpower locked behind a veil. A walk around central Kuala Lumpur brings to mind downtown Los Angeles, only much larger.

In his remarks to the triennial meeting of heads of Muslim countries, Mahathir subjected guests to his famous frankness. He reminded them that Muhammad reached out to non-Muslims and that tolerance was long the rule in Muslim nations. Educated as a physician, Mahathir recalled the golden age of Islamic learning while Europe was in the dark ages, then criticized Islamic scholars for veering away from practical knowledge in the sciences they'd pioneered in favor of religious infighting that persists to this day. "Whether we like it or not, we have to change, not by changing our religion but by applying its teachings in the context of a world that is radically different from that of the first century of the hegira" — the time of Muhammad — he reminded leaders gathered in Malaysia's glittering new capital, Putrajaya.

He also faulted those who excuse Muslims' status as "poor, backward, and weak" as "the will of Allah," challenging individual Muslims and leaders to improve themselves and their nations. Malaysia's progress under Mahathir provides a vivid example of what is possible.

Mahathir also censured Muslims for reacting to their enemies with anger, rather than the more thoughtful approach he credits Jews with. "They survived 2000 years of pogroms not by hitting back, but by thinking," Mahathir said. Was there no other way for Muslims to react, he asked, "than to ask our young people to blow themselves up and kill people and invite the massacre of more of our own people?"

More pointedly, he contended, "over the past 50 years of fighting in Palestine we have not achieved any result. We have in fact worsened our situation."

Overall, Mahathir's messages of rejecting radical fundamentalism and suicide bombings in favor of modernization and coexistence with non-Muslims are values the Islamic world needs to embrace if it is to avoid poverty, discontent and a deepening rift with the West that suits radicals on both sides. Even if one could scour out the anti-Semitic portions of the speech (as Malaysia's Foreign Ministry has desperately tried to do), there would still be a problem with the prime minister's remarks.

Despite his belief in modernity, Mahathir would saddle all Muslims with the ancient feud between Israelis and Palestinians. He repeatedly cites it as a "major" issue for all Muslims; it should not be.

Of the world's 1.3 billion Muslims, half live here in Asia where this fight between cousins over a patch of desert has no relevance.

The Israeli-Palestinian issue has defied solution for millennia, and the climate for agreement appears less promising now than at any time since The Camp David accords. To tie Muslim progress and unity to resolving that dispute is to choose a losing hand.

I wish that instead of gratuitously insulting Jews, Mahathir would have had the chutzpah to challenge his fellow leaders to take risks at home and make their own societies look more like Malaysia. Making the tired Palestinian-Israeli issue a cornerstone of the Islamic agenda puts the fate of the ummah (Islamic community) in the hands of others. To take responsibility for ourselves in the 21st century, Muslims must leave behind the ancient squabbles of the Middle East and apply Islam's teachings to today's more relevant issues of freedom, progress and social justice.

The writer, a Jewish-born convert to Islam, is the founding director of 8 1/2 Global Communications in Hong Kong.[Not to be reproduced without the permission of the author.]

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