Before exploring something to a greater degree, we must go through the concept of jihad. The word is borrowed from the Quran, the holiest book for Muslims, which was descended from the sky on the Last Prophet Muhammad (SAW). Jihad is an Arabic word that means striving and struggling for some purposeful aim. Jihad has different forms, but mostly the word is perceived in terms of armed conflict. Muslims in Kashmir, Chechnya, southern Philipines, Bosnia, and Kosovo have designed or fashioned their struggle as Jihads, Hizbollah, and HAMAS have also termed their services as Islamic Jihad. Osama bin Laden and Al-Qaeda have waged a global jihad against the government and the West. Jihad is a broader term. First and foremost, there is the struggle for existence, which means every living being has the right to fight for survival. By observing the dynamics since the globe’s inception, it is obvious that the survival of the fittest is possible. The most basic Jihad is Jihad for rights. The struggle to get the rights to self-determination can be observed in the Palestine-Israel conflict.
The roots of the conflict lie in Hertzel going to France, where he observed the oppression of Jews and hence started to find a country or piece of land for Jews. On the map, he found the piece of land in Jerusalem. Hertzel himself is called the founder of political Zionism. The seed that Hertzel sowed was taking strong roots in the ground, and eventually, by observing in the coming days that half of the area of Palestine was occupied, it clearly depicts that the roots eventually grew into a bigger tree. Hertzel and the company had the full plan of installing Jews there, but the hindrance was the Muslims that lived there in the greater population. At the time of Ottoman rule, they were in power. They dispatched the British spy TE Lawernce, known as Lawerence of Arabia, who somehow deluded the Saudi king Fesial of Hejaz and dismantled the railway line in Hejaz that connected Istanbul and Hejaz.
In 1917, Britain offered complete support on this account. British Secretary Arthur James Balfour wrote a letter in which he mentioned
“ Jews will have a homeland in Palestine. Britain was committed to it, and afterwards, they had the chance to do just that”
The changing dynamics of Palestinians living there felt uncomfortable, which proves that if an independent state were forced to adjust the people who never lived there, it would make them anxious more and more. Hence, the revolt began as those entities were overpowering the current situation.
The first intifada came into being on December 9, 1978, followed by the second on September 28, 2000. Later, the catastrophic events started to escalate when there was the formation of HAMAS during the first intifada. Seeing and analyzing the whole scenario from the perspective of the jihadist lens, it is quite clear to say:
“One side warrior is another side terrorist”
For Palestinians, Hamas is the warrior, but the US government has designated HAMAS as a foreign terrorist organization, including the Islamic State and Al Qaeda. These non-state organizations aim to establish an Islamic caliphate governed by the interpretation of Shaira, known as Islamic Law. But according to Islamic scholars, Islam doesn’t guide us to do jihad on the battlefield without considering controlling our nafs (self or ego). The brutal human aggression has been surpassed in the exact region of the Middle East known as Palestine, and jihadists are continuing their practices to protest. As a result, the Red Sea crisis becomes visible, in which the axis of resistance includes the Hezbollah Islamic state and the Houthis of Yemen. On the radar of these are Israel and other countries, including the US, the USA, and Australia. The Bab al-Mandab Strait has been the focal point for attacks, and 30 percent of global container trade passing through the Suez Canal is facing immense difficulty and loss.
The point to note here is that tensions rose rapidly after October 7, 2023, when there was an unprecedented attack on Israel, as claimed by Hamas. Under the cover of retaliation, Israel started bombing, firing missiles, stripping off the clothes of women, and sexually harassing them, targeting the last hope and resort of medical survival for those individuals who are fighting each day at AL-SHIFA in the name of having weapons in the basement. These unjustifiable actions cannot be tolerated by Muslims, hence, the blood of jihadists rushed into their veins. Disappointed by international action to stop the war, they started acting up, as the spirit of the saying is evident among a few Muslims that states:
The Muslims are like one body if one part of the body is in pain then the whole body feels it and suffers in the pain.
But the question remains the same: is it a real Jihad or just a power play?
Well, the answer to this is complex and multifaceted, as according to holy warriors (Jihadists), they want to strip the land of Israel to stop them in the region from gaining power as they are proxies of Western groups. Solely protesting bombing and creating genocide, war, or conflict is more frequently complicated, and exploiting or utilizing this conflict to extend some ideological beliefs is turning the situation into a baffling one. The solution does not lie in using hard power and abusing strength by burning Rafaha and releasing the dogs inside the residential house in
Jabiala Reefuge Camp, Northern Gaza Strip, or by launching 120 ballistic missiles, 170 drones, and 30 cruise missiles in Operation True Promise. The UN Charter promotes principles of sovereignty, peaceful resolution, equality, and respect for human rights. Even the just war theory highlights the conditions under which war can be morally justified by emphasizing that the use of force must be equal to the due protection of non-combatants and minimize harm to civilians. The use of just war theory suggests the rule of Jus ad Bellum (Right to go to war).
The end of the war is not soon to be expected, as different missions like the Al-Aqsa flood and the occasions that followed on all fronts. Following those Jihadist groups’ proponents the complete demolition, they consider Israel an illegitimate body in the region. Jihadists’ plan to end the conflict more brutally and radically is not widely supported and is in direct conflict with the international justice system. Many Palestinians have taken the conflict as a right to fight for national determination for an independent state since 1967, while few entities, specifically Islamist organizations, term struggle as Jihad. The reality is that this conflict cannot be summed up into a single dimension; it has various aspects such as religious, national, social, and political. Yes, it can be considered an interchange between power dynamics, and as a consequence of that, we can observe polarity around the world.
The Author, Rohma Qaiser Satti is a student at the National Defence University, Islamabad, focusing on Middle Eastern studies to deepen understanding of regional conflicts and their origins.
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