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Islam and Arabic as the Rhetoric of Insurgency: The Case of the CaucasusEmirateAlexander Knysh aa

Islamic Studies, Department of Near Eastern Studies, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, USA

Available online: 19 Mar 2012

To cite this article: Alexander Knysh (2012): Islam and Arabic as the Rhetoric of Insurgency: The Caseof the Caucasus Emirate, Studies in Conflict & Terrorism, 35:4, 315-337

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Studies in Conict & Terrorism , 35:315337, 2012Copyright Taylor & Francis Group, LLCISSN: 1057-610X print / 1521-0731 onlineDOI: 10.1080/1057610X.2012.656343

Islam and Arabic as the Rhetoric of Insurgency:The Case of the Caucasus Emirate

ALEXANDER KNYSH

Islamic Studies, Department of Near Eastern StudiesUniversity of MichiganAnn Arbor, MI, USA

Interpretations and uses of Islam are legion today. Some call for improving or pre-serving the morals and dignity of a certain local Muslim community or of the global Muslim community ( umma ) in its entirety. Others are eager to demonstrate that Islamis fully compatible and, in fact, conducive to modernity, democratic governance, and technological advancement of humankind. Still others posit Islam as a powerful meansof liberation from occupation and domination/exploitation of Muslims around the world by non-Muslim powers. 1 This article addresses one concrete example of how some Mus-lim insurgents of the Northern Caucasus use Islam to unite the diverse and occasionallymutually hostile ethnic groups of the area in the face of Russian dominationwith the goalof establishing an independent Islamic state based on the Muslim Divine Law ( Sharia ). After providing a general overview of the history and ideology of this Islamic/Islamist movement, the article focuses on the ways in which its leadership uses the Internet to

disseminate its understanding of Islam and to rally young Muslims round the idea of the trans-ethnic Sharia state that they promise to institute after defeating and expellingthe Russian occupiers and their local backers. Special attention will be given to therole of Islamic concepts and taxonomies as well as the Arabic language in framing the political grammar of the insurgency movement known as The Caucasus Emirate. 2

Religion is an ancient andwell tried methodof establishingcommunion throughcommon practice and a sort of brotherhood between people who otherwise havenothing much in common.

Eric Hobsbawm, Nations and Nationalism Since 1780 , p. 68

Under normal circumstances, the symbolism of language blends into a banalor quotidian view of identity that is hardly noticed in everyday life. However,its potency comes to the fore in situations of strife or conict when it becomes

Received 13 June 2011; accepted 6 November 2011.This article is a spin-off of my earlier article Virtual Jihad in theTwenty-First Century: The Case

of the Caucasus Emirate, published in Ab Imperio: Studies of New Imperial History and Nationalismin the Post-Soviet Space 1 (January 2010), pp. 183211. It focuses specically on the role of Islamand the Arabic language in the ongoing construction of a new trans-ethnic and trans-national identityby the Northern Caucasus Islamic ghters ( mujahideen ).

Address correspondence to Alexander Knysh, Islamic Studies, Department of Near EasternStudies, 3111 Thayer Building, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48104-1608, USA. E-mail:[email protected]

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particularly urgent to mark the boundaries of the group or the Self as a form of (sometimes atavistic) self-defense.

Yasir Suleiman, Arabic, Self and Identity: A Study in Conict and Displacement , p. 1

Legal discourse is a creative speech which brings into existence that which itutters. . . . In other words, it is the divine word, the word of divine right, which,like intuitus originarius which Kant ascribed to God, creates what its states.

Pierre Bourdieu, Language and Symbolic Power ,p .42

One does not often hear of a state whose formation is rst announced on the Internet. Evenmore rarely does such a state exist primarily in cyberspace. Self-designated the CaucasusEmirate, 3 it was established by a group of mujahideen 4 of the Northern Caucasus on 31

October 2007. On that day, its founders, who had been waging a bloody war against theRussian Federal state for almost fteen years, declared that their Emirate would supersedethe Chechen Republic of Ichkeria that itself had theretofore been no less virtual thanits newly declared successor. The abolition of the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria andthe creation of the trans-ethnic Islamic state (emirate) 5 in the Northern Caucasus wereofciated by Mr. Dokku Umarov. Born in 1964 and trained as a construction engineer atthe Petroleum Institute in Grozny under Soviet rule, Umarov joined the Chechen strugglefor independence from Russia in 1994. 6 In his own words, he was moved by patrioticsentiment and indignation over the winter 1994 invasion of his native land by the RussianFederal forces on the orders of President Yeltsin. 7 Umarov served as head of the ChechenSecurity Council under the late President Maskhadov and, following the reoccupation of Chechnya by Russian Federal forces in the fall of 1999, was appointed commander of the Southwestern Front of the Chechen separatist movement. After the successive deathsat the hands of Russian special forces of two presidents of the unrecognized ChechenRepublic of Ichkeria in 2005 and 2006, vice-president Dokka Umarov was proclaimed itsfth president in June 2006. He held that ofce for a little more than a year only to announcethe abolition of his state and the establishment of the Caucasus Emirate with himself asEmir (Commander-in-Chief) of all Caucasus mujahideen. In this new capacity, Umarovasserted himself as the only legitimate leader of the Caucasus jihad .8 According to theDeclaration of the Caucasus Emirate, his jurisdiction now extends beyond the connesof the Caucasus proper to encompass all Muslims oppressed and occupied by Rusnya (a

derogatory term for Russia used by the Caucasus mujahideen ). Umarovs militarypoliticalagenda includes extending the sway of the Caucasus Emirate to the lands of the Krasnodarand Stavropol regions ( krai s), the Volga region ( Povolzhe ), and Siberia with the ultimategoal of liberating all of his fellow Muslims from indel Russian rule. 9

Think, says Umarov, addressing his followers in a virtual communiqu e, to whatextent we have angered Allah, if He sent down upon us these people, the mostdespicable and the lowest even among [the] kuffar 10 (unbelievers). Our gloriousforefathers waged Jihad against these enemies, and today Allah is testing ourgeneration, as He tested our fathers. Everything repeats [itself]. Jihad exposesfaith and indelity. Today, as in the former times, people [are] divided intoMujahideen, Munaqs and Murtads. 11




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committed to waging it are part and parcel of the global confrontation between the Muslimnation/community ( umma ) and its enemies worldwide. Says Mr. Umarov:

We are an inseparable part of the Islamic Ummah. I am saddened by the position

of those Muslims who declare as their enemies only those kuffar who attackedthem directly. And at the same time, they seek support and sympathy from otherkuffar, forgetting that all indels are one nation. Today in Afghanistan, Iraq,Somalia [and] Palestine our brothers are ghting. Those, who have attackedMuslims wherever they are, are our enemies, [our] common enemies. Ourenemy is not Rusnya only, but also America, England, Israel and anyone whowages war against Islam and Muslims. 15 And they are our enemies becausethey are the enemies of Allah. 16

It should be pointed out that despite the vociferous protests of the Chechen foreign minister

in exile Akhmed Zaka(y)ev (who currently resides in London) and some other secular-minded advocates of Chechnyas independence in the West, the Middle East, and Russia,themajority of Chechen eld commanders accepted Umarovs Declaration of theCaucasusEmirate. Their acceptance has amounted to their de facto recognition of Umarov as theircommander-in-chief in the ongoing Caucasus jihad against the Russian government andits local backers. 17 No less, or perhaps even more importantly, Umarovs claims havebeen recognized by the eld commanders of the mujahideen units in the neighboringrepublics of the Northern Caucasus some of whom were appointed to high positions in thegoverning structures of the Emirate, such as, for example, the Kabardian eld commanderAnzor Astemirov, who until recently held the post of the chief Islamic judge ( qadi ) of the Emirate. 18 Some Chechen eld commanders originally opposed to the creation of amythical new state in all of the Caucasus have eventually come around, leaving Zaka(y)evand other secular-minded Chechen nationalist leaders residing in the West in the positionof generals without an army. 19

In his lengthy defense of the Declaration that appeared about a month after its rstpublication on the Internet (28 November 2007), Movladi Udugov, the 49-year-old formerminister of information of the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria, who is widely believed tobe the mastermind behind its text, 20 provided a detailed justication of the radical shift inthe strategy and goals of the anti-Russian resistance movement in the Northern Caucasus.Being the Emirates most detailed manifesto so far, it merits a closer look.

Udugov begins by stridently denouncing Chechen critics of the Emirate with special

reference to the deposed foreign minister Akhmed Zaka(y)ev, 21 whom he dismisses asa sellout and potential collaborator with the apostate regime of Ramzan Kadyrov, thepro-Russian president of the Chechen Republic. Looking on the bright side, Udugov viewsthe rift within the Chechen separatist leadership as a timely and healthy parting of waysbetween the mujahideen and the alien elements of Chechen resistance that, in his words,harbor hatred toward Islam and the Sharia(t) under the guise of supporting the Chechen jihad .22 The loud bemoaning of the demise of the secular Chechen Republic of Ichkeriaby the opponents of the Sharia(t) is, according to Udugov, not only misguided, but alsooutright wrong. It ignores the fact that the Declaration of the Caucasus Emirate hassimply restored the Sharia (t ) states of Chechnya and the Northern Caucasus as a whole thatwere established in the eighteenthearly twentieth centuries under such prominent leadersof the Caucasus jihad as Shaykh Mansur Ushurma (d. 1791), Imam Shamil (d. 1871), andShaykh Uzun Hajji (d. 1920). 23




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Islam and Arabic as the Rhetoric of Insurgency 319

To reiterate, Mr. Udugov energetically denies that there is any split within the ranksof the Chechen resistance movement. Rather, he describes the recent developments inChechnya and the Northern Caucasus as a healthy process of purifying the Caucasus jihad movement from alien anti-Muslim and secular-nationalist elements. This process,in Udugovs opinion, will result in the eventual liberation of the Muslims of the Caucasusfrom chimeras and false fears of the past decades. According to Udugov, the anti-Sharia (t ) elements of the Chechen resistance movement that reside in Europe (Udugovmockingly dubs them Euro-Chechens) are but the ideological bedfellows of the pro-Moscow apostates currently in power in Chechnya, namely, Kadyrov and his retinue. Inthe words of Udugov,

In London, Moscow and in occupied Johar (Grozny) these people [namely, theopponents of the Emirate] talk about the same things, that is, Wahhabism,al-Qaida, and international terrorism. They thus use the same language, thesamewords. Sooneror later theywill unite. It does not matterunder what pretext

this unication will take place, because they have a common enemy . . .themuhajideen and the Islamic state. 24

Udugov pins his hopes on the new generation of devout Muslims who genuinely believein the basic precepts of Islam and the Sharia (t ) and who refuse to utilize them as simplepolitical and rhetorical tools, which, in his view, is exactly what the Euro-Chechens havedone until their parting of the ways with the leaders of the Caucasus Emirate. Whenasked about the exact character of the new state, Udugov atly rejects all Western formsof government, such as democracy, communism, monarchy, totalitarianism, and so on,as being contrary to Islam. He insists that every state is based on an ideology, the restbeing derivative. Because, in his view, there is only one true ideologyIslam, the state canbe either Islamic or pagan (idolatrous). Idolatry being the greatest sin condemned by theQuran, it must be fought by every faithful Muslim to the bitter end. Quoting a prophetichadith , Udugov predicts the eventual cessation of divisions within the worldwide Muslimcommunity ( umma ) followed by the rise of a virtuous and just Islamic caliphate. Thesegoals can only be achieved by a consistent and uncompromising adherence to the divinecommands as enshrined in the Quran and the Prophets Custom ( sunna ). Using examplesfrom the life of the rst Muslim community in Medina (this gold standard of Sala, orfundamentalist, Muslims of all stripes), Udugov energetically denies the legitimacy andvalidity of any tactical concessions to, and negotiations with, Russia and/or the West, whichis the political course advocated by the exiled Euro-Chechens.

On the practical plane, Udugovs position effectively means an outright rejection of international diplomacy; he vocally decries having faith in and recourse to any internationalforums and institutions, such as the United Nations, the Organization for Security andCooperation in Europe, the International Criminal Court, and so on. 25 In line with thisposition, Mr. Udugov derides the alleged diplomatic achievements of the Euro-Chechenexiles in Europe and the United States as a dangerous self-delusion. In his word, seekingthe conrmation of our legitimacy from our enemies is ridiculous, because one cannotcomplain to one group of kars about [the misdeeds] of the other. 26 Attempts by thesecular-minded Euro-Chechen leaders in exile to please the Western governments andpublic at large by removing any mention of the Sharia (t ) and Islamic state from theirpolitical programs are wrongheaded and futile. The Euro-Chechens themselves mightview this as a clever tactical stratagem, but it is, in Udugovs view, nothing short of ashameful betrayal of Islam. In support of his argument Udugov points out the failure of




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similar compromises between Islamist movements and secular rulers in Nassers Egypt,in King Husayns Jordan, in Kerimovs Uzbekistan, and in Ataturks Turkey. Only anuncompromising, consistent faithfulness to Islamic values and the Sharia (t ) can, in hisopinion, guarantee the Muslim community ( umma ) genuine freedom and independencefrom Western dominance. This goal, Udugov insists emphatically, can only be achieved bya relentless prosecution of jihad and, if necessary, dying in the path of God. It is, saysUdugov, time for us to decide whether we should be praying in the direction of Strasbourgor Mecca. 27 For him, Islam is indeed a religion of peace, but only when it is in power. 28

The new generation of Muslims, according to Mr. Udugov, should free themselvesfrom the empty fantasies about the language of diplomacy and international law that arestill being entertained by the older generation of Chechen leaders in their naive belief inWestern ideals and institutions. The events of the recent decades, he argues, have proved hissecularist counterparts dead wrong. The West and Russia have always regarded Islam andMuslims as their enemies, and this attitude is not about to change. We should, concludesUdugov, act according the norms of the Sharia(t), and rely not on the [international] public

opinion or the good will of the kars, but on Allah alone. 29 There is no plurality of religions; there are only two faithsIslam and paganism. Likewise, there is no pluralityof types of statehood. There are only two types of statesa state that is based on thesovereignty of God, and a state that rests on the sovereignty of Taghut (that is, a set of idolatrous codes and norms) that may manifest itself in different forms from dictatorshipto democracy. 30

The principal points of Udugovs creed are echoed in the pronouncements of thelate rebel amir of Kabarda, Balkaria, and Karachai Anzor Astemirov. Like Udugov, Mr.Astemirov rejects democratic system of government and the pagan convictions and teach-ings associated with it. Defending the establishment of the Caucasus Emirate against itssecular-minded critics, Astemirov argues that

Human rights, international law, referendum, freedom of speech and belief,the expression of the will of the peopleall these notions are incompatiblewith our religion and have absolutely nothing to do with the mujahideen of theCaucasus. 31

Mr. Astemirov then proceeds to add a moral and ethical dimension to the debate betweenthe Islamists of the Caucasus Emirate and their secular-minded opponents, saying:

[All] sensible people see the [detrimental] results of permissiveness and West-

ern pop culture. Freedom of belief to which the kars are calling is but freedomto be an atheist. From the very early age our children are being encouraged to-wards lechery and shamelessness; their schools impose upon them democracy,Christianity, Darwinism and other destructive doctrines. The least they try toteach Muslims is to be tolerant of evil and unbelief. 32

There is nothing particularly new about the ideas advocated by Messrs. Udugov andAstemirov. They can be traced back to the anti-Western, radical Sala (fundamentalist)creed of the Egyptian writer Sayyid Qutb (executed in 1966) and the Indian-Pakistani Mus-lim leader Abu Ala Mawdudi (d. 1979), 33 on the one hand, and the puritanical teachingsof the conservative Arabian reformer Muhammad Ibn Abd al-Wahhab (d. 1791), on theother. 34 The inuence of the former two is evident in Udugovs and Astemirovs com-mon rejection as pagan or idolatrous of Western social, cultural, and political values




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and institutions and in their unanimous condemnation of any society not governed by theSharia (t ) as being in the state of pre-Islamic ignorance ( jahiliyya ). As an alternative, theEmirates ideologists propose to institute the rule of God ( hakimiyya ), which is exactlywhat both Qutb and Mawdudi insisted on. 35 The Wahhabi inuence comes to the fore inthe ubiquitous use by Messrs. Udugov and Astemirov of such typical Wahhabi notions askufr al-tawhid (indelity [resulting from abandonment of] the principle of monotheism),kufr al-wala (indelity [caused by] associating with indels), al-wala wa l-bara (as-sociation [with fellow monotheists] and dissociation [from indels and apostates]), shirk (polytheism), bida (heretical innovation [in religion]), and so on. Ibn Abd al-Wahhab,Qutb and Mawdudi considered jihad to be the only effective remedy for the evils of ungodlyexistence into which their respective societies had sunk. On this issue Messrs. Udugov andAstemirov are in full agreement with their intellectual forebears.

What concerns us here is the ways in which these familiar Sala ideas in general andthe jihadist ideology of the Caucasus Emirate in particular are rhetorically and linguisti-cally packaged and disseminated via the Internet media. How do jihad -oriented resistance

movements such as the Caucasus Emirate conceive themselves and what image do theywant to project to the outside world by means of multimedia technology? It is within thecontext of these broad questions that the article now examines the role of Islam and theArabic language in articulating the ideological positions of the Caucasus Emirate.

The principal source is the Emirates ofcial website, kavkazcenter.com. The authorchose this Internet forum because some Western commentators consider it to be one of theearliest overtly jihadi website[s]. 36 It is also credited with pioneering the use of videoclips portraying attacks of mujahideen as a propaganda and recruitment tool. 37 Establishedas early as 1999, it is described by a major Western expert on cyber- jihad as a regularly up-dated, well-designed site, which is fully searchable. 38 No less importantly, it prominentlylinks to numerous other Islamic websites and is, in turn, featured on major Islamist Internetforums, such as the Algerian Front Islamique du Salut (FIS), Azzam.com, Islam Q@A, aswell as various religiopolitical websites in South and Southeast Asia. 39 Kavkazcenter.comhas distinguished itself as a staunch supporter of the Palestinian resistance movement andreceived accolades from some radical Palestinian groups in the aftermath of the martyrdomoperations conducted by Chechen and Ingush suicide squads. 40 The remarkable interna-tional prominence and longevity of kavkazcenter.com make this forum worthy of a closerlook.

The sites content is available in Russian, Ukrainian, Turkish, Arabic, and Englishagood indication of its target audiences. The Russian version of the site is updated daily andcontains information that is often missing, abbreviated, or edited out on the other language

sites. Each language site is designed to cater to the cultural and religious sensitivities of thetarget audience without, however, compromising the Emirates overall ideological message.The Russian language site is occasionally shut down by hackers who may or may not haveconnection to the Russian Security Service (FSB). In addition to kavkazcenter.com, thisarticle draws on the postings on its sister-sites, such as http://www. Islamdin.com/ (Kabarda,Balkariia, Karachai), http://www.jamaatshariat.com/ru/ (Daghestan), http://hunafa.com/ (Ingushetia), and http://abror.info/ (Ingushetia). They usually replicate the postings of thekavkazcenter.com, while giving more attention to the events in their respective geographicalareas.

The kavkazcenter.com site features numerous rubrics, links, and chat rooms, such asOpinions, Literature, Photographs, Interviews, Analysis, History, and so on. Onits home page one can watch video clips featuring interviews with amirs of the mujahideen ,a portrait gallery of martyrs, and a running band with images of Russian atrocities




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in Chechnya and Ingushetia. There are occasional video clips criticizing or ridiculingKadyrovs puppet regime 41 in the Chechen Republic. Overall, the dominant theme of thewebsite is the global jihad that Muslims around the world are waging against their indeloppressors or the apostate local agents of the latter. This theme determines the sitesfocus on various hotbeds of conict between Muslim mujahideen and their adversaries, suchas Afghanistan, Pakistan and Kashmir, the Philippines, Somalia, Yemen, the IndonesianArchipelago, Eastern Turkestan/Xinjiang, and Palestine. Special attention is given to the jihad in Afghanistan, with the Taliban depicted as the avant-garde of valiant defenders of Islam against the indel Western aggressors and their local clients. A frequent visitor tothe kavkazcenter.com website gains the impression of a permanent life-and-death strugglebetween the Muslim mujahideen and their enemies the world over. The site administratorsdepict the former as fearless warriors ghting against great odds, yet managing to scoreone victory after another. Their opponents, on the other hand, are portrayed as agents of Satan bent on subjugating the Muslims to their ungodly rule and robbing Muslim countriesof their wealth.

While there is no doubt that the Emirate and its martyrdom operations squad namedThe Gardens of the Righteous (Arab. Riyad al-salihin ) have been responsible for sui-cide attacks on the Russian police and security forces as well as civilian targets, 42 itsleadership also claims to have been behind natural and man-made disasters such as theSaianoShushenskaya hydroelectric power station catastrophe in August 2009, the deadlyexplosion at the city of Ulyanovsk ammunition depot in November 2009 or the forest resthat scorched Central and Eastern Russia in the summer of 2010. In some cases, the pressreleases of the rebel website allude to a shadowy group of Russian mujahideen allegedlyacting in league with their North Caucasus comrades. 43 Despite their blatant improbability,such reports are deemed to accentuate the capacity of the mujahideen to attack targets faroutside their immediate theater of operations and, in so doing, to strike terror in the heartsof ordinary Russian citizens. When the cause of an accident cannot be credibly attributedto a mujahid unit, the wrath of God is invoked 44 explicitly or implicitly, in much the sameway as the disastrous 2004 tsunami in Southeast Asia or the Hurricane Katrina were inter-preted by some English-language jihadi website as acts of God that strike the beaches of debauchery, nudism, and prostitution. 45

A permanent rubric of kavkazcenter.com is devoted to showcasing the progressivedecay and perversity of the Russian state with special attention to the unscrupulousness,ruthlessness, and immorality of its rulers. The depravity and moral turpitude of ordinaryRussians are also highlighted. 46 The level of anti-Russian hatred is quite staggering, despiteoccasional attempts on the part of the website administrators not to paint ordinary Russians

and their despotic rulers with the same brush. For the sites administrators (i.e., MovladiUdugov & Co.), the only good Russians are those who have dared to embrace Islam. Someof them are frequent contributors to the website invariably voicing their disgust at Russiasformer and current crimes against humanity and its Muslim populations in particular. TheRussian converts routinely denounce Russian Orthodox religion and Russian culture asungodly and immoral, simultaneously servile and authoritarianin short, abominable byany human standard. The incurable depravity of the Russian nation is juxtaposed with thehighly moral, valiant, and altruistic ethos of the Caucasus Muslims exemplied by theEmirates mujahideen . Bad as it is, Russia is by no means the only anti-Muslim country.Also frequently mentioned are instances of persecution, discrimination, and hate crimesagainst Muslims in the United States, China, India, and Europe. Finally, the administratorsof the site regularly report the atrocities allegedly committed against true Muslims by theungodly rulers of such nominally Muslim countries as Egypt, Algeria, Yemen, Saudi




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Arabia, Jordan, Indonesia, Pakistan, and so on. Such reportage is designed to inculcate inthe sites visitors empathy for the suffering of Muslims the world over, while at the sametime projecting the image . . . of a global, and globalized, [ jihadi ] campaign. 47

In line with the Emirates ideological premises outlined above, its leaders starklydivide the whole world into the faithful followers of the Sharia (t ) and the adherents of man-made, pagan laws and customs ( Taghut ), who are identied as indels (Arab.kar s or kuffar ). This overriding Sharia -versus- Taghut dichotomy determines the resultanttaxonomies of human actors involved in its maintenance. The Sharia (t ) aspect of thedichotomy is represented by the mujahideen . Those Muslims who live by the Taghut customs and enforce the Taghut laws are condemned as murtad s,48 namely apostates,who, under the Sharia (t ) code, are subject to capital punishment. For the supporters of theEmirate, the pro-Russian President Ramzan Kadyrov of Chechnya and his ofcials are theprime embodiments of the most heinous type of apostasy. The Muslims who observeMuslim religious duties but refuse to join the ranks of the mujahideen or dare to criticizethem are labeled munaq s49 or hypocrites. The quartile taxonomy of mujahideen , kuffar ,

murtads , and munaqs is applied consistently in the postings of the resistance websitesthat have just been described, creating a bi-polar world in which one realm, in the wordsof a Saudi jihadist leader, is that of a dark image, lled with idolatry, indelity, sedition,injustice, outrage, and immorality, while the other is a bright one, radiant with rays of light, faith, true religion, piety, and virtue, under whose protection the monotheistic mujahidyouth . . . are prominent. 50

While ubiquitous, this taxonomy is not without gray areas. Thus, the borderlinebetween the murtad s and the munaq s is rather fuzzy. On some occasions, the munaq sare described as children of the Devil, who are not only blind and stupid but alsomorally awed. 51 Their qibla (direction of prayer) is Moscows Kremlin; they violate everyconceivable Islamic prohibition, for instance, by sipping vodka like water during Russiaspagan holidays, thenhaving st-ghtswith theirdrug-addicted sons. 52 The onlydifferencebetween them and the full-blown apostates seems to be that they do not actively supportor participate in the abominations of the ruling clique. Thus, while Chechnyas PresidentKadyrov is an out-and-out apostate, because he believes in the trinity of the Sharia(t),tariqa(t) and the Russian constitution, enjoys close relations with Putin, and celebrates thepagan holiday of New Year dressed as Father Frost, 53 the secularized Euro-Chechenswith Zaka(y)ev as their spokesman are merely hypocrites. Their position outside thepale of true Islam is determined by their wrongheaded belief in the Taghut as enshrinedin international laws, the UN Charter, and all manner [of similar] aberrations ( prochienenormalnosti ). 54 It appears that the only distinction between Kadyrov and Zaka(y)ev

is that the latter does not actively cooperate with the indel Russian government led byPutin. 55 By adopting indel European customs and dress-code and by residing in Westerncapitals, Zaka(y)ev and his fellow nationalists in exile have sold their souls to the Devil.According to the ideologists of kavkazcenter.com, Zaka(y)evs blind faith in Western ideasand institutions as evidenced by his attempts to elevate the secular Chechen constitutionabove the Quran have effectively put him into the category of false prophets. 56 Relativelyminor differences in their respective levels of delusion and perdy notwithstanding, boththe murtad s and munaq s are consistently dissociated from the true Muslim monotheists(muwahhidun ) exemplied by the Emirates mujahideen .

The ideologists of the Emirate tend to see traces of the pagan Taghut lurking ev-erywhere: in the celebrations by Muslim families of New Year and other Russian stateholidays as well as birthdays of their members. Even Muslim athletes participation in theOlympic games is condemned due to the pagan origins of this sporting event. Despite




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their honorable status as the custodians of the Two [Muslim] Sanctuaries, 57 the rulers of Saudi Arabia do not escape the site administrators opprobrium, because they allow theSaudi national team to circumambulate the sacred Olympic re at the opening of theOlympiad in the same way Muslim pilgrims to Mecca circle around the Kaba. 58 This prac-

tice is denounced as a blameworthy innovation and a conscious or unconscious concessionto the pagan tradition of ancient Greece (i.e., a typical example of the Taghut ). No wondertherefore that in one of the websites postings the Saudi ruling family is branded as headsof hypocrisy. 59

However, it is Su Islam and its local leaders ( shaykh s and ustadh s) that bear thebrunt of the righteous indignation of the Emirates ideologists. They view Susm as themost insidious manifestation of the corruptive, tyrannical forces of the pagan Taghut .The Qadiri Su dance performed collectively by members of Daghestani, Chechen, andIngush Su communities is ridiculed as an idolatrous form of worship imitating monkey-play. The medieval Su doctrine of the unity of all being 60 is condemned as shirk andkufr , namely, polytheism and unbelief, while Su masters are being dismissed asmanipulative and unscrupulous charlatans. This hostile attitude toward Susm is hardlysurprising given the fact that Chechnyas President Ramzan Kadyrov has made a concertedeffort to position Susm as the legitimate form of traditional Chechen Islam, therebymaking it an ideological alternative to the politically active Sala interpretations of Islamthat he has routinely denounced as Wahhabism, terrorism, or extremism. 61 The sameis true of the ofcial religious leaders of Daghestan who advocate Su Islam as the foremostideological alternative to Wahhabism. The cozy relations between the local Su groupsand the ruling elites of Daghestan and other republics of the Northern Caucasus 62 have notbeen lost on the leaders of the Emirate, rendering their vituperations against Su beliefsand practices ever more ferocious. The following satirical verses are typical of their deeply

ingrained resentment of Su masters ( shaykh s) and their disciples ( murid s):

Watch how the Su disciples have grown blind and how fear has turned theminto women!

They are but moral cripples, who are being led astray by blind men [who claimto possess] eyesight.

These miserable wretches dream of nothing but being pussy-cats of their fraud-ulent Su masters ( shaykh s)!

They [Su disciples] spread gossips, like old women, while also being greedy,and their masters are despicable agents and commissars of Satan.

They are weaving cozy nooks for themselves from the words of God, then, likeostriches hide their heads in the sand!

Fed with a fatty broth, they are like a hoard of dirty pigs; they fawn before the[Russian] kars and are slaves of the butchers of Kremlin! 63

In short, the Sus are invariably portrayed as the complete antipodes of the Emiratesmujahideen and the pure ( chistyi ) Islam they claim to embody. They are, in the words of a Russian contributor to the Islamdin.com website, a pack of dogs of Hell in the service




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of the kar s and murtad s. Intolerant of any teachings other than their own, they are alwayseager to attack and bite fellow Muslims who refuse to join their mystical brotherhood(Arab. tariqat ).64

Even this very cursory survey of the contents of the Emirate websites is sufcientto demonstrate the ubiquitous and consistent presence of religiously charged rhetoric andArabic terminology. This is hardly surprising, as many of the younger amirs of this virtualstate have been educated in religious colleges of the Middle East and North Africa, 65

whereas others have studied Islamic theological and juridical literature and the Arabiclanguage in Russia either formally or informally. The interviews and statements of themujahideen leaders are richly sprinkled with long-winded quotations from the Quran andhadith . They seem to be particularly fond of uttering standard Arabic formulas that arecommonly associated with piety and righteousness, such as There is no power or mightexcept from Allah, May God guide us on the straight path, I seek refuge in God fromthe accursed Satan, Praise be to God, the One and Only, and so on. 66 Public speechesof and interviews with some foreign-educated mujahideen feature a nearly Macaronic

mixture of Russian and Arabic words and phrases. When making a video-recorded policystatement, they usually do so against the background of a green or black banner with theArabic inscription of the shahada . Religious hymns in praise of jihad and martyrdomposted on the Emirates websites are broadcast in Arabic (sung by male voices only withno musical accompaniment). 67 In their blogs, visitors of the kavkazcenter.com site andits afliates frequently ask each other where and how this or that Arabic hymn can beaccessed and downloaded. Using Arabic is both fashionable and authoritative with thesites administrators and patrons.

The extensive use of Arabic/Islamic terminology in the predominantly Russophonepoetry andprose composed by contributors to therebel websites often requires an annotationto explain its meaning to the uninitiated. When speaking before cameras, the young amirsoccasionally have to provide a running commentary on or translations of the Arabic wordsand phrases they deploy so generously as to make their messages almost unintelligibleto audiences not steeped in the Arabic language and/or Islamic history, theology and jurisprudence. In this way, the pronouncements of the Emirates leaders and the poetryand prose of contributors of its websites become sacralized and endowed with the higherauthority associated with Arabic, the language of the divine revelation. Quotations from theQuran and the Sunna of the Prophet are so numerous and long-winded that it is sometimesimpossible to comprehend the exact purpose for which they are so abundantly marshaledby the Emirates spokesmen. This discursive strategy of the leadership of the Caucasusmujahideen may conjure up the image of the Hanbalis from the Abbasid era whom their

opponents ridiculed for lling their speeches with scriptural quotations to such an extentthat the original object of their discourses was all but obscured. 68 It seems that the Emiratesspokesmen see their prociency in the two foundational sources of Islam and the Arabiclanguage as a decisive advantage over their opponents, be they the despised munaqunor the hated kuffar . In any event, they routinely debunk their critics among the ofciallyappointed clergy of the North Caucasus republics for their lack of knowledge of the Quranand the Sunna of the Prophet and Islamic theological terminology. 69

This is not to say that the mujahideen are alone in their extensive use of ArabicIslamicconcepts as a means to demonstrate their religious expertise and personal piety and to imbuetheir pronouncements with scriptural authority. Their religious opponents, too, are proneto intersperse their denunciations of the religious extremism and incompetence of themujahideen (whom they dub Wahhabis or Kharijis) with Arabic words and Islamiclegal vocabulary. 70 In this way, the Arabic language and the Islamic tradition based on it




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326 A. Knysh

have become a site of contestation for both the Emirates mujahideen and their ideologicalopponents who are usually classied as either Sus or adherents of traditional Islam. 71

One should point out that the use of Arabic, and especially of ArabicIslamic religiousand legal terminology, is far from supercial. One may argue that it decisively shapes thevery conceptual framework and mindset of the speakers as the following quotation from astatement by the Emirates late chief judge ( qadi ) Anzor Astemirov nely demonstrates:

Taqlid (that is, following the opinion of [authoritative] scholars) is not allowedwhen it comes to the fundamentals of the aqida 72 (that is, usul al-din ). Beforeone can accept somebodys statement concerning a matter of creed, one shouldask for a clear dalil (that is, a proof [derived] from a religiously sound source).As for the furu (that is, branches or details) of the Sharia(t) law, in this respectwe follow the opinion of those who have knowledge [of such things] and donot need to request a dalil on each issue.

The gist of Astemirovs argument that can be extracted from the overall context of hisstatement is that the Emirates mujahideen need not have an extensive scholarly expertise tounderstand and practice the basic precepts of their religion (which, according to Astemirov,include the divine command to wage jihad against indels and polytheists). For him, theyare self-evident. If and when re-interpreted in a novel way, the interpreter should justify hisinterpretation by producing a cogent scriptural proof. However, the mujahideen , not beingformally trained jurists, should seek council of religious jurists ( fuqaha ) when dealing withambiguous matters pertaining to the implementation of some ner points of the Sharia (t ).

It should be pointed out that Astemirovs argument cited above comes in response tothose learned critics of the Emirate who argue that its leaders do not possess the requisitetheological and legal competence to declare and wage jihad . Seen from this vantage point,the ArabicIslamic theological terminology employed by Astemirov can be construed as adeliberate rhetorical stratagem aimed at countering a theological/juridical objection to themujahideen s interpretation of Islam. Couched in a carefully selected Arabic terminology,it is aimed at showcasing Astemirovs expertise in Islamic juridical theory ( qh), whilesimultaneously calling in doubt the juridical competence of his critics. The critics, inthis case, are the ofcial religious scholars of Astemirovs native Kabardino-Balkaria,who had been trying to dissuade the republics pious youth from taking arms against theFederal and republican authorities and police force. Overall, our analysis of postings onkavkazcenter.com and the afliated rebel Internet forums seems to conrm Gilles Kepelsobservation that

On websites in every European language, whether jihadist or pietist, trendy jargon blends in with an intense polemic founded on obscure religious referenceto medieval scholars whose work was written in abstruse Arabic. 73

The use of Arabic is not conned to academic debates over differing interpretations of Islam. It may appear in much graver contexts, for example, in the recordings of lastconversations between small groups of Daghestani mujahideen surrounded by police unitsand their families and friends. Breathing heavily in the face of inevitable death, 74 thedoomed ghters often prelude their nal farewells and instructions to their loved onesand comrades-in-arms with a battery of pious Arabic phrases and creedal statements 75

aimed at asserting their abiding loyalty to Islam (or at least their understanding of Islam)even in the face of an impending doom. 76 To an outsider, these formulaic pronouncements




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may occasionally sound like magic incantations deemed to strengthen the resolve of theghters to sacrice their lives in the path of God. Their families are usually tearful, theircomrades-in-arms encouraging and, occasionally, envious of their friends being on thebrink martyrdom and, consequently, at the gates of paradise. From the viewpoint of themujahideen , the ArabicIslamic formulas they utter in the precious last minutes of theiryoung lives are a pass of sorts to the felicitous life to come. In this way, Arabic, the languageof the Islamic revelation, imbues them with strength and heroism.

Finally, there were a recent series of postings on the rebel websites that call for theadoption of Arabic as the ofcial language of the new state. Their authors emphasize therole of Arabic as the unifying factor that helped Muslims to overcome their ethnic andcultural divisions at the time of the Umayyad and Abbasid caliphates. If we examine[our] history, argues the blogger who names himself Abu-Zayd, it will become obviousthat each time an Islamic community neglected the Arabic language, it set on the path of moral decay and fell victim to foreign military and political aggression. 77 In the presentconditions, when Islam and the Muslims are under attack from all sides,

The Arabic language serves as the primary means of communications amongforeign mujahideen in every country where jihad is waged. Without knowing it,we are [doomed to] to talking only to each other. It is very important that [all]mujahideen have a common language, and the Arabic language is the perfectcandidate for this [role]. This is why it is so important that the amirs of the jamaats 78 [of the mujahideen] make it obligatory for their mujahideen to studythe Quran and the Arabic language at least one hour a day. 79

No less importantly, the mastery of Arabic is presented by its advocates as the surest way

to preserve the purity of Islam, because, in the words one writer, understanding the Book (Koran) and the Sunna is a [religious] duty, and one is unable to understand them, withoutthe knowledge of Arabic. That without which a religious duty cannot be properly fullledalso becomes a duty. 80

This is why, insists one author, all of us should study the Arabic language andteach it to our children. It is not as difcult as it seems at rst sight. Studying fortwo-three hours once a week is enough. I dont think one would have a problemnding time [to do this]. All we should do is to eliminate from our schedulessome unnecessary activities, such as idle talk with friends, interacting with

them through the Internet, watching the TV, as so on.81

While one does occasionally hear dissenting voices that propose to adopt Ottoman Turkishas the state language of the Emirate, 82 the majority of postings on the rebel sites givespreference to Arabic. The adoption of Ottoman Turkish is considered to be opportunisticin that it is justied by its advocates by the recent strength of the Ottoman Empire and itsinuential role in the Caucasus politics. However, the majority opinion is that by virtueof its being the language of the Islamic revelation Arabic is elevated above such transientgeopolitical considerations. It is an eternal value that is not subject to uctuation of cklehuman fortunes. 83 The debate just described has proved important enough for the reclusiveand elusive amir of the Emirate Dokku Umarov to weigh in, suggesting that the discussionof this issue be broadened [and] suggestions, comments and arguments [regarding thismatter] be systematized and carefully analyzed. 84




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328 A. Knysh

Let us now place our survey of the uses of the Arabic language and Islamic terminologyby the spokesmen and supporters of the Caucasus Emirate into a broader cultural, political,and historical context. The creation of this trans-ethnic political entity, albeit largely virtual,may be seen as an attempt by its leaders to bridge, if only on a symbolic and rhetoricallevel, the vast disparity between their opponentsthe increasingly assertive Russian statewith its modern armed forces and relatively strong economy ush with oil wealth, on theone handand the small bands of poorly equipped and underfunded Islamist guerillas,no matter how highly motivated and courageous, on the other. The relative scarcity of themujahideen s physical presence on the ground is at least partially compensated by theirrobust presence in cyberspace projected via several jihadist websites. 85 Furthermore, onecan argue that this virtual presence has given the Caucasus Emirate an aura of invincibilityand permanencewhile individual mujahideen and their tiny ghting units arebeing chasedand destroyed by Russian Federal forces, Kadyrovs militia, and republican police units, thewebsites analyzed continue to be updated regularly and to provide a pro-rebel spin on theevents in the region, Russia, the former Soviet Union, and internationally. The irredentist

jihadist rhetoric and prompt reaction to the latest developments on the part of the sitesadministrators project an image of competence (i.e., being au courant) and self-condenceto the outside world. This virtual strategy seems to be consciously designed to facilitaterecruitment of young ghters for the political and military causes espoused by the Emirate.

Another ideological benetof thetransformation of themovement forChechen nationalliberation into as a trans-ethnic Islamist one is that it gives the ghters a feeling of belongingto a global imagined community of the faithful, the umma .86 By occasionally accessing thewebsites postings via their laptop computers or smart phones, the Caucasus mujahideenno longer feel alone or forgotten in their unequal battle against perceived or real injusticesof the social and political order they have vowed to abolish. Rather, they can now conceiveof themselves as yet another detachment in the global army of Muslim sisters and brothersunited in their cosmic battle for a noble, divinely sanctioned, transcendent cause. Thisperception imbues the Caucasus mujahideen with the self-condence and sense of purposethat localized, ethnic-based secessionist movements are unable to furnish.

Instead of a Conclusion: Some Loosely Strung Thoughts About Language,Religion, and Identity

The establishment of the Caucasus Emirate is a direct outcome of the two decades of thepost-Soviet turmoil in a region that enjoyed neither social stability nor economic prosperity

even in its better days, under the heavy but relatively benevolent hand of the Soviet regime.During the Soviet period, the subsidized economies of the Northern Caucasus republicsmanaged to provide for the basic needs of their populations. 87 Then came GorbachevsPerestroika and the fall of the Soviet Union, bringing in its wake social, economic, andpolitical upheavals on an unprecedented scale. Several armed conicts ared up acrossthe Caucasus, the RussoChechen war of 19941996 being the most devastating one. 88

It destroyed thousands of human lives, much of the Chechen republics Soviet-era in-frastructure, displaced hundreds of thousands of people and all but ruined its economy.Furthermore, it also triggered the rise of anti-government insurgencies in the name of Islamnot just in Chechnya but in the neighboring Muslim republics of the Northern Caucasus aswell.

As one can see from the evidence adduced earlier in this article, the deadly strugglebetween the Russian Federal troops and the Chechen separatists has led to the progressive




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marginalization of Chechen nationalist ideology espoused by its founders in favor of a pan-Islamist one. This development seems like a logical outcome of the lack of internationalrecognition of the Chechens right to secede from Russia and, later on, of the failure of theleadership of the rst independent Chechen state (19961999) 89 to deliver law, order, andeconomic prosperity to its war-weary population.

In retrospect, the recent declaration of the Caucasus Emirate by Umarov, one of thefounding fathers of the Chechen national resistance and state, seems not only logical, but,in fact, inevitable. Faced with the military defeat of 1999 and goaded by Russias effortsto indigenize the conict by co-opting some members of the Chechen national elite inreturn for generous nancial infusions from the Federal Center (as well as promises of broadautonomy), the irredentist wing of the Chechen separatist movement had no choice but toturn to the jihadist international. While the creators of the Caucasus Emirate may havehoped that their new strategy would give them better access to the resources of rich Islamicstates and charities worldwide, their immediate goal seems to have been quite local. Facedwith the military power of the Russian state they sought to unify the theretofore isolated

regional pockets of anti-Russian, separatist insurgency under the aegis of a transnationaland trans-ethnic resistance movement headed by Chechen military commanders. The roleof the ideological scaffolding of this new militarypolitical formation was assigned toIslam. In practical terms, the Islamization of Chechen separatism entailed the enforcementof the norms of the Sharia (t ), the ubiquitous deployment of the Arabic language and Islamicsymbols, and the relentless and uncompromising prosecution of the anti-Russian jihad .

The founders of this new Islamist/ jihadist polity had good reasons to believe that theywould achieve at least some level of success in their bold undertaking. First, as alreadypointed out, the long conict in Chechnya had spilled over into the neighboring republicsvia young Muslim volunteers who at one point or the other joined the Chechen resistance;after undergoing baptism by re in Chechnya, they returned home ready to take on theirown ruling regimes (which were and still are uniformly secular and pro-Russian) in thename of the international jihad waged by the global umma against the overwhelming powersof Taghut . Second, the preaching of jihad by the returning veterans of the RussoChechenwars and by the jihadi websites fell on a fertile soil due to numerous popular grievances anddiscontents in the region that had been engendered by the local corruption, authoritarianism,and misrule. 90 Islamist/ jihadist appeals to justice and equity under the aegis of the divinelyrevealed law, the Sharia (t ), found an eager hearing among theCaucasus Muslims, especiallyyounger ones, who were marginalized by the social and economic status quo and who hadlittle hope to make their voices heard under the heavy-handed, corrupt and nepotisticgovernance of the pro-Russian political elites of their republics. 91

The claim of the late Kabardian guerilla leader Anzor Astemirov that he had beenadvocating for the creation of a supra-ethnic Islamic polity in the Northern Caucasusalready in 2005 rings true. 92 He seems to have persuaded the fourth president of ChechnyaAbdulkhalim (Abd al-Halim) Sadulayev (Sad Allah) to lay the ground for the declarationof a Sharia (t ) state throughout the entire Northern Caucasus. Sadulayevs untimely deathin June 2006 at the hands of a Russian special force unit interfered with this master plan. 93

It was, therefore, only a matter of time for an Islamic state to be declared outside Chechnyaby an ambitious jihadi leader such as Astemirov. One can say that the idea was oating inthe air. Faced with this eventuality, it was only natural for Umarov, Udugov, and their closecircle of followers to seize the initiative and declare a Chechnya-based Emirate before itwas announced elsewhere in the Northern Caucasus.

On the debit side, the pursuit of an ambitious global agenda by these newlyminted transnationalist jihadists 94 has inevitably alienated them from the secular-minded




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Caucasus nationalists whose goal is much more local in scope, that is, to secure theirrepublics national sovereignty and independence from Russia. Hence, the oft-cited fun-damental conict 95 between the abstract, universal agenda of global jihadism , and theparticularistic identities, grievances, and aspirations of local Muslim communities. In-evitably, acerbic mutual recriminations have ensued between their respective supporters,resulting in a fateful split in the ranks of the former comrades-in-arms. Lines of loy-alty and ideological underpinnings have now been sharply redrawn, values and principlespolarized, and the parting of ways becomes inevitable. This parting of ways has been ac-centuated by the use of diametrically opposed idioms and concepts (Arabic/Islamic versusRussian/Western), by appeals to different sources of authority (the Quran, Sunna, andSharia (t ) versus Russian and Western secular laws and institutions), and even by outwardmeans of self-expression, such as a distinct dress-code and physical appearance (militaryfatigues or free-owing Islamic dresses versus well-tailored secular suites; Islamicscalp-caps versus Western-style hats; unkempt beards versus trimmed ones or no beards atall, etc.). 96 In this way, the twofactionsmutual dissociationhas been rendered complete and

nal.The extensive deployment of ArabicIslamic religious terminology by the Emirates

spokesmen is meant to accentuate their drastic departure from the secular Russo-centricculture that continues to dominate their societies. One is witnessing, in essence, a concertedattempt by the Caucasus mujahideen to create a new, Islamic vocabulary to convey theirexperiences and challenge the dominant secular Russian idiom. In response to a situationof strife and conict, a new religious and cultural identity/self is being forged. 97 As hasbeen seen, Arabic is widely and deliberately deployed by the Emirates spokesmen as analternative symbolic capital aimed at setting its users apart from both the predominantlyRussian-speaking ruling elites of the Northern Caucasus republics as well as the localethnic nationalists anxious to revive their local vernaculars in order to reassert their newlydiscovered and re-imagined national identities. 98 A new, Islamic (Arabophone) linguisticcommunity is thus being consciously or subconsciously constructed, in which the use of the Arabic language and Islamic conceptual apparatus serves as an important marker of religious [self-]identication. 99

Participants in this nascent linguistic and conceptual community consciously and con-sistently aunt their distinctiveness as they seek to transcend both the Russo-centric andethno-centric nationalist idioms/rhetoric that have been predominant in their societies overthepast onehundred years or so.By consistentlydeploying ArabicIslamic vocabulary, theyseek symbolically to reach out to, and identify themselves with, the imagined transnationalumma based on its single-minded allegiance to the Muslim revelation and the linguistic

vehicle in which it was originally expressed. In the spirit of Pierre Bourdieus statementquoted in an epigraph to this article, 100 the Arabic language, and ArabicIslamic legalterminology in particular, simultaneously legitimize and create the new reality as it is en-visioned by the founding fathers of the Caucasus Emirate. For them, Islam thus servesas that ancient and well-tried method of establishing communion through common prac-tice which Eric Hobsbawm mentions in the other epigraph cited at the beginning of thisarticle. 101

True as Hobsbaums generalization may appear at rst blush, one should keep inmind that the opponents of the Emirate equally rely on the ArabIslamic idiom to refutethe Emirates claims to be the sole representatives of pure and correct Islam. 102 So,in and of itself the Arabic language and the Islamic concepts it enshrines is not enoughto construct a new religious and cultural identity/self. The language and the concepts itarticulates are just containers for the distinctive meanings and interpretations that thus




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are, pace Hobsbaum, the real method of establishing communion through the processof communication and intellectual participation of like-minded individuals in the samediscursive/ideological formation. Thus, what matters is not the language or religion perse, but how they are spoken about, understood, deployed, and, eventually, acted on by thespeakersandtheir targetaudience(s). In otherwords, thesame language andconcepts maybe(and in fact quite often are) interpreted in an almost diametrically opposed manner by NorthCaucasus Muslims (supposedly no less or more personally pious than the mujahideen ), whoprefer accommodation and compromise with the ungodly but still powerful state to a life-or-death armed struggle in the name of the global jihad . As mentioned, this is the positionmaintained by most Su-based communities in the region, whom the mujahideen denounceas apostates.

And now to the issue of the remarkable transition from the heady ethnic nationalismof the late Soviet and early post-Soviet period to a local version of transnational Islamism,understood as political, social, and cultural action in the name of Islam, the global umma ,and the Sharia (t ). This transition is not new of course. It is familiar to us from the recent

history of many Muslim countries and regions, such as, for instance, Iran, Iraq, Egypt, theMaghreb, Jordan, Palestine, and so on. In each of these countries this momentous transitionhad its own logic and driving forces. For example, in Egypt and Algeria the pious urbanpoor, university students, and recent migrants from the countryside aligned themselves withthe petty bourgeoisie, low-ranking army ofcers and state ofcials in a shared aspiration toestablish a just and equitable social order on the basis of the Sharia (t ).103 In the case of theNorthern Caucasus, establishing the rule of the Sharia (t ) and adopting Arabic as the ofciallanguage of the Emirate are declared to be the ultimate goals of the local insurgency wagedin the name of Islam. Once achieved, the local societies would be empowered to overcometheir ethnic and clannish fragmentation that has heretofore prevented them from forming aunied front against the Russian state.

In this respect, there is an obvious resemblance between the ideological agenda of the Caucasus Emirate and the Sharia (t )-enforcing strategy embraced by the leaders of the Caucasus jihad movements in the nineteenth and early twentieth century. As in thepast, 104 the leaders of the Emirate have chosen Arabic as their preferred vehicle of religiousand social discourse, statesmanship, and legislature. As with Shamils and Uzun HajjisImamates (18321859 and 19191920, respectively), 105 the Emirate leaders claim to beimplementers and enforcers of the will of God as inscribed in Arabic in the Sharia (t ) hasbecome a means of not only legitimizing the new jihadi state but also of transcending ethnicdivisions among the local mountaineer communities as well as divergent political, cultural,and economic aspirations of their elites. At this stage, it is hard to predict how effective or

otherwise this new strategy will turn out to be in the long run.Having just mentioned the historical antecedents to building Islamic states in the

region, one cannot avoid pursuing this parallel a step further. When, in the wake of the1917 collapse of the Russian Empire, the regions independence from an unstable and weak Bolshevik state became a strong possibility, the mountaineers of the Northern Caucasusfound themselves split over the place and scope of the Sharia (t )-based legislation in thelife of their societies. 106 One group, the supporters of the Sharia (t ) (Rus. shariatisty ),demanded a comprehensive and unconditional implementation of Sharia (t ) norms in allspheres of public life and politics of the newly created state. Their opponents amongthe left-leaning revolutionary intelligentsia, on the other hand, sought to restrict Islam tothe realm of private faith and worship and to implement secular codes to regulate publicrelations, legal transactions, and political decision making in the newly created federation of mountaineer peoples ( gorskie narody ). This latter group eventually triumphed (in 1922)




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thanks, in large part, to the support of Russias Bolshevik government. 107 In retrospect,one can argue that the pro- Sharia (t ) faction probably stood a better chance of resistingthe subsequent imposition of Bolshevik rule on the Muslim communities of the NorthernCaucasus due to the strong support it enjoyed among the masses. 108 This may indeed have

been the case then. Now, after seventy years of Soviet communist rule, two decades of thepost-Soviet transformation, and in the face of Putins government determination to keep theregion under Russian control at all costs, the viability of the Islamic state in the NorthernCaucasus is tenuous at best. What cannot be disputed is that both armed and ideologicalstruggle under Islamic/Islamist slogans against Russian domination and its local backersis likely to continue for years, if not decades to come. In this scenario, Arabic, the sacredlanguage of the Muslim scriptures, and the Islamic concepts articulated in it have a majorrole to play as the rhetoric and ideological underpinning of Islamist insurgency.

Notes

1. As argued in thepresent authors book Islam in Historical Perspective (Boston, Columbus,Indianapolis, etc.: Pearson/Prentice Hall, 2011), chapters 2325.

2. The present authors article does not address the so-called New Muslims movementwhose members are united by their commitment to practicing pure Islam unadulterated by localcustoms and practices that they consider un-Islamic. Marat Shterin and Akhmet Yarlykapov intheir recent article, Reconsidering Radicalisation and Terrorism: The New Muslims Movement inKabardino-Balkaria and Its Path to Violence, Religion, State and Society 39(34) (JuneSeptember2011), pp. 303325, have argued that North Caucasus Muslims (usually young) espousing thisversion of Islam are not necessarily violent ( jihadist ) by their nature; they can, however, becomeradicalized under certain conditions. The article argues convincingly that one such condition has

been the RussoChechen conict of the last two decades (see p. 318). It has given rise to the jihadist insurgency discussed in what follows.3. Rus. Imarat Kavkaz.4. From the Arabic mujahid , pl. mujahidun , namely, jihad warrior; literally, this term

refers to someone who exerts himself on the path of God. This is a preferred self-denition of the individuals who are commonly referred to as jihadists or Muslim terrorists/militants in theWestern and Russian multimedia and academic discourse; for a recent example of the latter, seeNelly Lahoud, The Jihadis Path to Self-Destruction (New York: Columbia University Press, 2010),p. xix.

5. Namely, an Islamic state ruled by a military commander (Arab. amir or emir ); in whatfollows both spellings of this Arabic word will be used.

6. Iuri Vershov, Doku Umarov bolshe ne ubiitsa, Rosbalt , Rossia, Sankt-Peterburg, 22

December 2010; last modied 11 June 2011, p. 1. Available at http://www.rosbalt.ru/2010/12/22/ 803088.html

7. RFE/RL Interviews Chechen Field Commander Umarov (an interview by Andrei Babit-sky). Available at http://www.rferl.org/atricleprintview/1060266.html (accessed 13 June 2009); cf.Vershov, Doku Umarov.

8. The Ofcial Version of Amir Dokkas Statementof Declaration of theCaucasianEmirate.Available at http://kavkazcenter.com/eng/content/2007/11/22/9107.html (accessed 15 January 2010).

9. Amir Emirata Kavkaz Dokku Umarov, My osvobodim Krasnodarskii krai, Astrakhan iPovolzhskie zemli, 8 March 2010.Last modied 11 June 2011.Availableat http://www.kavkazcenter.com/russ/content/2010/03/08/71087.shtml

10. The plural of the Arabic kar (unbeliever; indel); the Emirates spokesmen use the

plurals kar s and kuffar interchangeably.11. That is, the Arabic for jihad -ghters, hypocrites, and apostates; Umarov, My os-vobodim.




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12. For the historical roots of this concept in pagan Arabia, see T. Fahd and F. H. Stew-art, Taghut in Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2nd ed. (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 19542004); online edition:http://www.brillonline.nl

13. An area ruled by wali/veli, a governor appointed by the Ottoman Sultan in Istanbul beforethe collapse of the Ottoman Empire in 1924.

14. Umarov, My osvobodim.15. This phrase was later omitted from Umarovs statement, but was preserved on some

websites, such as Jihad Unspun . Available at http://www.jihadunspun.com/intheatre internal.php?article=109196 (accessed 21 March 2010).

16. Ibid.17. See, for instance, Sheikh Salakh: Vse mudjahedy podderzhivaiut provozglashenie

Imarata Kavkaz. Available at http://www.kavkazcenter.com//russ/content/2008/09/25/61268.shtml(accessed 12 June 2009); Amir Supian, Prezhde chem provozglasit Imarat Kavkaz, byli skazanybole vazhnye slova. Available at http://www.kavkazcenter.com/russ/content/2009/02/0763864.html(accessed 12 June 2009).

18. On him see note 24. Astemirov was ambushed and killed in Nalchik by a police unit on 24

March 2010; cf. Shaykh Salakh: Vse modzhahedy. The two chief qadi s of the Caucasus Emirateappointed after the death of Astemirov hail from Daghestan.19. Mairbek Vatchagaev, Zakaevs Attempts to Persuade Dokka Umarov are in Vain,

Jamestown Foundation , North Caucasus Weekly 9(24) (19 June 2008). Available at http://www. jamestown.org/single/?no cache=1&tx ttnews%5Bswords%5D=8fd5893941d69d0be3f378576261ae3e&tx ttnews%5Bexact search%5D=Zakaev%92s%20Attempts%20to%20Persuade%20Dokka%20Umarov%20Are%20in%20Vain&tx ttnews%5Btt news%5D=5007&tx ttnews%5BbackPid%5D=7&cHash=c38828dec230d6f40fe6a5ba5757081e (accessed 11 June 2011).

20. Movladi Udugov, Voina idiot za obraz zhizni. Available at http://www.kavkazcenter.com/russ/content/2007/11/28/54654.shtml (accessed 11 June 2011); for Udugovs alleged roleof the mastermind of the Declaration see, for example, Vatchagaev, Zakaevs Attempts.

21. In the aftermath of the Declaration of the Caucasus Emirate Zaka(y)ev declared himself the prime minister of the Republic of Ichkeria that was abolished by Umarovs decree.

22. Udugov, Voina.23. For an illuminating comparison between Uzun Hajjs emirate and that of Dokku Umarov

see Mairbek Vatchagaevs Uzun Hajis and Dokka Umarovs Emirates: A Retrospective, JamestownFoundation, North Caucasus Weekly 9(10) (13 March 2008). Available at http://www.jamestown.org/single/?no cache=1&tx ttnews%5Bswords%5D=8fd5893941d69d0be3f378576261ae3e&txttnews%5Bany of the words%5D=uzun%20haji%27s&tx ttnews%5Btt news%5D=4785&tx ttnews%5BbackPid%5D=7&cHash=b40b431a5c) (accessed 11 June 2011); for the history of the Islamicmovements led by these three leaders see my entries Ushurma, Mansur; Shamil; and al-Kabk (the Caucasus) pt. 3, in the Encyclopaedia of Islam , 2nd ed. (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 19542004); onlineedition: http://www.brillonline.nl.

24. Udugov, Voina; this idea is echoed by the late Kabardian amir Astemirov who wasalso the Emirates chief qadi , who argues that the [only] difference between the democrats [of theRepublic of Ichkeria], who reside in Europe, and between todays Kremlins stooges in Chechnya isthat the former want to live under the wing of the West, whereas the latter under the wing of Russia;see Amir Seifulla o protsesse podgotovki k provozglasheniiu Kavkazskogo Emirata, 20 November2007. Available at http://www.kavkazcenter.com/russ/content/2007/11/20/54479.shtml (accessed 11June 2011).

25. Udugov, Voina.26. Ibid.27. Ibid.28. Ibid.29. Ibid.30. Ibid.31. Amir Seifulla o protsesse.




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32. Ibid.33. As discussed in the present authors Islam in Historical Perspective , pp. 431445.34. Ibid., pp. 401405.35. Ibid., p. 434 and Gilles Kepel, Jihad: The Trail of Political Islam , 2nd ed., trans. by

Anthony Roberts (Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press, 2002), p. 26.36. Abdel Bari Atwan, The Secret History of Al Qaeda (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University

of California Press, 2006), p. 127.37. Gary Bunt , iMuslims: Rewiring the House of Islam (Chapel Hill: University of North

Carolina Press, 2009), p. 223.38. Gary Bunt, Islam in the Digital Age: E-Jihad, Online Fatwas and Cyber Islamic Environ-

ments (London and Sterling, VA: Pluto Press, 2003), p. 70.39. Bunt, Islam, pp. 67, 70, 112113, 138, 161, and so on.40. See, for instance, Umm Iklil, Pobeda ili rai, 1 February 2009. Available at http://

www.kavkazcenter.com/russ/content/2009/02/01/63732.shtml (accessed 11 June 2011); AmirMuhannad, Kavkaz podderzhivaet Gazu. Available at http://www.kavkazcenter.com/russ/ content/2009/02/01/63732.shtml (accessed 2 April 2009); Andrew McGregor, Distant Relations:

Hamas and the Mujahideen of Chechnya, Jamestown Foundation 7(8) (23 February 2006).Available at http://www.jamestown.org/single/?no cache=1&tx ttnews%5Btt news%5D=3166 (ac-cessed 11 June 2011); Press Release of Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center at theCenter for Special Studies (C.S.S), 19 July 2006. Available at http://www.terrorism-info.org.il/ malam multimedia/English/eng n/html/hamas ch e.htm (accessed 3 April 2009); Khamas prizy-vaet palestintsev brat primer s chechenskikh boevikov, 23 September 2004. Available athttp://lenta.ru/terror/2004/09/23/propaganda/ (accessed 11 June 2011).

41. Thus, Kadyrov is routinely called Kafyrova damning pun on the Arabic word kar ,meaning indel.

42. As documented by Gordon Hahn in his publications for the Monterey Terrorism Researchand Education Program . Available at http://montrep.miis.edu/ (accessed 11 June 2011).

43. See, for instance, Rostekhnadzor kosvenno podtverdil, chto osennii pavodok mozhetunichtozhit SSh GES, 30 August 2009. Available at http://www.kavkazcenter.com/russ/content/ 2009/08/30/67721.shtml (accessed 11 June 2011); Na unichtozhennykh voennykh bazakh vUlianovske nakhdilos khimicheskoe oruzhie? 14 November 2009. Available at http://www.kavkazcenter.com/russ/content/2009/11/14/69144.shtml (accessed 11 June 2011).

44. V Permi sgorel tsvet goroda, 5 December 2009. Available at http://www.kavkazcenter.com/russ/content/2009/12/05/69533.shtml (accessed 11 June 2011); Demogracheskaia katastrofa,4 January 2010.Available at http://www.kavkazcenter.com/russ/content/2010/01/04/69917.shtml (ac-cessed 11 June 2011).

45. Bunt, eMuslims , p. 8.46. What follows are the recurrent themes of kavkazcenter.com and its sister websites, which

absolves the present author from documenting every instance of their appearance.

47. Bunt, iMuslims, p. 199.48. The correct transliteration of this Arabic word is murtadd , but the gemination (doubling)of the nal consonant of the Arabic stem is ignored in the transliteration system adopted by thewebsite administrators.

49. A Quranic term originally applied to the prophet Muhammads opponents in Medina,who adopted Islam outwardly out of expediency, while harboring a deep-seated unbelief and hatredof the Muslim community.

50. Norman Cigar (trans.), Al-Qaidas Doctrine for Insurgency: Abd al-Aziz al-Muqrins APractical Guide for Guerilla War (Washington, DC: Potomac Books, 2009), pp. 1617; the presentauthor has made a minor change to the translation by replacing the word unitarian ( muwahhid )with monotheistic.

51. Akbar al-Madzhid, Novatorstvo islamskogo poeta. 17 March 2009. Available athttp://www.kavkazcenter.com/russ/content/2008/09/03/60756.shtml (accessed 11 June 2011).

52. Akbar al-Madzhid, Novatorstvo.




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53. Ded Moroz i kadyrovskaia troitsa. Available at http://www.kavkazcenter.com/russ/ content/2008/12/04/62601.html (accessed 15 January 2009).

54. Amir Supian, Prezhde chem.55. In the sites chat rooms, Putin is routinely nick-named Pukin, namely, farter; see, for

example, http://www.jamaatshariat.com/ru/content/view/508/29/#comments (accessed 5 September2010).

56. Shamil Mansur, Padshii bard. 12 August 2008. Available at http://www.kavkazcenter.com/russ/content/2008/08/12/60137.shtml (accessed 11 June 2011).

57. Namely, Mecca and Medina.58. Amir Supian, Prezhde chem; the circumambulation of the Kaba sanctuary ( tawaf )

constitutes one of the central events of the annual Muslim pilgrimage ( hajj ) to Mecca.59. Ded Moroz.60. For the heated theological polemic around this controversial Su teaching see the present

authors book Ibn Arabi in the Later Islamic Tradition: The Making of a Polemical Image in Medieval Islam (Albany, NY: SUNY Press, 1999).

61. Shterin and Yarlykapov, Reconsidering Radicalization, pp. 304 and 322 note 6.

62. For details see the present authors article Contextualizing the Su-Sala Conict: Fromthe Northern Caucasus to Hadramawt, Middle Eastern Studies 43(4) (2007), pp. 503530.63. Shamil Mansur, V edinstve sila musulman. 24 February 2009. Available at http://www.

kavkazcenter.com/russ/content/2009/02/24/64175.shtml (accessed 11 June 2011).64. Amin, russkii muslim, Oskal suzma. 27 October 2009. Available at http://www.

islamdin.com/index.php?view=article&catid=36%3A2009-11-12-19-39-41&id=546%3A2009-10-27-21-15-16&option=com content&Itemid=32/ (accessed 11 June 2011); see also ibid., Su-iskaia schetina i moskovskaia svinina. 19 November 2009. Available at http://www.islamdin.com/index.php?view=article&catid=36%3A2009-11-12-19-39-41&id=569%3A2009-11-19-19-28-58&option=com content&Itemid=32/ (accessed 7 March 2010).

65. Forsomerepresentativeexamplessee http://www.kavkazcenter.com/russ/content/2008/09/ 25/61268.shtml (regarding Shaykh Salakh of Tevazanin) (accessed 11 June 2011); http://vip.lenta.ru/news/2004/09/27/qaracaevo (regarding Ramazan Borlakov of Karachaevo-Cherkessia andhis religious school at the village of Uchkeken) (accessed 11 June 2011); another typical exampleis the late Musa (Artur) Mukozhev, who studied at the Imam Muhammad Bin Saud IslamicUniversity in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, and his successor Anzor Astemirov, Shterin and Yarlykapov,Reconsidering Radicalisation, p. 311; cf. Mairbek Vatchagaev, The Northern Caucasus RemainsCombustible, The JamestownFoundation , North Caucasus Weekly 1(19) (15 May 2009). Available athttp://www.jamestown.org/single/?no cache=1&tx ttnews%5Bswords%5D=8fd5893941d69d0be3f 378576261ae3e&tx ttnews%5Bany of the words%5D=combustible&tx ttnews%5Btt news%5D=35000&tx ttnews%5BbackPid%5D=7&cHash=cf459067776ad9b033138a78dccf522b (accessed 11June 2011). Special mention should be made of Said Buriatskiy (Said Abu Sad al-Buryati), theRussian-Buriat convert to Islam who has acted as the principal spokesman and ideologist of the

Emirate until his death in March 2010. A uent speaker of Arabic, he studied Islamic subjects inreligious colleges of Yemen and Egypt: V Ingushetii ubit boevik Said Buriatskii. Available athttp://www.infpol.ru/newspaper/number.php?ELEMENT ID=30498/ (accessed 25 April 2010).

66. Cf. Bunt, eMuslims , p. 15.67. Music is shunned by the followers of pure Islam in accordance with the more strident

(puritan) interpretation of the Sharia .68. See, for example, Hashwiyya, Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2nd ed. (Leiden: E.J. Brill,

19542004); online edition: http://www.brillonline.nl.69. As shown, for example, by Vladimir Bobrovnikov in his article, Ordinary Wahhabism

vs Ordinary Susm? Filming Islam for the Post-Soviet Young People, Religion, State and Society39 (23) (June-September 2011), pp. 291295; the present author expresses profound gratitude toDr. Bobrovnikov for sharing his work before its publication.

70. Bobrovnikov, Ordinary Wahhabism, pp. 285287; alongside such common Arabicwords used by Daghestani Muslims as tariqa(t), wird (Su community ), murid , ustadh , hadith,




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ziyara(t), and so on. Daghestani critics of Wahhabism also employ relatively rare terms such astasliya , fatwa,shafaa, talqin , nazm , sharh , taqlid , usul al-din , and so on, which are less familiar(if at all) to the average Daghestani believer with no formal religious education. For a study of the application of the historical concept of Kharijism to various strands of the jihadi movementworldwide see Lahoud, The Jihadis Path , passim.

71. For details, see the present authors article, Contextualizing the Su-Sala Conict.72. Interestingly, Astemirov leaves this Arabic word for creed or profession of faith

without translation, which indicates that it is already familiar not only to the mujahideen but to hispotential listeners/readers outside the movement as well. However, he deems it necessary to explainthe meaning of usul al-din (the foundations or fundamentals of religion). The fact that Astemirovsexplanation itself contains an Arabic religious term is quite revealing.

73. Gilles Kepel, The War for Muslim Minds: Islam and the West, trans. Pascale Ghazaleh(Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press, 2004), p. 256.

74. In the overwhelming majority of cases the mujahideen prefer death to captivity, unlessbetrayed, drugged, or overpowered in their sleep.

75. Usually, the shahada , the praises of the Prophet, his family, and his companions and of the

Muslims the world over.76. See, for example, Poslednii razgovor Salakhuddina (Rustama) Zakariaeva. 25September 2010. Available at http://guraba.info/index.php?option=com content&view=article&id=934&catid=17&Itemid=37 (accessed 11 June 2011); Poslednii zvonok pered smertiu. 4September 2008. Available at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eo-rRYM7eKE&playnext=1&list=PLF44CA4326BDA2432 (accessed 11 June 2011). Poslednii zvonok mudzhakhidaShamilkalinskogo raiona. No date. Available at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J8QgV90X5Zc&feature=related (accessed 11 June 2011).

77. Abu-Zayd, Ia za arabskii gosuderstvennyi iazyk Imarata Kavkaz. 21 November 2010.Available at http://www.kavkazcenter.com/russ/content/2010/11/21/76670.shtml (accessed 11 June2011).

78. That is, community, band, or group.79. Abu-Zayd, Ia za arabskii.80. Otdel pisem (The letter section), KavkazTsentr, Status arabskogo iazyka v Islame.

17 December 2010. Available at http://www.kavkazcenter.com/russ/content/2010/12/17/77358.shtml(accessed 11 June 2011); cf. Abu-Zayd, Ia za arabskii.

81. Status arabskogo iazyka.82. Said-Magomed Tokayev, Kakoi gosudarstvennyi iazyk dolzhen byt v Imarate Kavkaz,

27 November 2010. Available http://www.kavkazcenter.com/russ/content/2010/11/27/76817.shtml(accessed 11 June 2011).

83. Abu Khafs (Abu Hafs), I vsio zhe, arabskii! 30 April 2011. Available at http:// kavkazcenter.com/russ/content/2011/04/30/81182 html (accessed 11 June 2011).

84. Otdel operativnoi informatsii (Department of Strategic Information), Amir Dokku Abu

Usman kratko prokommentiroval temu gosudarstvennogo iazyka Imarata Kavkaz. 21 January 2011.Available at http://www.kavkazcenter.com/russ/content/2011/01/22/78411.shtml (accessed 11 June2011).

85. One can argue that this presence is quite robust with insurgent attacks on Federal troopsand police forces in the region taking place on an almost daily basis; however, it has denitely beenon the wane compared to the previous decade (19992009).

86. For a perceptive if controversial analysis of this phenomenon see Oliver Roys Globalized Islam: The Search for a New Umma (New York: Columbia University Press, 2004).

87. For some pertinent observations relevant to the Soviet economy in general and that of the North Caucasus region in particular, see Georgi Derluguian, Bourdieus Secret Admirer in theCaucasus (Chicago and London: Chicago University Press, 2005), pp. 7277, 104124, 132137,and so on.

88. The other conicts of that period are the AzeriArmenian war for Nagorno-Karabakh,the war between Abkhazia and Georgia, and the armed conict between the Ossetian and Ingushcommunities in North Ossetia.




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89. Its ofcial title at that time was The Republic of Ichkeria.90. For an illuminating discussion of the clumsy and counterproductive measures to con-

tain Islamic extremism by the authorities of the republic of Kabardino-Balkariia see Shterin andYarlykapov, Reconsidering Radicalisation, pp. 318321.

91. For a percipient analysis of the disproportionate role of young Muslims (primarily men) inthe Islamization of North Caucasus societies and dissemination of various versions of pure Islam,see Shterin and Yarlykapov, Reconsidering Radicalisation, pp. 307310; for the attractiveness of Sala Islam to younger generations of Muslims in general see Roel Meijer, Introduction, in RoelMeijer, ed., Global Salasm: Islams New Religious Movement (London: Hurst, 2009), pp. 132.

92. Astemirov Takes Credit for Idea of Caucasian Emirate. 30 November 2007. Available athttp://kavkazcenter.com/eng/content/2007/11/30/9148.shtml (accessed 11 June 2011).

93. Amir Seifulla.94. This term was coined and widely used by Fawaz Gerges in his Far Enemy: Why Jihad

Went Global , 2nd ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009), pp. 119150 et passim.95. Manuel Castellis, The Rise of the Network Society , 2nd ed. (Oxford: Blackwell, 2000),

p. 3.

96. Compare, for instance, the video clips of Chechen mujahideen on YouTube to the televisedpublic appearances of Euro-Chechen leaders in exile, such as the aforementioned Akhmed Zaka(y)evand Ilyas Akhmadov, Chechnyas foreign minister under the late president Maskhadov, who currentlyresides in the United States.

97. See the excerpt from Yasir Suleimans Arabic, Self and Identity (Oxford and New York:Oxford University Press, 2011), p. 1, which is quoted in the epigraph to this article.

98. Postings on the Emirates websites are replete with condemnations of various manifesta-tions of ethnic nationalism, which are seen as a conscious or unconscious attempt on the part of itsadvocates to undermine theunity of theglobalMuslim umma in general and that of theCaucasian Mus-lims in particular; see, for example, Amir Seifullakh (Sayf Allah), O gnilom zapakhe natsionalizma.29 September 2008. Available at http://www.kavkaz.org.uk/russ/content/2008/09/29/61307.shtml(accessed 11 June 2011); cf. Amir Seifullakh dal interviu Dzheimstaunskomu fondu. 26 March2009. Available at http://www.kavkazcenter.com/russ/content/2009/03/26/64698.shtml (accessed 11June 2011).

99. Olivier Roy, Holy Ignorance. When Religion and Culture Part Ways , trans. Ros Schwartz(New Yor

knysh 2012 caucasus

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