Leila Aboulela - The Kindness of Enemies

Many Muslims in Britain wished that no one knew they were Muslim. They would change their names if they could and dissolve into the mainstream, for it was not enough for them to openly condemn 9/11 and 7/7, not enough to walk against the wall, to raise a glass of champagne, to eat in the light of Ramadan and never step into a mosque or say the shahada or touch the Qur’an. All this was not enough, though most people were too polite to say it. All these actions somehow fell short of the complete irrevocable dissolution that was required. Yet children pick up vibes, they know more than they can express, they feel and understand before learning the words for a particular emotion or idea. Many of the young Muslims I taught throughout the years couldn’t wait to bury their dark, badly dressed immigrant parents who never understood what was happening around them or even took an interest, who walked down high streets as if they were still in a village, who obsessed about halal meat and arranged marriages and were so impractical, so arrogant as to imagine that their children would stay loyal. Instead their children grew up as chameleons, not only shifting their colours at will, but able to focus on two opposing goals at the same time. They grew up reptiles plotting to silence their parents’ voices, to muffle their poor accents, their miseries, their shuffling feet, their lives of toil and bafflement, their dated ideas of the British Empire, their gratitude because they remembered all too clearly the deadends they had left behind.

I was actually one of the lucky ones. I was one of the ones who saw the signs early on in the tricksy ways of schoolchildren, in the way my mother, snow-white as she was, was disliked for being Russian. I saw the writing on the wall and I was not too proud to take a short-cut to the exit.

Oz brought in a flurry of snow with him. He stood stamping his wellies, taking off his scarf and gloves. Melting snow gleamed on his hair and I could tell that his lips were numb. The news of the snowstorm was not reassuring. ‘Some of the trains are cancelled; I had to change twice. Here, Malak, I got you the vitamins you asked for.’ He used her first name as if he was indulging her. He seemed more grown-up in her presence. Perhaps his role was to be the steady responsible son so that she could be the ditzy artistic parent. Yet I had seen in him too the inclination for theatre. Oz liked to make his classmates laugh at his impersonations of politicians. He once had me laughing out loud when he used a clothes hanger and did Abu Hamza, the hook-handed cleric. Shaking the snow off his coat, he hung it behind the door. ‘When I got out of the station the bus wasn’t there and all the taxis were taken. The roads are pretty bad. I walked because it was quicker than hanging around waiting for the bus.’

‘Poor Ossie,’ drawled Malak without much sympathy. This was a sharper side of her, a glimpse of the mother who had handed him calmly to babysitters, tucked him into boarding school during a messy divorce, gazed past him as if he never existed while she was practising for a new role. I guessed he was not a child who was encouraged to complain, a child who learnt to search for comfort away from her.

He turned to me. ‘Did you see the sword? It belonged to Imam Shamil.’

‘We can’t be a hundred per cent sure.’ Malak ran her finger through her hair. ‘It could have belonged to someone else.’

‘You haven’t told her yet, have you?’ He was excited or just flushed from his walk in the cold. He drew out a chair but didn’t sit down. He looked straight into my eyes and later, I would remember that focused look, the youthful energy in the voice. ‘Imam Shamil is my … is our,’ a quick glance at his mother to include her, ‘great, great, great — not exactly sure how many greats I should say — grandfather! We are descended through his son, Ghazi.’

My delight was muted by my mobile which, now on silent, buzzed again. It was Tony, who since my mother’s death has been plaguing me with his sadness. Every other evening tears and long-winded confessions of guilt — he had not looked after her enough, he had not urged her to see a specialist soon enough. It was earlier than usual for him; on most days he only started to unravel after six. I rejected his call. I would not act as his grief counsellor today.

I said to Malak, ‘Did you know that Queen Victoria supported Imam Shamil? His picture was on the front page of the London Times with a call for the English to be,’ I made quotation marks with my fingers, ‘ “the generous defenders of liberty against the brutal forces of the Russian Empire.”’

Malak made a face at her son. ‘Queen Victoria championed a jihad.’

Oz sat down. ‘Don’t be naive, Malak. If Russia took over the Caucasus, it would have threatened India. Besides, the word “jihad” then didn’t have the same connotation it has now.’

‘Ever since 9/11, jihad has become synonymous with terrorism,’ she said. ‘I blame the Wahabis and Salafists for this. Jihad is an internal and spiritual struggle.’

‘But this is not entirely true. If someone hits us, we need to hit back.’

‘It’s better to forgive.’

‘No it’s not. Limiting jihad to an internal struggle has become a bandwagon for every pacifist Muslim to climb on. You Sufis …’ he wagged his finger at his mother.

‘Am I a Sufi? Do you see me as such? Then you are doing me a great honour.’

‘You’re a wannabe, Malak. Besides, what choice do you have? Actresses aren’t exactly welcome in mosques.’ He gave a little laugh but I could tell that he was having a dig at his mother.

‘I couldn’t care less what conservative Muslims think of me, but a wannabe Sufi? Really!’ she looked at me and rolled her eyes. I smiled.

‘Yes, of course, with your chants and spiritual retreats,’ he continued. ‘Plus you’re interrupting. I was saying that you Sufis play down your historical role in jihad. Most fighters against European Imperialism were Sufis. And Imam Shamil is a prime example. He was the head of a Sufi order.’

This was not new to me. But this stress on Sufism was not an angle I had previously considered to be important. I needed to reconsider. Shamil’s Sufism might well be what I needed to refine my research direction.

Malak replied, ‘Every fight Shamil fought was on the defence. He was protecting his villages against Russian attack. And surrender to the Russians would have meant the end of their traditional way of life, the end of Islam in Dagestan. The Russians were so brutal they often didn’t take prisoners of war. By comparison Shamil’s generals were scholarly and disciplined. This type of jihad is different from the horrible crimes of al-Qaeda.’

‘I agree, but still it was guerrilla warfare …’ reiterated her son.

‘No it wasn’t.’

He grinned. ‘Malak, you think guerrilla warfare is what you see in the movies! Shamil understood that he couldn’t pitch a direct battle against the tsar’s large and well-equipped army so he lured sections of them up the mountains. He tricked them into dividing and then launched attacks at them.’

‘Well, that is a clever thing to do.’

‘That cleverness is guerrilla tactics.’

But Malak wasn’t going to be shaken. ‘Listen Oz, the door of jihad is closed. Jihad needs an imam and there is no imam now. Jihad is for upholding the values of Allah; it’s not for scoring political points, it’s not for land, it’s not for rights, it’s not for autonomy.’

‘It’s for getting us power over our enemies. Jihad is not something we should be ashamed of.’

‘What we are ashamed of is what is done in its name. Not every Muslim war is a jihad. Not suicide bombers or attacking civilians.’