According to the Associated Press:
World leaders with the power to make war but a duty to preserve peace solemnly marked the end of World War I’s slaughter 100 years ago at commemorations Sunday that drove home the message “never again” but also exposed the globe’s new political fault lines.
As Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin and dozens of other heads of state and government listened in silence, French President Emmanuel Macron used the occasion, as its host, to sound a powerful and sobering warning about the fragility of peace and the dangers of nationalism and of nations that put themselves first, above the collective good.
“The old demons are rising again, ready to complete their task of chaos and of death,” Macron said.
“Patriotism is the exact opposite of nationalism. Nationalism is a betrayal of patriotism,” he said. “In saying ‘Our interests first, whatever happens to the others,’ you erase the most precious thing a nation can have, that which makes it live, that which causes it to be great and that which is most important: Its moral values.”
Comment:
French President Emmanuel Macron, facing domestic nationalist opponents, is nevertheless correct to criticise nationalism for creating conflict between peoples, though patriotism is also at fault for keeping Europe divided. But what Macron did not admit was that the actual target of World War I Western nationalism was not simply other European countries but the Ottoman-led Islamic Khilafah State.
The Islamic Khilafah State had for over a millennium been the world’s foremost state and its solitary superpower, defining the global order politically, economically, militarily and culturally. After the eighteenth century, the Ottoman State had fallen from the rank of the foremost powers in the world but Britain and France viewed its continued existence as necessary to maintain the balance of power in the world, in particular against the expanding Russian Empire. All this changed during the rule from 1876 of the sincere, courageous and brilliant Khalifah Sultan Abdul Hameed. The West realised that the Khilafah State still had within it the elements of greatness and could yet ascend to return as the foremost world power, ending the global imperialism of the Western powers.
Most of the great Ottoman Sultans had been meticulous observers of European politics and Sultan Abdul Hameed was no exception to this. Recognising nascent German aspirations, the Sultan encouraged German ascendancy, supporting it with modern rail access to the oil fields of the Middle East. But the spectre of the Khilafah connecting itself by train to Germany, which lies at the heart of Europe, was viewed as an unparalleled strategic threat to the entire international system; the still much-feared Islamic armies could be mobilised into central Europe within weeks. Consequently, an extraordinary realignment of world powers began, which saw the heretofore bitter opponents Britain, France and Russia unifying in common opposition to Germany and, behind it, the Ottoman State.
The rest, as they say, is history. Despite the dethroning of Sultan Abdul Hameed in 1909, the West knew they had to strip the Ottoman State of its vast territories to ensure no future Khalifah could ever threaten Western dominance again; World War I only ended once these lands were firmly in Western control, while Germany, the alleged target of the war, suffered no great territorial losses. Within a few years they were able to abolish the Khilafah completely, even in the severely reduced limits of the present Turkish state, thus converting it into a Western-styled republic. Freed of the Islamic State, the West has been able to achieve total domination of world affairs, exploiting mankind for the aggrandisement of the Western elite, while bequeathing a world civilisation that champions the material at the expense of the spiritual, the ethical and the humanitarian.
Despite Macron’s pleas, Western civilisation will never be able to escape its nationalism or restore its moral values, since these are inevitable consequences of the secular Capitalist ideology that underpins it; indeed the West’s salvation lies only in Islam. With Allah’s permission, humankind will soon witness the re-emergence of a righteous Islamic Khilafah (Caliphate) State on the method of the Prophet ﷺ that will reunify Muslim lands, eject the disbelieving Western imperialist, and return justice and peace to the entire world. In one hadeeth reported by Ahmed:
«تَكُونُ النُّبُوَّةُ فِيكُمْ مَا شَاءَ اللَّهُ أَنْ تَكُونَ، ثُمَّ يَرْفَعُهَا إِذَا شَاءَ أَنْ يَرْفَعَهَا، ثُمَّ تَكُونُ خِلاَفَةٌ عَلَى مِنْهَاجِ النُّبُوَّةِ، فَتَكُونُ مَا شَاءَ اللَّهُ أَنْ تَكُونَ، ثُمَّ يَرْفَعُهَا إِذَا شَاءَ أَنْ يَرْفَعَهَا، ثُمَّ تَكُونُ مُلْكًا عَاضًّا، فَيَكُونُ مَا شَاءَ اللَّهُ أَنْ يَكُونَ، ثُمَّ يَرْفَعُهَا إِذَا شَاءَ أَنْ يَرْفَعَهَا، ثُمَّ تَكُونُ مُلْكًا جَبْرِيَّةً، فَتَكُونُ مَا شَاءَ اللَّهُ أَنْ تَكُونَ، ثُمَّ يَرْفَعُهَا إِذَا شَاءَ أَنْ يَرْفَعَهَا،ثُمَّ تَكُونُ خِلاَفَةً عَلَى مِنْهَاجِ النُّبُوَّةٍ. ثُمَّ سَكَتَ»
“There will be Prophethood for as long as Allah wills it to be, then He will remove it when He wills, then there will be Khilafah on the Prophetic method and it will be for as long as Allah wills, then He will remove it when He wills, then there will be biting Kingship for as long as Allah Wills, then He will remove it when He wills, then there will be oppressive kingship for as long as Allah wills, then he will remove it when He wills, and then there will be Khilafah upon the Prophetic method” and then he remained silent.
Faiq Najah