The Sharifian Solution
The Origins of Arab-Israeli Collusion and the Inversion of the Spirit of Karbala
For better or for worse, I grew up in Jordan. I had a good childhood there and I love its people and beautiful land—and long for it—often in the spring time. One of the perks (or curses?) of living in a former British mandate colony is receiving a mishmash of government propaganda and post-colonial flavored education. In high school, we read Beckett’s absurdist play, Waiting for Godot, and I identified so strongly with it that I wanted to become a satirist and a literature major. How can a play by an Irish playwright that was written in the wake of World War II as an allegory for Cold War politics resonate so much with a young school girl in an elite Amman school?
Growing up in a colonially-constructed state is enough to explain anyone’s penchant for the absurd. A typical upbringing in this milieu produces a lot of conformity of thought and an almost automatic capitulation to the status quo. West Amman was—and remains—an elitist, memetic village. Portraits of the Sovereign Supreme abound in every bureaucratic government agency. One’s own imagination beyond the confines of the “sacred and holy” nation state borders is seen as dangerous and has to be euthanized early on through deep-seated cultural, social and even religious conditioning.
Though the Shaam (the Levant)—modern day Jordan included—was lauded by the Prophet ﷺ as a blessed place, since the 20th century, it has been held in the grip of the pernicious power dynamics of the system I called earlier, “the Kingdom of Fear.” Just like Moses lived in Pharaoh’s palace, and just as Jesus dwelled in the shadow of the repressive Roman Empire, beautiful, hallowed lands tend to be perilous territory for principled individuals. Political minefields abound in the security state. Taboos are a plenty. Palestinians are second class citizens at best, unless they are wealthy. “Big Brother is listening,” and “long live His Majesty” were firm fixtures in everyday conversation. Anything outside of the “accepted” compliant conversation was simply not allowed.
“Waiting for Godot” in Amman means that I could never quite square away the dissonance of living under the rule of a tribalist monarchy with a refugee-majority population, right next door to occupied, colonized and apartheid Palestine. It didn’t seem just nor logical for Jordanians to enjoy “peace and security” while our brethren next door get subjected to the most brutal forms of displacement, settler violence, mass incarceration, ethnic cleansing and now, genocide. “Waiting for Godot” in Jordan is perpetual. In the cumbersome world of politics, we are taught, belonging to nationhood is more important than anything else. “We live in a tough neighborhood and need to do anything to survive.” The specter of “normalizing” with an ethno-religious supremacist colonial state in exchange for a false sense of security loomed over everything. What a bargain.
I suppose my penchant for the absurd was stronger due to the fact that my family—the black sheep Husseini cousins of the ruling family, the Hashemites—arrived there out of necessity, not of choice. It was the price to pay for my ancestors’ rambunctiousness in resisting Israeli colonization. In his youth, my great uncle—who ultimately became Minister of Religious Affairs in Jordan—was involved in armed resistance to the Zionist colonization of Palestine and played a leading role in the battalion to save Gaza in 1948 on Christmas Day. General Sadek of Egypt broke him and his men out of prison to fight and returned them to their cell after the battle was won. My uncle was pinned with medals of honor on his prison uniform. When he proved to be too much of a rebel for the Egyptians, King Hussein of Jordan offered him asylum from the persecution of Abdel Nasser. For the opportunities this unlikely move opened up for family—despite its disenchantments—I am grateful to God alone.
Back then, there was still a modicum of shame among Arab rulers: General Sadek fought the last battle in Gaza even despite the fact that Cairo told him to withdraw his troops. In a famous (and now eerily prescient) line, he said: “my military honor does not permit me to see my brothers and sisters, defenseless civilians, cornered in this small strip of land and let them be slaughtered like chickens by the Zionists.” Later in the 60s and under Nasserist mania, Arab governments still felt somewhat beholden to the righteous indignation of their people and appealed to the masses in their pretense of resisting Israel, even if all such efforts did was serve to bolster their own legitimacy and nationalist symbols.
This backdrop should come as no surprise to anyone familiar with authoritarian regimes. After all, Jordan came to exist when Israel came to exist. The twain needed the surrogacy of British colonization in order to be born. Jordan, however, is unlike any other “post”-colonial Arab state because it was essentially ground zero for the Caliphate’s demise. Performing a danse macabre on the grave of the Ottoman Empire, it became the opium den for—and the igniting spark of—divided state politics and Arab nationalism. Thus, the regime had to work very hard to make the myth of a “post” colonial world—of sovereignty and independence— a firm reality in “the hearts and minds” of its people. With its emotive royalist symbols, its Prophetic lineage and carefully drawn tribalist and classist social hierarchies, Jordan’s nationalist identity became so deeply entrenched, that it became inconceivable to even think of an alternative universe in which such a system does not exist. This was—and remains—firmly forbidden.
No more absurd than this is the present day reality: Jordanians have been forced to sit by and idly watch the genocide of their brethren right next door while normalization treaties resumed, as well as trade, water and energy deals. Jordanian men feel emasculated, women feel betrayed and even children are barred entry to the vicinity of Gaza protests in Amman. But this [natural and righteous] rage continues to be suppressed. The lack of response to the genocide from Arab and Muslim governments has been shocking for most, and will forever constitute a stain on their legacies and on humanity itself. The moral vacuum was so stark, that it conjures an absurd reality best captured in Beckett’s words, “there's no lack of void.”
Social media has been abuzz (or rather—ruthless) with Jordan’s present-day complicity: the Jordanian government has accused Hamas and Iran of inciting the popular nightly protests in Amman this past Ramadan and it arrested scores of protestors, underscoring the government’s vicious arbitrary detention policies and restrictions on freedom of expression.
Jordan has been the focus of much fury (and, in turn, defensive apologetics by diehard loyalists) regarding its role in the thwarting the Iranian retaliation to Israel’s targeting of one of its consulates. Active Jordanian military action was seen for the first time in months—but it was not on behalf of the starved and maimed population of Gaza; it became the only Arab country to shoot down the Iranian drones headed to an Israeli military base in a so-called move to protect its airspace. At the same time, Israel was granted full freedom over Jordanian airspace, so one wonders how the sovereignty argument holds in this regard. This development came as a crushing and shocking revelation to onlookers, who are simply baffled as to how an Arab and Muslim ruler with a Palestinian wife could protect Israeli interest in this way. This, of course, delighted Hebrew media and came as a glad tiding for Israelis: “the tides are changing,” they celebrated. “Arab neighbors are protecting us.”
What most people do not understand is that the dynamic that undergirds this alliance—this protection—is not new in the least. It is tied to the very genesis of the Hashemite Kingdom. Recall that the very founding fathers of Jordan came to power through the Sharifian Solution: the informal name for Britain and France’s post-Ottoman Middle East and nation state-building policy. The idea being that installing members from the Household of the Prophet ﷺ (the Aal al Bayt) would somehow assuage Ummatic bitterness over their destruction of the Caliphate as a political system.
The policy was first put forward by T. E. Lawrence in 1918, as a move to grant the “Islamic” seal of legitimacy to the rule of Hussein ibn Ali, who declared himself the Caliph of the Muslims after the Ottoman Empire was abolished in 1924. However, Hussein bin Ali's reputation in the Muslim world “was thoroughly damaged by his alliance with Britain, his rebellion against the Ottoman Empire, and the division of the ex-Ottoman Arab region into numerous countries; as a result his proclamation attracted more criticism than support across the Ummah.”1
Abdullah I, Hussein bin Ali’s son, first made contact with the British in 1914 and he would become Jordan’s founding King. He asked Lord Kitchener whether Britain would assist his father in the event he decided to resist further “Turkish moves” against him in the Hijaz. These efforts succeeded in what came to be known as the Great Arab Revolt in 1916, (which I studied as Jordan’s greatest historic feat as a schoolgirl). In a previous article for the Maydan, I wrote that the Arab Revolt “was not simply an Arab nationalistic, anti-Turk campaign as it is often glossed over today: it was first and foremost a struggle for Islamic legitimacy.”
Herein lies the inescapable fact that Arab nation states can never ultimately shake off. Islamic legitimacy (or lack thereof) will always murmur under the thin veneer of Arab nation states, no matter how strong their national identity or security apparatus is. Just as the State of Israel unapologetically draws on its Jewish identity, the question of “Islamic legitimacy” will always remain a central concern to the Muslim populace they rule over, even if the masses delay or defer those concerns out of fear and intimidation. Ultimately, “Islamic legitimacy” is not simply a matter of invoking “Islamic” symbols or titles, such as the “Caliph” or “Custodian of Al-Aqsa.” Such platitudes are seen as hot air, empty and hypocritical when they do not uphold, in word and deed, actual Islamic values and principles.
Not only that, there are historic underpinnings to Jordan’s protective status of Israel since its inception. In the wake of the 1948 Nakba, Jordan’s “Arab Legion” took over Jerusalem and the West Bank and established Jordanian military rule in Palestine, despite popular Palestinian disdain for such a move. The Palestinians were no fans of King Abdallah I because his rule was seen as a British dependency, and thus, no different than British direct rule. The British, were, after all, responsible for the establishment of the state of Israel so it is only natural that their ally would be met with distrust. The Arab League held a similar animus towards him. In 1950, they threatened Jordan with sanctions and even cancellation of its membership in the Arab League, but Jordan abated concerns on the condition that Abdallah not renew his contacts with Israel. He promised to do so—but continued to maintain contacts with them in secret. Abdullah I also refused to sign the military treaty with the Arab League (known as the Collective Security Pact) and allied instead with the British, in case a Third World War broke out. It is all the same under the self-preservationist sun. In the words of veteran journalist Abdullah Schleifer in his famed book, The Fall of Jerusalem:
“Abdullah and the leaders of other neighboring Arab states thought of the issue at stake in Palestine more in terms of a bargain[…] as a war over real estate rather than an anti-colonial struggle.” P. 31
Because of his stances, Abdullah I was assassinated in 1951 at the Sacred Compound of Al-Aqsa, which the Jordanian government offically oversees to this day.
Thus, it is amply clear to those who read history that the back-channeling with the enemy in the underground “Tunnels of State Treachery” and collusion with Israel has been the name of the game since even before its cursed inception, bolstered in a more metastasized form today with new autocratic GCC state actors and the sinister “Abraham Accords.” There is also enough historic evidence to show that even Morocco, another Arab Kingdom which deploys the ruling household’s Prophetic [Hasani] lineage, tipped off Israeli intelligence, and helped Israel win Six Day War during King Hassan II’s reign. With friends like these…
This reveals the most uncomfortable open secret that nobody wants to talk about in the Arab world: what gives Israel and Netanyahu the cover they need to carry out their genocidal and expansionist policies is Israel’s reliance on the undeterred fealty and capitulation of Arab governments, knowing full well that they would never transgress the bounds of normalization due to self-preservation and self-interest. Western-Israeli hegemony in the Middle East relies—and thrives—on unconditional Arab compliance based on this exact reasoning and realpolitik of “security and peace” (as well as water, gas, and debt reliance) in exchange for Palestinian statehood and blood. It as simple as that. Ethical or not, Islamic or not, it doesn’t really matter in this game. In the Kingdom of Fear, power, at any cost, in whatever form, reigns supreme.
One can say that the “post” colonial world of the “rules-based order” was in essence a dog-eat-dog world. If not this flavor of rule, then a more brutal and insidious regime would have eventually been installed to oversee Western-Israeli interests in the region. Some say that temporary security is well worth the price to pay in the face of a land-hungry, brutal, well-funded, genocidal military superpower next door. But clearly, this veneer of security in exchange for rights is itself a false one, as we have seen in recent weeks, with WWIII being mere maniacal breaths away.
There are those who might simply say there is no room for idealism in the dirty world of politics. This subpar, repressive form of order and governance must remain the status quo because the alternative is *gasp* anarchy and revolt. There are even those who might say that it was God who gave these Muslim rulers power and like it or not, unconditional fealty, loyalty and allegiance to the ruler is to be respected under specific interpretations of Islamic law, so long as there is no restriction on their right to practice Islam, ie. pray five times a day. (Read more about why this type of thinking constitutes Muslims’ Original Sin, in my view.) There is no shortage of morally relativist justifications that one can make to absolve themselves of seeing things as they truly are: let each reap what their minds and hearts have sown to their own accord on Judgement Day.
These justifications do not concern me here. What concerns me is the long dureé of the “Sharifian Solution” and its implications on our present day. It is all the more egregious when such betrayals to the core fundamentals of Islamic legal principles (usul) against the life, dignity and rights of the Palestinian people are enacted in the name of the blessed Prophetic household. Today, Lawrence of Arabia’s vision for the Middle East is thriving in disintegration, corruption and normalization with the most insidious actors and inheritors of the British Empire.
The more I learn of the lives and ethos of the Aal al-Bayt themselves, the more I grew wary—and indignant—towards any discourse that uses Islam—and the Prophet’s noble family no less—as a fig leaf for tyranny. Recall the true Aal al-Bayt ethic in the Prophet’s beloved son-in-law, Imam Ali, who was known for his immaculate and relentless preservation of the ideals of justice at all costs.
He was known to say, “Justice is better than courage, because if everyone were just to others, then there will be no need for courage.” He also desired martyrdom over displeasing Allah for even one second: “Martyrdom is the best way to depart from this world. I swear by him in whose hand lies the soul of this son of Abu Talib, I would prefer a thousand wounds of the sword in the way of Allah, than disobey Him and die in bed.”
Recall the true Aal al-Bayt ethic in Imam Hussain's stance, whose martyrdom was foreseen by the Prophet ﷺ himself, and he shed tears over his valiant grandson’s demise. Hussain was not simply a “rabble-rouser” who declared war upon the tyrannical forces of the Umayyads and Yazid, rather, he was strong armed to grant them blind fealty, and by extension, legitimacy, which is something he—as an upholder of Prophetic values—could never accept. He did not initiate strife or defiance, rather, it was Yazid that forced Imam Hussain to bow down to his rule. Imam Hussain refused out of principle, and famously declared: “the likes of me will never obey the likes of you.” It was a matter of nature. Of alchemy. Of upholding natural law: Prophets—and their spiritual heirs—do not capitulate to tyranny. Plain and simple. It was this stance—this sacrifice—that led to his martyrdom at the hands of Yazid’s army in Karbala. He was also known to have said:
Death is nothing but honor.
Living with tyrants is nothing but humiliation.
This fighting Aal al-Bayt spirit is further seen in his courageous sister, the Lioness of Aal al-Bayt, Sayyida Zeynab—the very inspiration for this Substack—who refused to show weakness at the Umayyad Court of Yazid in Damascus and spoke a just word in the face of a tyrant with such eloquence and grace in one of the most thunderous sermons of protest in human history.
Recall that the true Aal al-Bayt were often the mirrors to society, the truth-tellers who paid a grave price for their principles. This is seen in Hussain’s grandson, Ja’far al-Sadiq, who was asked by the Abbasid Caliph Ja’far al-Mansur:
“Why do you not frequent us like the rest of the people?”
To which al-Sadiq defiantly replied, “we have nothing to fear over in this dunya (life), and you have nothing to offer me for my akhira (hereafter). You are neither in a state of felicitous bounty for us to congratulate you for it, nor are you in a state of grief for us to pay our condolences.”
It is no surprise then, that his son, Musa al-Kadhim, was similarly persecuted by the Abbasids and imprisoned by the Caliph Harun al-Rashid during a visitation to his Grandfather’s ﷺ burial site in Madina. Threatened by the breadth of his knowledge, good character, principles, piety and vision, he was imprisoned until his death in Baghdad in 417 H.
Recall the example of rulers who, when tempted with enforcing their authority through the ruthless whip of suppression, remembered that their rule is a trust—rather than a source of unadulterated power—by God. Consider these words from the Caliph Umar ibn Abd al-Aziz, when he was told, “oh Amir of the Believers, the people are becoming unruly and their morals are being compromised, nothing but the whip will fix them,” to which he replied, “you lie. The only thing that will reform them is justice and fairness.” Umar ibn Abd al-Aziz held himself to such a lofty standard of self-accountability, that he was known to tell his companions, “if you see me go astray, then shake me violently by my garments and wake me up, remind me ‘to fear Allah, oh Umar, for you will soon die.’”
These exemplars from the Prophetic model of leadership show us what it truly means to be Vanquishers of the Kingdom of Fear in full, unabashed, embodied form. They upheld their values even at great peril to themselves. They did not resign themselves to the worldly calculus of what is most “expedient” and “safe” to simply “keep the peace.” Rather, they sacrificed even themselves at the altar of Allah and their guiding exemplar, the Prophet ﷺ, and fought for what is just and what is true. They had to earn the mantle of being true Muslim leaders.
Where are we today from such exemplars? When all that abounds is self-interested tyranny in regimes across the Muslim world that lack any accountability? When the scholars have more adab (comportment) with the tyrants than they do with Allah? When there is more concern over holy sites and sovereignty than the criminal, wanton bloodshed of thousands of believers? When we have come to accept a completely and utterly broken system as sacred, infallible and holy?
Thus, the British-backed Sharifian Solution represents the very inversion of the Spirit of Karabala. This should surprise no one: just as the Qur’an mentions how—the descendants of Abraham, the Bani Israel—were not immune from transgressing the bounds of Allah despite their lofty status and Prophetic lineage:
Abraham was tested by his Lord with commandments, which he fulfilled. Allah said, “I will certainly make you into a role model for the people.” Abraham asked, “What about my offspring?” Allah replied, “My covenant is not extended to the wrongdoers.” (Qur’an 2:124)
In the same vein, it is to be expected that there are those among the Prophet’s progeny that would betray his moral example ﷺ. Having prophetic blood course through one’s veins is not a carte blanche right, and does not grant anyone the automatic privilege of being a card carrying member of the Aal al-Bayt. To truly belong to the Aal al-Bayt, one needs to walk the walk and talk the talk; to show it in both word and deed. It is a path of service and responsibility, not of power and access. Recall that the Prophet ﷺ said of his beloved companion Persian Salman al-Farsi, “Salman is one of us, the Ahl al-Bayt” because it was Salman’s idea of digging a trench in the Battle of Khandaq which brought victory to Muslims. The Prophet ﷺ said that Salman was a member of his family—despite having no physical, blood ties to the Prophet—as a reminder that it was the spirit of Aal al-Bayt that mattered the most, and not simply blood ties. (Unfortunately, due to intra-Muslim sectarianism, this spirit, this reality is completely looked over by most Sunnis today, who would rather normalize with Israel than ally with “kafir” Shi’i forces in their collective defiance of Israel during this egregious genocide. See: Karbala: the Universal Cause for more on this blindspot)
One could say that what the era we are living in truly lacks is the Sharifian Solution. But not in the cynical, Yazidi-British monarchic solution dressed in Prophetic garb. Indeed, we do need a return to the “Sharifian Solution,” but not in the divisive style and vision of T.E. Lawrence. Rather, the true “Sharifian Solution” this world so sorely needs is a restoration of the Aal al-Bayt spirit of justice, sacrifice, and resistance to oppression. The solution is through the re-establishment of the true essence of what it means to belong to the Prophetic Household: a pact of service that upholds the ideals of honor, courage and justice.
No matter at what cost.
Al-Rasheed, Madawi; Kersten, Carool; Shterin, Marat (12 November 2012). Demystifying the Caliphate: Historical Memory and Contemporary Contexts. Oxford University Press. pp. 48–. ISBN 978-0-19-025712-5.