"A declaration of war on Christianity"

The Moroccan writer Tahar Ben Jelloun (photo: AFP)

On the morning of 26 July 2016, in the church of St-Étienne-du-Rouvray, a small town near Rouen, the 86-year-old priest Jacques Hamel was murdered by two IS terrorists during a service. The Moroccan writer Tahar Ben Jalloun, a high-profile intellectual in the Arab world, issued this response the very same day

By Tahar Ben Jelloun

I am angry. I think we are all angry to see how these individuals are in the course of instigating a new religious war in France and in Europe. We know how long it will last and how it will end. Badly, very badly.

To enter a church, a house of God, a place of peace and fraternity and to commit the worst crime, to slit the throat of a priest, an elderly man, and to leave another person for dead, that is to open the gates of a war. It is a war declared on Christianity at a time when the Pope presides over a gathering of young people in Krakow in a spirit of peace and fundamental spirituality.

In carrying out this unspeakable crime, these individuals have offered their lives to Daesh. Daesh has become an enterprise of destruction and death that is taking over the present and the future. It has all been said on the subject of this factory of hatred and crime. But there remain grey areas that will, I hope, be brought to light. Then we will know who is backing the organisation and who is financing a murderous army such as this one: which states, which interests, which intrigues.

Anger is followed by fear

Tatort des Grauens: die katholische Kirche in Saint-Etienne-du-Rouvray; Foto: picture-alliance/dpa — Dem Krieg sämtliche Schleusen öffnen: Vergangenen Dienstag hatten zwei Männer die katholische Kirche im nordfranzösischen Saint-Etienne-du-Rouvray gestürmt und fünf Menschen, die dort eine Messe feierten, als Geiseln genommen. Sie schnitten dem 85-jährigen Jacques Hamel die Kehle durch. Eine weitere Geisel wurde lebensgefährlich verletzt. Als die Angreifer die Kirche verließen, wurden sie von der Polizei erschossen. Die Terrormiliz "Islamischer Staat" (IS) reklamierte die Tat für sich.

But at the moment, anger is being succeeded by fear. We are all afraid. I am thinking of the six million Muslims who leave peacefully in France and who will sooner or later have to pay the bill for these terrible misdemeanours. If someone attacks a mosque tomorrow, if tomorrow an organisation defending the West decides to avenge the victims and strikes out blindly, one will be able to say that the "Islamic State" has succeeded in igniting a religious war.

It is time to react, but not in a lukewarm fashion, not in the form of an indignant protest letter. It is time that all the Muslims of France take to the streets, whether practising or not, and regardless of their political orientation; they must take to the streets en masse and take a stand against this war, with which the "Islamic State" aims to overrun everything. In a large-scale, powerful silent march that anyone can join – to rise up against this horror, to counter it, to publicly denounce it. It is also high time that everyone opens their eyes and actually reports each and every suspect. Some of them are known, others keep themselves hidden.

This is about the freedom of all of us, it is about our lives, the lives of our children. Let us put an end to the leniency, because we are dealing with people who are prepared to do anything, who shrink from nothing and who do not value their own lives, because they have decided to offer that life to the death machine that is pursuing a long-term war that will be far from over tomorrow.

The evil sits deep, and there are far too many oiling the cogs of the macabre machinery, whether through money, or through the sacrifice of their own lives. If only our numerous intelligence agencies would publicise everything they know about these people.

After all, this is not a battle that can be waged alone. All affected nations should pool their efforts to put an end to this war.

It is down to Muslims to provide Islam and the Koran with the necessary respect, otherwise they could themselves potentially become accomplices to these murderers. It is not enough just to say: "But Islam is completely different". This must also be demonstrated: through campaigns and global mobilisation.

Tahar Ben Jelloun

Translated from the German by Nina Coon