Quora Answer: Why Do Many People Support ISIS?

The following is my answer to a Quora question: “Why do many people support ISIS?”

The underlying ideology of ISIS is Wahhabism.  Wahhabism is a puritanical, exceptionalist, literalist heresy of Sunni Islam that arose 300 years ago.  It was founded by Muhammad ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab an-Najdi.

From its very beginning, Wahhabism was a violent ideology that declared all Muslims to be heretics, unless they believed as the Wahhabis believe.  This takfir, declaration of apostasy, against Muslim continues to this day, with Wahhabis regularly accusing orthodox Muslims of disbelief and polytheism.  Wahhabism also calls for the violent subjugation of non-Muslims, and establishment of some sort of caliphate that they hope to grow into a global polity.

To this end, the Wahhabi sect attacked and pillaged Muslim cities, villages and nomadic tribes. They enslaved, and murdered thousands.  They desecrated graves and places of worship.  They staged mass executions and massacres.  This Wahhabi sect eventually came to rule the Hijaz and surrounding areas, and renamed the entire area Saudi Arabia.  As the ruling ideology of Saudi Arabia, Wahhabism is promoted and exported throughout the world.  It is no coincidence that 17 of the 19 hijackers were Saudis. Boko Haram, Al Qaeda, Laskar e-Taiba, Jemaah Islamiyya, and almost every single violent jihadist group is Wahhabi.

Even amongst Wahhabis who do not identify with the violence, their views are still extreme and exceptionalist.  They do not mix with non-Muslims.  They claim that celebrations such as birthdays and even secular holidays are haram.  They claim music is haram.  They have a deeply misogynistic view of society.  They are anti-intellectual, and hold literalist interpretations of scripture.  It is not a large step from suspicion of the “kuffar”, to hatred of the “kuffar”, to waging war against the “kuffar”.

As long as we have Wahhabi institutions, Wahhabi money funding mosque buildings, Wahhabi publications, Wahhabi trained preachers coming back to the country, we are indulging a fifth column that cannot be trusted, and should be viewed as a security threat.  Wahhabi groups have this modus operandi of their preachers, mostly graduates of the University of Madina, returning to their native lands and taking up positions of influence in Muslim organisations or as community leaders.  This is the source of that poison.