Authors: Montasser Alde’emeh and Pieter Stockmans
In this book, the authors narrate the life story of one of them: Montasser Alde’emeh. It describes how he grew up in Flanders, where his father owned a farm. How Montasser went to school and became a fighter (but with a good heart: he stood up for those who were bullied). How he had to watch painful news broadcasts about Palestine and the Middle East with his father in the evenings. How he delved into Islam. How his love for their mother prevented his brother from leaving to become a Syria fighter. How he went to college and found his own way out of hatred, among other things, by understanding rather than knowing, and how he managed to drive out the Darkness in his heart with Light. How the justice-seeking boy became a righteous man.
Where I live, many say “if the wolves tear each other apart over there, the sheep here are safe.” I read this book out of interest in threats: the Syria fighters. Charlie Hebdo. The authors let us look into Montasser’s soul. Montasser tried to transcend the dogmatic knowledge, the way Islam is taught at Imam schools, with his own understanding, and he succeeded.
After the dogmatic phase, not everything aligned with his personal beliefs. However, this is a difficult step that is not for everyone, leading many to fall into the chasm of hatred and not be able to get out. Those who fall into the chasm engage in battle with others. They want to establish a Caliphate (IS), others an Emirate according to a federal principle, where there is room for all branches of Islam (Nusra Front). All parties seek recognition of a problem that has persisted for decades. The comparison with the establishment of the state of Israel is not far-fetched: just as Jews need a land, the same applies to them, a country where they can be Muslim undisturbed, and live according to their own teachings, among like-minded people. However, the fragmentation of the issue hinders a central solution in the short term.
The authors propose a package of 66 measures, divided into “ten bullets of reconciliation,” some of which (The Way To) are already being implemented.
Given the global impact of the project that IS and other fighters are undertaking, this book should be taken seriously by political leaders who transcend the interests of their own party, so that it shows that the majority of Belgium indeed “cares about it”. Because this is happening in our backyard, and it concerns us all.
The most important sentence in the book for me is “… And then I will reach out my hand to you.” Because this is a universal message that we all need to send to offer a way out of such a maze.