A Velvet Jihad

least regarding me. If you follow me on any of those platforms, you probably saw that my name, my writing found its way into a piece in the New York Times, one that was profiling longtime comrade and friend Darryl Cooper of the Martin Made Podcast, One that actually did a pretty decent job, kept it pretty fair, and they saw fit to quote from the piece I wrote for Mary and West and turned into a special episode for you guys, where I basically went through all of his initial claims

and essentially contested them while trying to stay as good faith as possible on Like a lot of people who have continued to critique him in various ways. I'll let the piece speak for itself. I recommend you go check it out over on the New York Times. You can also see what I said about it in on my substack or Patreon, which I recommend you, guys subscribe to if you haven't already. Both are fine, you get the same content there on both, but whichever one you might prefer.

And I try to put out a lot of stuff that you know doesn't necessarily make it onto this show. I have recently contributed to my friend David Joseph Vlatzko of The Radicalist to his substack the piece that I released for you guys earlier this month, or rather last month, where I talked about the progressive turn capital p progressive turn of the Trump administration. So I recommend you go

check all that stuff out if you haven't already. In terms of other housekeeping, I just want to thank, as always everybody for supporting this show on subseac and Patreon, including the amazingly generous friends of mine here in History Podcasting World, John Andre Saither and Mike Maylebin for their long running support of this show. So again, if you want to support History impossible. Head on over to Historyimpossible dot subsack dot com or Patreon dot com, slash History

Impossible and become a paid subscriber or donor today. It would be unbelievably appreciated. But if you can't afford that right now, feel free to just spread the word about this show, share it on social media, share it one on one to friends of yours that might be really into history. So with all that said, why don't we get into this new special episode, this second episode in this little mini series of sort of pieces that I'm

doing where I talk about the theme of imperialism. Last time we had the theme of imperialism as it relates to the like I said, the new Trump administration taking

on a Rooseveltian that is teddy Rooseveltian turn. And this one is a well, it's based on a piece that I wrote that came out right at the beginning of twenty twenty five that looked at the theme of imperialism, of soft power imperialism, which was actually something that the United States was pretty masterful at doing for a very long time, as you will hear, and it how it actually can be applied to numerous other examples in history, some older than others, and some more recent and surprising

than others. And it all fits together with a lot of the work have done regarding the Israeli Palestinian conflict and themes of jihadism and Islamism. So, without further ado, let us get into some impossible history about imperialism.

Macabi tel Aviv lost for what it's worth, as much as it became yet another proxy for the still ongoing war between Hamas and Israel, still ongoing as of this recording. Many months over six months since these events happened, groups of men were roaming the streets, accosting fans of the Israeli team and beating them where they found them. One Israeli was captured on video pleading not Jewish, not Jewish as he was assailed. David de Brewing. I hope I

am pronouncing his name right. But David de Brewing, writing for the Free Press, summarized some of the violence quite well in his write up as follows. Quote in video of other attacks last night, a victim is struck and lies injured on the ground, seemingly unconscious. A father could be seen fleeing with his son, A man jumps into

one of Amsterdam's canals to escape his assailants. In the recording where he is forced to say free Palestine, his assailants laugh and jeer that he is a cancer Jew, a classic slurre in Dutch where both diseases and the Jewish ethnicity are deployed as put downs. While the chaos unleashed by football hooliganism is well known, especially over in Europe, it would turn out that evidence suggested this was something else.

As more became clear in the day that followed, it became obvious that this was a coordinated attack on the Israelis visiting the Dutch capital. According to an investigation conducted by The Telegraph, it quote emerged that the attacks on the Jewish football fans were planned in advance and coordinate using WhatsApp and telegram.

as racial untermention doing his work for him. Soon further potential context was added that there was some vandalism and outright hooliganism from some of the Israeli fans, including the ripping down of Palestinian flags, as well as expletives being shouted by Israeli fans I e Let the idf win and fuck the Arabs, and some assaults were captured on video by the Dutch photographer Annett de Graph, which were

initially misattributed to Arabs attacking Israelis. So there was some further context like I was saying, But in addition to this not being particularly exonerative of the initial plans for a quote unquote jew hunt, much of the supposed context was not being repeated as an effort to provide a clearer picture of that night's events, or to more accurately depict the realities of the divisions that exist, or at least perceived to exist between Israelis or Jews and Arabs

and Muslims, rather bringing up the fact that there had been some Israeli fans acting in pretty uncouth, unbecoming ways. These additional facts were being repeated by pundits in publications with almost too obvious motivated reasoning. Speaking of obvious, the delight clearly underlied the performative outrage by professional distorders of

history like Owen Jones, and was very obvious. It was palpable, honestly, with Jones describing Sky News as re editing of their footage to more accurately reflect the reality as being the real problem, along with quote the violence perpetrated by Israeli football hooligans and their hideous racism unquote than the commentator Meti Hassan, who the real MENSH representative Richie Torres repudiated beautifully when he blasted Hassan for quote unquote just find

a pogram over an Amsterdam. But asan he seemed like he wanted to try and one up the one aboutism and quote tweet President, then President Joe Biden saying that the President's legacy will be that quote, you and your administration that helped kill sixteen thousand Palestinian kids unquote, as if that had anything really directly to do with what had happened in Amsterdam. Apart from the justifications being made

by people who participated. There were plenty of other examples of this kind of redirection at work in the days that followed the attempted pogram, and they revealed the same trend that instead of trying to dig out the overall complex truth that led to yes, it was a modern day pogram attempted or otherwise that's what it was, that there was an effort to whitewash a systematic targeting of

Jews in a Western European country for violence. Now much does seem to rest on the use of the world pogram to describe what happened, with many of the commentators in this camp that I've been talking about seeming to believe that a pogram requires a perfectly lopsided situation in which the victims Jews in this case, are viciously set upon with no attempt at defending themselves, or they themselves

playing a part in the violence in general. Not only does this smack of the problematic trope about Jews not fighting back in the Holocaust being one reason so many were killed, but it also forgets the fact that one of the most savage pogroms against Jews in the early twentieth century, the Hebron Riots of nineteen twenty nine in what would be Israel, also involve Jews and non Jews fighting back against the mob that was obviously targeting them.

The contrarians in this case seem to be upset that the programists were facing victims that did not act like the victims of a pogram in the quote unquote correct way. The bigger question, however, is why it makes a certain amount of sense that some people who already oppose Israel

on grounds that the IDF is killing members of their family. However, there are and have been no shortage of people who, for over a year and a half, rush to explain away or even defend things like this, like the Dagistan attempted pogram or the student incident at Cooper Union in New York City. And these people who try to explain all this away have zero meaningful connection to the ongoing conflict seemingly apart from a vague notion of political solidarity.

I would call it political avatarism. Has nothing to do with the realities on the ground. It has vexed a lot of people, including me for years now why there appears to be an almost reactionary need by a certain section of the western left, but increasingly especially it seems nowadays, on the right. But that's a whole different story. We're

not going to get into that. But the point is there is this almost reactionary need to stand in solidarity with self evidently problematic movements and even defend their actions because of things like perceived victimhood or just desserts or who knows what that could be something to dive into with some greater depth in the future here in history impossible.

do with homophobia. Interesting little side note there too, and other things that involve this same kind of extremism associated with a very particular religious ideology. But why, that's the real question. Why. Many have problematically stated or suggested that the spread of Islamic communities in Western countries is leading to a sort of subversion of Western values, particularly in Europe, though this thinking arguably helped result in the United States's

own quote unquote Muslim ban back in twenty seventeen. However, this is usually filtered through a very particular lens of anti immigrant sentiment and perhaps a subconscious throwback to post nine to eleven anxieties about terrorism. When one sees growing crowds of decidedly nonsvend looking people rushing around the streets of Amsterdam looking to hunt down Jews to hurt, it might seem to be completely reasonable to feel that way.

After the migrant crisis in Europe in twenty fifteen and the subsequent tensions and crimes that occurred, anti immigration sentiment certainly rose and felt very justified to many, regardless of political ideology. Again, in the European context, especially as the years went on. However, that does not explain the willingness of certain classes of people willing to go to bat for bad behavior on the part of foreign actors or

domestic ones acting on behalf of a foreign cause. For that matter, what does seem to explain this trend, among many factors that have already been examined, is not an importation of people, but rather an importation of ideology, in other words, an act of subtle soft imperialism.

you heard right now. I do not mean to say that Pollock, one of the most celebrated modern artists of the twentieth century, was an assassin or international superspy for our most infamous of alphabet agencies, but rather the success of his work was in fact due in part to an enormously successful propaganda campaign developed by an organization that was a front for the CIA. Obviously, some background is

in order. You see what we see as a free wheeling, earnest and yet somehow ironic epitome of pretension, that is modern art that was never going to stand a chance without a little boost from Uncle Sam at least, that is what figures linked to both the art world and the world of covert intelligence. Believed that the height of the Cold War. Technically, this effort began during the Second World War in an effort to combat the aesthetics of Nazism.

But once Hitler and his regime shuffled off this mortal coil and Stan and his Mega Empire revealed themselves as the true nemesies of our age. And unlike most people who have written about this subject, I say that without irony, when that happened, the effort to promote American values in contrast to Soviet ones, by any means necessary, took on

a stark meaning. As Lucy Levigne wrote in a twenty twenty article for j Store Daily, quote modernism in fact became a weapon of the Cold War unquote and continuing, she writes the following quote. In the battle of her

hearts and minds, modern art was particularly effective. John Hay Whitney, both a president of MoMA, the Museum of Modern Art, and member of the Whitney family, which founded the Whitney Museum of American Art, explained that art stood out as a line of national defense because it could quote, educate, inspire,

and strengthen the hearts and wills of free men. This mission of using modern art to essentially propagandize the world with American values was essentially gifted to the United States by Soviet propaganda, which repeatedly claimed that thanks to our love of capitalism, our nation was quote unquote culturally barren.

Their contrast, that is, Soviet realism, which at least in my opinion, has some kitch charm of its own, was not exactly setting the world on fire, but their claims about the United States made a propagandistic response relatively easy. In nineteen forty six, the US State Department spent almost fifty thousand dollars, which is about eight hundred and fifty thousand dollars in twenty twenty four money on paintings by the likes of artists like Georgia O'Keeffe and included them

in a traveling exhibition known as Advancing American Art. This traveling exhibition did well in much of Europe, but the Americans you saw it were frankly embarrassed. Modern art was not the most popular medium for self expression in the immediate post war United States. The famous Look magazine even wrote a piece called your money bought these paintings, expressing outrage that taxpayer dollars funded such a project. Because it's important to note that the state departments involved in this

exhibition was no secret. Politically, the exhibition was a sham on both sides of the aisle. Both President Harry Truman lambassad the artwork as anything but that is, anything but art, and Republican Congressman John Tabor and Fred Busby expressed concern

that the artists whose work had been tapped had Communist sympathies. Ironically, and perhaps every sense of the word, this was why the artists, as well as later ones like Jackson Pollock, were perfect subjects for the mission of spreading American values or perhaps more accurately, American vibes. As Lucy Levigne writes in her article quote, the American public's fear of the

red menace brought advancing American art home early. But it was precisely because modern art was not universally popular and was created by artists who openly disdained orthodoxy that it was such an effective tool in showcasing the fruits of American cultural freedom to anyone looking in from abroad. Because the state Department's involvement in the Advancing American Art Exhibition is what made this a matter of public record and

admonishment thanks to its use of taxpayer dollars. Again, it quickly became clear to America's Cold warriors that doing things like this would require congressional approval, and that was a hurdle that they just couldn't.

Good Shepherd. I consider that to be an underrated masterpiece of that decade. By the way, so consider that my film recommendation for this episode. Now, this is definitely something I want to get into and dive with a greater depth into in the future. But the important point to remember that we should focus on here at least is that codified into law in nineteen forty seven. The CIA grew up with the Cold War. One could even call it its fraternal twin or or perhaps vestigial twin. There

is no CIA without the Cold War. In other words, though one could also reasonably say that there is no Cold War without the CIA. There was also no connection between modern art, remember not traditionally beloved by the establishment or even the broader public, at American values without a certain president, and that would be Dwight D. Eisenhower recognizing the ideological value in a medium so American in its

essence as modern art. President Eisenhower served as a speaker at the twenty fifth anniversary celebration for the Moment in nineteen fifty four, and he said the following in this speech quote, as long as our artists are free to create with sincerity and conviction, there will be healthy controversy and progress in art. How different it is in tyranny when artists are made the slaves and tools of the state.

When artists become the chief propagandists of a cause, progress is arrested and creation and genius are destroyed.

But it's hard to deny that that's a very compelling speech that he just gave, even that little portion of it. And there's a lot of other things about him that I tend to like think the fact that he liked

poker is one of them too. Anyway, in the case of this speech that Eisenhower made, this was as close to a public declaration of official policy toward the government sponsoring artists to spread the American Way abroad to counter Soviet tyranny as American citizens were ever going to get, because four years earlier, in nineteen fifty, the CIA had established a front organization known as the Congress for Cultural Freedom, or the CCF, which was far from Washington, DC or

as of nineteen sixty one Langley, Virginia, situated in the perhaps former cultural capital of the world, Paris, with the aim of quote propagating the virtues of Western democratic culture unquote through the use of quote an autonomous association of artists, musicians, and writers quote in the words of history in Francis

Stonor Saunders, This office operated for nearly two decades. As Saunders continued in her nineteen ninety nine work who Paid the Piper, The CIA and the Cultural Cold War Quote.

convincing the American public to suddenly like modern art. Rather, it was to convince European cultural skeptics of America's ability to even create modern art. In the first place, and thus sway them away from any possible Soviet influence. In other words, the CCF, under the direction of the CIA, attempted to woo European fence sitters away from the evils of communism by showing them weird, transgressive, and ultimately, here's the key word, individualistic art, in other words, the total

antithesis of collectivist communism. The biggest in best irony, and perhaps the one most relevant to the broader story we're looking at today, is the fact that these moves by the CIA via the CCF were aimed at the European left, that is, socialists, leftists, and other parts of the anti totalitarian left in Europe, i e. The place that George Orwell might have still occupied had he not died in

nineteen fifty. This can be seen in the CIA funneling money into the United States's own anti communist leftist publication, The Partisan Review, which actually had published Orwell as well as TSA.

it happens in grad school. They quote had exploded the Cold War propaganda potential of Orwell's fable, sponsoring the publication of several foreign language translations and even producing a cartoon strip version for dissemination in South America, Asia, and the Middle East. One official noted the happy coincidence that quote both pigs and dogs are unclean animals to Muslims unquote,

and that's the end of the full quote. Now this does nothing, in my opinion, at least to diminish Orwell's scathing indictment of Stalinism, or to pretend that it wasn't effective at spreading its intended message, or to suggest that it was a bad thing. I only bring this up to point out that the British government recognized the power of animal farm and gave it a little boost where

it counted. And as we will see or have seen at this point, cultural imperialism is arguably endemic in the modern globalized world, and therefore it is appropriate to make qualitative judgments about what is being imported and exported as far as ideas go, and frankly, if is not obvious I personally think Orwellian in the good sense of the word. I should say anti tootalitarian leftism is a good thing to spread if we are to make qualitative judgments, and

in this case I do think we should. But anyway, as American journalist and CIA official Thomas Brayden explained when he described the program and the thinking behind it and the Saturday Evening Post in nineteen sixty seven, he said, quote, back in the early nineteen fifties, when the Cold War was really hot, the idea that Congress would have approved many of our projects was about as likely as the

John Birch Society's approving medicare. I remember, for example, the time I tried to bring my old friend Paul Henrespock of Belgium to the US to help out with one of the CIA's operations.

or no CIA stooge. Braden was spot on in his assessment of who was both a the most valuable in Europe when it came to the intellectual fight against communism instead of the military one, and B who was the most vulnerable to such invitations or ascetic provocations or mileage

may vary depending on how you look at this. This vulnerability, though, is key to understanding the central concept of American cultural power during the height of the Cold War, most certainly, but it is also key to understanding a deeper, far more relevant form of empire that actually has history stretching back well over a century, and more to the point, the primary type of empire and imperialism that exists moving into the twenty first This is not to say that

classic imperialism, for lack of a better term, does not still exist and cause untold amounts of damage. Russia's three year old war with Ukraine, however you want to define NATO's role in it, was without question an act of flagrant territorial imperialism. One can also reasonably make the argument that there is a form of commercial imperialism, perhaps even a sort of neo colonialism, occurring in Africa, especially in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, under the auspices of

massive Chinese corporations. And also we should point out to the massive benefit of the United States, especially in the tech sector, as documented very poignantly by Siddarth Kara in as twenty twenty three book Cobalt Read How the Blood of the Congo Powers Our lives. However, the most common form of what could be called imperialism in the twenty first century is one that exercises a softer touch. Soft power is the colloquial term in the history of international relations.

Common though it certainly is in the twenty first century, it is actually a much older practice than a lot of people realize. The only difference between soft power now and soft power, say, two hundred years ago, is that it spreads much faster and easier than it used to, thanks to the quantum leap of communications technology that basically

has occurred in that span of time. However, we should not underestimate the power, persistence, and application of soft power in our past, even though it was moving at the speed of a steamship instead of the speed of light. Historian David Todd explores his concept in the context of French history with what he calls their quote unquote Velvet Empire, a much more informal system of culturally derived power than

the Napoleonic image. Say that nineteenth century French imperialism tends to conjure, David Todd's point is to suggest that this approach was no less effective than formal militaristic control, and indeed, France developed a stronger global presence through their soft influence. As Todd writes, quote, France of the nineteenth century deserves to be considered an empire because it combined wealth extracting practices with claims to universal dominion, and because it affected

the economic life of millions of men and women. Todd makes the United States comparison explicit as well, pointing out that the French Velvet Empire's quote sophistication prefigured in some respects the global projection of American smart power with its

blue genes and sentimental movies. What the French accomplished overseas after the Napoleonic era does in fact share more with the United States in the twentieth and especially twenty first centuries than any other imperial power of the modern era. The French Velvet Empire had, as Todd puts it, quote, a preference for a soft and concealed style of domination

and a specialization in the procurement of conspicuous commodities. For the French, these conspicuous commodities meant everything from silk to champagne, with the latter example's legacy being acutely felt every time you make the mistake of calling sparkling wine champagne and have a pretentious Twits swooping in to correct you that champagne is only champagne when it comes from grapes grown

in that particular region of France. Now annoying, to be sure, but it's also accurate, and more importantly, it's actually evidence of lasting cultural power projected very deliberately by French commercial

interests and allowed, if not megaphoned, by their government. So in other words, it worked, and this was not lost upon the contemporaries of the French velvet Empire, as Adolaphi Blanci, who taught refers to as a disciple of the famed French aconymous Jean Baptiste set in promoting what Todd calls French champagne capitalism, said of the Crystal Palace exhibition of eighteen fifty one the following quote, all the products, wherever they came from, looked common and provincial when compared to

those of France. They possess elegance, grace, and jeen seqois. The exhibition of leon silk textiles of plain cloths, cut or primped velvets, taffeta satins and plain stout silks, crapes, plush scarves, dobbies, pattern fabrics, brocades, church or palace cloths is very dangerous for husbands from the morning to the evening. Thousands of ecstatic women joint down in their notebooks the

names and addresses of French manufacturers quote. The point being made by Blancie and a century and a half later by Todd, is clear the perception of French commodities by the mid nineteenth century had become perfectly tied to notions of high class and refinement. Post Napoleonic French imperial influence, however, soft was secure for the foreseeable future, and all they had to do was make the rest of the world by into the vision of refinement that they had sold them,

or were trying to sell them. Rather, David Todd is careful to note that the terms empire and imperialism in this case are not being used in the typical pejorative way, while also acknowledging that the distinctiveness of soft and hard imperial power admittedly throws his entire thesis into question. After all, should we call global capitalism? And that is what this

is a form of empire. Empire may be a neutral term by definition, but it is hardly neutral in almost every instance of it being used, and frankly we can thank Star Wars for that as well. As well hundreds of years of human history, with its more extreme examples like the Third genocidal Pushed to the East or the horrors of the Belgian Congo serving as good examples of why. The sticking point is the question of coercion, which is usually what gives people the reflexive gag when they think

of empire. After all, is coercion not a feature of imperialism? Is it not the central feature of imperialism? Well, the thing is not. Necessarily, As Todd writes in his book Quote, empires are rarely, if ever entirely coercive. Even the most formal of colonial ventures. The British raj in India relied extensively on indigenous collaboration, while British settler colonialists have been

described as prefabricated collaborators of imperial rule. From this perspective, informal empire is merely a system of collaboration that leaves intact the external layer of sovereignty of foreign colonized statee. Now, none of this is to say that empire is ideal, especially for those not at the helm of the empire itself. This is especially the case if the external power seeks to do more than engage in global trade, which tends to benefit everyone, though rarely in equal terms or measures.

Of course, this is to say that intent matters. Shocking for me to say that, I know, and if the intent is to do more than simply spread the prestige and appreciation of your culture through your products and services, as the French in part did, and by the way, this is obviously putting aside the actual violence that they perpetuated in Algeria and into China, of course, But if your intent is to do more than just, you know, spread prestige, then this is where the self evident problems

of imperialism very quickly begin to make appearances. A good example of this is the spread of European colonists in the New World hundreds of years ago. Many indigenous tribes had no problem engaging in trade with these strange newcomers once communication became less of an issue. But when the colonists began trying to force the tribes into communion with their god instead of letting them believe in their own gods, the reality of the situation likely set in for a

lot of the indigenous people here. And this is to say nothing of the hard power that was used against the indigenous peoples of the United States, because we have plenty of examples of that too, from the incredibly destructive ethnic cleansing of the Trail of Tears to the slaughter at Wounded Knee. In other words, soft imperial power may not be inherently coercive, but it does not take much for it to become so, or at the absolute least,

be perceived to have become so. This is all to say that imperialism has always been way more complicated in its use of formal and informal control methods. But as time has gone on, with only a few exceptions in the twenty first century, much of the imperialism we see has more in common with how the French began to do things in the mid nineteenth century, hands off, distant cultural with a soft velvet touch. And yet we must remember, however soft imperial power may be, it is still imperial power.

one strictly informed by the tenets of Sharia law. If one needs a more Western comparison for familiarity sake, it is essentially the Islamic version of what people mean when they say Christian nationalism. Like the idea of Christian nationalism, there really is not one singular expression of Islamism. It

has variance depending on time, place, and in leadership. Wahabism in Saudi Arabia is a form of Islamism, for example, So is the ideology of major terrorist organizations, including Hamas, which one could more accurately call jihadism because of its willingness to engage in violence to achieve Islamist goals. There are also far more moderate that is, at least compared

to groups like Hamas and other jihadist organizations. But there are more moderate individuals and organizations who might be classified as Islamist as well, including Bosnia's Party of Democratic Action or the SDA, or the Turkish politician Murve Safa Kavaki and I hope I pronounce that name right. It is important to point out these more moderate examples because Islamism, like I said, a moment ago, can differ in some

ways from culture to culture. Bosnia's SDA, for example, is certainly informed by religious adherents and conservative values, but it is more defined by its nationalistic character, making it more particularly Bosnian than it is Islamist. However, Islamism's most visible and controversial, to put it mildly, manifestations are very much tied to the ideologies that have come from the Middle East.

Islamism was born from something of an Islamic revival that took place in the early twentieth century after the fall of the Ottoman Empire and Turkey's turn to a more secular approach to governance under the Young Turks. Similar to a lot of the secularizing forces that took place in

Europe and in the United States. Now this created the secularization process created a perhaps inevitably a reactionary backlash, and many more radical corners of the Islamic Middle East, which became characterized by a fundamental zeal and militant adherence to the Qur'an and Hadith, also known as Solfism, at least

in the Sunni context. It also became characterized with knee jerk rejections and even hatred of anything associated with the West, and as the twentieth century progressed the Jews in Israel. This is where things might start to sound a bit familiar for longtime listeners of History Impossible, because this was the political hotbed for the future Grand Mufti of Jerusalem and the father of the organized Palestinian nationalist movement and

Nazi collaborator, Hajamin al Husseini. As I have covered in past episodes of History Impossible, Hajamin cut his teeth on this stuff at Al Jar University under the tutelage of the early Islamist scholar and ideologue Mohammed Rashid Rita, despite the fact that Rita was actually a bit of an Ottomanist as late as nineteen oh eight and supporting this notion of a pan Ottoman identity for everybody who lived

within the empire. This did take a turn after around nineteen oh eight, because as the years went by, Rita became nothing if not a hardcore Islamic revivalist, something akin to a twentieth century Egyptian version of Jonathan Edwards or George Whitefield, and he quickly developed a following of students that included people like Hajamin al Husseini. In the early nineteen teens, Rita's teachings, which could be seen in his publication al Manar, were likely one of the major origins

of Hajamin's own anti semitism. In the years leading up to the First World War, Almanar was actually publishing article after article accusing the Jews of being the puppet masters of European finance and empire, as shown by the scholar Nevill Mandel. If this was not clear enough, Arab nationalists did not need the Nazis, the British Empire, nor even the Zionis Project's incursion into Arab lands to become your

typical and recognizable anti Semites. However, the anti Semitism present in Islamism is merely one feature among many, and far from the most significant when discussing Islamism in the context of empire. This is because at its core, Islamism is what we today could frankly call a kind of maga ideology in the sense that it fixated and continues to fixate on a mythical past where Islam dominated the land and all was greater than.

Western secularism. Remember, they were already pretty angry about the secularization process that was going on within the Ottoman Empire, but any chance that there could be any revival of that empire in an Islamic context went away with the collapse of the empire itself. So this manifested in the outdated and logistically impossible by the nineteen twenties, at least,

ambition of restoring the caliphate or an Islamic empire. Fantasies of rebuilding fallen empires was nothing unique among reactionaries and conservatives in the immediate aftermath of the First World War and Bolshevik Revolution. Rashid Rida's fantasies were not dissimilar from the empire rebuilding messianic delusions of figures like Baron Roman von ungern Sternberg, the bloody White Baron that we've talked

about before. In Rita's vision laid out in his book, Al Khilafa al al Imama al Uzma or the Caliphate or the Supreme Immamate, an Islamic caliphate, not necessarily a Turkish or Ottoman one, but that was the most recent model, would be restored, that was his vision, and the authority

would be delegated by Islamic jurists. The long term goal would be a perfect, strictly Islamic society, which would serve as a model for further solifist minded reform in all corners of the Muslim world, as in Islamic societies like Indonesia, Malaysia, and places at the time occupied by the British and

Soviet empires like Kazakhstan and India. In essence, Rita was calling for an Islamic superstate, utopian in form almost like that of so called world communism, in which the word of Allah would be supreme and the authority of Christians, capitalists, and communists would wither away. As historian John Willis has written on this quote, pan Islamism was a response to the crisis of legitimacy in the international state system in

the early twentieth century. In this view, pan Islamism was part of a wave of international movements, including Bolshevism and pan Asianism, that sought to create an alternative to the

nation state and the post Westphalian international order. Islamism largely synonymous with pan Islamism in this context, it should be said, has gone through a number of variations since Rashid Rita laid his ideas to paper, including Hajjimen al Husseini's own interpretation of a restored caliphate operating with Palestine and thus obviously Haja Mean at its center, which is something we have discussed before on History impossible, but it is worth

pointing out regardless of where the hypothetical caliphate would be centered, there was always one constant, a restoration of the caliphate and new moral order on a global scale, enforced by the sword being the ultimate goal. Sometimes it would manifest in harder, more militant ways, including through the writings and teachings of Sayit Kutba, which inspired Asama bin Laden, and other times it would take a softer, supposedly more reformist route.

The militant often again called jihadist route, is well worn territory and one that requires very little unpacking for the purposes of what we're talking about here. We all know what jihadism is and how it manifests, and need little in the way of a reminder. Suicide bombings, that's the most common thing that people think of, or mass shootings, or the invasion of Israel on October seventh, those are

examples of jihadism and practice. What we are more concerned about here in this story is the use of softer power. This is because, whether it is soft power or hard power, at its shared cross cultural core, Islamism's ideology is an expansionist one, one like that of harder jihadism, that will not rest until the so called House of Islam triumphs

over the so called House of war. This principle is laid out very concisely by the late celebrated and controversial Orientalist historian Bernard Lewis in its excellent book The Crisis of Islam. In which he wrote the following quote. In Muslim tradition, as recognized in stricter militant forms of Islam,

the world is divided into two houses. The House of Islam Dar al Islam, in which Muslim government's rule and Muslim law prevails, and the House of War Dar al Hahab, the rest of the world still inhabited and more important, ruled by infidels. The presumption is that the duty of jihad will continue, interrupted only by truces, until all the world either adopts the Muslim faith or submits to Muslim

rule unquote. This explanation were refers to jihad, that is quote the arms struggle for the defense or advancement of Muslim power unquote. But it is indeed important to remember that the desire for Islamic dominance is by no means limited to violent acts. In fact, violence is relatively rare by all metrics and generally not supported by most Muslims, to say nothing of the rest of the world, i e.

not to say Christian nationalism does not exist. I'm more just saying that it does not appear as strongly or meaningfully as examples of Islamism tend to do.

But in practice, especially in the early twenty first century, in the world that we live in that is very globalized, even with its current seeming fragmentation into a more multipolar one. In that context, things are not that simple. In fact, we've seen quite the opposite play out, both in the United States and more problematically, in Europe. In essence, Islamism is something many in the West would typically recognize as inherently illiberal and something we would not want to see

our own religious fundamentalists doing abroad. That is because it is a form of soft that is cultural or like France in the nineteenth century velvet imperialism. Just as post Napoleonic France did not focus on territorial conquests as much as cultural influence soft power, Islamists in the modern era see very little value in violence, and in fact, they often see violence as counterproductive to the ultimate goal of Islamic dominance. However, it is important to recognize that this

notion of Islamic dominance is not necessarily universal. As suggested by Bernard Lewis's earlier explanation, submission is perfectly acceptable in lieu of conversion. While there are certainly Islamists who might believe it would be nice if the West became a uniformly Islamic place, that is rarely, if ever, the immediate goal or even long term goal in some cases of

Islamist activist groups operating in the West. In the most general terms, the goal of these organizations is to make aspects of Islamic inspired dominance and values seem anodyne, if not preferable, to what currently exists, that is, liberal democracy and free market capitalism. When looking at it this way, it becomes less seemingly bizarre that what we see as pro social justice, progressive activists and seemingly secular leftists in the West link arms with Hamas and other supposedly anti

colonial groups in hatred of capitalism and liberalism. There is very little daylight between these two classes of activists, at least as far as they're both concerned. This is something of which many Islamist groups like to take advantage, because,

like any rational actor, they seek any advantage they can use. Now, one may wish to make a counter argument that there are Zionists and pro Israel organizations that do and have done the same, especially with evangelical Christians and politicians who align with them, and that is indeed true, but let's stay focused. That's not what this is about. In the modern era, Islamist groups values and tactics are under the protection of speech laws in the West, particularly in the

United States. However, the speech the expression in which these groups engage is not necessarily what matters. It is the international associations that tend to give the game away about

what the goals of these groups entail. As an example more directly tied to recent events, namely the Israel Hamas War, there is American Muslims or Palace Stein or AMP, which was placed under investigation in twenty twenty three by the Attorney General's Office of Virginia for possibly funneling money to Ramas, which is again, it needs to be stated, designated a terrorist group and that is against the law. Similarly, the Muslim American Youth Association or the MAYA has its own

problematic ties. According to a twenty ten report by the FBI, quote, the Muslim American Youth Association served as a conduit for money to Hamas through the Holy Land Foundation and served as a forum where Hamas could promote its ideology and recruit new members. The Holy Land Foundation or HLF, mentioned in this report is also worth scrutiny in this context because its ties to Hamas, which have likely existed since nineteen eighty eight, when both organizations were founded, have led

to legal trouble for the organization in the past. The same FBI report lists the Holy Land Foundation as quote the financial arm of Hamas within the United States unquote, proven by documents seized in a raid on the home of a one Ismail Salim Elbarase, who was arrested in two thousand and four for his fundraising activities for Hamas

via the Muslim Brotherhood. It is clear that these organizations appear to have missions more dedicated towards supporting the Palestinian nationalist cause than to the restoration of a caliphate, though it is important to remember that, at least according to some radicals following the lead of Hajamin al Husseini, Palestine has frequently been seen as the center of that dreamed

of empire. It is also important to remember that the Muslim Brotherhood, an international organization that lives at the center of most Islamist causes, was co founded by Hajamen, and like any Islamist organization, it yearns for a caliphate as one of their stated aims. According to the Muslim Brotherhood Review's Main Findings, ordered by the British House of Commons in December of twenty fifteen.

Muslim societies, and that nationalism was not the answer. So this goal of a restored caliphate is unlikely to be the explicit goal of these organizations or even of the individuals working within them. However, Palestine serves as the best entry point into Western politics with Islamist organizations. After all, there are very few, if any causes relate to the Muslim world about which Westerners have even an inkling of awareness.

Look at the complete and deafening silence of many of these activists when it comes to the slaughters that have occurred in Yemen at the hands of Saudi Arabia. It is fair to say that most Islamist organizations are fully aware of this fact. One of the most famous international Islamist organizations, though Ishibu Tadir or HT, well known thanks

to its most famous or infamous defector, Majed Nahwas. Now regardless of how one feels about his post Covid populis turn, Maja Nahwas has written extensively about his exit from the organization and, as he sees it, the threat that Islamism imposes to the West. In two thousand and nine, Nahwas, a British born Pakistani Muslim, returned to Egypt, where a decade before he had helped inculcate what he called in

one of his columns, Islamist Fever. HT has been around since nineteen fifty three, when it was founded in East Jerusalem and Jordan, and has since expanded to include members in over fifty countries. It sports an estimated membership that ranges from tens of thousands to over one million. The truth is no one really knows. Like most Islamist organizations, it has ties to the Palestinian nationalist movement, but it takes a broader view in its vision of a world

dominated by an Islamic empire. Following the lead of its founder, another Palestinian Islamic scholar and early pan Islamist, Taki Audin al Nabahani, HT stated aims include not just the usual restoration of the caliphate, but also expand that caliphate into non Muslim areas, that is, to expand the House of Islam into the house of war. As described by Bernard lewis. However unrealistic this aim is, and it certainly is that it is among the clearest examples of Islamist ideology put

into supposed practice for a long period of time. That practice, while never is shooting outright, the possibility of true violent jihad, tends to be more political in nature, as demonstrated by former members like Maja Nahwas, especially with most of ht's activities in the Western countries where they continue to have a presence. The different branches of the organization seem to have different specific goals depending on the national demographics of

Muslims living in the countries in which they operate. For example, Denmark has a more significant Arab population and England has a more significant South Asian population, so the rhetoric is tailored for those populations. However, the underlying ideology, tactics, and ultimate goal remain the same across the board. Despite these nuances, this mostly includes distribution of propaganda material, usually replete with the typical anti Semitism that is the blood of Islamism.

According to Imran Khan on a two thousand and three broadcast of the BBC program Newsnight, this was particularly evident with ht's activities in Denmark. Khan described a material as follows quote. In March and April two thousand and two, Hizzibu tarier handed out leaflets and a square in Copenhagen

and at a mosque. The leaflet, which also appeared on the Danish group's internet site, makes threats against Jews, using a quote from the Koran, urging Muslims to kill them wherever you find them and turn them out from where they have been turned you out. The leaflet also said the Jews are a people of slander, a treacherous people. They fabricate lies and twist words from their right context, and the leaflet describes suicide bombings in Israel as legitimate

acts of martyrdom. This is largely the extent of what HT does. They attempt to radicalize other Muslims into their worldview, or remaining essentially non violent in their actual methodology, though sheddy no tears and even applauding when violence does occur. According to the United Kingdom's Home Office in two thousand and five, quote HT is a radical but to date non violent Islamist group that holds anti Jewish, anti Western,

and homophobic views unquote. This assessment only changed in twenty twenty four with an attempt to get HT classified as a terrorist organization in the UK, which was largely in response to the group's ramped up activities at the wake of the October seventh, twenty twenty three program in Israel. However, it is in the United States where HT really shines

as an example of Islamism's velvet imperial approach. This is because, unlike the arched eyebrow and even hostility that the group has received from various European governments, including an outright ban by the German government, HT enjoys the protections of the American rights and, more importantly, something a bit closer to

mainstream acceptance than its European counterparts. The result was the formation of Hizib Uttarier America in the late two thousands under the leadership of for profit Argasi University Chicago professor doctor Muhammed Malkawi. Many annual conferences were held and often canceled at various times in the following decade. The group's spokesmen raise a emman claim quote, the call is not to bring an Islamic caliphate here to this country or

anything of that sort. The messages from Muslim countries to return to Islamic values. This, according to the chairman of the Council of Islamic Organizations of Greater Chicago's Zaher Shalul, is simply untrue in the sense that quote. They are very vocal and they target young Muslims in college who are attracted to their ideologies. They tend to disrupt lectures Friday prayers most of the time they are kicked out

from mosques unquote. However, their methodology is made very clear in this summary from Shiv Malik in his two thousand and four piece for The New Statesman.

Mohammed never raised arms to establish his state unquote. Malik also points out that quote it seems laughable that HT, armed only with the righteousness of its ideas, could overpower

some of the most ruthless regimes in the world unquote. However, while HT itself can reasonably dismiss on the basis of widespread influence, especially in the eyes of people to whom their fringe status matters most, that is, regular Muslims, fringe groups are always smaller than the ideology they spread and managed to normalize, and all sorts of radical ideologies have a way of flourishing when the societies in which they

exist undergo their own tumult. This is why the kinds of things stated by HT and other Islamist groups started to be heard with more frequency after the atrocities of ten to seven and the beginning of the most recent Israel Hamas war. They've even made their way into the news in a totally different way. As of this recording, a man in Britain has been arrested for burning a Koran.

This obviously does not run a foul of typical speech laws, and yet this man named Hamit Kuskin was charged with an intent to cause harassment, alarm or distress against the religious institution of Islam after burning this Qur'an. In other words, he ran a foul of a blasphemy law that does

not apply to the country in which he lives. Of course, there have been protests against this, very loud ones, but there have been other people within the British government, such as add Non Hussein and MP saying that as if this is a bad thing. Free speech means protecting the right to offend Muslims, to which I would say, at least personally, yes.

at least a principled among us would as well. And trying to lump everyone together into some Islamophobic soup is arguably just as offensive to liberal secular folks as burning a Quran is to devout Muslims.

special episode is about. My soapboxing decide. I think this notion of changing values that more reflect religious sensibilities than secular, democratic ones is as good of a piece of evidence as we're going to get for the influence of soft imperial power. It might not be framed that way, but a lot of the conspicuous consumption that occurred in the nineteenth century of French goods was not consciously associated with

French prestige. It was all about making the people who consume them feel a certain way, just as denouncing a man burning a holy book is less about creating a caliphate in Britain than it is about people feeling good about themselves for denouncing supposed bigotry. This is the kind of thing that Western activists do not get exercised about, and the probability that they would is actually pretty low because what I'm trying to appear to is to basically

liberal values. But Western activists tend to distrust liberal values. They tend to distrust the supposed evil of capitalism. That hatred of capitalism and liberalism provides one of the easiest entry points for a group like HT. One of their pamphlets makes this clear, proclaiming that quote Islam will prevail over all other ways of life, including Western capitalism and

the culture of Western liberalism. It is become almost a given that these two forces, that is liberalism and capitalism, have developed truly nefarious reputations in the eyes of many

Western radicals. Islamist groups like HT, if it hasn't been made clear enough are not unaware of this fact and have enough operatives sophisticated enough to avoid talking about the more alienating aspects of their ideology, including their misogyny and homophobia, while also being careful to use terms like Zionists rather than Jews, but only when it matters, and this requires

circling back to the original question of imperialism. It might be kind of obvious to some listening, but I want to make sure that we can.

about the people condemning the burning of a Quran in the UK and celebrating the fact that a man is probably going to jail for it, or at least was arrested for it, while creating a caliphate that enforces strict Islamic values is the long term goal. Creating a lifestyle via a supposedly moral framework is far more useful to

Islamist groups. This is because in selling this lifestyle they have created a naive rhetorical defense force in the West that will make it harder for Westerners to dismiss eighth century moral values out of hand for fear of being

branded as xenophobic or racist. This lifestyle marketing approach is catalog brilliantly by the polemicist Brandan O'Neil, and is excellent after the pogram seventh of October Israel and the Crisis of Civilization, where he tackles what he calls the cult of the Kifaya, pointing out that quote cafeya chic is all the rage unquote, and using a particularly Tellian example of a three thousand British pound version of this traditional scarf from Balenciaga, that quote you can't put a price

on virtue, signaling on quote.

mass produced cafaas into our societies. In the words of an article published in The Guardian, points to a performative streak in pro Palestine activism that it has become de brigueur in certain circles to flout all the laws of cultural appropriation and pull on this hot accessory of the West. Suggests that the activist set is as keen to say something about itself and its own rectitude as it is about the predicament of the Palestinian people. And what is

the activist set trying to say? I kind of made it clear what I thought earlier, and to put it bluntly again, it is obviously a way for them to be fashionable and on the supposedly right side of history. This is a win win scenari for many of the approval seeking among us. As Brendan O'Neil continues to write, quote and what is its usefulness? What holy service does this garment play in the lives of the elites? Its prime role is as a signifier of virtue. It is

sartorial shorthand for ethical correctness. It communicates to your fellow travelers in the universe of luxury beliefs that you too have contempt for Israel and compassion for Palestine, an entirely requisite credo for access to the cultural establishment in the twenty first century. Wearing the cathaya in public, or in posting photos of yourself wrapped up in one, is fundamentally a statement of your moral fitness for political high society.

Far from being an act of solidarity, Cathaya wearing is more about raising awareness of yourself and your goodness than it is about raising awareness of the Palestinians and their

challenges unquote. While certain complications to this assessment have manifested thanks to the new Trump administration's recent crackdowns on pro Palestinian protesters in a lot of cases with a chilling degree of what appears to me to be at least bordering on First Amendment violations, that is well said at least about the cafaya wearing set before all these changes

started to happen. All this is to say that with the kafaya in this particular case, but also more broadly, what we're talking about here is that a lifestyle is being sold, and while it is being spread primarily by the forces of capitalism, the ideology that fuels the anger, which fuels the righteousness, and which thus fuels those forces of capitalism which are driven by people making purchasing decisions.

Remember that ideology is not capitalism or liberalism or progressivism or leftism, Islamism, and thus it is an imperial force. Is this imperial force as powerful or as obvious and violent as the British lording over India, or the Belgians lording over the Congo, or the Third Reich lording over parts of Poland and parts of Yugoslavia.

lifestyle the class that those commodities ultimately suggested. David Todd writes about the phenomenon of what he calls nineteenth century France's Champagne capitalism, which he defines as quote the power base of a sophisticated model of global reale mont or a positive influence due to prestige quote and paired with the occasional violence in certain corners of the world, something that created quote what may be termed an empire of

taste unquote. It should be clear in the twenty first century that a lifestyle is no longer just demonstrated by physical commodities or even mere physical appearance, but by the essence of the person's beliefs and allegiances, often signaled through physical appearance, which can be done with a few swipes across a touch screen, a physical commodity.

one percent. As Brendan O'Neil summarizes in his polemic quote as British political scientist Matthew Goodwin explains where the old elite derived its sense of social status from physical manifestations of wealth, such as fine clothes, jewelry, foreign travel, servants, private carriages, and large properties. The new elite tends to distinguish itself from the low status masses by focusing far more and projecting their cultural capital rather than their economic capital.

With prosperity spread far more widely across society than was the case in the past, ostentatious displays of riches have much less significance instead, says Goodwin. For the sophisticated, financial, secure, urban dwelling, university educated new elite, a certain set of fashionable beliefs has been become the new signifier of social status.

In other words, when one, for example, to go back to the one I made earlier, makes the argument that Islamophobia is a devastating problem, but it is only made in response to criticism of Islam or even Jihadism or hamas as is more common now, one is giving oneself one's very own hyper modern tray chik vibe, just with moral signaling rather than with wealth signaling. It is a lifestyle and one that only truly benefits two things as I suggested earlier, one's own ego and the ideologues who

aim to spread their beliefs in the first place. To bring this back around to imperial analysis, this can also be observed in the spread of nineteenth century France as Empire of Taste. The most important take way was not that this velvet empire made the French rich, as David Todd writes it quote was not a purely capitalistic enterprise. It pursued profit but also power and prestige unquote. It was very much not just about money. But is all

this Islamism, global capitalism, French luxury. Is it all really truly a form of imperialism? Is this empire what I've been talking about?

been clearly defined throughout history. David Todd does a wonderful job preemptively facing off these criticisms in his own work, noting that one can simply dismiss the usage of the word empire or imperial in the case of the French Empire of Taste as quote a metaphor used to convey the crushing extent of French culture domination unquote, or even a type of rhetoric used to quote a suage wounded national pride after the loss of real territorial empires in

seventeen sixty three or eighteen fifteen quote, before he puts those concerns to rest. As Todd writes, quote, it is also very tempting to take the use of the word empires seriously and highlight what was authentically imperial about French economic and cultural domination. Two imperial traits stand out. The first, given that all empires are collaborative yet hierarchical enterprises between different national or ethnic groups, is the contribution of numerous

non French auxiliaries to the dynamics of Champagne capitalism. The second is the French state's overtly political utilization of Champagne capitalism's successes in a bid to assert French supremacy in some parts of the world, or merely to proclaim France's

status as a global overlord. If one was to remove any reference to France or at Champagne capitalism in this passage and replace them with more neutral general terms, it is pretty clear that the broader point can be made about imperialism that has little to do with territorial claims, resource extraction, or even economic enrichment. Those things could well

be part of the picture. But what the French understood in the nineteenth century and what Islamists understand in the twenty first is that influence can come in many forms, and the more amorphous and seemingly personal that influence is, the harder it is to extinguish. This was also understood, as we saw earlier on in this episode, by the United States intelligence agencies concerned with the spread of democratic capitalistic values abroad to combat the spread of communist ones

during the Cold War. If one wishes to go further back into the past, one need not look any further than the attempts to spread Christianity.

and enrichment that one could envision. Those things will come to them and be brought willingly.

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