"X" Factors in Defeating Radical Islam
The Iraq Experience of an Albanian-American Sufi Muslim in the U.S. Army Special Forces

by Murat Muftari
Illyria [New York]
July 27, 2012

http://www.islamicpluralism.org/2078/x-factors-in-defeating-radical-islam

Murat Muftari on a civil mission to assist Iraqis driven from their homes by Wahhabi terrorists, 2005.

The post-9/11 world has brought many variables to the global chess game, changing the course of history. Before the atrocities of 9/11, radical Islam had an identifiable and widely-encountered face, but the Western public did not grasp who it included or what they wanted. It was a genuine "X" factor to most.

I fell into another "unknown" category, as a young Albanian-American Muslim, eager to learn about the real world. When the World Trade Center towers were hit on the morning of September 11, 2001, I was on my way to a class in American Government 101 as a freshman in college. So too would 9/11 change the course of my story.

Growing up with a thirst for the truth, experience, and excitement, I knew my calling had finally come. I suspended my college aspirations, looked into how to join the military, and drove to the nearest recruiting station. My research had guided me towards a new "18-X program" that the U.S. military created after 9/11. It allowed individuals to become Army Special Forces personnel if they could pass an intensive 24-month training program testing both the body and the mind. The program could put me on the frontlines of the global war on terror, with the most elite brothers to my left and right. And so began the main chapter in my journey of learning about the real world and finding out of what I was made.

Twenty-four months later, with a Green Beret on my head and a Special Forces tab on my shoulder, and after many restless nights, it was time to join the fight. After a hasty, two-week pre-mission training exercise, I would join my new Special Forces A-Team downrange in Iraq – "the sandbox." As we landed in Tikrit, Iraq, on the night of a Super Bowl Sunday, I knew the luxuries and comforts of home were half a world away. My wish to learn about the real world had quickly come true, in joining my team right in Saddam's backyard. It was the first of my three deployments to Iraq.

The end of 2004 and beginning of 2005 was a transitional period in the Iraq war; tactics had changed, suicide bombings were the new norm in enemy action, and the influx of foreign fighters had seemingly increased. Although I was the rookie, and an Albanian-American Muslim, I gained the support of my experienced fellow-soldiers, by allowing my actions to speak louder than my words. We were near the center of Tikrit, in a team ten-strong with a guard force of Kurdish Peshmerga fighters helping to protect our compound. We were deployed in the heart of Tikrit, but not only to stay within the safety of our compound. We had goals to achieve.

For the most part, we went about our various operations with minor problems. But hostility toward our team and our compound was growing in Tikrit, as we began disrupting the financing and logistics cells of anti-Coalition Sunnis. As our duties continued, we were exposed to a more sophisticated and complex cell of insurgents committed to oppose our operations and, ultimately, our way of life. Surveillance and intelligence had led us to the local leader of the cell and my first encounter with the Tawhid al-Jihad network. This terrorist group was more extreme, better financed, and prepared to execute mass casualty suicide operations against U.S. forces and local inhabitants.

After repeated small arms attacks on our compound, my team leaders drafted an operation based on a day-time mission. We knew that conventional procedure would not work in the area, given the system of paid informants and observers the enemy had in place. So, with mission approval, in Special Forces style, dressed in traditional Iraqi garb, we conducted a day-time snatch-and-grab action, targeting the local boss of Tawhid al-Jihad when he least expected it. The mission was a success. Our team's fight against Islamist extremists, however, had just begun.

Phone-camera image posted online by Al-Qaida, showing the bombing of the Tikrit house, April 14, 2005, 655am.

The morning of April 14, 2005 is one that is stamped in my memory forever. At 6:55 a.m., I woke up to an earth-shaking thud, a fire ball racing through my bedroom, and the wall of bricks next to my bed collapsing on top of me. The extremists had just sent their wake-up call, in the form of a fuel-tanker suicide bomber, and I had just been introduced to authentic Wahhabism. Somehow, everyone on our side survived the explosion (one of the largest jihadist bombings in Iraq). The house we were occupying had been destroyed, but stood ready to be rebuilt. I, for my part, felt reenergized and motivated. I had just met my foe as an Albanian-American Muslim and as a Special Forces combatant, and for the first time I was truly exposed to the other face of Islam.

The bombed house within 30 minutes of the explosion, April 14, 2005. Photograph by Murat Muftari.

I had grown up as a Bektashi Sufi Muslim, in the vicinity of Baba Rexheb's First Albanian-American Teqe in the U.S., in Taylor, Michigan. There I was taught a different Islam. The guidance of Baba Rexheb concentrated on high character, love, knowledge, progress, reason, tolerance, and a shedding of the ego. With Wahhabi extremism in front of my face in Iraq, after learning such a different understanding of Islam through Baba Rexheb in his Teqe, my path in this world was becoming clearer.

Rahmetli Baba Rexheb Beqiri (1901-95).

I realized there were several "X" factors in the war against the Wahhabi Islamists. One was the appearance of a new breed of Special Forces soldiers, through the 18-X program. The 18-X conception recruited well-disciplined, outside-the-box thinking, type-A individuals ready to get down and join the fight to free the oppressed. I have formed many solid friendships with Shias, Sunnis, and Kurds, through my three deployments to Iraq. These friends I made respect my background as an Albanian-American Muslim, and the similarities between the suffering that my people endured in the history of Albania and Kosova, with the injustices imposed on Iraqis. They have become lasting relationships based on honor, mutual respect, and trust. The ultimate reward came recently when one of my Iraqi counterparts named his newborn son after me.

The second "X" factor deals with the position that pluralistic Islamic Sufism holds in my heart and the hearts of millions of believing Muslims throughout the world. Our Islam is one where love is the essential theme and the real reason of our existence. One that requires abandoning the ego, acquiring greater knowledge, and learning to fully grasp its truth. One that remains faithful to the path of truth by gaining respect for the absolute. One in which the idea and words written through our guides in symbolic beauty liberate our awareness for the greater good. One empowering freedom of thought to prosper and grow like a flower in perfect conditions. One where oppression cannot win because free thought is no longer containable.

We say to the misguided Wahhabis, who build their defense around an offensive system of despotism, that one sure path to the truth was found by some of the greatest Islamic mystics around the world. These are mystical guides that passed their message through scripture and singing, and knowledge and kindness are their weapons. Their weapons never malfunction, never run out of ammunition, and they do not have to wait for spring offensives. Their weapons spread and increase continuously in the information age and their ammunition of love does not miss.

As an Albanian-American Muslim and former Special Forces soldier, I have had the honor to tackle Islamic extremism in two ways. One was on the front lines in Special Forces, where our motto was "De Oppresso Liber" or "to free the oppressed." The other was as a Sufi Muslim who had the luck of learning from the Bektashi Baba Rexheb, one of the greatest Islamic mystics known to mankind.

At one time, I believed that simply being on the front lines in military service would make me a positive "X" factor in the global war against extremism, but seeing Wahhabism directly put me back on the path to the truth. I now hold a weapon far more advanced than any I previously held in combat. Sufi Muslims and the wisdom of their guides are an "X" factor defeating the negative side of Islam and freeing the oppressed in a way as compelling as the military effort. A collective thought and vision as powerful as the mystical truths of Sufism may guide the globe towards worldwide harmony, and I am one of millions among its growing numbers of foot soldiers.

Murat Muftari after an overnight mission pursuing foreign terrorists, Baquba, Iraq, Spring 2006.

Related Topics:  Albanian Muslims, American Muslims, Balkan Muslims, Bektashi Sufis, Iraq, Kosovo, Sufism, Terrorism, Wahhabism receive the latest by email: subscribe to the free center for islamic pluralism mailing list