The Role of the Kafir West in Tearing Apart our Ummah
and in Destroying our Khilafah (Caliphate), the Symbol of Our Strength
(Translated)

When we were one Ummah unlike any other, our state would cast its Rayah (banner) over all regions; it was the protector, the shelter, and the deterrent against anyone who might even contemplate attacking a single Muslim. The Muslims were one body, supporting one another with victory, aid, and reinforcement. If one limb complained, the rest of the body would respond with wakefulness and fever. Then the enemies understood that this unity and this state were the reason for the strength of the Islamic Ummah and its protective shield. So they set about targeting that shield, trying to strip it away, exerting tremendous effort over many long years until they reached their objective, unfortunately, and destroyed the Khilafah State (Caliphate) in 1924, tearing the Ummah of Islam into many fragments to prevent it from returning to its former state.

The Khilafah did not fall suddenly due only to internal factors; rather, it was demolished gradually through a long plan led by the Western colonial states, with the participation of traitors among the Muslims from the Arabs and Turks at the time, who were influenced by their calls to nationalism, separatism, and others. Thus, the demolition was intellectual and political before it was military.

The most prominent features of that plan were:

- Weakening the Islamic idea among Muslims through intellectual invasion, distorting Islam, and planting nationalist thought in order to dismantle the unity of the Ummah and shift loyalty from Islam to race and land.

- Extending indirect political influence in an initial stage through debts and interference in the appointment and dismissal of sultans.

- The official demolition of the Khilafah.

- Dividing the lands of the Muslims afterward into artificial states and drawing borders with the aim of preventing them from uniting again.

- Further dividing what had already been divided and continuing to incite wars and sectarian and nationalist sentiments.

Whoever carefully examines the history of the Islamic State realizes the major role of the West in what occurred. This does not mean that we deny the shortcomings of the Khalifah (caliphs), the scholars, and the Ummah in failing to arm themselves with the means capable of repelling the plots of the enemies. Rather, here we seek to shed greater light on the immense deception of the West and its major role in what happened, so as to grasp the magnitude of what they did, take heed from it, and rise again by thwarting all their plans.

The kafir (disbelieving) West launched a fierce war against the ideas of Islam, such that scarcely any Islamic concept or ruling escaped distortion, confusion, and slander. As a result of the weakness of understanding in later eras regarding the Khilafah, scholars did not rise to confront this onslaught with sufficient strength, which led to the infiltration of Western concepts and European laws—initially on the basis that they did not contradict Islam and were compatible with it—causing, later on, the spread of Western thought and its solutions, and silence regarding that.

All of this unfortunately coincided with the weakness of the Khilafah in its final years and the increase in misapplication within it. It was no longer that state which implemented the Islamic principle and carried it forcefully, due to the despotism of some caliphs, weak administration, the infiltration of foreign influence, and the shackling of political decision-making through external debts, in addition to the decline of the industrial sector and attention to sciences, among other things. Nor should we forget the state’s failure to acquire advanced weaponry and its negligence in this regard, which led to a relative backwardness in its military equipment compared to other states, resulting in numerous defeats and the beginning of the fading of the image of the invincible state.

In contrast, the West succeeded in portraying itself as the dominant victor whose laws and dictates must inevitably be followed by the world.

The enemies did not stop there; rather, they turned to traitors among the Arabs and Turks, recruiting them to lead separatist movements and to act as callers to nationalism, patriotism, secularism, and Westernization, thereby worsening the situation and compounding weakness upon weakness. Mustafa Kemal was but one of these traitors who accepted to be a demolition tool in the hands of the enemies, through whom they destroyed the great edifice of the Khilafah and replaced it with a nationalist state that later accepted the division of the Islamic Ummah.

With the fall of the Khilafah, Europe—headed by Britain—descended upon the Ummah of Islam like diners descending upon their dish, continuing what they had begun of division and colonization before its demolition. They concluded agreements such as the Sykes–Picot Agreement and others, drew borders, erected barriers, and placed a guard over every rag, whose orders were in the hands of his masters.

As a result, Palestine was occupied and remains so to this day, complaining of the betrayal of the betrayers and the negligence of the negligent, and paying the price of division and the absence of the state. May Allah have mercy on Khalifah Abdul Hamid, who prevented its desecration until his last breath. His statement still rings loudly in our ears: “If the Khilafah State is ever torn apart, then they will be able to take Palestine without a price. But as long as I am alive, the surgeon’s scalpel cutting into my body is easier for me than seeing Palestine severed from the Islamic State. This will not be; I cannot agree to the dissection of our bodies while we are alive.”

Yes, unfortunately we have lived through the dissection of our bodies while we are alive. What our brothers in Palestine continue to suffer today is not separate from all that Muslims everywhere have suffered due to colonialism. The list of the bleeding wounds of our Ummah is long—from Kashmir to Chechnya, from Turkestan to East Timor to Myanmar, and beyond.

So has the West been satisfied with all that it has done? Of course not. Rather, it continues to exert all its efforts to prevent the return of the Khilafah. America has become adept at further dividing what is already divided and inflaming sectarian and nationalist sentiments whenever it can. The situations of Yemen, Sudan, Syria, and others today are not hidden from anyone.

O Muslims: you are one Ummah unlike any other. Your unity and your Khilafah were the cause of your strength, your revival, and your Lord’s pleasure with you. That is why the kafir colonial West demolished it. So will you not roll up the sleeves of your resolve to return to how you once were—one Ummah with one state and one banner—to enrage your enemies? Do your hearts not long to restore your honor and glory, to purify your Aqsa and your Ka‘bah, and to support your oppressed brothers everywhere?

Indeed, working to restore the Khilafah is truly the honor of this world and the Hereafter. Through it alone you will regain your leadership, preserve your unity, and even save the entire world from the injustice, tyranny, and abyss to which it has descended. Allah (swt) says:

[وَيَوْمَئِذٍ يَفْرَحُ الْمُؤْمِنُونَ * بِنَصْرِ اللهِ]

“And that Day the believers will rejoice * In the victory of Allah” [Ar-Rum: 4–5].

Written for the Central Media Office of Hizb ut Tahrir by
Minnatullah Taher