US invasion of Iraq trigerred Takfiri idelogy in ME: Pundit

Press TV has conducted an interview with Kevin Barrett, the editor of Veterans Today from Madison, to discuss the recent remarks by Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei during a meeting with the visiting Azeri President Ilham Aliyev, on promotion of Islam as a way for countering divisive plots by Takfiri groups. 

The following is a rough transcription of the interview.

Press TV: The urgency of basically expanding Islamic activities to counter Takfiri groups and their ideology, how important do you think that is?

Barrett: Well of course this is very important. I think the Takfiri movement has picked up a certain amount of esteem thanks to the destabilization operations in the region by the United Sates when it invaded Iraq and destabilized [and] overthrew the government of Libya and now [it has targeted] Syria. So, chaos is starting to spread and the sensible reaction to this is for the people who value stability and reason to work together to try to prevent this tendency towards chaos and extremism.

I think the Supreme Leader of Iran is doing a very good job of negotiating this difficult terrain. It is especially good to see that Iran and Azerbaijan are establishing better and better relations. There have been problems in that relationship going back for quite some time. There has been an Israeli presence in Azerbaijan and various other issues but it looks like that those relations are greatly improving partly because the government of Azerbaijan recognizes that some of their former allies are actually responsible for the destabilization of the region and they are adopting a more balanced policy in reaching out to Tehran. I think that is a very sensible move on their part.

Press TV: This basically becomes part of that bigger strategy of more unity and cohesion between Muslim nations in order to combat the current crises that this region is facing.

Barrett: I think that Muslims all over the world need to unite to spread real Islam; the comprehensive, universal Islam that embraces all sorts of different styles, ethnicities, people from all over the world. Islam has been a major part of Africa, of Asia, parts of Europe for nearly a thousand years. So, it covers such a huge part of the globe and the variety of ways of interpreting Islam something that we can imagine trying to get rid of and that is what the Takfiris are doing. They actually want to kill people who interpret Islam differently from them. Perhaps the silver lining of this very dark cloud of the Takfiris is that all the other Muslims which are 99.9 percent of Muslims is the world are going to have to sit down and work together and that actually could end up fostering a movement towards Islamic unity and development towards a kind of Islam that will be able to play a major part in the world of the future.    

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