Political Islamism and forest fires

At first glance, nothing seems to link these days’ forest fires to political Islamism. The flames devour the trees, animals flee or perish, families lose their homes, and sometimes their loved ones. The tragedy appears to be merely a natural or human-made disaster.

However, many radical Islamists see a completely different reality in these tragedies: a formidable propaganda opportunity. Where the population sees forests reduced to ashes, they discern an ideal stage for spreading their ideology. Every disaster becomes a psychological lever, every disaster an opportunity to recruit, convince, and intimidate.

I remember this chilling sentence that a fanatic Islamist said to me: “These heatwaves and fires are nothing compared to what awaits you in the hereafter if you stray from the path of God.” Behind these words lies not just a belief; they illustrate a rhetoric of fear, where earthly suffering is instrumentalized to impose a worldview.

In this fanatical madness, the heatwave and fires become preaching arguments. They are presented as a foretaste of the so-called “hell” designed to break the most recalcitrant. Fear becomes a tool of persuasion. Disaster becomes a sermon. Anguish becomes a means to subdue consciences.

This radical discourse, devoid of any common sense, relies on a deeply manipulative mechanism: transforming a tragic event into supposed proof of divine punishment, exploiting the distress of victims to strengthen ideological control, and presenting unverifiable, illogical, and mendacious interpretations as absolute certainties. Lies, guilt-tripping, and intimidation intertwine to make people believe that every flame is a message from heaven.

In this biased view of the world, the forest is no longer a living heritage. Trees, animals, ecosystems, the air we breathe, and even human lives take a back seat. The essential thing for them is to terrify the population; to weigh them down with a permanent threat. They readily associate natural disaster with a supernatural warning. They want to keep populations under the grip of fear to lead them toward the “right path” that these sinister ideologues claim to hold. This is the well-known modus operandi of fanatical ideology: it is not content with explaining the world rationally and convincingly; it seeks to appropriate tragedies to govern minds. The more fear grows, the more it hopes to extend its influence. The flames consume the forests; the propaganda, for its part, attempts to consume consciences.

Djamel AREZKI