Islamic Roots Run Deep in Spain's History
The relationship is marked by centuries of periodic
conflict and uneasy intimacy.

By Henry Kamen, Henry Kamen is the author of "Empire:
How Spain Became a World Power, 1492-1763."

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-op-kamen21mar21,1,1555892.stor\
y?coll=la-news-comment-opinions

MADRID — The train-bombing massacre carried out by
Islamic terrorists in Spain on the eve of a general
election had clear motives: to force a change of
government, which it achieved; and to get Spanish
troops out of Iraq, which it will certainly achieve.
How to account for this astonishing success of the
Islamic fundamentalist cause in Spain?

More than any other Western country, Spain has lived
on intimate terms with Islam. For 700 years, from the
8th century to the 15th century, Muslims ruled the
greater part of the country. They profoundly changed
its culture, its food and its art. But they gradually
lost their political hold and by the 13th century were
in retreat. The last Muslim king in Spain left his
capital, the city of Granada, in 1492, the year that
Christopher Columbus set out on his voyage of
discovery to the New World. That was the end of Muslim
power, but hundreds of thousands of Muslims continued
to live in Christian Spain until they were expelled in
the 17th century. Spaniards thought that it was the
end of their experience of Islam. The ancient Moorish
palaces were allowed to crumble into rubble.

Spanish interest in the Muslim past was awakened in
the 19th century, and then, quite improbably, by an
American. Washington Irving had already attained
considerable success with his books in the United
States. His visit to Spain in 1815 so inspired him
that he remained in Europe for 17 years, publishing
first a history of the "Conquest of Granada" (1829)
and then "Alhambra" (1832), which was about the
history and legends of Moorish Spain. When Irving
visited the palace of the Alhambra in Granada, it was
nothing but a ghostly ruin. But his romantic evocation
of its past caught the imagination of the public
everywhere and stirred the Spanish authorities to take
a renewed interest in their heritage.

Realizing that they had once had a Muslim destiny,
Spanish writers, artists and, above all, politicians
set out to recover it. Their view was a wholly
idealized one. Writers of the Romantic school produced
plays and novels about a past that had never really
existed, in which Christians and Muslims lived
together like brothers, frequently warring but always
respecting each other. Historians represented Spain as
a crucible of civilizations, in which the coexistence
of Christians and Muslims set an example of a tolerant
society. In their annual celebrations, still seen
today, towns staged mock combat of Christians against
Moors.

There was, however, an aggressive side to this
historical re-creation, because Spaniards were always
taught that they had "conquered" the Muslims.
Politicians started looking for territories to
conquer, and the closest candidate was Muslim Africa.
Since the 15th century, Spain had occupied a couple of
small towns on the African coast. In 1859, Spanish
generals led a military campaign into Morocco to give
Spaniards pride in their imperial prowess. The
commitment to war against the Muslims absorbed Spanish
leaders for more than 50 years but came to an abrupt
end when the army was annihilated by Muslim tribesmen
in 1921. "Morocco," a politician wrote, "was our last
chance to hold our heads high in Europe."

Morocco did not retain good memories of the Spaniards,
which must be borne in mind when assessing why the
terrorists chose Madrid as a target.

Spain's large population of immigrants, most of them
from Morocco, is a source of vulnerability. Of 40
million people, about 800,000 are Muslims, and if
illegal immigrants were added, the figure would
significantly rise. The birthrate of Moroccans in
Spain is twice that of the Spanish. Tens of thousands
of Moroccans hold low-paying and temporary jobs in
every conceivable enterprise, mostly in the
construction industry. They occupy entire areas of the
inner city in Madrid and Barcelona, and their presence
inevitably provokes a reaction from the host
community.

Moroccan delinquents are disproportionately
represented in crime statistics, and their cases tend
to grab headlines. A Muslim religious leader's recent
book offering hints on how to beat your wife without
leaving visible marks provoked outrage.

The Muslims in Spain strongly condemned the train
bombings. At least seven Moroccans are known to be
among the more than 200 who died in Madrid.

Madrid is home to more than 200,000 Moroccans, most in
the Lavapies district, where many of the bombing
suspects lived. Spanish investigators suspect that
Moroccans were also responsible for a terrorist
bombing in Casablanca last May.

Former U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine K. Albright,
commenting on the Madrid massacre, said, "Osama bin
Laden has been able to do something that 40 years of
communism was unable to do, which is to divide Europe
from the United States." She may be right in the case
of Spain. Since the Spanish-American War and the loss
of Cuba in 1898, the Spanish left has been obsessively
anti-American. The prime minister-elect, Jose Luis
Rodriguez Zapatero, said "there are going to be big
changes," and it appears they all augur ill for
President Bush. The crucial change will be Zapatero's
desire to move closer to Islamic countries, because he
believes they were alienated by the Iraq invasion.

Zapatero expressed disappointment that some Moroccans
may have been participants in the Madrid bombings but
stressed the importance of "good relations with
Morocco." He has repeatedly said he will withdraw
Spanish troops from Iraq on June 30 unless the United
Nations is running the show by then. His threat is
largely symbolic: The 1,300 Spanish soldiers there
play a noncombative role, though 11 have been killed.

The election results in Spain, Zapatero predicted,
"are going to have a big impact on those in the United
States." He hopes that Bush, whom the new prime
minister branded a "liar" on Iraq's arsenal of weapons
of mass destruction, loses in November.

The tragedy in Madrid was a monstrous crime against
humanity, and, like Sept. 11, 2001, it will probably
shake up far more than the muddy waters of Spanish
politics.







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