For the first time since the Bush regime launched its open-ended war against terror in 2001, they have begun to classify the elusive terrorist enemy as "Islamo-fascists". Previously Washington had carefully limited the words Islam or Muslim in relation to the war and had referred to the enemy generically as terrorists – a troubling loose term for anyone who resists the war, real terrorist or nationalist resister. As George W. Bush made clear in the 2004 General Election, he does not do "nuance".

Is re-labeling radical Islam as Islamo-fascism purely a political ploy by Washington? Bush certainly has political reasons for doing so. Starting with 9-11, Bush and his neo-cons have blatantly appropriated American fear to achieve both domestic and foreign policy objectives. To perpetuate wars of aggression abroad, an unquestioning and frightened home population is critical.

However, after almost five years of relentless manipulation and with the 2006 mid-term election looming, there are signs that Americans are finally becoming skeptical of Bush’s fear-mongering. What better time then for Bush to re-cast the enemy with a name as historically frightening and odious as fascism? What greater enemy of civilization than violent, racist fascism and its disciples such as Hitler? The word fascist also creates a historic connection with World War II, with Bush as the self-appointed savior offering to save western Christian civilization – while creating new markets for American multi-nationals, naturally.

Regardless of Bush’s political reasons, is there, any truth to the term "Islamo-fascism"? Are only individual radical Islamists such as Bin Laden fascistic or does Islam itself contain seeds of fascism. The word fascist is complex and probably too easily thrown around. Any authoritarian figure with rigid conservative views or a believer in force, has probably been labeled as fascist at some point.

Although there is no fixed definition of fascism, there are features common to all its forms. According to western political thought, fascist beliefs are ultra-conservative, elitist, often racist, opposed to equality and democracy and, above all, utterly opposed to socialism and liberalism. Fascist movements are also always willing to use violence to gain and keep power. Although supporting rule by a chosen elite, fascism uses the language of equality – ordinary people have to be seduced if they are to be ruled. Hitler for example achieved this trick by using the slogans of socialism to fool German workers and then indoctrinated them by teaching that all Germans were united by a superior racial bond which trumped all class differences. The real rulers, the old German elites and big business, understood the joke of course and became Nazism’s natural partners. The same thing happened in Italy under Mussolini, although there was less emphasis on race. Whatever the method, fascism attempts to create a bond of unity and equality among its followers, which is then translated into permanent political power.

Perhaps the main characteristic of fascism is that in seeking power it must impose a dominant, all-pervasive ideology, that is accepted almost like religious truth. This ideology must gain control all aspects of law, politics, education and culture. In Germany, Nazi ideology probably came as close to any belief system has come to completely controlling a country. Fascist ideology, whether based on race, faith, nationalism or a longing for a glorious past, must offer certainty, identity and protection to those who accept it and hostility to the "other". For fascism to survive it must remain unquestioned, and to achieve this, the "other" must be destroyed ideologically and maybe physically.

Few secularists would hesitate to call the Taliban or Al-Qaeda fascist-like, but these are small groups dedicated to seeking power through religious war. The more critical question is whether Islamic teaching itself contain seeds of fascism?

On its face, Islam, the faith of a billion people, with its message of a universal brotherhood united and equal in faith before Allah, appears to utterly contradict fascism. Unlike fascism’s necessity for a permanent ruling elite, Islam, with its many religious leaders and traditions, seems to support a chaotic equality. It is also true that Islamists claim Islam is historically destined to rule the world but in this they are not very different from Christian evangelicals who hope to win the world for Christ. What then, if anything, is so different and dangerous about Islam that Washington has taken to calling radical Muslims fascists? Asking such a question does not imply that other faiths could not possibly be fascistic – in fact quite the contrary, given horrors such as the Spanish Inquisition.

Islam in its pristine form that existed in 7^th Century Arabia, is an ideology that openly seeks political power. It seeks to dominate the lives of believer and non-believers under its power. This was made clear by Islam’s founder Mohammad who, based on his military power, took Mecca and became the spiritual head and political ruler of Arabia. The early caliphs who succeeded Mohammad, carved out a massive empire from Spain to India and imposed Islam upon many of the conquered peoples by the sword. This is an uncomfortable historical fact that western liberals and Islamic scholars ignore, tending, instead, to emphasize that the crusades were the beginning of the troubled relationship between Islam and the West. The real collision began in the 7^th Century when Arab Muslims, without provocation, attacked Zoroastrian Iran, the Christian Byzantine empire and Spain soon thereafter.

Providing religious justification for the early Islamic conquests was the Koran, considered the literal, unalterable word of God, and the words and deeds of Mohammad himself, known as Hadith (both sources together form the basis of Islamic Shariah law). Orthodox Islam divided the world’s people into two parts, the House of Islam or peace and the House of the infidel or war. Islam teaches that it is the religious duty of Muslims to make relentless war until the infidel was conquered, killed or better still converted. Since the Koran and Hadith are considered divine, the duty to conduct Jihad or "holy war", becomes a never-ending religious duty, ensuring constant distrust and strife with non-Muslims. Thus, it is orthodox Islamic theology that justifies perpetual war upon the non-Muslim. Thankfully, relatively few Muslims support such war literally.

In countries, such as Pakistan or Saudi Arabia, Islamic law is an all pervasive ideology that seeks to influence and bend politics to its will. It also reserves for itself the power to regulate education, public and private lives, social and sexual relationships amongst Muslims and non-Muslims. There is no area that Islamic law does not seek to influence. In this respect it is authoritarian and, when unopposed, lends itself readily to totalitarianism. In fact, any act seen as criticizing Islam can bring the charge of blasphemy or apostasy, with severe consequences. It is with this threat that Muslim intellectuals are often silenced. Islam’s totalitarian nature is also evidenced by denying Muslims the right to freedom of conscience by leaving Islam. A Muslim who dares to leave Islam and adopt another faith can be executed as an apostate.

Since 9-11 Muslim scholars and western liberals have been at pains to portray Islam as a faith that tolerates others. Beside the fact that tolerance alone is hardly reason to rejoice, certain troubling issues about Islamic "tolerance" are never discussed in the West. Put simply, other faiths are not accorded equal rights in countries where Islamic Shariah law is prevalent.

The equality that Islam talks about is not based on principles the West understands. The Western idea of equality, however imperfect in practice, is universalist, being based on the Enlightenment and later liberal thought. Islamic equality is the equality only of Muslim males. Under Shariah law the non-Muslim occupies second-class status of varying degrees. For example a non-Muslim may not testify against a Muslim nor does Shariah allow marriage between a Muslim woman and a non-Muslim male, although, for Muslim demographic advantage, it permits Muslim men to marry non-Muslim women. If Shariah law is strictly applied, a religious apartheid that victimizes non-Muslims is the only outcome. Muslim scholars should be asked how Shariah law is so different from the racial segregation imposed by the Nazi Nuremberg laws against the Jews in the 1930s?

Muslim spokesmen also proclaim that Islam’s tolerance is proven by the protection offered to other "peoples of the book", namely Jews and Christians living under Islamic jurisdiction. This alleged special protection is afforded since Islam claims to be the historical and spiritual successor of Judaism and Christianity. However, if Islam is as tolerant as claimed, why should any religious minority require special protection. The truth is that Shariah law reduces all non-Muslims, Jews and Christians included, to second class status or "dhimmi". The dhimmi are allowed to live and work as political and social subordinates, in perpetual insecurity, and without aspiring to power.

Islam, unlike other faiths, because of its demands for political power, has a Marxist style belief in the inevitability that it will rule the planet. Marxists believed communism would arise through sheer necessity and class struggle – Islamists believes they are destined to rule because they possesses the absolute religious truth. This belief creates a great barrier for co-existence and bars the creation of secular societies in Islamic countries based on a political concept of citizenship. Islamists are being very honest when they express their disdain for secular democracy. It is not surprising that Islamic countries found it difficult to accept the United Nations Declaration of Human Rights, which demands freedom of faith and conscience as a fundamental human right.

Another feature of Islam that has brought it into open conflict with western ideas of free speech, is the special position of Mohammad. Islam allows no criticism or critical moral evaluation of its founder. Mohammad is the central figure of Islam and it is his deeds and words that, along with the Koran, form the basis of Shariah law. Thus what Mohammad did, in reality or purportedly, Muslims attempt to imitate. In this respect, Mohammad is far more significant to the daily lives of Muslims, than Christ or Buddha are to their followers. When radical Islamic movements, such as the Wahhabists in Saudi Arabia, promote their brand of Islam, their vision is Mohammad’s 7^th Century rule. It is no exaggeration to say that Islam falls or rises with Mohammad and if this critical historic figure cannot be objectively discussed, Islam hinders its own moral growth.

In conclusion, while it is patently wrong to call moderate mainstream Muslims as supporting a fascist ideology, an Islam that seeks to assert political power is a different matter. This political Islam, which draws its beliefs from orthodox Islamic teachings, that are authoritarian, intolerant and undemocratic, shows all the signs of religiously based fascism. This conclusion in no way implies that only Islam is capable giving birth to such dangers.