Middle Nation Content Talks: Islamic Realpolitik

Please, my fellow speakers, if you can just request the mic control also, I can hand it over to you. I hope you have seen the latest video by brother Shahid. The last two videos, to be specific, because they are closely related, inshallah, to today's today's topic. So it's gonna be nice inshallah. Okay.

So since brother Shahid is here, I'll just start inshallah playing the video. It's I shared it in the group, and I shared it under this post. So, hopefully, you have seen it. If you didn't, I'm gonna play it for you inshallah now. So and then we will move on to discuss the specific parts of it, give some introduction, how we will approach it, and so on as we are used to inshallah.

Okay. So let's play that video. Really good one, so pay close attention inshallah.

It should be fairly obvious by now to anyone who watches my channel regularly that I approach politics and global affairs from a realpolitik perspective, which is to say a practical, realistic, objective reading of what's going on and how Muslims should navigate these real world circumstances without ideological blinders. Now realpolitik has gotten a bit of a bad name because it is understood to be an amoral approach to politics, removed from ideology or ethics. Basically, an ends justifies the means mentality. This is more or less the official definition of realpolitik, and it is the way that most practitioners do it. But, of course, anytime you want to achieve a particular goal, that goal is based on an ideologically determined system for prioritization.

Meaning, you cannot remove a belief system or an ideology from what determines what you want to achieve. Specific outcomes are sought because your belief system views those outcomes as good. So for example, when realpolitik practitioners prioritize, say, control of our markets, security, economic growth, or whatever, it's because those practitioners' ideology regards those things as being of the greatest importance. So it's not really true that there is no ideology involved here. We have just tended to see amoral ideologies engaging in realpolitik.

In my opinion, you can utilize the realpolitik approach for pursuing moral outcomes. In fact, I think if you are serious about achieving moral outcomes, you must take a realpolitik approach to strategy. And I do not believe that this conflicts with Islam whatsoever. Quite the contrary. From the earliest period, the Muslims balanced ideals against pragmatism, seeking ideal outcomes through pragmatic means.

I believe that the treaty of Hudaybiyah was an example of taking a realpolitik approach, while the emotional reaction of to the treaty was purely idealistic. Now we're not aware that the prophet received any revelation about the treaty until after he had signed it. Meaning, his decision to agree to it was not a matter ordered by Allah but it was subsequently heralded by Allah through as a victory, which means that evaluated the situation rationally, engaged the potential benefits of entering the treaty, and made his decision on that basis believing that the was the most practical strategy for pursuing the moral goal of spreading Islam further and easing the difficulties of the Muslims. When the were besieging Medina at suggested offering a deal to some of the tribes, including granting them a share of the Muslims' crops in exchange for them severing their alliance with the Quraysh. That was a pragmatic realpolitik strategy aimed at relieving the Muslims of the peril that they were facing.

When the Sahaba asked him whether or not this resolution was given to him by Allah or whether it was his own idea, and he said it was his own idea, they expressed their dislike for that compromise. Ultimately, of course, a different realpolitik strategy was employed to dismantle the siege, basically using what we would now characterize as espionage or against the tribes in order to cause them to disband the. You can also look at the very careful investigations that made around the caravan of the Quraysh before embarking on the battle of Badr. This also was him taking a realpolitic approach to decision making. He wanted to have as much objective information as possible about the caravan before deciding to engage.

And, again, the correctness of his decision was only later confirmed by Wahi. You can even look at his handling of to see the realpolitic approach he took in the absence of revelation. This is even more interesting because had been ordered through to deal with them, but he had not been instructed specifically on how to deal with them. And his appointment of to decide their fate was a remarkable stroke of political savvy, reconciling both and the tribe with the ultimate judgment of Sa'ad. Now it's also claimed, of course, that Sa'ad's judgment was derived from the Torah, which there's no real reason to suppose it was, but it certainly aligned with it even according to modern rabbinical scholars.

And so since it did in fact align with the Torah, with their scripture, this left with even less grounds to object to the judgment. This whole episode demonstrates the brilliance of Rasulullah tactical political acumen. In all three of the instances I mentioned, we see Rasulullah accepting or offering to accept a temporary concession or compromise or even what might appear to be the surrendering of an authoritative principle with the treaty of Hudaybiyah. Allowed the document to not refer to him as but simply as Muhammad bin Abdullah. He allowed for the return of Muslims back to Makkah who had fled to Medina and so on.

At he basically offered to sacrifice Muslim crops as a payoff to the. And he allowed someone else to render the judgment when every Muslim knows that all judgments are to be referred to Allah as messenger. But these apparent concessions, these apparent compromises were pragmatic realpolitic maneuvers in which ideology, for lack of a better term, directed what outcomes were sought, but not the strategy on how to achieve them. The strategy for achieving a moral or ideological outcome was left to be determined through a political, military, or economic assessment of what was the most effective given the prevailing circumstances. And I think you can certainly look at the story of Al Khudr in the Quran and see the theory of realpolitik at work.

Al Khudr did many things which upon first appraisal were highly questionable, if not immoral, But his actions were decisive measures to address issues about which Allah had made him aware. Now an uncharitable interpretation of the would see it as approving the idea of the ends justifies the means. But I would argue that it simply represents taking a realistic and unidealistic approach to solving problems, confronting dangers, and supporting the common good through objective evaluation and decisive action. Now there's an old moral teaching about a man passing by a river and suddenly seeing a baby floating past about to drown in the water. He runs into the river to save the baby, but then he sees another and another and another, an endless number of babies floating down the river all about to drown.

Now another man appears on the shore, and the man in the river cries out to him for help. The man on the shore pauses for a moment and then starts to walk away. The man in the river shouts at him, where are you going? You have to help me save these babies. The man replies, that's what I'm doing.

I'm gonna find out where the babies are being placed in the river and stop it. So who was right? The man in the river was suddenly be able to save a few babies, but will just as certainly fail to save many. The man on the shore will certainly be able to save many babies, but will just as certainly fail to save a few, but he will bring the problem to a conclusive end. The man in the river represents the moral idealist or ideological approach, while the man on the shore represents the realpolitik approach of achieving moral ends through objective and.

But, of course, the man on the shore is also guilty of literally walking away from drowning babies whom he could save at that moment if he tried. There's no getting around that fact. But in my opinion, his approach is still superior. I think that we can frame this approach as the moral decision making equivalent of the decision making approach of delayed gratification. It's similar to how you choose to sacrifice some form of immediate gratification today for a greater gratification in the future.

For example, it's more pleasant to just sit on your couch rather than go to the gym. And going to the gym, of course, won't provide you immediate results anyway. But if you go to the gym instead of sitting on your couch, eventually, the outcome is going to be far better for you than the immediate enjoyment of lazy indulgence. This is delayed gratification. Realpolitik is something like this.

You may have to do things that are distasteful to you in the immediate term, things that even contradict your values perhaps, but they are necessary if you want to achieve long term moral outcomes. This is a very hard pill for most people to swallow, and it's not for everyone. Just like the example of the two men and the babies in the river, pursuing immediate moral outcomes still involves immoral repercussions and so does pursuing long term moral outcomes. But the question is, which is more important in the grand scheme of things? My personal opinion is that the long term takes precedence, and I believe that Islam validates this view.

Look. The Dunya is a very rough neighborhood, and it is comprised of rough people all battling for their interests. If your own life and circumstances are safe and secure and comfortable and easy, that was made possible for you by people who were willing and ruthless and realistic enough to carve it out of impossibility. Idealism can only rightly be a motivating engine for action, but it cannot be used to steer it. Seeking instant moral gratification can too easily become futile self righteousness that achieves no worldly good except your own sense of being good.

Because solving problems and achieving moral outcomes requires patience, sacrifice, compromise, vision, endurance, realism, and, yes, ruthless focus and determination. We can think about Abu Dar al Dafari, Radi Al Ahmad. He was one of the most pious and most fearless men from among the Sahaba, but also one of the most problematic, difficult, and divisive. Abu Dar never held his tongue when he felt something was wrong. Whatever he felt or thought he said, regardless of the situation or to whom he was speaking, he was a man who had no attachment to the dunya and was outstandingly courageous.

You know, he announced his conversion to Islam publicly before anyone was doing that, and he did it right outside the. He was beaten for it, but he went back the next day and did it again. And then he went back again and did it again, and the same thing happened. And every time, he was mercilessly beaten. Yet this brave man with all his strength of character and fearlessness, when he asked to appoint him to a position of leadership, the prophet refused and told him that he was weak.

Now weakness is not a word that anyone would use to describe someone like Abu Dagh, but the very same qualities that made him great outside of leadership would be weaknesses in leadership because leaders cannot be morally impulsive with no ability to bear what their consciences dislike for the sake of a greater good. Leaders must have the ability to hold their tongue, to be tactful, to be strategic, to consider all contingencies, and do what is necessary for the larger goals that it is their job to achieve. Abu Dar was a man who needed instant moral gratification. He was not a man who knew how to choose his battles. He would battle anyone instantly at the slightest perception of wrong.

But a leader must have the wisdom to weigh the magnitude of wrongs to identify which are greater and most dangerous because the complicated reality of the world is that sometimes tolerating one wrong can prevent a worse one from happening. Moral idealists cannot understand or accept this reality. But, again, they have the privilege of being spared from having to understand that because of the hard decisions made by men who do understand it. And here, it's important to remind ourselves that good deeds cancel bad deeds. Bad deeds do not cancel good ones.

You will meet Allah with every good deed you have ever done, but only with those bad deeds which your good deeds have not been sufficient to negate. Now leaders of states operate on a scale far beyond most people in terms of both their good and bad deeds, and it would be naive to think that the good they achieve for their people did not come at a cost and did not cause the suffering of some or even many. They will have wronged, and they will have hurt more people by their decisions and their policies than most of us interact with in our lifetimes. But if they also achieve long term good and benefit to their people, it will also be far beyond anything we can do in a lifetime of good deeds, and Allah will count it all. The dua of all of those that they may have wronged will be heard, but the safety, the prosperity, and the betterment of the lives they improved will also be seen.

And if the wrongs that they committed or tolerated as a necessary evil on the path to a greater long term good, it seems likely to me that they may be forgiven. I do not know, however, if an idealistic leader who fails to face the realities of the world and who imagines that his moral purity should be sufficient to defeat his nation's enemies and that his personal goodness is enough as a political strategy for victory. And because of this, his nation is inevitably subjugated by those practicing realpolitik. I don't know if this delusional and negligent approach can be forgiven. Okay.

So Okay. So welcome, everyone. Happy to see some familiar faces. Happy to have you all here. Happy to have my wonderful speakers with me today.

So as you heard from the video, we will today try to dissect and discuss this Yeah. It's a kind of an intricate balance, right, that needs to be achieved between some pragmatism and, on the other hand, probably some morality or some ideology and especially in relation to today's Islamic leadership. Right? So in the video, there were some historical instances that gave us some lessons in how we can navigate these complexities, especially from the, of course. But today, we will try even to look at some instances from the leadership of the Khalifa Rashidun.

And because, you know, people usually speak about how they wanna bring back the Khalifa and that it was the best time ever, I'm not saying these were not some of the best leaders that we have ever had, but there were also instances where people were against some decisions that they deemed as immoral or as controversial. So it really is something that has been since the start. Right? It's not something new that leaders need to decide a bit more realistically than just based on emotions or based on what is moral in the short run. So inshallah, we will try to explore this real politic as brother Shahid called it, and we will try to adopt it, inshallah, from an Islamic perspective.

Right? Because in the end, everything we view is through this lens. So let us begin inshallah. So we firstly need to somehow, you know, define what is real politic. Right?

So as brother Shahid mentioned in the video, it is this kind of like you know, it can be compared to this philosophical approach where you have, you know, pure realism and pragmatism that it is somehow like pragmatism in politics, right, without taking into account any ideological or moral or ethical premises The as brother Shait also mentioned in the video, this kind of idea, the the means justify the ends. Alright? So this is how we can consider the Western perspective of it. Alright? But now we need to somehow define the Islamic perspective of realpolitik.

Right? Because it does differ from the Western concept. That's everything, basically. Right? So my first question to my fellow speakers, inshallah, would be how do you think or how do you view the concept of realpolitik in Islam?

How do how does it differ from the more or less secular understanding of the term? Because we cannot divide politic from morality in Islam, but there is some specific balance that needs to be achieved. Yeah, so this would be my first question inshallah. How do you think that the concept of freedom politic and Islam differs from the western secular understanding of that term? So I already see some hands up.

It feels like I'm in a class, so my brother, MD, please feel free.

Yeah. Assalamu alaikum everyone. So for me, this this video was very eye opening, and it gave me a lot of self reflection on one of the reasons why as the Arab and Muslim world, the last eighty to a hundred years made me self reflect on on on the amount of opportunities that we squandered. So I I think with Islamic realpolitik is that we look more into the greater good, you know, and that for me is of course, we are we we our our objective is more on how to improve the well-being of the entire community more than it is on a certain materialistic outcome. So that's in short.

But I'll let you continue from the floor.

Exactly. Brother Omar, please.

Yes. Am I audible? Alright. So I think the point made in the video and the point where we can start is that Islamic jurisprudence ever since its, you know, inception was that you don't have to necessarily be faced with a with a situation where you know the good from the bad, but most probably, you will always have to choose the the lesser of two evils. Right?

So this is where realpolitik instantly comes in is that society or the the like the brother Shahid said in the video, the Dunya is a rough neighborhood. Right? So it's not a utopia, meaning that anyone can distinguish between the good and the evil. But as Habir al Jainil Omar said, he said in Arabic, so he said that a scholar, a true scholar is the one who distinguishes the lesser of two evils and calculates which would be more beneficial to the ummah from from a from a strategic long term view. So and also, it has to be mentioned that real politicking in that sense is not, you know, it's not just a concern for the rulers.

It's a concern for the scholars as well and a concern for society as a whole. Meaning that all of them have to be on the same page, all of them have to have the the interest of the ummah in mind, and they all have to they all have to be somewhat logical, reasonable. They have to have their moral instant moral gratification, like, whether she put it, they have to have it at bay, and they should not be so rash to to to spill out judgments or to call out immorally immoral accusations of of people they don't know the situations they are in, and the choices they are facing. So in a nutshell, Islamic republican is choosing the lesser of two evils because you're you're not living in Utopia, and it's not cons it's not the concern of the rulers only. It's the concern of the scholars who play a great role in society and the ummah as well because the ummah should be more educated.

That's it. Thank you.

Can you hear me? I just want to sort of clarify a couple of things. One, I I think I tried to clarify that's a very old podcast, by the way. But I think I I tried to clarify it in there that when I was talking about how realpolitik as it's practiced in the West is deemed as being amoral or unideological, but the reality is that they are following their sense of morality. They're just being honest about it.

This is the difference between realpolitik and every other form of political practitioner, which is that they're simply being honest about the fact that they approach politics in in a way that doesn't really factor in morality. And this is consistent with the West's deprioritization of morality. And I think, of course, they deprioritized morality because it's not really a concept that they fully understand anyway, and they don't really see the value in it. So I don't I I think that just just to clarify, I think that real politics simply means approaching politics, policy, approaching strategy in the most effective way possible according to the moral sense that you have. So when when that plays out in the West, plays out in an amoral or an immoral fashion.

But in in the same way, when it plays out among Muslims, plays out in a moral fashion because we are trying to be effective in the most moral way possible, and we're trying to be moral in the most effective way possible. And so, for example, I would even I would even say that we shouldn't use the term or the the phrase lesser of two evils. We should use more what Allah refers to in the Quran, which is to do what's better between the available options. So rather than just saying we're going to pick the lesser of two evils, let's say, we're trying to pick what's the better of the available options. Neither of those options may be optimal.

Neither of those options may be ideal. But those are the available options, so we choose the better one. That's all. I think that's that's more of a a a positive way of looking at it, and it's a more Islamic way of looking at it. And I think that that's really what we mean, or what I mean anyway, in terms of an Islamic approach to realpolitik.

And I wish that we had a different phrase for it rather than using the western phrase realpolitik, because really what we're talking about is just being effective, trying to be effective. And I and I personally think that trying to be or trying to achieve moral outcomes in an ineffective way amounts to the same thing as being amoral or immoral because you're not going to achieve the outcome at the end of the day if you're ineffective. I'm I'm reminded of the dua of when he said that he sought refuge from the fitna of an incompetent friend, and he sought refuge from a competent enemy. So we have to try to approach all of our challenges in the most effective and competent way possible, and that means being realistic, that means being practical, that means being pragmatic so that we can be effective to achieve what's

better.

Rather than saying the lesser of two evils, we're trying to achieve whatever is better according to what is actually possible to achieve. That's all I wanted to say.

Thank you, Rafi. But, you know, this can be a bit like sometime like, again, with the labels of the web, when we use them, right, we you know, it's very difficult to convey the message because it has been painted by the western experience of that given words, right, or that given label. So I completely understand the the term, but we also understand why we use these terms. Right? Because it shares some of the apparent meanings even though the core, like, understanding of the specific word is probably different.

But then, you know, how can leaders nowadays or especially Muslim and Arab leaders, how can they balance, you know, the this approach of realpolitik, but also take into consideration the ethical and, you know, some moral the the moral ground of Islam, right, without compromising somehow their principles. And I would like to ask how do we see this approach or this specific strategic approach, right, play out currently? And, of course, with respect to Palestine. You know, like yeah. How you know, in these situations where we have some kind of short term moral compromises and they are, of course, necessary for the greater good, how can the leaders ensure the these compromises do not somehow go against the core values of Islam or become some way of, you know, leading to injustice?

Yes. Brother, please.

Yeah. I think the problem is that, they are working and navigating in a very, very challenging environment and a very, very challenging, period of time. This part of the world has not experienced this kind of turbulence and this kind of instability probably ever. So they are also dealing as well with a world that is changing rapidly as well. A world that is becoming faster, faster in terms of how information is disseminated, faster in terms of how, destruction, takes place, and, faster in terms of how much resources and and material wealth is being consumed and used and, at the same time, fast in the sense of the need to take very quick decisions and very strategic decisions.

And so putting that together and factoring in as well that you are dealing also with a population that has also, over time, its needs have increased because of how fast the world has, advanced. Back in the day, most of the region didn't have the same kind of, needs and resources that we need today. And so keeping up with speed and at the same time trying to stay autonomous and independent, it it is a very, very challenging landscape to to work in. And some of the things that I wish we can look at as subjects or as people that live under under the rulership is to understand that. Is to understand that it's very easy to talk about how bad they are or how bad they are functioning because we're not in the driving seat.

We're not in their position and making decisions that affect millions of lives. It's not that easy. And taking emotional decisions or decisions by what I like to call decisions that are supported by people that in Egypt, we coined them as, which basically means as it's a term that describes people who are who really mean good and who want to do good, but they are moral idealists as, Shahid said, they end up taking decisions that irreversibly, damage, their country, damage the Oma, damage the region that they are in. And the word comes from the Naxa or the catastrophe of nineteen sixty seven because Nasser, one of the things that he was very famous in was was saying the things that he was that that he was he was very famous in saying the things that people like to hear and taking the actions that were popular. But were they a lot of the time effective?

I would not say so, for some time. Some some decisions were very damaging. So this is the term that's where the term originally comes from. And this is a problem that we've had for eight to ten decades is that we are we want we always want people to lead us who who who say who say the things that we like and who say the thing and do the things that we think is good for us because we want to we we want to show and and express our morality in a very confrontational way. And so what you would realize is all the all the leaders that were strategic thinkers and strategic decision makers in the history of of the region, the last eight to ten decades, they were not not painted in good light by the Arab and Muslim masses.

They were called traitors, they were called Zionists, they were called they betrayed the Palestinian cause, when in reality they bought more time for the cause and they prevented war from spreading into war and destabilization spreading from their into their own countries. And so this is kind of the problem that you see. And I always have this thing is that those people that are saying or insinuating that Arab rulers are serving Israel or their Zionists are themselves serving

I don't know, brother. Maybe there's some problem with the connection. Or can you hear brother well?

No. I think he got disconnected.

Oh, okay. Yeah. I I was scared if it's just on my side.

No. We can't hear him as well.

Okay. In Jallah, while he he had some very good points in Jallah that we will try to address, but I saw your hand brother Omar up. So if you wanna share some thoughts about that, the question that was asked, inshallah, related to this this intricate balance. Right? The, you know, leaders and brother, MG, of course, you know, spoke about some stuff.

So if you wanna add to that, feel free inshallah, and brother MG inshallah solves these issues.

Okay. So I think well, first of all, a more a more intimate relationship has to exist between scholars and the the rulers. Because the scholars, at the end of the day, they know what what might be beneficial to the ummah in terms of the society and how society would benefit or at least they can be consulted on matters of the jurisprudence and the laws that can be made to ensure the greater good or the the lesser evil in in in the sense that the the the achieving the goal that's necessary. So as brother Shahid has has clarifying that the the goal necessary may be the lesser of two evils or maybe the greater good. So in whichever case.

So the the the relationship between the rulers and the scholars has to be very intimate. And I also think that the rulers also need to have person people of expertise in different fields. Meaning that they shouldn't only consult the scholars, but they should also consult academics with regards to what would happen in the long term if if a certain law is passed or a certain war is waged or certain city is built or a certain canal has been paved, all of these, you know, state actions or state prerogatives, these are in in the end affecting the omen, affecting the society. So you you need both the the the the the scholars to tell you that this would be of of of of relation to a core Islamic value or not, and you need the academics to know which would be the most effective way to reach that goal within the framework or within the the outlines that have been outlined by the scholars. So, yeah, I I think it can be achieved that way if if if both of them are consulted.

And let's bear in mind that Imam Abu Hanifa, the very first imam of the the jurisprudence schools in Islam, he held an academy in his mosque where he taught or Islam jurisprudence, and he consulted with academics. He didn't only consult with Islamic scholar religious scholars. He consulted with academics because he wanted to know how the laws that were being put would affect society from a technical point of view in the long term. So I I I hope that answers the question. Thank you.

I know I know brother had had more to say, MG, but let me just, if you don't mind, jump in for a second. I think that it's important when we're talking about states, when we're talking about governments and countries and so on, it's good to remember that states don't have

a

lifespan. It's not like an individual. On an individual basis, all of our moral decisions and our moral outcomes take place within a span of, you know, maybe seventy, eighty years. It's very short term. The the the decisions that we have to make are very, by nature, short term decisions because our life itself is short term.

But that's not the case with states. That's not the case with nations. Nations don't have a lifespan. They don't have a point at which they're going to die and and be judged. They have to make and so so the people who are in charge of nations, the people who are in charge of states, they themselves are, of course, individuals and they have a lifespan, but they have to make decisions on the basis of years and generations ahead.

They have to think about the the total long term vision for their nation, for their state, for their country, for their people. That's not a thing that individuals have to do. So we have a kind of a privilege or we have a kind of an advantage in that we can be more short term moral thinkers than the leaders of nations can be. The leaders of nations have to think about sometimes what the moral outcome is going to be a generation from now or two generations or three generations from now. They need to think about I mean, if you if if like a good way to compare it maybe is for example, if there's a if there's a conflict and let's say the the solution to that conflict, I have potentially the solution to intervene in that conflict because I have a weapon.

Say I have a gun, and I'm supposed to now intervene in that conflict because I have a gun. However, I have no bullets. So I have to go through this process of either purchasing bullets, finding bullets, and then loading my gun and and so forth. I have to go through all of this process so that I can do what you think I can already do. But I there's a whole process that I have to go through before I'm actually ready to do the thing that you need me to do.

And so it may look like I'm not intervening. It may look like I'm doing nothing while I'm trying to find the ammunition for my weapon. But I'm actually in the process of trying to solve this problem, but it takes time. This is how it works with with nations. I mean, you think about, like, a a a policy for a country.

Say, for example, developing their economy, developing or or shifting the core focus of their economy, for example, they start implementing policies. Say they start implementing policies right now. You're not going to see the impact of that for ten years. Ten or fifteen years down the line, you'll see the the outcome for the decisions that were made in 2024. You're not going to see it until 2035 or 2040.

And people today might look at it and say, well, this person, this leader or that leader is is doing nothing. This ruler is doing nothing, but they're making decisions that have long term impact. Maybe we won't even live to see that impact, and maybe the ruler or the the leader himself or herself may not live to see the impact. They themselves may not live to see the outcome, but they're making decisions on the basis of the potentially limitless lifespan of their nation rather than making decisions on the basis of their own lifespan or the lifespan of the people who they are individually ruling right now in the present. So you have to make decisions and you have to implement policies with a long term vision in mind, and that means a long term moral outcome which between the outstart of that policy and the outcome of that policy, there may be years, there may be decades, there may be generations, but these are the these are this is the approach that responsible leaders have to make.

Now in the meantime, of course, they do have to deal with emergency situations, crisis situations, and what have you, but their approach to those things is always going to depend upon their, again, their available options. And and they may be working on they may be working on strategies for increasing the available options for the next ruler or the next ruler or the next ruler so that so that generations down the line, the people of their nation will have more options available to them than the people who are living right now. So I think that that's that's also a very important thing to remember when we're talking about so called realpolitik, and that for for leaders, for nations, this is a very long term scenario. They have to make decisions in in a way that, as I say, we may not even see outcome, but they're making decisions that can have a moral outcome, that have the intention of having a moral outcome, that they simply do not have the ability to achieve right now in our lifetime. I think it's important to remember that.

Yes. Just like a love rather. I will just continue with what you've just said about the long term vision that leaders, Muslim or Arab leaders, need to follow. Well, we'll have to look into because it's first of all, the Islamic principles, it ground grounding them and looking into real politics would force them into a long term vision. And one more thing, in some of those Muslim countries, their political system encouraged long term long term planning.

It's not a short term who gets into the office, how can I say, system where they have to only focus on the short term short term and what people need to hear to get into that seat, but also because it's a stable system where if not them, it's their their prodigy, their their family line that is going to be ruling that that place? And therefore, it it encourages them to look into the long term vision overall. I'm just looking at it from this this perspective that the long term vision rooted in ethics or rooted in Islamic principles is encouraging in such kind of political systems. On another thing, also the one of the what can Arab leaders do to balance realpolitik on the question of that? I think the what they are doing now, is the promote promoting unity with within the Ummah, within the other Muslim nations.

As you mentioned, brother Shahid, in your latest of the latest videos, how there is there has never been this kind of unity at a state level at a national level among the Muslim states and how that is actually placed well into the realpolitik and also the the what we are trying to achieve in terms of our principle Islamic principles. So these are things that the Muslim Arab leaders are doing, and we that that the people need support well, people need to support them. As brother MJ mentioned, it's not an easy environment to to be a leader when most of your public are exposed to a lot of propaganda against those leaders. And there are many examples that we will probably later on state on how the public is not really helping in that matter in that in that arena. But there are real politics, understanding real politics from the and from and and from other resources.

And even from what is going on now in in our in our in in the world is something that we are trying here in Middle Nation and also with this content talk, trying to spread among the people to to see it from a different different perspective and not necessarily what you hear. Like, you have people have to, you know, think or critically think about what they are hearing and just not accept it, not absorb everything that is out there. And what just think. I mean, we see so many media posts and all all over the social media about how other peep we let other people judge our environment or tell us about our own environment, which is really scary. And to believe them and to go ahead and even it's like self defeating, yet there are other people, other sector of our our people that are trying to collect that and trying to show them that, well, we there is no need to look into the upside.

We don't need any other people to tell us what is going on in our environment. We need what I'm trying to say is there is awareness of this kind of propaganda that is out there, which is a good sign, but we still need to work on and to help the Arab or Muslim or our leaders, our environment, our people, our scholars in that matter. We need to look into ourselves most most importantly, and that would definitely help us in gaining our ultimate goal of within the.

One key like, thank you very much, sister. But there was this one key point that you and brother Shay mentioned, which, in my opinion, is, like, the striking difference with the Western approach to realpolitik, which is especially about this short term side. And it's like, you know, brother Shaikh mentioned in many videos before, the politic politics in the West are basically you know, they say what people wanna hear, and then they make policies or they adopt policies for business just to be able to secure a place in the business. Right? And that's all they care about.

They do not care about the people. They do not care what will come after. And we can see this in different policies when you see how they approach it. And subhanAllah, this is very key difference. And then, you know, leaders, like, for example, China, when they have these five year plans for the economy, it is then criticized as being, you know, central planning or when Arab leaders do it, etcetera.

So very interesting distinction, and I'm very happy that you highlighted it because I think this is one of the major differences and, you know, one of the key pluses of the governments outside of the West that they really try to think about this, continue with it. Right? Like, what comes after me is my responsibility as well of the policies that I do now. You And, know, in economics, it takes time for the policies to take effect through the economy through when the subjects try to adopt to these policies, how they shift their behavior, even producers, consumers, etcetera. So it's very important to take into account these consequences of the policies and not just do whatever it takes me to get into business, to get this position, and whatever comes after.

I don't care. Right? And people usually tend to assess, like, the immediate consequences, and they do not see that, for example, the second term, it's already the consequence of the policies of your previous president. Right? So people usually just ascribe an outcome that is now happening to the current presidency or to the current party that is in the parliament, for example, or whatever field they might be in, the ones who are deciding now, but they do not see the it's a legacy.

Right? Like, the outcome that you have now is mostly due to the policies that were enacted in the previous term. Right? Yeah, this is very important, I think, for people to realize that if your economy is doing well now, it does not have to be because of the steps that your current leader did, but try to look at the previous four years what was being done. Alright?

And the same if it's negative, it's not due to the current leader. It's probably because of the previous leader. Alright? Also, I would like to type back, sorry, just for this, you know, step aside. I would try to you spoke about and brother Angie was speaking about before he cut off about, you know, that this narrative that is usually being brought up, right, with especially, of course, western Muslims, but we see it even among some people in our Ummah that the Arab governments are basically sellouts, and they work for the Zionist regime.