Nearly two years since the onset of COVID-19 pandemic and a number of natural disasters, including forest fires in Greece and floods in Germany, China, and several European countries, the landscape has become fertile ground for the exploitation of these crises. A number of political Islamist movements and terrorist organizations are doing so by putting significant focus on religion as an explanation for these crises, and a lifeline for people amid the chaos. This phenomenon is growing in third world societies, especially in the Arab region, due to the spread of extremist Salafist groups, as well as the prevalence of a weak educational system.

Hardline religious discourse 

This extremist religious discourse, which is spreading throughout the Arab region, has two main themes.

1. Invoking the notion of divine punishment: Many Salafi religious groups have interpreted the recent pandemic and natural disasters as divine punishment for people’s deviation from religious laws. This prompted these groups to use religious slogans to attract citizens and issue calls for marches and protests. A number of countries, including Morocco, Algeria, Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, and Pakistan, witnessed a marked response to these calls at the onset of the pandemic.
   
2. Rejection of precautionary measures: Extremist Sunni Salafist and Shiites went a step further, escalating the situation by rejecting precautionary and preventive measures imposed in some Arab countries. These included banning large gatherings, temporarily suspending religious rituals and prayers in mosques, and temporarily closing places of worship, having halted Friday prayers to prevent the spread of COVID-19. There was significant pushback to these measures by a number of religious groups, despite the issuance of religious fatwas from the official religious institutions in the region, and in particular Al-Azhar, affirming the legitimacy of these decisions.
   
   Despite this, fatwas by Islamic groups that view the pandemic as divine punishment refused to halt religious rituals, arguing that such a move would exacerbate the spread of the virus rather than curb it, and that the virus does not infect believers. This had an impact on the level of adherence to precautionary measures, and increased support for such groups.
   
   Several Shiite sects in Iraq’s Karbala and Najaf objected to disrupting religious rites by stopping Friday and congregational prayers in mosques. The Iraqi Shiite preacher Qasim al-Ta’i issued a fatwa calling for continued congregational and Friday prayers. In response to an inquiry sent by one of his followers regarding the closure of some holy sites in anticipation of the spread of the virus, Al-Ta’i said, “the virus does not infect believers.” This was in response to Iraq’s most prominent Shiite preacher Ali al-Sistani, who promoted the halt of group prayers in light of the pandemic. This fatwa was rejected by leader of the Iraqi Sadrist movement Muqtada al-Sadr, who refused to prevent Friday prayers, with thousands of his supporters gathering to pray at the Kufa Mosque after the government’s decision to stop Friday prayers.

Making political gains

These developments invoked a historical link between the rise of religious organizations and situations of crisis. The Muslim Brotherhood was established during the 1920s, a time of global economic crisis, which followed the Spanish flu epidemic. This pattern was repeated with the emergence of the jihad militant organization in the aftermath of the June 1967 war in Egypt. Extremist groups have traditionally sought to exploit disasters and crises to increase recruitment, presenting them as a consequence of turning away from faith.

Many groups tried to exploit the recent crises to make political gains:

1. Putting pressure on ruling regimes: This appears to have been the Muslim Brotherhood’s chosen tactic, as some of its leaders spoke out against the  suspension of group prayers. Wagdy Ghoneim, an Islamist close to the group, commented on the Egyptian government’s decision to temporarily suspend group prayers in mosques, saying, “I ask people to pray in congregation in the streets in front of mosques.” This was repeated by some Salafi sheikhs in Alexandria, who called on citizens to go out to the streets to pray in large groups, a call supported by some members of the Muslim Brotherhood abroad with the aim of politically exploiting the pandemic to rally their followers and pressure governments.
   
2. Attracting new members: Some Salafists and Shiite sects close to the Iranian regime have been active in exploiting recent crises, ISIS, for example, announced through its Al-Nabaa newspaper that the spread of the virus is a signal of God’s wrath against non-Islamic societies. The group called on people to repent and join the organization in order to avoid calamity.

Despite regional and international efforts to combat the spread of the pandemic and its  economic consequences, some extremist groups are working to exploit the situation, attracting more followers and expressing an increasingly more radical discourse, which may result in another turn to violence  on their part.