Fact and fiction: Germany’s affair with Jihad

German author Stephen Kopetzky’s novel 'Risk' launched at KLF

KARACHI: German author Setphen Kopetzky views ISIS and Taliban as different. According to him, ISIS has a completely different structure which has nothing to do with Islam. Germans tried to use religion as a weapon making indirect wars too but the today's crisis is really a disease of politics, he shared.

Stephen Kopetzky was speaking at the launch of his latest book 'Risk' on the second day of the seventh Karachi Literature Festival. Kopetzky has authored seven books including travelogues. He was sharing his views on the current militant crisis that is pervasive in the world. Linking the contents of his book that deal with a concept of German Jihad, he said the book is connected to what is happening now.

"In World War I, the Ottoman Empire was a friend of Germany," he said, adding that today it is the connection with the nearer East especially with respect to the influx of refugees. "Europe is not a fortress. It is open to the world," he said.



While Kopetzky commended moderator Mohammad Hanif's work on 'A Case of Exploding Mangoes' for inspiring him into creating his own protagonist, a German soldier, Hanif queried him about German Jihad and how it came into being.

"Well, they (Germans) invented it," he said, elaborating that Germans are known for good planning and organisation. The plan for World War I was to go to France and beat them and in six weeks bring back troops and defeat Russia.

"After four weeks it was clear that the plan was not working," he said. He then narrated an account of a certain German diplomat in Cairo who went to Berlin and became the head of secret intelligence. According to Kopetzky, he came up with a masterplan, a memorandum of revolutionising Islamic territories of enemies as every Muslim country was a colony, of either France or the British. Kopetzky then read out some excerpts from his novel indicating the onset of German Jihad and the need of Ottoman Empire as an ally.

According to Kopetzky, although he has quoted the real masterplans of Berlins in his novel, it is the ending that he has invented. The novel ends towards a mention of submarines in Karachi, a symbol so strong that it becomes the means to surrender. To which Hanif cheekily added that yes that is what we do in Karachi anyway, we turn stories around.

Answering a question as to why he did not narrate history straightaway and instead chose to write a novel, Kopetzky said that being a novelist this is what he does. "History with characters, emotions and metaphors. This is what we do."