Yet there are still some mosques in remote areas of Pakistan where, after Friday prayers, imams pray for the health and long life of the Ottoman Caliph—even though the last Ottoman ruler died long ago. These prayers are often followed by supplications for the victories of Muslims in Palestine, Cyprus, and Kashmir against the “kuffar” (infidels). The invocation for the Ottoman Caliph is a remnant of the Khilafat Movement of the 1920s, a pan-Islamic campaign against British rule that was supported by Mahatma Gandhi and sections of Indian Muslim leadership.

The Khilafat Movement was led by Mohammad Ali Johar, a distinguished journalist, writer, poet, and orator. He died in London in 1931 while attending the First Round Table Conference. He was later buried in Jerusalem, near the Al-Aqsa Mosque, at the request of the then Grand Mufti of Palestine, Amin al-Husseini.

“We feel happy when bombs fall over Tel Aviv,” said Amar Ali Jan, a prominent Pakistani leftist leader and president of the Pakistan Workers Party, in his recent interview. “I do not trust the American people,” he added—ironically, he has done his PHD from an American University. “Israel has attacked Muslims. Iran is on the frontline against imperialist forces.” Amar Ali Jan is not alone in expressing such views.

During the Khilafat Movement, Gandhi and Deobandi clerics found themselves aligned, creating widespread religious and political fervor among Muslims in South Asia. The Indian National Congress, Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind, and even segments of the Communist Party of India.

Another leftist figure, musician Taimur Rehman of the band Laal, in a video on social media, linked Zionists to the Epstein files and alleged global conspiracies involving child exploitation networks. Such narratives are not isolated. Across........

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