As we live in a confused world guided by biased media, mercenaries will thrive and flourish in their swamps by inflicting damage, hijacking friendships, causing chaos and creating mayhem.
We all recall that half a century ago King Abdul Aziz, the founder of Saudi Arabia, hosted US President Roosevelt on the shores of the Red Sea. A word of honor was all that both leaders could share and agree to. To the Saudis, this word carried solidarity, fraternity and pride. To the Americans, it meant honesty, impartiality and chivalry. To the enemies of both nations, this represented trivialities, loss of freedom and impurity.
Against all odds, the Saudis survived the enemies’ backlash and overcame their resentment. Equally today, in the wake of the barbaric attacks on WTC and the Pentagon, the Saudis are facing even more xenophobic hostilities, but still stand tall and strong, holding to their word of honor, exercising patience in time of distress, not because of self-pride and valor, but due to their belief and conviction in destiny. Undoubtedly, it is Islam, peace and tranquillity that harnessed this pragmatic vision of our leaders’.
Islam has stringent laws and codes to combat terrorism with unprecedentedly successful results, so much so that Saudi Arabia enjoys a high degree of security with the lowest crime rate, robberies and human rights abuses per capita. However, those communities, who blame Saudi Arabia for religious intolerance and insanity have opted to harbor the fugitive terrorists and nourish their human rights ego.
Others try to frighten the world with audio-visual terror, perpetuating social injustice, reacting with joy to the miseries of the vanquished and provoking insanity through self-created rights and wrongs. Felonious activities, crime rate, drug abuse and sexually transmitted terminal diseases devour the essence of their life. Today, these communities remain shameful and confused due to their inhumane activities and despicable acts of atrocities.
Those communities — rather than the Saudis — should be asked to change their educational curriculum, repair their decadent social structure and replace their man-made laws with God’s edict.
Over the past three decades, 60 percent of the Saudi investment abroad (amounting to $700 billion) has gone to the US, creating half a million jobs and securing over one trillion dollars worth of trade in favor of US companies. Whereas Saudi Arabia strongly backed the US during the Cold War era, joined the free world in the creation of the World Bank and IMF and vigorously tapped its energy resources to stabilize the world economy, other countries, supported by the mercenaries, deprived the American tax payers of social benefits, injected into the US foreign policy their intolerance and joyfully exposed the wrong deeds of US politicians while strengthening their enemies in the making. It must be self-defeating and grossly unrealistic to question whether the Saudis are still a friend or foe.
It is no secret that Saudi Arabia has always supported the Palestinian struggle to free their occupied homeland, as much as the civilized world legitimately supported George Washington to win freedom for his country from Britain, Churchill and De Gaulle to drive the Nazis out of Europe and Nelson Mandela to dismantle apartheid regime in South Africa.
However, many forget that the appalling acts of terror delivered by Hitler, Mussolini, Oswald, McVeigh, WACO fanatics and KKK militias were inspired neither by the Palestinians nor by Muslims. They were all conducted by people in the heart of the Western world and those who grew up imbibing Western culture and values. How can such mercenaries equate the stone-throwing kids of Palestine with the colonizers and occupiers of their homeland?
In our global village, evil may spin along many axis, perpetuate in various domains and horrifically hide as an exorcist. The war against terror should smoke those mercenaries out from within, exposing their pernicious philosophies and mischievously hidden goals. They seek to terrorize intelligent minds, break the bonds of alliances and snipe in the dark. Their activities will undoubtedly inflict a more devastating damage than that resulted from the Sept. 11 attacks.
Twisting facts and dishonoring history could fatally aggravate tolerance, but will never threaten civic liberty or demean the word of honor.
After all, this word is all what sure friends can still cherish.
— Dr. Fawaz Al-Alamy is deputy minister of commerce