RIYADH, 10 August 2003 — While it is true that some Saudi nationals were among the terrorists of Sept. 11, it is a far cry from saying that the Saudi government or the Saudi people were somehow involved or condoned such a diabolical crime. If we accept this kind of logic, then we would conclude that the US government and the American people were somehow involved in terrorism because John Walker, an American citizen, was caught with the Taleban in Afghanistan.
Another charge leveled at Saudi Arabia in connection with terrorism is that the country’s educational system breeds terrorism. But if this is true, then the US educational system breeds racism and bigotry as the Ku Klux Klan amply demonstrates in its hatred of non-whites.
The Israeli expert used by some influential American circles to buttress their arguments about Saudi Arabia’s connection to terrorism by pointing to our educational system should look closer at home.
In a recent survey, it was found that 31 percent of Israel’s elementary students attend religious schools — a number unparalleled by any other country in the world. In fact some terrorism experts described the Sept. 11 terrorists as “adults with education and skill, not hopeless young zealots...they mingled in secular society, even drinking forbidden alcohol, hardly typical of Islamic militants.”
Terrorism expert, Ehud Sprinzak, went further by stating that these terrorists owed their allegiance, not to Islam or any religious belief, but to Osama bin Laden. As he put it, “Perhaps...loyalty to Osama bin Laden is even more powerful than the religious and nationalist fanaticism that has been behind other suicide attacks”.
Timothy McVeigh who was responsible for the Oklahoma City bombing and the unabomber, responsible for many terrorist acts in the US, were American citizens but in neither case did anyone jump to the conclusion that the two represented the American people or the American government and none of their families or relatives were accused of the crimes the two had committed.
This is a fair way of looking at things and no individual or nation should be tried and convicted by innuendo and guilt by association through selected leaks to the mass media by individuals who may have hidden agendas and who do not give the accused the chance to defend himself by facing his accusers.
I lived for many years in the US and I know that the American people are fair-minded and, if they are presented with the facts, they will pass a fair judgment.
This brings me to the recently published report by the US Congress on the causes of the 9/11 terrorist acts in the US, a heinous crime which Saudi Arabia and its people condemned in the strongest terms because Saudi Arabia itself had been the target of terrorism in the past.
The latest example was the terrorist bombing in Riyadh on May 12, 2003. Yet the Congressional report left out 28 pages that pertained to the role of Saudi Arabia on the pretext that US national security demanded it. But as Prince Saud Al-Faisal, the Saudi foreign minister, stated publicly “Saudi Arabia has nothing to hide” and he demanded that the deleted portions concerning the role of Saudi Arabia be published so that the American people and the whole world would know the facts and so judge for themselves. Congress gets its information from the likes of Dore Gold, the former Israeli Likud ambassador, hardly an objective observer in this regard, and from Sen. Charles Schumer of New York, a well known supporter of Israel and a biased critic of Saudi Arabia. Innuendoes and trial by the mass media without presenting facts is a form of blackmail if not a form of terrorism.
— Dr. Sulaiman Al-Juraid is Member of the Shoura Council.
