JEDDAH, 23 October — It is interesting to hear what Americans say about the events in Afghanistan. One American reader observed that of the 900 people allegedly killed in bombing raids, none would have died if the Taleban had handed over Bin Laden. Well, first of all, the Taleban have told the US repeatedly that they would hand over Bin Laden if they were shown evidence that he is guilty. But the US government continues to refuse to do this. Whatever happened to the cornerstone of American law — innocent until proven guilty? Is the US judge, jury and executioner all in one? Or has that role been given to the American mass media? If it is true that Bin Laden is indeed responsible, why not present evidence? By doing so, the US would not only gain more respect but also more support from Arab and Muslim countries.
The US specifically said that it would hit military targets. If that is the case, how can the continuous dropping of bombs on houses be explained? And what about the 2,000-pound bomb that mistakenly hit a civilian area and killed dozens?
According to CNN, the military claims that terrorists could have been hiding in those houses. Do they plan to bomb every house in Afghanistan, killing the innocent and those presumed guilty? What about the sophisticated intelligence and satellite images? Or is all that nothing but newspaper rubbish and hype?
If the US really had a genuine altruistic motive in eliminating terrorists, why hasn’t it removed Saddam Hussein long before now? And why in the past has it propped up other dictators? What about the tanks that recently entered the Palestinian territories killing innocent people? Is that not terrorism? Just what is the US definition of terrorism? Does it define the word according to its own “national interests”?
The US — the so called “defender of human rights” — has not been re-elected to the UN human rights body. It has also refused to sign the UN treaty banning land mines. Can any sane person explain where is the humanity in that? And then George Bush tells reporters in the White House that he does not understand — is even “amazed” — that so many people all over the world hate the US!
No thinking person objects to freedom or real democracy; all thinking people, however, object to hypocrisy, double standards and inconsistencies. And American foreign policy is perceived to be riddled with all three.
Many Americans say that it is easy to criticize the United States for its foreign policy because it is a superpower. The UK, on the other hand, has not been criticized for its foreign policy but it was nonetheless the first country to join the US in its anti-terrorist campaign. Exactly my point. Demonstrators in Jakarta, Islamabad, Manama and other cities and towns in the world have been seen burning the American flag, not the British one. Effigies of George W. Bush are seen burning and being stamped upon but there have been no effigies of Tony Blair. Americans need to ask themselves why the Sept. 11 tragedies happened in the US. Why not the UK, Russia, France, Germany and China?
How many Americans have asked themselves those questions? And of the number who have asked, how many have had the courage to answer truthfully? How many have even listened to a dissenting view?
There was a time in American history when a statesman said to his opponents, “I may not agree with what you say but I will defend to the death your right to say it.” Where is that kind of honesty and straightforwardness which is what the world has come to admire and expect of America? Its unfortunate absence from most of the current discussions is itself one of the problems. We should note that British foreign policy has not been criticized because the UK does not veto every single resolution in the UN Security Council that calls for an end to Israeli aggression and that Israel should be punished for its actions.
The UK did not withdraw from the Durban conference because Israel was accused of being a “racist nation”. How can Israeli policies be viewed as anything but racist? Its Arab citizens are treated as second-class and lack the same rights as its Jewish ones. It demolishes people’s houses and destroys their agricultural lands simply because those people are Arabs. It builds settlements on land whose Arab owners have been expelled at gunpoint. What is this but racism? No court in America would uphold such actions in the US. Why do the Americans support them in Israel?
The UK has not given Israel $90 billion in aid over the past decade so that it can continue to commit atrocities against the Palestinians. Bullets that kill and maim innocent Palestinian children are not made in the UK but in the US and are freely supplied to the Israelis.
King Abdallah of Jordan pointed out in a CNN interview, “None of this would have happened if America did not have such a biased policy in the Middle East.” Every farmer and every amateur gardener knows that in order to get rid of harmful weeds, they must be pulled up by the roots. It is useless to simply cut away the part that is above the soil; the roots remain underground and in time will sprout again. Instead of studying the reasons that led to the inexcusable and horrible tragedies on Sept. 11, instead of getting at the roots, the anger and hurt of the world’s only superpower has led to the killing of more innocent civilians. What happens in the world media if even one American citizen is killed anywhere in the world? All major wire services pick up the story and give it prominence.
But when innocent non-white Afghanis are killed in air raids, they are merely “military mistakes” — or that awful euphemism, “collateral damage”. There is no question that the terrorist acts must be condemned in the strongest possible terms. Condemning them, however, does not mean that what caused them should be ignored. By ignoring the cause, we are leaving the way open to future terrorist acts. Those who committed the acts in New York and Washington should not be allowed to tarnish the image of Islam; Islam forbids the killing of innocent noncombatants.
Those who committed the terrorist acts did so because in their souls they hated America. But they did not hate America because of its democracy, its freedom and liberty. They hated it because of its biased and unfair foreign policies that result in the killing, suffering and displacement of innocent civilians. In the Middle East, those innocent civilians are usually Palestinians and, to add insult to injury, the White House and the US media continue to blame the Palestinians for the problem and call them “terrorists”.
If Americans really want to know why their country is hated, I have given them some things to think about.
It is strange and incomprehensible how Americans inevitably boast of their freedom when they are in fact restricted by their government’s actions and policies. What did Americans do when they learned that because of sanctions against Iraq, 500,000 children had died in that unfortunate country? Only a small group of Americans demonstrated against sanctions in front of the White House and they were later arrested.
People all over the world ask why the majority of Americans — if they are as Bush called them “good people who stand for democracy and freedom” — turn a blind eye and a deaf ear when their government is the cause of so much injustice; when their government refuses to join a UN treaty for banning land mines; when their government has caused the death of hundreds of innocent and defenseless people; when weapons made in their factories kill innocent children every day?
These are the questions that are foremost in the minds of fair-minded people all over the world.
