Time and place are two factors that greatly influence our judgment of an event. Last year’s attacks in the United States were extraordinarily terrible from a Western perspective but an ordinary event from a Middle Eastern standpoint.
The violent acts spawned by Jamaa Islamiya, Al-Qaeda, Al-Zawahari or Abu Hafs plus the Algerian butcherings are far more hideous. As daily witnesses to terrorist and extremist attacks right across the Arab world, Arabs cannot be shocked or surprised by the Sept. 11 events.
Evidently, the reaction of the US authorities toward the attack is identical to the reaction of Arab governments when their people have been victims of similar attacks by these same groups. All these governments swing into action, determined to stamp out the perpetrators with military power. They are evidently wrong because a cultural problem can never be solved militarily. Guns may win battles but they will not win every war. There is a big difference between a group bound together by professional militarism under a powerful leader such as Abu Nidal and a movement working on an ideological basis such as Al-Qaeda. The Abu Nidal group will last only so long as his personal influence prevails and will disappear when he weakens or disappears. On the other hand, Al-Qaeda is a way of thinking, with followers running into thousands or perhaps even millions. It is capable of surviving for a long time and of launching wars even if Osama Bin Laden and his companions are dead and gone. The US might succeed in defeating Al-Qaeda in open battlefields, but weapons of mass destruction cannot eliminate the organization’s strength as long as its ideology has an appeal to certain people. This is a cultural issue that the US has totally failed to understand or come to terms with.
Egypt has been successful to a remarkable extent in dealing with extremists while the Algerian government has not. The Egyptian movements lost ground because the common man there was revolted by the bloody horrors committed by extremists in the streets of Cairo and in Upper Egypt. With the support of the common man, the government weakened the fundamentalist forces though not all of its appeal. The cultural war against extremists, which the government has launched, is a long process. But, it will undoubtedly succeed in rooting out the religious ideologies that are based on armed struggle.
The US will not win the war against Al-Qaeda or any other such organization without a cultural confrontation with Al-Qaeda. The US cannot succeed in this without taking the Muslim world into its confidence. It may be true that the Muslim world is not much concerned with the present American woes but it would spring to attention if the US understood Muslim issues and extended some sympathy. The US should recognize that the challenges faced by both the US and the Muslim world are basically the same. The same ideology of violence and its accompanying bloody acts could happen in Cairo, Kuala Lumpur, New York or Paris. In order to win the war against terror, it is basic that the US learn to distinguish between the angry but spontaneous outburst of Arab emotions against the US and the activities of extremist organizations. Though both are opposed to the US, only the activities of the armed groups pose a threat or a danger. While winning the war against Al-Qaeda will never be possible without first winning Muslim hearts, the US has already lost many of them by exaggerated security procedures in the US where Muslims and Arabs are involved.
