In the aftermath of last week’s bombings in London, it is becoming evident that the war on terrorism as proclaimed is simply not doing its job. In whatever corner of the world, when mutated individuals mercilessly kill and maim innocent civilians, we are not any safer than before.
From Madrid to Bali, from the WTC to London now, terrorists struck randomly at civilians who had no doing in whatever these criminals’ twisted minds chose to perceive as injustice. Whatever their grievance may have been, there is no sane justification in the acts they carried out for they were nothing short of murderous ones. Suicide bombings of the innocent is but a quick trip not to heavenly heights but to the pits of eternal damnation.
Terrorism against the innocent has risen dramatically in recent years. Carried out by militants and extremists against groups or individuals, or sponsored by states in the form of military aggression and occupation that are rarely highlighted, it is terrorism nonetheless.
The number of victims in those places I’ve mentioned pale beyond comparison to the numbers of the innocent that have needlessly lost their lives in Afghanistan, Palestine and Iraq, where no mention of the word “terrorism” is ever brought up to explain the loss of over a hundreds thousand innocent souls who had nothing to do with bombings elsewhere. Instead, we are told these souls were “collateral damage”.
Try explaining to relatives of the innocent victims of Iraq that their departed kin were a result of “collateral damage”. Or in Afghanistan or Palestine. I would strongly guess that they wouldn’t be in the least amused. If I were a betting man or a statistician, I would not be at folly to believe that more innocent people have tragically lost their lives since Mr. Bush donning the cloak of a crusader took office and announced his “war on terror”.
His “war of terror” against the civilians of Fallujah and other cities in Iraq is well documented in scores of war crime journals by those independently covering events in Iraq. Afghanistan is another killing field where there has been no respite from pointless death. And before one rolls his eyes and assumes this is another diatribe against the United States, let me assure you it is not. The killings were real, the occupation and selective torture is real, and it goes on day in and day out to this day.
This state-sponsored terrorism in the guise of democracy or freedom for the people rings hollow from such lofty pedestals when one witnesses the gruesome carnage that has resulted. And the civilians who have lost their lives as a consequence of the aggression in Afghanistan or Iraq are no different or lesser in value than those elsewhere. Only their relatives are being told that this is good for them. That this will make them free.
Free from what? The ghosts of the departed will forever haunt their living days. How can we expect any normalcy for or from them in the face of continued occupation and violence? No amount of consolation can rid the searing pain of loss, of loved ones who are no longer with you, be it in London, Bali or Baghdad.
Whatever the real agendas behind the continued occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq may be, they remain craftily hidden. Meanwhile, more elements of the would-be subversives are free to use this state-sponsored terrorism as their degenerative call to arms. Tragically, they will continue to target the innocent.
