by Ayesha Ahmad
04/12/2001
Good Muslim, bad Muslim. Time was, not too long ago, these terms meant something along the lines of "a Muslim who tries to follow the Qur'an" versus "a Muslim in name only."
Now - if you go by the editorials, scholarly opinions (from Muslims and non-Muslims alike) and articles about Muslims pervading today's American media, you'd think a good Muslim is one who waves a flag or supports Bush, and a bad Muslim is one who criticizes U.S. foreign policy or Israel, or condemns the airstrikes on Afghanistan.
In the past two and a half months' of intense media scrutiny on Islam and Muslims, I have not yet heard one voice in the American media daring to say that there are those of us who believe that the true Islamic system is better than capitalist secular democracy and at the same time unambiguously condemn violence against innocent civilians.
Can I express my belief that Islam is truly the answer - in all ways - without being accused of such crimes as being a terrorist, harboring terrorists, supporting terrorist groups, or perhaps having once caught sight of someone on the street three years ago who may or may not have sent money last year to someone in Saudi Arabia with the same last name as one of the suspected hijackers?
Oh wait - they're not "suspected" anymore. It's been proven that if you were an Arab on one of the doomed flights, you were one of the terrorists. Actually, one of them even rose from his ashy grave recently to explain to federal prosecutors how his passport flew out the window before the plane hit so it could be found two blocks away unscathed. No, really: I mean, how else could the government be so sure?
According to a BBC report, one of these fanatically devout Muslims even sent a letter to his German girlfriend just before the attack, saying he did what he had to do and she should be proud of him. Anyone else catch the irony here, or is it just me?
But, I digress. All this sarcasm arose in response to a November 19 Washington Times editorial by columnist Suzanne Fields, entitled, "Who are the good Muslims?"
Fields, in the best tradition of the new breed of sudden scholars on Islam, says that, "the Islamists seek to create a revolution in social values designed to destroy the freedoms we take for granted."
The "Islamists" she refers to are the general population of Muslims across the Muslim world who believe in an Islamic political system - as she says, "in several Arab countries [Iran, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Algeria] where political ideology cannot be separated from faith." Aside from the fact that Iran and Algeria aren't really Arab countries, she says that Islamic faith-tainted political ideology is "puritanical, confrontational, repressive and anti-modern."
I'm not Arab either - or Iranian or Algerian, fancy that - but I'm waiting for just one of these new scholars to prove that the way of life proscribed by our beloved Prophet (saw) is repressive, or against the best of modernity (as opposed to modernism), or violently confrontational: and I have to say I resent the association with the witch-burning, fearful Puritans.
Fields refers to a "scholar" named Charles Freund, who says that the U.S. is seen as an enemy of Islamists because "America's seductive and pervasive secular culture undermines their revolutionary goals." I spent a few minutes trying to figure out what the heck he was talking about, and then I realized he was just echoing what our president said the week after the attacks: "They hate our freedoms."
Fields also slams Columbia University professor Edward Said, well-known for his deep scholarship in books like "Orientalism" and "Culture and Imperialism." Said, alas, is Palestinian, so Fields must disregard him and his view of the West as responsible for "Othering" the East, because he "threw rocks at Israeli soldiers on the West Bank and said it made him feel good." Apparently, as a scholar, even a Palestinian one, he ought to be above feeling so strongly about his homeland being illegally occupied and denied independent statehood for decades.
And finally, Fields brings in the director of the Middle East Forum in Philadelphia, Daniel Pipes, whom she names both a "scholar" - because he "knew" before September 11 of the "peril to the West in the Islamist philosophy" - and as a "prophet" because he warned beforehand about militant Muslims in the U.S. Because of Pipes' scholarship and prophetic abilities, Fields is able to warn us that we must distinguish between "faithful Muslims who are good Americans and the malign fanatics of the faith," - the latter of whom she says represent major Muslim organizations here.
Can you feel the eyes watching you, all of a sudden? Do you hear the whispers as you walk the streets, heads turning briefly at your too-long beard or the scarf wrapped around your head?
Fields is using these scholars to justify her right to say prejudiced things, complaining that Bush is too nice to us Muslims and that "we" - I guess she means Americans other than me - must remember that not all Muslims in America are worth being nice to. I suppose because "they hate our freedoms."
I should say before I go further that anyone who quotes Daniel Pipes as a scholar - or as a "prophet" - perhaps should not be taken so seriously, but the fact is that Pipes, and his sidekick, Steven Emerson, are respected in some corners. One New Jersey senator said that Emerson's 1994 "Jihad in America" video "'played a real role' in winning House passage of the recent anti-terrorism bill,' according to a Nov. 14 Washington Post article. Scary, huh?
Fields, on the other hand, frames her editorial with references to the newfound liberation of the Afghans from the Taliban, specifically in terms of men who were shaving their beards and women who were "radiant" when they "threw away their veils in Kabul." She takes a token stab at hijab (Islamic headscarves) when she says a woman who covers modestly "and exotically" - what on earth does that mean? - can still be beautiful "wearing cloth of many colors, cut in sensual lines, but forcing her to hide her beauty is a cruel insult to femininity."
Well, Fields has every right to her opinion (and I agree that forcing it, which is un-Islamic anyway, is a bad thing) but her expression of it here only adds to the sublime ethnocentrism of her editorial - once again, that women around the world must have the kind of Western "liberation" that forces them to display their femininity for all to see. Why is it so hard for Fields to understand that we "veiled" Muslim women find our liberation in another way, express our femininity by the way we choose to protect it? Ms. Fields, nobody is asking you to wear a hijab, so please get over it and let me wear mine in peace!
This brings me to another point. At a recent conference on Palestine here in Washington, a number of panelists expressed their frustration with the feeling that if they want to explain to someone why Palestinians are victims, they have to start in 1948 and tell entire tomes of information in order to make people understand.
I know how they feel. I'm tired of having to talk for ten years to explain why I'm not oppressed, why Islam is not evil, why Muslims are not violent, or why some Muslim countries repress their own people but Islam doesn't. Oh well, at least now I don't have to explain where Pakistan is anymore! (That's where I'm from. Pakistan is not an Arab country either, by the way.)
But, I understand my responsibility to keep explaining anyway. So here it is: Ms. Fields, and every other columnist out there is paving the way for a real repression of Muslims' freedom of religion in this free country.
And to all Muslims who are apologizing for something they carry no culpability for:
Yes, this country gives us freedoms we wouldn't have anywhere else, especially in "Muslim" countries. We should understand and appreciate them, and give thanks to Allah for providing us with the opportunities provided by living here. As a journalist, I find the most important freedom in the First Amendment, and I claim the rights given to me by that historical paragraph to say the following:
Islam is the Truth, given to us by our Lord repeatedly throughout history and culminating in the final message of the Prophet Muhammad (saw).
Islam is not a religion, but a deen - a way of life, all-encompassing, touching everything from the core of one's personal spirituality to the election of the head of state. (Yes, election.) Islam's social, political and economic systems are the only truly just systems because they come not from other people, who are fallible and have their own motives, but from the Creator, Whose guidance is perfect and Who knows what is best for His creation.
Islam is ultimately the only hope against the tyrannies of oppressive regimes around the world, and the tyrannies we are shielded from within the borders of the superpower we call home. As Muslims, we must accept that someday, by the grace of Allah, we can have a real Islamic state - not the brutal dictatorships or puppet excuses that exist today - in which people of all races and creeds can live peacefully, practicing their own faiths, under the just legislation of God, where Muslims' practice of true Islam can shine with a light strong enough to reach the most hardened hearts.
And we believe in this possibility without an inch of room for accepting the kind of violence we saw on September 11. We reclaim the true meaning of being a good Muslim by denouncing injustice and wanton bloodshed, and by unequivocally upholding the message we were put on this earth to proclaim. (IslaimcOnline)
Violence, Lies, and Videotape
By Imad-ad-Dean Ahmad, Ph.D.
Minaret of Freedom Institute
16/11/2001
The first casualty of war is truth. The astonishing amount of deception - including self-deception - on all sides since the September 11 tragedies demonstrate the accuracy of that cliché. Let's take a quick tour of the falsehoods floating around amid the flames and smoke of the violence from New York to Kandahar, and the talking heads from the American media to Osama bin Laden's videotape missives to al-Jazeera.
One tremendously significant issue concerning self-deception is the question as to against whom this war is being fought. U.S. President George W. Bush's administration's claim that this is not a war against Islam, is a fair one, for they have made it a point to avoid attacking Islam as a religion or a belief system, despite urgings to the contrary from usual corners. But the claim that it is not a war against Muslims is a hollow claim indeed. Not only is it Muslims who are the victims now in Afghanistan, but it is Muslims who are on the target list for the future. Iraq, Hizbullah, and the Sudan are on the list, while Irish, South American and (it need hardly be noted) Israeli terrorists are not.
One prime example of self-deception seems to be in the news media over the question of "who did it"? Neither the Western media nor the Muslim press wants to admit that we just don't know who the planners behind the attack were. In his videotapes, bin Laden seems to be sure it was committed by Muslims inspired by him - although he is quick to add that he had nothing to do with it directly. Well, obviously, Mohammad Atta professed being a Muslim, but was he recruited by fanatical members of al-Qaeda, by secular Iraqi agents or by emphatically non-Muslim Israeli agents? All three views have proponents who insist they know the truth, but no one has any evidence.
Consider the Kuwaiti press who held a press conference in Washington, DC, last week to demonstrate freedom of the press in Kuwait. One of the editors from the Gulf emirate restated the discredited notion that Israel had warned off 4,000 Israeli citizens from going to the World Trade Center on September 11. The genesis of this rumor is typical of the genesis of all gossip. Israeli media had begun to mourn the four thousand (American) Jews estimated to work in the World Trade Center. This was misreported as a reference to 4,000 Israeli citizens. When the Arab press reported that there were not 4,000 Israeli citizens at the World Trade Center that day, the story spread that 4,000 Israelis must have been warned to stay away.
But Americans are as eager to jump to conclusions as Arabs. In a sloppy attempt to discredit the above-mentioned story, Truthorfiction.com (2001) also asserted a claim that five Israelis were arrested for dancing on a rooftop in New Jersey while videotaping the destruction of the World Trade Center. In fact, five Israelis WERE arrested (Radler 2001). While the American media generally ignored this story, the Israeli media celebrated their subsequent release. Of course, Israeli media deplored the fact that these five Israelis were held without charge on secret evidence, making no mention of the one thousand Muslims now being held without charge on secret evidence.
It is not just the Arab press and American Internet sites that propagate rumors as fact. A reporter for USA Today in attendance at the press conference insisted to me that hard evidence proving bin Laden funded the September 11 events had been published in her newspaper. When I asked her what this evidence was, she said there was proof that bin Laden's chief financial officer had sent money to Mohammad Atta. I asked for a specific citation, but she was unable to provide it, insisting that it had been in "all the papers". So I tracked down the citation myself. Here is the exact quotation (McCoy and Cauchon 2001): "Perhaps the clearest way to show the difficulty authorities face is to examine what is publicly known about $100,000 wired about a year ago to Mohamed Atta, a reported leader of the hijackers who carried out the Sept. 11 attacks. Investigators say they believe the money came from Shaykh Sai'id, a reputed top bin Laden finance lieutenant in the United Arab Emirates." A "belief" that an event happened does not constitute proof that it happened.
Much of the confusion, of course, stems from the need to get news out under tight deadlines with various players trying to put their own spin on fast-breaking events. On November 15, the Washington Post reported that the Pentagon called the release of the aid workers previously held by the Taliban a "rescue" even though they were "turned over peacefully by the Taliban" (Kaufman and Graham 2001). On November 16, the same newspaper clarifies the issue by stating that the aid workers were freed by troops identifying themselves with the Northern Alliance but seemingly under the command of a local tribal leader who had defected from the Taliban (Moore 2001).
Such confusion under pressure, however, will not excuse the self-deception in the exultant attitude that the fall of Kabul marks victory for America in the war against terrorism. The fall of Kabul is a victory for the Northern Alliance, without doubt. It is a victory for the Afghani people who are now free to listen to music and to shave their beards and remove their burqas provided the Afghani factions do not plunge the country into the same kind of a horrific civil war that brought the Taliban to power in the first place. But a victory against terrorism? Have the media and the commentators already forgotten that the U.S. objective in the attack on Afghanistan was to capture bin Laden and the al-Qaeda leadership? Unfortunately for the cause of truth, the war isn't over yet.
Terrorism: the word itself is dangerous
The greatest threat to world peace today is clearly "terrorism" not the behavior to which the word is applied but the word itself. For years, people have recited the truisms that "one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter" and that "terrorism, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder." However, with the world's sole superpower declaring an open-ended, worldwide "war on terrorism," the notorious subjectivity of this word is no longer a joke.
It is no accident there is no agreed definition of "terrorism," since the word is so subjective as to be devoid of meaning. At the same time, the word is extremely dangerous, because people tend to believe that it does have meaning and to use and abuse the word by applying it to whatever they hate as a way of avoiding rational thought and discussion and, frequently, excusing their own illegal and immoral behavior.
There is no shortage of precise verbal formulations for the diverse acts to which the word "terrorism" is often applied. "Mass murder," "assassination," and "sabotage" are available (to which the phrase "politically motivated" can be added if appropriate), and such crimes are already on the statute books, rendering specific criminal legislation for "terrorism" unnecessary. However, such precise formulations do not carry the overwhelming, demonizing and thought-deadening impact of the word "terrorism," which is precisely the charm of the word for its more cynical and unprincipled users and abusers. If someone commits "politically motivated mass murder," people might be curious as to the cause or grievances which inspired such a crime, but no cause or grievance can justify (or even explain) "terrorism," which, all right-thinking people agree, is the ultimate evil.
Most acts to which "terrorism" is applied (at least in the West) are tactics of the weak, usually (although not always) against the strong. Such acts are not a tactic of choice but of last resort. To cite one example, the Palestinians would prefer to fight for their freedom by "respectable" means, using F-16s, Apache attack helicopters and laser-guided missiles such as those the United States provides to Israel. If the United States provided such weapons to Palestine as well, the problem of suicide bombers would be solved. Until it does, and for so long as the Palestinians can see no hope for a decent future, no one should be surprised or shocked that Palestinians use the "delivery systems" available to them their own bodies. Genuine hope for something better than a life worse than death is the only cure for the despair which inspires such gruesome violence.
In this regard, it is worth noting that the poor, the weak and the oppressed rarely complain about "terrorism." The rich, the strong and the oppressors constantly do. While most of mankind has more reason to fear the high-technology violence of the strong than the low-technology violence of the weak, the fundamental mind-trick employed by the abusers of the epithet "terrorism" (no doubt, in some cases, unconsciously) is essentially this: The low-technology violence of the weak is such an abomination that there are no limits on the high-technology violence of the strong which can be deployed against it.
Not surprisingly, since Sept. 11, virtually every recognized state confronting an insurgency or separatist movement has eagerly jumped on the "war on terrorism" bandwagon, branding its domestic opponents (if it had not already done so) "terrorists" and, at least implicitly, taking the position that, since no one dares to criticize the United States for doing whatever it deems necessary in its "war on terrorism," no one should criticize whatever they now do to suppress their own "terrorists."
Even while accepting that many people labeled "terrorists" are genuinely reprehensible, it should be recognized that neither respect for human rights nor the human condition are likely to be enhanced by this apparent carte blanche seized by the strong to crush the weak as they see fit.
Writing in the Washington Post on Oct. 15, Post Deputy Editor Jackson Diehl cited two prominent examples of the abuse of the epithet "terrorism": "With their handshake in the Kremlin, Sharon and Putin exchanged a common falsehood about the wars their armies are fighting against rebels in Chechnya and the West Bank and Gaza. In both cases, the underlying conflict is about national self-determination: statehood for the Palestinians, self-rule for Chechnya. The world is inclined to believe that both causes are just -- Sharon and Putin both have tried to convince the world that all their opponents are terrorists, which implies that the solution need not involve political concessions but merely a vigorous counterterrorism campaign." Perhaps the only honest and globally workable definition of "terrorism" is an explicitly subjective one "violence which I don't support."
The Western press routinely characterizes as "terrorism" virtually all Palestinian violence against Israelis (even against Israeli occupation forces within Palestine), while the Arab press routinely characterizes as "terrorism" virtually all Israeli violence against Palestinians. Only this formulation would accommodate both characterizations, as well as most others.
However, the word has been so devalued that even violence is no longer an essential prerequisite for its use. In recently announcing a multi-billion dollar lawsuit against 10 international tobacco companies, a Saudi Arabian lawyer told the press: "We will demand tobacco firms be included on the lists of terrorists and those financing and sponsoring terrorism because of the large number of victims smoking has claimed the world over." If everyone recognized the word "terrorism" is fundamentally an epithet and a term of abuse, with no intrinsic meaning, there would be no more reason to worry about the word now than prior to Sept. 11. However, with the United States relying on the word to assert, apparently, an absolute right to attack any country it dislikes (for the most part, countries Israel dislikes) and with President Bush repeatedly menacing that "either you're with us or you're with the terrorists" (which effectively means, "either you make our enemies your enemies or you'll be our enemy and you know what we do to our enemies"), many people around the world must feel a genuine sense of terror (dictionary definition: "a state of intense fear") as to where the United States is taking the rest of the world.
Meanwhile, in America itself, the Bush Administration appears to be feeding the US Constitution and America's traditions of civil liberties, due process and the rule of law into a shredder mostly to domestic applause or acquiescence. Who would have imagined that 19 angry men armed only with knives could accomplish so much, provoking a response, beyond their wildest dreams, which threatens to be vastly more damaging to their enemies even than their own appalling acts? If the world is to avoid a descent into anarchy, in which the only rule is "might makes right," every "retaliation" provokes a "counter-retaliation"and a genuine "war of civilizations" is ignited, the world and particularly the United States must recognize that "terrorism" is simply a word, a subjective epithet, not an objective reality and certainly not an excuse to suspend all the rules of international law and domestic civil liberties which have, until now, made at least some parts of our planet decent places to live.
John V. Whitbeck is an international lawyer who writes frequently on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and wrote this commentary for The Daily Star
Overuse obscures the term 'terrorism'
December 3, 2001
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Few words in the English language are more misused than the word terrorist. One front page last week carried eight stories, and every one included a reference to terrorists.
All adversaries are not terrorists. President Bush's description of any nation that "harbors" terrorists as a terrorist nation is meaningless. Many nations, including this one, must deal with fanatical protesters. That does not make every nation terrorist.
It is a relative term. In Israel, Palestinians who kill Israeli civilians are called terrorists. Israelis who kill Palestinian civilians are called soldiers.
It is this relativism that led the Reuters news agency to tell reporters to stop using the word, that one man's terrorist is another's freedom fighter.
Two weeks ago Secretary of State Colin Powell urged Palestinians to arrest and punish "perpetrators of terrorist acts" against Israel and told Israel to "end its occupation" of Palestine.
Are acts committed against an occupier acts of terrorism or of resistance?
Surely, you say, the word is not always relative. The heinous acts of Osama bin Laden fit the political definition of terrorism, which is the use of violent means against civilians to achieve political ends.
Bin Laden is an easy case, both because his means were so disproportionate and because he acted against civilians living under a democratic government that is not an occupier.
What of the suicide bombings in Israel this weekend, which killed at least 25 civilians?
In 1947-48, Jews in Palestine blew up British civilians (the King David Hotel) and Palestinian civilians (Deir Yassin). For Jews, both peoples were occupiers, and Jewish bombers were freedom fighters, not terrorists.
For years, Israeli leaders, including Prime Ministers Menachem Begin and Yitzhak Shamir, refused to deal with PLO leader Yasser Arafat on grounds he was a terrorist. The current prime minister, Ariel Sharon, still refuses to deal with Arafat.
If Arafat was a terrorist, what of Begin, Shamir and Sharon?
In 1947-48, Begin headed Irgun, an underground group pledged to drive Britain out of Palestine (which Britain did not "occupy" but ruled under international mandate) and to fight Palestinians. Irgun was responsible for the massacre of 250 Palestinian civilians, including many women and children, at Deir Yassin, a village near Jerusalem.
Shamir headed Lehi, an Irgun splinter group also known as the "Stern Gang." In 1944, with the Allied war still raging against the Nazis, Lehi murdered Lord Moyne, the British minister for the Middle East.
Four years later, Lehi (a Hebrew acronym for "Freedom Fighters of Israel") was held responsible for the murder of Count Folke Bernadotte, U.N. mediator for Palestine. Bernadotte's sin was a plan calling for the union of all the people of Palestine -- Jews, Palestinians and Jordanians.
Is Sharon a terrorist?
In 1982, Defense Minister Sharon planned Israel's invasion of Lebanon. During the occupation of Beirut, hundreds of Palestinian refugees in two camps were murdered by Lebanese Christian militiamen, allies of Israel. An Israeli investigation the following year found Sharon "indirectly responsible" for the massacre, and he was forced to resign from office.
Now Sharon heads a government that deliberately follows a policy of "decapitation," that is, assassination of Palestinian officials.
For years, Arafat was called a terrorist, not just by Israel and America but by Egypt, which jailed him as a member of the Muslim Brotherhood, terrorists in Nasser's eyes. Hafez al-Assad of Syria, a nation on the State Department's "terrorist" list, tried several times to kill Arafat.
When a "terrorist nation" kills a "terrorist" is it an act of terrorism?
Arafat's Fatah was at the top of the U.S. and Israeli "terrorist" lists for years. Then Fatah morphed into the PLO and then into the Palestinian Authority, which Israel now counts on to fight terrorists.
When do terrorists become statesmen? When terrorism succeeds.
The word has been debased and degraded into meaninglessness, and Bush did not help last week:
"If anybody harbors a terrorist, they're a terrorist. If they house terrorists, they're terrorists. I mean, I can't make it any more clearly (sic) to other nations around the world."
Well, yes, perhaps he could. There are real terrorists out there, ones like bin Laden and al-Qaeda.
But the idea that we will turn our wrath on every nation with which we have a dispute (e.g. North Korea, Iraq), or which harbor groups potentially hostile to us (e.g. the Philippines, Sudan, Syria, Egypt) is to turn a legitimate conflict into national paranoia.
We will always face opposition from nations and groups that oppose our values and our policies. That does not make them all terrorists.
Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda brought two new elements to terrorism: They used more deadly means than ever before, and they are irrational. Groups like Irgun, Lehi, Fatah and Hamas used means proportionate to their ends and were coldly rational.
There is no question about al-Qaeda's terrorism. Leave it at that.
by Goldsborough (jim.goldsborough@uniontrib.com)