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Thursday, September 23. 2010

A Little Understanding

On Monday there was a documentary on HBO called My Trip to Al Queda by journalist Lawrence Wright. It was based on Wright’s 2005 Pulitzer Prize winning book, The Looming Tower, considered one of the most comprehensive looks inside the dark world of Islamic terrorists by a Western author. I haven’t read it, but having watched the film, it’s on my list.

The documentary, based on Wright’s one-man play of the same name, opened my eyes to much I had taken for granted about terrorism and even more alarming, to even more I never knew about Islam and how the terrorists justify their actions through their holy book.

Years ago, shortly after 9/11, my good brother Tony sent me an e-mail about the caliphate at the heart of Osama bin Laden’s goal. I brushed it aside, figuring it was the product of some right wing propaganda mill, which it might have been, but who knows now. Wish I had kept the e-mail.

Over the years though, after watching the news and listening to the tapes and video that have sporadically spewed from the caves of Afghanistan and Pakistan, I began to see the truth at the heart of the e-mail. As I recall, the e-mail suggested the entirety of the Muslim world was out to succeed at converting the convertible and killing all the rest. That’s where the e-mail left the rails for me.

As we found out in these past months, ever since the controversy over the Islamic Community Center in Manhattan caused a stir, not all Muslims are terrorists who harbor a deep-seated hatred for the West.

We did find out of course how quickly the extreme fringe of the Right Wing could find a good target for their political ambitions! The Community Center had been planned for more than a year before the yahoos came out on radio and television to denounce the center, accuse the center’s Imam of being a terrorist sympathizer and calling the proposed center a slap in the face to all us “good” Americans. All in time for the Midterm elections! Something their Teabagger kooks and Teabagger sympathizers can run on — even if they live 6,000 miles away in Wasilla, Alaska.

Turns out the Imam, who is now considered by Fox and Freaks to be a terrorist sympathizer (at the least), was a confidant of the previous president and did outreach to the Muslim world in hopes of repairing our image in the Muslim world after our unprovoked attack on Iraq. Very much a moderate then and, we hope, still a moderate today. Actually, judging from Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf’ most recent comments, he appears to be the epitome of moderation and for me at least, a great example of tolerance and humility.
 When the Imam first proposed Cordoba House in 2009, he said the goal of the center was to “… push back against the extremists.” Little did he know at the time the extremists he would first encounter were the nut jobs on the fringe of the American Right.

Wright’s documentary though tells us a lot about Islam in general and what’s at the heart of the extremists in that religion.

First of all, why did the terrorists choose September 11 for their attack on the United States? According to Wright, it goes back 327 years when the Ottoman Empire, one of the dominant political forces of the world at the time and a society governed by Islamic law, was pushing to conquer all of Europe. They already were forced out of Iberia by the Spanish but were making a push towards Vienna, Austria. On September 11, 1683 they were defeated on the outskirts of the Austrian capital by Russian and Polish troops and eventually pushed back to Constantinople, in what is now Turkey. Not until seeing Wright’s documentary was I aware of that little piece of information.

Since then there has been a small pocket of extremist Muslims looking for revenge and turn the tide of history back towards Islam. Osama bin Laden is just the latest to hold this view.

The documentary points out the extremists have no vision of the future, no political or economic philosophies, only an insistence on purity and destruction.

For the ultimate example of what a caliphate controlled by extremists would be like, Wright talks about the extremist Taliban government in Afghanistan that banned women from society, destroyed ancient, pre-Islamic artifacts as well as the Kabul zoo, killing all but three animals.

Wright tells us more about Islam and the extremists than can be spoken of here and I would be willing to bet Lawrence Wright would be the first to admit he has just a fraction of knowledge and understanding of Al-Queda, but he has far more than the average American.

A big part of Wright’s book, if not the entire thesis, is that the majority of Muslims do not agree with the aims of Al-Queda, Like Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf.

The other part of Wright’s story, maybe more significant for we Americans, has been our reaction, which in a general sense has been anti-Islamic and anti-Arab. Nothing new, that’s been a hallmark of American culture since the very beginning, starting with Native Americans, to Asians, the Irish and now Hispanics — as well as Muslims.

Politically, we have lost our core values as a nation. We’ve engaged in torture — for no good reasons — gave up key liberties in our Bill of Rights, most especially our rights to privacy and freedom from unwarranted search and seizure. Wright has first hand experience with the latter. During the research for his book the government tapped all his conversations: phone and electronic and they actually showed up at his door asking questions.

When “they” asked about his daughter, then living in London, Wright freaked out. His daughter had never been a part of his investigations, had never been mentioned in his research and was as far as Wright was concerned, far removed from any discussions on Islam and terrorism. What she had done was rent an apartment through a solicitor (attorney) who also represented some jihadists in real estate matters.

In short, what we had given up was our right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness — exactly what bin Laden had hoped for when he declared war on the United States.

The most egregious: we have engaged in war as the aggressors, first and foremost in Iraq. Some may argue the war in Afghanistan is unwarranted as well, but it was from that country that Al-Queda launched its attack on September 11, 2001, with the blessings of the Taliban government in charge at the time.
 Not that there is a great government in Afghanistan now; it’s one of the most corrupt in the world.

Again, we played into bin Laden’s plan. He wanted us to assume the role of the aggressors because it was good for bin Laden’s vision of being the victims, just as history, according to his view, had dictated. Men who had never thought of taking up arms against the U.S. flocked to Iraq to fight the invaders — the new Crusaders.

Now, at this juncture, we are poised to bring all our troops home from Iraq, not just the last of the combat forces that left in August. A strategy for our exit from Afghanistan is in place and in both cases, it is highly unlikely anything like a real democracy will be in place. In fact, one can argue the Taliban will once again rule Afghanistan.

So, what have we accomplished in Iraq and Afghanistan to ensure our nation’s security? Lawrence Wright didn’t really have an answer for that and quite frankly, no one does. But if you ask the Taliban or Osama bin Laden, they’re sure to give you an answer you won’t like. As far as they’re concerned, their plan is succeeding.

Posted by Tim Forkes in NEWS and POLITICS at 12:01 | Comments (0) | Trackbacks (0)

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