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Is it Islam or American policy abroad responsible for our terror?
As I see American Muslims loyalty and religion put to question, I can't help but dive into our very short history as a nation: On February 19, 1942, soon after the beginning of World War II, Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066. The evacuation order commenced the round-up of 120,000 Americans of Japanese heritage to one of 10 internment camps-officially called "relocation centers"-in California, Idaho, Utah, Arizona, Wyoming, Colorado, and Arkansas. The U.S. internment camps were overcrowded and provided poor living conditions. According to a 1943 report published by the War Relocation Authority (the administering agency), Japanese Americans were housed in "tarpaper-covered barracks of simple frame construction without plumbing or cooking facilities of any kind." Coal was hard to come by, and internees slept under as many blankets as they were allotted. Food was rationed out at an expense of 48 cents per internee, and served by fellow internees in a mess hall of 250-300 people. In 1968, nearly two dozen years after the camps were closed; the government began reparations to Japanese Americans for property they had lost. In 1988, the U.S. Congress passed legislation which awarded formal payments of $20,000 each to the surviving internees-60,000 in all.
In the early sixties, black Americans faced prejudice and discrimination in almost every aspect of life, from jobs and housing to education. In the South, where 60 percent of all African Americans lived, blacks were deprived of equal voting rights until 1964. They were even denied the right to sit at the same lunch counter or use the same public rest room as white people. In the case of African Americans no reparations are paid but there are several law suits currently in the court system.
http://www.bookrags.com/history-america-in-the-1960s/03.html Our principles, constitution and Christianity didn't prevent discriminating against minorities. In both examples we as a government of the people and by the people admitted our mistakes. Are we ready to repeat the same mistakes?
Let us first define the enemy in our president's own words "The ideology known as Islamic radicalism, militant Jihadism, or Islamo-fascism -- different from the religion of Islam - exploits Islam to serve a violent political vision that calls for the murder of all those who do not share it. The followers of Islamic radicalism are bound together by their shared ideology, not by any centralized command structure. Although they fight on scattered battlefields, these terrorists share a similar ideology and vision for the world. http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2005/10/20051006-2.html So our enemy is really not Islam or Muslims, it is this strange and dangerous ideology Islamo-fascism (boy, I love this name!). I am in total agreement that radical Islam is very dangerous not only to the western civilization but to civilization as a whole. Actually to be more accurate radicalism regardless of the basis is dangerous we saw this on two world wars when millions of human beings were massacred because of a radical idea, to know a little more about Nazism and Fascism use this link http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/nazism We don't even have to go this far in history or geography to understand the danger of radicalism probably all of us that can read remember the morning we woke up to the horrible news coming out of Oklahoma City, when a young American killed 168 of his country men, again it was radicalism http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/timothy_mcveigh So we understand how dangerous the enemy is, throughout our history we were victorious. We might lose few of our good people. We will make the sacrifice and evil will die. We even have a name for the new world "The New Middle East".
On surface the argument have merit especially not considering the instances when we lost in Vietnam or the fight ended with a tie in Korea. How about Iraq? Regardless if it is technically a civil war in Iraq or not the American people know it and said it loud and clear in all recent polls. We are losing the war. Israel is not any better; they failed over 58 years to end terrorism as they call it. If we dive a little deeper than the surface the argument becomes shaky, some times we win some times we lose. Is there a pattern?
"The followers of Islamic radicalism are bound together by their shared ideology, not by any centralized command structure. Although they fight on scattered battlefields, these terrorists share a similar ideology and vision for the world." So the enemy defined by the president of US is not centralized, it is certainly not like the Nazi Germany, but may be, just may be more like Vietnam!
To win over this enemy we need a new weapon, we need to isolate it, suck the air that sustains it, and deprive it of new recruits. Every single day our bombs -- whether we drop it ourselves or through a proxy- kill an innocent civilian, destroy the livelihoods of families or create what is called collateral damage, we unknowingly support the enemy. We create new grievances, bitter vendettas and make the radicals' mission to recruit new suicide bombers easier than ever and in the process we lose a few more yards in our fight against terror. This victory over radicalism can happen when the injustices STOP and the real people have real future, have hopes and are allowed to dream. This can happen when we become a REAL honest broker in international conflicts, work diplomacy and pressure with our true interests in mind. Immediate attention should be given to the hot spots; for example, when grievances are addressed starting from people without land in Gaza and west bank, to people that don't know if the morning will bring them, sun, rain or a carpet of bombing in Lebanon.
This doesn't mean all radicals will disappear; they will be there as long as we are, but one thing is guaranteed, when you are honest, people respect you no matter how different you are. If other nations like our freedom and democracy, they will like us even more when we add honesty and justice to our role in the international arena. Only then will the radicals find it more and more difficult to recruit the 18 to 25 years old that are willing to die because whatever is out there up in the sky is better than what they got today. US Department of State list of terrorist organizations include some of the very familiar names we hear in the news everyday Al-Qa'ida, Hamas and Hezbollah http://www.state.gov/s/ct/rls/fs/37191.htm
Al-Qa'ida http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/al-qa%e2%80%99ida The origins of the group can be traced to a few weeks after the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979, The U.S. viewed the conflict in Afghanistan as an integral Cold War struggle, and the CIA provided assistance to anti-Soviet forces through the Pakistani ISI.
HAMAS (Islamic Resistance Movement) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/hamas Created in 1987 by Shaikh Ahmed Yassin of the Gaza wing of the Muslim Brotherhood at the beginning of the First Intifada, Hezbollah (Party of God) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/hezbollah#history Hezbollah was formed primarily to combat the Israeli occupation following the 1982 invasion of Lebanon[6][31]
Is it a coincident all three were born from the ashes of a war or an occupation that we directly or indirectly promoted? What will the new wars of the 2000s bring us tomorrow, next year or next decade?
We should really be scared!
I am an Egyptian American born in Alexandria. I immigrated to the US in the late eighties, during this time lived in many places in US and Europe. I work as an IT manager and love it. I love to travel, it makes me feel young, and it awakes in me sense of adventure and curiosity. I love knowing people from different cultures; it never fails to amaze me how we all live in our little worlds that never meet. History is my second amazement, it always differ depending on who is winning, that leads me to my third hobby, politics is it history or human nature that is the culprit?
I concur. I would also point out that honesty dictates to say the truth: ALL radical groups and not just Islamic are dangerous and that should include in all honesty radical Christians like Southern Baptists Robertson- kind, Bushists ( those are just satanists, sorry), Neocons( satanists again), radical Zionists ( those who consider all the Jews to be their flock), radical nationalists like the participants of the nationalist coven in the current Ukrainian capital, etc. etc. Oh, well. If only we could say that way. I am in this country practically the same amount of time you are and I still do not understand how come the stupid and mean are so universal and unified and good and rational are so rare and disconnected. Take care of yourself.
Mark Sashine, aka Panurg
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Mark Sashine (44 articles, 19 quicklinks, 228 diaries, 3268 comments)
on Tuesday, August 22, 2006 at 1:18:17 PM
Panurg, you stated you have been in this country about twenty years, I think. If you are so unhappy in the US, why do you stay? Unlike many who are born here, and know nothing different, you have lived and been a citizen of a another county. Why do you not return to your native land or to a country where the most numerous citizen are not as you say about Americans, "... how the stupid and mean are so universal and unified(in the US), and the good and rational are so rare and disconnected."
Is there one Islamic country where Sharia is practiced that is just and merciful? I have found none. I have found things in those countries that startle a normal person: Islam's treatment of women, harsh penal system, harsh treatment of non-Muslims, etc. I could list twenty things happening every day in Egypt, Jordan, Palestine, Iran, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Afghanistan, Nigeria, Yemen that repel every sense of decency. Every one of these repugnant things are compelled by both Koran and Hadith.
Phil.
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pratliff94 (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 940 comments)
on Tuesday, August 22, 2006 at 2:35:44 PM
This is my country. I live here. And as a citizen of this country I have an obligation to outline bad things and promote the good things. Citizens of other countries, the good ones, do that too. That's what a citizen has to do. And of course, I am more concerned that things I know for sure are bad should not develop in my country. Only if I take care of my own place I can voice my indignation about other places I know nothing about or know very little of. And it is not true that Koran and other Sacred texts fortify the oppression of their own population. I lived in the Moslem territories when it was communism there. Women were abused the same way although Allah was not in the print. Women are abused in the US too, make no mistake. There are whole cities where domestic violence is rampant.
The decisions about women, for intance when women have no say in the decisions is an abuse big time. I taught the Appalachian chidren and it is my opinion that the kids I taught were starving. They had not enough food. We better look at our people before we criticise others. We also better sort our fears. And one more thing: to be born in a lucky country is not much of an individual feat. I earned my citizenship. And I will continue to warn this beloved new country of mine of the dangers it faces, those dangers others faced before and consequences of which I know of too well.
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Mark Sashine (44 articles, 19 quicklinks, 228 diaries, 3268 comments)
on Tuesday, August 22, 2006 at 3:17:14 PM
On the same token, I could list more than twenty things happening every day in many US cities -that I'm pretty certain are not compelled by the bible- that repel every sense of decency. Believe me, it's tempting to go there, but I'm not sure we'd get very far. So, I implore you to differentiate between Islam the religion and the local traditions in many of the countries you mentioned.
I'm not sure if you've read the Quran and Hadith yourself or you're just repeating what the likes of Robert Spencer say about them. Do yourself a favor and if you read the Quran, do it with the full context in mind and understand why and when the verse(s) was revealed and in what circumstances.
It is easy to write stereotypical and distorted quasi-facts to reassure ourselves that we're on the "right side".
Wael.
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waelsm (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 3 comments)
on Tuesday, August 22, 2006 at 10:54:30 PM
