Why Muslims are angry

The impending invasion of Iraq is seen as a crusade against Islam, says Sheema Khan

“A History of Terrorism,” the title of a current exhibit at Harvard’s Lamont Library, provides much food for thought. Probing the maxim “one man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter,” it asks viewers to consider why relatively small-scale terrorist attacks are strongly condemned, while acts such as the Second World War firebombing of Dresden and the use of the atomic bomb against Hiroshima and Nagasaki are often considered justified.

It also reveals a strategy for future American foreign policy, based on a declassified 1948 document that was premised on the fact that the United States has half the world’s wealth and only 6.3 per cent of its population. “We cannot fail to be the object of envy and resentment,” the document reads. “Our task in the coming period is to devise a pattern of relationships that will permit us to maintain this position of disparity without positive detriment to our nation’s security.”

Given the growth in that disparity since 1948, this strategy is key to understanding U.S. foreign policy during the past half a century. Among Muslim nations, the impending invasion of Iraq is seen in this light, as the first step toward increased American hegemony in the region, fuelled, Muslims believe, by the motive of controlling oil supply. There is further concern that American policy-both domestic and international-has religious overtones.

Since 9/11, Muslims worldwide have heard influential American Christian evangelical leaders demean Islam and the Prophet Mohammed, with nary a disclaimer from the White House. Analysts attributed the silence to the Republican Party’s need to secure the “religious right” vote during midterm elections last November. Indeed, after electoral victory, the White House issued a public rebuke against religious anti-Islamic diatribe to show Muslims that the U.S. was not at war with Islam.

But Muslims also are keenly aware of the security crackdown in the U.S. that has targeted their community with secretive detentions, summary deportations and the profiling of nationals from predominately Muslim countries.

They have also seen the death of thousands of fellow Muslims in the aftermath of the U.S. bombardment of Afghanistan, along with the imposition of a U.S.-backed leader for the maintenance of American interests in the region- namely, regional security and the construction of an oil pipeline through the impoverished nation.

And, for the past 35 years, Muslims have witnessed the brutal occupation of the Palestinian homeland by successive Israeli governments, with full military and financial backing by Washington.

Many see double standards in the American justification for war on Iraq. If the goal is disarmament, what about North Korea, a nation with far more dangerous capabilities? If it is the flouting of United Nations resolutions, what about Israel, which has ignored some 64 resolutions (and counting) with U.S. approval? The latest American case for war is to spread democracy. There is no doubt the people of the Middle East would welcome democracy, but most have been denied it by regimes many of which are backed by the U.S. And the people know their exercise of democracy is acceptable to Washington only as long as the people’s choice agrees with that of Uncle Sam- remember Algeria’s 1991 election when Washington supported military intervention after an Islamic party was poised to take office?

Muslims’ distrust of American intentions is strengthened when they learn that strategies for extending U.S. influence in the Persian Gulf were in the works well before 9/11. A paper prepared by the neo-conservative think-tank Project for the New American Century for the incoming Bush administration: “the United States has for decades sought to play a more permanent role in Gulf regional security. While the unresolved conflict with Iraq provides the immediate justification, the need for substantial American force presence in the Gulf transcends the issue of the regime of Saddam Hussein.”

There is widespread sentiment in the Muslim world that this war is for the strengthening of Israel, as part of George W. Bush’s plan to remake the Middle East. Consider that, last month, the New Yorker reported on a policy paper circling amongst U.S. hawks, called “A Clean Break: A New Strategy for Securing the Realm,” written in 1996 by U.S. foreign policy analysts as advise for then Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The title refers to a foreign policy for Israel that would de-emphasize the peace process between Israelis and Palestinians and move “to a traditional concept of strategy based on balance of power.” One key item in the strategy, the paper implies, would be toppling Saddam Hussein.

But the real heart of the anger felt by Muslims is the violence that has been, and will be, meted out to the Iraqi people. The equating of Islam with violence by Western pundits is seen as the pinnacle of hypocrisy when you consider that 90, 000 tons of bombs –the equivalent of 71/2 Hiroshima bombs- were dropped on the people of Iraq in the 43 days of the 1991 gulf war, and that UN sanctions contributed to the death of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis afterward.

As images of Iraqi casualties mount during the coming conflict, the resentment can only increase. With the current talk of regime change and occupation of Iraq, Muslims world wide are reminded of the consequences the last time a superpower invaded and occupied Muslim land: the Soviet Union’s 1979 invasion of Afghanistan.

After 13 years of bitter fighting and one million Afghan dead, the occupiers left when the cost became too high. Many view the impending war on Iraq as a war against Islam. Last fall, a group of more than 200 prominent Muslims accused the United States of leading a crusade against Islam and warned that an assault on Iraq could provoke revenge attacks against Western targets.

“There is a feeling that we are powerless,” says Tariq Ramadan, a highly respected Swiss-based Islamic scholar who has written extensively on finding common ground between Muslims and the West. “We can’t speak about a ‘a clash of civilizations’ yet, but the ingredients are there and, after an attack on Iraq, they will be stronger.”

Sheema Khan is chair of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, Canada.

The Globe and Mail- March 12, 2003