I am sending this on from Pakistan's Dawn daily- it picks up Le Carre's
article on Iraq-Usa conflict last week.
--
Has America gone really mad?
By Roedad Khan
History has dealt the Islamic world a terrible hand. From the 13th century
onward, the defining moments in the world of Islam were the Mongol
invasions and the imperialist intrusion of the West and the advent of
colonial dependency. It is significant how little the western approach to
the Muslim world has changed during this period.
Before embarking on his Egyptian expedition, Napoleon Bonaparte presented
himself to the Islamic world as its greatest champion and a great admirer
of the Holy Prophet. Today there is a striking similarity in President
Bush's approach to the situation in Iraq and the rest of the Islamic world.
The modus operandi is the same. Praise Islam as a religion of peace and
love but be war-like and destroy weak and defenceless Muslim countries if
they refuse to toe the line. Praise the Holy Prophet but unleash the hounds
of war against his followers, bomb innocent men, women and children, occupy
their lands, change their governments by force of arms and replace them
with client regimes.
The first blow to the Muslim world came in 1220 AD. "You have committed
great sins", Genghis Khan, sole superpower and terror of the world in the
13th century, told the people of Bukhara. "If you ask me what proof I have
for these words", he said. "I say it is because I am the Scourge of God".
The next blow was in 1258 AD when Hulagu, the grandson of Genghis Khan,
attacked one of the central pillars of Muslim ascendancy, the Caliphate
itself. When the siege of Baghdad ended, 80,000 people came out of the
great city. They were counted by the Mongols and then systematically
killed. For six days and nights, the massacre continued.
The slaughter was so thorough and so appalling that its memory has never
left the Arab minds. The sculls of the dead, as legend has it, were stacked
in a pyramid as a grim reminder of Mongol savagery. The Caliph himself was
rolled in a carpet, and then trampled to death by galloping horses. The
date was February 20, 1258 AD. The fall of Baghdad plunged the Muslim world
in a state of shock and terror from which it has not recovered till today.
For the first time a significant part of the Islamic world was subjected to
the domination of a non-Muslim power. Is history about to repeat itself?
The next expedition against the world of Islam was commanded by Napoleon
Bonaparte. On June 22, 1798, he set out to conquer Egypt, a country he
described "as the first theatre of civilization in the universe".
"Soldiers", Bonaparte proclaimed, "you are going to undertake a conquest,
the effect of which, upon commerce and civilization, will be incalculable.
The eyes of mankind are fixed upon you.
The Memluke Beys, who tyrannize over the unhappy inhabitants of the banks
of the Nile, will no longer exist in a few days after our arrival. The
people among whom you are going to live, are Mahometans: the first article
of their faith is, 'there is no other god but God and Mahomet is his
Prophet. Do not contradict them. Treat their Muftis and their Imams with
respect'".
The snake, it is said, covers its prey with saliva before devouring it.
After establishing his headquarter at Alexandria, Bonaparte issued the
following proclamation in Arabic:
"In the name of God, gracious and merciful. There is no god but God; he has
no son nor associate in his kingdom.
"Inhabitants of Egypt! When the Beys tell you the French are come to
destroy your religion, believe them not: it is an absolute falsehood.
Answer these deceivers, that they are only come to rescue the rights of the
poor from the hands of their tyrants, and that the French adore the Supreme
Being, and honour the Prophet and his Holy Quran".
"All men are equal in the eyes of God: understanding, ingenuity, and
science, alone make a difference between them. As the Beys do not possess
any of these qualities, they cannot be worthy to govern the country. Yet
they are the only possessors of extensive tracts of lands, beautiful female
slaves, excellent horses, and magnificent places! Have they, then, received
an exclusive privilege from the Almighty? If so, let them produce it.
"But the Supreme Being, who is just and merciful towards all mankind,
wills, that, in future, none of the inhabitants in Egypt shall be prevented
from attaining to the first employments, and the highest honours. The
administration, which shall be conducted by persons of intelligence,
talents, and foresight, will be productive of happiness and security".
"The French are true Mussulmen! Not long since they marched to Rome, and
overthrew the throne of the Pope who excited the Christians against the
professors of the Mahometan religion. Our friendship shall be extended to
those of the inhabitants of Egypt who shall join us, as also to those who
shall remain in their dwellings, and observe a strict neutrality; and, when
they have seen our conduct with their own eyes, hasten to submit to us; but
the dreadful punishment of death awaits those who shall take up arms for
the Beys, and against us: for them their shall be no deliverance, nor shall
any trace of them remain".
Before launching the attack on Afghanistan, Bush visited the Islamic Centre
in Washington DC and addressing the gathering, quoted from the Holy Quran:
"In the long run, evil in the extreme will be the end of those who do evil.
For that they rejected the signs of Allah and held them up to ridicule".
The 20th century began with western powers seeking to impose a new order on
the Middle East, the heartland of Islam. The Middle East, as we know it
today, emerged from decisions made by Allies during and after the First
World War. Middle Eastern countries and their frontiers were created in the
salons of Paris under the notorious 1916 Sykes-Picot treaty. Iraq and what
we call Jordan are British fabrications, lines drawn on a map by British
politicians after the First World War, while the boundaries of Saudi
Arabia, Kuwait and Iraq were established by a British civil servant in
1922.
The frontiers between Muslims and Christians were drawn by France in Syria
and by Russia on the borders of Armenia and Azerbaijan. At that time, the
political landscape of the Middle East looked different from that of today.
Israel, Jordan, Syria, Iraq and Saudi Arabia did not exist. Most of the
Middle East still rested under the drowsy and negligent sway of the Ottoman
Empire. The Middle East, a conglomerate of artificially created states,
became what it is today because the European powers willed it so.
This is the darkest period in the history of Islam. Iraq faces the full
might of the United States and is threatened with destruction. This, in
spite of the fact that Baghdad presents no clear and present danger to its
neighbours, and none to the US or Britain. What is at stake is not an
imminent military or terrorist threat but the economic imperatives of US
growth. Iraq has 112 billion barrels of oil-deposits, or roughly 11 per
cent of the world's proven supply. That is more oil than the resources of
Europe and South America put together and more than Africa and the
Asia-Pacific region combined. That oil has global strategic, political and
economic significance.
The temptation to grab Iraq's oil must be irresistible. Iraq must suffer
because it has oil and it has Israel as an enemy. What is worse, it is
Muslim. North Korea has admitted it has nuclear capability but it is not
threatened as Iraq is. If Saddam did not have oil, he could torture his
citizens to his heart's content. Other leaders in the Islamic world do it
everyday with the blessings of George W. Bush.
If Iraq is invaded and Saddam toppled, the lines drawn in the Middle East
by old European imperial powers will be redrawn by the world's newest
imperial power, the United States. The radical transformation of the Middle
East being considered by the Bush administration will be the biggest
political change since the notorious Sykes-Picot treaty in which victorious
Britain and France carved up the Ottoman Empire.
Iraq with its vast oil resources will be placed under permanent US military
rule. Afghanistan is no longer a sovereign, independent country. Pakistan
has got temporary reprieve by succumbing to American pressure and extending
'unstinted cooperation' to the US in its war against terror in Afghanistan.
All other governments in the Islamic world, deemed unfriendly to the US or
Israel, will be replaced by pro-US and pro-Israel pliant governments.
There is a dry wind blowing throughout the Islamic world and the parched
grasses wait for the spark. Once the match is lit, the blaze will spread
like wildfire. The entire Islamic world will then find itself in the eye of
the storm. The political system fabricated by Kitchener, Lloyd George and
Churchill in 1922 will collapse like a house of cards and go up in flames.
There should be no illusion about the sort of Islamic landscape that
America is destined to find when it embarks on a war against Iraq. Nothing
would convince the Muslim world that it would be a just war. It would be
seen as an imperial reach into the Muslim world, a favour to Israel and a
way for the United States to secure control over Iraq's oil.
"The United States has gone mad", wrote John Le Carre', expressing the
sentiments of millions of people all over the world. "Americans entered one
of the periods of historical madness, but this is the worst I can remember:
Worse than McCarthyism, worse than the Bay of Pigs and in the long term
potentially more disastrous than the Vietnam war".
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