Excellent article
> Assalamu'alaikum,
>
> They can't see why they are hated
>
> Americans cannot ignore what their government does abroad
>
> Special report: Terrorism in the US
>
> Seumas Milne - Guardian
>
> Thursday September 13, 2001
>
> http://www.guardian.co.uk/Archive/Article/0,4273,4255855,00.html
>
> Nearly two days after the horrific suicide attacks on civilian workers in
> New York and Washington, it has become painfully clear that most Americans
> simply don't get it. From the president to passersby on the streets, the
> message seems to be the same: this is an inexplicable assault on freedom
> and democracy, which must be answered with overwhelming force - just as
> soon as someone can construct a credible account of who was actually
> responsible.
>
> Shock, rage and grief there has been aplenty. But any glimmer of
> recognition of why people might have been driven to carry out such
> atrocities, sacrificing their own lives in the process - or why the United
> States is hated with such bitterness, not only in Arab and Muslim
> countries, but across the developing world - seems almost entirely absent.
> Perhaps it is too much to hope that, as rescue workers struggle to pull
> firefighters from the rubble, any but a small minority might make the
> connection between what has been visited upon them and what their
> government has visited upon large parts of the world.
>
> But make that connection they must, if such tragedies are not to be
> repeated, potentially with even more devastating consequences. US
> political leaders are doing their people no favours by reinforcing popular
> ignorance with self-referential rhetoric. And the echoing chorus of Tony
> Blair, whose determination to bind Britain ever closer to US foreign
> policy ratchets up the threat to our own cities, will only fuel
> anti-western sentiment. So will calls for the defence of "civilisation",
> with its overtones of Samuel Huntington's poisonous theories of post-cold
> war confrontation between the west and Islam, heightening perceptions of
> racism and hypocrisy.
>
> As Mahatma Gandhi famously remarked when asked his opinion of western
> civilisation, it would be a good idea. Since George Bush's father
> inaugurated his new world order a decade ago, the US, supported by its
> British ally, bestrides the world like a colossus. Unconstrained by any
> superpower rival or system of global governance, the US giant has
> rewritten the global financial and trading system in its own interest;
> ripped up a string of treaties it finds inconvenient; sent troops to every
> corner of the globe; bombed Afghanistan, Sudan, Yugoslavia and Iraq
> without troubling the United Nations; maintained a string of murderous
> embargos against recalcitrant regimes; and recklessly thrown its weight
> behind Israel's 34-year illegal military occupation of the West Bank and
> Gaza as the Palestinian intifada rages.
>
> If, as yesterday's Wall Street Journal insisted, the east coast carnage
> was the fruit of the Clinton administration's Munich-like appeasement of
> the Palestinians, the mind boggles as to what US Republicans imagine to be
> a Churchillian response.
>
> It is this record of unabashed national egotism and arrogance that drives
> anti-Americanism among swaths of the world's population, for whom there is
> little democracy in the current distribution of global wealth and power.
> If it turns out that Tuesday's attacks were the work of Osama bin Laden's
> supporters, the sense that the Americans are once again reaping a dragons'
> teeth harvest they themselves sowed will be overwhelming.
>
> It was the Americans, after all, who poured resources into the 1980s war
> against the Soviet-backed regime in Kabul, at a time when girls could go
> to school and women to work. Bin Laden and his mojahedin were armed and
> trained by the CIA and MI6, as Afghanistan was turned into a wasteland and
> its communist leader Najibullah left hanging from a Kabul lamp post with
> his genitals stuffed in his mouth.
>
> But by then Bin Laden had turned against his American sponsors, while
> US-sponsored Pakistani intelligence had spawned the grotesque Taliban now
> protecting him. To punish its wayward Afghan offspring, the US
> subsequently forced through a sanctions regime which has helped push 4m to
> the brink of starvation, according to the latest UN figures, while Afghan
> refugees fan out across the world.
>
> All this must doubtless seem remote to Americans desperately searching the
> debris of what is expected to be the largest-ever massacre on US soil - as
> must the killings of yet more Palestinians in the West Bank yesterday, or
> even the 2m estimated to have died in Congo's wars since the overthrow of
> the US-backed Mobutu regime. "What could some political thing have to do
> with blowing up office buildings during working hours?" one bewildered New
> Yorker asked yesterday.
>
> Already, the Bush administration is assembling an international coalition
> for an Israeli-style war against terrorism, as if such counter-productive
> acts of outrage had an existence separate from the social conditions out
> of which they arise. But for every "terror network" that is rooted out,
> another will emerge - until the injustices and inequalities that produce
> them are addressed.
>
> E-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
>
____________________________________________________________________ Pittsburgh Muslims Discussion List ____________________________________________________________________ Excellent article > Assalamu'alaikum, > > They can't see why they are hated > > Americans cannot ignore what their government does abroad > > Special report: Terrorism in the US > > Seumas Milne - Guardian > > Thursday September 13, 2001 > > http://www.guardian.co.uk/Archive/Article/0,4273,4255855,00.html > > Nearly two days after the horrific suicide attacks on civilian workers in > New York and Washington, it has become painfully clear that most Americans > simply don't get it. From the president to passersby on the streets, the > message seems to be the same: this is an inexplicable assault on freedom > and democracy, which must be answered with overwhelming force - just as > soon as someone can construct a credible account of who was actually > responsible. > > Shock, rage and grief there has been aplenty. But any glimmer of > recognition of why people might have been driven to carry out such > atrocities, sacrificing their own lives in the process - or why the United > States is hated with such bitterness, not only in Arab and Muslim > countries, but across the developing world - seems almost entirely absent. > Perhaps it is too much to hope that, as rescue workers struggle to pull > firefighters from the rubble, any but a small minority might make the > connection between what has been visited upon them and what their > government has visited upon large parts of the world. > > But make that connection they must, if such tragedies are not to be > repeated, potentially with even more devastating consequences. US > political leaders are doing their people no favours by reinforcing popular > ignorance with self-referential rhetoric. And the echoing chorus of Tony > Blair, whose determination to bind Britain ever closer to US foreign > policy ratchets up the threat to our own cities, will only fuel > anti-western sentiment. So will calls for the defence of "civilisation", > with its overtones of Samuel Huntington's poisonous theories of post-cold > war confrontation between the west and Islam, heightening perceptions of > racism and hypocrisy. > > As Mahatma Gandhi famously remarked when asked his opinion of western > civilisation, it would be a good idea. Since George Bush's father > inaugurated his new world order a decade ago, the US, supported by its > British ally, bestrides the world like a colossus. Unconstrained by any > superpower rival or system of global governance, the US giant has > rewritten the global financial and trading system in its own interest; > ripped up a string of treaties it finds inconvenient; sent troops to every > corner of the globe; bombed Afghanistan, Sudan, Yugoslavia and Iraq > without troubling the United Nations; maintained a string of murderous > embargos against recalcitrant regimes; and recklessly thrown its weight > behind Israel's 34-year illegal military occupation of the West Bank and > Gaza as the Palestinian intifada rages. > > If, as yesterday's Wall Street Journal insisted, the east coast carnage > was the fruit of the Clinton administration's Munich-like appeasement of > the Palestinians, the mind boggles as to what US Republicans imagine to be > a Churchillian response. > > It is this record of unabashed national egotism and arrogance that drives > anti-Americanism among swaths of the world's population, for whom there is > little democracy in the current distribution of global wealth and power. > If it turns out that Tuesday's attacks were the work of Osama bin Laden's > supporters, the sense that the Americans are once again reaping a dragons' > teeth harvest they themselves sowed will be overwhelming. > > It was the Americans, after all, who poured resources into the 1980s war > against the Soviet-backed regime in Kabul, at a time when girls could go > to school and women to work. Bin Laden and his mojahedin were armed and > trained by the CIA and MI6, as Afghanistan was turned into a wasteland and > its communist leader Najibullah left hanging from a Kabul lamp post with > his genitals stuffed in his mouth. > > But by then Bin Laden had turned against his American sponsors, while > US-sponsored Pakistani intelligence had spawned the grotesque Taliban now > protecting him. To punish its wayward Afghan offspring, the US > subsequently forced through a sanctions regime which has helped push 4m to > the brink of starvation, according to the latest UN figures, while Afghan > refugees fan out across the world. > > All this must doubtless seem remote to Americans desperately searching the > debris of what is expected to be the largest-ever massacre on US soil - as > must the killings of yet more Palestinians in the West Bank yesterday, or > even the 2m estimated to have died in Congo's wars since the overthrow of > the US-backed Mobutu regime. "What could some political thing have to do > with blowing up office buildings during working hours?" one bewildered New > Yorker asked yesterday. > > Already, the Bush administration is assembling an international coalition > for an Israeli-style war against terrorism, as if such counter-productive > acts of outrage had an existence separate from the social conditions out > of which they arise. But for every "terror network" that is rooted out, > another will emerge - until the injustices and inequalities that produce > them are addressed. > > E-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > > ============================================================================ ==== > ININ List Archives Found Here: http://www.egroups.com/messages/inin > ============================================================================ ==== > TO SUBSCRIBE: > To subscribe please e-mail [EMAIL PROTECTED] > In the body type: "subscribe inin-net" > > TO UNSUBSCRIBE: > To unsubscribe please e-mail [EMAIL PROTECTED] > In the body type in: "unsubscribe inin-net" > ============================================================================ ==== > ISLAMIC NEWS AND INFORMATION NETWORK: HTTP://WWW.ININ.NET > > VISIT: HTTP://WWW.MEDIAMONITORS.NET > > WE AFFIRM THAT INJUSTICE ANYWHERE IS A THREAT TO JUSTICE EVERYWHERE!!!! > > > DEFINING APARTHEID > > Article 2 of the "International Convention of the Suppression and > Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid" of 1973 clearly defined the > term "crime of apartheid." This includes similar policies and practices > of segregation and discrimination as practiced in South Africa and > which also apply to inhuman acts committed for the purpose of the > establishment and maintaining of domination by one racial group over > another. This includes the deliberated imposition of living conditions > calculated to cause physical destruction and any legislative or other > measures preventing a racial group from full development of their > political, social, economic and cultural life. This is an accurate > description of what the zionists are doing to the Palestinian people > with the full support of the USA. > > > -- To unsubscribe: send a message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the word unsubscribe in the body of your email message.
