"Terrorism" Is a Guerrilla War Against Western Aggression & Domination
- From: Kayid Al-Kuffar <Kayedhom@xxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Fri, 14 Sep 2007 07:08:09 -0700
"Terrorism" Is a Guerrilla War Against Western Aggression & Domination
"Millions of Iraqi children were killed as a result of the Western
embargo and no-fly zone We have to treat those responsible in kind
Hundreds of thousands of civilians have been killed in Afghanistan and
Iraq What are we to do?
Sympathy & Support for al-Qaida
Abu Muhammed is a courteous, intelligent man. We first met in a London
hotel earlier this year. He is of slight build and softly spoken. We
sipped tea and discussed events in the Middle East.
Abu Muhammed, which is not his real name, is also linked to al-Qaida
and in tonight's Dispatches on Channel 4, he justifies the July 7
bombings.
"If somebody commits an aggression against you, you are allowed [in
Islam] to commit an aggression against him.
"Millions of Iraqi children were killed as a result of the [Western]
embargo and no-fly zone and we have to treat those responsible in
kind.
"Hundreds of thousands of civilians have been killed in Afghanistan
and Iraq since 2001. And it is very clear in the Qur'an; make your
punishment proportionate to what was done against you."
He offered advice to British Muslims.
"They need to arm themselves to prevent the kaffir [non-believer] from
coming into their home, terrorising their families, frightening their
children and invading their privacy. They have to be prepared to pay
the price and fight back."
Of course, most westerners would immediately label Abu Muhammed as a
terrorist and argue that his words are too shocking for the British
audience to hear.
If he is reported, his utterances must be draped in moral outrage and
treated as the frothing ranting of a demented man.
My rendezvous with Abu Muhammed was in a central European city. He has
recently been barred from entering Britain but still communicates to
followers through the internet.
After spending several hours discussing topics such as whether Osama
bin Laden could be compared to Martin Luther, it became clear that Abu
Muhammed is not "mindless" but a product of the political realities of
our planet.
He certainly justifies violence in the context of war. He also claims
that Tony Blair is responsible for the deaths of thousands more
innocent civilians than "Sheikh Osama".
My meeting also convinced me that a government policy (eagerly
endorsed by the media) that denies a credible arena for the views of
people like him contributes to, rather than reduces, the risk of a
violent attack on Britain.
The British media have never been comfortable investigating the causes
of "terrorism".
In the 1980s, the Thatcher government argued that the IRA depended for
survival on "the oxygen of publicity".
A former British Army commander in Northern Ireland made the comical
claim that "without the exaggerated attention of the media the IRA
would probably have languished and died".
In 1988, after a decade of browbeating BBC and ITV bosses, the
government announced that supporters of Irish terrorism would be
banned from speaking on television or radio.
It shied away from a complete ban in print because it could have
triggered a revolt over press freedom.
Anyway, popular newspapers simply amplified the government's counter-
terrorism agenda. The target of the legislation was television,
especially current affairs programmes such as Thames Television's
Death on the Rock.
It had infuriated Thatcher and raised awkward questions concerning the
gunning down of three unarmed IRA members in Gibraltar.
The new law allowed members of the IRA's political wing, Sinn Fein, to
be quoted in reported speech.
Pictures of the person speaking could be shown so long as the words
were voiced-over by someone else or displayed in subtitles.
The law had unforeseen consequence; it brought farce into the coverage
of Northern Ireland.
Out of work actors began earning £200 for voicing Sinn Fein statements
on television.
The party's president, Gerry Adams, was told that he was to be dubbed
by the actor Stephen Rea in a documentary. Adams replied "Great. His
voice is much better than mine".
The Terrorism Act 2006 has avoided the black comedy of Thatcher's
censorship but its reach is far wider and the denial of freedom of
speech far greater.
The act classifies "justifying or glorifying terrorism" as a criminal
offence.
The law is not directed at what people do but what they say; it is an
offence to write or announce anything that might, directly or
indirectly, encourage another person to commit an act of serious
violence in support of any political cause anywhere in the world.
Someone who justifies resistance to occupation, whether in Iraq or the
Palestinian territories, is vulnerable to prosecution.
The law is yet to be tested in court but it is already serving one of
its intended purposes. It has severed genuine debate between Muslims
and the mainstream media.
Yet the views of Britain's Muslims are shared by much of the Ummah,
the global community of Muslims.
Many believe that Britain was attacked in July 2005 not for what it is
but for what it does.
The presumed leader of the London bombers, Mohammed Siddique Khan,
said so in a video released by al-Qaida.
Muslims are keenly aware that western politicians can use terrorism to
further their own political goals.
In the aftermath of the 7/7 attacks, Tony Blair joined more than 150
world leaders gathered at the United Nations in New York to mark the
organisation's 60th anniversary.
Blair held centre stage and one of the primary goals of the meeting
was to forge a consensus on the meaning of "terrorism".
Secretary general Kofi Annan had pledged to western nations that the
UN would agree on a "no excuses" definition.
Bush announced before his audience of presidents and prime ministers:
"The terrorists must know the world stands united against them".
Predictably, the general assembly failed once more to reach agreement
on a clear definition of terrorism. The two sides restated long-held
positions:
The United States and the European Union condemned any targeting of
civilians; the 56-member Organisation of the Islamic Conference
insisted on exempting "national liberation movements".
Iran and the Palestinians argued that any definition should exclude
"the legitimate right of peoples to resist foreign occupation". A
member of Pakistan's delegation explained:
"The UN must differentiate between terrorists and freedom fighters. If
someone is subjugating your civilians . . . and they shoot someone in
your family, some people will say, 'OK, I'm going to fight back'."
Blair told the UN that "the root cause of terrorism is not a decision
on foreign policy . . . it is a doctrine of fanaticism." Most Muslims
would not agree.
In their homes, British Muslims will say one thing to friends and
family and another to the mainstream media.
There are very few Muslims in the UK who would agree that the killing
of innocents is desirable (after all who does?), but a large section
would say that the debate about terrorism is missing the point.
But now they do not need the mainstream media. They watch al-Jazeera
as well as satellite TV from Muslim countries and a plethora of
internet sites that provide a parallel worldview. They believe they
have another source of the truth.
The mainstream media are largely dismissed as government propaganda.
Muslim organisations that claim to speak on their behalf are usually
considered mouthpieces for specific interests or movements that advise
the government in order to claim lucrative grants.
The under-30 generation have taken this disconnect a stage further.
Surveys indicate that a large section of this generation - around 20%
- at least empathise with the 7/7 bombers. They are growing up in
Britain but have no representation in mainstream British media.
Fun-Da-Mental are a popular Muslim punk band. High street shops refuse
to handle their disc All is War, The Benefits of G-Had.
As they prepared for a festival in St Petersburg - no one will host
their gigs in the UK - one of their singers explained the meaning of
the song.
"It's not about rejecting Britain per se," he told me. "It's rejecting
Britain's foreign policy. That's the crux of the problem. It's not
about alienation or being disenfranchised or anything like that, it's
about foreign policy."
He added with a wry, frustrated smile: "I feel like I'm in a Monty
Python sketch - even the people who commit those acts say the reasons
and we are still told it's not those reasons. It's so strange."
A policy of excluding extremists is not working. Bush's dictum that
"you are either with us or the terrorists" is being applied here and
the results are simply pushing more young people into the terrorists'
camp.
MI5 admits monitoring at least 2,000 British Muslims who are "actively
promoting violence".
It was with some irony that I recently watched a 1997 interview with
Blair, after he had invited Adams and Martin McGuinness to Downing
Street. "If you are at least talking to someone, you have . . . some
chance of something better emerging."
Journalists need to present the views of radical Muslims. Their views
are as justifiable as those living in the West. We are victims of our
own propaganda.
Journalism has a duty to reflect and not condemn the views of people
such as Abu Muhammed. In denying them a voice, it is contributing to
the radicalisation of British Muslims.
Phil Rees @ Media Guardian
http://edstrong.blog-city.com/terrorism_is_a_guerrilla_war_against_western_aggression__.htm
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