Afghanistan vs. Terrorism of Globalization [Archives:2001/47/Law & Diplomacy]

Abdullah Sallam
Al-Hakimi
The September 11 attacks on New York and Washington DC were just horrible humanitarian atrocities. The whole world and the Arab and Islamic world in particular condemned these actions which killed many innocent civilians including Muslims. Such attacks and their consequences, that is the formation of a global coalition to fight terrorism, the mobilization of military forces in an unprecedented manner and the continued brutal attacks against Afghanistan, go way beyond simply re-drawing the international map. Now, it seems that the US-led war against the so-called terrorism will not be limited to Afghanistan, as reported by some senior US officials. It will indeed be expanded to include others parts of the world. Surely, the current situation will shape new global and regional policies. These will change and develop in ways that help in re-drawing the new political map of the world in light of the policies imposed by the military and economic powers. What is happening now and what will happen in the near future will not be a simple war against wide international gangs suspected with terrorism or violence. But, it is a wide-scale operation to establish a new world order. In fact, what is happening now is a prelude for a new global order to be established on the remains of the former world order which came out after World War II.
As for the Islamic organizations operating in the Arab World such as Hizbulah, Abdullah Salaam al-Hakimi states, “Hizbulah is a legitimate Islamic party that works within the scope of the Lebanese political system and that derives its legitimacy from the legitimacy of the Lebanese regime. Moreover, Hizbulah is a political and cultural party having a good reputation all over the Islamic world. It did strongly condemned the September 11 attacks. Clearly, Hizbulah has never carried out suicide attacks against its political opponents. On the contrary, it has been several times the victim of terrorism but never retaliated with terrorism. Currently, Israel cannot justify its strike against Hizbulah as, if it has been able to do so, it should have stroked during the time of the presence of its forces in Southern Lebanon. The existence of Hizbulah is of prime importance since the party is capable of playing a crucial role in rationalizing Islamic movements at the intellectual and political levels around the Islamic world.
Commenting on September 11 attacks, al-Hakimi said that hastiness in accusing Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda network of being responsible of carrying out the attacks was a surprise move since all the participants in these actions died in the crashes. He adds that the US administration has no definite proof against him. Furthermore, he insists on the fact that a wide portion of Muslims still believe that Osama bin Laden does not have the capability to carry out operations of that scale which require sophisticated technology, intelligence, planning and execution capacities. So, regardless of who is the responsible of September 11 attacks, American national interests dictate the US administration to carry out serious and huge investigations in order to know the perpetrators of these attacks. Abdullah Salaam al-Hakimi does not believe that the international events following the September 11 attacks are in any way related to a war of religions or a crusade, as some people described it. The main reason is that the modern world cannot accept religious or ethnic conflicts such as those which took place in the Middle Age. The whole world supports now peaceful coexistence, cooperation and complementarity for the sake of humanity as a whole without any discrimination or prejudice. Accordingly, Arabs and Muslims should know that the covert armed organizations, particularly those who commit in the name of Islam terrorist actions against anyone who disagrees with their beliefs, offer a distorted image of Islam and the essence of its tolerance. In short, all of us should move swiftly by different ways to help some Westerners in correcting their misconception about Muslims and to convey to the whole world the genuine tolerant nature of Islam.

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