Silver LiningUprooting terror drives [Archives:2005/858/Opinion]
By Mohammed Hatem al-Qadhi
[email protected]
The blasts that hit London last Thursday are terrible and disgusting. The black infamy revived the terrible memories of the September 11, 2001.
I still remember when one of the US diplomats warned that the consequences and dilapidations of the September 11 terrorist attacks in the US would be great. He said that we would see fire everywhere in the region. Yes, we have seen that fire in Iraq, Yemen, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Syria and elsewhere. Bloodshed has never stopped since then and it is us who are going to pay the price for many years to come.
What is the crime that at least 50 innocent people traveling underground in London have done to get killed and hundreds others injured? Why is this zeal for killings and bloodshed? This is a question that now everybody is asking and trying to find an answer to it.
These terrorists shrug off their shoulders and believe they are doing the right job to serve Islam and, but they are, in fact, devastating the image of Islam and Muslims who are facing hard times in Europe, the US and elsewhere. Wherever they go they are looked with suspicious eyes and considered killers and murderers who kill for nothing but nonsense. These people in the West do not know the truth of Islam and they, therefore, look at it now as a religion of terror and hostility and they do not care about the essence or the truth of Islam which moderate Muslims are trying to raise their attention to. It is not everybody will take the trouble of studying whether these people staring fires everywhere are real or fake Muslims. In other words, these events will definitely embroil us into the turmoil of many consequent challenges that can continue for a long time We will have to pay the bill which is , of course, very expensive.
Of course, such acts have not come out of the blue. Rather, there are a number of elements standing behind. Oppression, tyranny and lack of democracy are some of the drives of terrorism. The political regimes in the Arab and Islamic world have been ruling their countries for decades with iron grip. They have opened mass graves for their political opponents and left no room for freedom of speech and expression. Yet, they allowed clerics to spread their ideas of extremism and fanaticism as along as they supported their stay in power. This coalition between the political regimes and religious institutions have created dictators who derive their power and rule from this religious institution which must be overhauled.
There is an urgent need that our school curricula be reformed to get rid of this culture of extremism which most us believe it is right and that the culture of democracy, tolerance and acceptance of others should be encouraged. People should grow up and be educated to accept the ideas of other people and believe that there must be a free room for all ideas to be argued and debated. There is a need to uproot the one way-track of thinking which we have grown up to respect and worship. Democracy should be also supported in order to have political regimes coming to power through fair, free and honest elections and which can make use of the resources of their people in improving their living standards only. This is not an easy job. The task in which the West must join is rather challenging and demanding but it is not impossible, isn't it?!
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[archive-e:858-v:13-y:2005-d:2005-07-11-p:opinion]
