ISLAM AS ENEMY

                                                                              

Sunday, 8 January, 2012

Islam as Enemy

Hameed Abdul Karim

The Western powers have always needed enemies to force their agendas down the throats of different nations at various times in history. With the end of colonialism, however, the U.S. spurred by its imperial mindset, has taken over the role of ‘civilising’ the former colonies, with the full backing of France, Canada, Germany, Italy, Spain and the UK which now are, for all intents and purposes, U.S. satellite states.

Enemy number one has always been ‘Islam’. The war against Islam, however, was reduced to a low intensity conflict whilst the West engaged itself in the ‘Cold War’. When Soviet Russia eventually caved in due to Western pressure, not without the crucial help of the Afghan Mujahedin though, it trained its guns back on Islam. 

Islam has always been a thorn in the West’s side. Despite centuries of colonialism the West has not been able to subdue the faith or the spirit of millions of its adherents.

War on Terror or Crusades?

Muslims see the West’s ‘war on terror’ as yet another campaign to crush Islam and think it’s a continuation of the crusades despite pious pontifications to the contrary. This raises the question - why does the ‘empire’, see Islam and the Muslims as enemies? This is largely because Muslims have never surrendered their passionate loyalty to their faith or their traditions in return for cars, coca-cola and in general the ‘good life’ which is fast crumbling under its own contradictions as we speak. Muslims had fought for their independence with ferocity as one insurrection after another during colonial occupation clearly demonstrates. Bear in mind that virtually all Muslim countries were under occupation of one Western colonial power or another for centuries but hardly any Muslim exchanged his or her faith for material gains. Even the likes of Salman Rushdie or Taslima Nazreen have not been able to make a dent in the mindsets of Muslims despite the West’s heavy funding and political support to bring Islam and Muslims into the ‘enlightened era’ and to fit in cozily with America’s PNAC.

‘Islamic Banking’ – ‘Islamic Fundamentalism’?

The West’s media has marched in lockstep with its leaders in their spiteful attacks on Islam and the Muslims without even pausing for reflection as is expected of media personnel. The media ‘experts’ have never seen a need for a deeper look or an understanding of what makes the Muslim tick.  The once valiant Afghan Mujahedin who fought the Russian occupation of Afghanistan are now being described as ‘Islamic fundamentalists’ or ‘Muslim terrorists’, because this time round they are fighting the US led NATO occupation of their land. Islam we are told repeatedly is a ‘backward ideology’ or a throwback to ‘medieval times’. Yet there is a glaring inconsistency to this charge. Today we see what is called ‘Islamic banking’ (a misnomer) flourishing the world over, whilst what is called ‘conventional banking’ is going belly up all over the U.S. and Europe. There are many non-Muslims who run ‘Islamic banks’ around the world but nobody has the imagination or the temerity to call them ‘Muslim fundamentalists’ or the system as a throwback to ‘medieval times’! Karen Armstrong in her biography of the Prophet Mohammed states that it was Islam’s obsession with social and economic justice that led to its success as a world religion. The book, though, has a lot of short comings.

Western Media Brainwashing.

Over the years the West’s media (sometimes copied by media of non-Western countries), in tandem with their respective governments’ pernicious imperialist designs, has shaped the minds of its viewers, readers and listeners with negative images of Islam. They want the world to believe their version of Islam instead of the Islam that Muslims believe in. Take for example the recent riots in the UK. Three Muslims were killed when a car driven by a rioter ran over them. The Western media referred to the dead as ‘Asian immigrants’. Had a Muslim committed this crime he would have been depicted as a ‘Muslim extremist’ or an ‘Islamic terrorist’. Nobody pointed a finger at the faith of the non-Muslim rioter, and that’s understandable because his faith cannot be held accountable for his crime.

It’s not uncommon to hear such clichés as the ‘green peril’ or the ‘crescent of crisis’ to describe Taliban’s resistance to the US led NATO occupation of Afghanistan. This is not to say that the Taliban are all lilywhite. But the fact is that the stories we hear about them come from their enemies just as much the same way the stories of the French Resistance came to us from Josef Goebells, Hitler’s propaganda chief.

Popular magazines like Time or Newsweek do not think it unfair or unethical to run cover stories describing American Muslims as the ‘Jihadi Next Door’ or the ‘Return of Islam’, depicting a picture of Muezzin in a minaret calling the faithful to prayer, to describe the roles of Islamic parties in North Africa and the Middle East. Neither does Hollywood, for that matter.

WASPS

While Muslims are being projected as some kind of barbarians from the Middle Ages, the Western media (that preeminently includes Hollywood) presents the actual fundamentalists in Washington DC who dictate terms to the world, as saviours of the universe when in fact they are anything but that. The US ruling elite comprise the White Anglo Saxon Protestants (WASPs) and the Christian and Jewish Zionist lobbies on the ‘principles’ enshrined in  America’s ‘Manifest Destiny’ which articulates America’s ‘divine’ right to rule the world. Any other creed or faith that challenges or refuses to submit to ‘Manifest Destiny’ is an outrage and has to be destroyed by any means possible. Islam is seen as an ideology standing in the way of the empire. 

When we had President George Bush snr claiming that he was doing the ‘Lord’s work’ when he bombed Iraq in what is called the 1^st Gulf War, nobody in the world ever called him a fundamentalist or challenged his secular claims. Ronald Reagan was yet another ‘born again’ fundamentalist who believed the Holy Spirit was in him as was Jimmy Carter. George Bush jnr claimed he was on talking terms with God and yet nobody dare call him a fundamentalist. If a ‘fundamentalist’ Muslim were to make a similar claim his co-religionists would  put him in the nut house. George Bush was put in the White House. Lucky he.

You can be sure Islam will continue to be in the ‘news’ and projected as civilisation’s enemy as the Arab Spring goes about bringing in change to improve the lives of their people which was made meaningless by US multi-national corporations and the banksters. Happily the Arabs Spring has inspired American and Israeli’s to rise up against the ruling elite in their respective countries and produced the ‘Occupy’ movements.  The 99% in the belly and heart of the US have woken up and can now connect with the Arab Spring. In the meantime, spy agencies like the CIA, Mossad and MI6 will not rest until they bring back the Arabs and the Iranians and the Turks back to the fold of obedience to the American empire and obeisance to Israel.

Appeared in LakbimaEnglish Sunday 8 January, 2012