It has been reported that as many as 40 people, if not more, were killed in a series of attacks in Iraq on Monday, October 27, 2003. It is also estimated that more than 200 people were wounded.
The attacks were waged at the International Red Cross and several Iraqi police stations.
On the preceding day, the Al Rashid Hotel, home to much of the international media and American officialdom also came under attack. US Deputy Secretary of Defense, Paul Wolfowitz, escaped with his life.
A week prior to this attack, a group of Americans who were providing educational aid to Palestinians in Gaza were ambushed as their convoy made their way towards Israel. Three Americans were killed.
Prior to this, the United Nation’s building in Bagdad was blown up, killing many, wounding more, and ending the life of the UN’s man in charge, as he was crushed under the rubble.
Add to all of this; there isn’t a day that passes without someone getting shot, blown up or murdered in Iraq and the Palestinian territories.
So what do we call the perpetrators of these attacks? Do we call them freedom fighters, activists, militants, combatants, soldiers, Islamists, Bathists, Jihadists, Shiites, Sunnis: or heaven forbid – TERRORISTS?
In our quest to be politically correct, we don’t know what the hell to call them.
When they murder Jews in Israel, they are generally called militants. When they kill Americans in the USA, or even plot against the USA, they’re called TERRORISTS. Same as when they kill Saudis in Saudi Arabia, or Australians in Indonesia. Etcetera.
But defining these attackers is somewhat more complicated.
The USA is an honest to goodness occupying military force in the sovereign state of Iraq. Doesn’t that give the dissident Iraqis the right to drive the occupiers out? And if it does, how about the attackers who are not Iraqis?
There is no secret that many of the attackers and killers of Americans and foreign agency workers include Palestinians, Syrians, Iranians, Saudi led Al Qaeda and others. All in addition to the combatant Iraqis.
What gives this disparate group the right to be attacking and killing Americans and aid workers who are investing fortunes in money and effort to bring Iraq into the 21st century?
The answer is simple. Islam and the Middle Eastern Arab culture.
When push comes to shove, and all other explanations are exhausted, it comes down to Islam and the Middle Eastern Arab world against the West, Modernity and Democracy. This is the common thread. This is the justification and the reason.
The Sunni Iraqis hate the Iranian Shiites. The Syrians also hate the Shiites. The Saudis through Al Qaeda hate the Iraqi Sunnis, the Iranian Shiites and the Syrian “secularists”. And the Palestinians, they’re just along for the ride looking to kiss anyone’s ass who can make them feel important and included.
We should never forget the Arab proverb: “The enemy of my enemy is my friend”.
To most of the Middle Eastern Arabs, including the Iranians and the world’s Islamists, the enemy is the West, Modernity and Democracy.
When the Arabs, Iranians and Islamists in general, get done with the West, they’ll start once again on each other, but in the meantime, they will band together to do in the West.
So, what should we call the people who attack and murder Secular Modernists and Democrats?
When the world figures it out, maybe they’ll also figure out why the Islamists and Middle Eastern Arabs also hate Israel. And maybe, they’ll finally all be called TERRORISTS; regardless of whom they murder.
And then, finally, maybe the Western world will figure out that the Islamic and Arab hatred towards the Jewish State has more to do with Israel’s Modern, Secular, Democratic and Western success, than it has to do with anything else.
To the Islamist and Middle Eastern Arab culture, it’s all one and the same. And whether we like it or not; the Islamists and Arabs have made it us against them. And one way or the other, this is a fight we will not be able to walk away from.
We better be ready.
One Comment
AMEN!!! Congratulations on your long and hard journey weighing ALL angles of going forward into the political arena! We, thankfully, will still have the benefits of your thoughtful, soul searching, right-on realistic brilliant editorials! Lets keep sharing them, too! Thank YOU! and Anne, for her stellar strength along side of you!!
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