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The Tracy Press - September 2, 2005
Illogical blame of Islam for 9/11
By Anees Ghani
September is here once again and with it terrible memory of its 11th day.
A few important points must be noted regarding the loyalty of American Muslims along with the request not to “Islamize” terrorism.
The religion I follow promises reward on the last day for all righteous believers in one God: Jews, Christians, or anyone. It instructs us to be true to covenants/promises, which include the Pledge of Allegiance for me. American Muslims are bound by our religion to be true to this country because we made a covenant at the time of naturalization. Terrorism has no place in our belief system and must not be identified with it.
We American Muslims hold America very dear and love its freedom, its dignity of citizenship and the opportunities it provides.
It was not an accident of birth but a lot of hard work that got us citizenship. We prize its advantages more than given credit for; and will always work to keep America peaceful. We abhor unrest, a compelling factor for migration, and we condemn terrorism of all shades and will always work against it.
A small resource-less minority can produce no David to combat this giant of media and vested interests that choose to misinform the just and fair-minded American public. Looking for a reason for terrorism? How convenient to neatly ascribe it to Islam! American Muslims, caught up in the swell of propaganda don’t know how to extricate themselves from this bind of adherence to their religion and loyalty to the United States. The repeated accusation of 9/11’s “terrorism” connection with Quran chews up the rights of American Muslims as promised by the Constitution.
Americans are fair and just, and these are the very qualities needed to find a way to end terrorism. If Muslims globally assert there is no injustice and “terrorism” involved in their belief system, then why turn every theory upside down to get to truth? Why no terrorism after World War I or World War II?
Most importantly, if one party believes Islam is responsible for 9/11, and others (over a billion) do not, who is to be the judge?
Islam is not only a religious practice of worshipping a God, but it is also an ideology with a sophisticated detailed jurisprudence dealing with human rights of all kinds, different religions, different genders, friend-turned-enemy or enemy-turned-friend, culminating in the maintenance of peace. And myriad of sects and political parties of many races committed terrorism long before 9/11.
At best, it can be considered a protest or a war. Why can terrorism not be caused by the Western powers’ need for oil or other biases, which compelled them to redesign the map of the entire Middle East while wresting its control from the Ottomans?
London Mayor Ken Livingstone’s comments to the BBC strengthen my argument; “Decades of British and American intervention in the oil-rich Middle East motivated the London bombers,” says Livingstone, who suggests that the attacks would not have happened had the Western powers left Arab nations free to decide their own affairs after World War I. Instead, that war finally brought the Middle Eastern Muslim region under the control of the West. The irony of fate of this era had technological advancement connected with oil production, which grew exponentially after World War II. In fact, due to its revenues and political clout, oil became a neo-colonizer. On the other side, people seem convinced that for this very reason, Western powers saw to it that all post-World War I Middle Eastern rulers were its toadies and all governments were weak lackeys of the West.
Kings, dictators and presidents came and went leaving their countries’ economy in shambles and people frustrated. It is this frustration of decades of poverty and hunger, misery and sickness and the ever-present threat to life that may have produced the Mohammad Attas and Osama bin Ladens, not Islam.
One must develop an independent, fair and realistic viewpoint based on logic and facts.
Anees Ghani of Tracy is founder of the Muslim American Women group that tries to bring understanding to the community in in the wake of 9/11 9/11 about Islam and its teachings.
http://www.tracypress.com/voice/2005-09-02-ghani.php
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