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CounterPunch
December
2, 2002
Sharon is Trapped...And
So Are We
By ROBERT FISK
The
Independent
Time was when Bali would have been the story of
the year, the most violent act in 12 months, to be recalled with
horror in December as the most terrible of crimes. But Bali was
just the story of the month. And soon, perhaps, the Karachi bombings
and the Bali bombings and the Mombasa bombings will be just stories
of the week. See how easily we have acclimatized to death on
a vast scale? What is to be this week's nightmare? How many innocents
will be killed by the time you open next week's Independent on
Sunday?
But last week's killings in Kenya and
the attempt to bring down an Israeli airliner were far more important
than most people realize. For by bringing Israel into the loop--by
allowing Israel to become a partner in President Bush's asinine
"war on terror"--al-Qa'ida has ensured that the Arab
Muslim world will henceforth give its real if quiescent sympathy
to Osama bin Laden. Outraged as many Arabs were at the international
crimes against humanity of 11 September 2001, few will object
to an attack against Israelis, however cruel, while Israel's
suppression of the Palestinians continues. If al-Qa'ida is now
against Israel, Arabs will give their support.
With utter predictability, Ariel Sharon
walked into the al-Qa'ida trap. He  vowed "revenge". Thus any
strike against the al-Qa'ida--by America, by Britain, by Australia--will
be seen as an Israeli attack. America and Britain and Israel
are now fighting on the same side. In the short term--and in
his mendacious attempt to link Yasser Arafat with Mr bin Laden--Mr
Sharon may have gained some advantage. At last, Israel's war
on Palestinian "terror" can be placed on the same footing
as its new war against al-Qa'ida. No longer will Mr Sharon's
ghastly spokesmen have to justify their army's brutality towards
Palestinians. Israel is fighting the same struggle of "good
against evil" that President Bush invented for us just over
a year ago.
But for Israelis, there is one big error
in all this. By responding to al-Qa'ida's wicked assault on its
civilians, it is taking on a mighty big opponent. For Mr bin
Laden's men are not the hopeless suiciders that the Palestinians
produce from their foetid refugee camps. The Afghanistan-trained
men of Mr bin Laden's legion do not spring from the squalor of
Gaza or the occupied masses of the West Bank. They are ruthless,
highly motivated, intelligent--just for once, William Safire
was right when he called them "vicious warriors"--and
they may be more than a match for Israel's third-rate intelligence
men. Israel's rabble of an army can kill child stone-throwers
with ease. Al-Qa'ida is a quite different opponent. And if Mr
Sharon wants to take on Mr bin Laden, he is ensuring that Israel
goes to war with its most dangerous enemy in 54 years. Better
by far to let the Americans tackle al-Qa'ida--and even they don't
seem to be all that successful--than bring Israel into the battle.
Now, however, Messrs Bush and Blair will
have to watch in silence as Mr Sharon bludgeons the occupied
Palestinians into further submission. Israel is now engaged in
our war, on our side, and whatever Israel does will now have
the imprimatur of the "war on terror". Israel is now
on the side of the good guys and if it kills nine children when
its air force wants to assassinate a Hamas leader, the White
House will not even be able to call it "heavy-handed".
(Incidentally, it's instructive to note that while the child-killing
in Gaza was "heavy-handed" in the words of Mr Bush's
spokesman, Ari Fleischer, the killing of 12 Israeli soldiers
and policemen was described by the same gentleman as a "heinous
crime".)
But let's move to one side for a moment.
Has anyone spotted something amiss about the latest episode in
the "war on terror"? Has it dawned on any of the chickenhawks
in the US administration or in Downing Street that they are losing
the initiative? Has anyone noticed that Mr bin Laden is writing
the script? Al-Qa'ida attacks New York so we attack Afghanistan.
Al-Qa'ida attacks in Bali and the Australian government re-pledges
its support for America. Al-Qa'ida threatens America and so we
murder four of its members in Yemen. And our governments--even
the Irish last week--respond not by protecting us, not by uniting
in a new, inspiring system of international justice, but by producing
laws that will diminish our freedoms, our rights and our liberty.
Under attack by al-Qa'ida? Let's tap into the telephones and
emails of our innocent citizens. Let's frisk every Muslim who
goes through our airports. Let's spy on our own people. How Mr
bin Laden--hardly a man of humor, as I can personally attest--must
be smiling.
Now Americans have got to live with the
Department of Homeland Security. The Teutonic roots of this name--Homeland
translated as Heimat in the Reich--are perhaps best ignored for
the present. But already, travelers in the US are finding themselves
targeted at airports because of their skin-color or their religion
or their jobs.
Here's just one small example. I've recently
finished another series of lectures at American universities.
Americans are great people; they are bright and they want to
learn the truth about the Middle East, not least because they
realize. that their newspapers and television stations lie to
them about the region. I give my lectures free of charge. But
on this last trip, I notched up my 21st consecutive "random"
security check at an airport boarding gate. Every time I travel
on an American aircraft, up pops this little coding on my boarding
card and all my hand-baggage is taken to bits.
Now I don't mind this at all. The security
staff are polite, underpaid and often very friendly--I even persuaded
one to turn up at my talk in Manhattan--but the origin of my
journey, Beirut, or the number of pariah visas in my passport
or perhaps just my reporting, has got me on to the American security
list. The boarding card "security" coding is in fact
quite easy to decipher--and if a numbskull like me can work it
out, be sure that the bad guys can--but the point is that, yet
again, a perfectly law-abiding civilian is paying the price for
Mr bin Laden.
So here's a few thoughts. Why must we
let al-Qa'ida write the script? Why don't we set up the machinery
of real international law? Why don't we talk about "justice"
rather than revenge? Why don't we have international tribunals
so that those who wish to kill us can have their time in court?
I don't want al-Qa'ida's members blown to pieces in Yemen by
Mr Bush's hit squads. I want to see them tried, fairly and by
due process. Of course, the Americans will whinge and whine about
this. They will rabbit on about how Americans may be taken to
court for political ends, about how American troops might be
liable for war crimes trials--and given some of their behavior
in Afghanistan, I can well see why they would worry about this.
I can see, too, why Mr Sharon would worry that he, too, could
end up in court on war crimes charges for his involvement in
the massacre of Palestinians at Sabra and Chatila in 1982. I
don't know if Mr Sharon is guilty. But I think he deserves a
fair trial.
No, I'm not equating al-Qa'ida and Mr
Sharon, nor am I associating the innocent with the guilty. But
it's time we wrote the script to this terrible conflict. It's
time we stopped crushing our own freedoms. It's time we talked
about law and fairness and justice. Not just for criminals. But
for the whole Middle East.
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