Bu-lat-lat (boo-lat-lat) verb: to search, probe, investigate, inquire; to unearth facts Issue No. 36 October 21 - 27, 2001 Quezon City, Philippines |
Slaughter
of the Innocent Bolsters View BY
ROBERT FISK
Back to Bulatlat.com Alternative Reader Index In
Baghdad we had the bunker where our missile fried more than 300 people to death.
In Kosovo we had a refugee column torn to pieces by our bombs. Now in
Afghanistan, a village called Karam is our latest massacre. Of
course it's time for that tame old word "regret". We regretted the
Baghdad bunker. We were really very sorry for the refugee slaughter in Kosovo.
Now we are regretting the bomb that went astray in Kabul on Friday night; the
missile that killed the four UN mine clearers last Monday; and whatever hit
Karam. It's
always the same story. We start shooting with "smart" weapons after
our journalists and generals have told us of their sophistication. Their press
conferences produce monochrome snapshots of bloodless airbase runways with
little holes sprinkled across the apron. "A successful night," they
used to say, after bombing Serbia. They
said that again last week and no one - until of course we splatter civilians -
suggests going to war involves killing innocent people. It does. That is why the
military invented that repulsive and morally shameful phrase "collateral
damage". And they are always ready to smear the reporters on the ground. At
first, NATO claimed its aircraft had not butchered the refugee convoy in April
1999. Once we found the bomb parts, with US markings, they changed their tune. The
new tune went like this: "If we killed the innocent we regret it, but why
don't the reporters 'break free' of their Serb minders and see what else is
going on in Kosovo?" We might be asked the same again, now we are involved
in what, historically, is for us in Britain the Fourth Afghan War. What are we
journalists doing giving succor to Mr bin Laden and his thugs? There
is one big difference this time round. In 1991, we had a real Muslim coalition
on our side. In 1999, we so bestialized the Serbs that the death of their
innocent civilians could be laid at the hands of Slobodan Milosevic, and anyway
- in theory at least - we were trying to save the Albanian Muslims. No
doubt some idiot general will tell us this time round that Karam is Mr bin
Laden's fault - idiot, because this is not going to wash with the hundreds of
thousands of Muslims who are outraged at our air strikes on Afghanistan. And
here's the rub. In every Middle Eastern country, even tolerant Lebanon,
suspicion is growing that this is a war against Islam. That
is why the Arab leaders are mostly silent and why the Saudis don't want to help
us. That is why crowds tried yesterday to storm a Pakistani airbase used by the
American forces. It
reveals a dislocation of thought among Arabs about the crimes against humanity
in New York and Washington, a disturbing disconnection that allows them to
condemn the atrocities in America without reference to America's response - and
condemn the response without reflecting on the carnage on the other side of the
Atlantic. The
Muslim world now sees innocent Muslims who have died in Western air strikes on
Afghanistan. If Karam turns out to be as terrible as the Taliban claims, all of
Mr Blair's lectures and denials that this is a religious war will be in vain. The Prime Minister can now only reflect upon the irony that an obscurantist sect that smashes television sets and hangs videotapes from trees is now using television and videotape for its own propaganda. Back to Bulatlat.com Alternative Reader Index We want to know what you think of this article.
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