American foreign policy must reflect American values

If we are to recount all the assistance, friendship and generosity Americans have extended towards us over the years that will require several columns. I shall never forget the business trip I made with an American colleague to northern Iowa in May 1990 during the month of Ramadan. I told my friend that since I was fasting and sunset was well after 9 P.M., to go ahead and have his dinner alone at the usual time, around 5 P.M. I bought some food for Iftar and dinner from a grocery store. As I was sitting down to eat around 9:30 P.M. there was a knock on my door. It was my friend: "What's the matter, aren't you hungry? Let's go!" He hadn't eaten! The only reason we are in America is because of a Jewish Professor of the University of Pennsylvania and his wife. We met them while they were on sabbaticals at Oxford. The Professor and his wife arranged for our postdoctoral and graduate scholarship at Penn. And most of our Bangladeshi friends around here received their green cards courtesy of the effort of a very able Jewish attorney. Therefore, it must be remembered that our criticism of the Bush administration is not a criticism of America, and that the criticism of Sharon's Israel is not a criticism of the Jews.

The principles on which America was founded -- truth, justice and belief in one God -- are identical to Islamic beliefs. More than once in these columns the writer has referred to America as a "Muslim" nation in that sense. It was no surprise therefore that after 9/11 as American Muslims reeled under the horrendous monstrosity that was undertaken in their name, the average Americans, after the initial anger, reached out to their Muslim citizens to protect them from an expected backlash. Harvard President's attending the Ju'ma prayer with Harvard's Muslim students three days after 9/11 was an example of such outreach. Unfortunately, the tragedy also provided the American Islamophobes with a golden opportunity to proclaim the beginning of the much-vaunted clash of civilization between the West and Islam, which, they stressed, America as the only real civilization must win at any cost. The Islamopohobes range from the scholarly Princeton emeritus Professor Bernard Lewis, who claims that Islam is a failed religion, to the think-tanker Daniel Pipes, who says Muslims are inherently violent, to evangelist Franklin Graham who calls Islam "an evil and wicked religion." This incessant Islam-bashing by the Islamophobes in the media has had the desired effect. To the Pew Research Centre poll question whether Islam is more likely than any other religion "to encourage violence among its believers," only 25 per cent said yes in March 2002. In June 2003, 44 per cent said yes. Islamophobia doubled in America in one year.

With the disappearance of the bipolar (communist, capitalist) world after Soviet Union's implosion in 1990, American foreign policy establishment faced the daunting task of formulating foreign policy to counter unknown or ununderstood threats. Into the void entered Harvard's Samuel P. Huntington who in a seminal paper in 1993 postulated a "Clash of Civilizations" mostly between Islam and the West. The optimists advocated a shift from threat mentality to an opportunity mentality and called for a civilizational dialogue between Islam and the West, pointing out that Islamic laws and beliefs are very similar to the basic premises of America's founding fathers. The Islamophobes won the day.

The most notorious among the Islamophobes are a close-knit group called neo-Conservatives, who are predominantly Zionist-Jewish and 100 per cent dedicated to the supremacy of the Israelis over the Muslim world in general and the Palestinians in particular. (The writer will devote at least one piece to the neo-Conservative movement in the future). For over a decade the neocon movement was honing its strategies in the expectation that eventually they would be able to emerge from the shadows and implement a foreign policy to destroy the "Islamic threat to civilization." September 11 provided them the opportunity. What is most disturbing is that the neocons are taking America away from its founding principles. In March 2001, before 9/11, a veteran of Israeli military, Robert D. Kaplan, briefed President Bush on his book, "The Coming Anarchy: Shattering the Dreams of the Post Cold War," which theorises a "Lord of the Flies meltdown" and that "the most important moral commitment for America is to preserve its power." Kaplan's subsequent book, "Warrior Politics: Why Leadership Demands a Pagan Ethos," became a required reading for policymakers leading up to the attack on Iraq in March 2003: "Our moral values ...represent our worst vulnerabilities." According to Kaplan, barbarians have exploited a global ideology Islam -- to recruit "holy warriors." The only adequate response is to remake the map of the Middle East, and indeed the world through regime change. (sounds familiar?)

Mr. Kaplan's bogus hypothesis must be refuted. America's moral values are its strengths, not its weaknesses. As the holy Qur'an says, bereft of spirituality, individuals and nations are doomed. Therefore, no true friend of America can ask America to adopt pagan ethos. The problem with these neocons is their obsession with the survival of Israel. They believe that the survival of Israel is directly proportional to the military might of America. Their original plan was to use American might to invade and neutralise, Iraq, Syria and Iran, so as to buy Israel another 50 to 100 years of existence. Now that it appears as though America might leave Iraq sooner rather than later, they are petrified. In America they are demonising the one block that sees through their game and are not afraid to articulate it: Muslim Americans. Daniel Pipes is on record as saying that the enfranchisement (voting rights) of Muslim Americans is a threat to Israel! Frank Gaffney, who at one time was a Deputy Secretary of State, recently wrote that Muslim Americans are fifth columnists, and the process of their separation from American society must begin! Meaning, arrangements must be made to intern Muslim Americans in camps, just as the Japanese were during World War II. Mr. Gaffney suggests that Muslim-American opinion-makers (such as the writer) should be the first to be interned! Following the neocon strategy to the letter, Mr. Gaffney published his article in an obscure magazine as a trial balloon, or an off-Broadway production. Once he finds out how it plays with focus groups, he will perfect it and move it to the mainstream: Broadway, or the neocon trumpets, "The Weekly Standard," and "Commentary."

Of course there is a much easier way for Israel: accept the Geneva Accord (for which according to Richard Cohen, my favourite Washington Post columnist, Israeli negotiator Yossi Beilin has been "(Charles) Krauthammered as virtually a traitor and (William) Safired to a crisp"). Former Israeli Prime Ministers Ben-Guerion and Golda Meir must be turning in their graves seeing that all the Palestinians, the Arab and the Islamic world want in exchange for their recognition of Israel is for Israel to withdraw to 1967 border, and Sharon, who wants the whole pie, is adamantly opposed to it!

It was so disappointing to read in The New York Times on December 7: "American soldiers have begun wrapping entire villages in barbed wire. American soldiers are demolishing buildings thought to be used by Iraqi attackers. They have begun imprisoning relatives of suspected guerillas." This is what Israel does, not America. Sadly, according to press reports, Israel has been teaching America these techniques in America and in Israel. According to Israeli military expert Martin Van Creveld, just as Israel has been unsuccessful in eliminating militant groups and suicide bombers, the US cannot expect to be victorious in Iraq. He adds: "Iraq is larger, the borders are open and there is almost unlimited access to arms. I don't see how on earth they (US) can win. I think this is going to end the same way as Vietnam did. They are going to flee the country hanging on the strings of helicopters," referring to the 1975 US departure from Saigon. The trick for Israel is to be like America, not force America to be like Israel. The trick for America is not to be like Israel. To win the war on terror, America must project American values in its foreign policy, the values embodied by my neighbour.