War on Terror Again?

War on Terror Again?After a year of some respite on the subject, the return of the hullabaloo in the media surrounding the war on terrorism and its attendant problems, protagonists and jargon churns one's stomach. Even though the intensity of the military confrontation between Western forces and the Taliban in Afghanistan remained unabated throughout 2009, as did the bloody conflict between the American-supported military establishment in Pakistan and the Taliban and Al-Qaeda insurrectionists in that country, as well as Al-Qaeda-linked violence in Iraq, there were important signs at several levels that the system of relationships between nations and peoples was on the verge of shedding that disastrous legacy of 11 September 2001 and rationalising the handling of terrorism.

 

Certain executive actions on the part of newly elected Obama administration, such as the decision to close down Guantanamo, the moves to restore normal judicial process for persons charged with or detained on suspicion of terrorism, and the instructions given to security and intelligence agencies to respect the human rights of detainees and refrain from all practices of torture, gave some long-needed sense of direction at the level of official policy in Washington. Secondly, many governments and a broad array of NGOs followed Obama's lead in discarding the Bush administration's rhetoric and attitudes on the war on terror, which integrally linked terrorism with Islam, reduced the handling of terrorism to the military/security dimension, and de- prioritised international law and human rights in the handling of the phenomenon. The effect of this response was to render Western and global opinion more open to including the socio-political and socio-economic dimensions in the approach to the fight against terrorism, whether in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq or Somalia, and to phasing out the militarism imposed by the Bush administration in favour of more holistic solutions that rely more on social, economic and political strategies.

 

In a similar manner, Obama's frequent and inspiring references to prioritising diplomacy, mutual respect and consensus-building in the conduct of international relations, his calls to negotiate peaceful solutions to the conflicts of the Middle East, and his declaration of the US's commitment to withdraw from Iraq and its desire to leave Afghanistan helped generate an optimistic and potentially constructive climate. To the Arab and Islamic worlds, in particular, it seemed that relations with the superpower were on the point of emerging from the critical condition in which they had been mired since 2001, while in the West the joy at the receding spectre of armed conflict was so great that Obama was awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace at the end of last year.

 

Unfortunately, that refreshing and heartening climate could not withstand the renewed surge in anti-terrorism fervour in the press and public forums brought on by the failed attempt to bomb a US passenger plane and the transformation of Yemen into a new battle theatre between the US and Al-Qaeda, albeit involving other parties. The high-alert security precautions that Western authorities introduced in airports and seaports following the Omar Al-Farouq "attack" bear pretty much the same stamp as the events that followed 11 September, both in terms of official statements justifying these measures and in terms of the paranoia and alarmism that allows a security mentality to prevail over respect for human rights, to which testifies the resurgence of a blatant bias against passengers hailing from Arab and Islamic nations. In addition, the terms and tenor of the rhetoric used by the Obama administration and other Western governments -- especially Britain -- in reference to the fight against Al-Qaeda in Yemen are practically identical to those the Bush administration used with respect to Afghanistan (after the fall of the Taliban), Iraq (after the occupation) and Pakistan (following the escalation in terrorist activities and the growing influence of Al-Qaeda in the areas bordering Afghanistan).

 

In Western eyes, Yemen today is no different from these three countries. It has been reduced to a single dimension: a base for Al-Qaeda activities that must be brought under control by means of heavy injections of military, security and intelligence assistance to the Yemeni government that is incapable of taking on Al-Qaeda by itself. The Western rhetoric on Yemen comes complete with the familiar nods to the need to address social and economic conditions in the country in order to "dry up the sources of terrorism". And as was the case in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iraq, this is unlikely to amount to more than a trickle of aid into non-security related fields in the hope of encouraging some international or Western NGOs to take on some developmental projects there. Or worse yet, the rhetoric could be translated into high-profile international conferences with low practical results in terms of the substance needed to propel the afflicted country towards solid and sustainable economic and social development.

 

Yet, the war on terrorism would not have resurfaced with all the ear-shattering din we have heard over the past few weeks had it not been for the two chief forces that benefit the most from this hateful rhetoric: the American ultra right and Al-Qaeda. The former, hell- bent on making a comeback after its defeat in the 2008 elections, has been steadily and relentlessly capitalising on the setbacks the Obama administration has met with in the pursuit of its agenda of change at home and abroad. After recouping some of its popularity, it has seized upon the attempted airplane bombing and the events in Yemen to paint itself as the champion of the security and safety of American society. Its means of doing so is to clamour for stronger security precautions at home and for intensifying the war on Al-Qaeda abroad, and simultaneously to question Obama's ability to undertake the responsibilities of the war on terror when oratorical flare distracts him from political realties and the moral commitments deriving from the Nobel Peace prize concern him more than national security.

 

It has always been one of the tactics of the neo- conservatives to accuse the Democrats of being weak, restrained in a straitjacket of morality, and squeamish when it comes to using the instruments of war. The effect today has been to push the Obama administration, fearful of losing its popularity ratings, into a reckless acceleration in the type of language and policies that were the hallmark of the Bush approach to the war on terror. Al-Qaeda, meanwhile, has been biting at the bit to lash out at an American president who addressed the Islamic world from Istanbul and Cairo, appealed for respect for Islam and the Muslim people, and dropped the jargon of the war on terror from the official American lexicon, vowed to close down Guantanamo and to withdraw from Iraq, and promised to work for a negotiated solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict that would fulfil Arab rights.

 

Al-Qaeda leaders could not have wished for a better succession of events than those that led to the Obama administration's failure so far to fulfil its pledges to the Arab and Islamic world and its reversion to the policies and rhetoric of the war on terror. This was just the opening they needed to reproduce their special brand of rhetoric that advocates violence and murder as the only means to confront American "arrogance" and "insolence". Osama bin Laden performed the task to the expected specifications in his latest videotape, in which he justified "the attack of Omar Al-Farouq" on the grounds of the US's perpetual support for Israel and, hence, its direct responsibility for the tragic suffering of the Palestinians in Gaza. He then took occasion to remind Arabs and Muslims of Al-Qaeda's traditional formula that holds that disregard for the sanctity of Palestinian blood due to American bias for Israel sanctifies his desire to avenge the Palestinians with American blood.