Christians are not our enemies

So here we had a terrorist action which was justified on religious grounds and supported by Europe, but the US did not follow the European policies. It decided to act, belatedly, but nevertheless it did act, to prevent the total destruction of Bosnia as a pluralistic and multi-ethnic state and to halt the further killing of Bosnian Muslims. The US punished the Serbian aggressor for the crimes it committed against Muslims in both Bosnia and Kosovo. To some extent it also managed to reverse the results of the Serbian aggression and impose peace.

What many Muslims around the world tend to forget is the fact American power in this particular case was used in order to save a predominantly Muslim country from the savagery of its Christian Orthodox neighbor, ruled by a communist dictator. A dictator, who in order to stay in power supplanted his extremist communist ideology with that of  Serbian orthodox ethno-nationalism, and who used terrorism and aggression to destroy Bosnia and Kosovo and their predominantly Muslim population.

I am disappointed when I read the false arguments of self styled anti-imperialist and anti-war ideologues, journalists, activists and even scholars, such as Noam Chomsky, Tariq Ali, John Pilger and Edward Herman who assert the American humanitarian intervention in Bosnia and Kosovo was in fact just the beginning of the so called "neo-imperial domination of the globe".

These intellectuals would want us to believe the war in Iraq  is the continuation of that "neo-imperial" strategy.

These "anti-war" scholars ignore inconvenient and salient facts. Saddam Hussein was one of the closest allies and collaborators of Slobodan Milosevic of Serbia who was responsible for the genocide of more than 200,000 European Muslims and the rape of 50,000 Muslim women.

While this might appear to be of no relevance to  anti-war scholars it is of relevance to me  personally and I think it should also be relevant to all Muslims including Australian Muslims.

The behaviour of great powers and their global imperatives are imposed on them by their very preponderance of power. In Bosnia and Kosovo the US clearly acted in the interests of Muslims. It certainly wasn't to ensure supplies of oil as Bosnia and Kosovo are relatively poor countries in terms of their natural resources.

Having said all this I do not mean to say that it is justifiable to kill tens of thousands of civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan in an attempt to kill several hundred terrorists or in an attempt to rid Iraq of its dictator. The loss of innocent lives is tragic and can never be sufficiently justified. But neither can the brutal oppression of the majority of the Muslim Shia population in Iraq who for decades were denied their legitimate rights to look after their own affairs. The jury is still out as far as Iraq is concerned and we don't know whether they will be able to fulfill their aspirations or not. But we hope they will, as the recent elections and the constitutional processes have confirmed.

What is sure is that it will be more difficult for Muslims to realise our aspirations for our place in the world if we do not clearly analyse the roles played by all parties in recent terror events. That includes the role of those who claim to be our religious brothers, such as al-Qaida, and those countries who are characterised as being Christian and "neo-imperialist".