None So Blind...

An Iraqi in a taxi containing explosives has become the first known
suicide bomber of the war to succeed in taking some of the US
invaders with him. By itself, his attack is simply another bit of
bloodletting in this unnecessary war. But what makes the event so
significant is not that it happened (though the fact that it did will
be causing considerable unease among America and its allies), but the
way in which Washington has reacted to this slaying of at least four
of its soldiers.

The cry has gone up from the American camp that suicide bombings are
the acts of terrorists, therefore this attack proves, beyond all
doubt, the long-argued American case that Iraq is a terrorist state.
Thus Washington was right all along to invade, and the sooner Saddam
Hussein can be put out of business, the safer the world will be.

There is none so blind as they that won't see.

This ignorant and deeply stupid analysis just about sums up the level
of what seems to pass for serious thought in George W. Bush's White
House.

Put aside for a moment the obvious objection that had there been no
invasion in the first place, there would have been no suicide bombing
in reaction to it, terrorist or otherwise ˜ in other words, that the
proof of this particular pudding was not in the eating ˜ and bring
the debate to a level that the current mindset of the US
administration is more attuned to.

Imagine instead that one of Davy Crockett's men had volunteered to
charge a wagonload of explosives out of the fort and straight into
Santana's forces surrounding the Alamo, in an attempt to break the
Mexicans' aggressive resolve. Would not that man now be high in the
pantheon of US heroes? Indeed are not Davy Crockett himself and the
rest his volunteers roundly honored for their bravery and self-
sacrifice, which held off an invader long enough for his campaign to
lose momentum and falter?

Were Davy Crockett and his men terrorists for throwing away their
lives in a hopeless action against vastly superior might? If an
American answers that they were not, then he is accepting that
neither was the Iraqi suicide bomber in his taxi.

Davy Crockett is a hero to the Americans. Every citizen remembers the
Alamo. Can Washington therefore appreciate that the Iraqi in the taxi
is going to be a hero as well, when his name and his self-sacrifice
become known, and that he will be a hero not just in Iraq but
throughout the Arab world ?

If they can imagine this, maybe the Bush White House will go the
extra intellectual mile and understand that the guy in the taxi in
Iraq was no more laying down his life for his president in Baghdad
than the guy in the raccoon hat was dying for his president in Texas.
Both men chose to die because they loved and wanted to defend their
homeland. An attack against one Texan or one Iraqi was an attack
against all Texans and all Iraqis.

But America of course cannot ascribe to its enemies the noble and
decent motives it is happy to honor among its own heroes. For
Washington, there can be no equivalence between Iraqis and Americans.
Yet consider this: One of them has a warmongering, bloodthirsty
president, elevated to his position in a sham election, who is happy
to slaughter innocents to promote his world vision. The other has
Saddam Hussein.


http://www.arabnews.com/Article.asp?ID=24497