“Cleanskins” are people who do not have a police terroist involvement, criminal conviction or even a minor police record. Why do 4 “cleanskins” succumb to the act of unmitigated indiscriminate bombing that terrorised London on Thursday?
Why did a 19-year old teenager with a British education in a British environment and love of British cricket descend to a stupid desperation that drove him to plant bombs, knowing that those would kill innocent people and himself.
Why were the 4 young men willing to kill themselves to make, what they thought would be a political statement?
Let’s have no doubts - they were terrorists and they did kill innocents. But it may satisfy Bush and his neo-cons, and Blair and his ambitions to leave it at that, that the 4 young men were terrorists committing terrorism, because they hated the American and British way of life.
That may suit and satisfy Bush's Christian Right constituencies. But we must ask why? We must also ask who have been the terrorists besides those 4 dead young men?
According to the British of earlier years, George Washington was a terrorist, and so was Menachem Begin. Just as recent as 20 years ago, many older Australians and New Zealanders considered Nelson Mandala as a black terrorist - maybe some still do?
To Arabs, particularly Afghans and Iraqis, the Americans were, have been and still are terrorists. The US has used its military to bomb, rocket, attack with missiles, machine-gun, shove, stomp, push, insult, confine, torture and humiliate Arabs and Afghans, and many other people around the world.
Hence to them, the USA is a terrorist state, and unfortunately a powerful one. And many other people of the world agree. The USA is worse than those it criticises, because it is so powerful that no one can bring its crimes to legal account.
How does one deal with a powerful terrorist?
Successive American Administrations have backed rebels, oppressors, insurgents against legitimately elected governments. They have formented unrest, instability, revolts, stop elections, and even condoned, supported or conducted political assassinations when those acts have been in the interests of the USA.
How does one deal with a powerful terrorist?
To the Palestinians, Israel is a terorist state, and Ariel Sharon is a terrorist. Recall Sabra and Shatila - there are more examples. Palestinians have been terrorised for years, while the USA financed the Israeli terrorist State’s terrorisms against them.
How does one deal with a powerful terrorist?
There is not only anger against but in fact deep hatred for America, and consequently its allies. Neutral parties and even some of the US' aliies despise the USA.
A 500 kg greedy gorilla terrorises its way around the jungle world, while smaller simians, some only marmosets, suffer in silent frustration and mounting resentment.
Translate that into the human world, and you get young impressionable men like the London bombers who want to right the wrongs they perceived in frustration and anger. Mix in a demagogic imam in Pakistan with the oratory skill to instigate and inflame, enhanced by his irresponsible assurance of spiritual salvation for matyrs, and the supply of the correct weapons by an unseen manipulator behind the scene, and we have our answers.
It’s convenient for Bush and his ilk to just label the incident as terrorism, an act committed by that easily branded-under-a-convenient-for-brushing-aside name of terrorists. It diverts attention from the US' own crimes, acts of terrorism and misbehaviour.
BUT what’s the underlying cause? What made George Washington the terrorist he was? What made Menachem Begin the murderous terrorist thug he definitely was? What made Simon Bolivar the terrorist that Spain hated? What made these 4 young British the terrorists they have been identified as?
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