Rising intolerance

Published : Oct 08, 2010 00:00 IST

Terry Jones, pastor at the Dove World Outreach Centre in Gainesville, Florida, talks to the media on September 10 after he abandoned the plan to burn copies of the Quran on the 9/11 anniversary.-SCOTT AUDETTE/REUTERS

Terry Jones, pastor at the Dove World Outreach Centre in Gainesville, Florida, talks to the media on September 10 after he abandoned the plan to burn copies of the Quran on the 9/11 anniversary.-SCOTT AUDETTE/REUTERS

It is disconcerting that in the U.S., a country that symbolises tolerance, there are opinion leaders willing to exploit the Islamic centre issue to promote intolerance.

As Americans we are not and never will be at war with Islam.

President Barack Obama at the Pentagon on the 9/11 anniversary.

ANOTHER 9/11 anniversary has gone by, and there was the customary poignant ceremony at Ground Zero in New York, the Pentagon in Washington, D.C. and the emerging national park in Shanksville (Pennsylvania) (where a hijacked United Airlines flight crashed on the momentous day nine years ago) to remember the nearly 3,000 victims. There was, however, a marked difference this time in the tenor of the observance because of a ballooning controversy around a proposal to put up an Islamic cultural centre in Manhattan, near where the twin towers stood. Voices in the background revealed certain bitterness, not discernible even during the first anniversary, because the planned centre would include a mosque, apart from a multifaith prayer hall and an auditorium.

The issue has undeniably generated discord and tension because the definitely contentious move fatally ignores the fact that the wound left behind by the gory happening of 2001 is yet to heal. The plan is also considered basically flawed because the world is still very much a threatened place, and any step that would further polarise populations on religious lines in countries across the world was to be resisted at all costs.

Reactions to the planned centre from a cross-section of the mourners and from those not directly touched by the tragedy have been on predictable lines.

However much the action was lawful in their eyes and in tune with the concept of tolerance embodied in the American way of life, many Americans are said to feel that those who have conceived of a mosque so close to the centre of the 2001 tragedy are insensitive if not downright provocative. The belief gaining ground, at least in some sections of the country, is that the new construction is an insult to the memory of the men and women who paid with their lives for no fault of theirs, and a symbolic victory for those who hailed the attack as retribution for the calumny allegedly heaped on Islam by the United States.

What should, however, be disconcerting to the millions who look upon the U.S. as a country that symbolises tolerance and also practises it at great cost is that there are opinion leaders in the U.S. who are willing to exploit the Islamic centre issue to promote intolerance, ignoring totally what the nation has stood for right from its birth three centuries ago.

The thoughtless announcement by a little-known pastor of Florida that he would burn copies of the Holy Quran on September 11 to protest against the proposed Islamic centre in the heart of New York City has incensed many across the globe, including those in the U.S. who stand for freedom and religious tolerance.

This was no more than a frivolous publicity stunt and an attempt at rabble-rousing by an inconsequential preacher. It could not, however, be ignored in the Internet age, as Obama himself acknowledged, because of the Web's immense capacity to influence and shape popular opinion. The pastor's antics attracted international attention, leading to demonstrations in Afghanistan, Pakistan and a few other countries against the intended sacrilege. It is an entirely different matter that he developed cold feet at the last minute and abandoned the insane plan.

Public opinion in the U.S. asserted itself swiftly against his threat. President Obama sought to defuse the situation by telling the nation that it was not Islam but a fundamentalist group, Al Qaeda, that was responsible for the colossal crime in 2001 and that his country was at war with terrorists and not against a religion. Although this distinction between a well-entrenched religion with a massive following and a terrorist movement is well known, the President was only trying to contain ruffled feelings on both sides of the divide. But it was clear that enough damage had been done to the U.S. image as an eclectic power that rose above religion and colour.

There are analysts who are strongly of the view that, irrespective of its ethics, a show of intolerance such as that of the Florida pastor could renew terrorist attacks against the U.S. This was possibly what the President had in mind when he sought to intervene and put the record straight. He said in as many words that acts of madness such as the pastor's could endanger the lives of thousands of American troops in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The cultural centre controversy comes against the backdrop of Obama's falling approval ratings. He is in the unenviable situation of having to balance his Islamic ethnicity and his role as the chief executive of a nation that boasts strong secular roots, in which he should not be seen as trying to placate a religion that has, unfortunately, been exploited by some elements with terrorist leanings. He has done his bit to distance himself from fundamentalists of Islam and Christianity and has not given any room so far for complaints by either side.

There is every reason to believe that the U.S. is not very far from another disaster, which may or may not be of 9/11 proportions. I am taking into account three incidents of the past year while making what may seem a brash assessment. First, on November 5, 2009, a U.S. Army Major and psychiatrist, Nidal Malik AbduWali Hasan, opened indiscriminate fire at the Fort Hood Camp in Texas and killed 13 individuals. This was not a terrorist attack. But the fact that the major, born in the U.S, had strong religious views and was opposed to the U.S. Army deployment in Iraq and Afghanistan cannot be missed.

A few weeks later, on December 24, 2009, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, 23, a Nigerian national, made an unsuccessful attempt to blow up, with explosives strapped to his body, a Northwest Airlines aircraft on its flight to Detroit from Amsterdam.

Finally, on May 1, 2010, Faizal Shahzad, a U.S. national with Pakistani origins, made a bold but crude attempt to bring about an explosion in New York City's hallowed Times Square by abandoning a car laden with low-grade explosives.

The claim, therefore, that the U.S is safe from terrorist incursions after the Department of Homeland Security, set up in response to 9/11, tightened up all possible avenues of entry into the country seems boastful. Like the United Kingdom, the U.S. has to contend with home-grown terrorism. Issues such as the Islamic cultural centre add fuel to the fire and can provoke mindless fundamentalists living in the country to indulge in adventurist action.

What the U.S. is going to do to meet this challenge will have implications for the whole of the global terrorist scene, which, incidentally, has been muddied by the arrival of the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) as a major player to complement Al Qaeda and other terrorist outfits. There have been more than speculative accounts on how the two organisations actually work in tandem. While Al Qaeda is mostly on the run, unable to launch any major action, the LeT has, of late, acquired an elan that projects it as the deadlier of the two.

The LeT is undoubtedly backed by sophisticated technology that is available to others also in the wide spectrum that terrorism now is. LeT camps are known for taking huge numbers of men from a variety of sources to train and export them to terrorist targets, including India. With a wide sway over the fanatical fringe in West Asia and links with many charities, the LeT is believed to have abundant funds at its command to go through with its operations.

The well-orchestrated action seen in the attacks in Mumbai in November 2008 is testimony to the LeT's prowess. Pakistan's unwillingness or incapacity to take on the LeT notwithstanding its own losses at the LeT's hands is one factor that should weigh heavily in the minds of U.S. authorities. The latter should also be exercised over the fact that the visa waiver for U.K. nationals is a loophole that permits terrorists born in the U.K. and having Pakistani and LeT connections to enter the U.S. with relative ease.

In sum, the current alignment of forces intending to harm the non-Islamic nations is too formidable for the U.S., the U.K., and India not to work in unison. The three countries are major targets for a variety of groups because of the strong collaborative ties that bind them in the fight against terrorists. The assistance rendered by the U.S. to India recently to question 26/11 suspect David Coleman Headley in Chicago is an example of this cooperation. The help cannot be wholly discounted, as some observers do, despite the fact that no earth-shaking information was obtained from him and there was an initial reluctance on the part of the U.S. to permit Headley's interrogation by India's National Investigation Agency (NIA).

That law enforcement officials in targeted countries have a platform to share intelligence and information has been convincingly established. This is undoubtedly a deterrent by itself, however small, to terrorism. Nations fearing terrorist inroads cannot stand in isolation any longer. They will have to pool their resources generously and imaginatively to fight the modern scourge. Considerations of sovereignty should not inhibit one another in extending a helping hand. Or else the victor will be Osama bin Laden and his ilk.

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