What Do All These Countries Have in Common?

What do all these countries have in common?

United States.  India.  Spain.  United Kingdom.  Nigeria.  France.  Egypt.  Netherlands.  Afghanistan.  Saudi Arabia.  Philippines.  Iraq.  Denmark.  Russia.  Israel.  Italy.  Bali.  Tanzania.  Jordan. 

These nations are all different in language, culture, forms of government, degrees of religious tolerance or lack thereof, isolationism or engagement, freedoms, geography, demographics, standards of living, and per capita income.

Yet each of these nations has been a victim of Islamic terrorism within recent memory. 

The excuses for terrorism have varied from one nation to the next and, from one month and year to the next, but the violence continues.

It is dangerously myopic for anyone to spend more than five minutes analyzing the excuses offered to justify terrorism against any of these nations.

The "Excuse of the Month" for attacks against Denmark is that a newspaper, the Danish daily Jyllands-Posten, published several Mohammed cartoons on September 30, 2006.  Some of the cartoons were reprinted in a Norwegian publication in January 2006.

I've questioned the wisdom of going out of one's way to publish images of Mohammed in violation of a religious taboo against depicting Mohammed (here and here).  It is pointless.  All it is likely to accomplish is to rally our Muslim enemies and alienate our Muslim allies.

But how that justifies violent attacks against the entire nation of Denmark and its governmental leaders, none of whom had anything to do with publishing the cartoons, has not been adequately explained.  It cannot be adequately explained because it is, in fact, unreasonable and outrageous.

Of course, there were completely different excuses for the September 11, 2001 attack against the United States, and for the series of isolated terrorist attacks against the United States that preceded September 11th.

There was another set of excuses for the long series of terrorist attacks endured by India. 

There were even more and different excuses for the attacks against Spain. 

And France. 

And Jordan.

And Saudi Arabia.

And Israel.

And the Philippines.

And Russia.

And Italy.

And Bali.

And I could go on and on.

But it all comes down to the same thing:  terrorism -- deliberate violence and murder against innocent, noncombatant civilian men, women and children.

The only thing that changes is the location and the excuse.

To win this war, we don't need to defeat Islam nor try to convert its one billion believers to something else or to unbelief.  That would make our job harder than it has to be.  In fact, it would make our job impossible.

The evil that we need to fight and defeat is terrorism.  That is a battle we can and will win.

With overreaction to the Mohammed cartoon raging worldwide, alarms are now sounding in every part of the world.  It's time for the decent nations of the world to stop hitting the "snooze" button.

Now is the time when all decent people and all decent nations must awaken, recognize evil for what it is, and fight it.

____________________________

Note:  This is an updated version of a post first published on November 8, 2005, when arson was raging in France.

Comments

[Jack Yan]

Bravo, Gina. It is important to remember that the acts of a few are not the viewpoints of the many when it comes to these terrorist acts.
   I recall when New Zealand banned French goods in the mid-1990s over nuclear testing at Mururoa Atoll. People who owned French cars found them damaged. French bakeries were vandalized.
   For why? At the time, 75 per cent of French citizens were against the testing, too—in line with New Zealand public opinion.
   And yet, a wave of hate swept across the country—targeting people who had nothing to do with a government’s decision thousands of miles away.
   This time, the boycotts are directed at Danish citizens and the government. While one of the parties to the Danish coalition has a record of what I would class as hate speech, Danish corporations that operate in the middle east are as much victims as the many innocent Muslims whose beliefs were blasphemed by these cartoons.

[be]

The pictures were ridiculous.

Freedom of speech doesn't mean insulting someone's religion.

The prophet peace be upon him is dear to us. And as Muslims, we aren't allowed to meant to draw pictures of other prophets e.g. Jesus, Moses, Abraham, and we are not allowed to disrespect other religions.

[yank in london]

Bali's not a country.....

[Gina Cobb]

Yank in London,

Thanks. When I wrote the post I knew that Bali is not a country but I chose to take literary license because if wrote "Indonesia" few people would have any idea which terrorist attack I was referring to.

It's also wrong to end a sentence with a preposition as I just did, but sometimes writing flows more easily if you break the rules.

And sometimes I start sentences with "and" or "but" even though that's not technically proper either.

And. Sometimes. I. Even. Do. This. Just. To. Make. A. Point.

Which isn't to fault you for making your point. (That wasn't a complete sentence either by the way.)

I appreciate hearing from you, and perhaps your comment will spare somebody some geographical confusion out there.