By Amina Qazi, Irvine, CA
In his letter in one of the recent issues of Pakistan Link entitled “Winning the War of Words”, John Williams complains: “...I do not see an effort on the part of Muslims in America to reach out to those in their former homelands to stem the tide of misinformation that has flooded Pakistan and Afghanistan.” A similar outcry against American Muslims was made by Bill Maher in his show “Politically Incorrect” just a few days ago. He posed the question: “Why won’t the Muslims themselves overthrow or at least rebel against their governments?”. The answer is plain and simple. Only those overthrow or rebel who have a reward in sight. And for Muslims all over the world there is no real support coming from anywhere. Yes, President Bush Jr. is supporting Pakistan. But America’s foreign policy has continually sent conflicting messages to not just Arabs but Muslims in general in the past ten years.
Mr. Williams stated “... in most Americans’ (including Arab Americans) opinion, I’ve spoken with, this is an ‘us or them’ scenario.” He then went on to justify the death of the innocent Afghanis. Actually, I am bitterly opposed to this standard of “giving away human lives” as collateral for war. Ever since the tragic death of the 5,000 innocents in the World Trade Center, it appears there is an effort to avenge those deaths with what may perhaps end up with 100s of thousands of lives. Congratulations! We’ve succeeded in becoming the little children in the sandbox who throw sand at each other for taking revenge.