US Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld’s decision to not apply the Geneva Conventions to Iraqi prisoners arrested in connection with suspected acts against US troops has already produced hateful consequences. This is consistent with longstanding Israeli policy to not extend Geneva Convention protections to members of the Palestinian Resistance.
The US stance turned out to be an open invitation to the prison guards and their superiors to torment and humiliate Iraqis in violation of American values of fairness and humaneness.
The behavior of American guards is not surprising. Many of the troops are drawn disproportionately from a segment known in colloquial terms as “White Trash”. This stratum of society in America is noted for its alcoholism, gambling, promiscuity, bigotry, economic envy and overall vulgarity. Previously, the US army was conscripted. It meant that perforce there was a more of a mix of different classes. Given the current make-up of the army, it is relatively easier for the US captors to view the Iraqis as a sub-human species fit for degrading treatment and an object of sadistic fun and ridicule.
Hollywood also has played a pivotal role. For a quarter of a century, Hollywood movies have frequently demonized Arabs as hateful creatures. Movie aficionados may take a cursory glance at the following films: Delta Force, Navy Seals, Iron Eagle, True Lies, Siege and Executive Decision. Hollywood is very much part and parcel of the popular media which shapes attitudes and moulds public opinion. Its visual impact is bigger than the written word.
My former law partner, the redoubtable US Senator Jim Abourezk, read this trend and, to that end, founded in Washington, D.C. the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) in 1980 in which the noted Arab-American leader Jim Zogby was the executive director with myself playing a humble supporting role. Abourezk thought then that the unfolding pattern of caricaturing and stereotyping Arabs and Muslims had to be seriously resisted or it would have perilous consequences.
The Arab community in the US was not fully aware of what lay ahead while the ruling elites in Muslim countries really did not care. Both were bogged down in a quagmire of non-issues.
You may ignore the fire but the fire does not ignore you. The consequences of such inattention and ineptness are readily and cruelly transparent in the post 9/11 world.
Here, one must pause and pay tribute to the sagacity, vision and sense of anticipation of Quaid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah who thought well before in advance about the harm likely to befall Muslims through the replacement of the British Raj with the Hindu Raj.
Today’s Sikhs, Christians, Muslims and, even more importantly, the Hindu untouchable Dalit, can testify about the effects of Hindutva and the foresight of the Quaid.
Unhappily, the general prevalence of an insipid thinking culture in Muslim societies and a defeatist mindset among Muslim elites is a significant contributory factor in not effectively deterring anti-Muslim hate.
