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Iraq Bloodshed…Official Arab Apathy
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Unlike
their leaders, Arabs and Muslims were more courageous in
protesting the U.S. attacks against Iraqis
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CAIRO,
April 10 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) – With at least 450
Iraqis slain in U.S. bombardment of the besieged western Baghdad town
of Fallujah and scores others killed in clashes with occupation forces
across the oil-rich country, Arab leaders courageously kept mum.
While
support for Iraqis' legitimate resistance is heating up on the Arab
street, Arab regimes are shying away from publicly criticizing the
heavy-handed U.S. military operations in the war-torn country,
reported Agence France-Presse (AFP).
Thousands
of Palestinian, Syrian and Egyptian demonstrators took to the streets
of their cities over the past few days to protest the massacres
perpetrated by the occupation forces against Iraqis.
In
a routine statement that rarely finds ears, the Arab League called on
the U.N. to step in and halt the deteriorating situation in Iraq.
Describing
the situation as grave, the pan-Arab organization Secretary General
Amr Moussa said "Arabs should not remain silent vis-à-vis such
an unacceptable situation."
However,
ever since the only thing Arab countries have struggled to do was to
keep their lips sealed.
Even
those who did react have called for the end of violence in general
terms, without blaming any party.
Gulf
Cooperation Council Secretary General Abdulrahman al-Attiya called
Thursday, April 8, on "all parties concerned... to immediately
halt acts of violence" and for Iraqis to "put national
interests above all else".
Even
while announcing Saturday, April 10, as a national day of mourning and
solidarity with the Iraqi victims, Libya refrained from openly
criticizing the U.S. military operations.
No
single official Arab reaction came even close to Russia's which
Friday, April 9, called on the U.S.-led occupation forces to refrain
from "disproportionate" use of force and halt its offensive.
Fearful
Some
analysts blamed the low-profile official reaction on the regimes' fear
of antagonizing Washington.
"Arab
governments are keen on having good relations with the U.S.,"
Mustafa Kamel al-Said, a lecturer at the faculty of economy and
political science at Cairo University, was quoted by AFP as saying.
"Some
Arab governments depend on the U.S. for financial assistance, others
are having problems with Washington and want to improve their
relationship," he said.
Disagreeing,
Waheed Abdul Megid, from the Egyptian think-tank Al-Ahram Center of
Strategic Studies, said several Arab countries, including U.S. allies
such as Egypt, did oppose the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq one year ago.
"What
is happening now in Iraq, he said, "delays
the hand over of sovereignty to the Iraqis," slated for June 30.
The
expert said several Arab regimes consider "Iran to have
instigated the movement of Moqtada Sadr" to wrestle control of
some southern cities from Bulgarian, Salvadorian, Spanish and Ukranian
control.
He
argued that conservatives who ousted reformists in Iran's
controversial February elections "want to drag the U.S. forces in
Iraq to a swamp, in order to prevent Washington from turning against
Iran" later on.
"It
is very simplistic to say what is happening now is resistance against
occupation, it is far more complicated than this," Abdul Megid
opined.
Another
Jenin
Trying
to make up for the official silence, Arab newspapers Saturday compared
the U.S. offensive on Fallujah to Israel's aggression against the West
Bank refugee camp of Jenin, and likened U.S. overseer Paul Bremer to
Israeli Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz.
"In
the first week of April 2002, Israeli occupation troops committed a
horrible massacre in Jenin. In the first week of April 2004, American
occupation soldiers committed a human massacre in Fallujah which is
still continuing," said Saudi Arabia's Al-Jazeera daily.
"In
both massacres, F-16s and Apaches were used, which caused the death
and destruction of man and civilization," it said.
"Now
Fallujah resembles Jenin... In both cases, it is the same Arab blood
and the destroyer has the same evil objectives against Arabs,"
the Emirati daily Al-Khaleej maintained.
On
April 3, 2002, Israeli troops, tanks and helicopters swooped on Jenin,
in the northern West Bank and massacred hundreds of Palestinian
civilians in the ensuing nine days of fighting.
The
massacre drew world condemnation, with U.N. special envoy Terje
Roed-Larsen calling the scene in aftermath "horrific
beyond belief".
"There
are many common points between the behavior of Mofaz in Palestine and
that of Bremer," said Al-Khaleej.
They
both "resort to the Apache or F-16 and heavy arms of
destruction... to bomb innocent civilians.
In
Damascus, Tishrin newspaper warned that "anger is mounting
in the Arab street against those who are killing Iraq's people with
their tanks in the name of freedom."
"Iraq
looks so much like Palestine nowadays. The pictures are the same,
those of F-16s and Apaches bombing houses, mosques and killing
civilians by the dozens," it said.
Bremer
Vs Saddam
For
its part, Saudi Arabia's Al-Watan daily asserted there was no
difference between "freedom" under the U.S.-led occupation
and former leader Saddam Hussein.
"The
savagery of the American occupation in Iraq reveals the lies of the
American administration," it said.
"What
is the difference between Saddam and Bremer? Both governments use
force and set red lines not to be crossed," Saudi's Al-Madina
newspaper added.
Qatar's
Al-Sharq said that Iraqis "today are victims of a total
war in which the same methods employed by Saddam Hussein are used."
A
statement signed by 67
prominent Muslim scholars worldwide pressed the U.S.
occupation forces to grind to cessation their "brutal
genocide" against Iraqis.
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