While commemorating the 20th anniversary of the terrorist attacks on the United States on September 11, 2001, American citizens must be wondering today if they were right when they supported the then President George W. Bush when he declared an international war on terror in retaliation to such attacks.
The entire world must have realised by now that punishing the entire Afghan nation for such terrorist operation was wrong even if it has been regarded as the biggest attack on civil targets in our modern history. Actually, many analysts including former president Hosni Mubarak, suspected the idea that these attacks were perpetrated by some terrorist elements hiding in caves of Tora Bora mountains in Afghanistan.
Mubarak, the former commander of the Egyptian air forces during 1973 war, emphasised how difficult it would be for any pilot to hit a skyscraper with an aircraft. He noted that the twin towers would appear as if they were two matchsticks that any pilot would find it difficult to smash into any of them with his plane. So, how did al-Qaeda terrorists managed to hit the two buildings in such high speed and precision?
Even if we assume that Mubarak’s conviction was wrong and that al-Qaeda members were the ones who plotted and carried out these terrible attacks, does this justify launching an all-out war on Afghanistan and then Iraq under the guise of fighting terrorism? And if Washington and its Western allies were right when they decided to launch 20-year war against Taliban to punish it for providing safe haven to Al-Qaeda, why have they now turned to strike a deal to ensure swift return of Taliban to power in this miserable country?
In an attempt to restore his popularity, which has been severely damaged as a result of the humiliating withdrawal of the American troops from Afghanistan last month, Joe Biden agreed to declassify information collected by the panel to the extent that it would not jeopardise the US national security.
Though the 9/11 commission report found no evidence implicating Saudi officials in the attack, some Americans wish to get huge financial compensation from the Kingdom on allegations that some Saudi nationals played a major role in funding Al-Qaeda.
Even if investigation proved that some Saudi citizens financed Al-Qaeda, does this give the US the right to seek compensation from the Saudi government? If that is the case, why don’t the Americans demand compensations from their administration, which contributed to the creation of al-Qaeda and the Taliban in the first place in order to deter the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan?
The American citizens should realise the fact that the US, which launched “the International War on Terror” was the one that supported and continues to support fanatic groups like the Muslim Brotherhood, the mother organisation of all the terrorist groups including al-Qaeda and its offshoots, which are currently operating in more than 28 countries.
On the other hand, who would question the US and its Western allies for launching war on Iraq based on false allegation of its possession of weapons of mass destruction? When it was proved that these claims were wrong, the US said that the aim was to end the autocratic regime of Saddam Hussein and replace it with model of Western Democracy. Unfortunately, the invasion of Iraq shattered not only Iraq but the entire Arab region and caused the emergence of more terrorist groups, which brought chaos and misery to millions of people.
On leaving Afghanistan, President Biden stated that the aim of this war has never been for building a democratic system but to deter terrorism of al-Qaeda. So what was the reason for the war on Iraq, which had never housed or supported al-Qaeda or any other terrorist group?
Unfortunately, the US refuses to admit that it was wrong when it launched these wars and supported al-Qaeda in the first place. Instead, the Biden Administration continues to support many other fanatic groups like the Muslim Brothers and asks Arab rulers to treat them as an opposition party not as a terrorist group even after they have pointed their guns at the government and citizens in Egypt and in many other Arab countries.
The Washington Post’s editorial on the human rights file in Egypt, published last week, is just one example of this American hypocrisy. The paper claimed that Cairo government has given the security agency free hand to impose “swift justice” against the Brotherhood and smaller armed Islamic groups that have attacked police and military officers since the overthrow of the MB rule in 2013. The paper even urged the State Secretary to reconsider the military aid to Egypt claiming that it violates the human rights of those terrorists.
