ARY is a London based channel that goes to 126 countries, the debate was on the topic of is Iraqi war, a war on Islam. And I took the position that this is not a war on Islam but a war on tyranny and repression of very ugly regime. But ofcourse Omar Bakri was trying to send a message that this is a war on Islam and hence the people should consider this as a new Jihad, if you had been reading my thread you could imagine that whatever I write, to say it on tv is potentially shuts up a lot of these terrorists and war mongerers.
This foreign affairs program is watched by millions of people in South Asia. Out of the 10 calls which came from Zimbabwe to Kashmir to Karachi to Stockholm and Johannesberg, 9 of them were questions for me while only one for him. The unfortunate issue of today's Islam is that they can not appreciate the basic fact that over the last 5 decades, this tyrant has squandered the wealth of Iraq and enslaved an entire nation.
He has been ruthless and has protected his regime, through measures that are so difficult to dismantle that it took 17 days of seige of Basra to flush these despots and elements out of the city. This is a freedom of a nation and I think soon the whole world will see it. Omar Bakri was reminded of some lessons of history and was told either Islamic world must connect to the world, and must institute pluralism, freedom and love for mankind at large as an intergral part of its mosaic otherwise self flaggelation and self denials and contradications will lead to the dismemberment of the civic sturcture of our society. Perpetual jihad is a recipe of disaster and this is not a war against Islam but is a war to free Islam from the tyranny of the despots that have desecrated the entire constitution of the society. Ofcourse this discussion was much more poignant and my personal anecdotes of invasion of Kuwait and massacre were graphically explained to the people in our side of the world. I portrayed him as an angel of death and in my part of the world, he is being seen as martyr. I told my audience at the start of the discussion that my heart goes out to the shoeless children of Basra who are facing a new Karbela, in reference to the martyrdom of grandson of Prophet, due to lack of water.
What a shame, a nation with two rivers and second largest reserve of oil, as well as a dictator with 19 palaces, the contrast between opulence and poverty is the antithesis of Islam. Anyone who thinks he has the right to call for any uprising of Islam is sorely mistaken. Naturally Omar Bakri could not answer my straight forward attack on suppression of Islamic populist in the entire Islamic world.
He said Saddam was a proxy for USA and therefore his actions were condoned by them. I retaliated by saying that Saddam was a baby with a pacifier, did not know right or wrong. I told him to own up to the responsibility that lack of freedom and individuality have destroyed any intellectual inquiry in Islam. The sound engineers when I came out told me that it was the most heated discussion and one sided at that, because Omar Bakri could not regain his ground. His crusade was derailed. |
