L'EDITORIAL DU MONDE
Horreur et menace
LE MONDE | 12.05.04 | 14h07 • MIS A JOUR LE 12.05.04 | 14h11
The situation in the Near East has cleared, this week, a new path in horror. After the death, Monday in Gaza, of six Israeli soldiers of the which the bloody remains were exhibited before the crowd by Hamas militants, a young American was decapitated in Iraq by Al- Qaida Islamicists.
A businessman of 26 years, Nick Berg, had been captured a month ago.
His assassins, and in the first place the Jordanian Abu Moussab Al- Zarkoui, pretend to want to avenge the torure inflicted by the soldiers of the American- Btitish coalition in the Iraqi prisns, and characterized George Bush as the "Christian's dog".
However, the horror of one cannot excuse that of the others. Denouncing abuse is one thing, and this is the privilege that democratic regimes make possible, even if it is dolorous. Committing the worst under the pretext that the enemy has dirtied its hands first is only a disgrace.
Ce qu'ont fait les hommes de Zarkaoui est une barbarie. Un crime moralement inexcusable, mais aussi politiquement dévastateur pour la cause qu'ils prétendent défendre. Si l'indignation suscitée dans les pays arabes et dans le reste du monde après les révélations sur le sort des détenus de la prison d'Abou Ghraïb est légitime, ce crime et la vidéo qui en témoigne dépassent l'entendement. Et l'on veut espérer une condamnation aussi unanime du crime mis en scène par Al-Qaida, de cette surenchère dans l'abomination./What the Zarkaoui's men did is a barbarity. An morally inexcusable crime, but also politically devastating for the cause that they pretend to defend. If indignation resuscitated in the Arab countries and in the rest of the world after the revelations on the treatment of detainees in the Abu Ghraib prison is legitimate, this crime and video testifies to something beyond comprehension. And one wants hope that a unanimous condemnation of the show crime of Al- Qaida, of this build up to abomination.
How can one commend onesself to God, which is what he does, when one is complicit in barbarity? How can one think that the Creator could rejoice to see a man's throat being cut to the cries of "God is the greatest"? How many times has the Muslim community crossed the globe, and in Europe, will they continue to repose confidence imams who refuse to condemn, clearly and publicly, these barbarous acts?
En même temps, cette plongée dans l'abîme de l'Irak à moins de deux mois du transfert de la souveraineté à un gouvernement intérimaire montre, une fois de plus, l'impasse dans laquelle s'est fourvoyée l'administration Bush. Au lieu de s'en tenir, après le 11 septembre 2001, à une lutte patiente et déterminée contre Oussama Ben Laden, Al-Qaida, ses séides et ses métastases, en Afghanistan et ailleurs - objectif approuvé par toutes les démocraties -, Washington a préféré se lancer dans l'aventure irakienne.
At the same time, this has plonged Iraq into the abyss less than two months before the transfer of sovereignty to an interim government shows, one more time, the impasse into which the Bush Administration has strayed. Rather than hold to a patient and determined fight against Osama bin Laden, Al- Qaida, and its henchmen and metastases, in Afghanistan and elsewhere-- an objective approved by all democracies--- Washington prefered to launch an Iraqi adventure.
Far from diminshing them, the Iraqi detour has accrued perils. In overthrowing the dictatorship of Saddam Hussein, the Bush Administration wants to affirm the hegemony of the United States in the name of universal values of which America is one of the chosen lands. But the choice obligates the primary world power: it should have a clear strategy for after the Iraqi war, and its soldiers should respect the moral values it holds itself out as representing. Alas, these two appointments have, for this hour, been broken. Today, the field of Iraqi battle is a threat to the entire world. And it is the entire world, through the UN, that is taking charge.
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