TERRORISTS WIN TWO BATTLES:
By Clifford D. May
The Foundation for the Defense of Democracies
March 16, 2004
In Spain, an atrocity has been compounded by a tragedy. The atrocity, of course, is the terrorist attack of 3/11, the slaughter of some 200 innocent people on their way to work and school.
The tragedy is that too many Spanish voters reacted not with defiance, not with determination to defeat the evil forces that committed such a barbarian act, but with a sudden surge to the Socialist Party, the party that has promised to pull its troops out of Iraq and distance Spain from the US-led war against terrorism. A Spanish journalist said to me yesterday morning: "They reacted emotionally, not with their heads."
Margaret Thatcher has written that the terrorist "wishes to intimidate just as much as to kill and maim." Too many Spanish voters, it appears, have been intimidated. Their votes send a message to the terrorists. It says: "Violence and the threat of violence can make us do what you want us to do."
We should know by now where this road leads. Europeans, of all people, should know. But as Denis Boyles has reported, too many Europeans do not see it this way. On the contrary: "Gerard Dupuy, writing in Liberation, ...worried that the bombings would cause even more people to flock to 'anti-terrorism's banner;' Germany's liberal Suddeutsche Zeitung offered only the hope the Spaniards wouldn't use Spain's 9/11 to emulate Bush's 'blind campaign' against terrorism."
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Appease terrorists, reward terrorism and there will be
more terrorism. Of this, there can be no doubt.
More than ever, it should be clear that in this war, you
are either on one side or the other. You're either with
the terrorists or you're with the victims. It is wrong, it
is immoral, it is craven to look at murderers and their
victims and say to both: "I'm not on either side. I'm
neutral."
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One more thing: It should be noted that al Qaeda viewed Spain as a target long before America's intervention in Iraq. To Radical Islamists all territory that has ever been under Muslim control must be restored to Muslim control. And it was only yesterday - 1492, to be precise -- when Spain's Muslim rulers were driven out of Iberia.
WOMEN UNITED: I spend most of my time staring at a computer screen. But last week the FDD was invited to several special diplomatic gatherings. One of these was at the White House. The President spoke. Also on hand were Secretary of State Colin Powell, Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz, National Security Advisor Condi Rice, several members of the cabinet and many Middle Eastern ambassadors.
But the most honored guests were a large group of Iraqi and Afghan women -- true freedom fighters who are intensely grateful to America for having liberated them, their families and their friends from the terror and oppression of Saddam Hussein and the Taliban.
Many of these women have been closely associated with the FDD for more than a year - they were activists in the FDD-assisted Women for a Free Iraq campaign. They greeted me with warmth and affection, and I was greatly gratified and moved.
IRAQIS UNITED: I also attended a reception at the Iraq Embassy the other night. I had never been there before. Neither had most of the Iraqis and Iraqi-Americans who were on hand. Most of them - perhaps all - would never have set foot in that building so long as Saddam Hussein was in power.
I was one of the very few non-Arabic speakers at the event. But here again, I was greeted warmly by friends - not least Ambassador-designate Rend Rahim Franke, one of the founders of the Women for a Free Iraq campaign.
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There was much talk of Iraq's new, interim constitution - as good a document as one could hope for. It guarantees federalism, religious freedom, women's rights, and civilian control of the military.
Upholding it will be a challenge. And no one underestimates how difficult the fight for Iraq's future will continue to be. Baathist diehards and the foreign Jihadis will kill as many Iraqi patriots, and as many of their American friends, as they can.
And, as told to me by those at the Iraqi embassy, the enemies of freedom and democracy are everywhere in Iraq today. There are infiltrators from Iran, Hezbollah agents and Saudi Wahhabis buying mosques, passing out cash. All of these elements have the same aim: to undermine the American and Iraqi effort to bring decent government and security to Iraq after so many decades of oppression.
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FREEDOM HOUSE: Finally, I attended, too, a reception at the Department of State. This was on the occasion of Freedom House's publication of "The Worst of the Worst: The World's Most Repressive Societies, 2004," published to coincide with the 60th session of the UN Commission on Human Rights. Freedom House was among those most strenuously making the case for an Iraqi interim constitution that would unambiguously guarantee freedom of religion, women's rights and Islam as a source - rather than the source - of moral and legal authority. The FDD worked on this issue with Freedom House, as it is proud to work on other issues with Freedom House. (Jim Woolsey, Freedom House's Chairman, also serves as FDD's Distinguished Advisor.)
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REUTERS STILL DOESN'T GET IT:<font size=3> From a Reuters dispatch on 3/11 regarding the terrorist attacks in Spain: "The group aligns itself to al Qaeda, blamed by Washington for September 2001 attacks on the United States."
Blamed? Doesn't Reuters have any investigative reporters who might be able to, you know, do the necessary digging to figure out whether or not al Qaeda has been wrongly accused?
Of course, according to Reuters, it is not clear whether those who slaughtered Spanish commuters are terrorists -- or freedom fighters. Reuters, ever the neutral news agency, is adamant that "one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter."
ON ANOTHER FRONT: <font size=4>Meanwhile, hardly noticed this weekend, two Palestinian suicide bombers murdered 11 Israelis. Hamas, working with the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades -- which report to Yasser Arafat -- claimed joint responsibility for the atrocity.
Also this weekend, four Palestinians who had been arrested and charged in connection with murdering three Americans in the Gaza Strip last year were released. A Palestinian court ruled there was insufficient evidence to prosecute them. <font size=3>
- CDM
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