Who did this?

In her recent article entitled Clintons Turn the Tide, Bloomberg columnist Margaret Carlson talked about how the former First Lady and her husband is going to win the Senate for the Democrats.

Both the Senate and the Lower House are now controlled by the GOP.

She used the example of Bill Clinton’s interview with Fox News (also depicted in my previous post) to show how in one fell swoop turned the tide against Bush- by setting the record straight that the Clinton administration did more to stem terrorism than the Bush administration.

American politics aside, Carlson in her article also alluded to headlines in the States which questioned whether Bush’s “misguided war in Iraq had created a new generation of jihadists determined to strike in the US and abroad.”

I find myself questioning the same.

What is frightening: The call by a supposed leader of Al-Qaeda to kidnap western Christians and for Muslim nuclear and biological scientist to join in the fight.

Why is that frightening? Because unlike most of us who are saturated with rhetoric and has conditioned ourselves to tune out, there will be those who hear that message, respond and act accordingly in any random part of the world.

Have we pushed them to that corner? Did Bush? Did we, the rest of the world, also did the same by sitting reticent?

Apathy: What do we do with that?

I remember what it felt like being in London two weeks after Sept-11 to the end of 2001. It was the hotbed of protests. Bush was mustering all support he could get to launch a war in Iraq. Blair was accommodating. Half of London threw up its arms. I remember wearing a sticker given out in the streets which said “No War”.

Almost everyday, there were fora on Afghanistan, Bush, Iraq, terrorism, etc. They became part of the language of our times.

I remember attending a church service in Holy Trinity Brompton, the home of the Alpha Course, and the pastor who was preaching (I forgot his name but it sounded like a female name) was putting support behind the Iraqi invasion.

WHAT? Yes, exactly. I remember I was fuming in the pews and Carol was trying to calm me down.

The pastor expounded on what the Bible said about end-times. Wars will happen. Granted. I, too, believe in the living word of God.

But he said one other thing: That this war in Iraq may be an act of intervention that pushed back/ delayed the devastation that could happen if terrorism is not stemmed. He cited a passage on this.

I look back after reading the article this morning and asked if he in fact got it wrong. Did the invasion accelerated the advancement of end times or delayed it?

Did what we do showed love to our neighbours as we would love ourselves, as Jesus taught us to?

As a British Chevening Scholar, I was invited to many British Council events. One of which I had not intended to attend but was in fact, persuaded to by the BC, was a forum and workshop on how the west (UK) could communicate more effectively with the Islamic world. They really wanted me there because I came from a then moderate and progressive Islamic country. I didn’t want to correct them to say that Malaysia is not an Islamic country. Instead I told them I am actually Chinese by descent and am a Christian.

That’s OK, they said. Your input from growing up in a Muslim-majority country would be really helpful. I am not sure if my comments were helpful, but I learnt so much that day.

In the forum were also peoples from all over the world. A large part were Muslims from the Middle East who either grew up there and now reside in the west or those who came from there as scholars like me.

I distinctly remember one Middle Eastern lady in a smart business suit and chic short-cropped hair stood up to give her opinion. She said she remember growing up in the Gulf and when she and her friends walked by the sea they could see warships. And that was the picture generations grew up with- belligerence at your shores, the anticipation and acceptance that war could happen anytime.

Generations grew up with those scenes in their minds and form anti-west sentiments. Who sent those warships?

How do you change generations other than letting them live out themselves? How to make sure that sentiments of hate and anger and revenge do not perpetuate?

There was a sense of heaviness in the room. Grey-haired chiefs of British Council outposts sighed in their seats. They took the responsibility of communicating and building bridges with the local community seriously. What now, brown cow?

How to you preach messages of friendship when your planes bomb and kill beloved and innocent friend and family?

I still applaud that initiative by good meaning leaders in UK. I have no answer to this great big problem of the world. I am not sure if my taking to the streets with the rest of those who were against the war amounted to anything.

I just want to say sorry to the Muslim world, for all the wrong we have done.

"Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother's eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, 'Brother, let me take the speck out of your eye,' when you yourself fail to see the plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother's eye. Luke 6:41-42