One wishes that before jumping to pronounce judgement the pro-Zionists had taken the trouble to go through the text of the speech of Mahathir Mohamad as Paul Krugman advised his readers of the NYT in its 21st October issue. Most of it, he wrote, was criticism directed at other Muslims, clerics in particular, and a lot of the speech sounded as if it had been written by Bernard Lewis who has made a name for himself by writing on Islamic decline. Krugman admonishes the Bush administration that thanks to its war on Iraq and unconditional support to Ariel Sharon, Washington has squandered away the post nine-eleven sympathy and brought relations with the Muslims to a new low. Krugman adds "somewhere in Pakistan Osama bin Laden must be enjoying this. The war on terror did not have to be perceived as war on Islam, but we seem to be doing our best to make it look that way".

If anything Prime Minister Mahathir deserves the unqualified appreciation of the Islamic world for identifying "our detractors and oppressors", criticising the harmful and artificial divisions created in the Muslim Ummah by the "new interpreters of Islam", and for charting out ways for the Muslims to get out of the quagmire. Mahathir's erudition and intellectual vibrancy in retracing the lessons bequeathed by Prophet Mohammed (SM) of strategic retreat in order to win final victory is truly remarkable. He warned his august gathering of OIC summiteers (freckles' summit meetings in the eyes of NYT-18th October) that "our detractors and enemies" would attack and kill the Muslims, invade their lands and bring down their governments unless the Muslims unite for the defence of the Ummah. He bemoans the failure of the Muslims to take advantage of the Industrial Revolution thus regressing the Muslim civilisation to the point of weakness which encouraged the Europeans to colonise the Muslim countries and to "excise Muslim land to create the State of Israel to solve their Jewish problem. Divided the Muslims could do nothing effective to stop Balfour and Zionist transgression".

In view of the contemptible and dishonourable state of Islam today Mahathir Mohamad introduces Muslims to the enemy's strategy who "survived 2000 years of pogrom not by hitting back but by thinking. They invented and successfully promoted socialism, communism, human rights and democracy" to avoid persecution and slowly to gain control of the powerful countries of the world. Like Kofi Annan, Mahathir sees no victory in senseless suicidal attacks because "it is wining the struggle that is important, not angry retaliation, not revenge". Putrajaya Declaration issued at the end of the OIC summit of 11-18 October, inter-alia, calls for dialogue with other cultures and civilisations, including the West, so as to bring about enlightened moderation, mutual understanding and increased appreciation of Islam as a religion promoting peace and harmony among mankind.

Putrajaya OIC summit was not a declaration of war by the Muslims on their persecutors. On the contrary it was an appeal of sort to the non-Muslim world inviting their attention to clarity on Islam and also an endeavour to unite Islamic Ummah by ceasing divisional and sectarian strife in order to meet the onslaught on Islam because otherwise, as Mahathir Mohamad warned: "The Muslims will forever be oppressed and dominated by the Europeans and the Jews. They will forever be poor, backward and weak". One cannot but emphasise the urgent necessity to remove the opaque and obscure vision the West has about Islam. Timur Kuran of the University of Southern California makes the point that as Timothy McVeigh belonged to a small minority of Americans consumed by hatred against their government, so Islamists, whether or not they are prone to violence, differ from most Muslims by a commitment to radical global transformation. Kuran, however, points out that those economic grievances that contribute to Muslim resentment of the global economic order and have unmistakable cultural and religious dimensions have to be addressed. Otherwise catching Osama bin Laden and the destruction of the Talebans will do nothing to alleviate the nightmarish conditions of Afghan countryside or the slums of Cairo nor will it keep Pakistani and Saudi youth from being taught that the West is evil and that oversimplified and grotesque version of Islam is the gateway to ultimate wisdom (The religious under currents of Muslim economic grievances-Timur Kuran-Social Science Research Council).

An international group of experts deliberating at Oslo in June this year to identify the root causes of terrorism concluded that suicide terrorism is not caused by religion or more specifically Islam. But for one the group had no Muslim scholar. They found that (a) lack of democracy, civil liberties and rule of law; (b) failed or weak states; (c) hegemony and inequality of power; (d) powerful external actors upholding illegitimate governments; (e) repression by foreign occupation; (f) the experience of social injustice, among others, contributed to terrorism. One is therefore concerned over the reasserted view of Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi that the underlying problem for the West is not terrorism or even Islamic fundamentalism but Islam as "a rival and inferior civilisation." Despite Berlusconi's penchant to raise political storms through irresponsible utterances (one may recall the recent spat with Germany over his comparison of a German Euro parliament member with a Nazi prison guard), one has to take notice of such comments when one fifth of humanity accepts "Islamic" and "Muslim" as self-descriptive. European efforts, particularly those of the French and the Germans, to understand transnational, trans-cultural and trans-religious differences notwithstanding, Berlusconi type expression of aggressive mentality can make Samuel Hunting-ton's "clash of civilisations" idea a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Western powers could consider undertaking introspective excursion into their conduct both past and present. Mahathir's declaration that 1.3 billion Muslims simply cannot be wiped out should be given due consideration. The creation of Israel as atonement for Holocaust and more generally for the persecution of the Jews by the Europeans along with continuing Israeli disregard for UNSC and UNGA resolutions under the pretext of providing security from militants need forensic investigation. Robert Hefner of Boston University holds the view that over the long term, a favourable outcome will require that the US and other countries dedicate themselves to resolving once and for all the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. As long as that impasse remains, Muslim democrats' appeal for peace and tolerance across civilisations is likely to receive cool reception even among the moderate and western educated Muslims.

One cannot but be amazed at the tone-deaf style of Bush administration diplomacy which refuses to recognise the political blunder of Iraqi invasion (moral justification of uprooting a despicable dictatorship notwithstanding) and untrammeled support extended to Ariel Sharon as main causes of anti- Americanism in the Muslim world. It would be incredible to assume that suddenly more than a billion people have become Islamists who see Islam not as a mere religion but as a political ideology which should be integrated in all aspects of society. On the other hand credence may be given to the observation of Ibn Khaldun made six hundred years ago that popular religion in Muslim societies tends to oscillate between periods of strict religious observance and others of devotional laxity. The Khaldunian model rings true even today when one observes the different strands in Muslim politics' -- neomodernism, Islamic liberalism or democratic Islamic -- constant struggle with a minority group of neo-fundamentalists who would love to ban female presence from public life, oppose music, arts and entertainment. Bush administration would be compounding its blunders if it assumes the "unanimous applause" given to Mahathir Mohamad by the assembled Heads of State/Government at Putrajaya as reflective of neo-fundamentalism in Islam. Robert Kagan's unflinching confidence in American military pre-eminence in opposition to European aversion to the use of military force as indicative of Europe's weakness has to be left behind. One has to keep reminding that American unipolar moment has come and gone and Joseph Nye's "American Paradox" is a reality where though the US cannot be assailed by any nation-state she cannot resolve transnational problems without multilateral cooperation.

Mahathir's speech to the OIC summit was a reminder to the Bush administration, if any reminder was needed at all, of this American Paradox. Well-wishers have advised the Bush administration to take the Arabs and the Muslims seriously by opening a direct dialogue with them to lessen the deep seated anger over perceived American arrogance and hypocrisy and arrest corrosive skepticism relating to American intentions towards the Muslim world. Efforts should be directed to talk to the Muslims and to engage them rather than to manipulate them. America's image as "arrogant, self-indulgent, hypocritical, inattentive, and unwilling or unable to engage in cross-cultural dialogue" needs immediate repair. The recent Franco-German-British initiative on Iran is a welcome move. One hopes the Bush administration would join the European caravan and eschew its penchant to filter all global problems through its obsessive eyes of war on terrorism.

Kazi Anwarul Masud is a former Secretary and Ambassador.