Clash of the Satans
Steve Emerson, a self-styled (aren't they all?) terrorism pundit says on Fox News that Birmingham, UK is an all-Muslim city where non-Muslims are not allowed in. David Cameron chokes on his breakfast. Mr. Emerson is a little off with his coordinates of Birmingham … Alabama, with its history of white shrouds. They are veils, aren't they? Wonder if his tweets spell the word 'Muslim' as 'KKK.'
Where are the pundits BEFORE tragedy strikes? Googling, perhaps. But the pundits are necessary to fill in the air time while being compensated with their 2 minutes (45 seconds plus TV commercials) of fame. After all, it takes time to find the perpetrators, even if one leaves his ID card in the getaway car.
That brings us to the perpetrators themselves, avenging by death the reference to Prophet Muhammad (pbuh), the very person who went to enquire about the well being of the woman who regularly laid thorns on his path. Not sure if the Kouachi brothers were aware of this. Nor is Fox News aware that backbiting is tantamount to eating the flesh of one's brother, arrogance puts us on Satan's VIP list and blowing one's own self up is more heinous than murder. If blowing yourself up with school kids is 'martyrdom,' then how come a billion Muslims still haven't chosen this 'easy' stairway to Heaven?
Fox, CNN…, sounds Hebrew to you? No, you haven't heard these as you have given more than enough airtime to al-Qaeda to be our de facto spokespersons. Sometimes I wonder why we endure the painfully long waits of YouTube 'spooling' while bandwidth hogging videos of morbid threats or boastful claims to mayhem are seamlessly uploaded from the caves of Tora Bora.
Surprisingly, the Muslim countries exhibit no peer pressure to put PR pressure. Hey, Saudi Arabia, how about pour some petro dollars into a strong Muslim lobby. Nah, it's more important to spend millions on the tallest clock tower in the world in Mecca (where Muslims congregate to forget about all worldly matters, especially time), overshadowing, literally, the Holy Kabah.
So, the nameless one billion Muslims who can't make it to Paris (getting visas will be all the more difficult now), virtually join hands in the unity march. The sane world, regardless of faith, mourns the cartoonists and cops in Paris, the coffee sippers in Sydney, the school children in Peshawar, not to mention the countless in Baghdad, Damascus, Kabul…all those with zero involvement with and influence on policy makers. This is terrorism and by no means the soothing euphemism known as collateral damage, just as it is terrorism when the drone misses its intended mark, just as fatal drunk driving is terrorism, Budweiser style: “Where there's life to take, there's Bud Light.”
As for Charlie Hebdo, sure, one can be left leaning, but not so left leaning that it is left with no compassion. Maybe to mock the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) is 'freedom of speech' to someone, just as drawing a caricature of Prophet David (pbuh) is, er, anti-Semitism, or a pictorial ridicule of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. is, er, racism. Remember the RR doctrine—with rights, come the responsibilities. The right to lampoon comes with the responsibility to at least consider the sentiments of one seventh of the world's population.
Does the world think that we (Muslims) will be on the other side of the Armageddon? Rupert Murdoch, CEO, Newscorp, may think so as he tweets: “Maybe most Moslems [are] peaceful, but until they recognise and destroy their growing jihadist cancer, they must be held responsible.”
Gosh! Do the one billion Muslims now have to display a yellow crescent on the lapel for its collective sin? I may be exempt—as a Muslim, I did go to a Catholic school…
The writer is an engineer & CEO turned comedian (by choice), the host of NTV's The Naveed Mahbub Show and the founder of Naveed's Comedy Club. E-mail: [email protected]
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