Darfur Issue #7
by Ainullotfi

I forwarded the mail from akh Dr Azhar for us to have an alternative perspective of what happened in Sudan.

Personally I do not know what really happened there. But I am cautioning against taking what the West told us about it wholesomely. This does not mean denial. This only means that we are cautious, so that we do not be unjust to ourselves.

The experiences in the last few years showed us that what they say aren’t always the truth. Dr Azhar has pointed out manifestly about the Ambon/Maluku case… every single media in the world told us that the perpetrators of the crimes there were the Muslims and the victims were the Christians. Only after we (our own brothers and sisters) went there and looked at the facts of the ground that we knew what really happened, and how the events there were started off by the massacre of Muslims during the Eid (yes, the Eid day!). Did any of the “neutral”, “unbiased” press record or report these? Until now the West’s perspective of things in Maluku are unchallenged officially, and on official record of everyone, the Muslims are the wrong, not the wronged.

The case of Iraq is another glaring example. Before the war everyone accepted it as fact that the Iraqis had WMD. Those opposed did not say for sure the Iraqis didn’t have, only they say they require more evidence. Some prefer to solve it not by war, but by other means. Furthermore, some have their own agenda vis-a-vis the Americans. But no one actually believed that the Iraqis didn’t have the weapons. Now, after all the destruction and killings, we know.

Remember the bombings of the “WMD factory” in Khartoum by Bill Clinton? How many innocent civilians (yes, civilians, and innocent too — Arabs have civialians, and they can be innocent too, not just the West!) were killed? Did anyone give a hoot? Okay… many would say later that the Americans were wrong, but after all, the Sudanese were not exactly good anyway, right? So what if a few blacks and Arabs, Muslims even, were killed? The “WMD factory” turned out to be just what the Sudanese government said it was… a pharmaceutical factory which amongst others produces baby milk! Mmm… the Sudanese government could speak the truth after all?

The internal strife in Algeria was another case that comes to my mind. Remember the violence there after the Islamists were denied their victory in the “democratic” elections some years ago? We were told that the fanatic fundamentalist Islamist gangs went on a rampage of violence in the whole country, killing just about anyone who crossed their path, and worse, worse! Raping the women just freely! Did anyone stop an ponder? On one hand they are accused of being religious fanatics, forcing every woman to don up the “discriminatory hijabs”, allowing them to only let their eyes seen by the world. Then in the same breath, they are accused of a heinous sexual crime… Does it add up? It’s either one or the other… no two thoughts about it, if one were to think straight! Only later we were to know that actually lots of these crimes were done by the Algerian “security apparatus” themselves, to tarnish the image of the Islamists and to isolate them from the support afforded to them by the Algerian people! But no, we could never figure it out ourselves… we swallowed what was reported by the “unbiased” Western press… and was unjust to ourselves… if not our own brethren.

No, I’m not saying that be go into a state of denial. Far from it. Rather I am just advising caution. Could we not get more information from the people we trust more on the matter? In the event, could we also get the bigger perspective of the whole Sudanese issue, beyond just Darfur? Could we even trust what was said by some of the Sudanese officials (in spite of the demonisation by the West)… some of whom we knew personally as examplary Muslim students at British universities years ago? Why would their word be of less value than those who are clearly trying to break Islam up?

Yes, if after further investigation, they were proved to be wrong and unjust… go ahead, we’ll fight them. But until we get a total picture of what happened, couldn’t we just advise restraint? At the same time, yes, do our best to help the victims of the problems there. Send help and relief. Support Mercy and Islamic Relief. Garner support from all over. Even volunteer to go there if one could, so that one could actually report back what really happened (as was the case in Maluku). But reserve judgments. Please.

Wassalam.

Ainullotfi Abdul Latif