War on Muslims sparks apocalypse fears

Faisal Bodi, Editor, 'ummahnews.com', Guardian News Service, London

One of the portents of the end of days, according to Islamic eschatology, will be the blurring of reality, an Orwellian era in which the lie has supplanted truth. To many a religious eye that hour has already dawned; our world -- dominated by spin, deception and conspiracy -- is one where it is increasingly difficult to isolate the actual from the intended.

The Bali nightclub bombing is a case in point. Muslims have had to watch helplessly as western journalists have coat-tailed their governments in concocting a spurious trail to the Jamaah Islamiyah (JI), and in turn to al-Qaeda.

The attacks did not fit into an al-Qaeda pattern of hitting political, military and economic targets. And they were condemned by Abu Bakar Ba'aysir, the alleged leader of the nebulous JI, who suggested that the U.S., which had most to gain from the bombing, was responsible.

In one sense it does not matter who the Bali culprits are. Ultimately the victims, as with the events following Sept. 11, will be Muslims. The war on terror has slickly developed, as though primed well in advance, into a war on Islam. Just as Pakistan's leader, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, was forced to accede to American influence over his country's independent madrasa system, Indonesia's president, Megawati Soekarnoputri, is being strong- armed into reining in groups that oppose U.S. hegemony.

But more worrying is how the war on terror has landed on just about everywhere. Soon after 9/11, U.S. officials identified the holiday idyll of Mauritius as a haven for Islamist extremists and a money laundering center for al-Qaeda. Of course no money has been found nor has any al-Qaeda operative been seized, but the convenient effect has been to intensify a wave of repression against the island's Muslim population.

In December 2000 the Mauritian government arrested the leader of the Muslim opposition party, Hizbullah (no relation to the Lebanese "party of God"). Cehl Meeah, an outspoken Islamic scholar, was charged with instructing party supporters to gun down three activists of the MMM-Labor alliance during the 1996 general elections.

The charges are based on the testimony of a single witness who was part of the rogue Hizbullah unit that carried out the murders. Hateem Oozeer, a lifelong criminal and drug addict, turned state's witness in return for de facto immunity from prosecution. It did not matter that two previous statements he had given exonerated Meeah of the crimes -- the authorities had their man.

Meeah has been a thorn in the side of Mauritian politicians ever since he returned to his native island after seven years in Mecca. One of his first moves was to set up Hizbullah to represent the interests of Mauritius' 250,000 Muslims.

Mauritius is a highly communal society, which is reflected in its political system. Most of its 50 percent Hindu population votes for the Mauritian Socialist Movement (MSN), or the Labor party, with the 30 percent of Christians for the rival Mauritian Militant Movement (MMM). Holding the balance of power, the Muslim population has hitched its fortunes to the MMM. By the 1990s, however, the marriage was on the rocks.

Hizbullah exploited the new circumstances. In 1995 the party won its first seat in parliament. On the morning of the 1996 municipal elections, government intelligence had Hizbullah marked to win all five seats in Plaine Verte, a predominantly Muslim suburb of the capital, Port Louis. But before polling had begun the murderers struck. The elections were postponed in the Hizbullah strongholds, but when they took place a week later the party returned two successful candidates.

The tragedy of Sept. 11 has been a godsend for the Mauritian government. It has claimed, on an island that has no history of terrorist activity, that Muslim extremists were plotting to use crop sprayers to destroy the country's sugar cane plantations. And with the cooked-up threat has come further repression, documented by the Islamic Human Rights Commission.

Islamic tradition teaches us that another of the portents of the last day will be an almighty war between the Islamic and the Judaeo-Christian world. Even if that day is far away, the war on terror is driving ordinary Muslims into an apocalyptic frame of mind. That, surely, cannot be conducive to the world peace and security which, we are told, is its aim.