The United States risks a severe miscalculation in dealing with the
destruction of the World Trade Center and the attack on the Pentagon
on Tuesday. This event is not an isolated instance of violence. This
is not an "act of war." It is one symptom of a cancer that threatens
to metastasize. The root cause is not terrorist activity, as has
been widely stated. It is the relationship between the United States
and the Islamic world. Until this central cancerous problem is
treated, Americans will never be free from fear.Merely locating and hunting down a single "guilty party" in this
case will not stop future violence: such an action will not destroy
the organization of terrorist cells already established throughout
the world. Of greater importance, it will do nothing to alleviate
the residual enmity against America that will remain at large in the
world, continuing to motivate violence. The perpetrators of the
original attack on the World Trade Center in 1993 were caught and
convicted. This did not stop the attack on Tuesday.



The chief suspect is the Saudi Arabian Osama bin Laden or his
surrogates. He has been mischaracterized as an anti-American
terrorist. He should rather be thought of as someone who would do
anything to protect Islam. Bin Laden began his career fighting the
Soviet occupation of Afghanistan in 1979 when he was 22 years old.



He has not only resisted the Soviets but also the Serbians in
Yugoslavia. His anger was directed against the United States
primarily because of the U.S. presence in the Gulf Region, more
particularly Saudi Arabia itself, the site of the most sacred
Islamic religious sites.

According to bin Laden, during the Gulf War America co-opted the
rulers of Saudi Arabia to establish a military presence in order to
kill Muslims in Iraq. In a religious decree issued in 1998, he gave
religious legitimacy to attacks on Americans in order to stop the
United States from "occupying the lands of Islam in the holiest of
places." His decree also extends to Jerusalem, where the second most
sacred Muslim site: the al-Aqsa Mosque. The depth of his historical
vision is clear when, in his decree, he characterizes Americans as
"crusaders" harkening back to the Medieval Crusades in which the
Holy Lands, then occupied by Muslims, were captured by European
Christians.

He will not cease his opposition until the United States leaves the
region. Paradoxically, his strategy for convincing the United States
to do so seems drawn from the American foreign policy playbook. When
the United States disapproves of the behavior of another nation, it
"turns up the heat" on that nation through embargoes, economic
sanctions or withdrawal of diplomatic representation. In the case of
Iraq following the Gulf war, America employed military action,
resulting in the loss of civilian life. The State Department has
theorized that if the people of a rogue nation experience enough
suffering, they will overthrow their rulers, or compel them to adopt
more sensible behavior. The terrorist actions in New York and
Washington are a clear and ironic implementation of this strategy
against the United States.



Bin Laden takes no credit for actions emanating from his training
camps in Afghanistan. He has no desire for self-aggrandizement. A
true ideologue, he believes that his mission is sacred, and he wants
only to see clear results. For this reason, the structure of his
organization is essentially tribal cellular in modern political
terms. His followers are as fervent and intense in their belief as
he is. They carry out their actions because they believe in the
rightness of their cause, not because of bin Laden's orders or
approval. Groups are trained in Afghanistan, and then establish
their own centers in places as far-flung as Canada, Africa and
Europe. Each cell is technologically sophisticated, and may have a
different set of motivations for attacking the United States.



Palestinians members of his group see Americans as supporters of
Israel in the current conflict between the two nations. In the
Palestinian view, Ariel Sharon's ascendancy to leadership of Israel
has triggered a new era, with U.S. government officials failing to
pressure the Israeli government to end violence against
Palestinians. Palestinian cell members will not cease their
opposition until the United States changes its relationship with the
Israeli state.



The Mujaheddin fighters in Lebanon also direct their hostility
against Israel and the United States. They also operate against the
Maronite Christian community in their own country, who were
supported by the French from World War I until the end of World War
II. They will not cease their operations until the region is firmly
in Islamic hands.



Above all, Americans need to remember that the rest of the world has
an absolute right to self-determination that is as defensible as our
own. A despicable act of mayhem such as those committed in New York
and Washington is a measure of the revulsion that others feel at our
actions that seemingly limit those rights. If we perpetuate a cycle
of hate and revenge, this conflict will escalate into a war that our
great-grandchildren will be fighting._


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_


William O. Beeman teaches anthropology at Brown University in
Providence, Rhode Island. A specialist on Middle East Culture, he
has written extensively on fundamentalism and terrorism. He has
worked for the past four years in Tajikistan, where he has been able
to monitor developments in Afghanistan. monitor developments in
Afghanistan.



Copyright 2001 William O. Beeman. This article may be distributed
for any non-commercial purpose.