Ever since 9/11, the Islamic community has been ostracized from western civilisation. Exasperate by the Islamic state and such figure heads as Osama Bin Laden, western society has very much aimed their anger towards many of the Islamic population. Buying into the stereotype that is exceedingly incited by the media, hatred is slowly becoming innate in our way of life. However, my question isn’t a factor of racial slurs and discrimination, because unless you are meticulous in your political correctness; I find that whether it be said once in a lifetime or every day, everyone and anyone can fall victim to political impropriety.
My issue lies within the labels, which are continually indoctrinated into the minds of the otherwise uninformed. According to official statistics, hate crimes against religious minorities has increased by 45% since 2001, which brings me to the question, where does the blame actually lie? The apparent epicentre to what is now dubbed as “Islamophobia”, is the day the World Trade Centre fell, which on that single day two thousand, nine hundred and ninety, six horrific deaths occurred. Controversially the media blames al-Qaeda, the people blame “Islam” and the conspiracy theorist blame, ex-president, George W. Bush and some Muslims even blame the Jews, but I wonder? Does this actually go deeper, than 9/11? Was this hatred always there? Is the media to blame? Or is Islam just the figure head to divert attention from the wrong doings in the west? This battle between western and eastern society is like an old couple where Mr. West has been cheating on Ms. East, so Ms. East decides to castrate him on television for the world to witness all his wrong doings.
So let’s start, where we all believe it began. 9/11 was a sequences of four coordinated terrorist attacks by the Islamic radical group al-Qaeda in the U.S. Four aircrafts, were hijacked by 19 al-Qaeda terrorists to be flown into four governmental buildings in an attempt to break down western civilisation in the United States, which resulted in thousands of deaths including the terrorist themselves. Two of the planes, American Airlines Flight 11 and United Airlines Flight 175, were crashed into the North and South towers, of the World Trade Centre complex. A third plane, American Airlines Flight 77, was crashed into the Pentagon in Arlington County. The fourth plane, was targeted at Washington D.C. but crashed into a field in Pennsylvania, after its passengers tried to overcome the extremists.
Now, opposed to condoning the event that went on, the media took this as a declaration of war, which is interesting as only two years later, America amongst other countries including the United Kingdom invaded Iraq. Now, according to U.S. President George W. Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair, this coalition of countries was all in an apparent effort to “disarm Iraq of weapons of mass destruction, to end Saddam Hussein ‘s support for terrorism, and to free the Iraqi people.”, coining the mission as “Operation Iraqi Freedom by the United States”, completely glorifying America in the process.
Controversially, many have previously thought that America had an ulterior motives for going into Iraq; that war cannot be used as a simple tool for peace. Yet, various ideas of conspiracy have since died out, many believed it was for oil, many just it thought it was pointless. I personally believe that 17,690 men and women were kill, in a war born out of vengeance and over forty thousand still live with the consequences of such war. I find that the 2 year gap between 9/11 and the Iraq war is convenient. The timing is too perfect, too faultless. A two year gap is long enough to give the impression of a just cause, to mourn the events of September 11th, but not long enough to lose focus, the tension between the east and west was still very much prominent in 2003, there was still so much hatred against the Islamic community, from the general public. According to the FBI, anti-Islamic incidents were the second least reported hate crimes prior to 9/11, but following September 11, they became the second highest reported among religion-bias incidents.
Controversially, a timeline starts to develop after the initiation beginning of the war in Iraq. In the next two years, two Islamic terrorist plots were either uncovered or put into place against Australia and the United Kingdom, who coincidently were the two of the biggest contributors other than the USA to the war effort in Iraq. In 2005, a successions of coordinated suicide bomb attacks in central London, was put into place, targeting civilians using the public transport system during the morning rush hour. The men, who carried out this heinous crime, were later found to be affiliated with both radical groups Al Jazeera and al-Qaeda. Similarly, in 2005, an Australian terrorism plot was put into place, targeting Sydney, Australia ‘s most populous city and the capital of New South Wales, however, was later thwarted; a group of five known terrorist affiliates were arrested on charges of planning an act of terrorism.
Further speculation into September 11th, lead too to popular belief that President George bush secretly orchestrate the 9/11 attacks; that the collapse of the Twin Towers was the result of a controlled demolition rather than structural failure due to impact and fire. Another prominent belief is that the Pentagon was hit by a missile launched by elements from inside the U.S. government or that a commercial airliner was allowed to do so via an effective stand-down of the American military. However, like I said, this is just all speculation and conspiracy, which has little factual standing.
What is interesting though, is that despite the sudden rise of hate crimes against perceived Muslims, in our post 9/11 society. The views of Muslim and Middle Eastern people pre 9/11 in the United States especially, has always been skewed. It can be traced to deliberate typecasting by film and the media. Take the film, “Delta Force”, where a bunch of Arabic terrorists hijack an airplane and good old Chuck Norris with his martial arts and fancy motorcycle swoops in to save the innocent Israeli passengers. Now this film, is one of many examples, but it was filmed in the early 50’s and highlights the general perception of Arabs, which still exists in today’s society, despite 9/11. Where Arab-Muslims are Stereotyped as the robed and turbaned, sinister and dangerous, engaged mainly in hijacking airplanes and blowing up public buildings, Muslims are not the first person to be targeted for racial profiling, but It seems that the human race cannot discriminate between a tiny minority of persons who may be objectionable and the ethnic strain from which they spring. If the Italians have the Mafia, all Italians are suspect; if the Jews have financiers, all Jews are part of an international conspiracy; if the Arabs have fanatics, all Arabs are violent. When does it stop?
