ICPTR

Terrorism can’t be defeated by arms. Arms may eliminate one head, but two heads will grow, even stronger, simply because of the perception of injustice, solidarity or revenge. There is so much anger. There is war in Iraq -Iraq is a Muslim country; there is war in Afganistan -Afghanistan is a Muslim country; There is war in the Holy Land -Palestinians are predominantly Muslim; There is terrorism in Somalia -Somalia is a Muslim country;  There is… And the list can go on; and today, two hotels have been bombed in Indonesia -Indonesia is a Muslim country. And Muslim countrties remain outside the world’s political, social, religious and cultural scenes. Their absence is not justified. their silence is rather immoral. Why are there no troops from Arab or Islamic countries in Afganistan? What are the concerns of authorities of Muslim countries? What is the contribution of the Muslims to the re-building of their brothers’ countries and humanity? What have they done in Bosnia, Yemen? Sudan,Pakistan or China? More lives -Muslims and Non-Muslim- are being killed. Why British or American young men and women are being killed, in the land of duty? What duty? Why do their families have to suffer from afar? I hope the Muslims love their children too, for if so they should love the other children too. It is time to react. It is time to act. It is time to show that they care, too.

Surely, war, arms and violence did not help at all, and will never do. Then, authorities of muslim countries have a moral authority and a more positve role to play in peace-building, now more than ever, not through arms but through cultural, intellectual and religious outreach. It is time to change the rules of peace-keeping-and building from the use of arms to the use of Islamic teachings. Muslim countries should have the audacity to dare to take a leading role in peace keeping and peace building in other Islamic troubled countries. They can promote the audacity of hope through the good teaching of Islam, for Islam is a religion of hope, modernity and moderation, brotherhood, science, and above all it is a religion of SALAM/PEACE. Is this too hard for some Muslims to understand? Then, it is to you to bring them back to the true teaching of the Quran and the Prophet, because this is the duty of true believers.

YES, terrorism can be defeated not by destroying bridges but by building them. The bridges of peace in a terrorism environment can be built not by violence but by reason. True believers can reason. Those who can’t can be converted to reason if they are to become true believers, if that is their claimed salvation. There are conditions for war, but terrorists’ conditions are nowhere to be found in the rules of God. War results in collateral damage. Peace results in collateral good. Those who kill do no good. Those who kill in the name of God and those who kill in the name of saving men are far from the truth.

The truth is THOU SHALL NOT KILL. In this case, if Muslim countries do not want to engage in war, it is time to leave their cocoon and engage in peace peacefully, and prove to the world community that there is more than terrorism and oil in the Arab and Islamic world. My be, it is the chance to peacefully and pragmatically claim back the place of the Arabs and Muslims in the civilisation of human kind. If Islamic authorities are incapable of doing it, then it is time for the millions of Muslims of the world to openly and actively engage in promoting peace, denouncing terrorism, and above all teaching about and for peace. True Muslims celebrate life not death, and humanity not one kind of humans. And to those who take the Quran to justify their doings, we say let’s read it together again, and again we shall find that the Muslims are Ummat al Wassat -community of middle-way.

And it is thus that We appointed you to be the community of the middle way, so that you might be witnesses before all mankind and the Messenger might be witness before you. <…contd…> (Holy Qurán 2:143).