If the USA is the big Satan, why are 20%-30% of all West bank and Gaza prisoners being tortured by their Palestinian Muslim brothers?
Most of the world is, quite rightly, disgusted with the continuing existence of the Guantánamo Bay prison camp – and neither have most of us forgotten about the Abu Ghraib fiasco, nor the whole, damning issue of those disgusting rendition flights.
So, it’s easy – and, up to a point, understandable – to buy into the myth that the USA is, somehow, the world’s Supervillain, torturing and killing people for fun, invading countries for the Hell of it, etcetera, etcetera.
I’m not a fan of the current American administration – and I do think the war in Iraq is an ungoing and unnecessary disaster for all concerned – but those who want to believe that the US is the Snake in an otherwise peaceful Garden, are, to put it mildly, gravely mistaken.
Whatever you think of Bush and his team, there are far worse regimes in the world – and whatever you think of US foreign policy, it is not responsible for all the world’s ills or evils.
Again, nothing excuses the gross blunders, and indeed crimes that the US government continues to commit in its foolhardy War on Terror, but don’t think that the world would be a better place if America, as those old placards suggested, did ‘go home.’
Sure, it’s easy to blame the USA for all of the world’s troubles, or blame the Israelis or the British – but those who sing these anti-colonial (or anti-zionist) songs and march to the drums of the ‘resistance’ better look deeply into their own hearts.
So, a bit less of the easy slogans, please; and more honest introspection. As the following story shows all too painfully, crime, brutality and inhumanity itself are part of the whole human experience:
Palestinians detained by Fatah and Hamas, the two main factions in the West Bank and Gaza, face routine abuse and torture, according to two leading human rights organisations in reports published this week. Al-Haq, an independent Palestinian human rights group, said yesterday that more than 1,000 people have been detained by each side within the past year. An estimated 20%-30% of the detainees suffered torture.
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