Author: Shahid Faridi
Publication: The Asian Age
Date: October 11, 2001
The US ambassador to India, Mr Robert
D. Blackwill, who has been lobbying Muslim leaders and organisations to
tone down reaction of the community against US strikes on Afghanistan,
received an earful recently about the "double-standards adopted by his
country in dealing with terrorism."
Mr Blackwill had invited a large
number of prominent Muslims to the US embassy in New Delhi for talks after
the terror attacks in New York and Washington.
While most invitees attended the
meeting, president of Jamiat-Ulama-i-Hind Asad Madani rejected the invitation
accusing the United States of unleashing state terrorism against the people
of Afghanistan in reply to the individual terrorism resorted to by those
who attacked the World Trade Centre and Pentagon.
Secretary of Jamiat-Ulama-i-Hind
Mahmood Madani said: "We have asked the Imams of mosques all over India
to adopt resolutions against the US attack on Afghanistan to be sent to
the UN."
Even those who attended Mr Blackwill's
meeting, blasted the US administration for its "support to the Israeli
terror against the people of Palestine."
One of the leaders, who attended
the meeting, told The Asian Age that the US ambassador tried to get the
support and endorsement of the Muslim community in India to the attack
on Afghanistan and his country's war against terrorism.
"But the ambassador was told that
there were doubts in the minds of people about the aim of US attack. We
told him that the attack on Afghanistan and the announcement that attacks
may also be carried out on some other countries are being seen as an attempt
by the US to extend its hegemony in the world. Mr Blackwill tried to allay
these fears," Maulana Obaidullah Khan Azmi, MP, told The Asian Age.
"The US ambassador was told that terrorism will not end by killing Osama
bin Laden or the Taliban. But it can end if the issue of Palestine was
resolved," he said.
Mr Azmi added: "We asked the US
ambassador to look into the reasons for the terror attacks. I told
the ambassador that his country should try to find out the reasons that
provoked the young men to launch the terror attacks on his country. I told
him that the Muslims of the entire world, including from India, strongly
condemned the attack on the US. Islam does not allow its followers to take
recourse to terrorism to achieve their goals. Those who are resorting to
terrorism in the name of Islam can have nothing to do with the religion.
We also opposed the term Islamic terrorism because it is a contradiction
in terms."
He said the Muslim leaders also
asked the United States to join the world community in defining the word
terrorism.
Meanwhile, Shahi Imam of the historic
Jama Masjid in New Delhi Ahmad Bukhari has decided to hold a demonstration
outside the United States embassy in Delhi on October 12 after Friday prayers.