The Tsarnaev Brothers
Published in Asharq Al Awsat
(Saudi Arabia) on 1 May 2013
by Abdel Moneim Said (link to original)
(Saudi Arabia) on 1 May 2013
by Abdel Moneim Said (link to original)
Translated from
by Melissa Gallo.
Edited by Laurence Bouvard.
Oh God, the two are Muslims, and once again this is about Islam. An unbelievable thing has taken place again, this time in Boston, with scenes of blood and body parts you only find in the worst horror movies where bodies are deformed and limbs fly. The whole world seemed to be turned upside down during the chase. Victims unfortunately lost their lives in a clash of civilizations. One culprit was shot, and it wasn’t long before the second brother was caught.
At the time of the event — the crime — in Boston, I called my close friend Mahmoud Abdullah who lives in the U.S., and he told me that the incident at the marathon’s finish line had nothing to do with us Muslims. So far, he said, it was probably one of the terrorist groups hostile to the federal government that sporadically conduct such actions. But the news came out piece by piece, and we learned the story as it had taken place. As usual, it happened in a way that was worse than our craziest nightmares. Our religion and identity once again becomes the object of doubt in the world, perhaps not to the same degree as after Sept. 11, 2001, but the effect was close, even closer when it was discovered that after the perpetrators of the terrorist crime had implemented their first step, it occurred to them to carry their bombs to New York City to detonate what was left in the famous Madison Square.*
I don’t know what problem terrorists have with New York City. Not only did the biggest bombing in history happen in this city, but there have also been repeated attempts, such as the 2010 car bombing plot by Faisal Shahzad in Madison Square.* It failed, but this only made others like Dzhokhar (Johar) and Tamerlan Tsarnaev think about it once again while they tried to exit Boston. In any case, neither of them arrived at the Big Apple, which in their minds was a sinful and offensive place that needed divine punishment. Here’s the question: Why do a group of Muslims take this task upon themselves, unlike people of other religions or doctrines who also historically have bitterness against the West and the United States? While they only got close to Americans after requesting an entry visa to America? Strangely, that’s what the Tsarnaev family did when the father filed an application for asylum in America to avoid Russia’s persecution of the Chechen people. The Tsarnaev family went to the U.S. and obtained the right of residence, the boys became citizens** and even received some money from Social Security with their incorporation into the American public school system. Despite that, the brothers prepared and executed their heinous plan of setting off a pressure cooker bomb with a mixture of gunpowder and deadly shrapnel among the annual Boston Marathon contestants.
I don’t think that the brothers had a problem with the marathon or with any of the contestants or with the city that is generally tolerant of foreigners. Nor did they have anger toward the extreme liberalism in the state. Rather, it was proved by the testimony of the younger brother that their main dilemma was with what he considered U.S. attacks on Islam around the globe. What happened in Chechnya wasn’t the problem, nor was it the living conditions of the Tsarnaev brothers in America. It was that Islam suffered a mortal danger.
Putting the problem in this perspective places difficult issues in front of us, the first being that there is no relationship between any of the contestants in the marathon and the American wars overseas. Within the framework of what I asked, there is nothing in Islam that makes the people of a country carry the blame for the government’s behavior or the wars their country enters. They are taxpayers, as it is said in Western thought. Whoever justifies terrorism does not justify it as a result of a particular decision or act by the government; rather, to this person, terrorism is always a result of the government's decisions that have an impact on the lives of people in other nations. Secondly, the wars waged by the Tsarnaev brothers and others have not been authorized by either the Islamic countries involved in the American wars or by the whole Islamic world. Thirdly, and this is perhaps the most important question of all, how do two young boys with bright futures in the U.S., who came to the U.S. to obtain this future, transform into deadly terrorists in such a frightening and essentially suicidal way? What happened to the Tsarnaev brothers in one way or another was a disarmament of their human conscience, for they were not in the battlefield under any circumstances, but entered a marathon where people were competing and contesting with endurance and a sense of accomplishment of a different kind. The fact that there were children present or loved ones and mothers and fathers, or the fact that the end result of their actions was tampering with life in a safe city did not change their hostile intentions. What was no less dangerous was instilling the satanic idea that killing the soul is in the interest of Islam, even though Allah has forbidden murder. The manner in which three people were killed and 260 injured, many with serious injuries, can only be the result of this satanic idea, which converted two young men into great killing machines who had lost all religious or human emotion.
The issue which is perhaps bigger than all of the above is that there is certainly no link between Islam as a religion and terrorist activity. In addition, those who belong to other religions commit terrorism in different places around the world. However, the supporters of other religions strive to keep their members from terrorism, while for us, the mere mention of the question compels many to defend Islam, and the matter ends with the acquittal of terrorists. I have written many times over the last few months about the recentralization of terrorist groups within the Arab region and its outskirts. It appears that some in the Islamic world have become ready to send new battalions as well, not just to our region, but also to the rest of the world. The result of all this is a hellish killing machine that does not stop producing machinery of mass murder and that generates collective hatred for Muslims. The Arab League and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation repeatedly complain about Western crimes against us. But this is not an excuse. We should have the same courage to put an end to those bloody killing machines.
*Editor’s note: This should be Times Square; the author was incorrect.
**Editor's note: Tamerlan Tsarnaev did not become an American citizen.
At the time of the event — the crime — in Boston, I called my close friend Mahmoud Abdullah who lives in the U.S., and he told me that the incident at the marathon’s finish line had nothing to do with us Muslims. So far, he said, it was probably one of the terrorist groups hostile to the federal government that sporadically conduct such actions. But the news came out piece by piece, and we learned the story as it had taken place. As usual, it happened in a way that was worse than our craziest nightmares. Our religion and identity once again becomes the object of doubt in the world, perhaps not to the same degree as after Sept. 11, 2001, but the effect was close, even closer when it was discovered that after the perpetrators of the terrorist crime had implemented their first step, it occurred to them to carry their bombs to New York City to detonate what was left in the famous Madison Square.*
I don’t know what problem terrorists have with New York City. Not only did the biggest bombing in history happen in this city, but there have also been repeated attempts, such as the 2010 car bombing plot by Faisal Shahzad in Madison Square.* It failed, but this only made others like Dzhokhar (Johar) and Tamerlan Tsarnaev think about it once again while they tried to exit Boston. In any case, neither of them arrived at the Big Apple, which in their minds was a sinful and offensive place that needed divine punishment. Here’s the question: Why do a group of Muslims take this task upon themselves, unlike people of other religions or doctrines who also historically have bitterness against the West and the United States? While they only got close to Americans after requesting an entry visa to America? Strangely, that’s what the Tsarnaev family did when the father filed an application for asylum in America to avoid Russia’s persecution of the Chechen people. The Tsarnaev family went to the U.S. and obtained the right of residence, the boys became citizens** and even received some money from Social Security with their incorporation into the American public school system. Despite that, the brothers prepared and executed their heinous plan of setting off a pressure cooker bomb with a mixture of gunpowder and deadly shrapnel among the annual Boston Marathon contestants.
I don’t think that the brothers had a problem with the marathon or with any of the contestants or with the city that is generally tolerant of foreigners. Nor did they have anger toward the extreme liberalism in the state. Rather, it was proved by the testimony of the younger brother that their main dilemma was with what he considered U.S. attacks on Islam around the globe. What happened in Chechnya wasn’t the problem, nor was it the living conditions of the Tsarnaev brothers in America. It was that Islam suffered a mortal danger.
Putting the problem in this perspective places difficult issues in front of us, the first being that there is no relationship between any of the contestants in the marathon and the American wars overseas. Within the framework of what I asked, there is nothing in Islam that makes the people of a country carry the blame for the government’s behavior or the wars their country enters. They are taxpayers, as it is said in Western thought. Whoever justifies terrorism does not justify it as a result of a particular decision or act by the government; rather, to this person, terrorism is always a result of the government's decisions that have an impact on the lives of people in other nations. Secondly, the wars waged by the Tsarnaev brothers and others have not been authorized by either the Islamic countries involved in the American wars or by the whole Islamic world. Thirdly, and this is perhaps the most important question of all, how do two young boys with bright futures in the U.S., who came to the U.S. to obtain this future, transform into deadly terrorists in such a frightening and essentially suicidal way? What happened to the Tsarnaev brothers in one way or another was a disarmament of their human conscience, for they were not in the battlefield under any circumstances, but entered a marathon where people were competing and contesting with endurance and a sense of accomplishment of a different kind. The fact that there were children present or loved ones and mothers and fathers, or the fact that the end result of their actions was tampering with life in a safe city did not change their hostile intentions. What was no less dangerous was instilling the satanic idea that killing the soul is in the interest of Islam, even though Allah has forbidden murder. The manner in which three people were killed and 260 injured, many with serious injuries, can only be the result of this satanic idea, which converted two young men into great killing machines who had lost all religious or human emotion.
The issue which is perhaps bigger than all of the above is that there is certainly no link between Islam as a religion and terrorist activity. In addition, those who belong to other religions commit terrorism in different places around the world. However, the supporters of other religions strive to keep their members from terrorism, while for us, the mere mention of the question compels many to defend Islam, and the matter ends with the acquittal of terrorists. I have written many times over the last few months about the recentralization of terrorist groups within the Arab region and its outskirts. It appears that some in the Islamic world have become ready to send new battalions as well, not just to our region, but also to the rest of the world. The result of all this is a hellish killing machine that does not stop producing machinery of mass murder and that generates collective hatred for Muslims. The Arab League and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation repeatedly complain about Western crimes against us. But this is not an excuse. We should have the same courage to put an end to those bloody killing machines.
*Editor’s note: This should be Times Square; the author was incorrect.
**Editor's note: Tamerlan Tsarnaev did not become an American citizen.
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