For the United States, Sept. 11 was a truly historic day; everything about what happened on that day is still being analyzed, debated, and evaluated ­ from air travel safety to foreign policy, including the secret military tribunals Washington set up to try suspects.
But the attacks that took place on that day did not only affect life in America; the outside world was directly affected as well. Several Arab regimes in particular have been coming under increasing pressure to acclimatize themselves to the new realities that Sept. 11 brought about. Decisive decisions had to be taken if these regimes were to survive.
Up to now, most Arab regimes drew their legitimacy not from being accepted by their peoples, but by pretending to uphold Islam. Whenever they felt threatened, they took refuge under the cloak of Islam in order to protect themselves from their enemies. This was what Sudan’s former ruler Jaafar Numayri, among others, did. It is therefore no coincidence that the weaker the regime in question, the more its television stations resemble Muslim pulpits than anything else.
In the past, the United States used to support such religious tendencies, seeing them as an effective deterrent to communist infiltration. That was why the United States (and Europe) welcomed Islamic organizations with open arms, and why cities like London, Chicago and Munich became refuges for Islamic extremists, where they could pursue their political activities freely.
Western support for Islamic fundamentalism weakened with the fall of communism, but it was left to the attacks of Sept. 11 to turn the whole policy on its head. Almost overnight, Islam became an enemy: a source of danger and terrorism. While to communists religion was the “opium of the masses,” the West now accuses Islam of inciting the masses to violence.
This being the case, some Arab regimes now find themselves having to search for other sources of legitimacy. Since their peoples reject them, however, their only alternative for survival is to build close relations with the United States.
That is how the American media campaign against Saudi Arabia, for example, should be seen. And that is why mosque imams all over the Arab world are being urged to stress moderation and avoid politics in their sermons. It will not be long before imams will all have to read out prepared sermons, urging tolerance and moderation.
Even President George W. Bush changed after Sept. 11. After starting his term as an avowed isolationist, extremely shy of involving himself in foreign affairs, the attacks turned him into something of an international statesman. It took Sept. 11 for the Bush administration to realize that even if it wished to shun the outside world, the latter would not leave America alone.
During its first eight months in office, Bush’s White House took several steps designed to disengage America from the outside world. Foreign affairs were consigned to the bottom of its list of priorities; the Middle East was seen as a quagmire best avoided; the United States refused to honor its obligations to the UN; it refused to ratify the Kyoto treaty on global warming; it was on its way to renouncing the 1972 ABM treaty, preferring the safety of a missile shield to protect it from the world.
Sept. 11 changed all that. The attacks revealed how vulnerable America was to global influences. International affairs immediately jumped to the top of the American political agenda. Suddenly, the United States had a “vision” of an Israeli and a Palestinian state living side-by-side in the Middle East. Bush suddenly began to cooperate with Russia’s President Vladimir Putin on issues the United States had hitherto been threatening to settle on its own.
Its own interests forced this new direction on America. Other countries would do well to heed what this new global atmosphere entails: they can either benefit from America’s new multilateral approach ­ or they can bear its full brunt.
Despite laying claim to the world’s most influential and powerful media organizations, America still suffers from a poor image abroad. The Americans recognize this, but they do not seem interested in finding out the reasons behind it.
At first, the Americans tried to convince themselves that they were attacked not because of their policies and actions elsewhere, but because of the values of pluralism, freedom, democracy, and civilization they espouse. But this explanation failed to convince even those who thought it up; American writers and analysts started studying the terrorist phenomenon, trying to find out what lay behind it.
Thanks to these attempts, the Americans now know that there are millions of people around the globe ­ in the Muslim world as well as elsewhere ­ who are living without hope. On the other hand, America has been behaving unbelievably arrogantly, telling the world in effect: “We do what we please, and you can go to hell.”
Asked whether it would not be appropriate for Muslim feelings to be taken into consideration when stationing US forces in the Gulf, Under-Secretary of State Richard Armitage said that American troops were there to protect the oilfields from Iraqi threats, and that they would remain there as long as they were needed. In other words, Muslim feelings count for nothing.
Thankfully, the Americans are beginning to appreciate the consequences of their policies of double standards. Why are Kurds in northern Iraq considered freedom fighters, while their brethren in Turkey are seen as terrorists? Was Iraq a terrorist nation when it was allied with the US in its war with Iran in the 1980s? Were Osama bin Laden and Al-Qaeda terrorists when the CIA was arming and financing them to fight the Russians? And how come erstwhile terrorists like Menachem Begin, Yitzhak Shamir, and Ariel Sharon could suddenly turn into “men of peace?”
Seeing how Israel continues to occupy Arab land in Palestine, Lebanon and Syria, and how it murders, destroys, demolishes, and blockades the Palestinian people and their properties ­ all with American support ­ is it strange that hatred for America is growing? Is it strange that this hatred ­ in the absence of democracy ­ is expressed in terrorist acts?

Dr. Fahed Fanek is Jordan’s leading economics and media consultant. He wrote this comment for The Daily Star

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