Robert Fisk’s Fakes
Sunday, 04 November 2007
Saudi Gazette
By Abdullah Al Asmary
INSTEAD of condemning Israel's "collective" punishment of the innocent Palestinians in the Gaza Strip or even commenting on the recent child trafficking charges brought against European aid workers (among them three journalists) in Chad, some British newspapers went too far in their coverage of King Abdullah's visit to Britain. It is not surprising that the articles on King Abdullah's visit lack credibility because these voices are widely known for their historically biased stance on both Saudi internal issues and the role played by Saudi Arabia in the turbulent Mideast. Years along, King Abdullah has been internationally regarded as an man of indisputable political rationality in an area which has often been shaped by irrational politics. In a lofty rhetoric and during King Abdullah's state visit to Britain, numerous newspapers articles surfaced to reflect lack of credibility vis-à-vis Arabs in general and Saudi internal affairs in particular.
On Oct. 30, Robert Fisk, an old-fashioned columnist in the mass-circulating newspaper The Independent, ran a front-page article in which he, in a painful inaccuracy, reiterated endless - and tasteless at the same time - stories on the deteriorating situation of human rights in the Kingdom, the so-called Wahhabi ideology and the Saudi Arabia's possible role in 9/11 attacks. All these charges have been well-circulated in the Western media so as to deflect the people's attention from the possible intelligence failure to foresee and disrupt Al-Qaeda's terrorist plans.
In an unsurprisingly imperial tone, Fisk opened his article with such an arrogant statement: "In what world do these people live?" Yeah, we live in a turbulent world, namely known as creative chaos, because of the self-imposed wars launched on this oil-rich area by world's democratic states in the name of preaching democracy and ousting dictators.
As far as human rights are concerned, Western military reaction to the hideous and barbaric attacks of 9/11 makes the world's peace fully vulnerable with serious and unprecedented violations of the basic human rights. In the aftermath of the attacks in New York and Washington and as a result of massive hunt for possible Al-Qaeda-linked operatives, several suspects have been detained, interrogated and denied all access to free and fair trials in traditional castles of democracy where rule of law has long been a source of great pride. Fisk's analysis of the reasons for the alleged deteriorating situation of human rights in Saudi Arabia is reliably mistaken and seems to miss the momentous steps undertaken by Saudi Arabia to crack down on human rights violations. In an oft-cited incident, the ban on women to drive is not a state-imposed legislation that has no ramification in the foreseeable future. High-ranking officials have repeatedly said that this issue has to be settled at societal level. Foreign Minister Prince Saud Al-Faisal told British Channel 4 that he personally wanted women to drive but the final word on that issue is for Saudi families. Elsewhere in the article, Fisk kept on reminding us that 15 9/11 hijackers were Saudis for which he directly blamed the so-called Wahhabi ideology. Again, his statements are self-contradictory. In an article published in September 2002, he believed that Al-Qaeda launched these attacks because of the unfettered American support to Israel. Such new analysis of the reasons behind these attacks is intended to appease agitated Israeli politicians and journalists who have repeatedly carried on Fisk's biased reporting, particularly during Israel-Lebanon conflicts. It is almost known to everybody that terrorism has no nationality. The awful London bombings in July 2005, never mentioned by Fisk, were masterminded and perpetrated by well-educated British-born suicide bombers who had not attended Saudi schools, nor had been directly influenced by Wahhabi ideology.
However, what struck me most is Fisk's claim that Saudi Arabia did not protest against Saddam's use of chemical weapons against - not his own people - but Iranians during the first Gulf War. One thing seems to escape Fisk's attention. At the time of first Gulf War, not only Arab countries would have been pleased to lend help to Iraq's Saddam Hussein, but Western countries felt the guilt at the rise of new anti-Western, post-revolutionary Iran. So they decided to generously support Saddam's eight-year-long military adventure there with all means at their disposals. Western help to the friendly regime of Saddam Hussein took the form of technological aid, massive arms deals and intelligence support.
At the end of a long list of baseless charges, Robert Fisk tries dishonestly to find a link between the destruction of Buddha statues of Bamiyan at the hands of the Taleban fighters and a possible Saudi theological cover to that uncivilized act. Again, such assumption is entirely meaningless and is totally based on reckless analysis. In order to enhance stability in that war-shattered country, Saudi Arabia was among the first to recognize the new Taleban-led government in Afghanistan and the first to cut ties with that isolated, theological regime. So how can Saudis push for the destruction of these religious structures while, at the same time, protecting Madaen Saleh, a historical structure located in the northwest of Saudi Arabia.
Despite the unbalanced analysis of King Abdullah's visit in some British newspapers, the red-carpet welcome of the King reflects people's deep respect for his honest personality. When he appeared on the BBC a day ahead of the visit, the King declined to answer some questions because he "did not want to be dishonest or evasive," as John Simpson reported at the BBC website.
Politicians on both sides, though, know well that the obvious differences between the two countries on many issues would not damage the well-established, years-long friendship that shaped the relations between Saudi Arabia and Britain. Such relationship is enhanced daily by the increasing number of Saudi students attending British universities and hundreds of British experts working in key sectors here in the Kingdom
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