Crusading Terrorism: How Canada and America Terrorized the Citizens
by Mahboob A. Khawaja, Ph.D.
If the facts of human life are definable and truth is ONE with its own meanings, then “suspicion” cannot be considered as the code of law to become the threshold of action against innocent citizens.Victims are not left with any option except to use truth as the power of human logic.

 

 

America asked Britain and Canada to market the “war on terrorism.” According to Ron Suskind - a White House insider (The One Percent Doctrine: Deep inside America’s pursuit of its enemies since 9/11, 2006, p 226), Secretary of State Colin Powell and Paul O’Neill complained that they ‘did not know the mind of the President’ and often policy was based on ‘his instinct and gut’ and that ‘a key decision largely remained a mystery.’

 

To promote the “war on terrorism” and mislead the American public, the Bush Administration purchased 774 innocent people as terrorists and paid $25,000 cash per head to Afghan warlords to populate Guantanamo Bay Prison – the Abu Ghraib of America.

 

Post 9/11, 2000 Arab students and others were arrested in the US on suspicion of terrorism. Dr. Dhaffir Rafel, highly respected international humanitarian work medical doctor from Syracuse, NY helped the sick, wounded and displaced children and families in Iraq, jailed for 25 years on bogus accusations of laundering charity funds.

 

Talk to Marzieh Hashemi in Colorado, young widow journalist, mom of three small kids was awakened at gunpoint in the early morning by an armed police raid, wanting a house search for income tax papers.

 

Across America, countless people of Arab and Islamic origins and families including school aged kids are detained under the law of suspicion. These are few samples of the contemporary history – again ignored and not learnt from.

 

Canada and the US arrested and tortured thousands of citizens of Japanese, German, and Italian origins during the Second World War and sent them to internment camps because they had specific ethnic ancestry. To re-enact the history, Canadian intelligence services targeted Momin Khawaja and his family as the first Canadian victims of the “war on terrorism.”

 

Momin (Computer scientist and community worker) does not appear to be guilty of any crimes except guilty of drawing suspicion, and to Ron Suskind “suspicion both inside America and abroad became the threshold for action.” 

 

Four years of the most precious time of their lives was stolen by the intelligence agencies. Could any law or government or the Ministers return this lost time to the Khawaja family?  For 4 years, the shackle's sound continues to be heard on Momin’s feet without he being guilty of any crimes. Momin still has no criminal record.

 

At issue are the facts of human life that Canada cannot deny nor morally defy:  

• “Use of Force’ by the Canadian Government to target the law-abiding citizens   to assert the preconceived notion of “bomb making and terrorism.”

• “Use of Suspicion” as law to enforce its threshold of actions.

• Arrest of Momin Khawaja on suspicion of “bomb making” and charged in Canada but not in UK where the alleged conspiracy of bomb making is said to have happened.
  

• For 4 years, he is being punished in jail without a trial and without being guilty of any crimes.

Following the arrest of Dr. Khawaja, (father of Momin) simultaneously in Arabia at the behest of the Government of Canada on false accusations of involvement in  “bomb making” and “terrorism,” the Minister of Security denied the knowledge of a formal request to a foreign government but the documentary evidence questions this public assertion as a lie.

Twice bail has been denied to Momin Khawaja, and after 4 years in jail the prosecution is pushing for a secret trial, making it known that some of the hard evidence will not be made available to the defense team. How could Momin get a legally fair trial in Canada?

Chief Justice Allan Lutfy has sounded the alarm bells and asked the Attorney General of Canada why the case of Momin Khawaja was delayed and certain explicit information not provided to the defense team? (National Post, Jan 30, 2008).

 

The prosecution lawyer told the judge:

 

• “the government wants kept secret on the grounds, its disclosure in open court could harm national security and relations with foreign governments..”

 

What an absurd dichotomy it is, if the Government wants, it spearheads the action to display all the secret information against the suspects on its web sites - all the malicious propaganda about Momin Khawaja and his family - pays millions of dollars to the mass media warlords to carve up the false imagery of the family as “Muslim terrorists,” but it cannot respond to a simple rational question asked by the Chief Justice. Are the politicians so powerful to ignore the expressed concerns of the Chief Justice?

Earlier another Presiding Judge of the Provincial Court, Mr. Douglas Rutherford expressed his public discontent at the deliberate delay in Momin Khawaja’s case:

 

• “it almost spells the impossibility of doing a trial like this.” (“Terror trial delay angers Judge”, Canada.com, January 25, 2008).

The prosecution lawyers say, they are not allowed by law to disclose the reasoning. How is it that might could be right in the Canadian liberal democratic system of governance?  Or is the prosecution building a castle over moving sand? The Canadian Government is looking for an escape route but it must face the real challenge: how could a government fight a war in secret while claiming to be a supporter of democracy, freedom, human rights and justice?

Under the officially sponsored Project Awaken and implications of the anti-terrorist act, the ultimate aim was to identify and facilitate media portrayal of the Khawaja family as “Islamic terrorists”, destabilize the family, drain-out their human energies in arrest, torture and make them run around in legal courts for years to come and dramatize the public imagery as ‘Muslim terrorists” because the Bush administration needed that political statistics to cover up its own shortcomings and fear of the unknown. Canada collaborated to bridge the gaps of time and history by using suspicion as a law and justifying the action by the use of force.

Canadian masses are concerned at the plight of Khawaja family and want to have answers for the state sponsored acts of terrorism against the ordinary citizens.

In a random glimpse of the official minds, the prosecution has demonstrated that the rule of law is irrelevant; respect for public rights is of secondary importance, force can be used against any law-abiding citizens without accountability and after four years of incarceration, search for justice does not include the pre-existence of injustice.

 

It was Government machinery in action to terrorize the citizens of visible Muslim minorities in Canada. Accountability was shrunk to only one criterion that Canada must produce substantial data to satisfy the American command for compliance with President Bush ‘War on Terrorism.”

 

Ron Suskind explains how eagerly President Bush spoke of “God’s will” in support of his presidency and that American “nation being guided by the Divine will in defeating the evil – the Islamic terrorists.” But Suskind questioned Bush on “God’s will,” something Woodrow Wilson and Lincoln never claimed in support of violence or human aggression against others.

In an age of reason, reason lost its place and purpose to “suspicion” as the code of Law.

 

Canada remained safe and there were no acts of terrorism across this nation. It is odd that Canadian politicians in ruling circles should have opted to defy the logic of moral conscience in their relations with the visible minorities of the Canadian entity. Many knowledgeable parliamentarians became silent spectators in the religious crusade of the “war on terrorism.” Prominent American intellectual Paul Craig Roberts (“What Do We Stand for? LewRockwell.com, Feb 19, 2008), asked the same question:

 

• “Do we Americans have any honor, any humanity, any integrity, any awareness of the crimes our government is committing in our names? Do we have a moral conscience?”

Canadian masses hold dear the values of morality, freedom and unbiased attitude, but with media carved fictitious stories they were made fearful about Islamic terrorism depicting photos of the members of the Khawaja family (while under detention), knowing full well, in time sequence, nobody would challenge the false sensational headlines created by hourly paid mass media intellectuals, financed by the intelligence agencies in support of  Project Awaken.

 

Does terror have any religion, shape or form?  Agents of intelligence establishments presuppose that public is ignorant. If so, why are the Canadian masses against the war on terrorism?

Making already a four year(s) delay, now the Canadian prosecution wants to go to a secret trial denying the right to Momin and his defense team to see evidence against him.

 

Momin was accused of involvement in UK based March 2004 plan to make a “bomb” but he is not charged in UK. Are you not surprised at the ambiguous assertion that at a place of accident if someone is accused of involvement but he is not charged?

 

The document sent by the Canadian Minister of Security to Saudi Arabian Government alleged that Dr. Khawaja (father of Momin), was involved in four different activities including the “bomb making’ theory. Are you still not surprised that the then Minister of Security Ms. Anne McClellan denied the knowledge of ever making such a request to Arabian Government to arrest Dr. Khawaja?

 

The intelligence agencies claimed that they neither raided the Khawaja family residence in Ottawa, nor arrested the five other members of the family. One wonders: if the Government is truthful, then public must be lying?

 

But why should the public lie, for what purpose?

 

If the raid never happened, how was the Khawaja family house damaged, and hundreds of people in the neighborhood witness to the armed assault, (as if there was a war going on)? 

 

Often ruling elites underestimate the strength of public memory and power of knowledge, reasoning, and wisdom. The armed attack, as witnessed by the neighbors, was like a violent tornado destroying in minutes what took us ages to build – the human dignity, social well being and lives lived in a civilized community of educated citizens.

 

No matter what illusions are crafted, for those victimized, their anguish, pain and continued sufferings do not vanish with the passage of time: the house is still bugged with listening devices generating radiation, doors and windows smashed, cash money stolen, family’s identity cards, health cards, passports confiscated, computers, academic books and kids toys taken away, and the list goes on… and other human damages inflicted speak their own language.

 

Since the official are used to lying and they do not remember what they said in March 2004 at the time of the armed raid, and what they are saying now, four years later. They found it convenient to make a bundle reply to the honorable Chief Justice and could get away with it. This is nothing new; they have been doing it for years. If you recall what happened to Engineer Maher Arar in Canada who was imprisoned and tortured in Syria with the complicity of Canadian intelligence, denied all along for years but ultimately admitted during the official inquiry under Justice O’Connor.

 

Eric Hoffer must have known the mindset and behaviors of politicians and elite bureaucrats in any government organization:

• “Those in possession of absolute power can not only prophesy and make their prophecies come true, but they can also lie and make their lies come true.”

Canadian masses are well known for their global humanitarian outlook, softhearted and peace-loving people with a natural passion to support human rights, freedom and multicultural nation-building. The thinking people of the world wondered why Canada has transformed from its riches of international human values to the dust of embraced animosity, from a peacemaker and peacekeeping nation of international stature to an active partner of intransigence in war in Afghanistan and aggressive behavior against its own citizens?

 

Aggressiveness divides people in hatred and conflicts, cooperation and respect for human dignity brings social harmony and peace in human society. Pursuit of justice assumes the pre-existence of injustice.

 

For four years, Dr. Khawaja has been asking the Minister of Security why he and his family were terrorized? What crime, uncommitted, could justify the inclusion of their family names in the No Fly List? Why their human dignity, normal lives, social and economic well being have been stolen by the Government?

 

Does the Government exist in theoretical concepts or is there a human side of it? The official planners must have known, how difficult it would be for the accused people to live and survive in the society after being labeled as terrorists?

 

What happened to those four accusations of “bomb making and terrorism” listed in the document by the RCMP-Canadian Intelligence Services and sent out to the Saudi Arabian Secret Police?

 

If those allegations were false, (the Canadian Government refused to admit that it ever made such a request), then the whole premise of case against Momin Khawaja is explicitly fake and erroneous.

 

To enhance the public Project Awaken, Canadian intelligence police continued to put shackles on Momin’s feet for four years to dramatize on screen that an alleged Muslim terrorist was in shackles and the shackle's sound ensures public safety and the success story of the intelligence agencies. In reality, it is their failure because years of sufferings have strengthened our resolve to stand for our rights and seek justice.

 

If anybody is fearful, it is the prosecution pushing to go for secret trial. Would the fair-minded Canadian public allow the minority elite bureaucrats to violate the citizen’s rights to fair trial and be subjugated to draconian justice?

 

Under President Bush, America not only lost its global moral standing and the “war on terrorism” but also exposed American military weaknesses and failure in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the continued fear of being replaced by another nation as a superpower; would Canada like to follow the suit?

 

History tells us that whenever aggressive nations surpass the limits and transgress against the weak and poor, the Law of God checks them promptly. See who dismantled the USSR after it invaded Afghanistan? Certainly not the West or NATO. Analyze what happened to some of the great European imperial powers and reflect on their dusty artifacts?

 

History will see the nations by their actions, not by claims.  According to Paul Craig Roberts (“What do we stand for?”), the Bush administration kept 774 of “the world's most dangerous terrorists” at Guantanamo Bay prison, but all have been released secretly, (only 6 are being tried in a military tribunal including two children) and that America paid $25,000 each to Afghan warlords to purchase the "terrorists" to validate the terrorist threat perceived in the war on terrorism.

 

The pursuit of the war represents the corporate interests and making bonded terrorists as the means to support the American war games against the destitute humanity across the globe.  In a new age of reason, quest for global peace and respect for human rights and dignity, one would hope that American leaders should learn from the living history, and Canadian leadership would not follow those who held gospel in one hand and used the other democratic hand to put the whole humanity to the flames of Two World Wars and continued to do so in Iraq and Afghanistan.

 

The search for oil, a stable dollar, and Bush's “war on terrorism” could make America a candidate for self-defeat and self-destruction and soon to be replaced as superpower by the natural process of historical change.

 

Political power is a transitory phenomenon, and every BEGINNING has its END. There are no Islamic states and no Islamic terrorism challenging America or any other Western nations. It is a political myth crafted for global business and strategic domination and to incite emotions and mislead the North American masses against Islam. No religion teaches hatred and terrorism, humans do by their own ignorance and arrogance.

 

Islam and Muslims have no animosity toward America. America is using wrong weapons to fight Islam and God. In the 21st century global citizens community, need is not for perpetuated animosity against Islam and Muslims but friendship and understanding for unity in diversity, that is what makes Canada strong and unique in multicultural mosaic.

 

 

Dr. Mahboob A. Khawaja is a political scientist with interests in strategic studies, comparative cultures and civilizations (West and Islam), peace and conflict resolution, and author of several publications on these subjects. His forthcoming publication is entitled: To America with Reason. The author and his family were the first targeted victims of the “war on terrorism” in Canada.

 

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