THE car bomb outside the Australian Embassy in Jakarta killed nine people and injured 180.
They were workers, shoppers, children. The attack on the school at Beslan led to the deaths of 350 parents, teachers, pupils. Trains in Madrid were blown up. Commuters were reading their newspapers and drinking coffee when the bombs went off, killing 190. The Bali bombings killed 202 holidaymakers, bar staff, taxi drivers. The September 11 outrages in New York and Washington claimed the lives of 3000 office workers, air travellers, firemen, tourists.
Then, there are the men, women and children killed in terrorist attacks on embassies, hotels, buses, theatres and churches in Russia, Israel, Iraq, Indonesia, the Philippines and a score of other places both East and West.
Count the bodies and weep. Count the bodies and pity those who still say we are not at war.
Though we did not make war on Islam, radical Muslims, including Osama bin Laden, have declared war on us. They hate us just for being free. They despise Western values, Western democracy and Western children – and so the atrocities continue.
We did not invite terrorism through misdeeds of our own.
The passengers on Pan Am flight 103, brought down on Lockerbie, had no dispute with Libya or Syria. A wheelchair-bound man thrown over the side of cruise ship was no threat to the Arab world.
War of values
The fundamentalists who have caused the deaths of 100,000 Algerians were not protesting against US foreign policy. The genocide driven by Muslims in Darfur has nothing to do with revenge for Iraq or Palestine, but these disasters have a lot to do with empire-building fanatics who will achieve Taliban-style rule if they keep democracy at bay.
The West can no longer deny it is a clash of civilisations. It is. It is a war of values.
We are at war not with Islam itself, but with a fundamentalist movement that enjoys the support of some Middle East leaders. The irony is that al-Qaida and its partners in terror are also at war with Islam, usurping its strength and mocking its teachings as they kill.
As it protects its own interests, the West is also fighting to rescue Islam, not destroy it. The fanatics who are hijacking Islam will fashion it in their own image if successful, leading to endless misery.
Demanding that our troops come home to defend our shores is naive. There are no shores in this war. There is no safe haven. There is no alternative to taking the fight to the enemy, wherever he is.
