London Bombings

Like many others, I have lived in London: I know those streets, those buses, those tube stops, and I know many people living there who I care about. I lived in London when the IRA was still exploding bombs on a regular basis: everybody in the city knew the risks they took every day, every time they stepped out the door. The resolute public attitude of those times continues today, typified in the following passage from Reuters:

At dusk, hundreds of thousands of Londoners began a long walk home, with the underground network that carries 3 million passengers a day closed at least until Friday.

Thomas Carr, a 63-year-old electrician who faced a two-hour walk home, said he would keep using the underground.

"It won't put me off using the Tube," he said. "You can't let them beat you."

Indeed, Thomas, you cannot. But you can at least know who is attacking you and why. Our governments have not been very clear on that point. In fact, they have been totally disengenuous.

Bush's response to the bombings is a shrug of the shoulders, an I-told-you-so comment:

"The War on Terror goes on..."

What is this "War on Terror", George? How do you win it? How do you end it? Is it really a war, or is that just a convenient political myth, designed to simplify the packaging of a complex problem for public consumption?

In response to the bombings, Juan Cole quotes Michael Scheuer's analysis de-bunking the Bush-Blair myth that Al Quaeda attacks the West because "they hate our values" ...

Scheuer believes that al-Qaeda is an insurgent ideology focused on destroying the United States and its allies, because its members believe that the US is trying to destroy them. Al-Qaeda members see the Israeli occupation and oppression of the Palestinians, backed by the US; US support for military regimes like those of Pakistan and Egypt; and US military occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq as evidence of a US onslaught on Islam and Muslims aimed at reducing them to neo-colonial slavery. That is, specific Western policies are the focus of al-Qaeda response, not a generalized "hatred" of "values."

This analysis is further strengthened by the following (breaking) news article which suggests that former Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu may have been the target of at least one of the attacks:

British police told the Israeli Embassy in London minutes before Thursday's explosions that they had received warnings of possible terror attacks in the city, a senior Israeli official said.

Israeli Finance Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had planned to attend an economic conference in a hotel over the subway stop where one of the blasts occurred, and the warning prompted him to stay in his hotel room instead, government officials said.

Mind you, other reports say the warnings went the other way, from the Israelis to the UK government:

The Associated Press reported July 7 that an anonymous source in the Israeli Foreign Ministry said Scotland Yard had warned the Israeli Embassy in London of possible terrorist attacks in the U.K. capital. The information reportedly was passed to the embassy minutes before the first bomb struck at 0851 London time. The Israeli Embassy promptly ordered Israeli Finance Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to remain in his hotel on the morning of July 7. Netanyahu was scheduled to participate in an Israeli Investment Forum Conference at the Grand Eastern Hotel, located next to the Liverpool Street Tube station -- the first target in the series of bombings that hit London on July 7.

Bodies still rotting in the subways and already the politicians are playing pass-the-blame. Fact is, whichever way the warnings went, there wasn't enough last-minute information to stop the bombing. And there never will be a 100% secure way to stop such bombings, unless we turn all our democratic societies into police states.

So if we want this "War on Terror" to end, it's not enough to say that "we are fighting them abroad so we don't have to fight them at home." It's not enough to spend billions on a bloated military and intelligence system, to launch wars on country after country after country. Real solutions are needed.

And the only viable solution at this stage involves recognizing that at least some of the grievances of Al Quaeda are not without basis in fact.

Before you start shouting "We will never negotiate with terrorists!", consider this: the US has already admitted that previous US administrations made mistakes in their dealings with dictators like Saddam. So now it's time to look at the current administration's many, many mistakes. Most specifically:

- the illegal invasion of Iraq, based on proven lies, still with no declared intention of ever fully withdrawing US forces or dismantling US bases;

- double standards in defining a totally pro-Western version of "Democracy",

- woefully complicit support for Israel's rabid dog policies in the Middle East.

Until and unless our governments get serious about addressing these failures, I cannot see an end to atrocities such as those committed in London today. And the only way our governments will ever acknowledge these failings, or do anything to change these atrocious policies, is if we, the people, pressure them to do so.

In other words, it's up to you and me. Let's save the world, together.