There has not been justice, only revenge

Leonardo Boff

06/05/2011

Opinión

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One would have to be one's own enemy and against the minimal humanitarian values to approve of Al Qaeda's horrendous terrorist crime of September 11, 2001, in New York City. But from all perspectives, it is unacceptable for a State, the world's most militarily powerful, to respond to terrorism by transforming itself into a terrorist State. This was what Bush did, limiting democracy and suspending the unconditional applicability of some rights that were the pride of the country. He did more: he directed two wars, against Afghanistan and against Iraq -where he devastated one of the most ancient cultures of humanity-, in which more than one hundred thousand peope have died, and more than a million displaced.

It is worth repeating the question that very few want to ask: why did those terrorists acts happen? Bishop Robert Bowman, from Melbourne Beach, Florida, who was a military pilot during the Viet-Nam war, clearly replied in an open letter to the President, in the National Catholic Reporter: «We are the target of terrorists because, in a large part of the world our Government defends dictatorships, slavery, and human exploitation. We are the target of terrorists because we are hated. And we are hated because our Government does hateful things.»

Richard Clarke, the person responsible for combating terrorism in the White House, said the same in an interview with Jorge Pontual, for Globonews, on 02/28//2010 and repeated it on 05/03/2011. He had warned the CIA and President Bush that an Al Qaeda attack was imminent in New York. They did not listen to him. It happened shortly thereafter. That enraged him. His rage against the Government grew, when he saw that with lies and falsehoods, Bush, from a sheer imperial will to maintain world hegemony, decreed a war against Iraq that had no connection whatsoever with September 11. His rage reached the point where, for the sake of his health and decency, he resigned his post.

More forceful was Chalmers Johnson, one of the principal analysts of the CIA, in an interview with the same journalist, on May 2nd of this year. He knew from within the damage caused by the more than 800 Northamerican military bases, all over the world, that incite in the populations the rage and revolt that are the breeding ground for terrorism. He quotes the book by Eduardo Galeano, «The Open Veins of Latin America», to illustrate the atrocities the Northamerican organs of intelligence committed in Latin America. He denounces the imperial character of the Governments, founded on the use of intelligence that recommends coups d'etat, organizes the murder of leaders, and teaches how to torture. He resigned in protest, and became a professor of history at the University of California. He wrote three volumes, «Blowback», in which he foresaw, with a few months of anticipation, the acts of revenge against Northamerican prepotency in the world. He has been seen as the prophet of September 11.

That is the backdrop for understanding the present situation that led to Osama Bin Laden's criminal execution.

The Northamerican organs of intelligence are failures. For ten years they have swept the world, hunting for Bin Laden. They accomplished nothing. Only using an immoral method, the torture of a messenger of Bin Laden, did they manage to get to his hiding place. Consequently, they have not had any merit of their own.

Everything in that hunt falls under the sign of immorality, shame and crime. In the first place, President Barak Obama, as if he were a «god» decreed the execution/murder of Bin Laden. That goes against the universal ethical principle of «do not kill» and of the international agreements that prescribe prison, trial and punishment of the accused. That was done with Hussein of Iraq, with the Nazi criminals of Nurenberg, with Eichman in Israel and with other accused. With Bin Laden, intentional execution was preferred, a crime for which Barak Obama must answer one day. Moreover, the territory of Pakistan has been invaded, with no prior warning of the operation. Subsequently, the corpse was taken and thrown into the sea, a crime against family piety, the right every family has to bury their own dead, criminals or not, because no matter how bad they have been, they never stop being human.

Justice has not been done. Revenge has been practiced, which is always condemnable. «Vengeance is Mine», says the God of the Scriptures of the three Abrahamic religions. Now we will be under the power of an Emperor on whom weighs the accusation of murder. And the necrophilia of the multitudes lessens and shames us all.

- Leonardo Boff is Theologian and Earthcharter Commission

Free translation from the Spanish by Servicios Koinonia, http://www.servicioskoinonia.org. Done at REFUGIO DEL RIO GRANDE, Texas, EE.UU.

https://www.alainet.org/en/articulo/149602