have always been a sucker for wide-screen epics. Ever since my Dad took me to see wannan tarihi Vadis – which ends with centurion Robert Taylor heading off to his execution with his bride on his arm – I’ve been on the movie roller-coaster. My dad didn’t make a great distinction between the big pictures and B-movies; he managed to squeeze Hercules Unchained a tsakanin Ben Hur da kuma Spartacus. But the extraordinary suspension of disbelief provided by the cinema carried me right through to Titanic, Pearl Harbor da kuma Gladiator. Awful they may be. Spectacular they are.
But the important thing, as my dad used to tell me, was to remember that the cinema did not really imitate reality. Newly converted Christian centurions did not go so blithely to their deaths nor did love reign supreme on the Titanic. The fighter pilots of Pearl Harbor did not perform so heroically, nor did wicked Roman emperors die so young. From John Wayne’s The Green Berets, war films have lied to us about life and death. After the crimes against humanity in New York and Washington last September, I suppose it was inevitable that the Pentagon and the CIA would call on Hollywood for ideas – yes, the movie boys actually did go to Washington to do a little synergy with the local princes of darkness. But when Vice-President Cheney and Secretary of Defence Rumsfeld turned up together for the premier of Black Hawk Dawn, I began to get worried.
Bayan haka, idan gwamnatin Bush na da sha'awar yaki, zai fi kyau a gano bambanci tsakanin Hollywood da ainihin abu. Amma duk da haka abin da muke samu shine nau'in fim na gaskiya, aikin almara don tabbatar da hasashen "yaƙi mara ƙarewa". Ya fara, ba shakka, tare da duk abin da ya shafi "'yan Salibiyya" da "yaki da ta'addanci" da "yaki da mugunta", yanzu sanannen "sun ƙi mu saboda mu dimokuradiyya ne", "axis na mugunta" kuma mafi kwanan nan. – Zai zama abin ban dariya da ban dariya idan wannan sharar ba ta fito daga Kamfanin Rand ba – “kwayar mugunta”. Na karshen, ta hanyar, ya kamata ya kasance Saudi Arabia, amma yana iya zama Iran, Iraki, Siriya ko kuma ko'ina a yammacin Pecos. Tare da wannan tosh ana bata tarihi. Ko da fim ɗin laifi yana ba da dalilin aikata laifin amma bayan 11 Satumba, Bush Productions ba zai ƙyale wani dalili da za a tattauna ba. Halaye da addinin wadanda suka aikata laifin ya halatta: Larabawa ne, musulmi. Amma a daidai lokacin da kowannenmu ya ba da shawarar mu waiwayi yankin da wadannan Larabawa suka fito – yanki ne mai cike da rashin adalci, zalunci, mamaya da kashe kananan yara da Majalisar Dinkin Duniya ta amince da mu – kamar yadda na bayyana a baya a wannan shafi. an yi yaƙin neman zaɓe.
Yayin da makiyan yankin Bush ke karuwa ba wai al-Qa'ida kadai ba har ma da Iraki da Iran da kawayensu, sai aka fara sakkushe labaran labarai. A watan Yunin da ya gabata, alal misali, mun sami Donald Rumsfeld yana zagaya tatsuniyoyi game da Iran. A wani taron manema labarai da aka gudanar a Qatar –ana iya zagaya wadannan karairayi, don Allah a lura, kamar yadda ake yi a kasashen Larabawa kamar yadda ake yi a yammacin duniya – Rumsfeld ya shaida mana cewa Iraniyawa “suna shiga ayyukan ta’addanci tare da jigilar mutane ta hanyar Damascus cikin kwarin Bekaa. Sun baiwa al-Qa'ida mafaka kuma sun kasance masu taimakawa al-Qa'ida daga Afganistan ta hanyar Iran."
Yanzu abin da ke tattare da wannan duka shi ne cewa an tura mutanen al-Qa'ida zuwa cikin Lebanon tare da taimakon Iran da Siriya. Amma duk da haka mun san cewa Iran, da nisa daga "tasar da" al-Qa'ida mazan al-Qa'ida zuwa Siriya, tana tattara su zuwa Saudi Arabia don ɗaurin kurkuku da yiwuwar kisa. Mun san cewa Siriyawa sun kulle wani muhimmin jami'in al-Qa'ida. Tuni dai Amurkawa sun amince da wannan duka. Sannan kuma, a tanadi wasu maza 10 na Lebanon da ke boye a sansanin Falasdinawa – wadanda watakila ba su da alaka da al-Qa’ida “babu wani mabiyin Osama bin Laden a Lebanon.
So Hezbollah had to be lined up for attack. The Washington Post did the trick with the following last month: “The Lebanon-based Hezbollah organisation, one of the world’s most formidable terrorist groups, is increasingly teaming up with al-Qa’ida on logistics and training for terrorist operations, according to US and European intelligence officials and terrorism experts.” This tomfoolery was abetted by Steven Simon, who once worked for the US National Security Council and who announced that “there’s a convergence of objectives. There’s something in the ‘zeitgeist’ that is pretty well established now.” Except, of course – zeitgeist notwithstanding – it is simply untrue.
The Washington Post had already lined up the Palestinians as America’s enemies – again “terrorism experts” were the source of this story – by telling its readers in May that “the sheer number of suicide belt-bombers attacking Israel this spring has increased fear among terrorism experts that the tactic will be exported to the United States”.
Tun da farko an yi amfani da irin wannan jigon don kafa Saddam Hussein a matsayin abokin al-Qa'ida. A cikin watan Maris, George Tenet, darektan CIA, ya bayyana cewa Baghdad "ya kuma yi hulda da al-Qa'ida", ko da yake ya dan murtuke wannan furuci da ya kara da cewa "Kiyayyar bangarorin biyu ga Amurka da Iyalan gidan sarautar Saudiyya sun ba da shawarar cewa hadin gwiwa ta dabara a tsakanin su abu ne mai yuwuwa”. Lura da rashin daidaituwa a nan tsakanin "ya kuma sami lambobin sadarwa" da "zai yiwu".
On the West Bank, Rumsfeld has already talked about the “so-called occupied” territories, a step down from William Safire’s outrageous column in The New York Times last March in which he admonished us not to call the occupied territories occupied. “To call them ‘occupied’ reveals a prejudice against Israel’s right to what were supposed to be ‘secure and defensible’ borders,” he wrote. Now we have Condoleezza Rice, President Bush’s National Security Adviser, telling us that “Arafat is somebody who failed to lead when he had a chance. Ehud Barak gave him a terrific opportunity to lead. And what did they get in return? Arafat started the second intifada instead and rejected that offered hand of friendship”.
Yanzu gaskiya ne cewa ilimin Ms Rice game da Gabas ta Tsakiya yana raguwa nan da mako, amma wannan ɓatanci da ake iya gani yanzu shine "layi" na Washington. Ba za ku lura ba, cewa Arafat ya kamata ya “jagoranci” ta hanyar yarda da ikon Isra’ila a kan dukan Urushalima, ba a ambaci “yancin komawa” ga ɗan gudun hijira ɗaya ba, na ƙauyukan da aka gina ba bisa ƙa'ida ba a wajen gabashin Kudus a hannun Isra'ila. , na yanki mai fadin mil 10 na Isra'ila da ke zagaye da "Falasdinu", na da kyar kashi 46 na kashi 22 na Falasdinu da ke karkashin shawarwarin baiwa Falasdinawa.
Ba shi da wahala a ga abin da ke faruwa. Ba al-Qa'ida kaɗai ba ne “maƙiyi”. Irak, Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, Saudi Arabia. Bush Productions suna kafa ƙasashen Larabawa. Ana shirya mu don almara mai faɗin allo, abin kallo da almara na Hollywood ke goyan bayan da kuma shirin karya. Kash, babana ba ya tare da mu don tunatar da su duka cewa cinema ba ya kwaikwayon gaskiya, cewa fina-finai na yaki suna karya game da rayuwa da mutuwa.
Fergal Keane is away
ZNetwork ana samun kuɗi ta hanyar karimcin masu karatun sa.
Bada Tallafi