Opinion • 26 January 2003

Just sit back and relax – enjoy the show

Julian Manduca wishes more thought could be given to what is about to happen in Iraq

Fehti Mograbi stretched out his arm to select a slice of bread. He did not know that this simple gesture would be his last. He barely had enough time to realise that the bread was warm and fresh, just as he liked it.
About 1/2000 of a second later a laser-guided bomb – a weapon of minor destruction - came crashing through the roof of the Mograbi home. Fehti’s head was taken clean off. His brains splattered the light blue wall behind where he stood. His daughter Ikballah, seventeen, took the impact of the blast in her stomach. Her sizzling guts spilled onto the supper table mini-seconds before she was burned to a cinder. At that very moment, Fehti’s wife Ishmael, was bringing in the cous-cous and lamb. The blast knocked everything out of her hands. She too was burned alive. Ishmael did not live long enough to enjoy a last thought about her son Isam, before she came crashing to the ground.
Isam was at his baby’s chair. Barely two years old. Unlike the rest of his small family he was too young to appreciate any of life’s wonderful simplicities and complexities. He would never do so.
War is never beautiful and when we soon sit comfortably back in our armchairs to watch what will no doubt resemble a child’s computer game, we should spare some thoughts for Ishmael, Fakri, Ikballah and little Isam.
The US does not send thousands of troops anywhere for no reason. The tearful scenes of US soldiers saying goodbye to their families should pale into insignificance, if the media allows us to see what really happens in Iraq after 27 January.
Ever since September 11, the writing has been on the wall for Iraq, Saddam Hussein and his people. The whole business of weapons inspections is merely a pretext for the impending destruction that George Bush Jnr. and his cronies intend to wreak on the Iraqi people.
Is it not ironic that it is only since Sept 11, that the term: ‘weapons of mass destruction’ has come into ‘common’ usage? The US and its allies harbour many more such weapons – most far more dangerous that what the Iraqis may posses. These ‘friendly’ bombs, however, are called nuclear, chemical and biological. Weapons of mass destruction are only what the enemy has.
The irony lies in the fact that throughout US history the weapons used in the attack that caused US citizens most destruction were two American commercial airplanes. One wonders why UN inspectors have not spent the last few months checking those.
Whether we join the EU or not is an important issue. Very important. But more of that later. As the US gears up for war, the rest of the world, barring a few, seem immobile, incapable of any reaction. To many of us Maltese it would seem to be not even an issue.
The adage goes that nobody wins in war – and truly so. How can we sit back and drink our teas and coffees without sounding even a whimper of protest. The Malta Labour Party, through its leader Alfred Sant, has voiced its opposition. So have the Maltese Bishops, following the example of the Pope. But what about the Christian Democrats and its leader Eddie Fenech Adami? What has president Guido de Marco got to say? Is the Nationalist Party lead by true statesmen? Or are they more like village lawyers, as was once famously suggested?
If there are to be protests in Malta they will no doubt be small and it will be groups like Graffitti and Move! to organise them. Bully for them!! And what about the rest of us? Where will all the armchair critics be? And the smart suits? What kind of ethics do we hold? What Christian values?
Economic considerations are never to be dismissed – and our future relationship with the EU and its allies must always be taken seriously - but in the face of war our ethical standpoints, and in this case opposition, must come to the fore.
If the US had shown clearly that the Sept 11 attacks were perpetrated by Iraqis or supported by Saddam’s regime, then the case for action would have been stronger. What has happened instead is that the US is launching its war effort even before the Iraqi leadership is found guilty. Never an acceptable way to mete out justice. julian@maltamag.com