Rafiq Jan |
“I wish I could have killed more invaders, and more traitors as well” ……were the words of the terrorist without any remorse after killing worshippers in one of the so-called safest countries of the world.
Boundless racism expressed with no remorse by a proud killer of innocent Muslims during Friday prayers in Christchurch, New Zealand. A white supremacist chose a minority group as a soft target to spew the venom with the ominous overture of manifesting extreme anti-Muslimism and anti-immigrant ideology.
Christchurch massacre, apart from being a unique terrorist activity, brings some tough points for the Western nations to ponder contextually:
The anti-Islam news programs coming out of Indian media houses openly scapegoat Pakistan and Muslims throughout the world as the root cause of all the troubles.
First, the uniqueness of this attack is due to the reason that unlike all the previous terrorist attacks in Europe or America this didn’t carry any slogan. Those were later proved to be the acts of individual frustrations that ended up in killing a few innocent humans before being arrested and shown on international media houses.
That could plausibly be taken as popularity stunt of a sick person. On the other hand, Christchurch shooting terrorists had a manifesto; posted online before the attack, identifying himself including his nationality as being Australian. Authorities knew 10 minutes before the attack but were slow to respond. A proof of how the powerful and racist west is radicalized by the Anti-Muslim propaganda.
Secondly, this barbaric act of killing is an extrication that terrorism has no faith, race or religion, ethnicity, ideology nor nationality. Extremism can be a justification by perpetrators for violence against civilians anywhere around the world.
Read more: Rise of militant Islamophobia: The West helps by ignoring it
Thirdly, having said all that in the context of the highly condemnable attack in a New Zealand mosque, questions arise for the role of western mainstream media in its dissemination of propaganda against Islam. Highly effective and vocal media and politicians always try to paint, both consciously and unconsciously, Muslims as uniquely prone to terrorism. They have lied and fudged for decades implicating a religion and its followers. And unfortunately, their lies may well have been a contributor to radicalize the white terrorist behind the Christchurch attack.
Finally, it is of utmost importance to note that the Indian media in many ways is even more dangerous than the western mainstream media in systematically dehumanizing Muslims all over the world. Indian RAW and RSS always drag Pakistan and Muslims into all terror attacks across the globe.
They use their diplomatic and mass media platforms fiercely to sway the international powers in their perspective. The anti-Islam news programs coming out of Indian media houses openly scapegoat Pakistan and Muslims throughout the world as the root cause of all the troubles.
Read more: Pakistan to award ‘courage’ of citizen killed in Christchurch
Media platforms spread with impunity, BJP, and RSS’s hatred narratives, the same way they showed their affinity to the Nazism in Europe in the 1930s and 1940s. Interestingly for a country that cries foul at Pakistan and terrorism, after the Christchurch massacre, Indian politicians and its media kept their condemnation limited by using the word “shooter” and “sick person” instead of calling him a terrorist.
Rafiq Jan is a Political Analyst. The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Global Village Space’s Editorial Policy.