Q:
What is your evaluation of the response of the last five years of the security
apparatus, both as an American and as a Muslim?
A:
Well, I think we've all become much more acutely aware of the state apparatus
in terms of monitoring. I don't like the feeling that I have to think about
what I say when I say things. It's not healthy, and I think a lot of people
feel it now in a way that they've never felt it before, and that troubles me
deeply about my country. I think that there needs to be a return to some real
central values about this country. I think Guantanamo Bay is absolutely an
unacceptable event in American history. It's going to be looked at as a really
black period in our legal tradition.
Q:
At what point does this more intense, heavy-handed security become
counterproductive?
A:
Personally, I think the intensified security has already become
counterproductive. They need to do their job, but they don't need to do it
constantly in our face. The intelligence community has a job to protect. The
first principle of any government is to protect its citizens. But you also
protect your citizens by being just to other countries and other peoples. You
endanger your citizens by reckless behavior. You endanger your citizens by
hubris. You endanger your citizens by the inability to actually apologize or to
ask forgiveness for your mistakes. And that's something I find the most
troubling about the whole situation, because I think real security is based on
having benevolent policies.
Q:
So what's your prescription?
A:
My prescription is that we need to dismantle the pyramid of domination and we
need to rebuild a house of mutual respect.
Q:
Give me that in bread-and-butter terms.
A:
In bread-and-butter terms, I truly believe that we need to stop being so
paternalistic in our attitudes toward Muslims, toward other countries, and
begin to actually speak to them as if they were human beings, fully
enfranchised, with the dignity that goes with that. To stop drawing lines in
the sand, to stop dictating to people as if you have some God-given authority
to do that, and to really start trying to talk to people and see what you can
do. I think we need commerce that is mutually beneficial and we need to stop
all of this hegemonic commercial tyranny that goes on in the Middle East, in
Central and South America. I mean people forget, you know, the South Americans
probably hate us more than the Arabs do.
Q:
How much more difficult has it become to achieve this kind of rationale?
A:
We're at the lowest ebb right now. It's going to be very difficult to get back
our credibility. In the recent war with Lebanon, it was so one-sided. If you
watched Arab television and then CNN, it was like two different universes.
That's really troubling to me because like the Chinese say, "There are
three truths. There's my truth, your truth and then the truth." If I'm
unwilling to let go of my truth and you're unwilling to let go of your truth,
we cannot see objectively this truth that's in the middle, between us. There's
good and bad in all of us, and I want to get rid of the cartoon scenario of
George Bush's world and Osama bin Laden's world, and I want to see it nuanced.
I want to see more intelligence here.
Q:
We know from history that wars are generally fought by young men. What are you
saying to these young people to prevent the sudden explosion of this sort of
negative potential?
A:
You have to give them hope. And there's something attractive about war to young
men. They need to see war for what it is. If Robert E. Lee in the Civil War
said war was hell, what would he make of 20th-century and 21st-century warfare?
I think we have to see war as the despicable creature that it is and really
work for peace. They say if you don't sweat for peace, then you bleed for war.
Q:
But can you pull that off from inside Islam?
A:
Muslims are peace-loving people generally. Among the young, yes, there are some
militant attitudes. But a lot of it arises out of chivalry-- and don't
underestimate the chivalrous impulse in men. A lot of these young men see women
being-- you know-- they see soldiers breaking into houses with Muslim women.
It's really beyond the pale for the average Muslim man, and something rises up
in them. And it can turn to deep resentment and rage. But generally I think the
impulses are actually quite noble.
Q:
So what do you say to the average person who sees some kind of a sinister
threat under every hijab and behind every beard?
A:
People have to be exposed to Muslims, just experience Muslims; talk to them.
Reach out, read about Islam, try to find out about it. There are 20,000 Muslim
physicians in the United States, Americans putting their lives in the hands of
Muslims every day. You're going under and the anesthesiologist is a Muslim,
right? He's looking out for you. He doesn't want you to die in that operation
because you're an infidel. He's doing his job. As is your pediatrician who's
trying to heal your child. And the mechanic who's fixing your car? He's not
putting a bomb in your car. It's Abdullah, the guy down at the Chevron station,
right? I mean it's one-fifth of the world's population for God's sake-- one out
of five people is a Muslim.
Muslims
have been an almost entirely benevolent force in the 20th century. They did not
wreak the havoc the Western powers wreaked on the world. They have not come
anywhere near to the environmental degradation that we've done to the planet.
So I think Muslims need to be seen in the proper light. They're mostly decent,
hardworking people, people with deep family values, and they want to live in
peace. My experience on this planet, almost 50 years, is that if you treat
people with respect, they tend to treat you with respect.