“The goal is to really underscore how the war on terror is so rooted in Islamophobia and to really lift up the story of the ways that Muslims have been impacted.”
The irony here is that for the most part, the “war on terror” scrupulously avoided even the appearance of “Islamophobia” by dissembling about and deflecting from the motivating ideology that underlay the 9/11 jihad attacks. The Obama administration’s entire counterterror program, for example, was called Countering Violent Extremism, and never mention Islam or jihad in the context of terrorism at all. Bush, Obama and numerous other American officials repeatedly denied that Islam was anything but peaceful. But now Maha Hilal is here to tell us that the war on terror was “rooted in Islamophobia.” Pull my other leg.
“We hope this visual representation will help people understand the war on terror has almost exclusively targeted Muslims.”
We hope there are some sane people somewhere who will remember that 9/11 and the 35,000 jihad attacks worldwide since then almost exclusively targeted non-Muslims and Muslims who were considered to belong to the wrong sect.
“Every single time I read one of the event’s descriptions, I would just be horrified….it was so grim … it was difficult to read about these things that were happening to my people…”
For a second I thought she was referring to the 9/11 attacks.
“Visual timeline project traces ‘underlying Islamophobia’ in war on terror,” by Aysha Khan, Religion News Service, September 11, 2019:
On the 18-year anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks that set off the ongoing global war on terror, a new visual timeline seeks to document the U.S. policies and programs that Muslim and civil rights activists say have resulted in major encroachments on human rights.
“The goal is to really underscore how the war on terror is so rooted in Islamophobia and to really lift up the story of the ways that Muslims have been impacted,” said Maha Hilal, a researcher on the war on terror and co-director of the Justice for Muslims Collective who directed the yearlong effort to produce the timeline.
“We don’t have the resources to create a whole museum, but we hope this visual representation will help people understand the war on terror has almost exclusively targeted Muslims,” Hilal said, noting that the timeline highlights the “underlying Islamophobia” linking nearly two decades of torture, immigration crackdowns, surveillance overreaches and more.
Illustrator Zaynub Siddiqui and graphic designer Maura Dwyer from The Sanctuaries DC, a community space for artists and activists that includes several Muslim members, illustrated and designed the 19 panels that comprise the timeline.
The resulting exhibition, “Shattering Justice & Re-Making the Muslim Threat: A Visual Timeline,” will open in Washington, D.C., on Sept. 11. Attendees will also hear a talk from Hilal on dismantling “the expanding apparatus of state violence,” a workshop by The Sanctuaries on cultural organizing, as well as parts of speeches by Presidents Donald Trump, Barack Obama and George W. Bush related to the U.S.-led global campaign against terrorism.
“This is not about Trump,” Hilal added. “Trump is just building off the infrastructure that was perpetuated by Obama and pushed through by Bush.”
Events on the timeline include the campaign against Afghanistan and authorization for use of military force in 2001; the establishment of the Department of Homeland Security and the signing of the so-called Torture Memos in 2002; the 2004 release of photographs showing abuse and torture of Abu Ghraib prison inmates; the murder of journalist and Saudi dissident Jamal Khashoggi last year; the Supreme Court’s controversial February ruling against a Muslim death row inmate seeking to have an imam at his execution; and Trump’s July veto of congressional resolutions that sought to block his administration from selling weapons to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates without Congress’ approval.
As she illustrated the 100-plus events on the timeline with just a pencil, a black marker and white paper, Siddiqui said she was struck by just how “emotionally straining” the process was.
“Every single time I read one of the event’s descriptions, I would just be horrified,” she said. “I could have finished it earlier but it was so grim … it was difficult to read about these things that were happening to my people, to our ummah (community), and realize that this was planned.”…