March 11, 2004 - a terrorist attack in Madrid inspired by Al-Qaeda
Just today I read this excellent article by Liat Collins, in Jerusalem Post called “My Word: Whose war is it, anyway?”
“The UN, Spain, Latin America – everybody wants to tell us how to solve our problems,” she says explaining why she turned down an invitation for a UN sponsored conference in Brazil with the theme “Latin America and Peace in the Middle East.”
You can’t blame her. Next, we will have an international conference in Darfur on how to resolve the conflict of the Middle East and a majority of the UN members are likely to participate.
After all, who cares for the millions of people who die prematurely every year in Africa from AIDS, hunger, genocide and various easily curable diseases. As long as it is not Israel killing them, who really cares?
Liat Collins writes that Spain would “prosecute Israeli leaders concerning the 2002 operation in which arch-terrorist Salah Shehadeh was killed, tragically along with 14 civilians.” A Spanish judge also started a process against US officials who have allowed “torture” at Guantanamo.
She writes:
The UN and the Spanish inquiries bring to mind the old Monty Python “Spanish Inquisition” sketch in which one character, on being asked a question, would declare: “I didn’t expect the Spanish Inquisition!” The “cardinals” would then burst into the room and the Michael Palin character would exclaim, “Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition!”
It was easy growing up in Britain to ridicule the Inquisition, Monty Python-style. It’s less funny living in an Israel under threat not only of Kassams, Katyushas, Grads and Iran’s race for nuclear arms, but also with the feeling that any measure of self-defense will be investigated by some international court – bouncing like a kangaroo over the facts – in something resembling a parody. Now into all this will step the pope – not the Pythonesque character, but the genuine figure, with pronouncements of brotherhood and peace and the need to stop the “cycle of violence.”
All this sense of self-righteousness that the leftist government and the politically biased judges have adopted in Spain is unbelievable. I don’t want to bring the old and gone past in this discussion, but I can’t help it. Latin America speaks Spanish today, because Spain colonized and exploited without giving anything back. It destroyed the culture of an entire continent.
And don’t tell me this was a long time ago, because the only reason why Latin America is free today, it is not because Spain is a better country, but because it is a weaker one. If it was stronger you would have seen a different attitude.
Isn’t Spain the country that under this leftist (oh so peaceful government) mobilized its army against Morocco because of an empty island. This small piece of land is situated only a few meters from the African shores, but the Spanish say its theirs only because they’re stronger than Morocco? Give them some more strength and they will tell Chavez who the Venezuelan oil wells belong to.
Just see how much luck the Basques, the Catalans and all the others will have in winning independence from what is still part of or what is left of the Spanish Empire (the name is not used anymore).
Spain is weak and therefore nice. Its foreign policy is not based on principles. Therefore it shows the teeth to Morocco, but it whimpers in the face of Al Qaeda, Hamas etc.
The Spanish justices who are mobilized to prosecute Israel for the victims in Gaza have yet to prosecute Al-Qaeda for the terrorist attacks against the Spanish railroad station on March 11, 2004.
Since that fateful day when innocent Spanish blood was shed, Spain has changed dramatically its language against Israel, has withdrawn its troops from Iraq and has been nervously anti-American.
Terrorism apparently works.
Spain’s newfound submissiveness towards the terrorists, be them in Spain, in Gaza or in Iraq, is a betrayal to its allies. It is an invitation for the terrorists to bomb again in order to shape the foreign and domestic policies of the Western countries.
Of course, if Israel were to set up a couple of terrorist attacks in Spain, the Iberian country would turn again to be neutral in Middle East affairs. But because Israel is not going to do it, its former army leaders are likely to get an invitation by the descendants of the Inquisition. This time around though, religion is not the official pretext.
Hi! I’m sorry if you think it’s excellent but I see the article quite demagogic.
First of all, the cause against Israel doesn’t depend on the government but some judges who think are able to manage some tough issues. But it’s not just nowadays, like it shows the Pinochet exemple, years ago.
The Spanish armament industry still selling weapons to Israel, in fact.
Good or bad, in Spain most part of “left-wing” people have been always “anti-american” and “anti-Israel” by definition, not just after the 11M attacks. The withdraw of Spanish troops from Iraq was an important promise of the socialist candidate and now PM, Mr. Zapatero. The Socialist Party and millions of people demonstrated against the Spanish participation on Iraq war. So, with or without 11M, the withdraw was quite an important issue.
The intervention over the little Morocco island wasn’t an action of the “left-wing” government but one of the Aznar’s former right-wing government, a close Mr. Bush ally. If I’m not wrong, that ridiculous action over such a tiny island was strongly criticized by the Socialist Party at that time.
Nobody in Spain thinks that the 11M attack changed anything (or not much) on foreign policy or social mind. I think the Spanish society had an excellent reaction after the terrorist attacks. Paranoia didn’t catch the people, as it happened in London, for exemple (I mention London because I saw that with my own).
If the question is why Israel or USA in Spain and not others; I think the answer is nothing about 11M and, of course, Inquisition. Maybe it’s just the anti-Americanism feeling from one part of the Spanish society, something that could be also behind the Pinochet case. Maybe because, yes, Spanish is “weak” and want to show is “strong” daring “strong” countries. I think it’s something around that but not about fear. To think that it’s ridiculous considering the current Spanish participation in Afghanistan, for exemple.
Thanks fugitivo and welcome to my blog,
You certainly offer some valid corrections on my comments on Spain’s behavior in foreign affairs.
I certainly don’t want to generalize the action of one judge with the entire Spanish people. It would be unjust, not to mention that I have to explain to a couple of very good Spanish friends here in New York.
However, I have to say that such actions would have not been taken in a different political climate whose creation carries the stamp of Zapatero’s political party.
Zapatero’s people are always making news by taking non-productive but pompous actions.
It is fine to be in favor of gay-marriage, but it is not a sign of fine political taste if you send a gay official to the coronation of the new Pope.
It is fine to cut the country’s military missions in the world, but it lacking a sense of responsibility to leave the posts without notifying the allies as they did recently in Kosovo.
It is fine to see to take sides in the Middle East, but it a ridiculous sense of grandeur to have a local judge take upon himself the mission to make international justice.
The last one cannot be unrelated to the first two examples. It is this need for political shows that does not really solve anything, except for giving a bad image even to good intentions.
And finally, while it was Anzar’s government that went military over two deserted island, Zapatero’s government is not going to let them go either. Even less will it ever discuss the cities of Ceuta and Melilla that are claimed by Morocco.
Don’t get me wrong I support Spain’s position on them, but you get the idea that no one will abandon anything as long as it is capable to hold.