In All The Excitement, Another Explosion Was Neglected

By Mark Steel
Published: 04 July 2007
Courtesy Of The Independent

...With all the excitement, though, everyone appears to have missed yet another explosion.

It took place at the end of last week, when the Washington Post reported a "NATO and US-led assault" on the Afghan village of Hyderabad.

Wali Khan, the member of the US-backed parliament for the area, was quoted as saying,

"More than 100 people have been killed. But they weren't Taliban. The Taliban were far away from here. The people are already unhappy with the government. But these kinds of killings of civilians will cause people to revolt against the government."

...A US army spokesman said the civilian deaths proved "insurgents are continuing their tactic of using women and children as human shields."

So there's another lesson for Al Qa'ida.

They could claim the Tiger Tiger nightclub was actually a military airfield, with a runway in the cloakroom, and civilian deaths would only have shown the British were using people who dance as human shields.

The reasons why someone erratically drives a car bomb to a nightclub or into an airport must be complex, but there's no doubt it's far more likely if you come from a region that's been mercilessly bombed by the government of the country you decide to bomb in return.

That was certainly the view of the intelligence report seen by Blair before the occupation of Iraq.

Maybe a combination of rage and helplessness leads some people to feel that at least blowing something up is acting rather than doing nothing, and they then seek justification for their decision by appealing to the far reaches of their religion.

Because there are obsessive people in all religions, but without an earthly motive, they don't usually resort to blowing up civilians to please their God...