Crimes, double standards and the mother of all reasons

The shooting deaths of 49 night clubbers in the US by Omar Mateen, a US citizen of Afghan origin claiming to have Daesh inspiration, has, like recent Daesh attacks in Paris and Brussels, grabbed global headlines.

World leaders have spoken out against “terrorism” driven by this death cult. Iconic buildings have been lit up with rainbow colours to honour those who died and candle-lit vigils have been held in various cities.

Once again the Western double standard rears its ugly head.

There have been no headlines, no high-level condemnations and no commemorations for the 49 men executed by Shiite militiamen, or the 643 Iraqi Sunni men who disappeared after escaping from Daesh-held Fallujah, at risk of being caught and killed by Daesh; instead, escapees have been detained and slain by besieging Shiite forces.

The Shiite-dominated government has not identified the culprits arrested for killing Sunnis, but both the Iraqi army and allied militias in Hashd Al Shaabi contain Shiite recruits who had belonged to “death squads” that targeted Sunnis after the 2003 US occupation.

The US, which partners with the Iraqi army and Shiite militias prosecuting the siege of Fallujah cannot escape the charge of being complicit in the killings.

Washington has trained army units, provided weaponry and flown missions in support of ground operations.

The US cannot dodge its culpability by saying it did not know what would happen. There have been many warnings about the anti-Sunni sentiments harboured by Shiite militiamen, who have killed and cleansed Sunnis from towns and villages recaptured from Daesh.

The government banned the Hashd Al Shaabi from entering central Fallujah, but has failed to safeguard escaping Sunnis.

So far, I have not read that Mateen, who regularly attended his local mosque, closely followed events in this region and deeply resented what is happening.

He must have been at least aware of developments in Palestine because his second wife, Noor Zahi Salman, is of Palestinian descent.

Muhammad Atta, Al Qaeda operative who trained and deployed the team that on September 11, 2001, brought down the World Trade Centre in New York City and targeted the Pentagon in Washington using hijacked civilian airlines, killing nearly 3,000 people, was strongly motivated by uncritical, unflagging US support for Israel and for the Mubarak regime in Egypt.

While Atta’s carefully planned operation was the worst terrorist attack suffered by the US, Mateen’s came second. But his may not have had anything to do with this region.

Mateen was reportedly “self-radicalised”, but it would appear his pet hatreds were for Afro-Americans, Hispanics, whites and gays.

This being the case, Mateen might well have thought it more dramatic and self-aggrandising to dedicate his nightclub massacre to Daesh, rather than attribute it to his racist and homophobic tendencies.

He could not, however, escape the constant newspaper and television coverage from war-torn Afghanistan, the country of his father’s birth, Pakistan, Palestine, Iraq, Syria and Libya.

In these countries, US and European interference and intervention made life either short-lived or impossible for citizens who had as much a right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness as those killed in Orlando.

During his shooting spree in the Pulse nightclub, Mateen placed three calls to 911 emergency dispatchers in order to pledge allegiance to Daesh leader Abu Bakr Al Baghdadi, and declare solidarity with the ethnic Chechens who carried out the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing and the US citizen of Palestinian origin who became a suicide bomber for Al Qaeda’s Syrian branch, Jabhat Al Nusra.

During 2013 and 2014, Mateen was interviewed three times by the US Federal Bureau of Investigation. The first time because he attended the same mosque as the Palestinian suicide bomber and twice after he claimed he had family ties to Al Qaeda and said he had been recruited by the Lebanese Shiite Hizbollah movement.

Mateen’s statements show he did not comprehend the complexities of jihadist politics or understand that Daesh and Al Nusra are bitter rivals or that Hizbollah’s fighters are all Shiites.

Mateen, a Pushtun, was Sunni.

The only thing that can be said about Mateen is that he was a “lone-wolf” who had fuzzy ideas about the conflicts in this region and falsely raised the black flag of Daesh to justify his actions.

Last year, Daesh claimed responsibility for an attack on a community centre in San Bernardino, California, by a clued-in “lone-wolf” duo who had pledged allegiance to the cult ahead of their operation.

The couple, Sayed Rizwan Farook and Tashfeen Malik, both of Pakistani background, had been radicalised before they met and married.

After mounting their assault, they were killed by the police and left their child orphan. Their partnership was clearly ideological.

The Orlando and San Bernardino attacks must be contrasted with the well-organised operations carried out by closely connected teams of Daesh militants in Paris last November and Brussels in March of this year.

The multiple French attacks were mounted by two teams of three radicalised European Union citizens, most of North African origin, who targeted a stadium, as well as cafés, restaurants and a music hall in central Paris.

The Brussels bombings at the airport and a metro station involved five European citizen bombers, four of Moroccan and one of Syrian origin.

One or more perpetrators had  a criminal record, served time in prison, or visited Syria and joined Daesh, which claimed both these operations.

Therefore, there is a world of difference between shooting attacks mounted by “lone-wolves” on behalf of Daesh and trained cult operatives carrying out orders.

It cannot be said often enough that the US is to blame for Iraq’s agony.

Politicians and officials who were responsible should be held accountable for the occupation of that country and the imposition of a sectarian system of governance that has brought nothing but misery, death, destruction and rampant corruption.

Britain, Washington’s enthusiastic accomplice, should have known better than to tangle with Iraqis again.

Having occupied restive and rebellious Iraq from 1916 until kicked out in 1958, the Brits should have advised the administration of George W. Bush to stay out.

Under Saddam Hussein, Al Qaeda was crushed and not allowed to morph into Daesh and Al Nusra.