Daily Times

In terms of rhetoric, it was business as usual for Britain. Both the PM and London Mayor Sadiq Khan spoke of a city refusing to be cowed by terrorists who seek to destroy “our way of life”. This is the same script that Tony Blair adopted following the London bombings. It appears nothing much has been learned since. A refusal to acknowledge the nexus between a militarised foreign policy abroad and attacks at home are not a demonstration of resilience but one of folly. Moreover, it leaves the British people the ones who paying the price.

With the British-US joint track record of bombing so much of the Muslim world — from Bosnia to Libya to Afghanistan to Iraq to Somalia to Yemen to Pakistan to Libya to Syria — the time for an honest conversation is long overdue.

The British political establishment can begin by asking itself what message it is giving to the Muslim world when a prime minister sees fit to resign over the non-binding Brexit referendum of his own calling — yet the man who committed the supreme crime of a war of aggression in Iraq, as per Nuremberg provisions, has never been hauled before any court to answer for this. For truth be told, Mr Blair, a televised apology to one Mr Zakaria simply doesn’t cut it.

The British political establishment can then ponder the dangers of continuing to pedal the lie of western liberal democracy. For in its heart of hearts it surely already knows that democracy cannot be installed overseas by military aggression. For democracy must name the process through which it comes into being. And a ballot box at the end of yet another unjust war does not wipe the slate clean. It simply raises the killing bar.

War, we must all remind ourselves, only has two purposes: to maximise the security of one people while minimising that of another. And when it comes to the western liberal democratic tradition of ‘righteous’ wars — the other is duly cast in the role of unrighteous, as being nothing more than a threat to life itself. In taking up this mantle — no questions asked — a compliant media effectively elects to be part of the war machine. We have seen this time and again in western media coverage of the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories. We are seeing it again today with the response of the British authorities.

So, before Britain’s Muslim population is called to take to the streets to denounce the attack that may or may not have been at the hands of the Islamic State — we, and they, must ask that the liberal democratic moderates join hands with them and publicly demand that Whitehall also be held to account for the violent actions undertaken in their name. For war is always a political choice.

When, and only when Britain has made sincere moves in this direction — will it be in a position to expose the false moral high ground of groups like the Islamic State. In return, it can expect genuine support form the Muslim world which, itself, has and continues to pay for such double talk on terrorism. *