Here is the big news! Osama bin Laden is captured, dead and buried in the sea “according to the Islamic traditions.”
As a well-educated Muslim I never heard of such a tradition. For thousands of years Muslims are expected to be buried in 24 hours following their death, but after a special funeral prayer on land, not to the sea. One defense of the sea burial — the potential for a grave to become a symbolic attraction point for radicals — is also nonsense, since the Wahhabi school of Islam, of which bin Laden was a follower, strongly forbids grave markers and tomb visits. In Wahhabi terms, God is only the agency to pray for, and building tombs for regular prayer visits is interpreted as competing with the “oneness of God.”
If bin Laden were buried according to Wahhabi tradition, he would have a simple grave, located where only God and U.S. officials know. Maybe they wanted God to be the only witness about his current address, but whatever the reason is, there will remain questions until photos of bin Laden’s body are released.
However, in the long term, positive consequences of this big event may be seen in the Middle East.
Bin Laden’s capture cannot be reviewed independently from what is happening in the Arab world. After U.S. intervention in Iraq, all recent uprisings demanding democracy and freedom — called “Arab Spring” — are about to sweep old-fashioned dictators from the region.
For the last epoch, bin Laden was one of the characters — as the scapegoat — in the family photo with Iraq’s Saddam Hussein, Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak, Libya’s Moammar Gadhafi, Tunisia’s Zine el Abidine ben Ali, Syria’s Bashar Assad and Yemen’s Ali Abdullah Saleh.
Now, as they are disappearing one by one from the photo, this loss is another sign of the ending of the last epoch; an epoch of secular dictators fighting against Islamic radicalism.
Bin Laden’s al-Qaida has been always a cause for their existence: Remember Gadhafi or Saleh warning the protesters and the world, “If we leave the power, al-Qaida will get it.” To some extent they are right, but they always used this excuse for oppression. With the capture of bin Laden, the dictators lost most of their legitimate basis. The Arab Spring will flourish more freely; we probably will see a new scapegoat in a new family photo.
The world, of course, is not a safer place as President Barack Obama said in a very naïve way. Al-Qaida has very organized factions everywhere from Yemen to Turkey and its leader’s death will not stop them at all. What is important in this incident is the symbolic message given to the world: Finally, the evil man pays for what he has done.
As President Obama stressed in his speech after the capture; “Bin Laden was not a Muslim leader; he was a mass murderer of Muslims.” He is right. At least every week hundreds of people were killed in al-Qaida bombings in Iraq, Afghanistan or Pakistan. The threat for all humanity is not Islam or any other religion; it is any kind of radicalism, and radical movements such as al-Qaida flourish and nourish themselves in undemocratic environments.
This symbolic message I mentioned above may transform into real consequences if the international community does not change its “Democracy Bon Pour L’Orient” understanding toward the Muslim world. Muslims deserve the same democratic standards as the Western World. They are trying to build their democracies with bloody struggles on the Arab streets, and westerners should demand the same kind of democracy in Egypt, Libya or Syria that flourishes in the West.
If not, it (Western world) will also pay the price. As the Bible says (Luke 6:31): “Treat others the same way you want to be treated.”
Aslı SÖZBİLİR
A Turkish journalist who specializes in minority issues and diplomacy. She is spending three weeks visiting Scripps Treasure Coast Newspapers through an International Center for Journalists program. Follow Asli’s blog: aslisozbilir.blogspot.com
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