My linguistic skills in Arabic were mediocre. Since I left the Middle
East in 2003 and haven’t practiced the language since, my Arabic has
deteriorated and is now quite poor. For me, studying Arabic primarily
became a door into studying Islam and Islamic culture. I was far better
in this field of study, and continued my personal studies of Islam for
years. I am at heart not a linguist, but rather an analyst with a strong
interest in history.
Before September 2001, I was already growing more skeptical of Islam
based on my own studies and personal experiences. Still, living in the
largest city in the Arabic-speaking world during the September 11
Jihadist attacks was certainly interesting. The Mubarak regime imposed a
curfew on Tahrir Square and parts of downtown Cairo that day. Perhaps
they feared that some local Muslims would publicly celebrate the
attacks, the way some Palestinian Muslims did. When Egypt received
billions of dollars in aid from the USA, this would not have been good
publicity.
I followed the news and newspapers back home via the Internet. They
claimed that all Arabs and Muslims were sad and horrified by the
attacks. This is not true. I know. I was there. Some of my Egyptian
Muslim neighbors celebrated with cakes and said openly that they were
very happy about the attacks.
To me, the most shocking thing about this was not that many Arabs and
Muslims hated the West in general and the USA in particular. I already
knew that. What was truly disturbing was that virtually the entire
Western world seemed to be in complete denial about this fact. This was
an entire civilization which once used to cultivate logic and reason,
yet now seemed to have lost the ability to think rationally. That really
scared me.
The Chinese military strategist Sun Tzu completed his book The Art of War
around the year 500 BC. Despite being more than 2,500 years old, it
remains surprisingly fresh and relevant. This is because Sun Tzu focused
mainly on the psychological aspects of conflict. While human technology
has changed greatly in 2,500 years, human psychology has changed a lot
less. One of the most famous quotes from The Art of War is this:
“If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the
result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for
every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither
the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.”
From what I observed in September 2001, it seemed that the Western
world had forgotten who our enemies are. Far worse, though, was that we
had even forgotten who we are, and the roots of our own civilization.
A decade later, another terror attack would have an even more direct
impact on my life. Both attacks became national traumas. Yet the 2011
attacks in Norway were carried out by a single individual acting alone,
whose alleged terrorist network only existed inside his mentally
disturbed head. The 2001 attacks in the USA were carried out by many
different individuals from a real international terror network whose
ideology has adherents worldwide. Moreover, when a small country is
attacked, this is bad for that small country. When a large and powerful
country is attacked, this has geopolitical consequences.
By 2011, I had been living in the same flat in Oslo for eight years,
since my return from the Middle East. When the July 22 attacks happened,
some people blamed me personally for the atrocities. I suddenly found
myself near the epicenter of an international news story. This was
extremely unpleasant, but in some ways also educational. If the 2001
attacks weakened my trust in Western mass media, the 2011 attacks
totally destroyed it.
