Lies by Omission

William Bowles , I'n'I

The London Independent’s editorial headed "Beware loose talk about a clash of civilisations" boggles the mind and my pen trembles and threatens to skitter right off the page of my 'little red note book’ as I transcribe the words from this misleading and dangerous distortion of the facts. "This terrorism isn’t our fault … We didn’t cause it … It’s not the consequence of foreign policy … It’s an attack on our way of life … It’s global … It has an ideology." — Tony Blair, speaking at the Labour Party Conference. The first thing one notices that is entirely missing from this artful piece of dissembling is any reference to Bush and Blair’s endless references to a "clash of civilisations" or indeed to the role of newspapers such as the Independent in spreading fear and loathing of an "intolerant strain of Islam" with its repetition of largely government-sourced stories about 'terrorist cells’ and 'home-grown terrorists’ or links to 'al-Qu’eda’s global network’. References entirely divorced from context or history, especially the pernicious 'war on terror’ fantasy that has created this abominable situation in the first place...

continua / continued