Islamic extremists are currently engaged in a relentless hate campaign and have been seeking to demonise the US in every possible way. Since 9/11, the extremists have gained from the wave of anti-Americanism in Muslim societies, in which even the more moderate sections have joined, to paint an unbalanced and one-sided interpretation of events.
Any objective analysis would suggest that the impression that the US has an anti-Muslim policy is misconceived. In the 1990s, it was the US that secured the liberation of the oppressed Muslims of Bosnia and Kosovo by taking military action against Yugoslavia. The emergence of six independent Muslim states in Central Asia in 1991 was the outcome of the collapse of Soviet communism which had been opposed tooth and nail by the US for decades.
In the Middle East, it was the US that had forced Israeli withdrawals from Sinai, both in 1956 and in 1978. The return of the PLO to the West Bank after the Oslo accords in 1993 was largely due to US efforts. In our own region, according to authoritative accounts, it was the US that had saved West Pakistan from an Indian invasion after the surrender of Pakistani troops in Dhaka in 1971. Similarly, when there were war fears between India and Pakistan in 1999 and again in 2002, it was the US that played the main mediatory role to dissuade India from any kind of military adventure. Continued US diplomatic and economic support has always been and remains a key factor in Pakistan’s quest for security against India.
As for the US invasion of Afghanistan, it was the Al Qaeda, operating from safe sanctuaries in that country, that first attacked the US, and not the other way around. The US attacked Afghanistan to dismantle the terrorist network there and not as a part of any global plan to conquer a Muslim country. Afghanistan is an impoverished country and there is no evidence that the US has exploited any of its negligible resources.
Moreover, the Taliban regime was very isolated in the world and was disliked even by its immediate Muslim neighbours including Iran, which at one time was threatening to go to war against it. It is a fact that the Taliban regime was practising a narrow-minded version of Islam that was anti-women, anti-entertainment and anti-education. Its ouster has been welcomed by large sections of Afghan society, above all, by Afghan women who had been virtually under house arrest during its rule.
The US invasion of Iraq that followed in 2003 has been rightly condemned by most observers as a unilateral use of force, based on false pretexts. Its real objective was the ouster of the Saddam regime. However, it is worth noting that a recent poll in Iraq shows that nearly three-fourth of Iraqis approve the US action in removing Saddam. The Shia majority had been badly suppressed by the Saddam regime, as were the Kurds, and it is understandable that they would welcome the change. These two groups are now ruling Iraq for the first time in history.
The resistance to the US military occupation seems to be coming from Islamic extremists like Al-Zarqawi and foreign suicide bombers. They have killed far more Iraqis than the US-led coalition forces in a ferocious guerilla war in which many innocent foreign hostages, including Pakistanis, have been executed.
It is notable that the Iraqi government, elected in free elections and recognised by the Arab League, the OIC and the UN, has not demanded the withdrawal of US forces. Nor has this demand been made by either the Kurds nor any top Shia leaders like Ayatollah Sistani or Al-Hakim. For these reasons, one must question the impression of many people in Pakistan, particularly the Islamic extremists, that the fight in Iraq is a war of national resistance and that most Iraqis are engaged in fighting the foreign troops.