Who are Terrorists? By Nihayatul Wafiroh

Last month I watched the movie “My Name is Khan.” For me, it is a good picture about the impact of September 11 for Muslim people although they did not involve in the terrorism. The first implication from this tragedy is that people attempt to determine the term “terrorism.” Who are terrorists? United States, in my opinion, gives the wrong direction in the identification of terrorists. US direct or indirect shows in their news that terrorists are from Muslim people. Indeed, this generalization gives negative effects for Muslim in all countries. Osama bin Laden who is assumed to be the leader of terrorist is a Muslim, but it does not mean that all Muslim follow his ideas.

I remember my experiences when I used to live in Hawaii. For Indonesian-Muslim men they need at least one and half-hour to deal with immigration staff when they arrived or departed to US. The US immigration always assumes that all Muslim men from Indonesia are suspected to be “dangerous” people, so they need to make sure that they are clean from terrorism. When the first time my husband came to Hawaii, he had to transit one hour in Guam. In Guam, the immigration staff asked him with many question. As a result he missed his flight and had to wait for 10 hours in Guam for another flight. We made a joke for his case, “although your name is without Muhammad, your face is look like al-Qaida.”

In Indonesia case, as a Muslim, I understand that in my country there are many types of Muslim groups : liberal, moderat and radical. Indonesian is a unique country, so all groups can develop together. Before September 11, I seemed that all groups did not have any problem. In fact, the tension among groups did not occur. Bernard Adeney-Risakotta mentions in his article that actually the impact of September 11 started in Indonesia since Bali bombing on October 12, 2002. It means before that terrorism was unknown in Indonesia.

As people in other countries, Indonesian people began to step far away from terrorist people. The problem in Indonesia is that the majority population in Indonesia is Muslim, as a result, they distrusted each other. Because of media, Indonesian people image that terrorists are who wear one-quarter pants, long shirt, a beard and have wives who wear the veil. This image is not far from the image of Osama bin Laden. People very strong held this picture, so when they meet people like this, they prefer to stand far from them. It is unfair for them and also for other Muslim people.

I personally disagree with this perspective. This generalization takes away their right. Indeed, not all people who wear this kind of dress are terrorists. Terrorism, in my view, is people who make other people’s feeling are terrorized, and they cannot live peacefully. With this determination, I think that capitalism is the big terrorism in the world, and the leader of capitalism is United States. So who are the truly terrorists?