NYTimes.com Article: Saved by U.S., Kuwait Now Shows Mixed Feelings

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This article offers some insight into the spectrum of public opinion in Kuwait.

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Saved by U.S., Kuwait Now Shows Mixed Feelings

October 12, 2002
By CRAIG S. SMITH 




 

KUWAIT, Oct. 11 - Muhammad al-Mulaifi, head of the
information department at Kuwait's Ministry of Islamic
Affairs, tried momentarily to suppress a smile, then broke
into a broad grin when asked if he supported the terrorist
attacks on the United States last year. 

"I would be lying if said I wasn't happy about the attack,"
he said, sitting on the floor of his air-conditioned home
office, a carpeted, cushioned oasis amid the harsh heat of
this small, dry country. Mr. Mulaifi said that many
Kuwaitis were delighted about what had happened to the
United States and that he had attended parties held in
celebration. 

"Only then did we see America suffer for a few seconds what
Muslims have been suffering for a long time," he said. 

His view is not an uncommon one among Muslims in this part
of the world, but it is surprising coming from someone
whose country the United States rescued from Iraqi
domination just over 11 years ago. 

And although Mr. Mulaifi may not be in the majority on this
issue, his opinions do represent the extreme end of an
anti-American sentiment that is spreading among Kuwait's
800,000 people. 

Forty-year-old Talal al-Amer, who calls the faithful to
prayer at the Anas Din Manik Mosque in a quiet middle-class
neighborhood of villas and palm trees, said he suffered
"double vision" when looking at the United States. "As a
Kuwaiti, I am happy with America's presence here," he said,
"but as a Muslim, I don't like it." 

That ambivalence is being fed by the growing fundamentalist
movement, which bridles at the American presence here, and
by anger over the treatment of Palestinians by Israel,
which many Muslims consider an American puppet. 

The combination of those forces is apparently what drove
two young Kuwaiti men to a suicidal attack this week that
killed one American marine and wounded another. Kuwaiti
government officials say the assault was carried out with
the help of other militants who were also planning a larger
attack. Several of those people are now in custody; it is
not yet clear whether they have direct links to Al Qaeda,
the terrorist network of Osama bin Laden. 

Mr. Mulaifi and others here believe that the attacks will
not stop with this one. 

Many Kuwaitis have hailed the two assailants as martyrs.
According to several who attended the men's funeral, the
bodies were not washed before burial - the custom in Islam
when the dead are martyrs. Many mourners also refused to
offer prayers to the dead men, because prayers are not said
for martyrs. 

Jaber al-Jalahma, a prominent fundamentalist cleric who
spoke at the funeral, told mourners that the attack "was a
message to all of us." 

"They were better than us," he said of the assailants,
according to witnesses, "because they stood up against
infidels bent on usurping our rights." 

Reached by telephone, Mr. Jalahma refused to speak to a
Western reporter, saying Americans were "devils." 

Despite lingering gratitude toward the United States for
having driven Iraqi troops from Kuwait, many Kuwaitis now
want the American military to leave the region. Some blame
the United States for not having ousted Mr. Hussein in
1991, arguing that he was left in power so Washington could
strengthen its military presence here. Few Kuwaitis support
an American invasion now, though the United States would
most likely use Kuwait as a base during any war. 

"America kept playing this game, insisting that Saddam
posed a great threat to Kuwait to justify their long-term
presence in the gulf," Nasser al-Khonais, a 31-year-old
librarian at Kuwait's Ministry of Education, said. 

Toppling Mr. Hussein now, he said, is simply a cynical
exercise to warn other countries in the region that America
can change any government when it wants. 

Passions would most likely be inflamed if the Bush
administration acted on its proposals to set up an
occupation government in Iraq after ousting Mr. Hussein.
Such a move would confirm the theory that America's policy
toward Iraq has been an elaborate plot to dominate the
region. 

Many people here stress that views like this are held by
only a small minority of Kuwaitis. "You do here, as
anywhere in the world, have some Islamist elements who
think bin Laden is great," a Western diplomat said. 

But even among more moderate Muslims, there is a growing
ambivalence toward America. Islamist politicians have
become a major political force in the country since the end
of the Persian Gulf war and now account for a third of the
Kuwaiti Parliament. The Muslim Brotherhood, which has
spawned several militant groups, and the Salafi movement,
promoting Islamic fundamentalism, are both active here. 

The attack this week in a country that is often referred to
as America's staunchest ally in the Persian Gulf gives some
measure of the depth and breadth of the anti-American
feeling growing among young Arabs across the region. 

"If pampered, wealthy Kuwaitis raised in pro-American
afterglow of the gulf war could do this, imagine what a
poor Yemeni warrior will do," Mr. Mulaifi said. 

He himself is a study in the radical change in attitudes
toward the United States since the gulf war. After Mr.
Hussein invaded Kuwait in 1990, Mr. Mulaifi spent three
months in Iraqi prisons, accused of being a spy because he
was caught with a camera in his car. His family bought his
release with bribes to Iraqi judges, and he was back home
by the time the war began. 

Though he was 18 at the time, Mr. Mulaifi did not join in
the fighting against Iraq, because "it was not an Islamic
war." 

After the war, he said he felt "love for America." One
reason he cited for his change in attitude was America's
support for Israel and that country's control of Jerusalem,
one of Islam's holiest cities. He also quoted Muhammad's
command to "drive the infidels from the Arabian peninsula."


At home this week, he stood leafing proudly through his
private archives of Qaeda material, housed in a small,
locked room with an electric sliding door. He pointed out
Mr. bin Laden's signature on some documents. He showed off
photographs of Mr. bin Laden's spokesman, Sulaiman Abu
Ghaith, visiting his home. 

Mr. Mulaifi says he is not a Qaeda member, but is "close to
Al Qaeda thought." He is cagey on whether he remains in
contact with the group ("That's a C.I.A question," he
said), but claims knowledge of its plans. 

He said the network had postponed a major attack that would
surpass Sept. 11, so that it would occur just after any
American invasion of Iraq, when a strike against the United
States would win the most support in the Arab world. 

Mr. Mulaifi said he had been close to the two men who
killed the marine this week, though he disavowed any prior
knowledge of their attack. He said they had come to him for
help early this year after being interrogated and tortured
by Kuwaiti security officers. They were first detained, he
said, upon their return from a failed attempt to reach
Afghanistan, where they had hoped to fight on behalf of the
Taliban. 

According to Mr. Mulaifi, the two had already fought in
Chechnya and Bosnia and had spent time in Afghanistan, but
were stopped while crossing Iran on their last trip and
sent back to Kuwait. 

He said he, too, considered the men martyrs. He read a
passage of Koranic commentary about the rewards martyrs
will receive in the afterlife. "I want to die a martyr,
too," he said.

http://www.nytimes.com/2002/10/12/international/middleeast/12KUWA.html?ex=1035442508&ei=1&en=f9c3c671cec68bd5



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