Islamic Summit Implies Its Support

The largest international Muslim organization handed the United States a diplomatic victory Wednesday, avoiding condemnation of the U.S. attacks against the Taliban in Afghanistan while urging resolution of the Middle East peace process.

In a surprisingly swift and unanimous action, the often-fractious 56-nation group, whose members range from Iraq and Iran to the more U.S.-friendly Egypt and Saudi Arabia, took less than four hours to issue a statement that gave implicit support to a carefully targeted campaign against the extremist Islamic Afghan regime.

The measured language by delegates such as Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat was the strongest sign yet of a shift of opinion in the Islamic world from strong opposition to grudging acceptance of U.S. strikes against a fellow Muslim country.

Members of the Organization of the Islamic Conference also expressed strong sympathy for the victims of the Sept. 11 attacks against the United States, which left about 5,600 people dead or missing.

The terrorists “have forced the international community and the United Nations to stand up to them, to reject them, to do whatever necessary to stop them and to lay the [foundation] for a new basis for relations among the states and people of the international community,” Arafat said.

Just a week before Wednesday’s emergency summit, called in response to the terrorist attacks, Muslim states such as Malaysia announced that they would denounce any moves against a fellow Muslim country.

U.S. officials who monitored the conference attributed the shift to a realization among some Muslim nations of the diplomatic value of their support--tacit or otherwise--for the coalition against terrorism.

The attacks have provided a window of opportunity for Muslim countries to renew ties with the U.S. Many relations deteriorated after the 1991 Persian Gulf War, amid the punishing U.S.-sponsored sanctions against Iraq and the intifada that pits the Palestinians and Israelis against each other.

Muslim nations are also worried that the anti-American conflict will spread to their own soil, either in the form of terrorist attacks against regimes supported by the U.S. or in the form of U.S. action targeted at states such as Iraq or Iran.

In a letter to the United Nations, the Bush administration refused to rule out future military action against other countries in its war on terrorism, an implied threat that left many at the Islamic conference confused, angry and anxious for better relations with the U.S.

“The entire political future of the region is unsettled and alarming,” said Abdelouahed Belkeziz, the organization’s secretary-general.

U.S. officials said the conference results show that Muslim countries have recognized the inherent danger represented by Osama bin Laden, who has threatened to topple the government of Saudi Arabia for allowing U.S. troops to be based there. Another factor is the unpopularity of the Taliban government, whose austere interpretation of Islamic law is at odds with much of the Muslim world.

However, many at the conference renewed their calls to see evidence supporting the U.S. allegation that Bin Laden was behind the Sept. 11 attacks. And they asked for a restrained and controlled response, avoiding Afghan civilian deaths.

One of the conference’s few concrete achievements came when the Qatari government, along with several other member nations, created a pool of $14 million to help the Afghan people.

The delegates also called for a U.N. conference on terrorism and an attempt to resolve the conflict through peaceful means.

“The Islamic world was among the first to have called for the dialogue of civilizations as a means for interaction, agreement and rapprochement of other peoples, instead of falling into conflicting sects and camps based on the principle of ‘If you are not my side, then you are against me,’ ” said the chairman of the conference and ruler of Qatar, Sheik Hamad ibn Khalifa al Thani.

The statement was a pointed reference to President Bush’s “with us or against us” litmus test applied to nations in the days after the Sept. 11 attacks.

But if the delegates constrained themselves in talking of the attacks on Afghanistan, they made up for it with vitriol directed at Israel.

The rhetoric was venomous, condemning Israel as a sponsor of “state terrorism” against Palestinians during the intifada, which has resulted in the deaths of more than 800 people, most of them Palestinians, in the past year.

The delegates also rejected any attempts to categorize Islamic groups such as Hezbollah and Hamas as terrorist organizations, although both groups have targeted civilians in suicide bombings.

“The conference stressed its rejection of any linkage between terrorism and Islamic and Arab people’s rights, including the Palestinian and Lebanese people’s rights to self-determination, self-defense, sovereignty [and] resistance against Israel and foreign occupation,” the consensus statement read.

Arafat charged that Israel is using the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks as cover to step up its campaign against Palestinians. At one point, Hamad even seemed to blame Israel for the Sept. 11 attacks.

The harsh talk was matched by few deeds. Conference organizers did not insist on a timetable for peace talks, nor make specific demands.

“I must state here that there are voices in our Islamic nation which spell out that state terrorism begets terrorist organizations and that violence breeds violence,” the Qatari ruler said. “The only way to break this vicious circle is to grant the Palestinian people their legitimate rights.”