Washinton Post Lapor Anwar Minta Maaf Dengan Yahudi
Wednesday, 30 June 2010 22:40 | Oleh Nik Nazmi Nik Samad
Sejurus selepas Anwar menyedari yang blogger di Malaysia dapat menghidu lawatannya itu, dia telah membuat kenyataan secara kasual mengenainya di media. Dan dia berbuat perkara yang betul iaitu sebelum akhbar The Washington Pos menghebahkannya. Apa yang Anwar gagal di sini, ialah membuat persediaan berkenaan butir terperinci yang dilaporkan oleh akhbar tersebut.
The Washington Post melaporkan yang Anwar menghabiskan banyak masa menjelaskan kepada rakan-rakan lamanya termasuk Pengerusi Jawatankuasa Luar Negara, Howard Berman dan beberapa orang pemimpin Yahudi. Anwar juga menekankan yang dia menyesal kerana menggunakan kata-kata seperti “pencerobohan Zionis”. Dia juga dilaporkan berkata, “Kenapalah saya perlu menggunakan perkataan tersebut jika ia menyebabkan salah faham?” dan “Saya perlu lebih berhati-hati.”
Langsung tidak mengejutkan apabila Wolfowitz mengambil langkah membela Anwar dan meminta agar sahabatnya itu diberi peluang memandangkan Anwar sedang mempertarungkan hidupnya, dari segi fizikal dan politik, melawan serangan kerajaan yang menggelarnya boneka Yahudi. Samada Yahudi akan mempercayai hujah ini, kita hanya perlu tunggu dan lihat. Tetapi, samada kita, rakyat Malaysia mempercayainya, adalah sesuatu yang menarik untuk direnungkan.
Dari sudut pandangan rakyat Malaysia, apa yang diperkatakanoleh Wolfowitz mengesahkan bahawa Anwar benar-benar sebuah boneka Yahudi. Dan Anwar tidak pernah berniat untuk menjadi sebaliknya. Anwar nampaknya begitu memerlukan sokongan Yahudi berbanding sokongan negara-negara Islam. Anwar tidak pernah menawarkan penjelasan atau permohonan maaf kerana menandatangani perjanjian Annapolis Summit yang hanya menguntungkan Israel dan bukannya Palestin.
Ia tidak pernah menjadi keperluan bagi Anwar untuk menjelaskan kepada umat Islam mengenai hubungan rapatnya dengan Wolfowitz, Camdessus, Gore dan lain-lain pemimpin barat yang terlibat dalam pembunuhan umat Islam di Iraq, Afghanistan dan Palestin.
Anwar juga akan melakukan apa sahaja dan sanggup menggadaikan imej Islamnya hanya untuk mengambil hati barat.
The Reversal of Anwar Ibrahim
by Rachel Motte
This week, Barack Obama reached out once more to the Muslim world. Following his promise last June in Cairo, President Obama hosted a Summit on Entrepreneurship, “to identify how we can deepen ties between business leaders, foundations and social entrepreneurs in the United States and Muslim communities around the world.” Bringing together 250 participants from 60 countries, the Administration once again tried to build bridges between East and West, and even brought Secretary of State Hillary Clinton along to close the summit on Tuesday evening.
Though Malaysia isn’t quite as far along as Muslim nations such as Jordan or Egypt with respect to Israel — it refuses to recognize the Jewish state or its passports — its official anti-Israel position does not come from a societal wellspring of anti-Semitism. Though Malaysia used to have a small Jewish community of its own, it dwindled as a consequence of the Second World War rather than, as in most of the Muslim world, as vengeance for Israel’s founding.
Malaysia’s reputation as a majority-Muslim nation known for moderation and stability is hard won in this decade, and a result of the leadership of the present Prime Minister and his immediate predecessor.
Prior to October 2003, Malaysia’s position as a responsible member of the community of nations was less certain. This was thanks to the country’s former Prime Minister Mahathir Mohammed. Even in power, Mahathir was a well-known anti-Semite and anti-American.
This past January, Mahathir declared that the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States were “staged as an excuse to mount attacks on the Muslim world.” He didn’t stop there. Speaking at that same month’s General Conference for the Support of Al-Quds (that is, the Arabic name for Jerusalem), he declared that Israel was created to solve “the Jewish problem” in Europe after Hitler failed to complete the Final Solution. “Even after their massacre by the Nazis of Germany,” said Mahathir, the Jews “survived to continue to be a source of even greater problems for the world.”
The case of Mahathir isn’t merely one of a has-been politician with a penchant for vile Jew-baiting. He still retains influence with hardliners. And the man whom he mentored, and then repudiated, is now leader of Malaysia’s political opposition — and he’s showing the world how well he learned under Mahathir’s tutelage.
Anti-Semitism is now resurgent in Malaysia thanks to opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim, a charismatic firebrand of a politician who collaborated with Mahathir — as a deputy prime minister and top aide— for nearly a decade in a relationship that Ibrahim described as being one of “father and son.” In 1998 Ibrahim got impatient about taking over from Mahathir, embarked upon a power struggle, and lost. For his troubles, Mahathir put him on trial for corruption and sodomy: and Anwar Ibrahim ended up in jail at the hand of his mentor.
Upon his release, Anwar Ibrahim came to Washington, D.C., and has spent the past decade cultivating a genteel, enlightened image in the West. Otherwise informed American observers of foreign affairs have adopted him as an exemplar of liberal Southeast Asian and/or Muslim democratic governance. Just a few years ago, he was invited to teach for a year at Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, from which he cultivated the acquaintances of eminent Jewish Americans like Paul Wolfowitz — as a means of showing just how far behind him was his own militant Islamist past.
Indeed, as recently as 2008, Al Gore — usually a savvy and perceptive man — could be found posting on his blog in defense of Ibrahim’s dignity in the face of criticism. That’s big-name Western approval one can’t buy — but one can work hard for it with the right enemies and media outreach inside the Beltway.
It also helps if one knows what to tell Western audiences who tune in to Western media outlets. This past March, in an interview with CNN World, Ibrahim told Wajahat Ali, “Stoking the flames of anti-Americanism and anti-Semitism is a good distraction from the stench in [Muslim societies’] own backyard, namely rampant corruption, denial of basic human rights, abuse of power and the suppression of civil society.”
The reality is that if you’d asked a well-informed American who the liberal democrat was in Malaysia between 1999 and 2009, he or she might well have said, “Anwar Ibrahim.”
But does Anwar Ibrahim’s portrayal of himself outside Malaysia match Anwar Ibrahim’s actions within his own country? Unfortunately, Ibrahim has decided to make his mark in domestic Malaysian politics — away from CNN, Al Gore, and Johns Hopkins — as an anti-American, anti-Semitic demagogue (Kita lihat betapa Ketua Umum mata sepet ini pandai bermain wayang kulit dengan pemimpin-pemimpin antarabangsa diluar cakap lain di dalam cakap lain adakah ini pemimpin yang hendak kita pertanggung jawabkan untuk duduk dikerusi Putrajaya, kita fikirkanlah sendiri).
The proximate cause of Ibrahim’s descent into the foul rhetoric of anti-Semitism was his decision to exploit the government’s hiring of a Washington, D.C., public relations firm, APCO, to do minor communications work within Malaysia (So BN telah memanggil APCO untuk melaksanakan kerja-kerja "minor communications work within Malaysia" tetapi pihak Pembangkang seolah-olah melihat BN (UMNO) dan Malaysia berkompromi dengan Isreal dan Yahudi. Kita dibenarkan untuk menuntut dan berniaga sehingga dimana pelusuk dunia tetapi prinsip-prinspip perjuangan dan maruah negara serta agama tidak semudah itu untuk digadaikan. Kita jangan cepat melatah nanti naik lintah siapa yang susah kita juga yang susah). Like many international firms, this one has done business within Israel, and even counts among its senior personnel persons of the Jewish faith.
Ibrahim has now effectively trashed his old friends in Washington and has used this PR contract as an excuse to spin a dark conspiracy theory of Jewish control, Zionist plots, and subversion.
Ibrahim’s lieutenants have charged, among other things, that the Malaysian government has “engag[ed] a company that has a close tie with the Zionist regime in Israel (Inilah dia pembohongan yang boleh melunturkan dan menjatuhkan kredibilti dan maruah agama, bangsa dan negara Malaysia. Inilah yang dipanggil gerak saraf yang telah digerakkan oleh Ketua Umum mata sepet untuk menjatuhkan UMNO dengan menabur racun dalam periuk UMNO yang kononnya UMNO adalah Yahudi dan Yahudi adalah UMNO. Apakah tujuannya dan matlamat perjuangannya. Setelah membaca dan mengikuti Ketua Umum mata sepet ini, saya dapati idaman yang sangat dihajatinya adalah Putrajaya kerana dengan Putrajaya tindakan undang-undang terhadapnya boleh dilupuskan sebab dia adalah Ketua Umum kepada rakyat Malaysia. Demi mencapai cita-citanya itu maka taburkan fitnah pembohongan dan racun dalam UMNO dengan mengaburi mata pemimpin-pemimpin Pakatan Rakyat yang lain bahawa memang UMNO pengkhianat dan penyokong Yahudi. Apabila api telah di nyalakan si bulan penuh mengambil peluang untuk menambahkan fitnah dan pembohongan tersebut dengan mengatakan UMNO telah diyahudikan oleh Isreal dan tidak lagi Islam siapa yang menyokong UMNO akan menyokong Yahudi. Itu adalah agenda terbaru yang sedang dimainkan oleh mata sepet dan bulan penuh disetiap telinga org-org Islam di Malaysia. Inilah dipanggil kerja-kerja subversif dan anti UMNO yang ingin melihat kehancuran dan kegagalan UMNO untuk mendaulatkan dan memartabatkan agama, bangasa dan negara Malaysia. Saya dapat rasakan dengan kehadiran PERKASA sebagai sebuah pertubuhan Melayu amat kena pada masanya kerana org-org Melayu sekarang terumbang-umbing tidak tahu mana satu yang hendak dipercayai UMNO, mata sepet atau bulan penuh. PERKASA akan menjelaskan perkara-perkara yang sensitif berkaitan dengan Melayu berdasarkan Perlembagaan Malaysia yang mana hak-hak org-org Melayu memang terpelihara dan dikawal rapi sejak 53 tahun dahulu). Its advisory panels consist of former security chief of the Israeli government, and many of their staff are formerly from the Israel Security Agency,” and that “its operators in Tel Aviv have close links to the Zionist regime.”
Ibrahim himself has delved headlong into anti-Semitic theorizing, publicly alleging that there are “Israeli intelligence personnel in the Police IT unit (Ini adalah kerja pendusta dan pembohongan yang konon pihak PDRM sekarang telah menjadi ala Morzad pasukan perisikan Yahudi).Worse, he connected his anti-Semitism to his anti-Americanism, when he angrily denounced the Malaysian Prime Minister’s politically courageous decision to stand with President Obama and cut off oil supplies to an Iran seeking nuclear weapons. Ibrahim stood in the legislature to charge that the supposedly “Jewish-controlled” PR firm hired by the Prime Minister was, in fact, working to manipulate Malaysian policy on America’s behalf (Siapa pembohong dan siapa pendusta yang menaburkan fitnah dan siapa pula yang berjuang mahu martabatkan agama, bangsa dan Malaysia).
Ibrahim angrily demanded: “How can our foreign policy have changed dramatically,” unless Jews were controlling Malaysian affairs for America’s benefit? “Our policy on Iran shows how weak we are (Siapa yang mengatakan begitu adalah seorang pendusta, pembohong dan penabur fitnah untuk menjatuhkan kredibiliti pemimpin-pemimpin BN). Unprecedented in the history of our country, even Mahathir Mohamad himself never shifted in Afghanistan and the Palestinian question.”
Remarkably, Ibrahim closed his statement with oblique praise for Mahathir — the man who shaped Ibrahim’s core thinking on things Jewish and American.
The sad truth is that we shouldn’t be surprised by Ibrahim’s descent into anti-Americanism or anti-Semitism. When he told CNN that “stoking the flames of anti-Americanism and anti-Semitism is a good distraction,” he wasn’t condemning: he was observing and prescribing.
This is not the first time Ibrahim has gone down this road: he has a history of Jew-baiting when expediency calls for it. To pick just one example, in 2008, with Malaysian elections approaching, he casually tossed out this charge in an interview with IslamOnline: “I have evidence proving that the government is backing the Jewish lobby in the U.S. and some parties inside Israel.” (To the credit of the Malaysian electorate, Ibrahim’s opposition coalition failed to win a majority in that election.)
And as scholars of terrorist finance like Ilan Weinglass have documented, “Anwar Ibrahim is a founder and director of the Muslim Brotherhood affiliated International Institute of Islamic Thought (IIIT), a think tank in Virginia that has alleged links to terrorism.” In 2002-2003, Ibrahim’s institute in Virginia was even investigated by the FBI, IRS and CIA for alleged financing of Hamas and Hizbollah.
In looking for America’s friends in the Muslim world, it’s often difficult to know the Good Guy from the Bad Guy. But it’s a good rule of thumb that the politician promulgating anti-Semitic conspiracy theories is not a friend of America.
In Malaysia, the events of the past few months have made it crystal clear a strange role reversal: it’s opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim who is whipping up anti-Semitic sentiment — and it’s Prime Minister Najib Razak who is, for better or worse, standing firm with President Obama and the United States (Sekarang sudah jelas bahawa Ketua Umum PKR ini kita boleh gelar sumpah-sumpah apabila bercakap di depan penyokong Pakatan Rakyat ia akan mengatakan bahawa BN ataupun UMNO adalah penyokong Yahudi dan akan membawa masuk Yahudi ke dalam negara Malaysia dan anti Islam kerana menyokong segala usaha dan tindakan Amerika Syarikat. Sebaliknya apabila berada di luar negara dia akan menunjukkan bahawa dia adalah liberal dan menyokong negara berdemokratik seperti USA dan mengamalkan prinsip-prinsip hak-hak asasi manusia dan undang-undang antarabangsa). Kita fikirkanlah mana yang lebih hebat dan mana yang lebih dashyat kerana jawapan tersebut berada di tangan kita siapa yang kita hendak nobatkan di Putrajaya untuk memerintah Malaysia di masa akan datang).
Lias Marzuki 5/5/2010
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