SIX REFLECTIONS ON TERRORISM
EDITH KURZWEIL
A Week
in Paris
D
uring my week in Paris at the beginning of October, I found that
the comments about the terrorism of September
II,
200I-in
newspapers, on television, and by friends-were not very dif–
ferent from those at home. Some Parisians thought that the Eiffel Tower
might be a target; others avoided taking the subway; yet others defied
the undefined threats by pointing out that ever since the terrorism dur–
ing and after the Algerian crisis, Paris was much better policed than any
U.S. city. Even though I often could detect an undertone of the familiar
anti-Americanism, most people expected our government to react mili–
tarily, but were fearful of too strong a retaliation,
a
fa
"wild west."
On October 4th, readers were informed on the front page of
Le Monde
that Bush was "for a Palestinian state," that Salman Rushdie
was "tired" that his books "end up becoming true," and that Trotsky,
after a life of having justified terrorism for the sake of the revolution,
stated that "no explanation of (whatever) ends can morally justify acts
of lynching or killing."
On the following day,
Le Monde
reported that a survey of French
Muslims found them hosti le to terrorism. Instead, they approved of
republican secularism, judged terrorism as against the Koran, and for
the most part identified themselves as French. Rejecting the idea that the
"suicide attacks" in the U.S. cou ld be compared to the Japanese
kamikazes of World War II, a Tokyo correspondent turned up evidence
that those men had been full of fear before blowing themselves up–
whereas Osama bin Laden's followers expected to enter a paradise
inhabited by seventy virgins. The day's editorial inquired whether or not
geopolitics really had changed now that the fight against terrorism has
become the main organizer of international relations.
The inside pages of
Le Monde's
weekend edition (October 7th and
8th) explained Islam's historical and current complexities, and its many
paradoxes, via the life of the prophet Mohammed and the diffusion of
his ideas around the world; it elaborated on the "thousand-and-one
translations of the Koran." Beneath the headline, "The United States
