The pro-Syrian Lebanese daily Al-Saffeer[1] carried today an article by Abd Al-Hamid Fakhuri titled "Heil Bush - America Uber Alles."[2] The following are excerpts from the article:
"Oh ruler of the planet Earth, like those who came before you, Pharaoh, Nebuchadnezzar, Alexander [the Great], Nero, Genghis Khan, and Hitler, we, Ruler of the World, offer you our submission and our complete loyalty on our own behalf and on behalf of our peoples. On the occasion of your magnificent victory in the elections of your great country, as you have imposed your will, that cannot be denied, on the [U.N.] Security Council which passed the resolution [to send weapons inspectors] as preparation for your war on Iraq - which confirms your penetrating and long-range insight and the rightness of the principles by which you rule."
"Heil Bush, America Uber Alles!"
"We humbly acknowledge that you have represented truth, justice, democracy, freedom, equality, and humanism in their most glorious forms throughout the generations - the wars you were forced to wage in Korea, Vietnam, Africa, Yugoslavia, Iraq, and Afghanistan, and the coups you planned in various areas in the world, and the assassinations of some leaders of countries that were carried out only because they did not obey you and, despite their weakness, joined the axis of evil that was eliminated or will be eliminated in future."
"Heil Bush, America Uber Alles!"
"We wonder what we should call you: 'Emperor of the Universe,' 'Sultan of All Time,' 'Shah of All Generations'? All these titles are not seemly [enough] for you. By Allah, had the monotheistic religions not been revealed, we would have made you into a god, as the Pharaohs and Romans did [with their leaders]. You have never spoken without wisdom dripping from your lips; you have done nothing without the good of mankind guiding you. You killed millions only to save billions more from the evil that they represented. All anyone has to do is watch you speak to see the nobility and courage on your face and perceive your pure, far-seeing gaze towards [the horizon], and the radiant half-smile that heralds your sublime goals and your optimism in leading humanity towards the ideal in which you believe."
"Heil Bush, America Uber Alles!"
"Even though you still struggle with a small number of problems that distract you, even partially, from your blessed concern about the future of mankind - such as Iraq, Cuba, North Korea, and, we almost forgot [to mention], Palestine, where a group of its sons continues to disturb your rest with the strangest Intifada of its kind, heeding no reason preached by the masters of Arab wisdom - and there are many. We know with certainty that you will eradicate them all with the reason of the power of justice by which you rule."
"Heil Bush, America Uber alles!"
"We buy weapons from your factories to express our complete submission, to increase the profits of your companies, to create employment for your workers, and punish our people so that they will... fear rebelling against us, or against you. We entrust our natural resources to your hands, and then borrow money from the international banks that you control. We open up our markets to your goods, in the name of international free trade, at the expense of our farmers and laborers, and we enable you to change our culture and even to cause its demise, including controlling our thoughts and deleting [from our writings] whatever you see fit [to delete], and rewriting our history and changing our curriculum, even in religious affairs. All this [you do] so that we will assimilate into globalization or Americanization, which is, beyond a doubt, the height [of aspirations] in our modern world. Thus, we renew our vow of fealty to you; we bow our heads and raise our fists to you to say in a single powerful voice: 'Heil Bush, America Uber Alles.'"
[1] Al-Saffeer (Lebanon), November 21, 2002.
[2] The term, from the Nazi salute and the Nazi slogan "Deutschland Uber Alles," was translated by the author into Arabic.
