Lebanese conflict sparking tensions in South Asia

ALERT: The current security alert in even India's major airports over possible terror attacks in the air, against the backdrop of US intelligence reports that terrorists plan to blow - up civilian passenger planes over the Atlantic, grimly and freshly underscores the link between the US-led "war on terror" and what may be called the globalization of the terror threat.

Those states which reportedly cooperated in the "war on terror", too run the risk of facing terror threats, particularly in the context of the mounting civilian casualties in the Israeli military incursion of Lebanon.

This inference forces itself on the observer particularly in view of reports that terror attacks are being aimed to coincide with Indian Independence Day celebrations on August 15.

A sound perspective on the emerging terror threats to civilian targets, both in the air and on the ground, in view of the growing "collateral damage" in Lebanon, is provided in an open letter addressed to the British authorities by prominent Muslim citizens of Britain.

"The debacle of Iraq and now the failure to do more to secure an immediate end to the attacks on civilians in the Middle East not only increases the risk to ordinary people in the region, it is also ammunition to extremists to threaten us all", the letter explained.

Such a statement could not have been timelier. It coincides with the acceptance of a UN Security Council Resolution on ending the crisis in Lebanon, by the Israeli and Lebanese governments and with a growing public outcry in particularly the Arab world on the heavy civilian casualties in Lebanon.

While the tendency on the part of the Western, mainstream media is to blame "Islamic terror" considerably for the crises in the Middle East, and Iraq, the statement by the British-based Muslims acts as a corrective to this obviously distorted interpretation of the violence.

As has often been pointed out in this column, it is the many territorial disputes Israel has with some of its Arab neighbours which have embroiled the Middle East in an endemic politico-military crisis. Terror and violence grows out of these unresolved disputes.

If progress is made towards ending these disputes, there is bound to be a reduction in Middle East violence.

Until then, numerous interests are likely to exploit the conflict situation to their benefit.

The South Asian region is also paying the price for the failure on the part of the Middle Eastern antagonists and of the world community to disentangle the Middle East conflict.

Religious hardliners and demagogues in this region are apparently exploiting the disfavour India has earned in some quarters over the "war on terror", to generate more and more hostility towards it.

The "religious card" could be seen to be working because these anti-India interests are playing on the religious and cultural susceptibilities of groups which are critical of India over the Kashmir problem and on account of its new-found closeness to the West.

The apparent reluctance of the US to get tough with Israel over its disputes with its neighbours is aggravating this hostility to India.

The end result is growing insecurity in South Asia.

So, India is also compelled to brace for mid-air massacres.