This week the attention of world's media turned to Gaza to follow the melodramatic scenes of the Israeli withdrawal which was more akin to a Hollywood epic than a news report.
In a well orchestrated but totally uncalled for exercise the Israeli government planned and enacted a series of scenes that even the best film director would have been proud of. Nine hundred journalists from throughout the world were given access to the staged conflict of Israeli brother against brother.
Scenes of Israeli soldiers forcing out settlers, who had barricaded themselves in a synagogue, young settler girls hysterically crying and scenes of a great emotional outpouring were beamed on TV screens world-wide. Interviews with illegal Israeli settlers, who explained how they were being forced out of their homes, added to the feeling of sympathy for a people that had illegally settled in another peoples' land.
The truth, however, was not shown in this epic. The $140,000 to $400,000 given to each family leaving their homes in the Gaza strip was not mentioned.
The fact that all these people had alternative accommodation waiting for them and indeed many of them would be moving to other illegal settlements (which are still being built) in the West Bank was not mentioned. The fact that this whole film was not needed was not mentioned.
It would have sufficed if the Israeli defence forces provided a fixed date when they would be leaving Gaza, the settlers would have duly left under the cover of darkness without the need for pictures of troubled soldiers, defiant settlers and media frenzy.
However, this theatrical display was aimed at showing the world that Sharon is serious about his disengagement plan and to a final peace agreement with the Palestinians. Where were the cameras and journalists in April 2002 when the Israeli army destroyed the West Bank city of Jenin, killing many civilians and flattening homes?
Where were the cameras and journalists to speak to the young Palestinian girl about her home being demolished and her memories? Where were the cameras and journalists to show the story of the Palestinian people and their displacement and suffering for over 50 years?
These events would have caused much anger for many Muslims who see the injustices being perpetrated on their brothers and sisters in Palestine going unreported but yet when a few illegal Israeli settlers are evicted a human side of suffering is presented. Where is the justice?
It is with blatant acts of injustice such as this that should drive the Muslim to speak out. We need to convert that anger to a constructive effort for the return of the Khilafah State which will be a shining light in the midst of corruption that has engulfed the world. A modern, progressive, independent State that has its reference to Islam rather that the war-mongering West. London Shehzad Bashir.