"Oh how foolish is humanity, not to recognise evil in its face! History is strewn with a whole ocean of bodies cut down by the fundamentalist sword.

"From the inception of Islam 1,400 years ago until the present, Muslim fundamentalists have wielded their theology of coercion and violence against other religions. This is not the first time that anyone has attributed the evil that fundamentalists do to the Quran, Islam's sacred scripture."

Such were the words of Dr Jose Dacudao of the Vincente Sotto Memorial Medical Centre in Cebu city, Philippines. The article he wrote was entitled ' A Theology of Evil and the Koran ' and it appeared in the Philippine Star newspaper (Sept 19, 2001).

The editors of the paper noted that they "considered it fit to print" on the grounds that it was based on "relevant rational comments".

That the Sept 11 tragedy could be turned around to suit the agenda of Islamophobic and bigoted Christian fundamentalists in the Philippines is hardly a surprise.

After all, Islamophobia has been part and parcel of the Filipino society for decades if not centuries, and millions of ordinary Filipinos still cannot come to terms that they were once a Muslim nation that were forcibly converted to Christianity at the point of a sword.

(Contrary to the rantings of Dr Dacudao, there is ample historical evidence to show that Islam's spread to the Southeast Asian archipelago was a peaceful one. The same, sadly, cannot be said of Christianity's arrival which came thanks to Portuguese and Spanish conquistadores who hacked their way across Southeast Asia as part of a 'holy war' against the infidel Moors. Ironically, till today the Muslims in the Philippines are still referred to as 'Moros', a term which dates back to the Crusades of the past.)

Bloody history

Anti-Muslim prejudice therefore runs deep in Filipino history. What is more, this hatred is compounded by a sense of guilt and complicity by Filipino Christians themselves who know that their own history is a less than perfect one.

The journals of Antonio Pigafetta, who accompanied the European explorer Magellan on his trip to the Philippines, is full of passages which describe in excruciating detail the massacre of entire Muslim societies who did not convert to the new religion brought by the explorer-conquerors.

What is more, Pigafetta actually describes these massacres in glowing terms, very much like that other explorer-conqueror Alfonso d'Alburqueque the younger (son of the Portuguese admiral Alfonso d'Alburqueque who conquered Malacca in 1511 and who then set out to kill every single Muslim man, woman and child in the defeated city)

Filipinos today naturally find it difficult to reconcile their own Muslim past and blood-soaked history with the image of Christianity as a religion of peace and love that they have been taught at school.

The historical discrepancies do not stop there. Filipinos still cannot come to terms with the fact that the real Filipino resistance to colonial rule did not begin with a handful of creolised Mestizo elites in the north, but rather the Muslim rebellions that began in the South during the Spanish era.

The fact remains that the Muslims of Southern Philippines were fighting against Spanish colonial rule for four centuries, long before the political awakening among the converted Filipinos in Luzon even began.

Old wounds

Today, the facts of history have been erased. So has any rational analysis into the roots of Muslim anger in the South. The Sept 11 tragedy has had long-term and far-flung consequences affecting the countries of the West as well as the East.

For many countries in the world with sizeable Muslim minorities, it has opened up old wounds after decades of internal civil conflict, and served as a justification for clamping down on local Muslim resistance movements.

The highly emotional tone of these conflicts have not, however, helped to address the real underlying issues that are at the root of the problem itself. What is worse, the fear of Islamic militancy has been exploited by some as a convenient way to whip up anti-Muslim sentiment, disguised as part of the now-global 'War on Terror'.

It did not take long for those with anti-Muslim prejudice and fears to crawl out of the woodwork: People like Dr Dacudao continue to heap their prejudice and fears on the Southern Muslims; deriding their beliefs, values, culture and religion and demonising them as intolerant fanatics and extremists.

But few Filipino leaders have addressed the real causes of rebellion among the Muslims of the South themselves. The chronic under-development of the region, the centralisation of power into the hands of an elite oligarchy based in Manila, the abuse of power by the armed forces and security services, the constant attempt to marginalise the culture, languages and religion of the Southerners - have all contributed to the souring of relations between Mindanao and the capital, Manila.

Armed suppression

During the Marcos era, the armed forces were used to suppress the rebellions in the South with such ferocity that the "ocean of bodies" that Dr Dacudao speaks of happened to be Muslim bodies, littered in burnt-out villages or mass graves in the jungle.

Rather than talk about the 'extremism' of the Muslims he could have done better by getting over his own myopia by looking at the extremism of successive governments - from Marcos to Aquino to Ramos, Erap and Aroyyo - who have used the army to quell a popular rebellion that was, after all, based on the demand for universal justice, democracy, development and equal representation. Instead, every single one of the presidents of the Philippines has used the Moro issue as a punching bag to show just how tough and committed they were, and far they would go to win votes.

The Sept 11 event has therefore been exploited to the hilt by anti-Muslim bigots and extremists in the North to curry favour with the West (most notably their ex-colonial master, the United States of America) and to justify further repression against the separatists in the South.

Already President Aroyyo has made numerous trips to the capitals of the United States, Singapore, Indonesia and Malaysia to win support for her 'war against terror' in her own backyard.

The likelihood is that the powers that be in Washington will not be all that concerned about how much terror she herself will unleash to solve her domestic problems.

But violence begets violence, and the likelihood is that Aroyyo's campaign against the Moro separatists will fail as all the previous campaigns before hers.

Bloodthirsty crusader

Manila still cannot get its act together and cannot understand that what the people of Mindanao really want is clean government, equitable growth, freedom of speech and a right to express their religious and cultural identity - just like all the other communities in the country. Bombing them will not weaken their resolve, but only make it stronger.

And as for the so-called threat of 'religious extremism' among Filipino Muslims, President Aroyyo should look closer to home and tackle the growing extremism among the Christian fundamentalists in her own backyard.

These are the fanatics who have made Christian-Muslim dialogue and co-existence next to impossible.

Anyone who doubts this should read and reflect upon the closing words of Dr Jose Dacudao, which could have easily been the words of any bloodthirsty crusader from the past:

"It is sad to note that even the most peaceful Muslim communities can produce fundamentalist warriors. That is why the Quran is a curse on humanity. It cannot be erased anymore. The threat that its evil verses pose on us is permanent."

Even the most fanatical crusaders in the past could accept that Islam and Christianity had common roots and should learn to coexist with one another. Such understanding seems totally lost among the zealots of the Philippines these days.