Ibtissam Al-Bassam, Arab News

Although I am aware that my words of comfort will not lessen your grief and our rage and anger will not make your pain and burden any lighter, I want you to know that Saudis, near and far, mourn with you the loss of your husband Mr. Paul Johnson.

When I saw you on TV last week, and heard your faint voice, I felt you were a relative of mine. Surely the bond of humanity that unites us created this feeling in my heart. Like all Saudis, I was deeply touched that, even at a very difficult time in your life and in the midst of your fears and sorrow, you refused to blame us or our country for the crime that a devilish, merciless group was about to commit on our land.

With my family and with friends, I prayed for the release of your dear husband and his safe return to you and to his many friends in America and in Saudi Arabia. We cried when we heard that the kidnappers had killed him in cold blood.

It is our religious duty to protect our friends, our neighbors and our guests, regardless of their faith, color, race or nationality. Murder and acts of terror are strange to our nature and alien to our culture. The chilling murder of your husband is a crime against you, against his friends, against Saudi Arabia, against America and against all humanity. Only someone totally ignorant of the teachings of our faith would believe that these murderers acted in the true spirit of Islam. Only an idiot would be convinced that they committed their hideous crime to avenge the torture, the abuse and the death of our brothers and sisters in Iraq, Ghaza and the West Bank. Everybody realizes that their acts of terror can only tarnish the image of our religion, hurt the Palestinian cause, and stop Iraqis from regaining their sovereignty and fan hatred for Arabs and Muslim in the world.

Mr. Johnson was our cherished friend and our welcome guest. Experience has taught us that the majority of foreigners who visit our countries and spend time in the Arab world quickly become our close friends. They develop an appreciation for our culture, a respect for our faith and an understanding of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

If you had surfed the web after the abduction of your dear husband, you would have noticed the large number of Saudis, who pleaded with the murderers to set him free. Their appeals were filled with quotes from the Qu’ran and the Hadiths (sayings of our Prophet, peace be upon him) that pointed to the fact that their sin is beyond redemption.

When the world learned that the merciless criminals had carried out their threat, hundreds of messages from shocked, outraged Saudis appeared on the web, cursing the terrorists and condemning the act of terror. Everywhere in the country, Saudis celebrated the death of Abdul Aziz Al-Muqrin and his evil companions. They pledged to assist the police and the government in fighting the terrorists and defeating terrorism. This is a clear indication that the devils who killed Mr. Johnson acted against the teaching of our faith and against the values of our culture. Had the villains been true Muslims, the pleading of Al-Muqrin’s mother alone would have been enough to bring them to their senses. They would have released your husband and would have spent the rest of their lives repenting and asking God to forgive them their sins. Our shock, our anger and our grief are beyond description. We are happy that the terrorists who killed your husband are dead, but we are sad and sorry that all our efforts to save his life did fail.

Mr. Johnson was an innocent victim of the madness that has engulfed our world. The terrorists killed him in order to promote hatred between Muslims and non-Muslims and between Saudis and Americans. They placed disgusting, repulsive photographs on the web in order to fuel the anti-Muslim, anti-Saudi and anti-Arab sentiments in America and in the West. Their aim is to reinforce the false belief that all Saudis, all Arabs and all Muslims hate America and Americans and are determined to kill Christians and Jews. These devils appreciate the power of images and imagery and understand that we all have a tendency to generalize.

I hope that during your long years in Saudi Arabia, you had many opportunities to meet Saudis and know how we feel toward you and toward your country. Most Arabs and most Saudis like Americans and appreciate American culture. They never call America or Americans “the enemy”. They only hate American policy in the Middle East.

President Bush said that the brutal, smiling soldiers who tortured, abused and stripped the Iraqi prisoners naked were not representative of American values and the American people. We believe him. We hope that Americans will understand that the few terrorists who attacked New York and Washington, and the criminals who killed Mr. Johnson are not representatives of Saudis, Arabs or any God-fearing Muslim.

You will return to your home country, but you will always be in our minds and our prayers. May the crime that filled your heart with grief and our hearts with anger promote awareness for the urgent need for justice, love, tolerance, understanding, security and peace in the world. May God give you the strength and the patience to bear the loss of a husband who will never be forgotten!

— Ibtissam Al-Bassam is a former dean of King Fahd Academy in London and a staff member of UNESCO. The views expressed are hers alone.