I've visited many world capitals and major cities without forming a psychological or spiritual bond with them. Long or short, these were transient visits, my contact with the place largely confined to the commute between my accommodation and the locations where my work took me, or to lunch and dinner engagements which, more often than not, were also work-related. But cities that you live in, where you get to know their streets and alleys, sit in their cafés, and mingle with their inhabitants, are another matter. These you either come to love and long to return to, or you come to hate them and greet the idea of returning to them, for some business or other, as you would a disagreeable obligation. For me, Boston falls in the first category. I had the good fortune to have been able to visit and reside in Boston regularly since 2003. I had visited it several times before this, during its bitterly cold winter. But at that point, Boston was, to me, no more than a famous northeastern US university town. Since 2003, I began to stay for more frequent and longer durations, of two or more months. I was there for study and research purposes, initially at Harvard University, in the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at the Kennedy School of Government, and subsequently at Brandeis University, although my study/research stints often led me to shuttle between both institutions. When you are in one academy in Boston, you are in close proximity to at least 10 other institutions that rank among the top universities and research centres in the US, and it is virtually inevitable that once you participate in one you imbibe from others. But Boston is about more than academia and the pursuit of knowledge. It is a mode of life you adopt when you take up residence in the heart of Cambridge, stroll across campus through Harvard Square and Harvard Yard, and attend some of the finest and, often, the liveliest musical performances both above ground and below, in the subway stations. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology, located steps away from the Charles River, is very similar. When you cross that campus on your way to Boston, as I have done hundreds of times, you feel that you are not only at the heart of a centre of learning, but also of commerce, sports, maritime navigation and history. Wherever your path takes you along the banks of the Charles, you are in the presence of the story of the beginning of the American state. It was there that the famous Tea Party took place and that the first battles for independence were fought. George Washington stood here, sounding the call of the revolution that inaugurated America's voyage to where it stands today. Bill Clinton lived here and Barack Obama studied here. Yet, probably the most significant and finest discovery I made in that city was its people, who are more important than its many landmarks, in my opinion. The Bostonian always wears a smile. He/she is youthful and energetic, thoughtful and considerate, always ready to help. If they have a moment's free time, Bostonians will take you to wherever you have to go. If they work in a store that you frequent, they will befriend you and give you a hearty welcome back when you return from abroad. I imagine it is obvious why I have chosen to speak of Boston today. I have often discussed the subject of terrorism in my columns. Generally, I have addressed the phenomenon in the Arab and Islamic region where it increasingly plagues us. This time, it struck elsewhere for different reasons. Perhaps there was some fanatic resentment against the federal government or against government in general. Perhaps it was because Boston and Massachusetts are among the most liberal of US cities and states. In all events, wherever they exist extremists have no qualms about murdering hundreds of innocent people during an athletic event such as the Boston marathon, using time bombs. Sometimes they appear to need no reason at all, as occurred when someone went on a shooting spree at MIT. When you are familiar with the place where terrorism struck, when you have lived there and know its terrain, you are bound to ask, “What if I had been there at that time?” It becomes a personal matter. Still, there remains the general and more important dimension: the madness that seems to have gripped the entire world. After all, raving mad has to be the only way to describe individuals or groups bent on arbitrarily killing other individuals and groups, and destroying their lives through criminal acts and through the protective measures that are taken to forestall such acts. By pure coincidence, during one of the regular lunch meetings I have with my dear friend, the eminent writer Salah Montasser, I learned of a book that was relevant to this subject. Montasser often informs me about the latest books he has read, and on this occasion it was The Age of Extremes: The Short Twentieth Century, 1914-1991, by Eric Hobsbawm. Published in 1994, it follows an earlier trilogy on what he called the “long 19th century”, from the French Revolution in 1789 to the onset of World War I, beginning with The Age of Revolution. Hobsbawm maintains that the 20th century fostered extremism through state communism, capitalism, nationalism and other ideologies that breed fanatics who kill and maim for no rational reason and without having any personal grudge or cause to bear against their victims. Either we are still in the age of extremes or extremism has entered a new phase in which the state itself is under threat. Religious or nationalist fanaticism is no longer the sole source of terrorism. Terrorism now also targets the law, the system — in short, “the state,” that sociopolitical entity which is one of the greatest products of the human intellect. What was once termed terrorism against the global order, or the forces that dominated this order, has evolved into terrorism against the state and the society that created it. The purpose is to precipitate a different type of environment in which human affairs are managed and conducted. When I was studying philosophy, it was commonly believed that the various schools of anarchism had been consigned to the dustbin of history. The minds that had brought mankind to the moon and then to Mars, and then from those astral heights down to the sub-microscopic level of the gene and the atom, could only have worked and collaborated so effectively in the framework of a state with its institutions, academies and companies, and their systems of operation and means for the dissemination of science and knowledge. Now it appears that this is what terrorism is targeting. Evidently, the product of the “Age of Extremes” has carried over into the 21st century, not only with the same degree of extremism but also, now, with the additional determination to destroy everything, even life itself. The means is to turn everything that man has made into an instrument of death. In Boston, the bomb the killers used was a pressure cooker, invented to help people prepare and bring warm meals to the table in record times. We have experienced this battle before in its initial dimensions. Its most appalling scenes transpired in the capitals and metropolises of the Arab world, sometimes in Cairo. One was naturally horrified and struck with grief. The attack in Boston stirred the same sentiments, but the horror and grief is for human beings everywhere.
