No pardon for those convicted of collaboration with Iran and its party

Al-Arabia — We are supposedly living in a country that has sovereignty and a clear-cut definition of ‘high treason,’ the punishment for which is execution in several countries. Some sins can be forgiven, except the sin of betraying one’s own homeland and conspiring to erase it. Additionally, there is no distinction in the degree of felony between those who commit that sin and these who publicly defend them, as both sides are equal in treason, and are culprits of dishonesty, insolence, and wickedness.

These words are meant to be thunderbolts upon the heads of those who are beating around the bush, attempting to jump over the walls of shame, pleading for compassion, and hinting implicitly and explicitly on including the terrorist members of the Abdali cell in the Amiri pardon. Have they not read the details of the Supreme Court’s irrevocable and conclusive final verdict that was published in the Al-Qabas newspaper on 23 July 2017 to realize the amount of treason and wicked conspiracy plotted against Kuwait, its people, and its existence by those cell members?

The details of that final verdict showed how all the accused members of the Abdali cell were convicted, revealing details on their training in Lebanon according to the planning of a Kuwait-based Iranian diplomat, and an officer in the Iranian Revolutionary Guards under the supervision of the Iran-affiliated Hezbollah. The verdict’s details also showed how the cell members were plotting to dismantle the basic social and economic structures of the state of Kuwait, attack and explode vital institutions, and terrorize the authorities and individuals in it.

The supreme court’s ruling pointed out that Hezbollah trained members of the Abdali cell, and that some of them had a direct connection with the Secretary General of the party, noting that the latter was also behind some previous criminal activities that directly affected Kuwait, such as the hijacking of Al-Jabriyah Airplane, the assassination attempt of Prince Jabir, the Iranian espionage cell, and the collaboration with the Iranian intelligence apparatus to form cells for the gathering and passing of intelligence, the smuggling and storage of arms and explosive devices inside Kuwait, and the monitoring of military and oil-related targets.

The question here is why should we not learn from our enemies? Whenever Iran senses that one of its citizens tends to become a traitor, it hangs him on crane masts and light pillars to deter anyone from attempting to act against it. On the other hand, we have pardoned the traitors following the Iraqi invasion, which reassured the other traitors who came after them and encouraged them to establish contacts and conspire with the enemy, until the Iranian espionage cell was captured in 2010. It was quite laughable and disgraceful on part of our minister of foreign affairs back then to describe Iran as “a neighborly state” to Kuwait and that both countries “show mutual respect!” This gave Iran a sign to our weakness, and thus it enhanced its respect to us by forming the Abdali cell after five years of espionage activities.

The second question is whether the same members of the Abdali cell would have dared to commit such a crime inside the territory of Saudi Arabia? Of course they would not, because they learned a lesson from their Hezbollah-affiliated Kuwaiti predecessors who were decapitated just two months and 11 days after their arrest in July 1989 for being involved in the explosions that took place in the Holy Shrine of Mecca.

As a matter of fact, we must be ashamed of ourselves for daring to rethink the question of pardoning the traitors. There is no way to equate those who are loyal to the Kuwaiti Constitution, authority, and homeland and ready to defend these entities (whether they were former MPs who went astray for personal interests or some young people with distinct opinions) with another category of people who are premeditated criminals that purposely and in full awareness intend to collaborate with the enemy, with an ill intention to destruct the homeland and kill its innocent citizens!

If we do not feel ashamed of ourselves, we should rather be ashamed of the souls of Kuwaiti citizens who perished, as well as the souls of other people who were bereaved by their mothers and children due to the crimes committed by Iran and Hezbollah. We should recall the images of those who were killed in the explosions in embassies and cafes, those who were killed in the procession of Jabir al-Ahmad, and those who got shot at on the head and brutally kicked off from an airplane door to fall on the ground. The latter was a scene watched by the world, and shockingly by us on the university hall’s mega screen in California. As we turned left and right, we found tears gushing from the eyes of American students around us, in reaction to that horrific scene!

The documentation of all these events and crimes has been published in my articles over the last 15 years, through some 80 articles in which I have warned against the threat posed by the stances of Iran and Hezbollah, meanwhile providing evidence from international intelligence reports. For example, in an article published in 2008 titled “And you dare say Hezbollah has no presence in Kuwait!” I have exposed the involvement of Kuwaiti mediators in collaborating with that Lebanese party and transferring funds to it.

Earlier, in a 2006 article I have shed light on a speech delivered by Hezbollah Secretary General in which he commended ‘the Kuwaitis who were present at the conference in Beirut’s southern suburb’ to show where some people’s allegiance goes to. In the same vein, in my 2008 article “Iran infiltrates Kuwait through the latter’s Media Ministry” I have revealed accurate information from inside that astonished everyone for their dangerous nature.

It takes a long time to address all the details of the infiltration of Kuwait, and I have been warning the government against it for 15 years. This infiltration has even extended to drug trafficking. However, today we are standing at a crucial juncture, and the entire region is going through crucial shifts that might pose an existential threat to us. Hence, we must act decisively with the surrounding hazards and treasons through acting as a sovereign state, which entails not granting a pardon to the criminals who are loyal to Iran and its party.

At last, but never least; to plea for a pardon constitutes a confession of being guilty, and only those who did not commit a sin could call for revoking the verdict issued against them.

This article was originally published in, and translated from, Kuwaiti newspaper Al-Qabas.