In an interview with Muslimpress, former U.S. Marine Tim King said \u201cFew news agencies in the West have interest in showing the vibrant side of Shia Islam, with its vast cultural history and peace.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThey ignore that the Shia population has been far less violent in recent years by comparison,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
Here\u2019s the full text of the interview:<\/p>\n
\u00a0What\u2019s the significance of the <\/strong>Arbaeen<\/strong>\u00a0pilgrimage, which is the largest gathering in the world?<\/strong><\/p>\n Tim King: I first would emphasize that very fact you state above\u2026 the fact that it\u2019s the largest gathering of human beings anywhere in the world, right at the center of one of the world\u2019s volatile and significant regions. The event has deep meaning for Shia Muslims who travel from many places, particularly Iran, braving the elements and depending upon support to complete the journey. The pilgrimage represents the martyrdom of Prophet Mohammad\u2019s grandson, the third Shia Imam, Husayn ibn Ali in 680.<\/p>\n \u00a0How do you relate the Battle of Karbala to our era?<\/strong><\/p>\n Tim King: Iraq was mercilessly decimated by U.S. forces during the \u201cBattle of Karbala\u201d in 2003, during the recent long-ranging U.S.-led war that left up to 1.5 million Iraqis dead due to a false flag story from the GW Bush Administration, that Iraq was building nuclear weapons, which was just one in a series of lies issued by U.S. presidents who are almost always hell-bent on waging wars somewhere in the Middle east.<\/p>\n \u00a0How do you see the global media coverage of this event?<\/strong><\/p>\n Tim King: I see an array of coverage but it is as if the western media finds some obligation to show the bad side, if they cover the event at all. If you examine non-western accounts, you see that the event went well for vast numbers of people, of course there was violence, but let\u2019s remember that Saudi, Israeli and U.S. agitators are said to be behind much of what went wrong.<\/p>\n Given Iran’s decisive victory in the 12-day war with Israel, how do you interpret the motivations behind these brutal attacks by the Zionist regime? Additionally, as you noted, while most Shia Muslims mourn Imam Hussein\u2019s martyrdom peacefully, Western media often portrays them as violent. Could you analyze this media bias in light of the recent conflict?<\/strong><\/p>\n Tim King: Few news agencies in the West have interest in showing the vibrant side of Shia Islam, with its vast cultural history and peace. They ignore that the Shia population has been far less violent in recent years by comparison, and also that much of the violence from the Shia side is connected to the protection of Muslims, largely Palestinian, who have experienced so much abuse from not only Jewish militants but also Christian militias and forces in Lebanon. Then there is Yemen, where Shia forces and support was used to try to minimize the egregious violence from Saudi Arabia\u2019s unwarranted, horrific attacks.<\/p>\n Additionally, the mainstream media never stops demonizing Iran, they always take stories out of context and endlessly blame Iran for problems in the world that grow in other places. Iran protects its religious minorities, unlike Saudi Arabia or its neighboring allies in the Persian Gulf region.<\/p>\n We can talk about it for days, but the single biggest reason that Israel constantly blames and attacks Iran is because the country\u2019s national leaders have never stopped backing the beleaguered population of Palestine.<\/p>\n \u00a0How can the Arbaeen gathering help unify Muslims?<\/strong><\/p>\n Tim King: I believe gatherings of this nature illustrate the common struggle of all Muslims to worship and observe the key figures in history recorded in the Holy Quran. Western and Zionist forces have played chess with the Middle East for far too long. The blame for nearly all suffering and strife in the Middle East is the result of western meddling and political control.<\/p>\n \u00a0Some commentators argue that the timing of the provocations signals foreign-backed elements seek to undermine the Arbaeen pilgrimage. What\u2019s your view?<\/strong><\/p>\n Tim King: I absolutely believe that to be the case. You have the radicalized Wahhabi and Salafist elements in Saudi Arabia that seek to implement their bizarre interpretations of Islam; the Zionist government of Israel which would like to wipe Iran from the map, and the impacts from the Trump regime in the U.S. which perhaps casts the worst light on Iran, as other world leaders increasingly take note.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Tim King<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0is a former U.S. Marine with twenty years of experience on the west coast as a television news producer, photojournalist, reporter and assignment editor. In addition to his role as a war correspondent, this Los Angeles native has served as Salem-News.com\u2019s Executive News Editor. Tim spent the winter of 2006\/07 covering the war in Afghanistan, and he was in Iraq over the summer of 2008, reporting from the war while embedded with both the U.S. Army and the Marines. Tim holds numerous awards for reporting, photography, writing and editing, including the Oregon AP Award for Spot News Photographer of the Year (2004), first place Electronic Media Award in Spot News, Las Vegas, (1998), Oregon AP Cooperation Award (1991); and several others including the 2005 Red Cross Good Neighborhood Award for reporting.<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" In an interview with Muslimpress, former U.S. Marine Tim King said \u201cFew news agencies in the West have interest in showing the vibrant side of Shia Islam, with its vast cultural history and peace.\u201d \u201cThey ignore that the Shia population has been far less violent in recent years by comparison,\u201d he added. Here\u2019s the full […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1434,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0},"categories":[373],"tags":[438,440,405,375,418,439],"video-categories":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/muslimpress.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1433"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/muslimpress.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/muslimpress.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/muslimpress.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/muslimpress.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1433"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/muslimpress.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1433\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1435,"href":"https:\/\/muslimpress.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1433\/revisions\/1435"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/muslimpress.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1434"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/muslimpress.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1433"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/muslimpress.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1433"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/muslimpress.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1433"},{"taxonomy":"video-categories","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/muslimpress.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fvideo-categories&post=1433"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}