Both Macleod and Butters feel the need to inform their readers that Yemen is “the ancestral homeland of Osama bin Laden.” This is misleading. While it is true that the bin Laden family has ties to this region – mostly through tribal affiliation and marriage (bin Laden’s father was Yemeni) – Osama bin Laden was born and raised in Saudi Arabia. However, I am quite certain that most articles and press statements about Saudi Arabia do not constantly reiterate this fact. Is this because American-Saudi relations are so intimately entwined through money and oil that it is not prudent to remind Americans that the very country to which the Bush Administration recently sold nearly 20 million dollars worth of arms is home to the culture that had a far greater effect on the psychology of bin Laden than Yemen?

Macleod writes that this attack took place “within a week of the seventh anniversary of the September 11 attacks.” Chronologically, this is true. Yet, no statement has been issued by Al Qaeda insinuating any intended significance of the month of September. What is significant about September for the vast majority of Yemenis is that it is the holy month of Ramadan. The sadness and rage that most Yemenis feel about the fact that terrorists masquerading as Muslims would carry out such a heinous act during a time that is considered so holy, so sanctified – where peaceful relations are considered not only appropriate but compulsory – has gone irresponsibly underreported.

If we are forced by lazy journalism to make comparisons between the September 17th attack and 9/11, I would point out the following: After 9/11 most of the world’s Arab and Muslim communities stood in shocked and compassionate solidarity with the U.S. This is something that the White House squandered at best and exploited at worst. Once again, we are conveniently ignoring the fact that these actions devastate most Yemenis and in very real terms serve to harm Yemen more than the U.S.

Butters writes that Yemen “is awash in weapons, which are sold openly in gun souks.” Macleod adds that the entire population of 23 million people is “gun crazy.” It is true that Yemen is a highly armed country, but this is a result of a very complicated history whereby Yemen was armed by foreign governments – including the United States – during the revolution in 1962 and the civil war in 1994. Yemen, like many developing countries that are strategically located, has been abused by more powerful governments as a site for proxy wars. The current Yemeni government has by no means eradicated this problem, but has taken measures to stymie it. One such measure is that it is no longer legal to sell arms openly, as Butters reported. As someone who has wandered the souks of Sana’a – I have never seen an open, public gun market.

Weapons in the hands of murderers and terrorists are indeed a critical issue in today’s world. So, I present the following problem for us to ponder: Eric Lipton of the New York Times reported just days ago that the United States has “agreed so far this fiscal year to sell or transfer more than $32 billion in weapons and other military equipment to foreign governments.” $6 billion of that figure is slated to come from Saudi Arabia, $3 billion from Iraq and roughly $10 billion will be purchased by the U.S. on behalf of Afghanistan. So, my question is – who is “gun crazy”? Haven’t we learned from the fact that the Taliban was trained and armed by the U.S. when it suited their interests but when those same arms and training are used against us, we become perplexed? Don’t we have more “gun crazy” people in America than in other developed countries?

Indeed, it still remains terrifyingly easy to purchase firearms in the U.S., and our right to bear arms is protected by the Constitution. There are so many armed Americans unwilling to give up their guns that the 2nd amendment remains a hot-button election issue. And before you respond that American arms are not used to terrify – remember the school shootings at Virginia Tech and Columbine, the rampant gang violence plaguing our urban centers, or even events like the Oklahoma City bombing. If the rest of the world only had access to reporting about gun violence in the U.S., would they not consider the country to be extremely dangerous? But Americans know that they are more than the sum of their guns – don’t we need to extend the same awareness to other countries? What is the difference between the gun souk and the pawn shop?

I am by no stretch of the imagination writing an apology or an excuse for the deplorable attacks that took place last month. I am simply trying to attenuate the simplistic reporting that results in the stereotyping of an entire country as somehow pre-disposed to acts of violence at best and complicit in them at worst.

President Bush announced that he is disappointed in the Yemeni government for its inability to prevent the attack on the Embassy. What he failed to address is that the attacks were a direct response to many recent successes against Al Qaeda in Yemen. These successes were recognized and applauded by U.S. diplomats at the most recent security briefing, which I attended at the embassy just a few weeks ago.

It would be naïve to say that there are no anti-American elements in Yemen – it is tragically evident that there are. However, while it is true that the Yemeni government is often criticized for its failure to address Yemen’s needs, there are many local NGO’s and other organizations that are striving daily to address Yemen’s critical issues; these efforts, of course, don’t make the New York Times.

Naima Brown is an American woman living in Sana’a. She holds a Master’s Degree in Middle Eastern Studies from the University of Chicago.