Reading the Middle East in Bangkok
by Professor Barry Rubin
Bangkok
A fascinating way to try to improve one's own understanding of the Middle East is to try to explain the region to people from a totally different culture and history. I've done this in several far-flung places around the world but Thailand provides a particularly interesting example of the particularity and--in global terms--bizarre nature of the Middle East.
Of course, many people in Asia have the fewest preconceptions about the region because Hindus and Buddhists do not have the links to the Holy Land or what might even be called the Holy Region, a factor which so affects Christian, Jewish, and Muslim thinking.
While there are certainly some strategic interests in the area, they also tend to be less than in many other places. There are certainly economic links, notably the flow of tens of thousands of workers to the area and the dependence on energy from the region. On the former issue, many of the workers go to the Persian Gulf where low pay by local standards brings relatively large savings when brought back home. Even in Israel alone there are an estimated 30,000 Thai laborers. As for oil and natural gas, China's modernization effort, to cite one example, is largely dependent on Middle Eastern energy imports.
Then there is another Middle Eastern export: terrorism and radical Islamism. At first glance, it is surprising this has become a major problem in Thailand. But the country's Muslim population is 10 percent, mostly concentrated in the far south. To compound the issue, there is an ethnic distinction involved, as well. Ethnic Thais are about 70 percent of the population, while the Muslims are Malays, the same community as the one dominating neighboring Malaysia.
In recent years, Thailand has played unwilling host to what is probably the most mysterious Islamist terrorist movement in the world. There is no group, no apparent leadership, no demands, and no clear evidence of external support. Yet Buddhists in the south are being murdered on a regular basis in particularly gruesome ways, including workers at rubber plantations, peddlers bicycling down lonely roads, and students walking to school.
The death toll is already between 2000 and 2500 and the situation has gotten so bad that Buddhists are starting to leave the area, presumably one of the terrorists' main goals. There have been a few terrorist attacks even in Bangkok, the capital where 20 percent of the country's 68 million people live.
The army rules Thailand in a military junta and plans are just starting for a return to civilian rule. Yet this is by no means a repressive or militaristic system. Everything is done in the name of the king, who this year is celebrating both his eightieth birthday and his sixtieth year on the throne. This military wants to avoid any impression that it is "occupying" the south and so is going very cautiously in dealing with the problem. It is not yet considered to be a war but that time may come in time.
What are some of the characteristics of Thailand that makes it so difficult for its leaders and intellectuals to understand the Middle East? They are actually virtues, though some might open them up to suffering as a result. One is the clear sense of pragmatism that animates the country.
While the country has many problems and real poverty it has also made remarkable progress. Moreover, it has a good record of solving internal disputes and avoiding problems with neighbors. For Thais, it could not be more obvious that problems should be examined in practical, logical terms in order to find solutions without resort to fanaticism or ideology. How could people choose to flatten their own countries?
Several Asian countries have achieved outstanding successes in moving toward democracy and raising living standards by hard work and a willingness to make changes. In almost every positive category of social and economic statistics, Asia is ahead of the Middle East. To comprehend that pragmatism is rejected by most of the Middle East, in terms of governments and movements, intellectuals and institutions, simply does not seem to make sense to Asians.
Second, is an open-handed acceptance of Westernization, modernization, and globalization. Thais have long accepted the idea that they can learn a lot from the West and import ideas and cultural items without fear of destruction. Again, there are real problems--the most famous one being the sex industry--yet there is no one who doubts that this is the proper path.
One is left with the startling conclusion that the many of the biggest defenders of Western civilization today are found in Africa and Asia. These are people who having experienced or seen at close-hand war, poverty, and oppression believe they have found a way to achieve something better. Again, this is an approach far different from what is seen in the Middle East, much to the latter's detriment.
Third, alongside this Western-oriented approach is a strong sense regarding the security of their identity. Listening to classical music, reading Shakespeare, or wearing Western clothes do not make them frightened of ceasing to be Thai. The clearest example of this phenomenon is Japan, though South Korea, the Philippines, and even China are also case studies of the ability to mix one's own culture, system, or ideas with those of the West with great gain. This is quite different from the Arabic-speaking and Muslim-majority world.
On more than one occasion, Arab friends have told me about discussions they have had with people in China or Japan. One conversation went like this:
"Having been the victims of Western imperialism," a Chinese official was asked, "for so many years how do you feel about this?"
"We got over it and moved on with our lives," was the response. There is a lot of wisdom in the Asian approach on these matters. In some ways, they are very lucky that they don't understand the Middle East.
Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center , Interdisciplinary Center (IDC), editor of the Middle East Review of International Affairs, and author of the recently published The Truth About Syria (Palgrave-Macmillan).
Pertinent Links:
1) Reading the Middle East in Bangkok
Showing posts with label Prof. Barry Rubin. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Prof. Barry Rubin. Show all posts
Tuesday, August 7, 2007
Sunday, July 29, 2007
MUST READ: HARRY POTTER & THE PRISONER OF POLITICAL CORRECTNESS
HARRY POTTER AND THE PRISONER OF POLITICAL CORRECTNESS
News item: The Iranian establishment daily Kayhan, July 26, 2007, criticized officials there for allowing the sale of the new Harry Potter book, claiming the series is a Zionist project in order to disrupt the minds of young people.
From the text:
By Barry Rubin
Harry Potter was angry. He had been used to all the abuse and criticism, the danger and adventure, the fear that Lord Voldemort would return and turn the world into a living hell for wizard and Muggle alike. But why were people who should have defended their civilization pretending that nothing was happening or even becoming apologists for the other side?
There it was, the lead story in the Daily Prophet newspaper:
Certainly, the MSMM (Mainstream Magical Media), had long been blind to the return of Voldemort and his Death Eater movement. The Order of the Phoenix, the group formed to fight Voldemort, had a lot of blogs but the followers of You-Know-Who seemed to control all too many of the biggest institutions. Even on the Internet, Draco Malfoy had even developed one of the most popular blogs of all, “The Daily Draco” and some of the blander naïf’s from one of Hogwarts’ houses had created the “Hufflepuff Post.”
Harry just didn’t understand. How could anyone not see the terrible things going on around the world: the suicide bombing attacks; the organized incitement of hatred, the attempt by an extremist movement to take over and enslave millions of people? Why were they constantly attacking the victims and ridiculing those trying to expose these dangers, distorting their words and slandering their characters?
Even Hogwarts could no longer be counted on to fight the threat. The school had been taken over by teachers who brainwashed students into thinking that the Voldemort movement was all the fault of Dumbledore and others trying to fight it. The Death Eaters’ deeds were simply being exaggerated, said the professors. They had grievances, after all, and if only these were addressed and understood, there wouldn’t be any conflict. And hadn’t all wizards committed crimes in the past? Let him who was without sin cast the first spell. This was certainly the line taken by the Magical Events Studies Association, the organization of those who held such views, producing studies like, “Dementors: Legitimate Resistance As A Response to Oppression.”
Nothing could be taken for granted. No matter what the other side did there was always some excuse made to rationalize it. With Voldemort working to develop extreme new magical weapons and threatening to wipe the Muggles off the face of the earth, there were those who explained that his statements were being taken out of context. He was merely expressing the hope that they would come to see the error of their ways and peacefully commit suicide.
Moreover, despite Dumbledore’s efforts to block aid or negotiations with Voldemort, delegations were constantly traveling to his headquarters, posing with him in photo opportunities. He was really quite nice in person, visitors explained. And he really does want peace. After all, he said so and why would Lord Voldemort tell a lie?
But of course, as popular as the Harry Potter series has been it is still just a set of novels about a fantasy situation. Thank goodness nothing like this could happen in the real world.
Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center, Interdisciplinary Center (IDC), editor of the Middle East Review of International Affairs, and author of the recently published The Truth About Syria (Palgrave-Macmillan).
Pertinent Links:
1) HARRY POTTER AND THE PRISONER OF POLITICAL CORRECTNESS (Article received via e-mail, there is no link)
News item: The Iranian establishment daily Kayhan, July 26, 2007, criticized officials there for allowing the sale of the new Harry Potter book, claiming the series is a Zionist project in order to disrupt the minds of young people.
From the text:
“The main thing is to try and convince as many people as possible that You-Know-Who came back, Harry….[Minister of Magic Cornelius Fudge] is absolutely refusing to believe it’s happened.”
“But why?” said Harry desperately. “Why’s he being so stupid?”…
“Because accepting that Voldemort’s back would mean trouble….”
“It’s hard to convince people he’s back, especially as they really don’t want to believe it in the first place.”
--Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, pp. 93-94.
By Barry Rubin
Harry Potter was angry. He had been used to all the abuse and criticism, the danger and adventure, the fear that Lord Voldemort would return and turn the world into a living hell for wizard and Muggle alike. But why were people who should have defended their civilization pretending that nothing was happening or even becoming apologists for the other side?
There it was, the lead story in the Daily Prophet newspaper:
“Minister Fudge Urges Engagement; Accuses Harry Potter of
Voldemortphobia”
“What’s going on here,” Harry said angrily. “I personally saw Voldemort
gathering his followers but when I read the Daily Prophet it would seem there is
no real threat. And now they want to negotiate with Voldemort?”
“That’s not all,” Hermione explained. “The newspaper is trying to make
you sound deluded for exposing the truth.”
“Yes,” Ron added, ”and there are a lot of people now who favor giving
aid to Voldemort in order—they claim--to moderate him.”
Certainly, the MSMM (Mainstream Magical Media), had long been blind to the return of Voldemort and his Death Eater movement. The Order of the Phoenix, the group formed to fight Voldemort, had a lot of blogs but the followers of You-Know-Who seemed to control all too many of the biggest institutions. Even on the Internet, Draco Malfoy had even developed one of the most popular blogs of all, “The Daily Draco” and some of the blander naïf’s from one of Hogwarts’ houses had created the “Hufflepuff Post.”
Harry just didn’t understand. How could anyone not see the terrible things going on around the world: the suicide bombing attacks; the organized incitement of hatred, the attempt by an extremist movement to take over and enslave millions of people? Why were they constantly attacking the victims and ridiculing those trying to expose these dangers, distorting their words and slandering their characters?
Even Hogwarts could no longer be counted on to fight the threat. The school had been taken over by teachers who brainwashed students into thinking that the Voldemort movement was all the fault of Dumbledore and others trying to fight it. The Death Eaters’ deeds were simply being exaggerated, said the professors. They had grievances, after all, and if only these were addressed and understood, there wouldn’t be any conflict. And hadn’t all wizards committed crimes in the past? Let him who was without sin cast the first spell. This was certainly the line taken by the Magical Events Studies Association, the organization of those who held such views, producing studies like, “Dementors: Legitimate Resistance As A Response to Oppression.”
Nothing could be taken for granted. No matter what the other side did there was always some excuse made to rationalize it. With Voldemort working to develop extreme new magical weapons and threatening to wipe the Muggles off the face of the earth, there were those who explained that his statements were being taken out of context. He was merely expressing the hope that they would come to see the error of their ways and peacefully commit suicide.
Moreover, despite Dumbledore’s efforts to block aid or negotiations with Voldemort, delegations were constantly traveling to his headquarters, posing with him in photo opportunities. He was really quite nice in person, visitors explained. And he really does want peace. After all, he said so and why would Lord Voldemort tell a lie?
But of course, as popular as the Harry Potter series has been it is still just a set of novels about a fantasy situation. Thank goodness nothing like this could happen in the real world.
Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center
Pertinent Links:
1) HARRY POTTER AND THE PRISONER OF POLITICAL CORRECTNESS (Article received via e-mail, there is no link)
Saturday, July 28, 2007
MUST READ: TURKEY: THREAT OR TRIUMPH FOR DEMOCRACY?
Turkey: Threat or Triumph for Democracy?
Barry Rubin
Turks of every political position tell me the same story to explain their situation: to cook a live frog you don’t put it in a pot on a high flame. You put it in cool water and raise the temperature very slowly. This is what’s happening in Turkey.
International media coverage of the July 22 Turkish parliamentary election repeats endlessly that the victorious Justice and Development (AK) party is really moderate now. Despite Islamist roots, they say, it is now a centrist party mainly concerned with Turkey becoming a European Union (EU) member and having a prosperous economy.
Certainly, such is the image the party has projected for its five years in power. Precisely because half of Turkish voters were convinced that AK had no Islamist intentions they voted for it. The economy is doing well. Turkey might benefit from having a system more balanced regarding religion.
At the same time, though, there is nothing to rejoice about. Long-term prospects are disturbing. No one knows what will happen but to conclude that Turkey will prove the virtues of Islamists-gone-moderate is somewhere between premature and naive.
If the world is unaware of the danger, a bad-case scenario is far more likely. Let’s not exaggerate the problem but let’s not ignore it either.
Consider foreign policy. Is it an exaggeration to say that the AK government feels more comfortable with Islamic Iran than with the United States? Not really. If the key issue in the Middle East, perhaps the world, is the spread of radical Islamism, does the AK government want to see this movement defeated in Iraq, Lebanon, Egypt, or among the Palestinians? No.
Even if the AK government does not want to impose radical Islamism at home, it is certainly not the enemy of radical Islamism abroad. Once pro-Western, Turkey is now neutral at best. The U.S.-Turkish alliance, a mainstay since 1946, is dead. This does not mean the two countries are enemies. They still have good relations. The armed forces may still think the same way as it did in the past. But the two governments are not really allies any more.
Turks tend to attribute the problems to the Iraq war and to what they see as American indulgence of the PKK, the Kurdish terrorist group trying to seize southeastern Turkey. But this is only part of the problem. The real issue is that the two governments are on different sides regarding the most important struggle of our time.
An equally worrisome issue is the long-run trend. It might well be that AK falls due to a split, scandal, or economic downturn in a few years. At least part of the economy’s good situation is due to government manipulation. Extremely high interest rates pour out money to foreign investors. How long can this continue? Experts think that a crash is inevitable.
Yet what if AK stays in power for a long time? The combination of a large parliamentary majority and choosing Turkey’s next president give it tremendous powers. By naming the judges it can shape the country’s laws; by choosing the armed forces’ commander it can reverse the traditional bar on Islamic-oriented officers and neutralize the military’s ability to intervene. Filling the bureaucracy with its supporters will move policies and their implementation closer to an Islamist agenda.
In eastern and central Turkey, cities are moving toward the kind of Islamic forms of belief and behavior supported by political Islamists. A huge change--in Turkey as elsewhere among Muslims--is the introduction of what I call “competitive Islam.” Historically, in the pre-Islamist era, it was impermissible to criticize any professing Muslim. Now, however, there is always someone to say that any given level of observance is insufficient and must be raised. This approach has now spread to Turkey, bringing an escalation of what constitutes the norm.
Those who do not want to face the threat of radical Islam generally are eager to say that all is fine in Turkey, that the election was a victory for moderation and democracy, and that it is good to have a model of moderate Islamic-oriented politics governing that country. Again, one should not exaggerate what has happened there. But the victory of AK is not exactly something to be celebrated, even if it can be managed.
The first step is to admit that there are real dangers and monitor very carefully what the AK government does. Now that it has moved from the low 30 to the high 40 percent level of voter support, the party is being tempted to conclude it can do anything it wants. This is bad for all concerned, even AK itself whose success is based on caution.
To avoid the danger of AK going too far, to ensure it stay moderate whether or not it wishes to do so, the regime must continue to feel under pressure to stay in the center. This means the army’s power as guarantor of Turkish democracy continues; that the media is not intimidated; that courts remain independent. An erosion of these control mechanisms could bring disaster.
Few outsiders understand that one of AK’s sources of appeal--and ironically also a cause of anti-Western feelings among domestic critics--is its claim of enjoying support from the United States, Europe, and Israel. Willingness to work with Turkey’s government, even if it is an AK one, is not the same as wanting AK to be in power. Western institutions, media, and even governments should indicate in appropriate ways that the AK is not their client and be ready to criticize its policies or behavior.
Pertinent Links:
1) Turkey: Threat or Triumph for Democracy?
2) GLORIA
Barry Rubin
Turks of every political position tell me the same story to explain their situation: to cook a live frog you don’t put it in a pot on a high flame. You put it in cool water and raise the temperature very slowly. This is what’s happening in Turkey.
International media coverage of the July 22 Turkish parliamentary election repeats endlessly that the victorious Justice and Development (AK) party is really moderate now. Despite Islamist roots, they say, it is now a centrist party mainly concerned with Turkey becoming a European Union (EU) member and having a prosperous economy.
Certainly, such is the image the party has projected for its five years in power. Precisely because half of Turkish voters were convinced that AK had no Islamist intentions they voted for it. The economy is doing well. Turkey might benefit from having a system more balanced regarding religion.
At the same time, though, there is nothing to rejoice about. Long-term prospects are disturbing. No one knows what will happen but to conclude that Turkey will prove the virtues of Islamists-gone-moderate is somewhere between premature and naive.
If the world is unaware of the danger, a bad-case scenario is far more likely. Let’s not exaggerate the problem but let’s not ignore it either.
Consider foreign policy. Is it an exaggeration to say that the AK government feels more comfortable with Islamic Iran than with the United States? Not really. If the key issue in the Middle East, perhaps the world, is the spread of radical Islamism, does the AK government want to see this movement defeated in Iraq, Lebanon, Egypt, or among the Palestinians? No.
Even if the AK government does not want to impose radical Islamism at home, it is certainly not the enemy of radical Islamism abroad. Once pro-Western, Turkey is now neutral at best. The U.S.-Turkish alliance, a mainstay since 1946, is dead. This does not mean the two countries are enemies. They still have good relations. The armed forces may still think the same way as it did in the past. But the two governments are not really allies any more.
Turks tend to attribute the problems to the Iraq war and to what they see as American indulgence of the PKK, the Kurdish terrorist group trying to seize southeastern Turkey. But this is only part of the problem. The real issue is that the two governments are on different sides regarding the most important struggle of our time.
An equally worrisome issue is the long-run trend. It might well be that AK falls due to a split, scandal, or economic downturn in a few years. At least part of the economy’s good situation is due to government manipulation. Extremely high interest rates pour out money to foreign investors. How long can this continue? Experts think that a crash is inevitable.
Yet what if AK stays in power for a long time? The combination of a large parliamentary majority and choosing Turkey’s next president give it tremendous powers. By naming the judges it can shape the country’s laws; by choosing the armed forces’ commander it can reverse the traditional bar on Islamic-oriented officers and neutralize the military’s ability to intervene. Filling the bureaucracy with its supporters will move policies and their implementation closer to an Islamist agenda.
In eastern and central Turkey, cities are moving toward the kind of Islamic forms of belief and behavior supported by political Islamists. A huge change--in Turkey as elsewhere among Muslims--is the introduction of what I call “competitive Islam.” Historically, in the pre-Islamist era, it was impermissible to criticize any professing Muslim. Now, however, there is always someone to say that any given level of observance is insufficient and must be raised. This approach has now spread to Turkey, bringing an escalation of what constitutes the norm.
Those who do not want to face the threat of radical Islam generally are eager to say that all is fine in Turkey, that the election was a victory for moderation and democracy, and that it is good to have a model of moderate Islamic-oriented politics governing that country. Again, one should not exaggerate what has happened there. But the victory of AK is not exactly something to be celebrated, even if it can be managed.
The first step is to admit that there are real dangers and monitor very carefully what the AK government does. Now that it has moved from the low 30 to the high 40 percent level of voter support, the party is being tempted to conclude it can do anything it wants. This is bad for all concerned, even AK itself whose success is based on caution.
To avoid the danger of AK going too far, to ensure it stay moderate whether or not it wishes to do so, the regime must continue to feel under pressure to stay in the center. This means the army’s power as guarantor of Turkish democracy continues; that the media is not intimidated; that courts remain independent. An erosion of these control mechanisms could bring disaster.
Few outsiders understand that one of AK’s sources of appeal--and ironically also a cause of anti-Western feelings among domestic critics--is its claim of enjoying support from the United States, Europe, and Israel. Willingness to work with Turkey’s government, even if it is an AK one, is not the same as wanting AK to be in power. Western institutions, media, and even governments should indicate in appropriate ways that the AK is not their client and be ready to criticize its policies or behavior.
Pertinent Links:
1) Turkey: Threat or Triumph for Democracy?
2) GLORIA
MUST READ: THE LOS ANGELES TIMES & ITS NAIVETE OF BIAS
The Los Angeles Times And Its Naivete of Bias
By Barry Rubin
What is really amazing about something like this Los Angeles Times editorial (see below) is that those writing it don't have the least consciousness of the fact that in Arab and Palestinian media, books, politics, etc., there is not the slightest acknowledgement to anything Israelis and Jews say, feel, or have experienced is acknowledged in any way. In other words, they and others demand that Israel be completely balanced--and criticize anything that appears not to be--while not demanding anything of the other side. I might add that I am not opposed to a passage being put in Israeli textbooks saying that the Arabs consider the creation of Israel a disaster for themselves.
But for the Los Angeles Times, one might expect some minimal attempt at balance, even if only to protect those writing it from well-grounded accusations of bias or stupidity. Something along the lines of: And Palestinian textbooks and media should also be revised. Yet in this seven-paragraph-long editorial there is no mention of how the Arab world deals with Israel or Jews. And if one points out how ridiculously imbalanced what they are doing is, those parts of the media and Western intellectuals who say such things would either be startled or dismissive. Let's assume that Israel's coverage of the Arab/Palestinian world view is just barely passing. That would make the score 80 for Israel and 0 for its enemies.
But there is still more ignorance here. First, every Israeli knows about how the Palestinians view the situation. Palestinians, both leaders, and average people, are constantly quoted. The observance of Nakba Day, a recently created Palestinian commemoration mourning Israel's creation, is widely covered in the Israeli media. When a long series on Israeli history was televised about two years ago this point was included.
But the opposite does not apply. Any survey of the Palestinian media--and that includes the television and newspapers controlled by the Palestinian Authority--will rarely if ever find any examples of empathy or even honesty about Israel, its people, or its history. MEMRI, Palestinian Media Watch, and the U.S. government's Foreign Broadcast Information Service, can and have supplied huge numbers of examples of this situation.
While there is some debate over exactly what current Palestinian textbooks contain--whether they reject Israel's existence altogether--there is certainly nothing that says, for example, "The Zionists felt a strong connection with their ancient land and argued that reestablishing a state there was necessary for their people's survival and well-being." The book could then go on to explain why Palestinians rejected this idea. Palestinians and Arabs in general are taught by every source--sermons, government statements, textbooks, etc.--that Israel is evil and illegitimate. The great majority of the time, the few statements that contradict these claims are discouraged, censored, or punished.
In general in the Arab world, Israel and Israelis are presented as monstrous murderers. In the Israeli media--tv, radio, and the four main daily newspapers--the presentation of the Palestinians is not that much different from what appears in the American media. There is considerable sympathy for their plight coupled with exposure and scathing criticism of any action that Israel's government or army commits that is deemed illegal or immoral. Soldiers who kill or injure civilians are punished or put on trial. On the Palestinian side, no one has ever been punished for terrorist acts against Israeli civilians. (At most, they are convicted of staging attacks at the wrong time, and even these people are quickly and quietly released.)
How then can such nonsense appear in elite American newspapers, so totally one-sided, demanding perfection from Israel and nothing from the other side? Clearly this must be an example of a philosophical standpoint which is distorting the truth and greatly damaging--I am tempted to write here the words, possibly helping to destroy--the side of truth-seeking, democracy, and freedom in the world. The roots and effects of that world view, which applies nowadays to far more than Israel, need to be explored and combatted.
The Los Angeles Times, Two versions of history. July 26, 2007:
History is continually being revised. Although written first by the victors, over time the voices of the defeated and disregarded demand inclusion. China and Korea insist that Japan acknowledge wartime atrocities; Native Americans, that their 4,000-year history become a part of this country’s founding narrative; and women, that their deeds get equal scrutiny with those of men.
Whether most Palestinians fled their homes voluntarily or through coercion and force, and whether they have a right to return, will likely be argued until the end of time. But that thousands did flee and have spent subsequent decades living in refugee camps — the United Nations says that descendants have swelled the number of refugees to 4 million today — is not at issue. Why not teach that truth?
By amending history textbooks for Arab children, Israel has acknowledged the validity of the Nakba. And if it’s valid for Arabs, it should be valid for Jews as well.
Professor Barry Rubin,Director, Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) CenterEditor, Middle East Review of International Affairs (MERIA) JournalEditor, Turkish Studies
Pertinent Links:
1) The Los Angeles Times And Its Naivete of Bias (received in e-mail)
By Barry Rubin
What is really amazing about something like this Los Angeles Times editorial (see below) is that those writing it don't have the least consciousness of the fact that in Arab and Palestinian media, books, politics, etc., there is not the slightest acknowledgement to anything Israelis and Jews say, feel, or have experienced is acknowledged in any way. In other words, they and others demand that Israel be completely balanced--and criticize anything that appears not to be--while not demanding anything of the other side. I might add that I am not opposed to a passage being put in Israeli textbooks saying that the Arabs consider the creation of Israel a disaster for themselves.
But for the Los Angeles Times, one might expect some minimal attempt at balance, even if only to protect those writing it from well-grounded accusations of bias or stupidity. Something along the lines of: And Palestinian textbooks and media should also be revised. Yet in this seven-paragraph-long editorial there is no mention of how the Arab world deals with Israel or Jews. And if one points out how ridiculously imbalanced what they are doing is, those parts of the media and Western intellectuals who say such things would either be startled or dismissive. Let's assume that Israel's coverage of the Arab/Palestinian world view is just barely passing. That would make the score 80 for Israel and 0 for its enemies.
But there is still more ignorance here. First, every Israeli knows about how the Palestinians view the situation. Palestinians, both leaders, and average people, are constantly quoted. The observance of Nakba Day, a recently created Palestinian commemoration mourning Israel's creation, is widely covered in the Israeli media. When a long series on Israeli history was televised about two years ago this point was included.
But the opposite does not apply. Any survey of the Palestinian media--and that includes the television and newspapers controlled by the Palestinian Authority--will rarely if ever find any examples of empathy or even honesty about Israel, its people, or its history. MEMRI, Palestinian Media Watch, and the U.S. government's Foreign Broadcast Information Service, can and have supplied huge numbers of examples of this situation.
While there is some debate over exactly what current Palestinian textbooks contain--whether they reject Israel's existence altogether--there is certainly nothing that says, for example, "The Zionists felt a strong connection with their ancient land and argued that reestablishing a state there was necessary for their people's survival and well-being." The book could then go on to explain why Palestinians rejected this idea. Palestinians and Arabs in general are taught by every source--sermons, government statements, textbooks, etc.--that Israel is evil and illegitimate. The great majority of the time, the few statements that contradict these claims are discouraged, censored, or punished.
In general in the Arab world, Israel and Israelis are presented as monstrous murderers. In the Israeli media--tv, radio, and the four main daily newspapers--the presentation of the Palestinians is not that much different from what appears in the American media. There is considerable sympathy for their plight coupled with exposure and scathing criticism of any action that Israel's government or army commits that is deemed illegal or immoral. Soldiers who kill or injure civilians are punished or put on trial. On the Palestinian side, no one has ever been punished for terrorist acts against Israeli civilians. (At most, they are convicted of staging attacks at the wrong time, and even these people are quickly and quietly released.)
How then can such nonsense appear in elite American newspapers, so totally one-sided, demanding perfection from Israel and nothing from the other side? Clearly this must be an example of a philosophical standpoint which is distorting the truth and greatly damaging--I am tempted to write here the words, possibly helping to destroy--the side of truth-seeking, democracy, and freedom in the world. The roots and effects of that world view, which applies nowadays to far more than Israel, need to be explored and combatted.
The Los Angeles Times, Two versions of history. July 26, 2007:
History is continually being revised. Although written first by the victors, over time the voices of the defeated and disregarded demand inclusion. China and Korea insist that Japan acknowledge wartime atrocities; Native Americans, that their 4,000-year history become a part of this country’s founding narrative; and women, that their deeds get equal scrutiny with those of men.
Whether most Palestinians fled their homes voluntarily or through coercion and force, and whether they have a right to return, will likely be argued until the end of time. But that thousands did flee and have spent subsequent decades living in refugee camps — the United Nations says that descendants have swelled the number of refugees to 4 million today — is not at issue. Why not teach that truth?
By amending history textbooks for Arab children, Israel has acknowledged the validity of the Nakba. And if it’s valid for Arabs, it should be valid for Jews as well.
Professor Barry Rubin,Director, Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) CenterEditor, Middle East Review of International Affairs (MERIA) JournalEditor, Turkish Studies
Pertinent Links:
1) The Los Angeles Times And Its Naivete of Bias (received in e-mail)
Tuesday, July 24, 2007
MUST READ: TURKEY: NO ONE KNOWS WHAT WILL HAPPEN
Turkey: No One Knows What Will Happen
By Barry Rubin
Istanbul
Answer A: In political terms, the Justice and Development (AK) party which won 47 percent of the votes in Turkey’s July 22 elections and will have almost two-thirds of the parliament seats is a pragmatic, conservative, business-oriented moderate party despite its roots as an Islamic-oriented one.
Answer B: In societal terms, the Justice and Development (AK) party is probably transforming Turkey from a secular into a more Islamic society, with a big effect on the status of women, the situation of minorities, and Turkey’s foreign policy.
Both statements are true. And this is the point many observers are missing in the great change signaled by the election results.
The outcome was a surprise. Sure, everyone knew AK would win but hardly anyone thought it would get almost half the votes. Even the party’s leaders didn’t expect this to happen.
Part of the reason was the brilliance of the AK party’s leadership. They usually knew exactly how far to go so as not to alienate people. After all, only 7 to 12 percent of Turks want an Islamist state. The AK party convinced many others that it is not seeking such an outcome, successfully positioning itself as safely centrist.
I am not saying that this is all a con game. The party got rid of some of its hardliners and brought in a lot of non-Islamic conservatives and technocrats. It has gone slowly and carefully on making any changes regarding secularism while the economy has improved under its rule (though this probably would have happened any way). Among a lot of intellectuals, it has now become fashionable to embrace the party, ridiculing fears about its intentions.
A number of other factors played a role in the AK landslide:
--The incompetence of the opposition. The other parties did not unite, except for the two on the left, and carried out old-fashioned rather than mobilizing, grass roots’-oriented campaigns. The “left” nationalist CHP focused on western Turkey and did little in much of the country. The party was led by the much-reviled Denis Baykal who now insists he will not resign his post after the election defeat.
--The collapse of the traditional conservative or center-right parties. For many years the Motherland and True Path parties were big vote-getters. They have vanished leaving the AK party as their heir. It was their tradition-oriented but hardly Islamist voters who gave the AK its big support.
--The lack of any popular liberal, Western-style party. In parliament there are now three parties: the Islam-rooted AK, the “left” nationalist CHP, and the right-wing nationalist MHP. Given this line-up, AK voters are less anti-American and more pro-European Union membership than the so-called anti-Islamic parties.
Why, then, did this article open with an apparent contradiction. Is the AK party trying to make Turkey Islamist or not? Let’s be clear, first and foremost, Turks simply don’t know the answer to that question. There is lots of evidence that the AK is moderate and democratic, both in terms of its behavior and composition. The party’s leader, Tacip Erdogan, made a very conciliatory speech after the election, hitting all the right notes to calm any concerns Turks might have about his intentions.
Yet the fact remains that while Turks hope this is true they don’t know what the party will do if it stays in power for many years. In conversations with intellectuals who start out stressing their comfort with the AK victory, after a while some misgivings creep into their sentiments. About one-third of Turks say today that they wouldn’t mind seeing a military coup to throw out AK. That partly arises from anger at losing but it also results from real fear.
There will be two fairly quick tests of the party’s short-term intentions. First, will AK pick a presidential candidate from its own ranks--someone identified with an Islamic orientation at least in the past—or someone widely acceptable? If the former it will be a danger sign. Second, when the armed forces make their annual promotions, will the party object to the purging of pro-Islamic officers, something the army does every year?
Even ruling out any conspiratorial intent on the AK party’s part, there are three very important points to keep in mind:
--The party’s moderation has been ensured by its feeling outside pressure from voters, rival parties, the army, the economy, and the EU. Being cautious brings it votes, investment, progress on EU membership, more votes, and non-intervention by the army. Yet what if at some point the party gets more confident, even arrogant? Erdogan seems too smart for that but it could happen.
The EU’s negotiators, at least, find AK easy to deal with. After all, being less nationalist, it is more willing to make concessions over the Cyprus and other issues than its rivals. It is happy to go along with EU demands to weaken the political power of the army, which makes it harder for the military to intervene to protect Turkey’s secularism. And it is eager to meet the standards required for membership since success would solidify its popularity at home and give it a certificate of moderation.
Yet are countries like France and Germany going to be more eager to have in the EU a country where half the voters support a party that is so Islamic-oriented? No. Remember that the goal is not to advance the membership process but to attain membership. I have made up a joke that makes Turks laugh, in the form of a new blessing: “May you live long enough to see Turkey as an EU member,” in other words may you live a very long time.
--The social factor. This is extremely important and almost all foreign observers miss it. Suppose the AK party is a model democratic government. Nevertheless, what is the long-term effect of its success? Employees in government offices know that if your wife wears a headscarf you are more likely to get promoted. Businesspeople know that if you want a government contract it is better to be seen as a pious Muslim and party supporter.
And what about women? Polling shows that more women support AK than men. Nevertheless, this does not mean that the increasing numbers of women wearing headscarves are all enthusiastically pious Muslims. If you live in a neighborhood or city where more women are dressing “modestly” not to do so is to stand out, perhaps to be accused of being a prostitute. There are also a small but increasing number of women wearing chadors or even Afghan-style burqas. So the situation of women is likely to change steadily in eastern and central Turkey especially, even if AK passes no laws and launches no repression.
Or take education. It is arguably unfair that graduates of state-sanctioned Islamic high schools cannot take college entrance tests. These schools are supposedly meant to train prayer leaders but they have really emerged as a whole alternative system. Some say that these schools can be as good as secular schools; secularists charge they are inferior and train people to follow authority rather than to function as democratic individuals. If there is a change to raise their status, hundreds of thousands of students could enter this system, indoctrinating them into an Islamist-style approach.
--Foreign policy. In the context of advancing radical Islamist forces in the Middle East and even Europe, the AK victory is seen as another step forward toward inevitable victory. This is not good.
Feeling alone and surrounded by unfriendly countries is a common feature of Turkish nationalist thinking, especially in the army as well as in the two opposition parties. In this world view, The Arabs are uncivilized, the Iranians are crazy, the Israelis are aggressive, the Greeks are untrustworthy, the Russians are expansionists, the French support the Armenians, and the Americans support the Kurds. This attitude meshes in many ways with an Islamist one, though the latter of course are more positive about fellow Muslims.
An AK-led government may not form an alliance with Iran but it is also not going to join the United States in combating Iran’s ambitions. Even though the two countries enjoy normal, even good, relations, it is simply not realistic to consider Turkey under the present government as a U.S. ally.
As for Turkey-Israel relations, these should stay the same. The government wants to keep happy the army, which favors them. But there can be no doubt that the AK party government would prefer to have no relations with Israel at all.
Turkish Jews are obsessed with keeping a low profile. Some of the communities’ wealthiest members are trying or succeeding to do business with the government, though reportedly the regime discriminates against smaller Jewish-owned companies. Many in the community feel they have no future in Turkey. One Jewish woman broke down in tears over the election results. Another sighed, in a hyperbolic but heartfelt statement, that the vote’s result made her feel walking down the street that two-thirds of those she passed (the AK plus the MHP voters) hated her.
Of course, there are lots of possibilities. The AK party could split, there might be a scandal, the economy could decline and in a few years 47 percent of the voters could be backing an opposition party. Or AK could be in power for 20 years and transform Turkey.
Professor Barry Rubin,
Director, Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center
Editor, Middle East Review of International Affairs (MERIA) Journal
Editor, Turkish Studies
Article received via e-mail from Professor Rubin...
Link information will be updated as soon as possible...
Pertinent Links:
1) Turkey: No One Knows What Will Happen
By Barry Rubin
Istanbul
Answer A: In political terms, the Justice and Development (AK) party which won 47 percent of the votes in Turkey’s July 22 elections and will have almost two-thirds of the parliament seats is a pragmatic, conservative, business-oriented moderate party despite its roots as an Islamic-oriented one.
Answer B: In societal terms, the Justice and Development (AK) party is probably transforming Turkey from a secular into a more Islamic society, with a big effect on the status of women, the situation of minorities, and Turkey’s foreign policy.
Both statements are true. And this is the point many observers are missing in the great change signaled by the election results.
The outcome was a surprise. Sure, everyone knew AK would win but hardly anyone thought it would get almost half the votes. Even the party’s leaders didn’t expect this to happen.
Part of the reason was the brilliance of the AK party’s leadership. They usually knew exactly how far to go so as not to alienate people. After all, only 7 to 12 percent of Turks want an Islamist state. The AK party convinced many others that it is not seeking such an outcome, successfully positioning itself as safely centrist.
I am not saying that this is all a con game. The party got rid of some of its hardliners and brought in a lot of non-Islamic conservatives and technocrats. It has gone slowly and carefully on making any changes regarding secularism while the economy has improved under its rule (though this probably would have happened any way). Among a lot of intellectuals, it has now become fashionable to embrace the party, ridiculing fears about its intentions.
A number of other factors played a role in the AK landslide:
--The incompetence of the opposition. The other parties did not unite, except for the two on the left, and carried out old-fashioned rather than mobilizing, grass roots’-oriented campaigns. The “left” nationalist CHP focused on western Turkey and did little in much of the country. The party was led by the much-reviled Denis Baykal who now insists he will not resign his post after the election defeat.
--The collapse of the traditional conservative or center-right parties. For many years the Motherland and True Path parties were big vote-getters. They have vanished leaving the AK party as their heir. It was their tradition-oriented but hardly Islamist voters who gave the AK its big support.
--The lack of any popular liberal, Western-style party. In parliament there are now three parties: the Islam-rooted AK, the “left” nationalist CHP, and the right-wing nationalist MHP. Given this line-up, AK voters are less anti-American and more pro-European Union membership than the so-called anti-Islamic parties.
Why, then, did this article open with an apparent contradiction. Is the AK party trying to make Turkey Islamist or not? Let’s be clear, first and foremost, Turks simply don’t know the answer to that question. There is lots of evidence that the AK is moderate and democratic, both in terms of its behavior and composition. The party’s leader, Tacip Erdogan, made a very conciliatory speech after the election, hitting all the right notes to calm any concerns Turks might have about his intentions.
Yet the fact remains that while Turks hope this is true they don’t know what the party will do if it stays in power for many years. In conversations with intellectuals who start out stressing their comfort with the AK victory, after a while some misgivings creep into their sentiments. About one-third of Turks say today that they wouldn’t mind seeing a military coup to throw out AK. That partly arises from anger at losing but it also results from real fear.
There will be two fairly quick tests of the party’s short-term intentions. First, will AK pick a presidential candidate from its own ranks--someone identified with an Islamic orientation at least in the past—or someone widely acceptable? If the former it will be a danger sign. Second, when the armed forces make their annual promotions, will the party object to the purging of pro-Islamic officers, something the army does every year?
Even ruling out any conspiratorial intent on the AK party’s part, there are three very important points to keep in mind:
--The party’s moderation has been ensured by its feeling outside pressure from voters, rival parties, the army, the economy, and the EU. Being cautious brings it votes, investment, progress on EU membership, more votes, and non-intervention by the army. Yet what if at some point the party gets more confident, even arrogant? Erdogan seems too smart for that but it could happen.
The EU’s negotiators, at least, find AK easy to deal with. After all, being less nationalist, it is more willing to make concessions over the Cyprus and other issues than its rivals. It is happy to go along with EU demands to weaken the political power of the army, which makes it harder for the military to intervene to protect Turkey’s secularism. And it is eager to meet the standards required for membership since success would solidify its popularity at home and give it a certificate of moderation.
Yet are countries like France and Germany going to be more eager to have in the EU a country where half the voters support a party that is so Islamic-oriented? No. Remember that the goal is not to advance the membership process but to attain membership. I have made up a joke that makes Turks laugh, in the form of a new blessing: “May you live long enough to see Turkey as an EU member,” in other words may you live a very long time.
--The social factor. This is extremely important and almost all foreign observers miss it. Suppose the AK party is a model democratic government. Nevertheless, what is the long-term effect of its success? Employees in government offices know that if your wife wears a headscarf you are more likely to get promoted. Businesspeople know that if you want a government contract it is better to be seen as a pious Muslim and party supporter.
And what about women? Polling shows that more women support AK than men. Nevertheless, this does not mean that the increasing numbers of women wearing headscarves are all enthusiastically pious Muslims. If you live in a neighborhood or city where more women are dressing “modestly” not to do so is to stand out, perhaps to be accused of being a prostitute. There are also a small but increasing number of women wearing chadors or even Afghan-style burqas. So the situation of women is likely to change steadily in eastern and central Turkey especially, even if AK passes no laws and launches no repression.
Or take education. It is arguably unfair that graduates of state-sanctioned Islamic high schools cannot take college entrance tests. These schools are supposedly meant to train prayer leaders but they have really emerged as a whole alternative system. Some say that these schools can be as good as secular schools; secularists charge they are inferior and train people to follow authority rather than to function as democratic individuals. If there is a change to raise their status, hundreds of thousands of students could enter this system, indoctrinating them into an Islamist-style approach.
--Foreign policy. In the context of advancing radical Islamist forces in the Middle East and even Europe, the AK victory is seen as another step forward toward inevitable victory. This is not good.
Feeling alone and surrounded by unfriendly countries is a common feature of Turkish nationalist thinking, especially in the army as well as in the two opposition parties. In this world view, The Arabs are uncivilized, the Iranians are crazy, the Israelis are aggressive, the Greeks are untrustworthy, the Russians are expansionists, the French support the Armenians, and the Americans support the Kurds. This attitude meshes in many ways with an Islamist one, though the latter of course are more positive about fellow Muslims.
An AK-led government may not form an alliance with Iran but it is also not going to join the United States in combating Iran’s ambitions. Even though the two countries enjoy normal, even good, relations, it is simply not realistic to consider Turkey under the present government as a U.S. ally.
As for Turkey-Israel relations, these should stay the same. The government wants to keep happy the army, which favors them. But there can be no doubt that the AK party government would prefer to have no relations with Israel at all.
Turkish Jews are obsessed with keeping a low profile. Some of the communities’ wealthiest members are trying or succeeding to do business with the government, though reportedly the regime discriminates against smaller Jewish-owned companies. Many in the community feel they have no future in Turkey. One Jewish woman broke down in tears over the election results. Another sighed, in a hyperbolic but heartfelt statement, that the vote’s result made her feel walking down the street that two-thirds of those she passed (the AK plus the MHP voters) hated her.
Of course, there are lots of possibilities. The AK party could split, there might be a scandal, the economy could decline and in a few years 47 percent of the voters could be backing an opposition party. Or AK could be in power for 20 years and transform Turkey.
Professor Barry Rubin,
Director, Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center
Editor, Middle East Review of International Affairs (MERIA) Journal
Editor, Turkish Studies
Article received via e-mail from Professor Rubin...
Link information will be updated as soon as possible...
Pertinent Links:
1) Turkey: No One Knows What Will Happen
MUST READ: INFLUENCE OF IRAN ON PALESTINE, LEBANON AND IRAQ
Influence Of Iran On Palestine, Lebanon and Iraq
By Barry Rubin
As American diplomats hold their first high-level meeting with Iranian counterparts for many years, U.S. policymakers need to be reminded of a very simple but incredibly important point. Namely: What do all the current threats facing the Middle East--the Hamas takeover in the Gaza Strip, Hizballah’s bid for power in Lebanon, political turmoil in Iraq, and imminent nuclear weapons in the hands of a radical dictatorship--all have in common? Answer: Iran.
Obviously, of course, these issues all have their local causes. But they are also linked by Tehran’s drive for regional hegemony. Iran’s strategy has basically been in place since the 1979 Islamist revolution but it has only recently begun to pay off. The often-stated goal of the revolution was to turn Iran into a utopian Islamist society and then to spread this revolution throughout the Middle East and the Islamic world in general.
While all Iranian leaders voice basic support for this program, the country has often been cautious in pursuing it, especially given the long war with Iran in the 1980s and the possibility of Western opposition. But now a number of events have given the regime renewed confidence and the extreme line taken by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has also produced more daring, and thus both dangerous and bloody, behavior.
Iran tries to extend its influence in three ways: propaganda and incitement; the promotion of client groups, and projecting the state’s own power. Today, Iran sponsors radical Islamist groups in Afghanistan, Iraq, Lebanon, and among the Palestinians as well as in other countries.
Its two most important clients are Hizballah in Lebanon and the Palestinian Hamas group.
This is not to suggest that these organizations are totally controlled by Tehran and have their every move dictated by it. Nevertheless, Iran does largely finance these groups, provides weapons and training, encourages them to launch attacks, and shapes their ideology. Without Iran’s backing they would be much weaker.
The evidence indicates that Iran has been urging them to be more aggressive and to launch terrorist attacks and more general offensives.
Take Lebanon, for example. Hizballah, the large Shia Muslim group, closely follows Iran’s line. In 2006 it launched attacks on Israel which led to a major war, steps it would never dared have taken unless Hizballah’s leadership knew that Iran wanted such actions. Indeed, the head of Hamas, Muhammad Nasrallah, is the official representative in Lebanon of the Iran’s “spiritual guide,” its most powerful official.
Since the end of the summer 2006 war, Hizballah’s emphasis has been to seek control over Lebanon, though it has simultaneously rebuilt its military power. On a number of occasions, Iran has been caught smuggling arms to Hizballah, through both Syria and Turkey. Iranian Revolutionary Guards act as military advisors to Hizballah. Opponents of an Iranian-Syrian takeover in Lebanon, both politicians and journalists, have been systematically murdered in terrorist attacks. Clearly, as many Lebanese have noted, Iran is seeking to turn Lebanon into a satellite state.
The same tactics are employed with the Palestinians. Hamas and the even more extremist Islamic Jihad follow Iran’s line. Tehran has publicly urged these organizations to carry out terrorist attacks and provides them with examples of openly antisemitic rhetoric duplicated in their propaganda.
In June, there was a turning point in Palestinian history. Hamas seized control of the Gaza Strip, expelled its nationalist Fatah rivals, killed many people because of their political views or activities, and made clear its intention of transforming the Gaza Strip into an Islamist state on the basic model of Iran. Many Palestinians and other Arabs publicly stated their fear and resentment at the idea that Hamas represented an Iranian effort to seize control of their land and cause.
These include two of the Arab world’s top journalists. Tariq al-Humayd, editor of Al-Sharq Al-Awsat wrote, "The source of the funds is obviously Iran. Today, no one has control over Hamas...except Iran, its economic patron, and Syria,” Iran’s ally and the place where Hamas has its headquarters. Ahmad Al-Jarallah, editor of Kuwait’s Al-Siyassa, noted: "By means of Hamas's takeover in Gaza, the Iran-Syria axis has managed…to sabotage the Israeli-Palestinian peace” and become the main arbiter of regional politics.
But this is only the beginning. On the horizon looms Iran’s nuclear arsenal. If Tehran gets weapons of mass destruction it will rally far larger numbers of radical and terrorist forces in attacking the West and more moderate Arabs as well as Israel. If Iran gets the upper hand it will block any chance for peace and push the region into decades more of bloodshed.
This is why the details of events in Iraq, Lebanon, and among the Palestinians do not detract from but indeed reinforces the need to contain Iran and especially to ensure that it does not obtain nuclear weapons.
Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center http://gloria.idc.ac.il, Interdisciplinary Center (IDC), editor of the Middle East Review of International Affairs http://meria.idc.ac.il> and author of the recently published The Truth About Syria (Palgrave-Macmillan).
Professor Rubin e-mailed the text of the article directly to me, American Infidel.
By Barry Rubin
As American diplomats hold their first high-level meeting with Iranian counterparts for many years, U.S. policymakers need to be reminded of a very simple but incredibly important point. Namely: What do all the current threats facing the Middle East--the Hamas takeover in the Gaza Strip, Hizballah’s bid for power in Lebanon, political turmoil in Iraq, and imminent nuclear weapons in the hands of a radical dictatorship--all have in common? Answer: Iran.
Obviously, of course, these issues all have their local causes. But they are also linked by Tehran’s drive for regional hegemony. Iran’s strategy has basically been in place since the 1979 Islamist revolution but it has only recently begun to pay off. The often-stated goal of the revolution was to turn Iran into a utopian Islamist society and then to spread this revolution throughout the Middle East and the Islamic world in general.
While all Iranian leaders voice basic support for this program, the country has often been cautious in pursuing it, especially given the long war with Iran in the 1980s and the possibility of Western opposition. But now a number of events have given the regime renewed confidence and the extreme line taken by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has also produced more daring, and thus both dangerous and bloody, behavior.
Iran tries to extend its influence in three ways: propaganda and incitement; the promotion of client groups, and projecting the state’s own power. Today, Iran sponsors radical Islamist groups in Afghanistan, Iraq, Lebanon, and among the Palestinians as well as in other countries.
Its two most important clients are Hizballah in Lebanon and the Palestinian Hamas group.
This is not to suggest that these organizations are totally controlled by Tehran and have their every move dictated by it. Nevertheless, Iran does largely finance these groups, provides weapons and training, encourages them to launch attacks, and shapes their ideology. Without Iran’s backing they would be much weaker.
The evidence indicates that Iran has been urging them to be more aggressive and to launch terrorist attacks and more general offensives.
Take Lebanon, for example. Hizballah, the large Shia Muslim group, closely follows Iran’s line. In 2006 it launched attacks on Israel which led to a major war, steps it would never dared have taken unless Hizballah’s leadership knew that Iran wanted such actions. Indeed, the head of Hamas, Muhammad Nasrallah, is the official representative in Lebanon of the Iran’s “spiritual guide,” its most powerful official.
Since the end of the summer 2006 war, Hizballah’s emphasis has been to seek control over Lebanon, though it has simultaneously rebuilt its military power. On a number of occasions, Iran has been caught smuggling arms to Hizballah, through both Syria and Turkey. Iranian Revolutionary Guards act as military advisors to Hizballah. Opponents of an Iranian-Syrian takeover in Lebanon, both politicians and journalists, have been systematically murdered in terrorist attacks. Clearly, as many Lebanese have noted, Iran is seeking to turn Lebanon into a satellite state.
The same tactics are employed with the Palestinians. Hamas and the even more extremist Islamic Jihad follow Iran’s line. Tehran has publicly urged these organizations to carry out terrorist attacks and provides them with examples of openly antisemitic rhetoric duplicated in their propaganda.
In June, there was a turning point in Palestinian history. Hamas seized control of the Gaza Strip, expelled its nationalist Fatah rivals, killed many people because of their political views or activities, and made clear its intention of transforming the Gaza Strip into an Islamist state on the basic model of Iran. Many Palestinians and other Arabs publicly stated their fear and resentment at the idea that Hamas represented an Iranian effort to seize control of their land and cause.
These include two of the Arab world’s top journalists. Tariq al-Humayd, editor of Al-Sharq Al-Awsat wrote, "The source of the funds is obviously Iran. Today, no one has control over Hamas...except Iran, its economic patron, and Syria,” Iran’s ally and the place where Hamas has its headquarters. Ahmad Al-Jarallah, editor of Kuwait’s Al-Siyassa, noted: "By means of Hamas's takeover in Gaza, the Iran-Syria axis has managed…to sabotage the Israeli-Palestinian peace” and become the main arbiter of regional politics.
But this is only the beginning. On the horizon looms Iran’s nuclear arsenal. If Tehran gets weapons of mass destruction it will rally far larger numbers of radical and terrorist forces in attacking the West and more moderate Arabs as well as Israel. If Iran gets the upper hand it will block any chance for peace and push the region into decades more of bloodshed.
This is why the details of events in Iraq, Lebanon, and among the Palestinians do not detract from but indeed reinforces the need to contain Iran and especially to ensure that it does not obtain nuclear weapons.
Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center http://gloria.idc.ac.il, Interdisciplinary Center (IDC), editor of the Middle East Review of International Affairs http://meria.idc.ac.il> and author of the recently published The Truth About Syria (Palgrave-Macmillan).
Professor Rubin e-mailed the text of the article directly to me, American Infidel.
Wednesday, July 18, 2007
MUST READ: THE TALE OF FOUR OP-EDS
A Tale Of Four Op-Eds
Prof. Barry Rubin
July 17, 2007
" The Communists disdain to conceal their views and aims," proclaimed the Communist Manifesto a century and a half ago. “They openly declare that their ends can be attained only by the forcible overthrow of all existing social conditions.” But this was before the age of public relations. Here is how it’s done today.
Recently, the three main city-based newspapers in America ran op-eds by Hamas leaders. First, the exact same article by Ahmed Yousef, an advisor to the man who had headed the Palestinian Authority, appeared the same day, June 27, in the Washington Post and New York Times.
This is an extremely unusual development and it turned out, according to Washington Post editors, that Hamas’s public relations’ agent had fooled them by not informing either newspaper that the other was publishing. It was not the last time that Hamas would fool them.
The idea of the op-ed article is to let an individual or group express its opinion directly, without the mediation of the newspaper’s reporters or editors. In this sense, the Yousef pieces were not op-eds and should not have been published. The reason is that they had nothing whatsoever to do with the thoughts or actions of Hamas. They were, rather, merely free advertising copy.
Hamas is a radical Islamist group which seeks the extinction of the state of Israel through terrorist means. It is the Palestinian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood, a point we will return to later. Hamas is very anti-Western and anti-American. The group uses antisemitic imagery, encourages children to become suicide bombers, seeks an Islamist state roughly along the lines of those in Iran or in Afghanistan under the Taliban, and says or does other things that do not fit with Western democracy.
One would never guess any of these things, however, from the June 27 op-eds. They seemed to have been written by a public relations’ agency and one can doubt that anyone in the Hamas leadership even read them, much less agreed with them. Since these articles are completely disinformation, they do not reflect Hamas’s doctrines, policy, or strategy. As a result, they are worthless for anything other than mobilizing support for the group and disguising its nature. This is not the purpose of op-ed articles.
What Yousef wrote was a remarkable example of--well, one cannot find a better word than the strangely fitting “chutzpah” to describe it. He asked for U.S. support for Hamas, without any change in Hamas’s program or acknowledgement of past error, of course. Hamas was presented as an example of American-style democracy at work. The Hamas coup against its Fatah coalition partners is presented as necessary to save Gaza from the “horrific” civil war which Hamas itself helped set off. Hamas is portrayed as the victim of Fatah terrorism, not mentioning of course Hamas’s own acts of violence. Fatah is presented as an American and Israeli puppet group acting against the Palestinians’ “thirst for political freedom.” One can only wait with bated breath the future free elections Hamas will hold.
Yousef then raises a new theme which we will hear more of later: Hamas is the moderate, al-Qaida are the radicals1. This theme is already being parroted in the American media, as in the Los Angeles Times story from Gaza of July 13: “Hamas says it disavows Islamic radicalism but faces tension between its religious hard-liners and pragmatists who want to convince the West that it is not a political mask for jihad2.”
But Yousef’s clear intention is to appeal to Americans by suggestion that al-Qaida kills Westerners while Hamas only murders Israelis. He states:
“I defy [Hamas’s critics] to demonstrate one instance in which Hamas's military structure has struck against any force outside the theatre of the occupation. The struggle has always been against the Israeli agenda of ethnic cleansing and conquest. Hamas is a movement of Palestinian liberation and nationalism -- Islamist, yes, but in the sea of contending faiths that is the homeland, where is the sin in loving one's creed?”
This paragraph is worth serious analysis. First, of course, it signals subtly (though no innocent observer will notice) that Israelis can be killed anywhere since for Hamas all of Israel is the “theatre of the occupation.” Second, he certainly cannot mention Israel’s prior withdrawal from the Gaza Strip and plan to pull out of most of the West Bank--not to mention Israel’s peace offer at the 2000 Camp David summit--because they belie his claims. Third, he claims for Hamas the leadership of Palestinian nationalism, thus stealing Fatah’s clothes. And finally, he equates being an Islamist--demanding a state totally ruled by the rulers’ interpretation of Islam--as equivalent to loving one’s religion. Hamas is reinvented as Southern Baptists.
What is most interesting of all, though, is the idea that Hamas only attacks Israel and thus has nothing against the United States. This is deliberately misleading. As noted above, Hamas is the Palestinian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood. The Hamas slogan in this regard has been that it is the job of Hamas to eliminate Israel and the job of its allied Muslim Brotherhoods elsewhere to overthrow the existing regimes and replace them with anti-American Islamist ones. In Lebanon, a special case, Hamas supports Hizballah. Thus, the disinterest in attacking other targets is not due to moderation or potential friendship but merely a division of labor. Hamas has a big enough job without taking on other assignments. And even given all this, Farfur--the Hamas version of Mickey Mouse--told the kiddies on Hamas television that the group’s ultimate goal was a world ruled by Islam3.
Then, even in the context of his argument so far, Yousef comes up with a whopper which I am willing to wager would only provoke mirth among Hamas leaders: “Palestinians want, on their terms, the same thing Western societies want: self-determination, modernity, access to markets and their own economic power, and freedom for civil society to evolve.”
Well, no, Hamas wants total victory, Israel’s destruction, and an Islamist state. Unless it gets that outcome it is willing to sacrifice self-determination (rejecting a two-state solution, or at least defining self-determination only in terms of getting everything), modernity (does Hamas want a `modern’ Western-style society or even a modern Jordanian or Egyptian-style one? No), economic progress (it is willing to see Gaza flattened in pursuit of its endless armed struggle), and freedom (any freedom outside of Islamic norms will be squashed). This is merely trying to appeal to Westerners at one of their most gullible weak points: Hey! We’re just like you. We want our children to be happy (then why teach them that being a suicide bomber is the highest of all callings?) and to be prosperous. As President George Bush said, “We all want the same things.”
Everything is blamed on the United States, of course, and its embargo against the Hamas regime. But of course Yousef cannot confront the real issue: even if Hamas had given the most hypocritical lip-service to recognizing Israel in principle as part of an eventual peace agreement, the embargo would have fallen within days. Hamas could easily have ended the pressure, even with the sort of wink-nod, English-only statements that Yasir Arafat did for the PLO. Hamas did not want to do this because its advantage was its intransigence. And its intransigence is what it is paying public relations’ people to conceal, with the help of the Washington Post and New York Times.
...
Barry Rubin is Director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center, Interdisciplinary Center university. His latest book, The Truth about Syria was published by Palgrave-Macmillan in May 2007.
Pertinent Links:
1) The Tale of Four Op-Eds
2) Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center
Prof. Barry Rubin
July 17, 2007
" The Communists disdain to conceal their views and aims," proclaimed the Communist Manifesto a century and a half ago. “They openly declare that their ends can be attained only by the forcible overthrow of all existing social conditions.” But this was before the age of public relations. Here is how it’s done today.
Recently, the three main city-based newspapers in America ran op-eds by Hamas leaders. First, the exact same article by Ahmed Yousef, an advisor to the man who had headed the Palestinian Authority, appeared the same day, June 27, in the Washington Post and New York Times.
This is an extremely unusual development and it turned out, according to Washington Post editors, that Hamas’s public relations’ agent had fooled them by not informing either newspaper that the other was publishing. It was not the last time that Hamas would fool them.
The idea of the op-ed article is to let an individual or group express its opinion directly, without the mediation of the newspaper’s reporters or editors. In this sense, the Yousef pieces were not op-eds and should not have been published. The reason is that they had nothing whatsoever to do with the thoughts or actions of Hamas. They were, rather, merely free advertising copy.
Hamas is a radical Islamist group which seeks the extinction of the state of Israel through terrorist means. It is the Palestinian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood, a point we will return to later. Hamas is very anti-Western and anti-American. The group uses antisemitic imagery, encourages children to become suicide bombers, seeks an Islamist state roughly along the lines of those in Iran or in Afghanistan under the Taliban, and says or does other things that do not fit with Western democracy.
One would never guess any of these things, however, from the June 27 op-eds. They seemed to have been written by a public relations’ agency and one can doubt that anyone in the Hamas leadership even read them, much less agreed with them. Since these articles are completely disinformation, they do not reflect Hamas’s doctrines, policy, or strategy. As a result, they are worthless for anything other than mobilizing support for the group and disguising its nature. This is not the purpose of op-ed articles.
What Yousef wrote was a remarkable example of--well, one cannot find a better word than the strangely fitting “chutzpah” to describe it. He asked for U.S. support for Hamas, without any change in Hamas’s program or acknowledgement of past error, of course. Hamas was presented as an example of American-style democracy at work. The Hamas coup against its Fatah coalition partners is presented as necessary to save Gaza from the “horrific” civil war which Hamas itself helped set off. Hamas is portrayed as the victim of Fatah terrorism, not mentioning of course Hamas’s own acts of violence. Fatah is presented as an American and Israeli puppet group acting against the Palestinians’ “thirst for political freedom.” One can only wait with bated breath the future free elections Hamas will hold.
Yousef then raises a new theme which we will hear more of later: Hamas is the moderate, al-Qaida are the radicals1. This theme is already being parroted in the American media, as in the Los Angeles Times story from Gaza of July 13: “Hamas says it disavows Islamic radicalism but faces tension between its religious hard-liners and pragmatists who want to convince the West that it is not a political mask for jihad2.”
But Yousef’s clear intention is to appeal to Americans by suggestion that al-Qaida kills Westerners while Hamas only murders Israelis. He states:
“I defy [Hamas’s critics] to demonstrate one instance in which Hamas's military structure has struck against any force outside the theatre of the occupation. The struggle has always been against the Israeli agenda of ethnic cleansing and conquest. Hamas is a movement of Palestinian liberation and nationalism -- Islamist, yes, but in the sea of contending faiths that is the homeland, where is the sin in loving one's creed?”
This paragraph is worth serious analysis. First, of course, it signals subtly (though no innocent observer will notice) that Israelis can be killed anywhere since for Hamas all of Israel is the “theatre of the occupation.” Second, he certainly cannot mention Israel’s prior withdrawal from the Gaza Strip and plan to pull out of most of the West Bank--not to mention Israel’s peace offer at the 2000 Camp David summit--because they belie his claims. Third, he claims for Hamas the leadership of Palestinian nationalism, thus stealing Fatah’s clothes. And finally, he equates being an Islamist--demanding a state totally ruled by the rulers’ interpretation of Islam--as equivalent to loving one’s religion. Hamas is reinvented as Southern Baptists.
What is most interesting of all, though, is the idea that Hamas only attacks Israel and thus has nothing against the United States. This is deliberately misleading. As noted above, Hamas is the Palestinian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood. The Hamas slogan in this regard has been that it is the job of Hamas to eliminate Israel and the job of its allied Muslim Brotherhoods elsewhere to overthrow the existing regimes and replace them with anti-American Islamist ones. In Lebanon, a special case, Hamas supports Hizballah. Thus, the disinterest in attacking other targets is not due to moderation or potential friendship but merely a division of labor. Hamas has a big enough job without taking on other assignments. And even given all this, Farfur--the Hamas version of Mickey Mouse--told the kiddies on Hamas television that the group’s ultimate goal was a world ruled by Islam3.
Then, even in the context of his argument so far, Yousef comes up with a whopper which I am willing to wager would only provoke mirth among Hamas leaders: “Palestinians want, on their terms, the same thing Western societies want: self-determination, modernity, access to markets and their own economic power, and freedom for civil society to evolve.”
Well, no, Hamas wants total victory, Israel’s destruction, and an Islamist state. Unless it gets that outcome it is willing to sacrifice self-determination (rejecting a two-state solution, or at least defining self-determination only in terms of getting everything), modernity (does Hamas want a `modern’ Western-style society or even a modern Jordanian or Egyptian-style one? No), economic progress (it is willing to see Gaza flattened in pursuit of its endless armed struggle), and freedom (any freedom outside of Islamic norms will be squashed). This is merely trying to appeal to Westerners at one of their most gullible weak points: Hey! We’re just like you. We want our children to be happy (then why teach them that being a suicide bomber is the highest of all callings?) and to be prosperous. As President George Bush said, “We all want the same things.”
Everything is blamed on the United States, of course, and its embargo against the Hamas regime. But of course Yousef cannot confront the real issue: even if Hamas had given the most hypocritical lip-service to recognizing Israel in principle as part of an eventual peace agreement, the embargo would have fallen within days. Hamas could easily have ended the pressure, even with the sort of wink-nod, English-only statements that Yasir Arafat did for the PLO. Hamas did not want to do this because its advantage was its intransigence. And its intransigence is what it is paying public relations’ people to conceal, with the help of the Washington Post and New York Times.
...
Barry Rubin is Director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center, Interdisciplinary Center university. His latest book, The Truth about Syria was published by Palgrave-Macmillan in May 2007.
Pertinent Links:
1) The Tale of Four Op-Eds
2) Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center
Tuesday, July 17, 2007
MUST READ: FLANAGAN METHOD: WEST'S POLICY TOWARDS MIDDLE EAST
Flanagan Method: West's Policy Towards Middle East
Prof. Barry Rubin
Father Edward Flanagan was a great man. In 1917 he founded Boys Town, now Boys and Girls Town, in Nebraska as an orphanage combining revolutionary and traditional approaches to help orphans who had never before known kind treatment. Flanagan was an innovative educator but he never meant his methods to be used in Middle East politics or international affairs.
Through no fault of his own, the Flanagan Method has, however, become the backbone of contemporary Western Middle East policy toward radical nationalists and Islamists. “There are no bad boys,” was Flanagan’s most famous statement. “There is only bad environment, bad training, bad example, bad thinking.” If, he argued, his orphans were only treated properly they could be saved. Or, in Flanagan’s own words, “There is nothing the matter with our growing boys that love, proper training and guidance will not remedy.”
Take Hamas, for example. Much of the media coverage, for example an article in the Los Angeles Times, July 13, tries desperately to find some way to avoid concluding that Hamas is fanatical, genocidal, terrorist, and ruthlessly repressive. If only it is given a chance and treated properly, the argument goes, it will become moderate. The Los Angeles Times article portrays Hamas as walking “an ideological tightrope” between its “pragmatists” and “hardliners.” Wow, I sure hope the pragmatists win.
If there is a villain, we are told it is the smaller Islamic Jihad, Army of Islam, al-Qaida or others “seeking to capitalize on the unrest between Palestinian political parties and turn Gaza into a radical Islamic state.” Hamas’s own goal is now attributed instead to marginal third parties who are supposedly using the Fatah-Hamas conflict for this purpose. It is bad enough to cope with the concept that Fatah are the good guys and Hamas the bad ones. Now this is being taken one step further, with Hamas as the moderates trying to hold off the real radical Islamists. To many in the West, a radical is simply a moderate they have not yet explained things to, or who perhaps have not yet tasted the supposedly inevitable moderating influence of being in power or the educational effect of receiving Western financial aid.
According to this view, it is not Hamas that is the source of religious extremism but various troublemakers who “have found cover” under Hamas’s banner. This neglects the fact that Hamas’s banner is hoisted over a charter which is perhaps the most explicitly antisemitic doctrine since the fall of Berlin in 1945 and its political progress is built on the bodies of those it has slain in numerous acts of terrorism.
“I have yet to find a single boy who wants to be bad,” said Flanagan, and it is a basic principle of many who observe the Middle East that no movement wants to be bad either. They also don’t seem to tell any lies. Or as the Los Angeles Times explains:
“Hamas says it disavows Islamic radicalism but faces tension between its religious hard-liners and pragmatists who want to convince the West that it is not a political mask for jihad.”
I have no doubt that Hamas says this to Western reporters. Unfortunately, this is not the kind of thing it says to its own supporters. The Hamas leadership, doctrine, methods, and goals are all hard line. Is this so hard to understand?
But if you are a naïve visiting reporter you might actually believe that “the wider challenge for Hamas is whether it can, or even wishes to, rein in independent Islamist groups seeking to impose Sharia law that would limit other religions and force women to wear hijabs or head scarves.” The notion of Hamas stopping those extremists so far-out that they want to make women wear head scarves is rather quaint.
“It costs so little to teach a child to love, and so much to teach him to hate,” explained Father Flanagan. Quite true. Perhaps, though, Western aid will pay for the Hamas-controlled schools so the cost of teaching hate will be financed by foreign taxpayers rather than Hamas’s constituents.
...
Professor Barry Rubin is the director of Global Research in International Affairs...
Pertinent Links:
1) Flanagan Method: West's Policy Towards Middle East
Prof. Barry Rubin
Father Edward Flanagan was a great man. In 1917 he founded Boys Town, now Boys and Girls Town, in Nebraska as an orphanage combining revolutionary and traditional approaches to help orphans who had never before known kind treatment. Flanagan was an innovative educator but he never meant his methods to be used in Middle East politics or international affairs.
Through no fault of his own, the Flanagan Method has, however, become the backbone of contemporary Western Middle East policy toward radical nationalists and Islamists. “There are no bad boys,” was Flanagan’s most famous statement. “There is only bad environment, bad training, bad example, bad thinking.” If, he argued, his orphans were only treated properly they could be saved. Or, in Flanagan’s own words, “There is nothing the matter with our growing boys that love, proper training and guidance will not remedy.”
Take Hamas, for example. Much of the media coverage, for example an article in the Los Angeles Times, July 13, tries desperately to find some way to avoid concluding that Hamas is fanatical, genocidal, terrorist, and ruthlessly repressive. If only it is given a chance and treated properly, the argument goes, it will become moderate. The Los Angeles Times article portrays Hamas as walking “an ideological tightrope” between its “pragmatists” and “hardliners.” Wow, I sure hope the pragmatists win.
If there is a villain, we are told it is the smaller Islamic Jihad, Army of Islam, al-Qaida or others “seeking to capitalize on the unrest between Palestinian political parties and turn Gaza into a radical Islamic state.” Hamas’s own goal is now attributed instead to marginal third parties who are supposedly using the Fatah-Hamas conflict for this purpose. It is bad enough to cope with the concept that Fatah are the good guys and Hamas the bad ones. Now this is being taken one step further, with Hamas as the moderates trying to hold off the real radical Islamists. To many in the West, a radical is simply a moderate they have not yet explained things to, or who perhaps have not yet tasted the supposedly inevitable moderating influence of being in power or the educational effect of receiving Western financial aid.
According to this view, it is not Hamas that is the source of religious extremism but various troublemakers who “have found cover” under Hamas’s banner. This neglects the fact that Hamas’s banner is hoisted over a charter which is perhaps the most explicitly antisemitic doctrine since the fall of Berlin in 1945 and its political progress is built on the bodies of those it has slain in numerous acts of terrorism.
“I have yet to find a single boy who wants to be bad,” said Flanagan, and it is a basic principle of many who observe the Middle East that no movement wants to be bad either. They also don’t seem to tell any lies. Or as the Los Angeles Times explains:
“Hamas says it disavows Islamic radicalism but faces tension between its religious hard-liners and pragmatists who want to convince the West that it is not a political mask for jihad.”
I have no doubt that Hamas says this to Western reporters. Unfortunately, this is not the kind of thing it says to its own supporters. The Hamas leadership, doctrine, methods, and goals are all hard line. Is this so hard to understand?
But if you are a naïve visiting reporter you might actually believe that “the wider challenge for Hamas is whether it can, or even wishes to, rein in independent Islamist groups seeking to impose Sharia law that would limit other religions and force women to wear hijabs or head scarves.” The notion of Hamas stopping those extremists so far-out that they want to make women wear head scarves is rather quaint.
“It costs so little to teach a child to love, and so much to teach him to hate,” explained Father Flanagan. Quite true. Perhaps, though, Western aid will pay for the Hamas-controlled schools so the cost of teaching hate will be financed by foreign taxpayers rather than Hamas’s constituents.
...
Professor Barry Rubin is the director of Global Research in International Affairs...
Pertinent Links:
1) Flanagan Method: West's Policy Towards Middle East
Monday, July 16, 2007
MUST READ: ISLAM IS A RELIGION OF ....WHAT?!?
Islam is a religion of....what?
Warner MacKenzie
“What's in a name? That which we call a rose by any other word would smell as sweet.” Romeo and Juliet, William Shakespeare. So, with Shakespeare in mind, aren't the accepted meanings of words common to all peoples, all languages? If one mentions the word rose in the English, Spanish, German or Chinese language, surely the same imagery appears in the mind of the listener? Well, at least one would think so……. What about more abstract concepts like love and peace? Don't they resonate with the same import in the minds and hearts of all cultures?
Personally, peace for me, would invariably conjure up an image of tranquility, calm, and in human relationship terms, individually or globally, an absence of hostility and the presence of a tolerant, harmonious co-existence.
Well, it appears that “It ain't necessarily so”.
Despite most of the world's inhabitants agreeing with the above definition there seems to be one theological school of thought which has an entirely different idea of what constitutes peace, according to Syrian born Dr. Professor Bassam Tibi, who teaches political science at Goettingen University in Germany.
Dr.Tibi, who claims to be a direct descendant of the Prophet Mohammed, is a member of a small worldwide Muslim reform movement which calls for a renovated, Europeanised Islam that is compatible with Western secular democracy. He recently warned the West against wishful thinking in any dialogue it entered into with Islam.
"The dialogue is not proceeding well because of the two-facedness of most Muslim interlocutors on the one hand and the gullibility of well-meaning Western idealists on the other," Bassam Tibi said in an interview with United Press International.
So, what's the fly in the ointment?
Well, it turns out, that the problem is the understanding, peculiar to Islam, of the word peace!
In the final analysis, it becomes all too clear that we are not, in fact, talking about the same concept at all.
Islam understands peace to be a different bird of a different feather, altogether.
And it's not a dove ….
...
Pertinent Links:
1) Islam is a religion of....what?
Warner MacKenzie
“What's in a name? That which we call a rose by any other word would smell as sweet.” Romeo and Juliet, William Shakespeare. So, with Shakespeare in mind, aren't the accepted meanings of words common to all peoples, all languages? If one mentions the word rose in the English, Spanish, German or Chinese language, surely the same imagery appears in the mind of the listener? Well, at least one would think so……. What about more abstract concepts like love and peace? Don't they resonate with the same import in the minds and hearts of all cultures?
Personally, peace for me, would invariably conjure up an image of tranquility, calm, and in human relationship terms, individually or globally, an absence of hostility and the presence of a tolerant, harmonious co-existence.
Well, it appears that “It ain't necessarily so”.
Despite most of the world's inhabitants agreeing with the above definition there seems to be one theological school of thought which has an entirely different idea of what constitutes peace, according to Syrian born Dr. Professor Bassam Tibi, who teaches political science at Goettingen University in Germany.
Dr.Tibi, who claims to be a direct descendant of the Prophet Mohammed, is a member of a small worldwide Muslim reform movement which calls for a renovated, Europeanised Islam that is compatible with Western secular democracy. He recently warned the West against wishful thinking in any dialogue it entered into with Islam.
"The dialogue is not proceeding well because of the two-facedness of most Muslim interlocutors on the one hand and the gullibility of well-meaning Western idealists on the other," Bassam Tibi said in an interview with United Press International.
So, what's the fly in the ointment?
Well, it turns out, that the problem is the understanding, peculiar to Islam, of the word peace!
In the final analysis, it becomes all too clear that we are not, in fact, talking about the same concept at all.
Islam understands peace to be a different bird of a different feather, altogether.
And it's not a dove ….
...
Pertinent Links:
1) Islam is a religion of....what?
Sunday, July 15, 2007
MUST READ: THE PALESTINIANS GREEK TRAGEDY
The Palestinians' Greek Tragedy
by Prof. Barry Rubin
In this land, says a character in “Oedipus” by the ancient Greek playwright Euripides, “Who seeks shall find; Who sits with folded hands or sleeps is blind." Yet in most things concerned with this land of the Middle East, the blind don’t just sit with folded hands or sleep, they are running things.
Too often, the failure to realize just how bizarre things are—or, to put it in another way, how perfectly logical they are when examined by a different set of beliefs and goals—makes it impossible to understand or cope with the region.
Consider Palestinian politics, always illustrative of these principles. The new theory is that Fatah, chastened by defeat in the Gaza Strip, will be more moderate and seek peace.
Consequently, even if nothing changes in its program or behavior it should be rewarded lavishly as a Western client. And that’s the saner Western reaction; the even worse alternative is to embrace Hamas.
But even the pro-Fatah strategy disregards a lot: the group’s continued disinterest in reform, weak leadership, incitement and tolerance of anti-Israel terror, factionalism, corruption, mistreatment of its own people, and much more.
Helping Fatah survive is probably the best policy but one worth implementing only if leverage is used to make the surviving Fatah behave less like Hamas’s twin brother. Like forcing a drug addict to get off dope, this would do more to keep the miscreant alive than shovelling in money to buy more heroin. People who would be appalled if the Free World enthusiastically and uncritically backs sleazy repressive Latin American or African dictatorships have no problem thinking Fatah a dandy ally without pressing it for reform. Mark my words: their ship will sink.
Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair is supposed to be the smartest Western leader. Now he has taken the job as bag man for Fatah, becoming its full-time fundraiser. No doubt, Swiss bankers and purveyors of fine luxury goods to embezzling Fatah officials will have cause to thank him. Already, though, Palestinians and Arab media are complaining that he is pro-Israel, an enemy. They will take the money but won’t say thanks.
But Palestinians haven’t concluded, even after 50 years of defeat due to radical strategy and tactics, that peace and moderation is the way out. They see alternatives. For example, in a recent Pew poll, Palestinians are the sole group in the world favoring a nuclear Iran. They better be careful. Given their luck, if Iran ever did fire a nuclear weapon at Israel it would land in the middle of the West Bank or Gaza Strip.
And there are even more alternatives. Fais Hamdan, a 34-year-old stone cutter from a village near Nablus understands more than sophisticated Western politicians. He told an American reporter that if Hamas wants “to kill any political deal, they only have to attack a settlement or another Israeli target. Don't think that Hamas is very weak in the West Bank."
Hamdan is right. Hamas is sure to launch attacks on Israel from the West Bank to discredit the Fatah regime. The response will then be that this proves all the more need to shore up Fatah. Wrong. The issue is really: will a Fatah government really act against such terrorists or want to imitate these supposed patriots fighting the real enemy, thinking to stop them would show Fatah as “protector” of Israel and thus totally illegitimate. This is how Palestinian ideology and politics work.
If you don’t believe Hamdan ask Hani al-Hassan, a member of the Fatah central committee and perhaps the last surviving member of Fatah’s original leadership. He is usually portrayed as a conservative because of his closeness to Saudi Arabia. He was also according to a very reliable former KGB agent the highest-ranking Soviet spy in the PLO. That ought to tell you something about Middle East politics.
...
Pertinent Links:
1) The Palestinians' Greek Tragedy
by Prof. Barry Rubin
In this land, says a character in “Oedipus” by the ancient Greek playwright Euripides, “Who seeks shall find; Who sits with folded hands or sleeps is blind." Yet in most things concerned with this land of the Middle East, the blind don’t just sit with folded hands or sleep, they are running things.
Too often, the failure to realize just how bizarre things are—or, to put it in another way, how perfectly logical they are when examined by a different set of beliefs and goals—makes it impossible to understand or cope with the region.
Consider Palestinian politics, always illustrative of these principles. The new theory is that Fatah, chastened by defeat in the Gaza Strip, will be more moderate and seek peace.
Consequently, even if nothing changes in its program or behavior it should be rewarded lavishly as a Western client. And that’s the saner Western reaction; the even worse alternative is to embrace Hamas.
But even the pro-Fatah strategy disregards a lot: the group’s continued disinterest in reform, weak leadership, incitement and tolerance of anti-Israel terror, factionalism, corruption, mistreatment of its own people, and much more.
Helping Fatah survive is probably the best policy but one worth implementing only if leverage is used to make the surviving Fatah behave less like Hamas’s twin brother. Like forcing a drug addict to get off dope, this would do more to keep the miscreant alive than shovelling in money to buy more heroin. People who would be appalled if the Free World enthusiastically and uncritically backs sleazy repressive Latin American or African dictatorships have no problem thinking Fatah a dandy ally without pressing it for reform. Mark my words: their ship will sink.
Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair is supposed to be the smartest Western leader. Now he has taken the job as bag man for Fatah, becoming its full-time fundraiser. No doubt, Swiss bankers and purveyors of fine luxury goods to embezzling Fatah officials will have cause to thank him. Already, though, Palestinians and Arab media are complaining that he is pro-Israel, an enemy. They will take the money but won’t say thanks.
But Palestinians haven’t concluded, even after 50 years of defeat due to radical strategy and tactics, that peace and moderation is the way out. They see alternatives. For example, in a recent Pew poll, Palestinians are the sole group in the world favoring a nuclear Iran. They better be careful. Given their luck, if Iran ever did fire a nuclear weapon at Israel it would land in the middle of the West Bank or Gaza Strip.
And there are even more alternatives. Fais Hamdan, a 34-year-old stone cutter from a village near Nablus understands more than sophisticated Western politicians. He told an American reporter that if Hamas wants “to kill any political deal, they only have to attack a settlement or another Israeli target. Don't think that Hamas is very weak in the West Bank."
Hamdan is right. Hamas is sure to launch attacks on Israel from the West Bank to discredit the Fatah regime. The response will then be that this proves all the more need to shore up Fatah. Wrong. The issue is really: will a Fatah government really act against such terrorists or want to imitate these supposed patriots fighting the real enemy, thinking to stop them would show Fatah as “protector” of Israel and thus totally illegitimate. This is how Palestinian ideology and politics work.
If you don’t believe Hamdan ask Hani al-Hassan, a member of the Fatah central committee and perhaps the last surviving member of Fatah’s original leadership. He is usually portrayed as a conservative because of his closeness to Saudi Arabia. He was also according to a very reliable former KGB agent the highest-ranking Soviet spy in the PLO. That ought to tell you something about Middle East politics.
...
Pertinent Links:
1) The Palestinians' Greek Tragedy
MUST READ: GETTING SERIOUS ABOUT SYRIA
Getting Serious About Syria
by Prof. Barry Rubin
"We must once again restore the Israeli army’s deterrence, because there is no other way,” explains Defense Minister Ehud Barak. Quite right. The place to start is Syria. Israel’s strategic policy toward Syria should be based on two simple, basic principles:
1. Israel should make the Syrians believe it wants to see the current regime there overthrown even if it has no intention of making this happen or even really wants that outcome.
2. Israel should make clear that if there is a future Hizballah attack leading to a war like last summer’s that Syria, not Lebanon, will be the main target of retaliation.
Let’s review the issues and then discuss why this is the best policy. It is true that Israel does not seek the overthrow of President Bashar al-Assad’s Baathist dictatorship dominated by the Alawite minority. The reason is that the likely replacement would be an Islamist regime from the Sunni Arab majority. An alternative could be simply another Baathist regime under a different leader but the risks of regime change are certainly real.
Strategy, however, is not just stating what you ultimately want but also what you wish the other side to think you want. In Syria and throughout the Arab world, the idea is clearly held that Israel is not willing to strike too hard as to bring down the Assad regime. In turn, this emboldens that regime to strike hard at Israel, knowing it has little or nothing to fear. That security should be taken away from the Damascus regime.
Clearly, Israel does not want war with Syria. Yet the whole concept of deterrence is to make clear to the Syrians that Israel is not afraid of war and that Syrian support for terrorism against Israel will have real and costly consequences. Without this fear, there is no deterrence. And without deterrence war--either directly with Syria or with Syria’s clients in Lebanon--is far more likely.
The weakness of Syria should also be a factor in Israeli thinking. Despite the possibility of renewed Russian aircraft sales, Syria’s military is badly outdated. A lot of the regime’s threats and use of terrorism is a bluff, formulated precisely to distract from that fact. The Syrian regime has no great power ally and cannot depend on a single Arab government.
...
Pertinent Links:
1) Getting Serious About Syria
by Prof. Barry Rubin
"We must once again restore the Israeli army’s deterrence, because there is no other way,” explains Defense Minister Ehud Barak. Quite right. The place to start is Syria. Israel’s strategic policy toward Syria should be based on two simple, basic principles:
1. Israel should make the Syrians believe it wants to see the current regime there overthrown even if it has no intention of making this happen or even really wants that outcome.
2. Israel should make clear that if there is a future Hizballah attack leading to a war like last summer’s that Syria, not Lebanon, will be the main target of retaliation.
Let’s review the issues and then discuss why this is the best policy. It is true that Israel does not seek the overthrow of President Bashar al-Assad’s Baathist dictatorship dominated by the Alawite minority. The reason is that the likely replacement would be an Islamist regime from the Sunni Arab majority. An alternative could be simply another Baathist regime under a different leader but the risks of regime change are certainly real.
Strategy, however, is not just stating what you ultimately want but also what you wish the other side to think you want. In Syria and throughout the Arab world, the idea is clearly held that Israel is not willing to strike too hard as to bring down the Assad regime. In turn, this emboldens that regime to strike hard at Israel, knowing it has little or nothing to fear. That security should be taken away from the Damascus regime.
Clearly, Israel does not want war with Syria. Yet the whole concept of deterrence is to make clear to the Syrians that Israel is not afraid of war and that Syrian support for terrorism against Israel will have real and costly consequences. Without this fear, there is no deterrence. And without deterrence war--either directly with Syria or with Syria’s clients in Lebanon--is far more likely.
The weakness of Syria should also be a factor in Israeli thinking. Despite the possibility of renewed Russian aircraft sales, Syria’s military is badly outdated. A lot of the regime’s threats and use of terrorism is a bluff, formulated precisely to distract from that fact. The Syrian regime has no great power ally and cannot depend on a single Arab government.
...
Pertinent Links:
1) Getting Serious About Syria
Wednesday, July 11, 2007
MUST READ: THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF YASIR
The Fall of the House of Yasir
Prof. Barry Rubin
“DURING the whole of a dull, dark, and soundless day in the autumn of the year….I had been passing alone, on horseback, through a singularly dreary tract of country; and at length found myself, as the shades of the evening drew on, within view of the melancholy House of Usher….With the first glimpse of the building, a sense of insufferable gloom pervaded my spirit.” Thus, Edgar Alan Poe began his remarkable 1839 short story, “The Fall of the House of Usher.”
Similar feelings beset me in contemplating the fall of the house of Yasir, the collapse of the PLO, of Fatah, and of Palestinian nationalism as a movement. I won’t go into that history of disaster in detail but suffice it to say that what is happening now fits completely into that pattern.
Put your finger into the wine and flick one drop onto the plate for each item: 1948 war; 1967 war; failed West Bank guerrilla war; September 1970 in Jordan; terrorism; Lebanese civil war; intransigence; internal anarchy; the murder of the first moderates; corruption; incitement to terrorism and intransigence; throwing away the opportunity at Camp David; throwing away the opportunity of 1988 dialogue with the United States; the 1990s’ peace process; and the second intifada. Forgive me for leaving out even more such examples.
Is there a pattern? Yes:
By seeking everything, get nothing. Having as one’s goal the destruction of Israel and total victory, rather than a compromise solution, the movement sank ever deeper into the mire.
Glorifying violence and terrorism brought death and destruction on the movement and its followers.
Embracing extremism, incitement, and demonization of Israel brought Hamas as its logical outcome.
And now ask yourselves one simple question: Do you really believe that the Hamas coup is going to scare Fatah straight? Are these leaders and ideologues really going to learn their lesson?
Well, this seems to be the main assumption of political leaders and the media in democratic countries. After all, to paraphrase Samuel Johnson, facing the hangman supposedly greatly concentrates the mind.
But wait a minute! The PLO, Fatah, and their hierarchies have made a whole career about facing the hangman and tweaking his nose while giggling madly. If they had learned from, say, September 1970 in Jordan or other disasters it would have been sufficient for them to get on the right path.
Remember the Oslo process and why was it going to work? Because, we were told, the PLO and Fatah were so weak and so buffeted by catastrophe as finally to understand they must change their ways or be destroyed. Here we go again!
Don’t get me wrong. I do believe Fatah is preferable to Hamas—though the gap is far narrower than all too many people seem to think.
But even if you want to believe that Abbas is some peace-loving good guy, he is weak, incompetent, has no following and no intention of really confronting the culture of terrorism and extremism his own group created and maintains. He will also never give up the demand that all Palestinians should be able to live in Israel which is a deeply personal belief of his.
One of the best stories explaining the Western approach to the Middle East is the following anecdote I made up: A tourist goes into a bazaar shop, points at a carpet and declares, “This is the most beautiful carpet I have ever seen! I must have it no matter how much it costs? What’s the price?”
This is how Abbas is being treated. His mere survival, no matter what he does, is being portrayed as such a marvelous asset that he is doing everyone a favor taking their money and help. Is this going to give him any incentive to change, an outcome already rather doubtful?
For goodness sake, if he and his colleagues want to survive—and not end up as bloodied corpses on some Hamas video—they better clean up corruption, give their people a moderate alternative, and stop cross-border terrorism. It is their job to persuade us that we have a real reason for not watching Hamas butcher them and loot their houses.
Otherwise, we will be forced to stand by, like Poe’s character, and watch those unwilling to save themselves. “That once barely discernible fissure…rapidly widened….I saw the mighty walls rushing asunder” and the ground closed over the fragments of the House of Usher.
Isn’t Middle East politics like a horror story, after all? It holds our attention for many reasons but this is one of them. “Look out behind you!” We warn, always in vain as the murderer or monster sneaks up. And isn’t there always that dumb sheriff or reporter, later inevitably getting eaten or stabbed, who keeps saying, “There isn’t anything there. It’s all in your imagination!”
Of course, fictional victims can be forgiven since they are only stalked and killed once. They had no chance to learn their lesson. We do and so does Fatah. But in the Middle East, the same things happen over and over. It would be wonderful if someone some day stopped the raving and instead insisted: Nevermore.
Professor Barry Rubin is the director of Global Research in International Affairs...
Pertinent Links:
1) The Fall of the House of Yasir
Prof. Barry Rubin
“DURING the whole of a dull, dark, and soundless day in the autumn of the year….I had been passing alone, on horseback, through a singularly dreary tract of country; and at length found myself, as the shades of the evening drew on, within view of the melancholy House of Usher….With the first glimpse of the building, a sense of insufferable gloom pervaded my spirit.” Thus, Edgar Alan Poe began his remarkable 1839 short story, “The Fall of the House of Usher.”
Similar feelings beset me in contemplating the fall of the house of Yasir, the collapse of the PLO, of Fatah, and of Palestinian nationalism as a movement. I won’t go into that history of disaster in detail but suffice it to say that what is happening now fits completely into that pattern.
Put your finger into the wine and flick one drop onto the plate for each item: 1948 war; 1967 war; failed West Bank guerrilla war; September 1970 in Jordan; terrorism; Lebanese civil war; intransigence; internal anarchy; the murder of the first moderates; corruption; incitement to terrorism and intransigence; throwing away the opportunity at Camp David; throwing away the opportunity of 1988 dialogue with the United States; the 1990s’ peace process; and the second intifada. Forgive me for leaving out even more such examples.
Is there a pattern? Yes:
By seeking everything, get nothing. Having as one’s goal the destruction of Israel and total victory, rather than a compromise solution, the movement sank ever deeper into the mire.
Glorifying violence and terrorism brought death and destruction on the movement and its followers.
Embracing extremism, incitement, and demonization of Israel brought Hamas as its logical outcome.
And now ask yourselves one simple question: Do you really believe that the Hamas coup is going to scare Fatah straight? Are these leaders and ideologues really going to learn their lesson?
Well, this seems to be the main assumption of political leaders and the media in democratic countries. After all, to paraphrase Samuel Johnson, facing the hangman supposedly greatly concentrates the mind.
But wait a minute! The PLO, Fatah, and their hierarchies have made a whole career about facing the hangman and tweaking his nose while giggling madly. If they had learned from, say, September 1970 in Jordan or other disasters it would have been sufficient for them to get on the right path.
Remember the Oslo process and why was it going to work? Because, we were told, the PLO and Fatah were so weak and so buffeted by catastrophe as finally to understand they must change their ways or be destroyed. Here we go again!
Don’t get me wrong. I do believe Fatah is preferable to Hamas—though the gap is far narrower than all too many people seem to think.
But even if you want to believe that Abbas is some peace-loving good guy, he is weak, incompetent, has no following and no intention of really confronting the culture of terrorism and extremism his own group created and maintains. He will also never give up the demand that all Palestinians should be able to live in Israel which is a deeply personal belief of his.
One of the best stories explaining the Western approach to the Middle East is the following anecdote I made up: A tourist goes into a bazaar shop, points at a carpet and declares, “This is the most beautiful carpet I have ever seen! I must have it no matter how much it costs? What’s the price?”
This is how Abbas is being treated. His mere survival, no matter what he does, is being portrayed as such a marvelous asset that he is doing everyone a favor taking their money and help. Is this going to give him any incentive to change, an outcome already rather doubtful?
For goodness sake, if he and his colleagues want to survive—and not end up as bloodied corpses on some Hamas video—they better clean up corruption, give their people a moderate alternative, and stop cross-border terrorism. It is their job to persuade us that we have a real reason for not watching Hamas butcher them and loot their houses.
Otherwise, we will be forced to stand by, like Poe’s character, and watch those unwilling to save themselves. “That once barely discernible fissure…rapidly widened….I saw the mighty walls rushing asunder” and the ground closed over the fragments of the House of Usher.
Isn’t Middle East politics like a horror story, after all? It holds our attention for many reasons but this is one of them. “Look out behind you!” We warn, always in vain as the murderer or monster sneaks up. And isn’t there always that dumb sheriff or reporter, later inevitably getting eaten or stabbed, who keeps saying, “There isn’t anything there. It’s all in your imagination!”
Of course, fictional victims can be forgiven since they are only stalked and killed once. They had no chance to learn their lesson. We do and so does Fatah. But in the Middle East, the same things happen over and over. It would be wonderful if someone some day stopped the raving and instead insisted: Nevermore.
Professor Barry Rubin is the director of Global Research in International Affairs...
Pertinent Links:
1) The Fall of the House of Yasir
Sunday, July 8, 2007
MUST READ: THE ADVENTURES OF TONY RODEF, MIDDLE EAST DETECTIVE: THE LONDON CAPER
The Adventures of Tony Rodef, Middle East Detective: The London Caper
By Barry Rubin
News item: After Islamist suicide bomb attacks on London and Glasgow by Islamists were foiled, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown ordered ministers never to use the word “Muslim” when discussing terrorism.
It was a dark and stormy night in London, which is just as well since my arrival was supposed to be a top secret. I was picked up at Heathrow Airport by a limousine and driven immediately to Number 10 Downing Street. I had been called in by a government frustrated about what might well be the biggest mystery in British history. Gordon Brown was certainly glad to see me.
“Tony Rodef, Middle East Detective! Just the man we need,” he said with a sigh of relief. “Quick, this is a major crisis. Let’s not waste any time but go straight to the briefing.”
We entered the prime minister’s briefing room and he introduced me to Moss, “Our top man on terrorism,” explained Brown.
“Moss?” I pondered. “Haven’t we met before.”
“Perhaps, sir, until last week I was in charge of stopping the import of stale vegetables from Central America.”
“Ah, yes. Do you like your new job?”
“Certainly,” he beamed. “Stale vegetables, detecting terrorists; it’s all the same thing, you see.”
“Quite.”
“Now, here’s the first slide, September 11, 2001.A group of terrorists, mostly from Saudi Arabia, hijack planes and attack New York and Washington. Why might they have done such a thing? Hard to tell. But it gets even more mysterious.” And so it went. Slide after slide. Bombs in Spain; bombs in Bali; bombs in Israel; bombs in the London subway. Six years of terrorism, often using the same methods.
“And finally,” Moss said showing the last slide, “the latest attacks in Britain. People from Iraq, Jordan, you know countries in your part of the world.”
I nodded. “So what’s the problem?”
“Ah,” said the prime minister, “that’s the point. We are trying to figure out who these people are and why they are doing this. We sort of suspect we might have done something to hurt their feelings.”
“I see.”
“Yes,” Brown continued. “We just cannot figure it out. Some of these people are Arabs but others are not. They come from lots of different countries. They often refer to someone named Al or Allah. Some are rich and some are poor. Some are common laborers; others are doctors. But what do they have in common? What’s linking them together?”
“Have you tried using James Bond?”
“He’s in semi-retirement now as a multicultural tolerance counselor in Manchester. So instead we have Philby who is heading our research section.”
“Philby?” pondered I. Haven’t we met before?”
“Yes, sir. Up until last week I was in charge of passing secret information to the Russians. Er, I mean collecting secret information on the Russians.”
Philby gave his briefing. They had run every known fact about the terrorists through the most advanced computers. The most promising correlations were height and the number of letters in their first names. They were all right-handed, a potentially promising lead. They didn’t eat pork or practice bungee-jumping.
“Is that all?” I asked Philby.
“Well there’s one more thing. All of them are Mu…Mu…Mu….”
“You’ll have to forgive Philby. He has a slight stutter.”
“Thank you, sir,” Philby gasped. “I meant to say that all of them are moustached men.”
“Moustaches, huh,” I retorted. “Perhaps that means something. A disguise perhaps?” I pondered some more. “So let me get this straight,” I summarized. “You have a bunch of men from a lot of countries running around setting off bombs for no apparent reason who are roughly the same height, have roughly the same number of letters in one of their names, don’t eat pork, and don’t jump off platforms with a cord attached to one of their legs.”
“That’s about it, sir,” said Philby. “Oh, and they go to mosques a lot and read religious literature in Arabic.”
“Philby!” the prime minister recoiled in horror.
“Sorry, sir. I meant to say they are sort of religious. But we’ve ruled that out as a motive.”
“A real puzzler,” I sighed.
“Look,” said the prime minister. “You must understand that solving this problem is of the greatest importance. We must find out who these people are, what they believe, why they are doing this, and how to counter them. The fate of our country depends on it. Nothing can stand in the way of our finding out what is going on!”
“I understand completely, prime minister,” I said in a properly deferential and sympathetic voice. “I, Tony Rodef, Middle East Detective am on the job. And if there is any common factor that links these people together I’m sure we will find it.”
“Money is no object,” he said emphatically. ”Now you must excuse me as I need to meet with the Muslim community leadership which is declaring its revulsion at these events.” We all stood up. “And remember if you find anything behind this wave of attacks you must let me know immediately.”
“Yes, prime minister,” we all said in chorus.
Barry Rubin is Director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center, Interdisciplinary Center. His latest book, The Truth about Syria is published by Palgrave-Macmillan.
Pertinent Links:
1) The Adventures of Tony Rodef, Middle East Detective: The London Caper”
By Barry Rubin
News item: After Islamist suicide bomb attacks on London and Glasgow by Islamists were foiled, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown ordered ministers never to use the word “Muslim” when discussing terrorism.
It was a dark and stormy night in London, which is just as well since my arrival was supposed to be a top secret. I was picked up at Heathrow Airport by a limousine and driven immediately to Number 10 Downing Street. I had been called in by a government frustrated about what might well be the biggest mystery in British history. Gordon Brown was certainly glad to see me.
“Tony Rodef, Middle East Detective! Just the man we need,” he said with a sigh of relief. “Quick, this is a major crisis. Let’s not waste any time but go straight to the briefing.”
We entered the prime minister’s briefing room and he introduced me to Moss, “Our top man on terrorism,” explained Brown.
“Moss?” I pondered. “Haven’t we met before.”
“Perhaps, sir, until last week I was in charge of stopping the import of stale vegetables from Central America.”
“Ah, yes. Do you like your new job?”
“Certainly,” he beamed. “Stale vegetables, detecting terrorists; it’s all the same thing, you see.”
“Quite.”
“Now, here’s the first slide, September 11, 2001.A group of terrorists, mostly from Saudi Arabia, hijack planes and attack New York and Washington. Why might they have done such a thing? Hard to tell. But it gets even more mysterious.” And so it went. Slide after slide. Bombs in Spain; bombs in Bali; bombs in Israel; bombs in the London subway. Six years of terrorism, often using the same methods.
“And finally,” Moss said showing the last slide, “the latest attacks in Britain. People from Iraq, Jordan, you know countries in your part of the world.”
I nodded. “So what’s the problem?”
“Ah,” said the prime minister, “that’s the point. We are trying to figure out who these people are and why they are doing this. We sort of suspect we might have done something to hurt their feelings.”
“I see.”
“Yes,” Brown continued. “We just cannot figure it out. Some of these people are Arabs but others are not. They come from lots of different countries. They often refer to someone named Al or Allah. Some are rich and some are poor. Some are common laborers; others are doctors. But what do they have in common? What’s linking them together?”
“Have you tried using James Bond?”
“He’s in semi-retirement now as a multicultural tolerance counselor in Manchester. So instead we have Philby who is heading our research section.”
“Philby?” pondered I. Haven’t we met before?”
“Yes, sir. Up until last week I was in charge of passing secret information to the Russians. Er, I mean collecting secret information on the Russians.”
Philby gave his briefing. They had run every known fact about the terrorists through the most advanced computers. The most promising correlations were height and the number of letters in their first names. They were all right-handed, a potentially promising lead. They didn’t eat pork or practice bungee-jumping.
“Is that all?” I asked Philby.
“Well there’s one more thing. All of them are Mu…Mu…Mu….”
“You’ll have to forgive Philby. He has a slight stutter.”
“Thank you, sir,” Philby gasped. “I meant to say that all of them are moustached men.”
“Moustaches, huh,” I retorted. “Perhaps that means something. A disguise perhaps?” I pondered some more. “So let me get this straight,” I summarized. “You have a bunch of men from a lot of countries running around setting off bombs for no apparent reason who are roughly the same height, have roughly the same number of letters in one of their names, don’t eat pork, and don’t jump off platforms with a cord attached to one of their legs.”
“That’s about it, sir,” said Philby. “Oh, and they go to mosques a lot and read religious literature in Arabic.”
“Philby!” the prime minister recoiled in horror.
“Sorry, sir. I meant to say they are sort of religious. But we’ve ruled that out as a motive.”
“A real puzzler,” I sighed.
“Look,” said the prime minister. “You must understand that solving this problem is of the greatest importance. We must find out who these people are, what they believe, why they are doing this, and how to counter them. The fate of our country depends on it. Nothing can stand in the way of our finding out what is going on!”
“I understand completely, prime minister,” I said in a properly deferential and sympathetic voice. “I, Tony Rodef, Middle East Detective am on the job. And if there is any common factor that links these people together I’m sure we will find it.”
“Money is no object,” he said emphatically. ”Now you must excuse me as I need to meet with the Muslim community leadership which is declaring its revulsion at these events.” We all stood up. “And remember if you find anything behind this wave of attacks you must let me know immediately.”
“Yes, prime minister,” we all said in chorus.
Barry Rubin is Director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center, Interdisciplinary Center. His latest book, The Truth about Syria is published by Palgrave-Macmillan.
Pertinent Links:
1) The Adventures of Tony Rodef, Middle East Detective: The London Caper”
Saturday, July 7, 2007
MUST READ: THE CASE OF THE MURDERED PALESTINIAN MOUSE
The Case Of The Murdered Palestinian Mouse
by Prof. Barry Rubin
The Hamas satellite TV channel produced a children’s show Tomorrow’s Pioneers, which should have been called Tomorrow’s Suicide Bombers, designed to get children to kill Israelis, or Jews in general, and participate in a radical Islamist attempt at world conquest. We know this because that is what the show’s hosts and their mascot, the high-voiced Farfur the mouse (based on Mickey) said. International media often reported that the show only asked the children to “fight” or “resist” Israel but this was a clear misrepresentation of the program’s incitement to terrorism, antisemitism, and even—in a departure from past Hamas propaganda—calls for an Islamist-dominated planet.
Given the controversy around Farfur, however, Hamas decided to make him a true example for the children to emulate, by becoming a martyr. Thus, Al-Aqsa television claimed that Farfur was murdered by an Israeli official wanting to grab his land. But is that true? The killing was not actually shown on television. One wonders….
Gaza City, another hot and dreary night. The air was unbearably humid and still off the Mediterranean. It was sweltering. Especially for those of us who lacked air-conditioning. I can’t afford it because business isn’t too good. My name is Sami Spade and I’m a private detective. A good and honest one, which is to say a very poor one.
I can’t even afford a secretary. It isn’t that there isn’t a lot of crime around Gaza City but the police are corrupt, the courts are corrupt, and most of the crime is being done by the authorities and their friends, relatives, patrons, and clients. Kidnappings? In plenty but those who grab people are too powerful to get them sprung. Disappeared people? There are lots of folks who want them to stay disappeared. Extortion, terrorism, gun battles. Above my pay level. That’s for sure.
And that’s why I was surprised by a knock on my door. Well, not a knock exactly, more like a scratching. It was persistent. The rent was overdue, of course, but my landlord didn’t scratch at the door, he knocked it down altogether. Curious I carefully tiptoed to the portal and with a single heave pulled it open fast.
To my amazement a tiny mouse fell across my threshold heavily to the floor with an anguished squeak.
“Who are you and what do you want? I haven’t got any cheese,” I growled.
The mouse got up and dusted himself off. “You got me wrong. I don’t need no stinkin’ cheese,” said the mouse. “I’m here on business.” The mouse looked around, “Quite a hole ya got here,” he added.
“What kind of business do you have with me?”
“An investigation of course. You’re a PI aren’t you.”
“That’s what it says on the door, rodent,” I answered.
The mouse looked hurt. “We don’t like that term. You don’t have to get personal,” he answered softly.
“Sorry,” I said back. “Ok. Come in and sit down.” The mouse walked in and climbed on my only other chair. I settled behind my desk, checking the drawer to make sure my .45 automatic was there. Just in case. The mouse could be setting a trap. “Any way, how can a mouse pay for a PI?”
“Don’t worry,” said the mouse smugly. “I have a lot of dough, a lot of bread even. But let me explain. My name is al-Hammett. But I’m so fast that my friends call me Dash.”
“Dash al-Hammett,” I mused, “sounds familiar. What’s up?”
“Have you heard of Hamas’s biggest TV star? Farfur? He’s my cousin. Or should I say he was my cousin. Farfur has been murdered. I have a very rich uncle who lives in Hollywood, name of Mickey. He wants to find out what really happened to Farfur. And he’s willing to pay. How about 500 dinars a day plus expenses?”
I couldn’t help but whistle. “Sounds pretty good to me. Tell me more.”
“As you know, Hamas says that Israel did him in because he wouldn’t sign over his land. I think it’s a frame. That Saraa, the teenage host? I never trusted her. And Mickey said something before he died.”
“Yeah?”
“He told me that if anything happened to him not to believe it was the Israelis. Look, Sam, I know you don’t mix in politics….”
“I’ve found it’s a lot healthier that way.”
“Sure I know what you mean. But here’s the story. All the Arab regimes and radical movements blame America and Israel for everything to cover up their own crimes. Right?”
I nodded. “Everyone knows that, everyone but most of the Western Middle East experts, a lot of the journalists, and some of the politicians. So you think that’s what’s going on here?”
“Absolutely. Maybe Farfur got the goods on some corrupt act or something. And they knocked him off because he knew too much. Wouldn’t be the first time. Will you take the case?”
“Sounds pretty risky,” I said.
“OK, make it 600 dinars a day.” He reached into a pouch around his waist and pulled out a thick wad of bills.
“You have a deal,” I said.
Later that night, much later, I headed for Al-Aqsa TV studios, wearing my trench coat and fedora. There were no stars and the night was dark. I had the tools of my trade with me and the night-watchman there was known to fall asleep on the job. Sure enough I easily jimmied the backdoor, slid inside, switched on my flashlight, and headed straight for Saraa’s office. It wasn’t hard to find the documents. They were right on her desk. They told the real tale. Farfur wasn’t killed by the Israelis. He had decided that Gaza was too hot for him, he was fed up by the lies, the propaganda, the killing. Makes sense. Hell of a job, luring little children to blow themselves up by giving them promises of rewards in heaven. Makes me sick to my stomach just to think of it.
...
Professor Barry Rubin is the director of Global Research in International Affairs...
Pertinent Links:
1) The Case Of The Murdered Palestinian Mouse
by Prof. Barry Rubin
The Hamas satellite TV channel produced a children’s show Tomorrow’s Pioneers, which should have been called Tomorrow’s Suicide Bombers, designed to get children to kill Israelis, or Jews in general, and participate in a radical Islamist attempt at world conquest. We know this because that is what the show’s hosts and their mascot, the high-voiced Farfur the mouse (based on Mickey) said. International media often reported that the show only asked the children to “fight” or “resist” Israel but this was a clear misrepresentation of the program’s incitement to terrorism, antisemitism, and even—in a departure from past Hamas propaganda—calls for an Islamist-dominated planet.
Given the controversy around Farfur, however, Hamas decided to make him a true example for the children to emulate, by becoming a martyr. Thus, Al-Aqsa television claimed that Farfur was murdered by an Israeli official wanting to grab his land. But is that true? The killing was not actually shown on television. One wonders….
Gaza City, another hot and dreary night. The air was unbearably humid and still off the Mediterranean. It was sweltering. Especially for those of us who lacked air-conditioning. I can’t afford it because business isn’t too good. My name is Sami Spade and I’m a private detective. A good and honest one, which is to say a very poor one.
I can’t even afford a secretary. It isn’t that there isn’t a lot of crime around Gaza City but the police are corrupt, the courts are corrupt, and most of the crime is being done by the authorities and their friends, relatives, patrons, and clients. Kidnappings? In plenty but those who grab people are too powerful to get them sprung. Disappeared people? There are lots of folks who want them to stay disappeared. Extortion, terrorism, gun battles. Above my pay level. That’s for sure.
And that’s why I was surprised by a knock on my door. Well, not a knock exactly, more like a scratching. It was persistent. The rent was overdue, of course, but my landlord didn’t scratch at the door, he knocked it down altogether. Curious I carefully tiptoed to the portal and with a single heave pulled it open fast.
To my amazement a tiny mouse fell across my threshold heavily to the floor with an anguished squeak.
“Who are you and what do you want? I haven’t got any cheese,” I growled.
The mouse got up and dusted himself off. “You got me wrong. I don’t need no stinkin’ cheese,” said the mouse. “I’m here on business.” The mouse looked around, “Quite a hole ya got here,” he added.
“What kind of business do you have with me?”
“An investigation of course. You’re a PI aren’t you.”
“That’s what it says on the door, rodent,” I answered.
The mouse looked hurt. “We don’t like that term. You don’t have to get personal,” he answered softly.
“Sorry,” I said back. “Ok. Come in and sit down.” The mouse walked in and climbed on my only other chair. I settled behind my desk, checking the drawer to make sure my .45 automatic was there. Just in case. The mouse could be setting a trap. “Any way, how can a mouse pay for a PI?”
“Don’t worry,” said the mouse smugly. “I have a lot of dough, a lot of bread even. But let me explain. My name is al-Hammett. But I’m so fast that my friends call me Dash.”
“Dash al-Hammett,” I mused, “sounds familiar. What’s up?”
“Have you heard of Hamas’s biggest TV star? Farfur? He’s my cousin. Or should I say he was my cousin. Farfur has been murdered. I have a very rich uncle who lives in Hollywood, name of Mickey. He wants to find out what really happened to Farfur. And he’s willing to pay. How about 500 dinars a day plus expenses?”
I couldn’t help but whistle. “Sounds pretty good to me. Tell me more.”
“As you know, Hamas says that Israel did him in because he wouldn’t sign over his land. I think it’s a frame. That Saraa, the teenage host? I never trusted her. And Mickey said something before he died.”
“Yeah?”
“He told me that if anything happened to him not to believe it was the Israelis. Look, Sam, I know you don’t mix in politics….”
“I’ve found it’s a lot healthier that way.”
“Sure I know what you mean. But here’s the story. All the Arab regimes and radical movements blame America and Israel for everything to cover up their own crimes. Right?”
I nodded. “Everyone knows that, everyone but most of the Western Middle East experts, a lot of the journalists, and some of the politicians. So you think that’s what’s going on here?”
“Absolutely. Maybe Farfur got the goods on some corrupt act or something. And they knocked him off because he knew too much. Wouldn’t be the first time. Will you take the case?”
“Sounds pretty risky,” I said.
“OK, make it 600 dinars a day.” He reached into a pouch around his waist and pulled out a thick wad of bills.
“You have a deal,” I said.
Later that night, much later, I headed for Al-Aqsa TV studios, wearing my trench coat and fedora. There were no stars and the night was dark. I had the tools of my trade with me and the night-watchman there was known to fall asleep on the job. Sure enough I easily jimmied the backdoor, slid inside, switched on my flashlight, and headed straight for Saraa’s office. It wasn’t hard to find the documents. They were right on her desk. They told the real tale. Farfur wasn’t killed by the Israelis. He had decided that Gaza was too hot for him, he was fed up by the lies, the propaganda, the killing. Makes sense. Hell of a job, luring little children to blow themselves up by giving them promises of rewards in heaven. Makes me sick to my stomach just to think of it.
...
Professor Barry Rubin is the director of Global Research in International Affairs...
Pertinent Links:
1) The Case Of The Murdered Palestinian Mouse
Friday, July 6, 2007
MUST READ: IT'S HARD TO BE AN ARAB
It's Hard to be an Arab
by Prof. Barry Rubin
Once, many years ago, I stood outside the door of a Middle East Studies Association meeting addressed by the late Edward Said as he thundered against those he deemed "the enemies of the Arabs." He even provided a list of names. Strange it was to think this was supposedly an academic meeting, not a rally of some extremist totalitarian political party.
Supposedly, there are those who love the Arabs and their cause and those who hate them. It is common to see the "supporters" as those who extol or apologize for the dictatorships that oppress Arab peoples; the "resistance" which blows them up; steals their children to be suicide bombers or fighters in futile battles; radicals who urge them to fight to the death; and journalists who make good livings by lying to them.
Pretty ironic, isn't it?
...
Pertinent Links:
1) It's Hard to be an Arab
by Prof. Barry Rubin
Once, many years ago, I stood outside the door of a Middle East Studies Association meeting addressed by the late Edward Said as he thundered against those he deemed "the enemies of the Arabs." He even provided a list of names. Strange it was to think this was supposedly an academic meeting, not a rally of some extremist totalitarian political party.
Supposedly, there are those who love the Arabs and their cause and those who hate them. It is common to see the "supporters" as those who extol or apologize for the dictatorships that oppress Arab peoples; the "resistance" which blows them up; steals their children to be suicide bombers or fighters in futile battles; radicals who urge them to fight to the death; and journalists who make good livings by lying to them.
Pretty ironic, isn't it?
...
Pertinent Links:
1) It's Hard to be an Arab
MUST READ: GAZA TODAY, LEBANON TOMORROW?
Gaza Today, Lebanon Tomorrow?
by Prof. Barry Rubin
The world is shocked by Hamas’s violent takeover of the Gaza Strip and the damage done to any hope for peace or regional stability is generally recognized. But a second, even more serious, extremist takeover is in the works for which Western inaction would bear far more responsibility.
This time the victim would be Lebanon, and the perpetrator is Hizballah backed by Syria and Iran.
Today, Lebanon is ruled by a Christian-Sunni Muslim-Druze coalition determined to maintain a moderate and independent Lebanon. This partnership arose after Syria assassinated former Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri in February 2005, coming out of a mass movement which successfully demanded the Syrian withdrawal after two decades in which Lebanon was looted as a satellite state by its next-door neighbor.
Syria is determined to end this period of freedom and in doing so it is aided by its client Hizballah and many smaller groups including Fatah al-Islam along with pro-Syrian politicians. Fifteen major terrorist attacks, mostly assassination attempts, and many smaller ones have taken place in the last two years by Syrian agents. Notably, two of these have killed coalition members of parliament, the first Christian, the most recent a Sunni Muslim.
These attacks are not just blind efforts at revenge or mayhem. Syria is literally murdering the Lebanese government out of existence. A few more successes and the coalition will lose its majority. Also, however, the term of pro-Syrian President Emile Lahoud, extended by Syrian demand, ends in November, making Damascus eager to get control of parliament before then to ensure its own choice will triumph.
While the violence falls well short of all-out fighting, Lebanon is engaged in a type of civil war. Hizballah walked out of the government and Syrian clients have paralyzed parliament in a so-far failed attempt to keep Lebanon from endorsing an international tribunal to investigate Hariri’s death. Everyone knows that the evidence points to the Syrian government at the highest levels for responsibility. Blocking this tribunal is priority one on the Syrian regime’s list.
As a result, coalition supporters are showing exemplary courage. Any politician or journalist who stands against Syria, Iran, and Hizballah faces the daily threat of assassination. In contrast, of course, the extremists endure no such risk since the coalition does not use terrorism against them.
...
Pertinent Links:
1) Gaza Today, Lebanon Tomorrow?
by Prof. Barry Rubin
The world is shocked by Hamas’s violent takeover of the Gaza Strip and the damage done to any hope for peace or regional stability is generally recognized. But a second, even more serious, extremist takeover is in the works for which Western inaction would bear far more responsibility.
This time the victim would be Lebanon, and the perpetrator is Hizballah backed by Syria and Iran.
Today, Lebanon is ruled by a Christian-Sunni Muslim-Druze coalition determined to maintain a moderate and independent Lebanon. This partnership arose after Syria assassinated former Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri in February 2005, coming out of a mass movement which successfully demanded the Syrian withdrawal after two decades in which Lebanon was looted as a satellite state by its next-door neighbor.
Syria is determined to end this period of freedom and in doing so it is aided by its client Hizballah and many smaller groups including Fatah al-Islam along with pro-Syrian politicians. Fifteen major terrorist attacks, mostly assassination attempts, and many smaller ones have taken place in the last two years by Syrian agents. Notably, two of these have killed coalition members of parliament, the first Christian, the most recent a Sunni Muslim.
These attacks are not just blind efforts at revenge or mayhem. Syria is literally murdering the Lebanese government out of existence. A few more successes and the coalition will lose its majority. Also, however, the term of pro-Syrian President Emile Lahoud, extended by Syrian demand, ends in November, making Damascus eager to get control of parliament before then to ensure its own choice will triumph.
While the violence falls well short of all-out fighting, Lebanon is engaged in a type of civil war. Hizballah walked out of the government and Syrian clients have paralyzed parliament in a so-far failed attempt to keep Lebanon from endorsing an international tribunal to investigate Hariri’s death. Everyone knows that the evidence points to the Syrian government at the highest levels for responsibility. Blocking this tribunal is priority one on the Syrian regime’s list.
As a result, coalition supporters are showing exemplary courage. Any politician or journalist who stands against Syria, Iran, and Hizballah faces the daily threat of assassination. In contrast, of course, the extremists endure no such risk since the coalition does not use terrorism against them.
...
Pertinent Links:
1) Gaza Today, Lebanon Tomorrow?
Thursday, July 5, 2007
MUST READ: DOCTORS OF TERRORISM
Doctors of Terrorism
By BARRY RUBIN
July 5, 2007 -- THE arrest of seven doctors in the attempted British terror bombings has shocked many people. Sadly, it shouldn't.
All seven are Muslims working at government-financed hospitals, their salaries paid by the British taxpayer. Dr. Muhammad Hanif practiced at Halton Hospital in Runcorn, Cheshire; Dr. Muhammad Asha, at the North Staffordshire NHS Trust's University Hospital.
So can doctors be terrorists? Can people who are financially well-off be terrorists? Absolutely. It is ideology, after all, that turns people into terrorists - not suffering.
Indeed, the No. 2 leader of al Qaeda is Dr. Ayman al-Zawahiri - who was previously a stalwart of the Muslim Brotherhood in his native Egypt. Zawahiri made the connections that led to his role in al Qaeda when he went to Afghanistan in 1980 to provide medical care for jihadists fighting the Soviets. Later, he was a key architect of the 1998 bombings of the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, which killed hundreds of innocents, and of the 9/11 attacks.
Other Islamist MDs include two recent leaders of the Palestinian terror group Hamas. Abdel Aziz Rantisi graduated first in his class from an Egyptian university in pediatrics; he succeeded slain cleric Ahmad Yassin as Hamas' chief in March 2004 - only to perish himself a month later. After him came Mahmoud al-Zahar (who had helped found Hamas in 1987), an Egyptian-trained surgeon who today is the most powerful man in the Gaza Strip.
Even before the rise of Islamism, there were secular doctor-terrorists. Dr. George Habash, a founder and for three decades leader of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), is now still active though enjoying his semi-retirement in Syria. The PFLP was one of the most bloodthirsty terrorist groups in history, with exploits such as a 1978 attack at Orly Airport in Paris and the 2002 shooting of five (including a mother and three children) in Itamar on the West Bank.
Dr. Waddi Haddad was Habash's sometime partner before forming an organization specializing in terrorist operations, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-External Operations. Among its more spectacular actions was a 1977 hijacking of a Lufthansa flight en route from Mallorca to Frankfurt.
Consider, too, the kind of people who become doctors - relatively intelligent, well-organized, hard-working. These are valuable skills both in leading terrorist groups and in carrying out operations.
Yes, we in the West expect the study of medicine to produce humanists - men and women who view all life as sacred, dedicated to broad service for humanity.
But it is also an intellectual endeavor - exposing one to other intellectual currents in the surrounding world. And in much of the Muslim world, the strongest currents have been the various extremisms that promote terrorism.
And the doctrines of radical Arab nationalism and Islamism (like the one that motivated those totalitarians working in concentration camps six decades ago) view their enemies as sub-human. Toward them, those trained in healing are quite willing to become doctors of death.
Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center. His latest book is "The Truth About Syria."
Pertinent Links:
1) Doctors of Terrorism
By BARRY RUBIN
July 5, 2007 -- THE arrest of seven doctors in the attempted British terror bombings has shocked many people. Sadly, it shouldn't.
All seven are Muslims working at government-financed hospitals, their salaries paid by the British taxpayer. Dr. Muhammad Hanif practiced at Halton Hospital in Runcorn, Cheshire; Dr. Muhammad Asha, at the North Staffordshire NHS Trust's University Hospital.
So can doctors be terrorists? Can people who are financially well-off be terrorists? Absolutely. It is ideology, after all, that turns people into terrorists - not suffering.
Indeed, the No. 2 leader of al Qaeda is Dr. Ayman al-Zawahiri - who was previously a stalwart of the Muslim Brotherhood in his native Egypt. Zawahiri made the connections that led to his role in al Qaeda when he went to Afghanistan in 1980 to provide medical care for jihadists fighting the Soviets. Later, he was a key architect of the 1998 bombings of the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, which killed hundreds of innocents, and of the 9/11 attacks.
Other Islamist MDs include two recent leaders of the Palestinian terror group Hamas. Abdel Aziz Rantisi graduated first in his class from an Egyptian university in pediatrics; he succeeded slain cleric Ahmad Yassin as Hamas' chief in March 2004 - only to perish himself a month later. After him came Mahmoud al-Zahar (who had helped found Hamas in 1987), an Egyptian-trained surgeon who today is the most powerful man in the Gaza Strip.
Even before the rise of Islamism, there were secular doctor-terrorists. Dr. George Habash, a founder and for three decades leader of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), is now still active though enjoying his semi-retirement in Syria. The PFLP was one of the most bloodthirsty terrorist groups in history, with exploits such as a 1978 attack at Orly Airport in Paris and the 2002 shooting of five (including a mother and three children) in Itamar on the West Bank.
Dr. Waddi Haddad was Habash's sometime partner before forming an organization specializing in terrorist operations, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-External Operations. Among its more spectacular actions was a 1977 hijacking of a Lufthansa flight en route from Mallorca to Frankfurt.
Consider, too, the kind of people who become doctors - relatively intelligent, well-organized, hard-working. These are valuable skills both in leading terrorist groups and in carrying out operations.
Yes, we in the West expect the study of medicine to produce humanists - men and women who view all life as sacred, dedicated to broad service for humanity.
But it is also an intellectual endeavor - exposing one to other intellectual currents in the surrounding world. And in much of the Muslim world, the strongest currents have been the various extremisms that promote terrorism.
And the doctrines of radical Arab nationalism and Islamism (like the one that motivated those totalitarians working in concentration camps six decades ago) view their enemies as sub-human. Toward them, those trained in healing are quite willing to become doctors of death.
Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center. His latest book is "The Truth About Syria."
Pertinent Links:
1) Doctors of Terrorism
Monday, July 2, 2007
MUST READ: GUIDE FOR MEDIA ON HOW TO RATIONALIZE ISLAMIST DICTATORSHIPS
Guide For Media On How To Rationalize Islamist Dictatorships
by Prof. Barry Rubin
The AP explains things to us as if they were the Hamas public relations department. This is not only bad journalism, not only a shamefully slanted apologia for Hamas, but a real case study of how the Western media is totally taken in by dictatorships (or at least the ones that are anti-American). AP doesnt seem to get the rather obvious point that if there is no sign of Hamas imposing rule of Islamism in Gaza it is because people get the hint.
...
Pertinent Links:
1) Guide For Media On How To Rationalize Islamist Dictatorships
by Prof. Barry Rubin
The AP explains things to us as if they were the Hamas public relations department. This is not only bad journalism, not only a shamefully slanted apologia for Hamas, but a real case study of how the Western media is totally taken in by dictatorships (or at least the ones that are anti-American). AP doesnt seem to get the rather obvious point that if there is no sign of Hamas imposing rule of Islamism in Gaza it is because people get the hint.
...
Pertinent Links:
1) Guide For Media On How To Rationalize Islamist Dictatorships
Friday, June 29, 2007
MUST READ: OUR 'FRIEND' FATAH
Our `Friend' Fatah
by Prof. Barry Rubin
During World War One, Germany concluded that its chief ally, Austria-Hungary, was more of a burden than an asset. As one German official put it, that alliance was like being “shackled to a corpse.†And more than a century earlier, it was said of the doomed French dynasty, the Bourbons, that they learned nothing and forgot nothing.
Welcome to the alliance with Fatah, sort of Austria-Hungary and the Bourbons rolled up into one. It is now ruler of a West Bank-only semi-state after Hamas captured the Gaza Strip from it. The United States is now backing Palestinian Authority leader Marwan Abbas with aid and probably military assistance. Israel’s government will do everything possible to preserve that regime, too.
This is a completely logical policy decision. It makes perfect sense given the balance of forces and the overall situation. I understand why it is being done. The problem is that it isn’t going to work. And if we know that now, perhaps this fact should shape policy just a bit?
...
Pertinent Links:
1) Our `Friend' Fatah
by Prof. Barry Rubin
During World War One, Germany concluded that its chief ally, Austria-Hungary, was more of a burden than an asset. As one German official put it, that alliance was like being “shackled to a corpse.†And more than a century earlier, it was said of the doomed French dynasty, the Bourbons, that they learned nothing and forgot nothing.
Welcome to the alliance with Fatah, sort of Austria-Hungary and the Bourbons rolled up into one. It is now ruler of a West Bank-only semi-state after Hamas captured the Gaza Strip from it. The United States is now backing Palestinian Authority leader Marwan Abbas with aid and probably military assistance. Israel’s government will do everything possible to preserve that regime, too.
This is a completely logical policy decision. It makes perfect sense given the balance of forces and the overall situation. I understand why it is being done. The problem is that it isn’t going to work. And if we know that now, perhaps this fact should shape policy just a bit?
...
Pertinent Links:
1) Our `Friend' Fatah
Sunday, June 24, 2007
MUST READ: MIDDLE EAST LESSON TOO LATE FOR THE LEARNING?
Middle East Lesson Too Late for the Learning?
by Prof. Barry Rubin
If you want to understand Arab politics, don’t bother with what Western “experts” say, get a feel for what people like to refer to today as the local “narrative.” This doesn’t mean you accept what is said as true, but that you understand how what is said makes things work (or rather, fail to work).
This is an especially interesting exercise in light of the Hamas seizure of the Gaza Strip. What will Palestinians, Arabs in general, and the West learn—if anything—from this experience.
As our text let us take an op-ed by Eyad Sarraj in the Toronto Globe and Mail of June 19, 2007, entitled, “Palestinian Territories: What’s Left.” There’s an irony in the title since Sarraj himself is an activist in the relatively tiny political left of Gaza. He is a physician and has been a human rights’ activist. He is one of the most “Westernized” Palestinian intellectuals and political figures. Eyad Sarraj received the 1997 Physicians for Human Rights Award and the 1998 Martin Ennals Award for human-rights defenders. He is director of the Gaza Community Mental Health Program.
In short, Sarraj should be giving us just about the most rational, pragmatic, honest, detached, and accurate analysis we are going to get from the Palestinians. So if he doesn’t get it, well, they are in very serious trouble.
I will present his words below in regular font and my responses or additions in capital letters.
...
Read the whole thing...
Pertinent Links:
1) Middle East Lesson Too Late for the Learning?
by Prof. Barry Rubin
If you want to understand Arab politics, don’t bother with what Western “experts” say, get a feel for what people like to refer to today as the local “narrative.” This doesn’t mean you accept what is said as true, but that you understand how what is said makes things work (or rather, fail to work).
This is an especially interesting exercise in light of the Hamas seizure of the Gaza Strip. What will Palestinians, Arabs in general, and the West learn—if anything—from this experience.
As our text let us take an op-ed by Eyad Sarraj in the Toronto Globe and Mail of June 19, 2007, entitled, “Palestinian Territories: What’s Left.” There’s an irony in the title since Sarraj himself is an activist in the relatively tiny political left of Gaza. He is a physician and has been a human rights’ activist. He is one of the most “Westernized” Palestinian intellectuals and political figures. Eyad Sarraj received the 1997 Physicians for Human Rights Award and the 1998 Martin Ennals Award for human-rights defenders. He is director of the Gaza Community Mental Health Program.
In short, Sarraj should be giving us just about the most rational, pragmatic, honest, detached, and accurate analysis we are going to get from the Palestinians. So if he doesn’t get it, well, they are in very serious trouble.
I will present his words below in regular font and my responses or additions in capital letters.
...
Read the whole thing...
Pertinent Links:
1) Middle East Lesson Too Late for the Learning?
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