Racism and Middle East politics

The skirmishes in the occupied land are part of a war of destiny. The outcome of hundreds of years of war will be defined in Palestinian land. … As the Imam said, ‘Israel must be wiped off the map.’ — Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as quoted by Aljazeera

flag_burningAnger towards Israel by its Arab neighbors is out of proportion to Israel’s sins. What we are witnessing in the Middle East is anti-Semitism, not politics. It is Jew-hatred, not a dispute over borders or rights or Palestinian statehood. This present conflict is the direct result of Arab racism and Arab intolerance.

As long as middle-eastern Arabs teach their children to hate Jews, there will be no lasting peace.

We who once held a similar disdain for black people should understand better than most what sort of challenges the Middle East faces. Generations have been taught hatred. Generations have been taught that Jews are not human beings. Generations have been taught that every piece of bad fortune has Jewish conspirators at its heart.

That sort of irrational racism can’t be eliminated by UN resolutions. It can only be reversed by sane and tolerant Arabs who are willing to speak out against their brothers.

And they better speak out soon.

This Middle East anti-Semitism has become much worse than anything we ever saw here in America. When Iranian President Ahmadinejad speaks unapologetically about genocide, any student of history can see that the racist fires of hatred are blazing hotter than they ever were in the American South. Our Ku Klux Klan was a murderous bunch of hate-mongers armed only with rifles and dynamite. Think what might have happened if they’d had Katyusha rockets and Kalashnikovs. Hezbollah is the Klan on steroids.

And like the Klan, Hezbollah is being driven by a warped religious zealotry. It believes that killing Jews is God’s work.

Are there righteous Muslims in the Arab world who will stand up and say that Allah does not hate Jews? Are there righteous Muslims in the Arab world who will say that groups like Hezbollah are distorting the teachings of Islam for their own purposes?

I doubt that peace in the Middle East is possible. I doubt that an entire generation of Arabs will come to repent of their anti-Semitic hatred. Jews make useful whipping boys for the powerful but incompetent Arab leaders who can’t make the trains run on time, or provide decent lives for their citizens.

Until Hezbollah and Iran and Syria agree that Israel has a right to exist, and that Jews have a right to live in peace, Israel needs the protection of the West against the Hitlerian plans of the powers that surround it. The West, which has learned a few hard lessons about the evils of racism, needs to come to Israel’s defense.

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Comments

  1. The crazy thing is that most of my friends who have moved here from a life in the South need to be re-educated with respect to their unknown prejudices. So ingrained are they that these unique racisms had tended to go undetected by my friends. They didn’t consider themselves racist. They support civil rights and the promise that all men are created equal. They were embarrassed by the Klan. And yet they believe Jews are naturally crafty and scheming. They fear to go to markets primarily shopped by Latinos, as brown equals dangerous. They think that Japanese are naturally smarter.

    Yeah, the Middle East has a ton of work to do. And Israel doesn’t do itself any favours by some of its activities as well (the settling and treatment of the Palestinians, for instance).

  2. What you have said here is so true, and it is well-considered. There is one thing that I have begun to doubt though, as people speak of “moderate” Muslims I wonder if there are even a small quantity of Muslims that are moderate where Israel and Jews are concerned.

    I wonder if those who wait for them to speak up do not wait in vain.

  3. I think there is corruption all over the world. Before 9/11 no one cared about the middle east! All governments are corrupt, so called Christians “neo-conservatives” that cause nothing but problems. Start a war for Oil. The Zionists (Christian and Jews)have commited many crimes that they will never expose.Zionist Jews have so much control over the USA. People need to read up on Israel’s history before they go taking sides. Why doesn’t the media ever say anything about MOSSAD and the numerous crimes they have commited and continue to commit? Oh that’s right b/c they are Jews! Israel is out to benefit itself, and no one else, funny to think of them as allies… history always repeats itself! There are good people in every culture, race and religion. Unfortunately, in the Middle East they have a lot of issues to work on, I don’t see how a civilization can grow under such awful ruling and chaos!