The most important thing the United States can do to solve the problem in Afghanistan is publicly support a South Africa style, one person one vote resolution to the Palestinian conflict over Zionism.
Until that happens, the United States will be in a legitimate conflict with the Muslim world. Not a PR conflict or a misunderstanding or propaganda conflict but a real conflict in which Muslims, in self defense, will attack the US from somewhere, if not Afghanistan, then Arabia, if not, then Sudan, if not then Muslim communities in the West.
There are over 100 million Muslims living under pro-US dictatorships in Jordan, Egypt the West Bank and Saudi Arabia - where the US supports and is publicly tied to the denial of people's rights to participate in their own politics because democracies in these countries would be dangerous to Israel keeping its Jewish majority.
There are nearly 100 million Muslims that have anti-Zionist leaderships, in Iran, Syria, Lebanon and Gaza where the people are punished for living under anti-Zionist rule, whether elected or not, by sanctions that cruelly harm the populations and leave the leaderships intact.
I don't think much need be added about the suffering of the 25 or so million Iraqis who committed the crime of being ruled by the anti-Zionist Saddam Hussein.
The idea that over 200 million Muslim people should suffer so 6 million Jews in Israel can have a Jewish majority state leads to conflict between the West and the Muslim world and there is no way around that.
Americans have been slow to understand that this is a real conflict. This is not a matter of George Bush using more aggressive language than Barack Obama. The United States is, with most Americans not fully aware, gravely harming large numbers of Muslims continuously for the purpose of keeping the region safe for a Jewish state.
Stop supporting Zionism and Al-Qaeda and the Muslim world will no longer be in conflict with the US and the West.
That can and should be done in a way that respects the religious, personal and property rights of those Jews living in the region.
Once that's done, Muslim grievances against the US will dissipate steadily and whether Bin Laden is caught or not, the lack of anger, which is now justified, that fuels his recruits will render the conflict he believes he's fighting irrelevant.
But giving the Palestinians Bantustans worse than those the Blacks of South Africa rejected, even if the Palestinians can be starved into accepting them, will not end or even decrease the conflict.
The alternative to US support for one state is decades of conflict that will just become more expensive in terms of money and lives and will hasten the decline of the US as a superpower.
3 comments:
Arnold,
you seem to assume that Saudi Arabians, Jordanians and Egyptians would want democracy as political system for their countries.
I am sure they would like participation in the politics of their countries but that could be achieved without the western democracy model.
Most likely the people of those countries would choose a mixed system with a strong role for religion, a strong but somewhat controlled ruler and a culture that would allow them to voice grievances without getting repressed for that. Such a system can be thought of without the "democracy" label.
There is some sound reason why the Arab dictators fear Iran. The Iranian system is somewhat resembling what their people would likely seek if allowed to choose.
Iran being a lively and prosperous example of an alternative system is much more dangerous to those dictators than any western "democracy" propaganda.
Sadly Arnold a lot of americans seem to be almost willfully ignorant of what is being done in their name,an example of this was one of the saddest and most sickening aftermaths of sept 11th,when it came to asking why did this happen? most americans seemed to be only too happy to accept bushs "they did it because they are jealous of our freedoms and our successes"I guess it was a lot easier to believe that they were innocent victims minding their own business hurting no one and then wham right out of the blue without any warning attacked by these cowardly fanatical islamists
B:
Democracy to me certainly does not mean Western democracy model.
Iran is clearly a democracy, and until Turkey settles and we see who ends up in control of foreign policy, I'm still calling Iran the most democratic nation in the Middle East.
Iran's democracy is theoretically imperfect because it is kind of a closed system - people in office can restrict who runs for office.
In practice, Iran is capable of adapting to any plausible consensus the Iranian people might reach.
The US injects a large amount of money and resources to the Egyptian political system. Without those injections, Egypt would immediately become more democratic.
Saudi Arabia is a colonial state administered by a corrupt dictatorial family. Without Israel though, its government would be an affront to US values and the US would offer moral and material support to reform movements instead of assistance in restraining such movements.
Anonymous:
Yes, it's not well understood in the US what is being done there. But the situations seems to me to be slightly better now, not much at all, but slightly better than it was ten years ago.
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