Initiatives
Sources
Murderers and Proud of it
February 2, 2004
By Robbie Friedmann
The Palestinians have long adopted the strategic approach that terror would lead
to a state. But now that establishment of a Palestinian state seems further
removed than after the issuance of the Roadmap, it is also clear they continue
to not miss any opportunity to miss an opportunity. Perhaps it is not a state
they are after. They could have had it decades ago and again in 2000 and had
they behaved - in 2005. Perhaps what they want is terror for the sake of terror.
Even if they do establish a state through terror it will be a state
for terror. They act of aspiring to ruin their enemy not out of being
despondent (“It’s
Aspiration, not Desperation: Understanding the Death Worship of the Palestinian
Suicide Bomber,” Itamar Marcus and Barbara Crook, Jerusalem Post, 29
January 2004).
This is best illustrated by using terror as a strategy - not merely as a tactic
- and it is evident throughout the world including currently in Iraq where
Israel is not a player and where Muslims kill more Muslims than anyone else.
Indeed, the culture of death that glorifies murder and genocide has very little
to do with territorial aspirations or with the Israeli-Palestinian dispute. It
has to do far more with the idealization of genocide that is caused by the
suicide of the perpetrator and by the idealization of death as a way of life and
this is not an oxymoron (“Contemporary
Islamist Ideology Permitting Genocidal Murder,” Yigal Carmon, MEMRI, Special
Report - Jihad & Terrorism Studies Project, 27 January 2004, No. 25).
Not all Palestinians are blowing $100,000 a month to live lavishly in Paris, as
Yasser Arafat’s wife is doing, and the corruption of the Palestinian leadership
does not mean the average Palestinian is corrupt. But it is also rather clear
that those who live in misery - economic, psychological, political and physical
- could point the finger at their leadership which has chosen terrorism over
diplomacy and a total rejection of any reasonable offer that could have
extricated them from their current predicament (“Palestinians’
Misery Self-inflicted by Refusal to Renounce Terrorism,” Craig Weiss,
Arizona Republic, 25 January 2004).
Instead, the average Palestinian is offering support to the leadership by
hailing suicide bombing and showing how proud they are of committing these
atrocious murders (“Suicide
Bomber’s Family is Proud,” Khaled Abu Toameh, The Jerusalem Post, 30
January 2004). Israel TV’s Channel 2 recently broadcast a special report on
terrorists jailed in Israel. One terrorist was featured who has a 500-year
sentence of several consecutive life terms. He responded to a reporter’s
question about him being a terrorist with an answer that Israelis are the
terrorists.
It is not just popular support that plays an important role in international
terrorism. Iran is now playing host to a terror convention while at the same
time it appears “in agreement” with general statements about the need to fight
terrorism (“Tehran
Terrorfest,” Amir Taheri, The New York Post, 26 January 2004): “The
other day at the World Economic Forum’s inaugural session at Davos, Switzerland,
Iran’s President Muhammad Khatami repeatedly nodded his head in approval as
forum founder Klaus Schwab called for the eradication of international
terrorism. In his own speech, Khatami called for a “dialogue of civilizations”
as an alternative to war and terror. Meanwhile, militants from some 40 countries
spread across the globe were trekking to Tehran for a 10-day “revolutionary
jamboree” in which “a new strategy to confront the ‘American Great Satan’ will
be hammered out.”
Moreover, the situation in Iraq is not necessarily motivated by remnants of the
Iraqi regime (“The
Jihad on Iraq: Bad analysis and bad policy” Michael Ledeen, National
Review, 26 January 2004): “Bad analysis leads inevitably to bad policy and
our narrow focus on Iraq costs lives. Widespread terrorism and political
demonstrations are not organized solely, or even primarily, by the shattered
remnants of Saddam’s Baathist regime, nor by the splintered pieces of al-Qaeda.
The war against us in Iraq and Afghanistan is an existential struggle guided,
funded and armed by tyrannical regimes in Iran, Syria and Saudi Arabia because
they are convinced - rightly enough - that if we succeed, they are doomed to
fall in a regional democratic revolution. Their plan, modeled on the strategy
that drove us out of Lebanon in the 1980s, was prepared long before we
attacked....The mullahs know their best chance for survival is to defeat us in
Iraq before we vigorously support their own people against them. Both our
national interest and our national values demand that we give that support -
political support, not further military action - now, before Iraq gets much
worse.”
This makes it abundantly clear - what should have been known for a long time -
that what is peace for us means war for them. What is freedom for us means
tyranny for them. And of course the opposite is true also. Hence negotiations
with states and with terrorists groups (which regrettably do take place) have to
take into account the absolute abuse of language by the terrorists and their
supporters. And that is why the word of Iran and that of Libya should not be
taken at face value except when they promise to kill. No amount of good will is
going to change the terrorists’ nature as the recent exchange of almost 500
terrorists for the bodies of three kidnapped and murdered Israeli soldiers -
under U.N. eyes - and one kidnapped businessman (“Israel
and Hizbullah Trade Prisoners and War Dead in Flights to and From Germany,”
Ian Fisher and Greg Myre, The New York Times, 30 January 2004) has
demonstrated. It only increases the insatiable appetite of the terrorists to
carry out more such attacks.
The terror attack in Jerusalem Thursday 22 January that murdered 11 and injured
50 proved the point once again. And for the umpteenth time U.S. Secretary of
State Colin Powell stated “this must stop” - if only the terrorists would have
taken him seriously. Israel has decided to deviate from tradition and actually
released a very graphic videotape of the bus attack (“Foreign
Ministry Releases ‘Bloody’ Bus Movie,” Tovah Lazaroff, The Jerusalem Post,
30 January 2004). This is a difficult clip to watch but it illustrates what one
only imagines happens. Perhaps it might achieve some effect on those who have
been too insensitive to the horrifying incidents as long as they happened to
others. Watch the bus bombing video
but expect some of the worse and most shocking images.
The brazenness of terrorist organizations goes way beyond perpetrating murder.
Now that Hamas - a key terrorist organization - is being weakened and is
threatened (even by its European supporters who outlawed it) it is ‘offering’
Israel a 10-year ‘cease-fire’ provided Israel withdraws from areas it captured
in the 1967 Six-Day War (“Hamas
Proposes Ten Year Truce for Israeli Pullback,” Reuters, Ha’aretz, 26
January 2004). Of course, this will not bring an end to Palestinian demands,
which proves time and again - for those who need such proof - that territories
captured in 1967 are not the problem but rather ANY territory Israel holds
constitutes a challenge for the Arabs to have it for themselves. The Hamas
leader clearly declares the temporary cease-fire will not bring an end to
the conflict and to Palestinian demands. That is one reason why all peace
advocates from Jimmy Carter to Thomas Friedman should cease discussing ‘peace’
and start talking about the end of conflict.
That is also a good reason why the highly ‘tooted’ Roadmap fails to strike up
the band these days. Actually, it appears as if the U.S. (and Israel) have given
up on the Roadmap altogether (“News
Analysis U.S. Folds Up Roadmap, Blaming the Palestinians,” Ron Kampeas, JTA,
Washington, 28 January 2004) as it seems to be banging its head against a
Palestinian brick wall of non-diplomatic cooperation on one hand and aggressive
terrorism on the other (“Middle
East Madness,” Editorial, Toronto Star, 30 January 2004).
Indeed, an Israeli analyst argues that the Roadmap was replaced by the vision of
George W. Bush articulated in the
24
June 2002 speech (“The
Day the Roadmap Died,” Aluf Benn, Ha’aretz, 29 January 2004). This is
a very encouraging development because it recognizes what was known for a long
time - that the Palestinians are not serious about peace and that rewarding
terrorism with a state - as was articulated in the Roadmap - was a grave error.
An Arab voice of reason was heard recently offering the right formula to fight
terrorism. This from Algeria’s ambassador to the U.S. (“Not
Enough to Fight Terrorism Locally,” Interview with Idriss Jazairy, The
Atlanta Journal-Constitution, 28 January 2004). Yet his country blocked a
U.N. Security Council vote to condemn the Jerusalem bus suicide bombing and the
U.N. Secretary general failed also to censure the act (“Israeli
Criticizes U.N. Chief on Reaction to Bus Attack,” Warren Hoge, The New
York Times, 31 January 2004).
The same ambivalent attitude is found in Jordan which urged a strong stand
against terrorism (“Jordan
Urges Arab Stand Against Suicide Bombings,” Associated Press, Ha’aretz,
25 January 2004) yet it is strenuously opposed to Israel’s security fence which
is increasingly (as it is still being built) proving to be a good barrier
against suicide bombing.
A new book on the intentions of Adolph Hitler - which is based on a second book
by Hitler published after his death - concludes that he actually laid out his
intention in a form of a strategic plan and that he indeed tried to execute it
(“Did
Hitlerism Die with Hitler? He Meant What He Said,” Omer Bartov; Hitler’s
Second Book: The Unpublished Sequel to Mein Kampf, By Adolf Hitler,
Edited by Gerhard L. Weinberg).
The author admits the information in the book is not new but the lesson is:
“This is a book that should be read, rather, by contemporary journalists,
political observers and all concerned people who have the stomach to recognize
evil when they confront it. For one of the most frightening aspects of Hitler’s
book is not that he said what he said at the time, but that much of what he said
can be found today in innumerable places: on Internet sites, propaganda
brochures, political speeches, protest placards, academic publications,
religious sermons, you name it. As long as it does not have Hitler’s name
attached to it, this deranged discourse will be ignored or allowed to pass. The
voices that express these opinions do not belong to a single political or
ideological current, and they are much less easy to distinguish than in the
1930s. They belong to the Right and the Left, to the religious and the secular,
to the West and the East, to the rabble and the leaders, to terrorists and
intellectuals, students and peasants, pacifists and militants, expansionists and
anti-globalization activists. The diplomacy advocated by Hitler is no longer
relevant, but his reason for it, his legitimization of his ‘worldview’ is alive
and kicking, and it may still kick us.”
Nowhere is Hitlerism - in both its expansionist and genocidal forms - as evident
as in the radical Islamist ideology of today, which is pervasive throughout the
world and not only in Islamic strongholds. We are now taking Osama bin Laden’s
threats very seriously, but not yet seriously enough the culture of expansion
and death promulgated by the Palestinians and their supporters throughout the
Arab and Islamic world. They do not only want a ‘living space’ (Lebensraum)
or to kill the ‘sub-human’ (Untermensch).
They want to destroy what is not theirs and to rule the world and paint it
green.
Indeed, some in Israel read the tea leaves correctly when interpreting action
and rhetoric that are so vehemently anti-Israeli (“Confront
the Evil,” Isi Leibler, The Jerusalem Post, 27 January 2004) and also
correctly point out that the “obscene level of anti-Jewish incitement is
comparable to the worst days of the Nazis in the early 1930s” but also that it
“is often said the attitude toward Jews is a litmus test for the level of
bigotry and intolerance in any given society.” This test shows a miserable
failure with regard to Israel as the world allows it to become not only attacked
but also demonized. This, instead of staunchly supporting the only democracy in
an area where official U.S. policy is to turn the former dictatorships and
monarchies into democracies.
But even some Arab condemnations of terrorism pale in comparison to the vitriol
they spew out against the leader of the battle against terrorism, namely
President George W. Bush. Arab press reactions to
President Bush’s
State of the Union Address (MEMRI, Special Dispatch - U.S. and the Middle
East, 30 January 2004, No. 652) is symptomatic of the mind-set that permeates
the Arab world. Bush is called a beater of ‘drums of war’ by the Saudis. The
Syrians define his achievements as “nothing but mistakes, errors and
catastrophes.” The Jordanian press - ironically and unintentionally - sets the
people of the Middle East apart from ‘mankind’ when stating that the Bush
address is “a tragedy not only for mankind, but for the peoples of the Middle
East.” The Palestinians became experts in logic stating that “Bush’s priorities
are illogical.” So did the Egyptian press when it stated “President Bush has
ceased to act with logic and common sense.” This is mainstream Arab journalism.
It represents the government line and hence is reflective of the immense gap
between the free West (particularly the U.S. and Israel) and the fixated
Arab/Muslim regimes - even those ‘friendly’ to the U.S. (and some who have peace
treaties with Israel).
For those criticizing the measures being taken against terrorism - particularly
those who state that they are exaggerated - the questions remain. How would they
explain such gaps in Arab statements? How would they explain such hatred? How
would they explain the actual terror and how would they explain the real threat?
They will in all likelihood be among the first to complain when the next terror
attack happens that not enough was done to protect us. The fight against
terrorism is not a sprint but a marathon and it still has a very long way to go.