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Facts and Logic About
the Middle East
P.O. Box 590359
San Francisco, CA 94159
(415) 356-7801 |
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October 26, 2004
Dear
Friend of FLAME:
The more we hear about beheadings and other bizarre executions in Iraq,
the cold-blooded murders of Russian schoolchildren, to say nothing of
decades of terrorist killings of Israeli innocents, the more freakish
the values of Arab culture seem. The disparity in values, at least between
radical Islam and Western culture seem unfathomable and unbridgeable.
Suicide bombers tell us proudly that they are unstoppable, that they
will win because we in the West love life and they for the sake of Allah
love death. And where are the voices of protest against this barbaric,
life-destroying creed from so-called moderate Islam? Until recently
they have been nearly silent, perhaps fearing reprisal from their fanatical
brethren, perhaps in a state of moral confusion. The article below,
by Farid Ghadry, President of the Reform Party of Syria, offers a refreshingly
bold, rational and self-critical perspective. In it, Ghadry issues a
daring wake-up call to the Arab and radical Islamic world. He contrasts
the objective achievements of Israel, even while under siege, with the
Era of Despair and moral bankruptcy that the Arab world has embraced.
One can only hope that Ghadry lives to herald this reality check far
and wide and to see his banner of reason taken up by other enlightened
Arabs and non-Arab Muslims.
Best regards,
Jim Sinkinson
Director, FLAME
Israel cultivates Nobel laureates, Arabs cultivate
suicide bombers
Israel Insider, October 18, 2004
by Farid Ghadry
The news this week that two Israeli scientists, in addition to an American,
won the Nobel Prize in chemistry, should be read with interest in the
Arab world.
This win says a lot about the state of affairs of the Middle East. While
Israel builds its future with Nobel laureates, the Arab world fills
its future with suicide bombers. Ever since the inception of the State
of Israel, Arabs have had this romantic notion that through wars and
revenge we can return to our past glory.
Of course, they don't tell us which past they are referring to. Was
it when we were governed by the Ottoman Empire or by England and France?
Or was it more like 1,300 years ago when spears ruled the battleground?
Ever since 1967, Arabs from all countries -- but especially Syria, Jordan,
Lebanon, and Egypt -- have lived this fantasy that we can throw the
Israelis to the sea. With the 1973 near-win against Israel, Arabs concluded
that one more loss is not reason enough to stop and think. One more
loss, with so many lives lost on both sides, is not enough for us to
understand that the continued struggle is destroying us from within.
Even after Anwar Sadat came to understand the value of peace and co-existence,
it seemed that more and more of our energies were diverted toward destruction.
The downfall of the Soviet Union, the longtime ally of the Arab world,
seemed to spur us to seek justice with the barrel of a gun rather than
through pragmatic understanding.
The Oslo Accords produced a willing Israel and exposed fraudulent Palestinians.
Again, we watched as Arab leaders mounted a campaign of deceit to divert
our attention away from our own oppression. We, the obedient Arab sheep,
followed. We carried banners, objected, revolted and in the end, we
created a new cadre of school children with strong arms to throw stones
but without the education and discipline -- no brains to produce Nobel
prizes.
Ever since the Intifada, a term that truly spurns our sense of justice,
we have achieved the lowest point of our self-esteem. Arab children
that throw stones seem to feel an invisible power that is not available
to the children of the State of Israel. That power to revolt consequently
pre-disposes to a low self-esteem, which inevitably helps to build the
mentality of a suicide bomber.
Suicide bombers feel nothing, understand little, and cannot see the
future. They go on automatic pilot with the brain functioning as a guiding
tool to self-destruct literally, as a person and against the society
that developed them. Suicide bombers represent the lowest of our self-esteem
as people of Arab descent.
We are in an Intifada, but it is one that is seen through the eyes of
the Israeli Nobel laureates. We, as people of the Middle East, are dying
and we cannot even feel it. We have reached the bottom and we do not
even know it.
Because of oppressive regimes that give us no chance to think for ourselves,
we have no hope, no future, and certainly no Nobel prizes in science
awaiting us. What very few people know is that an Intifada is also attributed
to the last movement by a human body upon death.
Could that be this understanding of Intifada that is the true symbol
of a struggle that should have ended long ago? All Arabs are in an Intifada,
still moving yet not truly alive as citizens of the world.
Every time the Syrian Ba'athists call for armed resistance, secretly
support groups like Hezbollah and Hamas, and propagandize Arab unity,
we fall further and further into oblivion. The funny thing is that very
few Arabs care to understand why we do not have Nobel laureates.
They blame it on Imperialism and Zionism. In their minds, absent these
two forces, we could be raking in those Nobel prizes. So while Israel
survives Intifadas, wars, hate, and oppressive Arab rulers, we, the
Arab people, must wake-up.
If we pursue the same policies that drove us to the lowest point in
our history (Asr al-Inhitat or Era of Despair as opposed to Asr al-Jahyliah
or Era of Ignorance that preceded Prophet Mohammed), only we lose. If
we listen to our rulers, we will always be kneeling on the sideline
watching Nobel prize winners produced by the Middle East -- but not
by us or for us.
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