The Arabs' new friends (ULTRA BARF)

Jerusalem Post ^ | Mar. 10, 2004 | Larry Derfner

[Alouette]

Right-wingers have been telling me for years that I'm na ve about the Arabs – that they'll never make peace with Israel, that their hatred for Jews is in their culture, their history, their religion, their blood. You can't trust them, give 'em an inch and they'll take a mile, blah blah blah.

Now, in the last couple of years, a lot of these same right-wingers tell me that not only can we make peace with the Arabs, but that the Arab countries, as well as the Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza, can become democratic.

And if I doubt that, they add, I'm a racist. Something is out of whack here. The Likudniks and Republicans, who have the lowest opinion of the Arabs, are also claiming to have the highest aspirations for them.

I think there's an explanation: Some of these people are just outright lying, and the others are in serious denial of their true beliefs.

What evidence can they point to for their optimism about the prospects of democracy in the Arab Middle East? The Iraqis who went wild over Saddam's downfall? I'm very happy and relieved for those Iraqis; they suffered horribly and thank God they don't have to worry about Saddam anymore, but I'm sorry – their opposition to Saddam doesn't necessarily make them lovers of democracy.

Despite what President Bush seems to think, a democrat is not somebody who just wants to be free; a democrat is somebody who also wants his political opponents to be free. But nobody is really going to want his political opponents to be free if he's convinced that their freedom will mean the end of his own, and in the Arab Middle East this is a wholly justified fear. It's the guiding principle of politics in the region, which is why Arab democracy has never gotten off the ground.

Bush and his supporters say the Iraqi Governing Council's agreement on an interim constitution this week is a milestone on their country's road to democracy. Every nation wants democracy, according to Bush's post-9/11 doctrine – the Iraqis do, all the Arabs of the Middle East do.

It's only their tyrannical leaders who've led them astray, and once the tyranny is lifted, they can be shown how to live in freedom and tolerance which, because they are human, is their natural inclination.

This is an old American conceit: We have nothing against those people, it's only their leaders and the system they've built that we're fighting against. It's a way of making war seem friendly, good-natured, American.

And in the case of Bush's doctrine, it's also a way of envisioning a happy ending – another American favorite – to the political disaster movie that is the Arab Middle East. God, if that place is just going to keep getting worse, if the only change is from Nasserism to Khomeinism to bin Ladenism, what's next?

When reality gets too bleak for Israelis, they say, "Yihyeh tov" – "It's gonna be fine." When the Middle East gets too bleak for neoconservatives, they say, Yihyeh democratia.

But look at what's happening. Look at the sorts of alternatives the Arabs of the Middle East are really choosing.

FOR INSTANCE, look at Gaza. Israel intends to give it to the Palestinians, to let them run the show themselves. And who are the local Palestinian Authority tyrants struggling against, for popular support? The Jefferson-Lincoln Club of Gaza? No, Hamas.

A lot of people people think that once Arafat goes, the scales will fall from the Palestinians' eyes and they'll find a more conciliatory leader – somebody better for Israel and themselves both. But as hostile toward Israel as Arafat has been, can anyone name a prominent Palestinian figure, somebody with true popular support, who has been less so? There is none. Abu Mazen was the Americans' man, not the Palestinians'. The only real competition Arafat and Fatah have ever had is from Hamas, Islamic Jihad, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, and the other "rejectionist front" groups.

The same basic situation holds true in Syria. The only serious rival for popularity the Assad family's Ba'ath dictatorship ever faced was from violent Islamic radicals. Ditto for Mubarak's regime in Egypt. In Jordan, the Hashemite kings have always been far more moderate toward Israel than their Palestinian nationalist and Islamic militant opposition.

The truth is that several Arab dictatorships are repressing their people's clamor for war with Israel or Islamic revolution. So far, none has been found repressing a popular desire for anything that could be called democracy.

Liberals don't like to talk about this because they're afraid of being called racists.

Right-wingers know this about liberals, of course, which is why they can go on singing about Arab democracy (while daydreaming about future invasions) with little interruption.

But you don't have to be a racist to look at the Arab Middle East and decide that democracy isn't an option here.

Despite what a couple of the more candid Likudniks have said recently, the problem is not in the Arabs' genes. Until the advent of Islamic militancy in the last generation, Arabs who moved to the West had no problem becoming democrats. As Bill Clinton once said of the Palestinians, they've "prospered everywhere they've lived in the world – except Palestine."

Although I took Clinton's point as further proof that the Middle East is cursed, he meant it optimistically – that inside, the Palestinians have what it takes to be a free nation with better things to do than fight. It was just the sort of idealistic, starry-eyed remark about the Arabs that Republicans and Likudniks once felt free to snigger over.

The writer is a veteran journalist.

[Alouette]

The writer is a veteran journalist.

That's a polite way of saying he is a senile old fart.

[Alouette]

FRmail me to be added or removed from this Judaic/pro-Israel ping list.

WARNING: This is a high volume ping list

[cripplecreek]

"The writer is a veteran journalist"


So is Andy Rooney.

Any questions?

[usurper]

But you don't have to be a racist to look at the Arab Middle East and decide that democracy isn't an option here.

Spoken like a true liberal defeatist. So if democracy is not an option I am sure he would prefer the lighter touch of a nice wholesome socialist like Fidel.

[Steve_Seattle]

What this "liberal" won't admit is that he no longer believes in democracy, even for us. That's why he can't get excited about the prospect of democracy in the Middle East.

[Alouette]

Larry is a socialist elitist. He never believed in democracy.

[aynrandfreak]

Something is out of whack here. The Likudniks and Republicans, who have the lowest opinion of the Arabs, are also claiming to have the highest aspirations for them.

He's got it backwards. The Laborniks and Dems who claim to have the highest opinion of the Arabs, don't believe that they are good enough for democracy/constitutionalism.

[EAGLE7]

The writer claims we can't help Arabs? That they choose tyranny and terrorism over freedom? Imagine someone saying that we can't help African-Americans, that they choose crime, welfare and cruelty to each other as a way of life? Imagine someone saying that.

[Democratshavenobrains]

a democrat is not somebody who just wants to be free; a democrat is somebody who also wants his political opponents to be free.

If this is true, then most Democrats aren't democrats.

[dinok]

"a democrat is not somebody who just wants to be free; a democrat is somebody who also wants his political opponents to be free"

One thing I have noticed about some on both the left and right is how they think its great to live in democracy, but how others are incapable of it. Its a form of snobbery that some of us that have lived under dictators find abhorrent. Its the political version of "let them eat cake". I see liberals who side with left-wing dictatorships like Cuba as much as I see conservatives who side with China because businesses can manufacture their products there with cheap Chinese labor: most of it forced and under terrible conditions. One thing I remember from my days under the Greek dictatorship in the late 60's was the hope that someplace somewhere someone would help us be free again. I hear from some "why don't 'those people' just rebel and get their own freedom.?" Easier said than done...unlike the America of the 1700's most people under a dictatorship have no arms, no ready militias and are spied on and threatened by governments that murder anyone to stay in power.

The Europeans are especially guilty of this. With the exception of the British, the rest of them owe their current freedom to the American boys who gave their lives to rid the place of Hitler and later on the communists.

Arabs suffer from two social ailments. One is the radical religious zealots that have perverted their society and teach hate of anyone other than Muslims on religious grounds. The other is their dictatorial governments that use Anti-Israeli and Anti-US propaganda to control them. The social acceptance of violence and terrorism to achieve political means is polluting the Arab culture. That cultural disease needs a cure...a counter balance. it needs our support and commitment. Not the acrimonious hand ringing and old school Anti-Americanisms by the lefties like this reporter.

[Pan_Yans Wife]

ping

[Teacher317]

The problem is that he starts with a fallacy... we don't say that Arabs cannot be peaceful. We merely assert that Arab dictatorships and militants cannot.

Once those groups are thoroughly conquered, Arabs are rather pleasant! ;^)

[Steve_Seattle]

Very well said, especially your final paragraph.

[SevenofNine]

Dubya I know you mean well but Arabs dont' want peace why they teach their kids to hate Jews and Infidels HELLO

Wake up and smell the s**** Dubya you are from Texas that mean you are rancher they don't

[MonroeDNA]

Actually, I found the article to be not bad at all.

Democracy is a high ideal, and savages cannot fathom it.

Backwards religeons, like Muslim, produce savages. They stone you, cut your throat, suicide bomb you, and love to rape your women, if they are not believrs of the cult.

They are savages, sitting on oil. With the exception of Persia (Iran), tey are stone age.

[dinok]

"savages"...

Great thinking...let's condemn the entire culture like some of them do. The key here is to give the Arab culture an alternative to what they have seen all their lives...Islamic and Arabic hate, isolationism and superiority.

They may turn it away...but they will have been given a choice.
Bush made a mistake in advocating this roadmap thing. Its a pipe dream. Arafat and Hammas need to be ground in to dust. Any peace can only be made after that.
But before the Iraqis decided to play ball, they had to be defeated. The Palestinians are not defeated...big mistake to let them think they can push Israel around.

Sharron should not be surrendering to them. No nation can achieve peace with an adversary who still is advocates the destruction of that nation.

[MonroeDNA]

I have no problem condemming the entire culture. Religeous rule, complete with stonings, hands cut off, etc., needs to be condemmed, whole heartedly. Or maybe a wall should get pushed over on me.

Savages.

[tubavil]

NPR "senior news analyst," Daniel Schorr...