What if YOU were a young
Palestinian?
By
Andrew
Alexander
8th April 2009
The easiest thing
to do with terrorists is to rage at them. Or to
declare, mindlessly, that we must strengthen 'the
war on terrorism'. Both are moral self-indulgence
and mental idleness.
We should be
trying to get into the minds of those committing
such acts, those supporting them and those who might
yet be drawn in. The starting point is inevitably
the Middle East, pulsating with millions of
refugees, the raw material of terrorism.
Suppose that you are a young man
living in Gaza, dominated by refugees or their
descendants whose original homeland was what is now
Israel. You may well have been brought up on
stories, sometimes exaggerated, of a home where your
forebears lived in security.
A young
Palestinian boy: There will be no curb to
terrorism until we stop waging wars on Muslim
countries (file photo)
With squalid conditions in the
refugee camps and little hope of good education or
employment, your frustration and rage is easily
directed at Israel, the U.S. as its relentless
backer and probably us, too, as Washington's
poodle like allies.
Or maybe you live in the West
Bank, once part of Palestine. Since the 1967 war,
Israel has left the West Bank littered with 600
checkpoints which divide even families.
This side of the border you will
see ever-growing Israeli settlements. The details of
the sheer illegality and subterfuge involved are
readily provided by the protesting Jewish
organisation Peace Now ( www.peacenow.org).
Our young Palestinian will also
remember so painfully Israel's punitive expedition
against Gaza supposedly to crush the governing
party, Hamas, whose military wing launched sporadic,
but not very effective, rockets on Israel.
Yet this only begins to touch on
the millions in the Middle East with deep
grievances.
The deaths
resulting directly or indirectly from the Iraq
invasion are put by reputable researchers at around
the million mark (more than we suffered in World War
II).
Nearly five million were forced
from their homes, either fleeing abroad or to safe
places in Iraq.
The breakdown in public services
caused by the West's sanctions on Iraq after the
First Gulf War also led to hundreds of thousands of
deaths. And we have not even touched on the deaths
in the Lebanon interventions, particularly after
Israel's attack to 'crush' the extremist Hezbollah.
Significantly, Hamas and Hezbollah
had electoral triumphs following Israeli attacks.
In Afghanistan, refugees from the
Taliban have had to face returning to a land where
the seven-year war against the invader has
reinvigorated that awful organisation.
Throughout the Middle East, tales
can be heard of relatives or friends who have fallen
victim to the U.S. and its allies, including Israel,
over recent decades, often accompanied by grim
details about trigger-happy U.S. troops, ideal
villains.
Our young man in Gaza or the West
Bank grows up dangerously full of frustration and
anger. His religion seems a stabilising force in an
unstable world.
For our part, Christianity has
long had its own revered martyrs. Your local church
may be dedicated to one. We should beware the fact
that Islam has an entrenched appeal to martyrdom.
Those with deep
grievances, actual or inherited, number many
millions. Just think about the scale of this. There
are about 300 million Muslim Arabs (plus Iran).
Pakistan, now being drawn into the conflict, adds
many more.
If only a tiny fraction takes the
Jihadist path, we face a formidable and, alas,
growing host. Can we be surprised that Islamic
extremists find no difficulty in recruitment?
We are very stupid - as stupid
as Chamberlain at Munich - to ignore the scale or
nature of the menace.
There will be no curb to terrorism
until we stop waging wars on Muslim countries and,
even more, until the problem of the Arab-Israeli
conflict is ended or at least ameliorated.
Washington holds all the levers.
It is the source of huge economic and military aid
to Israel. President Clinton nearly achieved a
settlement, but was balked at the last moment by the
then Palestinian leadership.
At least he tried. Other
presidents have declined to pressure Israel into the
necessary concessions and Britain's efforts has
amounted to little more than pious pleading.
Of course, the
Zionist lobby in the U.S. and elsewhere is powerful.
In the American case, Jewish Zionism is augmented by
various Evangelical Churches that excitedly grasp at
the state of Israel as fulfiling Old Testament
prophecies.
In the propaganda battle here as
in the U.S., Zionists are adept at playing the anti-Semitic
card, so familiar to fair-minded journalists. The
BBC in particular is easily scared.
Developments within Israel are
grim. Its crazy system of proportional
representation gives every loony some power in
coalition governments. Hence we have the notorious
extremist Avigdor Lieberman in the post of Foreign
Minister.
Israeli organisations such as
Peace Now, which once organised a 400,000-strong
demonstration against the Lebanon intervention in
1982, face an uphill battle. Yet the chance for
peace does not depend on Israeli political
manoeuvring.
President Obama
has the real, unquestionable power to impose a
settlement. How hard he tries affects everybody,
particularly us.
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