The New Middle East

First, let me say that I do not support or condone the actions of Hamas, Al Queda, Hizbollah or the Iraqi insurgency. Nor am I any fan of Saddam Hussein, which some modern day socialists are. His rule was no golden age of Iraq. He was a tyrant and not the smartest tack on the board, else he would have capitulated with the First Infantry Division on his border.

In the Washington Post of July 29th, Steven Cook rightly cautions against equating democracy with the rule of law necessary to conduct it in Lebanon and Palestine. He misses his own point, however, as part of the rule of law is accepting the results of democratic elections, especially if they reflect the will of the electorate. Also, to occupy another country where they hate you - or even a region of that country - and not expect an insurgency is hardly honoring the rule of law.

In the Post of August 23rd, Saad Eddin Ibrahim of The American Univeristy writes about "The New Middle East" Bush is Resisting. He hits the nail on the head where it comes to respecting the rights of elections we do not agree with.

If we and Israel respected the Palestinian election, there might not have been any kidnapping of Israeli soldiers and there would certainly be clear channels for negotiating for their release. As it is now, tensions can only increase.

If we had any respect for the rule of law, we would not have even tried to cobble together an artificial Iraq, but would have instead found a Sunni Arab nation or Turkey to occupy that portion where we really were not wanted, perhaps the Baathist Syria or the Hashemite Jordanians. Neither would have been opposed as we are, and in fact would and still could be looked upon as liberators from American tyranny. Many fear a civil war, which is silly since the civil war in Iraq has existed since and even before the first President Bush's administration provided aid and comfort to those who would overthrow Saddam. Such a war is more tribal than sectarian. As soon as we supported Saddams would be overthrowers, we entered the fray on their side. It is a truely clumsy act of dissembling to claim otherwise. See http://www.geocities.com/mikeybdc/Iraq.html for more information on both the Iraqi situtation and on American hegemony and the inadequacy of the UN.

On Hamas and Israel, the sad fact of the matter is that some form of government unfriendly to Israel is the natural outgrowth of years of occupation, detention and settlement. There are two hopes for peace in Israel, one is the creation of a Palestinian state, not as an Israeli colony but either an independent nation or a province of a larger Arab state (Palestine, Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Iraq and possibly Arabia) under a Hashemite constitutional monarchy. The other option is total annexation and full citizenship for Palestinians and Israeli Arabs. The latter would be necessary if the Tablets of the Law are to be returned by God and the Coptic Church to Israel (which seems to be a right wing hope in its quest for Armageddon). See http://www.geocities.com/xianleft_michael/Israel.html for more information on this.

Our involvement in this region has as much to do with the preservation of the defense industrial complex. If we are ever to break free of this we need to redirect our defense industry to the peaceful exploration of space and transform our alliance to an allied government, which as I say in the Iraq essay, is necessary given the current American overreach and the resentment among our allies that George Bush is behaving as if he were king of the world, which our international treaties actually make him.