Russian version
Ancient Lies No Basis for a Policy
- Информация о материале
- Автор: Jonathan Tobin
Saddam's words and Arafat document illustrate the distorted visions
of a region
Jewish World Review Jan.
3, 2007 / 13 Teves, 5767
Two seemingly unrelated events in the waning days and hours of 2006
pretty much summed up everything you need to know about the Arab-Israeli
conflict.
Their meaning can be characterized simply: The Arab world's obsession
with eradicating the State of Israel and the West's willingness to deceive
itself about the character of Arab leaders and their intentions both are
based on lies.
The more famous of the two events was the hanging of deposed Iraqi
dictator Saddam Hussein. In his final moments before he got his just desserts,
the doomed Iraqi once again played the card that he and other Arab despots
have always used with impunity: Israel.
Thus, among his final comments on the gallows came this declaration:
"Palestine is Arab!"
Why invoke this cause with his last breath? Because even at that moment
he still thought it worth a try to deflect discussion of his comeuppance
to that of the conflict with Israel.
ALL-PURPOSE EXCUSE
The Arab world has used the fight against Zionism as an excuse for
every problem that exists within their societies. Whether it is the domination
of tyrants like Saddam or the lack of economic progress and the rest of
the standards by which they lag behind the West, the answer is always the
same: It would be different if only there were no Israel.
That this thesis is nonsense has been no deterrent to its frequent
use. This diversionary tactic is so deeply ingrained in the culture of
the Arab world that it is routinely repeated not just by spokesmen for
the regimes that run roughshod over their own people but also by their
intellectuals and would-be reformers who ought to know better.
By focusing on the external enemy — and a state ruled by a despised
minority of dhimmi Jews at that — the Arabs have given themselves as well
as their leaders a ready-made excuse for all of their failures.
Though he spent his career terrorizing his own people, Saddam was always
careful to pose as a pan-Arab anti-Zionist. When his troops were evicted
from Kuwait in 1991 with little resistance on the part of his army, it
was no surprise that he used his SCUD missiles to attack Israel. Though
Israel had nothing to do with Saddam's looting of Kuwait and was excluded
from the international coalition organized to oppose him by the first President
Bush, it was imperative for him to make it appear as if Israel was actually
a belligerent in that war.
This earned him the cheers of Palestinians, who took to their rooftops
to cheer the missiles headed for Tel Aviv. He reinforced that impression
with his subsequent payments to the families of Palestinian suicide bombers.
But this was, like everything else he did, a lie. Like the rest of
the Arab world, Iraq did nothing useful for the Palestinians other than
to encourage them to continue in a pointless war. But by doing so, he deflected
criticism from Muslims who still prefer to embrace canards about the Jews
rather than to examine their own faults. And by saying "Palestine" before
the trap door opened, Saddam gave Arabs another excuse to ignore the truth
about the campaign to remove his regime.
All this also helps to feed the fallacy — still widely believed in
the West — that the Arab-Israeli dispute is the source of all the region's
problems. But as Saddam's life and death proved, intra-Arab warfare and
atrocities have little to do with the Jews.
Another event that was received with far less fanfare took place only
days before Hussein's death. It was the release of a 33-year-old classified
document by the United States State Department. It confirmed what had long
been rumored: that the late Palestinian Liberation Organization leader
Yasser Arafat personally ordered the murders of two kidnapped American
diplomats in March 1973.
Members of a PLO-front group called "Black September gunned down the
two, Cleo Noel, U.S. ambassador to Sudan, and the embassy's Charge d'Affaires
George Moore, along with Guy Eid, a Belgian envoy, in cold blood." The
supposed separate identity of the group — which was also responsible for
the 1972 massacre of 11 Israeli Olympic athletes in Munich — from that
of Arafat's Fatah was a cover story intended to separate the Palestinian
mainstream from its more egregious crimes.
Arafat denied any role in these murders to the day of his own death
in 2004. Though he was the godfather of modern terror, he sought to burnish
his mythical image as a statesman to the West. But this was nothing compared
to the self-deception of Western governments who knew better, particularly
the employers of Noel and Moore, the United States State Department.
Though the Sudan murders were invoked by critics of America's policy
of engagement of Arafat throughout the era of the Oslo peace process, the
State Department always denied there was any proof of Arafat's direct involvement.
But, as the document released late last month proved, this denial was as
brazen a falsehood as any ever uttered by the Palestinians. In fact, the
National Security Agency had intercepted a transmission from Arafat's headquarters
in Beirut to Khartoum, Sudan, ordering the murders of the Americans.
EVIDENCE OF MURDER
Thus, even though the United States had in its possession direct evidence
of his responsibility for the murder of two its diplomats, Arafat not only
was never charged with these crimes but also enjoyed the hospitality of
the White House more than any other foreign leader during the Clinton administration.
Yet with Arafat now as dead as Noel and Moore, is there any point in
rehearsing this sorry chapter of history? Yes, because the State Department
cover-up of this crime (a whitewash that ought to have prompted at least
a fraction of the outrage that the contemporaneous Watergate cover-up did)
was an act of policy.
It was important to generations of American diplomats and their political
masters not to publish the truth about Arafat because they believed making
deals with him was more important than combating terror. Their subversion
of justice was for a cause they thought to be nobler than justice for slain
Americans — peace. And in the name of this illusion a long list of cabinet
secretaries and a president of the United States willfully ignored not
only the lies that Arafat told during peace talks but abandoned their duty
to apprehend and punish a terrorist.
Hussein's last words and the Arafat transcript both illustrate how
lies told by Arab despots have been abetted by the lies of their willing
dupes. Those willing to embrace future deceptions, whether on the part
of "moderates" such as Mahmoud Abbas (Arafat's longtime deputy) or his
"extremist" Hamas rivals, would do well to study both incidents and realize
that a peace will never be built upon falsehoods.
© 2005, Jonathan Tobin
Russian version
Russian version
An introduction to MAOF
Haim Goldman
Haim Goldman
Dear Friends,
Would you believe that the undersigned has anything in common with
-- Professor Victor Davis Hanson (Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University),
-- Dr Charles Krauthammer, (Washington Post, Time, The Weekly Standard),
-- Caroline Glick (Deputy Managing Editor of the Jerusalem Post),
-- Jonathan Tobin (Executive Editor of the Philadelphia Jewish Exponent).
Amazingly, the editors of the MAOF website decided that the missives of the undersigned are worthy of translation and posting along the articles written by these distinguished authors.
The first letter was published without the consent of the undersigned.
However, after thorough examination of the laudable attitude of MAOF and of the excellent contents of the website, the undersigned had most graciously granted his permission for publication of his missives in both English and Russian.
“Analytical Group MAOF” [1] is an organisation founded about ten years ago by Russian-speaking Jewish intellectuals. The attitude of MAOF is definitely pro-Zionist -- unambiguously and unapologetically.
One of MAOF’s primary purposes is providing information and analysis about Middle-Eastern and world affairs as well as about Israel’s history, values and dilemmas. In addition to extensive publication activity in various media, MAOF also organises excursions and seminars. While the vast majority of the contents of the MAOF website is in Russian, texts originally written in English are provided in the original [2] as well as in Russian.
There are arguably about 250 millions of Russian-speakers worldwide and many of them do not read English. The indisputable motivation for the author’s permission was to grant those millions of disadvantaged people the grand benefit of reading the author’s ruminations. If the author is ever maliciously accused that his tacit motivation for authorising the publication was his craving to be listed along with the above-mentioned distinguished writers, his plea will definitely be “nolo contendere”.
The editors of MAOF expressed their gratitude by granting the undersigned a privilege that no other author got – the opportunity to review and correct the Russian translation before publication. The original letters of the undersigned are at [3] and their Russian version is at [4]. At of today, only two letters are posted but several other letters are pending translation.
You are kindly ENCOURAGED TO RECOMMEND the MAOF website to your friends and colleagues worldwide, particularly those who speak Russian. Those who do not enjoy the benefit of proficiency in the exquisite Russian language can find many thought-provoking and inspiring articles about Middle-Eastern and world affairs in the English section [2].
Sincerely,
Haim Goldman
28.10.2006
REFERENCES:
[1] http://maof.rjews.net
[2] section.php3? sid=37&num=25
[3] authorg.php3? id=2107&type=a
[4] authorg.php3? id=2166&type=a