21 mars 2002

By courtesy of Micky S.


The administration's policy in the Middle East just took a dramatic turn in the wrong direction. This turn at once marks a concession to terrorism and a violation of principle.

Just as Israel was defending itself from unremitting, unbearable terror, President Bush stated that what Israel was doing -- targeting terrorists and militarily occupying the land they were coming from -- was "not helpful." As this paper reported, "[T]he State Department urged a complete withdrawal from all Palestinian cities and refugee camps retaken in the withering
two-week crackdown." The New York Times reported that "Secretary of State Colin L. Powell had delivered a blunt private demand to Prime Minster Ariel Sharon to withdraw from the Palestinian-controlled areas to help American efforts to broker a cease-fire."

Until now, many of us who venerate democracy over dictatorship and decency over terror found welcome relief in President Bush's Middle East policies. Unlike his predecessor, he had refused to bestow upon Yasser Arafat the mantle of a responsible state actor, to bring Arafat to the White House and to pressure the democratic state of Israel to make concessions to the dictatorial Palestinian Authority. President Bush was seen as the most pro-Israel president in recent memory and thus as the one most supportive of democracy in the Middle East.

We seem to have forgotten that Palestinians celebrated in the streets on Sept. 11. Many in the Arab world understand what our Department of State does not: America's fate and Israel's fate are one and the same. Both countries are democracies. Both respect religious and ethnic diversity in citizenship. Both allow their citizens -- we could call them the "democratic street" -- to determine their political and economic policies. Both countries boast a thriving commitment to freedom of speech and press.

No such things can be said of the Arab nations, some of which are our allies, some of which are not. And while Palestinians celebrated the slaughter on Sept. 11, Israel lowered its flags.

Last September the United States was forced to deal with what Israel had been dealing with since its founding in 1948. Yet, if Israel concluded that the U.S. war against terrorism was responsible for the escalation of suicide bombings in Israel and asked the United States to refrain from its campaign in Afghanistan and withdraw its troops, we would be shocked and would refuse to do so. The United States has a right to defend itself and to root out those who would kill as many civilians as possible. Israel, our fellow democracy, has that same right -- and let us not forget that those who would destroy us are those who would destroy Israel, too.

A message has been reiterated with this recent turn in policy. It was first sent in 1991, when the United States asked Israel not to defend itself after Saddam Hussein launched Scud missiles at it during our liberation of Kuwait. The message was sent again when Arafat was given the respectability of multiple visits to the White House shortly after he allied himself with Hussein in the Gulf War. The message is this: Jewish blood is cheap. Kill civilians, expand suicide bombings, and you will be rewarded: Terrorism works. The message may not be deliberate, but it is tragically clear.

Israel is being pressured so that we can assuage countries such as Egypt and Saudi Arabia. Yet, it just so happens that those countries are responsible for the reappearance of the worst forms of anti-Jewish propaganda since Joseph Goebbels. A recently published Saudi government newspaper article
claimed the Jewish holiday of Purim requires that "Jewish people must obtain human blood so that their clerics can prepare the holiday pastries. . . . [This] is a well-established fact, historically and legally, all throughout history." A recent Egyptian government daily claimed a Palestinian suicide bombing at a Jerusalem cafe was "heroic."

Meanwhile, Arafat has allowed the continued operation of Hamas in the West Bank and Gaza as well as the growth of the suicidal Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades. His Fatah emblem covers the entire state of Israel with two rifles and a grenade. Israeli control of the West Bank and Gaza Strip is not the problem for the Arabs. Democracy is the problem. Israel's existence anywhere is the problem. Jews are the problem. This was not supposed to happen again. The world, we thought, would long note what the long march of Jewish blood libels, mixed with the ceding of land to dictators, caused.

We pressure Israel and make no demands on our Arab allies to cease the dissemination of medieval, terror-inspiring propaganda. Instead, the president appeased Saudi Arabia by inviting Crown Prince Abdullah to visit him at his home in Texas -- as if we owe the Saudis any favors, as if they don't owe us a great many explanations. And we are beginning to, yet again, bestow respectability on Arafat.

The Arabs' conclusion? Speak platitudes in English, foment terrorism in Arabic, and the United States will apply pressure to fellow democracies over and against those who rule by bullets rather than ballots. These lessons in double standards bode tragic for democracy, not just here at home or in Israel, but across the globe.

The writer is co-director of Empower America and author of the
forthcoming book "Why We Fight: Moral Clarity and the War on
Terrorism."