OK, for years, people who claim to be my intellectual betters on foreign policy (and pretty much everything else), and particularly about the Middle East, have been telling me that the root cause of the problems in the Middle East is the “occupation” of disputed territories in the West Bank and Gaza, and that we won’t be able to make any progress without solving that issue. It is what motivates Arab anger, and animates their protests.
Well, surely if this is the case, with all of the apparent anger and ongoing revolt in Cairo, we should be seeing many reports on the ground of protesters with angry signs against the Zionist entity, right? Or have I just missed them somehow?
You forgot about our Imperialist take over of Iraq. Perhaps not the root root cause, but motivation for Arab anger.
I do wonder how much of the Muslim Brotherhood is funded from ransom payments paid to pirates in Somalia. Meh, probably no connection there…
Victor Davis Hanson has a pretty good summation which clears it all up over on PJ Media:
“What’s the Matter with Egypt?”
Essential points include the one where, in areas awash with petrodollars, people are kept poor and un-free. However these same people can get on the web and notice how other people have lots to eat and a bit of freedom. Allied with that is the misdirection the diktators utilize by blaming Israel, the Great Satan, and anyone other then themselves. Lastly the same diktators make a deal with the radicals: they will look the other way while the rads bomb away and blame Israel and the Great Satan….so long as the rads leave the diktators alone.
Not trying to claim to be one of your intellectual superiors or anything, but I think you may be setting up a bit of a strawman. When I’ve heard people use arguments similar sounding to the one you’re asking about it’s usually an explanation for why people in the Arab world are angry *at us* (and you left out the third reason beyond Israel and Iraq, and that would be that we prop up western-friendly thugocracies). I don’t think most of even leftist intellectuals would claim that all anger in the middle east aimed at anyone was caused by the Israeli occupation of Palestinian lands.
I wish the Egyptians luck, and have been keeping them in my prayers. They deserve far better than they’ve gotten for my entire lifetime, and I hope this situation leaves them freer and happier than they are today.
~Jon
“I don’t think most of even leftist intellectuals would claim that all anger in the middle east aimed at anyone was caused by the Israeli occupation of Palestinian lands.”
You would be mistaken. Walt and Mearsheimer, Goldstone, Finkelstein among others are quoted for their attacks on Israel and the “occupation” being the cause by the majority of the left. The President lets troop strength increase in Afghanistan yet keeps pressuring Israel on settlements and making concessions. Why?
Bill,
You mean that your interpretation of Walt, Mearsheimer, etc. Once again, I don’t think that the people you’re bashing actually hold the views you really wish they held. I could be wrong. I’m not a leftist intellectual (just a mostly right-leaning libertarian with a slight anti-militarist streak on the side) myself, so I can’t speak for them. But this argument smells of straw.
~Jon
I’d say you’re in the wrong barn. With all that has gone on in the middle east, why does the U.N. continually and mercilessly bash Israel? I would bet you a huge sum of money that within a 6 months, everyone will move on from Egypt and come back to those occupying Israelis.
‘You mean that your interpretation of Walt, Mearsheimer, etc.”
You have to be either obtuse or blind. The plain meaning of their words leaves no doubt where they stand. They have said as much on TV and radio. No less an Israeli basher than George Galloway has touted their “work”.
One difference is that Egypt doesn’t have oil. It needs a real economy.
The Palestinians are a carefully crafted flesh-and-blood rhetorical device usable by any aggrieved Arab or Muslim to hang just about any grievance upon. In the way that Arabs are, in general, waaaay up the does-not-play-well-with-others scale compared to the world of humanity at large, so the Palestinians are, even with respect to fellow Arabs.
Cultures of grievance require some downtrodden to complain about and the Palestinians are the perpetual prosecution Exhibit A. They are authentically oppressed, alright, but by their alleged Arab “brothers” and their own cynical elites; not by Israel.
The Palestinians have rarely been allowed to immigrate and naturalize in other Arab countries because the one place that did once allow them in – Jordan – had to fight a civil war to foil their attempt to usurp the sitting government. Thus, all doors are now closed to them. Within their own borders they have resolutely refused to make anything of what ground they have, preferring, instead, to nurse mesmeric fantasies of milk and honey once they have expropriated the Israelis.
The Egyptians now in the streets are looking out for themselves by seeking to force out their legitimately much-despised ruler. The “plight” of the Palestinians is not a matter at issue. The one policy of the Mubarak regime which seems unlikely to be altered by whatever sort of government eventually succeeds his Hosni-ness is ground-level antipathy to the Palestinians and continued refusal to let them into Egypt.