War Again
The Middle East is burning again. In a show of force which seems incongrous with the situation, certainly more aggressive than anything our own country has done in recent memory when three of its citizens, civilian or military, were held hostage in an attempted exchange, Israel is on the move.
I don't know much about the middle east, but I know something about our own President's behavior, and most of what I know, as I've said before, I don't like. The current adminstration is dangerous enough, with a middle-east on the edge of war, God help us all. There is no way the Palestinians can be kept in poverty, without opportunity or a humane living environment, that we can expect this decades-long crisis to end. Both the Israelis and the Palestinians deserve a nation to live in, and I don't think either side wants the other side to have one. Certainly, Israel, with its greater resources, isn't doing much, if anything, to solve the poverty problems in the Palestinian community. By no means do I support the regular suicide bombings inside Israel. By absolutely no means. The cycle of abuse, as Martin Luther King says, continues as violence, oppression, revenge and stubbornness fail to solve a single piece of the tragic mess.
I do see we just vetoed a resolution critical of Israel in the security council, the only nation to do so. Does this have anything to do with Bush's black and white approach to Christianity and the Bible in particular, or rather, to the naive approach of the larger fundmentalist communities and leaders he allows to inform him? I admit I know little about the resolution, but I do know Bush has fundamentalist advisors close to him, men (of course men) who view Israel as still priviledged as a nation in God's eyes, the chosen people still, regardless of their foreign policy.
If I had the money, I'd move to France and live next door to Johnny Depp. We could drink Beaujolais, talk about rational politics, maybe I could turn him onto Patrick O'Brian. We could discuss the deeper mythos of P2, for something is certainly going on with Davy Jones.
Or maybe I'd like Durham, the apparently intelligent Christian locale I've been drooling over in BW3's blog.
Right now, I feel like anyplace but here. As the Iraq war continues, atrocities surface from time to time, the historically common result whenever young men are given guns and then sat them down in a country, especially when they themselves are targets. Bush, Cheney, Wolfowitz, Rumsfeld...all four misjudged the situation and somehow, unbelievably, were re-elected by a naive American body politic.
I know I have friends who voted for and still support Bush. I am sorry if I've hurt anyone's feelings. But right now I'm scared, scared for my 14 year old son in five years, scared for this country, embarrassed of how we appear to the rest of the world. Whatever one thinks of Hillary Clinton, she did say this administration was 'one of the worst.' History, most likely, will say the same. Grandchildren will ask me about Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib, the Iraq war and how it connected to 9/11. What will I say?
Praying the the violence in the middle east diffuses.
I don't know much about the middle east, but I know something about our own President's behavior, and most of what I know, as I've said before, I don't like. The current adminstration is dangerous enough, with a middle-east on the edge of war, God help us all. There is no way the Palestinians can be kept in poverty, without opportunity or a humane living environment, that we can expect this decades-long crisis to end. Both the Israelis and the Palestinians deserve a nation to live in, and I don't think either side wants the other side to have one. Certainly, Israel, with its greater resources, isn't doing much, if anything, to solve the poverty problems in the Palestinian community. By no means do I support the regular suicide bombings inside Israel. By absolutely no means. The cycle of abuse, as Martin Luther King says, continues as violence, oppression, revenge and stubbornness fail to solve a single piece of the tragic mess.
I do see we just vetoed a resolution critical of Israel in the security council, the only nation to do so. Does this have anything to do with Bush's black and white approach to Christianity and the Bible in particular, or rather, to the naive approach of the larger fundmentalist communities and leaders he allows to inform him? I admit I know little about the resolution, but I do know Bush has fundamentalist advisors close to him, men (of course men) who view Israel as still priviledged as a nation in God's eyes, the chosen people still, regardless of their foreign policy.
If I had the money, I'd move to France and live next door to Johnny Depp. We could drink Beaujolais, talk about rational politics, maybe I could turn him onto Patrick O'Brian. We could discuss the deeper mythos of P2, for something is certainly going on with Davy Jones.
Or maybe I'd like Durham, the apparently intelligent Christian locale I've been drooling over in BW3's blog.
Right now, I feel like anyplace but here. As the Iraq war continues, atrocities surface from time to time, the historically common result whenever young men are given guns and then sat them down in a country, especially when they themselves are targets. Bush, Cheney, Wolfowitz, Rumsfeld...all four misjudged the situation and somehow, unbelievably, were re-elected by a naive American body politic.
I know I have friends who voted for and still support Bush. I am sorry if I've hurt anyone's feelings. But right now I'm scared, scared for my 14 year old son in five years, scared for this country, embarrassed of how we appear to the rest of the world. Whatever one thinks of Hillary Clinton, she did say this administration was 'one of the worst.' History, most likely, will say the same. Grandchildren will ask me about Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib, the Iraq war and how it connected to 9/11. What will I say?
Praying the the violence in the middle east diffuses.
Comments
I suspect that the administration's position on the permissibility of Israel's actions has less to do with religion and more to do with the war on terror. President Bush gave a speech yesterday in which he said that every nation has a right and a duty to defend itself against terrorism, overtly connecting Israel's actions to the global war on terror.
The problem with that view is that it, while consistent, further projects the image of the US and Israel waging a war against Islam, which will do nothing to stop the violence.
I am seriously sympathetic to the plight of Israel. IN a political science class I once wrote a position paper on the Arab-Israeli conflict which essentially sided with Israel most of the time. I even worked as an Israeli ambassador at a mock UN. But, one of the key tennants of just war theory is that a war must not only have a just cause (in this case, defending one's self against terrorist acts) but also limited and proportional conduct. A just war is prosecuted with restraint and the highest regard for civilian lives. Israel's bombing campaigns, much like those of the US, by their very nature fail to show proper respect for civilians.
In my opinion a war has been waged wrecklessly (and therefore immorally) when 1 civilian is killed for every 10 military casualties. This is not a magic number, but it is a point at which I think a line has obviously been crossed. Yet when wars are waged from the sky you often get the reverse of that number - 10 civilian casualties for every 1 military causalty.
Bombs may (or may not) be smart, but intelligence is often not accurate enough to allow bombs (whether their guidance systems work properly or not) to impact only military targets.
That's a whole lot to say, in a nutshell, that there are some real similarities between the United States and Israel in the way in which we wage war, and in the way in which we prosecute the war on terror. In both cases, I think that even if the intentions are noble (which is sometimes a big if) the end result is more harm than good.
In part, though, the interaction between you and I on this issue has finally spurred me to 'own' my blog, to change the name to something I like and do something cohesive on it.
Best,
t
You humble me with your words above. A more thorough response to this post is currently on my blog.