13.10.06

How "anti-religionist's" co-views feed the bitter divide. What exactly is an "anti religionist" co-view?

That is when a true blue Bush Hater (due to hatred of the "Lord", "Jesus", etc) is faced with fundamentalists of any stripe plus a North Korean nuclear meltdown and are forced to make a decision about Iran's progress towards clean energy. Bush & Co. will profit from the co-view as well as the view that all muslims are fascists and terrorists in order to form "a more perfect union" of divided patriots. It's called the demogogue's demography delight.

http://www.haroonsaadiq.com/affairs/islamicfascists.htm

But paradoxically, that changed, I think, five years ago when I left Britain. I moved to Nazareth in Israel, an Arab — Muslim and Christian — community on the very margins of the self-declared Jewish state. In the ghetto of Nazareth, I rarely meet Israeli Jews unless I venture out for work or I find myself sitting next to them in a local restaurant as they order hummus from an Arab waiter, just as I once asked for a madras curry in High Wycombe. When Israeli Jews briefly visit the ghetto, I suddenly realise how much, by living here, I have become an Arab by default.

Equally, what would they make of my belief that Hizbollah does not want to wipe Israel off the map? Would they find me convincing if I told them that Israel, not Hizbollah, is the aggressor in the conflict: that following Israel’s supposed withdrawal from south Lebanon in 2000, Lebanon experienced barely a day of peace from the terrifying sonic booms of Israeli war planes violating the country’s airspace?

Would they understand as I explained that Hizbollah had acted with restraint for those six years, stockpiling its weapons for the day it knew was coming when Israel would no longer be satisfied with overflights and its appetite for conquest and subjugation would return? Would the officials doubt their own assumptions as I told them that during this war Hizbollah’s rockets have been a response to Israeli provocations, that they are fired in return for Israel’s devastating and indiscriminate bombardment of Lebanon? And what would they say if I claimed that this war is not really about Lebanon, or even Hizbollah, but part of a wider US and Israeli campaign to isolate and pre-emptively attack Iran?

One does not need to be a psychologist to understand that those with no legitimate way to vent their rage, even to have it recognised as valid, become consumed by it instead. They seek explanations and purifying ideologies. They need heroes and strategies. And in the end they crave revenge. If their voice is not heard, they will speak without words.
So I find myself standing with Bush’s “Islamic fascists” in the hope that — just possibly — my solidarity and that of others may dissipate the rage, may give it meaning and offer it another, better route to victory.

6 comments:

Carmenisacat said...
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Carmenisacat said...
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Carmenisacat said...
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Carmenisacat said...
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Carmenisacat said...
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Carmenisacat said...

Eh, anyway, not worth the time to record such thoughts about such things.