Posted on 01/12/2009 9:29:04 AM PST by Sgt_Schultze
A few days ago one of my Palestinian friends, a well educated professional with a huge admiration for the USA and its people, asked me a simple question: why does the USA hate us so much? As much as I wanted to, I could not dispel his — in my eyes — wrong impression. However, I must say that our deafening silence about the atrocities committed in Gaza by Israeli and with our current government’s approval is disheartening.
The USA has lost its credibility as a beacon for freedom, liberty and justice.
After the terrorist attacks on September 11, when many Americans asked me why do they hate us, I found myself trying to understand the question by questioning the assumption that there is a clear cut “they” and “us.” However, my answer was very clear that whoever “they” might be, they don’t hate us as people, but they hate our policies and hypocrisies, our silence when it comes to “their” suffering.
They hate our double standards and blind support of a spoiled son and the despotic leaders of the Arab world. A 2004 study commissioned by the Pentagon, the Defense Science Board confirmed that view when it concluded that “Muslims do not hate our freedom, but rather they hate our policies.”
After the daily carnage and massacres committed by the Israeli Defense Forces against the civilian population in Gaza — with the approval and support of the US government — no one should wonder again, why they hate us so much.
The United States is the only power on earth that can stop the ongoing killings and ghoulish mayhem in Gaza, and ultimately stop the rocket fire onto cities and villages in southern Israel. We are the only government that has the leverage to put pressure on the Israelis, and they will listen to us.
Above all, we offer them unconditional and one-sided political, ideological, financial and military support. Israel receives $4 billion to $6 billion annually from our taxpayer money in direct and indirect aid, and we can and should expect them to adhere to international humanitarian law.
Barack Obama once said that we are more feared than respected. People around the world, especially in the Arab and Muslim countries, were looking forward to Obama’s administration and a dramatic change in U.S. foreign policy. Now they will have an even harder time respecting us and admiring our principles, for we have squandered all of our best cards in the war to win the hearts and minds of people around the world.
Why has Obama been for so long silent when hundreds of innocent civilians in Gaza are being massacred? Today, he says he is concerned about the suffering of the civilian population in Gaza and Israel. This is a good beginning, but by far not enough. Hasn’t he seen entire families being annihilated by the fire of weapons we supply to Israel, free of charge? Doesn’t he himself have two little precious girls? Aren’t the little Palestinian children who die on a daily basis worth a statement in support of the civilian population in Gaza?
Obama has already condemned the rocket attacks by Hamas. It is time for him to issue a strongly worded disapproval of Israel’s actions, or at least a call for an immediate ceasefire. For me, his continued silence is either a sign of approval for Israel’s war against the civilian population, or a sign of weakness. I don’t know which one is worse.
Many know that George Bush and Dick Cheney are not angels of peace, for they are hand in a glove with the military-industrial complex. However, I heard many times over, that Obama would be the messiah who would bring this nation back to its core values of respect for human rights and justice.
I wish him luck as he inherits a political, economic and moral mess, and may God open his heart for an even-handed policy toward the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Mohamed Esa writes from Westminster. To submit a piece for Other Voices consideration, send it to: Other Voices, c/o Carroll County Times, 201 Railroad Ave., Westminster MD 21157.
I don’t personally ‘hate’ the Palestinians.
I have the exact same attitude towards them the Saudi’s, Jordanians, Egyptians, Iraqi’s have of them....(chuckle)
Bottom line remains this is a war of annihilation, and as such it will not stop til one side is dead.
I despise them because they are baby-killing religious zealots. They should be squished like a dangerous bug.
No “Barf Warning?” There oughta be!
Ditto!
I hate the 3,000 Palestinians who were dancing in the streets in the Middle East on September 11, 2001, and handing out candy, when the World Trade Center twin towers collapsed.
Maybe we hate them because they are in cahoots with Al-Queda and similar anti-American, anti-Western groups such as Hezbollah and Hamas.
I will never forget the cheering that went on in Gaza and the west Bank during the 9/11 attacks......now, dear so-called Palestians, I cheer whenever CNN shows another Israeli missle hit on hammas.........payback is a bitch....
yes...I am still bitter
Excuse me, but the ones Hamas, Hezbollah, and Al Qaeda want to annihilate is “us.” If Israel were destroyed and everyone there was dead, the terrorists are not done. They want to kill you and me and everyone in the US except their Muslim allies hiding out in the US. You know, the ones pretending to be moderates; the ones building mosques all over the USA. When Americans get that through their thick heads, we will have made a step forward in the current war we’re engaged in. Liberals and RINOs are clueless and will be the major cause of the next attack on US soil.
They're still here.
But, keep trying and maybe we will learn to.
But what can be expected from a "person by the name of Mohamed Esa"
The author of this article is suggesting that the attacks of September 11 are the same as Israel's attacks on Gaza.
But they are not.
The attacks of September 11 were deliberate attacks against innocent people.
The attacks in Gaza are against military targets which Hamas has placed in the midst of innocent people.
The attacks of September 11 were motivated by a hatred of innocent people in New York ande Washington and Pennsylvania, as well as against innocent people who happened to be flying on commerical jets that day.
The attacks against Hamas in Gaza are motivated by a desire on the part of Israel to not have missiles rain down on themselves. Israel has alerted and continues to alert innocent people of its intentions to take out military targets.
There is no real comparison between the attacks of September 11 and the military attacks of Israel against Hamas in Gaza.
Professor of GERMAN, no less. he visited the Holocaust Memorial and apparently learned nothing. What part of “Never Again” do you NOT understand, SLIMEBALL???!!! (stop me before I go “R. Lee Ermey” on this shlub;)
So he as with all other anti-American left wing idiots do not care that the Hamas terrorist in Gaza have been firing rockets at Israel for the past 8 years and that Israel dislocated its own citizens from the Gaza even though they had been living there for over 20 years.
If the so called Muslims of Hamas and Iran wanted peace they would have by now gained great values if they had kept the peace and killed all the terrorist in their mist. Just think of how they would be living if they had decided to live in peace with Israel - They would be in a great time along with their families, but they decided to kill Israel and it is their mission to destroy all Jews. So unless they stop their actions of killing and destroying there is NO reason that they should not be defeated as we did with Japan and Nazi Germany.
I had the answer to this question back in the 1980s. It was told to me by a Lebanese electronics engineer, so this is not just the belief among “the peasants”, but of the Arabic middle classes as well.
He told me that the only reason Israel exists is because it is heavily subsidized the the United States. If the US would just stop funding Israel, it would disappear in just a few years. He continued by saying that half of the money America spends on defense goes to Israel.
He would not, could not, be convinced otherwise. He had seen the might of the Israeli army, and how easily it had conquered several Arab armies at the same time. The *only* way this could have happened, in his mind, was that Israel had available to it so many resources from the US, that it was, in fact, virtually the US military fighting those Arab armies.
And *this* is why Arabs are so angry with the US. Because all of it is the US’s fault.
The Russians and their Arabic dictator clients did much to spread this thinking throughout the Cold War, and it has taken root among the Arabs.
Because, in the final analysis, if the truth is that Israel succeeded where the Arab world failed, solely because of hard work, education, and spending their time developing and improving their economy, instead of doing whatever it was that Arabs did, that utterly wasted their time, then the Arabs would know, beyond any doubt, that their miserable circumstances are their own fault.
And the Arab world cannot bear to admit their own problems are caused by their own bad habits.
A son of a camel speaks.
Just as soon as I saw his name was Mohammad I knew his screed.
he did not let me down.
Its was called a surge in Iraq, it is what the Israelis are doing.
I stopped reading right here. I've learned to spot Dhimmi speak coming a mile away. Move along folks. Nothing to see here.
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