"Israel Is Not The Cause of All The World's Problems"

Here is Barry Rubin's response to The Problem is Still Israel-Palestine, an editorial that appeared in Embassy--Canada's Foreign Policy Newsletter. First is Rubin's response; the original editorial appears afterwards.

ISRAEL IS NOT THE CAUSE OF ALL THE WORLD’S PROBLEMS

By Barry Rubin

Note: The following response was published as a response to an editorial in The Diplomat, a top Canadian international affairs' magazine, which explicitly claimed that the Arab-Israeli conflict--and specifically Israel's "occupation" policy--was at the root of all the problems in the Middle East, between the Middle East and the West, and between Islam and the West. This notion continues to be expressed (perhaps increasingly so) despite the fact that there is so much evidence to the contrary and that (though many in the West seem to have failed to nice this little detail) Israel has withdrawn from the Sinai, south Lebanon, the Gaza Strip, and much of the West Bank, as well as offering to leave the rest of the West Bank and the Golan Heights in exchange for full peace.

What is antisemitism? It is not merely the Nazi view that all Jews are evil and should be killed without exception. It is a set of beliefs including the idea that Jews are the cause of all the world’s problems—which is expressed in this editorial—and others which are not contained in this particular editorial.

These other ideas include, Jews are conspiring to seize world power, Jews are traitors to the nation and pursue their own interests at its expense, and Jews drag countries into unnecessary wars for their own greedy reasons. We can look to Jimmy Carter and Walt-Mearsheimer for these aspects of antisemitism.

Another contemporary mistake about antisemitism during most of history is to think it is present only if all Jews are seen as enemies. Historically, of course, if Jews ceased to be Jews religiously (by conversion) or took a position that advocated the community disappear by other means (as left-wing revolutionaries dissolving any Jewish identity in the new socialist or communist utopia), they were given immunity from being denounced or persecuted. Even Usama bin Ladin likes Noam Chomsky. But I digress. If you are interested in these issues, please see my book, Assimilation and Its Discontents.

On the other side, there is acceptance of a myth—if it was ever true at all it is 20 years out of date—that all Arab states are obsessed with the Palestinians. It ignores such things as: inter-Arab rivalries, fear of Islamism and Iran , disgust with the Palestinian political groups and leaders, the use of the issue in demagoguery at home and manipulating the West internationally, and many other factors, not to mention radical Islamist revolutionary ideology. If you are interested on this point, please see my book, The Tragedy of the Middle East.

It’s understandable that many people want to believe that the sole or core issue of the Middle East is the Arab-Israeli conflict, as you suggest in your September 5 editorial (“The Problem Is Still Israel-Palestine”) but to think in this manner is to ensure the region will be misunderstood and that problems there become much worse.

After all, if everything can be pinned on the Arab-Israeli conflict, it means the West need fight no battle, face no threat, bear no cost, or deal with complex issues. All that is necessary is to force Israel into concessions that risk its existence or eliminates it altogether and all problems of Arab nationalism, Islamism, terrorism, and revolution disappear.

Father Kung, cited as the source for this view, may be a great theologian but is certainly no expert on Middle East , politics, Islamism, terrorism, nationalism, or revolution. In fact, the key issues there are: who holds power in each country and in the region; who gets rich and what ideas govern society. The Middle East ’s troubles stem, too, from failure in development rooted within the local societies. Arab nationalists and Islamists strive for power; states seek to expand their influence and perhaps territory.

That is what’s going on in the region. Iran and Syria seek hegemony; Sunni and Shia fight for control of Iraq ; Arab nationalist dictatorships survive their shortcomings by demagoguery against Israel and the West. Radical Islamist movements challenge them for power.

This isn’t surprising. European history was marked by violence and ideological dispute for centuries along similar lines even though European countries were far more successful in economic, social, and intellectual development. All this turmoil took place without there being an Israel there.

Even radical non-Palestinian Islamist literature in Arabic has not focused on the Arab-Israeli conflict. Prior to September 11, for example, Usama bin Ladin mentioned the Palestinian issue around 10 percent of the time, far less than he talked about Saudi Arabia , Iraq , and many other things. As for the Arab states (other than Syria ), the emphasis they put and the resources they devote to the Arab-Israeli conflict have fallen steadily over the last thirty years as they turned their attention to other matters.

Your editorial claims: “The problem is, `as it always was’ still rooted…in Israel and Palestine .” Really? Conflict between Middle East and West isn’t rooted in decades of colonial rule over Algeria , Egypt , or Iraq ? In Western support for Arab regimes past and present including Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and Egypt while radical Islamists want to overthrow them? Not rooted in jealousy over the West’s greater success and power? In the Islamist view that the West is decadent and the Arab nationalist view that it is imperialistic, whether or not these accusations are true? Not rooted in murderous conflict between Sunni and Shia, advocates of capitalism and socialism, and other internal disputes spilling over as participants think they can get Western help or use anti-Western xenophobia to mobilize support? Not rooted in the false picture daily presented of Western society, religions, and culture? Not rooted in antagonism that powerful Muslim groups find in Islam itself, whether or not they “misinterpret” it?

Has it really come down to this: that all problems between the Middle East and West or the Middle East and Christianity can be blamed on Israel?

The idea that the “essential rift between Islam and the West is still to be found in the Israeli-Palestinian divide,” is also highly inaccurate. Inasmuch as there is a rift, Islam is a different religion with its own historical culture and worldview whereas the West has been shaped by different religions. Ordinary Muslims worry about their societies becoming secular like the West, overwhelmed by Western culture and attitudes. Islamists know the West opposes its goal of turning the Middle East into the equivalent of Iran and Taliban Afghanistan. September 11 didn’t happen because of Israel but due to al-Qaida’s goal of spreading radical Islamist revolution and most immediately due to U.S. backing for the Saudi regime, their top target. To believe the problem is mainly or basically Israel is to fool oneself.

Moreover, the greatest outpouring of attacks on Israel happened after Israel made the Oslo agreement, withdrew from southern Lebanon , the whole Gaza Strip, and virtually all populated portions of the West Bank , proposed an independent Palestinian state, and so on. Israel has made numerous concessions and taken many risks for peace which have not been reciprocated by Syria and Palestinians, though Jordan and Egypt have shown through diplomatic compromise how real progress can be attained.

Blaming Israel for everything blinds one to the real issues, which must also be addressed if any problems are going to be solved: the Palestinian movement is still largely based on Israel’s destruction, radical Islamists seek to take over Middle East countries and transform their societies, Iran and Syria seek regional hegemony, and failed Arab nationalist dictatorships make their people discontented.

The Middle East and the problem of radical Islamism require a bit more work than a single-issue approach and a single scapegoat for the turmoil there.

Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center and editor of the Middle East Review of International Affairs (GLORIA) Center . His latest books are The Truth about Syria (Palgrave-Macmillan) and The Long War for Freedom: The Arab Struggle for Democracy in the Middle East (Wiley).

Here is the original editorial from Embassy:

The Problem is Still Israel-Palestine

Families of some of the people who died in the 9/11 attack in New York have said they would rather that former mayor and Republican presidential candidate Rudolph Giuliani not show up for this year's commerative ceremonies. They say they don't want him to cast his political shadow on the event.

That's the trouble with 9/11. Politicians have been casting political shadows on the tragedy ever since George W. Bush first arrived at the scene to announce to the world that the massacre "would define his presidency."

But each successive commemoration of 9/11 has had a double-edged meaning. The first is the gradually receding mourning for the innocent lives lost in the attack. The other is the fallout from the political exploitation of the event by a small but influential group of American neo-conservative thinkers and politicians. In the end, the neo-cons succeeded in what they set out to do. They turned the deeply flawed idea of "a clash of civilizations" into a self-fulfilling prophecy. And the world is still paying a dear and bloody price for the manipulation of the facts they used to justify the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq.

Instead of defeating terror, they have spread it widely.

Now on the sixth anniversary of 9/11, the United States and the world will have to find new and better ideas–and more worthy leaders–who will take it away from its war hysteria.

One of those people may well be the aged Swiss Catholic priest and theologian Hans Kung, the man who former Archbishop of Canterbury George Carey called, "Our greatest living theologian."

The problem is, "as it always was" still rooted in the Middle East. Not in Iraq, Afghanistan or even Iran, but in Israel and Palestine. It will take thinkers like Fr. Kung and courageous leaders of vision to recognize that the essential rift between Islam and the West is still to be found in the Israeli-Palestinian divide. The peaceful creation of a Palestinian state will not, in itself, ensure peace between the cultures. But no peace will ever be possible without it.

Six years after 9/11, the fault lines are more deeply drawn than ever. "These wars against two Islamic countries, together with the double standards practiced by the West for decades over Israel's contemptuous policy of occupation, which scorns all UN resolutions, have inflamed the whole Islamic world to unspeakable anger and bitterness and hardened its attitudes," wrote Fr. Kung in the preface to his 2007 masterwork on Islam.

For his part, Fr. Kung is working to build realistic bridges between the three great Abrahamic religions, Judaism, Christianity and Islam, because there will be, "No peace among the nations without peace among the religions."

Building on his work, other thinkers and leaders will have to find the courage and the perseverance to win reconciliation between Islam and the West. Any other alternative is as unthinkable today as it was on Sept. 11, 2001.

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