vision2020
RE: Amb. Hume Horan on the US and Islam in the Modern World
Tim,
I think Friedman's explanation is at best a simplification that has been
used as an excuse for the horrendous treatment of Palestinian refugees.
Even if it is correct, and I'm not conceding that, I have a problem with
Israeli policies that allow people to move to Israel when their families
have been out of the area for hundreds of years, but excludes people whose
grandparents were either run out (or left) in 1948. As far as the 1967
conflict is concerned, I'm pretty sure Israel launched the first strikes,
destroying its neighbors air forces. If I'm wrong about this, I expect to
be promptly corrected. Israel then kept the land it took (returning the
Sinai to Egypt later).
I just don't know enough about Islam to try to address his other points;
however, I do think that the status of the Palestinians is one of the root
causes for the animosity towards us. While the colonists like Britain and
France may have played a huge role before 1948, we have taken over since
then. I think that problem is an ulcer; without it I don't think that
hostility towards us would be so extreme.
>From: "Tim Ewers" <tewers@uidaho.edu>
>To: "Sunil Ramalingam" <sunilramalingam@hotmail.com>, <meteor2@moscow.com>,
> <vision2020@moscow.com>
>Subject: RE: Amb. Hume Horan on the US and Islam in the Modern World
>Date: Thu, 6 Dec 2001 15:56:46 -0800
>
>Friedman discusses this issue at length in "From Beirut to Jerusalem." If
>I
>remember correctly, according to Friedman, the Palestinians were not so
>much
>forced into exile by the Israelis as they were encouraged to get out of the
>way by the neighboring Arab states. The Arab states, opposed to the
>creation of the state of Israel, intended to run the Mediterranean red with
>Jewish blood. They failed in 1967 and Israel ended up with even more land.
>
>The point that strikes me is the degree to which America is considered
>responsible for the situation in the Middle East. I don't for an instant
>believe our hands are clean, but the cause(s) of the problems there precede
>U.S. involvement, (or even existence). For instance, the Balfour
>Declaration, which lead to the creation of Israel, was drafted in the early
>part of this century. The Declaration was drafted by the British as a
>land-division agreement involving the French and the Arab states. The U.S.
>was not involved.
>
>What I find interesting about the piece by former Ambassador Hume is the
>explication of, perhaps, a more fundamental reason for the conflict in the
>region. Pointing fingers at the U.S., Israel, or the Israeli treatment of
>the Palestinians may be a diversion from actually addressing what ails the
>region.
>
>
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: Sunil Ramalingam [mailto:sunilramalingam@hotmail.com]
>Sent: Thursday, December 06, 2001 2:04 PM
>To: tewers@uidaho.edu; meteor2@moscow.com; vision2020@moscow.com
>Subject: Re: Amb. Hume Horan on the US and Islam in the Modern World
>
>
>One quick thought that jumped out at me when I read this paragraph:
>
>"Once, when I appealed to Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud for more
>help to UNRWA, he replied only "You Americans created the refugee
>problem. You solve it." In response, I asked could he imagine, if a
>catastrophe had driven half a million Canadians into ND, ID, and MN,
>that three generations generations later, these populations would
>still be held in refugee camps? How differently the half million
>Jews driven from Arab lands in 1948 were received by Israel, compared
>to how the half million Arabs, driven from Palestine in 1948, were
>received by their Arab neighbors!"
>
>I don't know how one can compare the treatment of Jewish refugees from Arab
>countries in 1948, and the Palestinians in exile. Israel was established
>as
>a Jewish state, and naturally accepts Jews from other nations. Lebanon and
>Jordan, just to use two examples, weren't created with such a mandate; why
>should one expect them to accept refugees from neighboring states? We
>don't
>have that open-door policy here...
>
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