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Malala Yousufzai, 14

Many of you have been shocked by the story of Malala Yousafzai, a 14-year old Pakistani girl shot in the head by a Taliban terrorist because of a blog she wrote and interviews she gave starting in 2009, criticizing the Taliban and calling for the education of women.

This lovely, self-possessed girl, who speaks and writes on a level far above her age, and who planned to enter politics (video), may or may not survive. If she does not, it will be an enormous loss for Pakistan and for the world.

This is not simply an atrocity of war. This was not done out of hatred, anger or because someone was crazy. Nobody lost control in the heat of battle or was infuriated by a ridiculous YouTube video. No low-level extremist was responsible for this.

No, it was something else entirely. Read about the letter sent by the Tehrik-i Taliban Pakistan (TTP) leadership to international media today:

The letter, written in English, says a Taliban gunman “successfully targeted” Yousafzai “although she was young and a girl and the TTP does not believe in attacking women.” It says Yousafzai, who gained global recognition at the age of 11 through an online diary she wrote for the BBC about TTP influence in her hometown of Mingora, was shot because “whom so ever leads a campaign against Islam and Shariah is ordered to be killed by Shariah.”

The letter accuses Yousafzai of being “pro-West,” promoting Western culture, and speaking out against Taliban militants — charging that Yousafzai’s “personality became a symbol of an anti-Shariah campaign.” Using the term for Islamic holy warriors to refer to Taliban militants, the letter says that “Yousafzai was playing a vital role in bucking up the emotions” of Pakistan’s military and government “and was inviting Muslims to hate mujahideen.”

The letter goes on to argue that “[i]t is a clear command of Shariah that any female who, by any means, plays a role in the war against mujahideen should be killed.” It then seeks to justify the shooting of the schoolgirl by citing passages from the Koran in which a child or woman was killed…

The Taliban’s justification concludes with a threat, saying: “If anyone thinks that Malala is targeted because of education, that’s absolutely wrong and is propaganda by media. Malala is targeted because of her pioneer role in preaching secularism and so-called enlightened moderation. And whom so ever will commit so in the future too will be targeted again by the TTP.”

The TTP also warned that if she survives, they will try again, and that it is intended as a warning to other children.

The Taliban has thus provided a coldblooded ideological and strategic explanation of their actions, a clear window into their thinking.

And what do we see through this window? For one thing, the emptiness of the idea that all disputes are based on a lack of understanding or communication between the sides. No amount of ‘communication’ can make me accept or understand the principle that promoting secularism is a death penalty crime for an eighth-grader.

We also see that these are not abnormal humans who are missing their moral senses. They are not Ted Bundy or Charles Manson. They are logically acting on the implications of the ideology that they are committed to, the ideology which informs their moral perceptions in the first place.

The ideology is Shari’a, Islamic law. A demand for strict observance of Shari’a characterizes radical Islamists everywhere, from Iran to Pakistan, to the UK.

Do I need to add that this ideology is evil and repugnant?

Technorati Tags: Malala Yousafzai, Pakistan, Taliban, Shari’a

Mitt Romney speaks on foreign policy at Virginia Military Institute, Oct. 8, 2012

I have strongly criticized President Obama for his policy toward Israel. In particular — although there are numerous other issues, like his remarkable disrespect for Israel’s Prime Minister — I was unhappy about his pronounced tilt toward the Palestinian position in peace process negotiations. I won’t go into detail here, but I called Obama the most anti-Israel President we have ever had.

Now for the first time it is beginning to seem that Mitt Romney has a good chance to win the election. I’m not suggesting that we can neglect the many other considerations, in foreign and domestic policy, that are relevant for choosing a president, but I want to look at this particular issue — Israel — and examine what we know about Romney’s attitudes.

In May of this year, at the same private fund-raiser at which he made his unfortunate “47%” remark, Romney said this about the “peace process:”

I’m torn by two perspectives in this regard. One is the one which I’ve had for some time, which is that the Palestinians have no interest whatsoever in establishing peace, and that the pathway to peace is almost unthinkable to accomplish.

Now why do I say that? Some might say, well, let’s let the Palestinians have the West Bank, and have security, and set up a separate nation for the Palestinians. And then come a couple of thorny questions. And I don’t have a map here to look at the geography, but the border between Israel and the West Bank is obviously right there, right next to Tel Aviv, which is the financial capital, the industrial capital of Israel, the center of Israel. It’s—what the border would be? Maybe seven miles from Tel Aviv to what would be the West Bank…The other side of the West Bank, the other side of what would be this new Palestinian state would either be Syria at one point, or Jordan.

And of course the Iranians would want to do through the West Bank exactly what they did through Lebanon, what they did near Gaza. Which is that the Iranians would want to bring missiles and armament into the West Bank and potentially threaten Israel. So Israel of course would have to say, “That can’t happen. We’ve got to keep the Iranians from bringing weaponry into the West Bank.” Well, that means that—who? The Israelis are going to patrol the border between Jordan, Syria, and this new Palestinian nation? Well, the Palestinians would say, “Uh, no way! We’re an independent country. You can’t, you know, guard our border with other Arab nations.” And now how about the airport? How about flying into this Palestinian nation? Are we gonna allow military aircraft to come in and weaponry to come in? And if not, who’s going to keep it from coming in? Well, the Israelis. Well, the Palestinians are gonna say, “We’re not an independent nation if Israel is able to come in and tell us what can land in our airport.”

These are problems—these are very hard to solve, all right? And I look at the Palestinians not wanting to see peace anyway, for political purposes, committed to the destruction and elimination of Israel, and these thorny issues, and I say, “There’s just no way.”

And so what you do is you say, “You move things along the best way you can.” You hope for some degree of stability, but you recognize that this is going to remain an unsolved problem. We live with that in China and Taiwan. All right, we have a potentially volatile situation but we sort of live with it, and we kick the ball down the field and hope that ultimately, somehow, something will happen and resolve it. We don’t go to war to try and resolve it imminently.

On the other hand, I got a call from a former secretary of state. I won’t mention which one it was, but this individual said to me, you know, I think there’s a prospect for a settlement between the Palestinians and the Israelis after the Palestinian elections. I said, “Really?” And, you know, his answer was, “Yes, I think there’s some prospect.” And I didn’t delve into it. [my emphasis]

Here Romney made two very important points which, if we go by their public statements, nobody in the Obama Administration understands:

• The Palestinians do not want a peaceful state alongside Israel, they want to replace it with an Arab state
• A “two-state solution” with hostile Arabs would present insoluble security problems for Israel

Since the 1970’s American policy in the region has been based on the idea that the result of the 1967 war must be reversed (if you are cynical, you may think that this is because of the influence in the US of the Petro-Saudi lobby). This has been expressed since the Oslo accords or 1993 as support for a “two-state solution.”

While events — the Hamas takeover of Gaza, the Second Intifada — have convinced the great majority of Israelis that a practical two-state solution is a fantasy based on wishful thinking, this has generally not penetrated the US media or political establishment.  So Mitt’s remarks in May came as a breath of fresh air.

Unfortunately, it seems as though Romney has now changed his mind. In a speech that he gave today at Virginia Military Institute, he said,

I will recommit America to the goal of a democratic, prosperous Palestinian state living side by side in peace and security with the Jewish state of Israel. On this vital issue, the President has failed, and what should be a negotiation process has devolved into a series of heated disputes at the United Nations.

It’s the same old nonsense! (I wonder who the “former Secretary of State” was that may have moved him in this direction — perhaps Saudi Lobbyist James A. Baker?)

Having said this, Romney still seems far more likely to be friendly to Israel than Obama, who Aaron David Miller said “really is different [from other presidents about Israel].” He has a good personal relationship with Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu. He is not associated with anti-Zionists like Edward Said, Rashid Khalidi or Ali Abunimah, or  left-wing Israel-haters like Bill Ayers, or antisemites like the Reverend Jeremiah Wright.

Mitt, you were right the first time!

Technorati Tags: Mitt Romney, Barack Obama, Israel, Palestinians, two-state solution

Both dishonest and offensive

The picture above was posted on Facebook by a person who thinks war is bad. Apparently, she believes that some of us disagree, and that seeing it might change our minds.

I find it dishonest and offensive, for several reasons.

1. It is dishonest because it suggests that the problem lies in the existence of armies, and not in human aggressiveness and acquisitiveness. Even if we could press a button and all military forces would disappear in a flash, the money spent on them magically appearing in national treasuries, is it likely that hunger would be eradicated? In the so-called “developing” world, where the great majority of the population lives on a subsistence level, aid money is routinely stolen to finance the lifestyle of a few kleptocrats. Why would this be expected to change?

Eliminating armies would not end aggressive behavior. If Israel, for example, didn’t have the IDF to protect it, it would be gone in a matter of days, its borders overwhelmed. The Arabs wouldn’t need armies to accomplish this.

Of course, there is no magic button, so the only way to implement an end to armies would be unilaterally. No sane person could suggest that this would work. How would Vladimir Putin, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, or numerous others react to the announcement that the US had decided to end military spending?

2. It is offensive because it suggests that those of us who support the military or serve in it don’t care about human suffering, particularly the suffering of children. It suggests that we believe that war is a good thing. It implies that soldiers are either immoral or dupes.

But I and many others distinguish between just and unjust wars, and believe that it is not a crime to engage in a just war. The fact that it may even be an obligation, in some cases, to fight does not imply that it is a welcome thing.

3. It is offensive because it implies that those opposed to the military are morally superior to those who support it, when it may be that they are simply confused about the difference between the real world and an imagined and unrealizable utopia.

Technorati Tags: antiwar movement

I am a Zionist.

That means that I support a Jewish state in its historical homeland. I oppose efforts to change it into another Arab state, or to kill and disperse its Jewish inhabitants. It does not mean that I think that Jews are superior to Arabs or anyone else.

It makes sense to me to talk about a Jewish people, and feel myself a part of it.

I believe that if the state of Israel were to disappear, it would unleash a wave of anti-Jewish violence in the diaspora, and the Jewish people as such would shortly cease to exist.

I am not ashamed of the circumstances of Israel’s birth, because I don’t accept the tissue of lies called the “Palestinian narrative.” If the Palestinian Arabs have been victimized, it’s been by their leadership and the Arab nations, not Israel.

I am not ashamed of the actions of the Israeli government, which is forced to fight a continuous battle, diplomatic, cognitive and military, against the large portion of the world that wants Israel to disappear.

I don’t claim that Israel is perfect or that its leaders always make the correct decisions. But I absolutely reject the vicious slanders that appear in Arab, European and — increasingly — American media, that invert reality and attribute to Israel the racist and genocidal motives of its enemies.

I am absolutely convinced that the Palestinian Authority (never mind Hamas!) is not interested in any solution to the conflict that leaves a Jewish state standing.

I don’t hate Arabs or Muslims. But I recognize that there is a growing segment of the Muslim world that believes in expanding the area ruled by Islamic law by means of a combination of threats, subversion, terrorism and war. I see these Muslims as the enemies of Jews, Christians and the secular West. I believe that it is our job to struggle to protect Western civilization against this very real opponent.

I think the “Arab Spring” has for the most part turned into an Islamist revolution.

I think the United Nations is so strongly influenced by enemies of Western civilization that it has long since ceased to be a force for good. At best it is a huge waste of resources, and at worst a tool of the barbarians.

I am very frustrated by American Jews who confuse Jewish ethics with a moral philosophy of naive humanism, who are incapable of understanding that there is such a thing as an enemy, and therefore embrace their enemies. They should all read Kenneth Levin’s book, The Oslo Syndrome: Delusions of a People under Siege, in order to understand themselves (the Israeli Left should read this too, but they are probably to arrogant to be cured).

Technorati Tags: Zionism, Israel