Nidra Poller is an author, commentator and translater who serves on the SPME Board of Directors
Ray Hanania’s contribution to the 27 June 2004 Faculty Forum is a self-unraveling argument that begins nicely–“Every time I am attacked by a supporter or ally of Hamas, Arab and Muslim leaders urge me not to respond”–and ends with good advice: “So instead of cowering under the intimidation of Muslim-American fanatics, we should be spending as much time criticizing them as we do Israel’s government.”
But ignoring his own albeit last minute advice, Hanania eschews criticism of Muslim fanatics and blames “Sharon’s government” for their misdeeds and for their very existence. How can that be? Logically, how could Sharon’s government be responsible for a worldwide phenomenon that is currently filling our television screens with horrifying scenes of beheadings and car-bombings? Or are we meant to believe that Ariel Sharon is responsible for Muslim extremists in Israel, and George W. Bush is responsible for them in the rest of the world?
Admitting that “We Arabs have made it easy for the religious fanatics to undermine our causes,” Hanania gives the example of Saudi Arabia, which has “had a longtime problem with fanaticism.” Pouf! All the Saudi billions pushing Wahhabi extremism to the four corners of the earth for decades, provoking unspeakable crimes against innocent civilians mistreated, massacred, beheaded, is reduced by inglorious understatement to a problem with fanaticism that is as passive as falling rain. Just so the real villain can be identified: Bush’s government. Aha, the Bush -Saudi connection if you see what I mean!
Which leads Ray Hanania to the heart of his subject: Hamas. Brought to you by Ariel Sharon and his extremist party allies who, thinking they were clever, encouraged a religious alternative to the PLO. And somehow, just by chance, this religious alternative and its (misnamed) spiritual leader “launched today’s onslaught of suicide bombings.” One might reply that Sharon at least corrected his mistake by rubbing out the creature of his erroneous reasoning”but let’s look at the logic again. How is it that people like Bush and Sharon keep creating these horrible terrorist organizations that then turn on them like wild dogs? And how is it that these terrorists supposedly created by or in reaction to extremists like Bush and Sharon justify their acts by qur’anic verses and jihad strategies? And, further, how is it that the supposedly secular PLO pursues the same ends with the same justifications and methods as Hamas? How is it possible that a culture, a religion, a civilization, an umma can exist concretely over vast regions of the world without having its own substantial factors of generation?
Hanania claims that most Palestinians don’t support suicide bombings; the fault lies in the suffering caused by the war criminal Sharon. Most Palestinians support compromise and peace; the fault lies in the stinginess of the Israeli offers. And Hanania warns that if Hamas succeeds in achieving Sharon’s fiendish plans “the future is bleak for everyone.”
Who are these “most Palestinians?” Reliable opinion polls consistently record strong majorities in favor of the pursuit of humanocide bombings even after the creation of a Palestinian State more or less along the “stingy” lines proposed at Camp David in 2000. What exactly is the compromise and peace supported by most Palestinians? In the absence of democracy and free speech you either invent whatever public opinion serves your ideological stance or else you face the truth, which is that we cannot know what most Palestinians want. We can only judge by what they do. And don’t do.
I might add that it is hard enough to know what any person really wants, even in the most intimate personal situations. People are capable of murdering their own wives, husbands, and children because they love them so much.
This impossible-to-demonstrate Palestinian moderation is simply used as a hook to hang repeated accusations against Sharon and his ilk–in other words, Israelisand to hide the fact that Israel is acting legitimately in self-defense. A closer look reveals that Hanania does not even claim that Palestinians are against “suicide bombing.” He says they would be against them if it were not for Israel’s faults, errors, and sins. As for compromise, yes, they are for compromise on their terms. Who isn’t?
Let us forget about most Palestinians and consider one specific argument put forth by one Palestinian, Ray Hanania, speaking for himself and obviously considering himself a moderate. “That’s why they insist on the Palestinian Right of Return (covering the past 57 years for Christians and Muslims), which really is no different in principle to the Jewish Right of Return (which covers the past 2,057 years for Jews).”
What in the world does this mean? Obviously the 2,057-years Jewish Right of Return would precede, supersede, and cancel any 57-year Palestinian Right of Return. But we must go further and ask where the right of return is inscribed in the laws of humanity or even established as jurisprudence. Where is this theoretical right of return respected in reality? And if it is or ever was or in any way should be, what is the cut off date?
The answer is that the cut off date is in the eyes of the beholder. Ray Hanania invents a right of return going back 57 years and draws a curtain over the migrations, conflicts, territorial exchanges, conquests, creation and dissolution of states and empires that have shaped and reshaped the Middle East. I refer readers to the groundbreaking studies of historian Bat Ye’or (www.dhimmi.org ). Why do the Arab, Christian, and Muslim immigrants to Palestine / Israel have a right of return to the land to which they immigrated? Why don’t they return to their homelands in Syria, Egypt, Jordan and as far away as the Balkans?
Why is this right of return to Israel proclaimed and, far worse, defended by crimes against humanity, when it is fiercely rejected by the Arab-Muslim populations of Europe? And by the way, what are extremist Muslims doing in the United States? Why are they in my country? Any Western political leader who encourages certain immigrant populations to return to their countries of origin is considered a dangerous extremist. Why is it intolerable for someone whose great grandparents once lived in what is now Tel Aviv to make a new life in Jordan, and highly desirable for someone who lived in an Algerian village to make a new life in Paris? In the one case it’s the right of return, in the other case it’s the right of no return, and both are based on the same jihad principles generated, let us remember, by the inner mechanisms of a culture that exists in and of itself and not as a reaction to the evils of Jews and Westerners.
Indeed the future is bleak for Palestinians if they do not change their thinking, their tactics, their leadership, their basic values. The Arabs have tried to destroy the State of Israel ever since its inception. After each major defeat, they claim that what they want is a Palestinian State. The Palestinians sign peace treaties in the hudna tradition, the better to attack Israel. And when they are defeated they pretend to be resisting against occupation. Time is running out. For the Palestinians. They will not have a state unless they sincerely, completely, concretely stop trying to destroy Israel. I agree with Ray Hanania that a brighter future for Palestinians is desirable. However, the failure of Palestinians to conceive and conduct a viable national liberation movement does not imply a bleak future for Israel, and it is essential for Palestinians to understand this. No matter the difficulties they create, no matter the horrors they perpetrate, no matter the loss of innocent lives that leaves us inconsolable, Israel will not go down with the Palestinians, the West will not go down with jihadi terrorists and their supporting states, jihadi extremism is not our creation, it is not our fault, and we will not be tricked into making suicidal concessions in exchange for insincere, inoperable promises.
This is my convincing argument against Hamas and its allies. It may generate some heavy flack but it has the distinct advantage of standing up to wear and tear and not unraveling into a tangle of frayed yarn.
