Why Do They Hate Us?
Richard Coduri, The Federal Examiner
www.federalexaminer.com
The rift between the
Middle East and the United States is vast, but not unbridgeable. It will
take vast amounts of time, money, and commitment on the part of the United
States and Arab governments to bridge, but if successful, it would prove the
most significant increase in security that the United States has gained
since the fall of the Soviet Union.
In order to
successfully tackle this enormous task, we first have to understand the
answer to the question that has been on minds, mouths, and magazine covers
for much of the last two years: “Why do they hate us?”
Last September,
14-year-old Naji al-Bahesh, a young Palestinian, was shot and killed by an
Israeli soldier in Nablus. At the time of his death, al-Bahesh was acting as
a volunteer guide for a four-person delegation of the Grassroots
International Protection for Palestinians group, with representatives from
the United Kingdom, Poland, and Germany. Al-Bahesh, who often acted as such
a guide for international organizations, was standing with the delegation a
good distance from an Israeli Defense Force patrol when he was shot without
provocation. No demonstrating or agitation was occurring in the area. The
gun that fired the bullet was an American-made M-16 rifle, sold to the
Israelis by the U.S. government and bought, most likely, with U.S. foreign
aid dollars.
This is why they hate
us.
In the United States,
we are shown photograph after video clip of hooded Palestinians burning
American flags and throwing rocks. Understandably, this angers us. As
Americans, we like to think of ourselves as the beacons of liberty and hope
in an otherwise dark world. We are right to think so highly of this great
nation, but we must recognize that we make mistakes and are not always just
with the use of our immense power. The Palestinian people don’t burn flags
because they hate McDonalds, baseball, or the amber waves of grain. They
don’t burn flags because they are angered by our permissive social
liberalism. They burn American flags because they believe that the United
States is the key to Israel’s dominance, and the suffering inflicted on the
Palestinians is the fruit of our unbalanced foreign policy. To them, we are
Big Brother’s big brother.
This is by no means an
excuse for violence against the United States, and certainly not a valid
reason for flying airplanes into skyscrapers. But in order to understand the
motivation for such actions, and the source of the occasional apathy in some
quarters of the Middle East toward condemning them, we must understand, and
take responsibility for, our role in the Palestinian-Israeli crisis.
There are tragic
stories to be told from both sides. The toll that this conflict has taken on
both Palestinian and Israeli society is tragic. It is time for the United
States, as the world’s superpower, to create conditions that both sides
cannot refuse. The Road Map is a start, but the Bush Administration needs to
be dedicated to enacting it in fairly. Only we have the power to effectively
influence both sides to a peaceful conclusion.
