Michael J. Totten just posted a great article about his meeting with Israeli officials last week. While the title reveals his ultimate point (The Mother of All Quagmires), I think his discussion and realization about Westerner’s (or more precisely, America’s) perspective on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is especially astute. We are simply too optimistic.
Most Americans are inherently optimistic and think just about any problem in the world can be solved. We put a man on the moon before I was born, but that was easy compared with securing peace between Israelis and Arabs.
[...]
Americans aren’t the only ones who have a hard time grasping the idea of an intractable problem. “Unfortunately we Westerners are impatient,” said an Israeli politician who preferred not to be named. “We want fast food and peace now. But it won’t happen. We need a long strategy.” “Most of Israel’s serious problems don’t have a solution,” said Dr. Dan Schueftan, Director of National Security Studies at the University of Haifa. “Israelis have only recently understood this, and most foreign analysts still don’t understand it.”
And he gives an especially clear explanation of the problem from the Palestinian perspective:
Far too many Westerners make the mistake of projecting their own views onto Palestinians without really understanding the Palestinian narrative. The “occupation” doesn’t refer to the West Bank and Gaza, and it never has. The “occupation” refers to Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. A kibbutz in the center of Israel is “occupied Palestine” according to most. “It makes no sense to a Palestinian to think about a Palestinian state alongside Israel,” Martin Kramer from the Shalem Center in Jerusalem said to me a few days ago. “From the Palestinian perspective, Israel will always exist inside Palestine.”
I find his answer to why America hasn’t “fixed the problem” yet as painfully true. Americans inherently try to solve problems with the best intentions. The problem is that these intentions have a tendency to be our Achilles heal because our pure optimism in this particular situation (the Palestinian/Israeli conflict) makes us blind to a problem that is rooted in the Palestinian and (ultimately) the Muslim psyche.
[via Commentary Magazine]
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Hey J… what did you just infer is in the Muslim psyche? Maybe I've been up too late… I'm normally at work, but I just performed in the V-Monologues.. and I'm up way too late.
I think I must misunderstand…
Can you extrapolate? I know it's old news.. but cut me some slack… I've been busy.
I'm also Muslim so I dunno if that's a problem.
Obama is our President he can solve anything.
Funny though, No one has ever been able to point to one accomplishment he has ever done in his life. Yeah, he has won elections, and that's something, but after he gets elected, what did he accomplish in the Illinois Legislature? What did he accomplish in his time in the US Senate (the 2 years which most of the time he wasn't there because he was too busy running for President). In his time in the private sector, or I should say non-profit sector as he has never spent any time in business, what did he accomplish there except forcing banks to make bad loans under threat that if they did not they would be tarnished as being racist.
But Obama is Superman. He is Jesus Christ. Yes he Can. What he can we don't know. But YES HE CAN.
SO of course we are optimistic about this whole Israel/Palestine thing. Yes, we can! Obama will save us. So, what we worry!
Obama's gonna save us. Obama will show the way!!!!!!
And if he can't solve this whole Israeli/Palestine thing it must be because he didn't want to!
"makes us blind to a problem that is rooted in the Palestinian and (ultimately) the Muslim psyche."
"Muslim Psyche"?
That's a racist statement you fuking Nazi!
Obama's Dad was a Muslim!
All hateful racist people like you should be killed!
There should be no tolerance for the intolerant!!!!
I love the Vagina Monologues! That's awesome you're performing in a production of it. I'm planning on attending a showing of it here in Israel at the end of the month. I've seen it at least half a dozen times but still enjoy it immensely.
Back to the topic at hand. You're correct in asking for an extrapolation on this post. I do believe I could have flushed out my personal reaction to the article a little more before hitting the publish button.
I believe the misunderstanding here is the difference between me saying "Muslim pysche" as apposed to "Arab psyche". What I wanted to say was that the Israel-Palestinian problem is larger than just Palestinian ideology. It extends far into other Arab nations like Iran, Syria, Lebanon. The anti-Jew rhetoric… the anti-Western rhetoric is what I'm specifically referring to. Solving the problems between Israel and Palestine won't be done without facing the problem of the ever increasing hatred all other non-Arab nations feel from Arab countries.
I have a deep respect for the Muslim faith.
I'm simply saying that the problem is far too complicated than simply splitting up land. The solution to the problem needs to begin in Middle Eastern Arab homes and schools. The solution, I believe, is to teach love and understanding instead of hate and anger.