It’s all about hatred Anti-Jewish animosity, rather than economic distress, is terror’s root cause by Gilad Sharon, 3/24/2008 ynetnews opinion piece.
Many people around the world, including some Israelis, believe that the moment the conflict between us and the Palestinians would be resolved, the reason for the Arab and Muslim world’s hostility towards us will disappear. Peace will prevail among Israel and all Arab states, tensions between Islam and the West will fade, and the terror threat against Western nations will be lifted.
This conviction is naïve and false – the Palestinian issue is the pretext; a means used to slam Israel. It is not the problem.
The Arab world never reconciled itself to our existence as a Jewish state in the Mideastern space. The only Arab maps where the State of Israel appears are military maps. When it comes to the maps used in geography classes at schools, we do not exist.
Arab states have no interest whatsoever in the fate of the Palestinians. Syria’s defense minister referred to Arafat as the “son of 60,000 whores,” while Egypt’s president once urged the Palestinian leader to do something by telling him: “Come on already, you dog.” We must understand the meaning of such insult in the Arab world, and this is nothing compared to the declarations that were not uttered in public.
If the Palestinian issue bothered Arab states so much, what stopped them from establishing a Palestinian state before 1967 and the Six-Day War?
The argument that the suffering and distress experienced by the Palestinians are the reason for terror against Israel and the West is also unfounded. Terrorism against Jews in Israel started more than 120 years ago, much before the Six-Day War and the War of Independence; before we were accused of expulsion or occupation. Just as it was then, today too the hatred for Jews and rejection of our existence here are the reason for terrorism.
Let’s examine, for example, the despicable terrorist who carried out the attack at the Mercaz Harav yeshiva in Jerusalem. We are talking about the son of a wealthy family who lived in a nice house and made a nice living through those he murdered via the family’s transportation company. He did not act because of distress, but rather, because of hatred.
Aggressor can’t be appeased
If we look back at the perpetrators of the September 11 attacks in the United States, we would discover that most of them were Saudis and that the funding and assistance they received is also related to the Saudis. It is difficult to claim that the Saudis suffer from any kind of distress, at least not in financial terms. Perhaps life is a bit boring for them, or the weather is too hot, but there is no shortage of money there.
The reason for that and other offensives is radical Islamic fanaticism that is unwilling to accept the West and its way of life and culture, and seeks to enforce its dark and zealous beliefs on all global residents through any means available. Live in line with our ways, or die – this is what they say.
It would be good for the US and Europe to realize that pressing Israel to make concessions would not bring them the calm they so covet and would not allow them to go back to a life of hedonistic euphoria. Giving in to terrorism and violence does not serve to appease the aggressor, as was proven by Hitler, but rather, only encourages it.
It would be good if people around the world and around here too would realize that the zealot demon that came out of the bottle cannot be compromised with. We can only push it back into the bottle with strength and determination and bury it deeply in the sands of the Arabian Peninsula.
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3522443,00.html
