"In the wake of the thwarted plot to explode bombs on flight from Britain to the U.S., several commentators echoed Pres. Bush's slogan that fighting terrorism is going to be a long war, the defining struggle of this generation. No one mentioned striving for a long peace with the Arab world, which will also take a generation.
The roots of terrorism are not insane. Real conditions gave rise to a huge disaffected segment of Muslims, mostly young and male. From northern Africa across the entire Middle East to Pakistan, there has been a population boom without much hope that any child will receive adequate education, except in the Koran, or adequate work. The governments are either militaristic or dominated by reactionary royal families.
In other words, terrorism grew out of poverty, ignorance, and a sense of hopelessness about the future. Hating America and Israel is also complex, but these other factors made a huge contribution. Therefore, since Islam isn't going to change, and since this new wave of the dispossessed isn't going away, the West has two choices. We can keep supporting the conditions that inflame radical Islam, or we can move positively to bring the Muslim world into a global alliance.
Terrorism is global because national boundaries don't hold back anger and hopelessness anymore. Unlike Communism, terrorism can't be contained. To win a long peace will be difficult because of the deep roots of the problem. But we make it more difficult by being militaristic, by supporting reactionary regimes, by making oil the centerpiece of our foreign policy in the Middle East, by engendering bogeyman hatred of Arabs, and by refusing to see that peace is achievable without annihilating the enemy. The administration's attitude that only total victory is acceptable amounts to saying that every radicalized Muslim male must be killed or neutralized. The war between Israel and Hezbollah is quickly dismantling that fantasy.
The time is dark right now, and a new scare like the airline bombing plot galvanizes fear and anger. But retaliation isn't going to work in the long run. Our only alternative is the long peace, and we have to hope that this idea begins to take root soon, or else we will be trapped in an endless cycle of attack and response just as we are today." Deepak Chopra
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My opinion==Islam is the problem. Islam must voluntarily change first.
What is your opinion? |
