May/June 2002
Feature Articles
Holistic Health Q & A
by Dr. Carol Anne Bates
The causes of heartburn and indigestion
- a holistic approach including acupuncture, Oriental Medicine, kinesiology,
homeopathy, and lifestyle changes.
What is... Fair Trade?
by Robert Roman
What Fair Trade is and how it creates
a win-win situation for the producer, the environment and the consumer.
UnCommon Sense! - The Middle East Conflict
by David Findlay
A military or a political solution?
Should we negotiate with terrorist-sponsoring states?
Articles on the theme "Prosperity"
Prosperity Practices
by Jim Malloy
Eight principles and practices to help
manifest great prosperity.
Enough for Everyone
by Patricia Crane
Tapping into the consciousness that
determines distribution.
Journey to Prosperity
by Lorri Ritter
Practical steps to increase prosperity.
True Prosperity
by Maria Moraca
Achieving happiness and contentment
regardless of what is going on in one's life.
My Cosmic Bank Account
by Dr. Audrey Craft Davis
The rewards of opening and "investing"
in a Cosmic Bank Account.
Prosperity Consciousness
by Rev. Linda Lou Kearns
How to get what you want and enjoy
what you've got. Some basic prosperity principles.
What is Prosperity?
by Charles Bleistein
How prosperity is linked to flow in
all aspects of life - including consciousness.
UnCommon Sense! - The Middle East Conflict
by David Findlay
What can I say in a few words about the Middle East conflict which hasn't been said so many times before and by so many people? This is a conflict that has been an integral part of twentieth century history. In fact it goes back much further... to the Crusades... and even further back to pre-Christian Old Testament times.
Should we just accept that there is no solution to the problem? Or, if conceivably there is a solution, is common sense likely to lead us to it?
I wish I knew! All anyone can really say at the moment is that whatever has been tried in the past has not worked. Common sense tends to suggest that, if we continue doing what hasn't worked in the past, it will continue not to work in the future.
I am writing this just after the first meeting between Yasser Arafat and Colin Powell. I am not going to try to predict what the situation will be by the time you are reading this column, except to say that, almost certainly, we shall not have arrived at a peaceful solution at least, not a lasting one.
Let's step back for a moment and look at the basics. Let's take an example, closer to home, of gang warfare. Two rival gangs fighting each other. Let's suppose that the two gangs both have their supporters in the community supplying them with unlimited money, personnel, weapons and moral support.
What's the solution? Get the two gangs together to try and sort out their differences? Maybe, but doubtful. The supporters of the gangs are just going to add "more fuel to the fire." The solution has to be to remove or handle the support either by agreement between the conflicting supporters, or by force. Once the gangs have been disconnected from their supporters, they will not have the means to continue the conflict at least not at the same level at which point negotiation between the two gangs stands a better chance. And, if negotiation does not work, a solution involving force becomes more workable.
How does this relate to the Middle East?
The conflicting "gangs" are the Palestinians and the Israelis. The Palestinians have as their supporters a number of terrorist groups such as the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigage (who claimed responsibility for the suicide bombing in a Jerusalem market place just as Colin Powell was arriving in the area and who are closely linked with Arafat's Palestinian Authority Fatah party), the Palestinian Hamas organization, the Lebanese/Syrian/Iranian Hezbollah and a majority of the populations of Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, Iran, Iraq and, no doubt, quite a few more countries. (Even America gives the Palestinians some 75 millions dollars a year in aid.) The Israelis have as their supporters primarily the Americans and the British, but also Jewish communities throughout the world, as well as many Christian organizations.
To attempt to get the Palestinians and the Israelis together to reach a settlement at this stage appears futile. All this invites is political posturing, "photo opportunities" to "look good" in the eyes of the "international community."
A solution if there is one has to be arrived at by the supporters of the two sides. Then, and only then, can the local conflict be effectively contained and handled it might even just "disappear."
For the supporters of the two sides to arrive at a solution there has to be negotiation between all the parties who could enforce a solution. A United Nations peacekeeping force is not going to work because neither the Arab countries nor a large number of Americans trust the United Nations. For a peacekeeping force to work it would have to consist primarily of troops from America, Britain and the Arab states.
The fact that there has to be negotiation between the supporters of the two sides indicates the folly of labeling all terrorists as equal and saying that we will not negotiate with terrorists.
If we are unwilling to negotiate with terrorists and states that sponsor terrorism, then we are effectively unable to negotiate with nearly all the supporters of the Palestinians. It would follow that there could be no possible solution except one imposed unilaterally by force.
Quite honestly I am skeptical of our ability to impose a solution unilaterally by force. Maybe we can do it in a country the size of and as poor as Afghanistan, but in the whole Middle East? If we were to try to impose a solution unilaterally on the Palestinian/Israeli conflict, we should face the opposition of the whole Arab world and most of the "international community." Fortunately, it does not seem likely that we'll try.
However, it does seem that we are considering unilateral action against Iraq. Regardless of the rights or wrongs of the situation and I'm no great fan of Saddam Hussein it is obvious that, if we take unilateral action, we'll also face the opposition of the whole Arab world and most of the "international community." Which in turn makes a solution to the Palestinian/Israeli conflict impossible.
So what should we do?
Stop considering all terrorists as equal. We need to accept that some terrorists are highly regarded by their communities as "freedom fighters" and "martyrs." This does not mean that we should sit back and do nothing about terrorist attacks against us, but that we do need to be willing to talk and negotiate with "terrorist-sponsoring" states something we are already doing, although we say we are not! take, for example, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan.
As for the Palestinian/Israeli conflict, we need to decide where we stand in relation to a potential solution. It looks as though there is broad agreement except among Islamic extremists that the "final solution" will not be the elimination of either the Palestinians or the Israelis but the creation of two states the borders of which would be respected and if necessary enforced by the supporting parties of both sides. There's the George Mitchell Report, the Tenet Plan and the Saudi Peace Plan. Is something on their lines the solution? Or do we want to come up with a new plan? Where should we draw the lines? Having decided on a Plan we need to make that Plan public to all supporters of the conflict and try to reach as much agreement as possible. We need to make it very clear what we are prepared to support and what we are not prepared to tolerate. If either the Palestinians or the Israelis go against the Plan, then we simply withdraw our support from the side in question. We should not try to enforce a solution without the agreement of all the supporters, but we are entitled unilaterally to withdraw our support. Remember, Israel cannot survive without American support and the Palestinians cannot survive without Arab support. So the threat to withdraw support is an extremely powerful "weapon."
I do not believe that the situation is hopeless. Neither the Palestinians nor the Israelis benefit by the conflict. And should there be an escalation of the conflict to include the whole Middle East, then the Arab states are going to lose out as well by reduced oil revenues to say nothing of America potentially losing its supply of "cheap" oil. The countries that gain most are Russia and China. Perhaps we need to take a closer look, for example, at the Russian/Iranian connection is Russia really our ally? or the Chinese/Pakistan connection how did Pakistan get its nuclear capability?
Now let's take a closer look at Iraq. There are widespread media "rumors" that America will do "something" in the next few months at the latest by the end of the year.
What we do about Iraq may be even more important to the future of the world than what we do about the Israeli/Palestinian conflict. Can we build a solid foundation for peace in the Middle East or are the conflicts in the area likely to trigger World War III?
As with the Israeli/Palestinian conflict both the "doves" and the "hawks" can present convincing arguments. The hawks, well represented by Benjamin Netanyahu (former prime minister of Israel and quite likely their future prime minister), claim that it is only a matter of time maybe two or three years before Saddam Hussein gets nuclear capability and that, if he has nuclear weapons at his disposal, he will have no hesitation using them against Israeli and/or American targets. The doves will point out that the 1991/1992 Gulf War did not succeed in stopping Saddam Hussein and that he, in fact, has been the political winner since he was able to stand up against the only remaining superpower and survive! If the Gulf War did not stop him and back then we had the agreement and support not only of the United Nations but even some of the Arab states what makes us think that we will be able to stop him now when we have practically no support from the rest of the world?
The key issue seems to be the danger to the area and America if Saddam Hussein has free rein to develop Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMDs), i.e. nuclear, chemical and biological weapons.
I agree that this is a key issue. The error is in thinking that we can prevent any country, that has some money and the will, from developing WMDs. The technologies are simply too widespread, and in the case of chemical and biological agents too cheap. How did Pakistan get its nuclear capability? From the Chinese. How did Saddam Hussein get his biological and chemical agents? From the Americans.
There are no workable military solutions to this problem. In fact, military "solutions" can easily make things worse. Do we really want the whole Arab world united against us?
Does this mean that there are no solutions, period? Hopefully not. What it indicates is that the solutions have to be political rather than military.
We have witnessed a rash of suicide bombings in Israel. We are however unlikely to witness acts of suicide committed by states. If Saddam Hussein employs WMDs against Israel or United States targets, it would clearly be an act of suicide. The military retaliation would be devastating. For the same reason it is unlikely that Pakistan or India will use their nuclear weapons. Or North Korea, or Iran.
What we are more likely to see or continue to see are states "unofficially" sponsoring terrorists. Take, for example, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan with their support of the Taliban and Al Qaeda. If the terrorists have WMDs, there's a real possibility of them being used with the unofficially-sponsoring states denying responsibility similar in a way to what Yasser Arafat is doing, though on a lesser scale, with suicide bombings.
Is there a solution to this problem? Is it realistic to suppose that we can knock out all the terrorist organizations in the world? Probably not. Maybe the best that we can hope for is to "contain" terrorists. It is, however, almost impossible for a terrorist group or organization of any size to operate without at least the unofficial support of one or more states. Take Hezbollah, for example, and their backing by Lebanon, Syria and Iran. If our Intelligence is really on the ball, it should be virtually impossible to hide the links between a terrorist group and the supporting state. It needs to be made very clear that any state would be held responsible for an act by a terrorist group that they are supporting and that the result would be the same as if they had committed the act themselves.
The fact is that, unfortunately, we need to learn to live with WMDs. This puts the emphasis on political rather than military solutions. And this means that we have to be willing to talk to and negotiate with states who are currently supporters of terrorists. Such a choice would not be weakness on our part and should not be perceived as such if, at the same time, we make it very clear just how and when we would use military force and how devastating that would be!
The alternative returning to Iraq is to take military action that will unite the Arab and Moslem world against us. There are some 200 million Arabs in the Middle East and about 1.2 billion Moslems throughout the world. Is it worth the risks? What do you think? E-mail your comments to: "UnCommon Sense" <david@altnewtimes.com>
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