This article was first published here by the Friday Times on August 16, 2023.
There have been whispers lately that the Biden Administration is trying to broker a deal to normalize relations between Saudi Arabia and Israel. In exchange for abandoning the Palestinians, America’s “values-based” President is rumored to be offering his military’s most advanced weapons while the Saudis are reputed to be angling for help building a “civilian” nuclear program and a defense pact. President Biden will surely claim this program is not intended to build nuclear weapons, but it is hard to conceive of any other reason a nation endowed with Saudi Arabia’s oil reserves would covet such technology. These developments provide yet another glimpse into the hypocritical and destructive role America has played in the region while proving its leaders have learned nothing after decades of committing similar blunders.
By trying to expand the Abraham Accords to Saudi Arabia, America is trying to foster a peace between dictators that ignores the underlying cause of conflict between Israel and the Muslim world, namely, the violent oppression of the Palestinians. The simple fact is these deals will never bring real peace to the region for the same reason Israel’s treaties with Egypt and Jordan failed to do so. Without a political agreement that protects the rights of the Palestinians, most Muslims will justifiably remain hostile towards Israel, preventing the establishment of the sort of deep-rooted ties that can lead to genuine peace. Despite the rhetoric about adequate compensation, there can be no doubt: this deal is meant to further marginalize and isolate the Palestinians, not help them.
At best, these accords may sweep the region’s problems under the rug for a time. But the most likely scenario is they will only make its problems worse by exacerbating its underlying issues. The primary significance of these accords is not that they will achieve a sustainable peace but how they prove once more that America has never been an honest broker between the Israelis and Palestinians. In their desperation to help Israel consolidate its de facto annexation of the West Bank, America’s leaders are willing to arm the Arab world’s despots with their most sophisticated weapons.
Saudi Arabia, for example, is governed by a violent monarchical dictatorship. Its war in Yemen has already killed 377,000 people. The Saudi royal family has built a repressive police state to enforce its rule and frequently murders or imprisons those who do nothing more than criticize it. It is not the sort of country America should be selling weapons to, particularly if those weapons create mushroom clouds. Despite these red flags, America has been Saudi Arabia’s primary arms dealer for decades. This deal, however, would take their relationship to a level reserved only for NATO allies. Strengthening Saudi Arabia’s dictatorship to such a degree not only betrays American values but will have a destabilizing and destructive impact on the region in many ways. It is an excellent example of the short-sighted and hypocritical thinking that has always characterized its approach to the region.
But nothing epitomizes American hypocrisy like its support for Israel. Despite the overwhelming evidence that Israel is an apartheid state, the majority of America’s political establishment refuses to admit it. Instead, they prefer to ignore the conclusions of venerable organizations like Humans Rights Watch, Amnesty International, and B’Tselem that have all condemned Israel as a state in which the political and legal system is explicitly designed to empower Jews while violently disenfranchising and marginalizing Palestinians. Though the exact mechanisms may differ from the South African version, Israel’s political economy is designed with the same ends in mind. It is an apartheid state in every meaningful way, just like America was during the Jim Crow era. One that has established violent military control over millions of Palestinians while dispossessing them of their land and rights.
America has been its unabashed supporter and enabler since nearly the beginning. Its leaders laud Israeli “democracy” and send it almost 4 billion dollars a year to ensure its military superiority while ignoring the fact that being a healthy democracy and violent military occupier are mutually exclusive. Sort of like being progressive and supporting apartheid. These glaring inconsistencies aside, American politicians overwhelmingly declare their affection for Israel while vehemently denying its racist nature.
There will always be people who are incapable of admitting the truth about Israel just like there are still people in America who think it is appropriate to teach children slavery provided valuable job skills for black people. But the truth is obvious to anyone capable of putting their tribal instincts aside. What should be equally obvious is that apartheid in all its manifestations and variations is evil. America’s support for Israeli apartheid is especially repugnant given its own ugly history. One would think both Americans and Israelis would have learned by now that political systems designed to empower one group over another based purely on race, religion, or ethnicity are inherently immoral. Sadly, one would be mistaken.
President Biden may pretend to be an ally, but he is an apartheid denier who sees no contradiction between his claims to support equality in America and his willingness to ignore Israel’s crimes against the Palestinians. To his credit, he is not the worst of the bunch. Politicians like Richie Torres, Ron DeSantis and Niki Haley are not just apartheid deniers, but enthusiastic apartheid lovers who seem to take a perverse joy in the repression meted out to the Palestinians.
America’s support for Israeli apartheid and Arab autocracy vividly highlight why it has been such a destructive force in the region. Instead of supporting democracy and defending human rights, America’s policies strengthen the foundational causes of the region’s instability by supporting its authoritarian rulers. Its attempts to bring Israel and Saudi Arabia together are the culmination of a decades-long effort to “stabilize” the region by trampling on the values it claims to stand for.
The best thing America can do for the Middle East is leave it alone. Its sanctions against Iraq killed 576,000 children. According to Brown University, the War on Terror that followed claimed approximately 4.5 million more innocent souls. America has done enough. But despite its genocidal record, its leaders and people still implicitly believe America is exceptional and justified in its hegemonic pursuits. That George Bush is a war criminal is beyond their ability to comprehend.
Conversely, the best thing Saudi Arabia can do is end its neo-colonial relationship with America and learn to stand on its own. The Sauds are desperate for America’s help because, despite turning their nation into the world’s fifth biggest military spender, their armed forces are incompetent. Without the American mercenaries and arms dealers who run its day-to-day operations and supply its weapons, Saudi Arabia’s military would cease to function. This incompetence is a direct result of its repressive political and social systems. The refusal of Saudi leaders to meaningfully empower their people has prevented them from building a military capable of protecting their nation without the help of a foreign patron.
As Machiavelli noted centuries ago, this is the path to servitude, not power. In their desperation to hold on to power at all costs, Saudi leaders ignore the lessons of history and common sense. But this is a depressingly familiar story in the Muslim world, one that epitomizes the dysfunction that has gripped nearly all of it for too long. Despite centuries of conquest and instability, the Muslim world’s rulers refuse to change their ways or admit the obvious truth that creating democratic political systems is the first step to developing adequate military and technological capabilities in the modern age. As a result, they must sell themselves to the West (or Russia, or China or a combination thereof) to maintain their power.
Nowhere is this more evident than the degree to which Muslim nations have abandoned the Palestinians in exchange for American support for their dictatorships. Collectively using the carrot of normalization could have convinced Israel to make peace with the Palestinians. But the region’s dictators have opted to negotiate individual deals, wasting the only leverage they have left while showing, yet again, how inept they are at doing anything other than cling to power.
Which means the Palestinians will need to stand up for themselves. The best way to do that is to learn from people who have been in similar predicaments. Gandhi, Mandela, and King taught the world how to fight injustice using non-violent, mass civil disobedience. Given their inability to secure their freedom through force of arms, the Palestinians would do well to remember this history. Armed struggle plays directly into the hands of the considerably more powerful IDF whereas adopting non-violent methods of civil disobedience on a massive scale would constitute the sort of indirect approach that would make Liddell Hart proud.
Between Gaza, Israel proper, and the West Bank, the Palestinians constitute a majority of the population between the river and the sea. A one state solution in which they are treated as equals has long been their surest path to freedom. If Israel truly is the democracy its supporters claim it is, they should have no problem fairly sharing power with the Palestinians according to transparent and equitable democratic principles. Of course, these demographic realities are exactly the reason most Israelis refuse to do so, even though their sprawling settlements have made a two-state solution impossible. Instead of creating a truly democratic society, they argue Israel must remain Jewish. In doing so, they are choosing apartheid without having the courage to admit it while simultaneously denying the realities that come with their choice to build their nation in the heart of the Arab world. Nevertheless, as the author already suggested years ago, peacefully forcing Israelis to decide if they would rather live in a Jewish state or a democratic one represents the Palestinians’ last, best option considering the lengths America is willing to go to convince the world to forget about them.
This article was first published here by the Friday Times on April 24, 2023.
Even though it was nearly twenty-five years ago, I still vividly remember what it was like to step aboard the USS George Washington for the first time. For those who are not familiar, the G.W. is one of ten Nimitz class aircraft carriers in America’s navy. It is a massive warship made from 60,000 tons of steel that is over 330 meters long and functions as a floating airbase. When fully loaded with its complement of 90 aircraft, it displaces nearly 97,000 tons.
Building one takes 2,500 hundred workers about five years and costs $5 billion, but that is a relative bargain compared to the new Ford class of carriers which cost $4.7 billion in research and development on top of the $12.8 billion price tag to build. These ships are miracles of engineering that highlight America’s industrial might, wealth, and determination to remain the world’s dominant military power.
I would often stand on the GW’s monstrous 4.5-acre (36 kanals) flight deck and marvel at the resources that went into designing, building, and deploying it. Once built, carriers are manned by a crew of 5,000 sailors and airmen and cost another $1.18 billion a year. Which means that simply operating and maintaining these ten ships costs more than Pakistan’s entire annual military budget. And that does not even account for the cost of their aircraft or the cruisers, destroyers, and fast attack submarines that escort them whenever they deploy which brings the total cost to $21 billion a year.
These ships allow America to control the world’s oceans and the 40% of its population that lives within reach of them. They represent a huge investment in its military, but they are just one part of the military power that America has built and sustained since WW2.
Serving aboard America’s gigantic warships was a surreal experience, one that fed an obsession with trying to understand the factors that allowed it to build such a powerful military. But this was merely part of a larger obsession – trying to understand why the Muslim world has been so militarily weak for so long as evidenced by the repeated pattern of conquests it has been subjected to over the past few centuries. Solving the riddle of America’s power therefore holds the key to helping Muslims prevent more violence like the sort that has consumed Kashmir, Chechnya, Iraq, Afghanistan, Palestine and far too many other places.
America’s military is the result of several factors working together. It is a large country, well endowed with fertile land and abundant natural resources. Its borders are protected by the Canadian Shield to its north and the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. Some might argue that geography, by itself, is enough to explain America’s power. But a comparison with Russia and Israel suggests otherwise.
Russia has also been blessed geographically, though not to the same extent as America. Its western and southern borders have always been vulnerable to attack and its lands are not nearly as fertile. But it is still a large nation, with lots of natural resources and protected on its northern and eastern borders. It also fields a powerful military, but one that pales in comparison to America’s. Russia’s military is large and moderately well-equipped but mostly used to secure its “near abroad.”
America’s military, on the other hand, extends its reach to the entire world. The easiest way to illustrate this point is to compare the number of carriers deployed by each nation. Between its Ford, Nimitz, America, and Wasp classes, America currently deploys a total of twenty-one aircraft carriers of various shapes and sizes. Russia, even during the height of its Soviet era power, struggled to deploy seven such vessels, most of which were incapable of launching fixed wing aircraft or deploying far from its shores. Of these seven, only one remains in service and it is currently in drydock. When it comes to projecting military power, the ultimate tool is the aircraft carrier. Russia’s inability to build more than a fraction of the carrier fleet built by America is one of many examples that highlight the limits of its power.
On the other end of the geographic spectrum is Israel, a tiny nation bereft of natural resources. Despite its diminutive stature, Israel fields the most powerful military in the Middle East and was able to establish its dominance over the Arabs long before America became its ardent supporter. Israel may not have aircraft carriers, but it does have a sophisticated nuclear triad, advanced tanks and fighter jets, and cutting-edge electronic warfare, signals intelligence, and missile defense capabilities. It also has a proven track record of dominating its enemies on the battlefield.
These examples are important because they show that geography, by itself, does not provide an entirely satisfying explanation. If geography were the only determinant of military power, America and Russia would field roughly equal forces and Israel would have ceased to exist long ago. Geography has certainly played a part in allowing Russia and America to build their large militaries, but the contrasts between them and Israel’s example show it is not the most important factor in explaining why. Instead, we must look to the type of political institutions that govern these nations.
Russia has a long history of being ruled by authoritarian and absolutist political institutions and their negative impact largely explains its relatively weak military abilities. America, on the other hand, features an inclusive, democratic system. Israel does too, for its Jewish citizens, at least. These are the keys to their military power.
Combined, the seminal works Why Nations Fail and The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers show how democracy leads to military power. In the latter, Prof. Kennedy explains that modern wars will typically be won by the side with the greater industrial and technological capabilities. According to Kennedy, military power is based on factors ranging from “geography and national morale to generalship and tactical competence” but primarily rests upon “adequate supplies of wealth, which in turn derive from a flourishing productive base, from healthy finances, and from superior technology.” In Why Nations Fail, the authors show how democratic systems lead to the wealth, industrial capabilities, and technology highlighted by Kennedy.
As Saudi Arabia’s military incompetence shows, by itself, wealth is not enough. It is the ability to design, build, maintain, repair, and use the weapons required to wage modern war that matters. Paying for them is just one step of many in the convoluted process required to master and incorporate them into an effective military force.
The most fundamental step in that process is creating democratic political systems. To be clear, democracy is about far more than elections. It is about devising a political system that uses institutional mechanisms to create pluralistic power structures and ensure governments are responsive to the needs of their people. Voting is just one of several methods used to achieve this. A true democracy establishes the rule of law and the primacy of the individual by creating independent and efficient courts that settle disputes fairly and protect the lives and property of citizens against government excess and each other. They also feature competent law enforcement, administrative, and regulatory agencies, and ensure freedom of speech and association. In doing so, they create an environment conducive to strong economic growth and technological development which can then be used to create strong militaries.
Aside from generating the wealth and technology needed to build powerful weapons, democracies also provide significant advantages with respect to training the soldiers who will use them, which impacts the other factors listed by Kennedy relating to generalship and tactical competence. Wealth and strong free speech guarantees are vital ingredients needed to build vibrant schools that can educate future soldiers and give them the critical thinking skills necessary to thrive in combat. Once they enter military service, these soldiers will typically find themselves promoted based on their professional abilities and merit rather than their perceived loyalty to a particular regime due the ability of democracies to create apolitical militaries.
Taken together, these factors allow democracies to design and build sophisticated weapons, buy lots of them, and staff their militaries with professional and highly trained soldiers, sailors, and airmen who can use them with lethal effect. By inference, these ideas also show why the Muslim world’s lack of democracy has made its nations so weak and vulnerable to conquest. As a result, those who wish to understand the roots of the Muslim world’s weakness must focus on the prevalence of authoritarian and absolutist political systems throughout it and the ways these have stunted its economic and intellectual development, making it impossible to build militaries capable of protecting them from conquest.
At first glance, China’s military modernization would seem to contradict these arguments. However, its well documented issues developing adequate jet engines or advanced semiconductors as well as the intellectual property theft that has fueled much of its progress indicates its authoritarian system has also limited its technological development. In fact, its economy is already showing weaknesses that are directly attributable to its repressive political system as illustrated by its ghost cities, capital flight, and the efforts to control or silence many of its prominent entrepreneurs and their companies. Just as the Soviet Union did during the 1960’s, authoritarian systems may generate growth for a time, but in addition to negatively impacting technological innovation, they are inherently unstable and will inevitably retrench or collapse in on themselves.
Though it still suffers from certain authoritarian tendencies, Turkey’s example also supports these arguments. It has the most extensive experience with democracy in the Muslim world and is, consequently, one of its most advanced and powerful states.
Despite the obvious benefits and the data provided by the different examples offered above, most Muslim states have not embraced democracy due to their unique historical experiences, the entrenched power of their military elites, and the toxic influence of their social institutions. This has led some to argue that Islam is incompatible with democracy. But as argued here in more detail, the history of the Rashidun era shows that not only are democracy and Islam compatible, but that democracy is the form of government closest to the Islamic ideal.
In addition to being the most logical way to strengthen individual Muslim states, creating democratic political systems is also the only way to overcome their geographic weaknesses. The Muslim world is divided into over 50 nations, none of which can compete with the Great Powers alone. As such, Muslims must come together the same way Europe did after WW2 to create new political and economic entities that can allow them to work together to prosper and protect each other through free trade and security alliances. Europe’s democratic political systems were a key factor in allowing it to unite and creating similar systems will be necessary if Muslims ever wish to do the same.
The Muslim world’s authoritarian political systems have prevented such unity because they typically rely on patronage networks glued together by corruption and nepotism. These have made it impossible to build the sort of neutral courts and administrative agencies that can meaningfully connect Muslim states by creating fair and transparent ways for them to trade with each other on a large scale. This has, in turn, made it impossible to build the sort of relationships that can lead to a security alliance.
Pan-Islamic sentiments may seem antiquated in the age of the nation-state, but the inescapable truth is that humanity’s history is a violent one and most of our conflicts have a tribal dimension. As Sam Huntington explains in his work The Clash of Civilizations, the world can be broadly divided into civilizational groups that share historical and cultural commonalities. According to Huntington, the Islamic and Western worlds constitute two such civilizations. These tribal dynamics explain why the West unequivocally backs Israel’s violence against the Arabs as it desperately tries to stop Iran from acquiring the same weapons it helped Israel develop. They also help explain Hindu India’s conflict with Muslim Pakistan. Even Europe’s rejection of Turkey is best understood in reference to their civilizational differences.
The conflict between Russia and Ukraine is intra-civilizational. But it has taken on inter-civilizational dimensions as Western nations side with Ukraine in their bid to box in their civilizational rival in Slavic Russia. There are certainly other contributing factors such as geo-politics and resource competition driving these conflicts but there is no denying their tribal nature.
The key to understanding these conflicts, and who ultimately wins them, is understanding how all the variables referenced throughout this discussion work together and shape each other. To do so properly, one must first recognize the primacy of political systems in shaping and impacting them all. As such, Muslim nations must build genuinely democratic and inclusive political systems if they ever hope to end the cycle of violence that has consumed so many of them. Doing so is the only way to overcome the many political, social, economic, technological, tactical, and geographic factors that have made it so weak for so long. Until that happens, Muslim nations will remain among the ranks of the conquered.
Between all the propaganda and gaslighting, wars inevitably reveal the ugly truth about a society. The war in Gaza has been no different. We are now five weeks into Israel’s counterattack on Hamas. The IDF (Israel Defense Forces) has responded to the murder of over 1,400 Israelis by killing 11,078 Palestinians, 4,506 of whom were children. Israel’s military spokesman, Brig. Gen. Daniel Hagari, all but admitted these killings were intentional when he stated the IDF’s focus is on inflicting “damage and not on accuracy.” When confronted about the IDF’s habit of dropping bombs on targets it knows are full of civilians in relation to a strike that murdered an estimated 50 innocent people, his fellow IDF spokesperson, Lt. Col. Richard Hecht, unapologetically shrugged these deaths off as “the tragedy of war.” These statements are merely confirmation of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s promise that he would respond to Oct. 7th in a way that reverberates “for generations.” A promise made good when 42 members of the Saqallah family were killed by an Israeli airstrike. Three generations, ranging in age from 3 months to 77 years old, were murdered as they were taking shelter in their home.
Given these statements of intent and the indiscriminate devastation being visited upon Gaza, it is painfully obvious Israel is following the Dahiya Doctrine first articulated by former IDF chief of staff Gadi Eisenkot during Israel’s 2006 war with Hezbollah by intentionally murdering Palestinian civilians. At the least, it is guilty of acting with reckless disregard to the fact that its missile and artillery strikes are killing thousands of women and children. In either case, the IDF is committing a massacre.
One can only wonder where those who were so horrified by Hamas’ killing of women and children are now. After all, as Jonah Goldberg pointed out to those who tried to justify Hamas’ brutality by framing it as legitimate resistance to Israel’s 17-year siege of Gaza, “no amount of context justifies killing babies.” Inexplicably, Mr. Goldberg was too busy dissecting the history and significance of the term “settler colonial” with mind numbing detail to offer any outrage over Gaza’s dead babies.
But Mr. Goldberg is hardly the only American who does not care when Palestinian babies are murdered. When asked about the rising death toll in Gaza, President Biden dismissed them out of hand, preferring to question the accuracy of the figures instead of addressing the underlying issue. His apathy, like Mr. Goldberg’s, is yet more proof that most Americans simply do not care when Palestinian children are murdered.
To their credit, at least Messrs. Goldberg and Biden are not blood thirsty sociopaths like Senator Lindsey Graham, Congressman Brian Mast, or Florida state representative Michelle Salzman. Graham does not believe there should be any limits on the number of women and children Israel should be allowed to murder in its quest to rid the world of Hamas’ evil, child killing members. Mast argued there are “no innocent Palestinian civilians.” While Salzman believes Israel should murder “all” Palestinians.
Of course, none of this is surprising. Anyone who has not been in a coma these past thirty years already knows about America’s pattern of killing Arabs and Muslims and the mix of ambivalence and racist demonization that accompanies it. Its sanctions against Iraq killed an estimated 576,000 children. The War on Terror killed another 4.5 million people. Its direct support for Saudi Arabia’s war in Yemen added 377,000 more. The great majority of Americans did not care then, and they do not care now. To expect them to suddenly show interest in dead Palestinian, Arab, or Muslim babies at this point would be insane.
The Western world’s blatant and overwhelming hypocrisy is certainly condemnable but adequately addressing this topic would take volumes while accomplishing very little. Instead of raging against these glaring double standards, I will simply point out that evil always leads to more evil. Even if it’s a delayed harvest, you reap what you sow, and America has sown death and despair throughout the globe.
As I explain here in more detail, these chickens are already coming home to roost. There is a direct correlation between the genocidal violence America has unleashed or enabled around the world and the mass shootings that are now a depressingly routine part of American life. These are a biproduct of being in a nearly continuous state of conflict for most of the past eighty years. They will continue to haunt Americans in their schools, restaurants, shopping centers, movie theaters, etc. until their country ends its militaristic policies and dismantles the weapons factories built to further them.
Aside from enabling one lone wolf shooter after another, America’s hegemonic pursuits are also slowly draining a foundational part of its power – its wealth. No empire in history has been able to maintain an aggressive military posture for an extended period of time without eventually imploding. Much of America’s nearly 34 trillion dollar debt can be attributed to its military spending. The interest payments on this debt now stand at 659 billion a year and could climb to two trillion by the end of the decade. Eventually, the financial house of cards built to pay for its imperial ambitions will collapse, impoverishing millions in the process.
America’s obsession with global dominance is slowly destroying and bankrupting it. But since most Americans simply do not want to have this conversation, I’m not going to waste more time on the matter. I have already done my best to warn America that it is on the path to self-destruction several times.
Instead of wasting time trying to dissuade America from its genocidal policies, I prefer to focus on the party that bears the most responsibility for the slaughter in Gaza – the Muslim world. Societies are never conquered by outsiders until they have sufficiently rotted from within. Those who cheered the massacre of women and children on Oct. 7th and those who have been tearing down posters of these innocents are all a reflection of this rot. Much like the subject of Western hypocrisy, adequately addressing the roots of the dysfunction that has gripped Muslim societies these past many centuries would take volumes, and then some. The Muslim world is a mess, and it has been a mess for a long time.
Gaza’s woes are just an extreme example of the weakness and instability that is typical of most Muslim societies. Nearly the entire Muslim world features authoritarian and absolutist governments that preside over unproductive economies and stagnant intellectual climates. This has made it incredibly weak and prone to conquest. The massacre happening in Gaza right now is but the latest in a long line dating back to Napoleon, the Czars, and even the Reconquista.
Despite this history of conquest and instability, Muslim leaders refuse to implement the sort of reforms that could help them to finally modernize and stabilize their nations. Instead, they furiously cling to power, refusing to change. In the same way America’s leaders can only offer thoughts and prayers or make impotent demands for legislation they know will never pass after massacres like the one in Maine, the Muslim world’s leaders can only hold meetings and issue scathing press releases as they watch Gaza’s children die. They may pretend to care about the Palestinians, but their refusal to change their ways, the repression they inflict on their own people and their refusal to speak against China’s crimes against its Muslim populations suggests their concern is mostly for show or politics. Due to their inaction and hypocrisy, Muslims are too weak to challenge America’s fleet as it stands watch over another slaughter.
Both the need for reform and the solutions have been obvious for a long time. As explained here, secular democracy has always been the ideal form of Islamic government. Adopting inclusive, democratic forms of government based on the rule of law would significantly improve the Muslim world’s military abilities while paving the way for the sort of regional integration and mutual security arrangements that could finally stabilize it. But aside from a few flawed experiments like those in Turkey and Indonesia, most of the Muslim world’s nations refuse to adopt this model.
As the slaughter happening right now shows, they should have listened. As such, I must renew my call for Hamas and the Palestinians to surrender. Given the IDF’s refusal to distinguish between Hamas and the women and children who live among them, it would be prudent for all Palestinians to wave white flags of surrender. Palestinians in the West Bank and Israel would do well to follow suite in solidarity with their brothers and sisters in Gaza. Peaceful, non-violent resistance is the only sane path left for them.
Unfortunately, my advice and warnings have gone unheeded so far. Which is a pity, because fires of the sort burning in Gaza tend to spread. Israel’s invasion of Gaza, even if it removes Hamas from power, will not lead to peace or even calm without a just political agreement with the Palestinians and dismantling the apartheid apparatus that has been built to subjugate them. Since Israel’s government is run by men incapable of making such an agreement, a repetition and expansion of the cycle of violence is almost certain. The Muslim world’s rulers would do well to prepare for the chaos that is coming.
Having done my best to highlight the rank hypocrisy of both the Western and Muslim worlds, I must now express my profound shame as I watch my country enable yet another massacre of defenseless women and children while the Muslim world impotently looks on. I am ashamed to be an American. But I am even more ashamed of myself and my fellow Muslims. There are nearly 1.9 billion Muslims in the world and not one of us has the power to stop this evil. Our leaders and governments may bear most of the fault, but even if it’s a distorted view, they are still a reflection of the people and societies they rule over. Every single one of us bears responsibility for what is happening to Gaza. One can only wonder how many more massacres we will watch before we make the desperately needed changes to our societies that can finally give us the strength to stop them.
What America and Israel are doing is evil. Murdering more children will never lead to peace. There is no justification for what is being done to the people of Gaza. America is not the arsenal of democracy, as some like to pretend. It is the arsenal of dictators and apartheid and the world’s preeminent merchant of death. That much is obvious. But none of this would be happening if Muslims were not so unbelievably weak.
Since our governments do not have the strength to take action, every one of us must speak out to stop this madness. The IDF beat back Hamas’ attack and captured many of its fighters while the rest retreated. The battle Hamas started on Oct. 7th is over. Israel’s military has re-established control of Gaza’s border, removing the threat of more attacks. What is happening now is not self-defense but revenge and collective punishment. Completely destroying Hamas, if it is even possible, would require destroying the entire Gaza strip and murdering tens or possibly even hundreds of thousands of women and children.
Those who remain silent are just as complicit as those depraved souls who rationalize these crimes by conflating Hamas with the Palestinian people or making disingenuous and grossly inaccurate comparisons with the Nazis. Unless Hamas has 100 panzer divisions along with a fleet of powerful aircraft and ships in its tunnels, the comparison is misguided, at best. Its primary purpose is to help Israel’s leaders deflect calls to pursue a diplomatic solution. Israelis may find the idea of negotiating with Hamas repugnant and, given the thousands of children murdered these past few weeks, Hamas’ leaders probably feel the same way. Regardless, the only way to salvage anything worthwhile from this war is to use it as a path to real peace but that requires dialogue, not dropping thousands of pounds of explosives on residential areas. Otherwise, the cycle will only repeat itself with greater intensity.
Sadly, we live in a world where even our “liberal” leaders prefer war over peace. President Biden could have tried for a Camp David moment. Instead, he responded to a massacre by green lighting another massacre. Yet one more horrible decision from a man who chose Clarence Thomas over Anita Hill, supported the Iraq War, denied Israel was an apartheid state and considered giving Saudi Arabia nuclear technology in a misguided attempt to seek peace by marginalizing the Palestinians. Hopefully, the President’s actions will cost him the swing states of Michigan, Ohio, and Pennsylvania during the next election, sparing the world from more of his awful decisions.
As a brown man in America, I have learned to be very careful when I share my thoughts. Particularly since there are people who think speaking up for children makes me a terrorist sympathizer or that calling Israel what it is – an apartheid state – makes me an antisemite. Despite these risks, I have no choice but to say something when children are murdered by American made bombs funded by my taxes.
I realize most Americans will never read these thoughts and those few who do will either vilify me or follow President Biden’s lead and dismiss them out of hand. Nevertheless, I will continue to remind everyone that men who hurt children are evil. Children are off-limits. Whether their parents are terrorists or settler colonialists is irrelevant. The ease with which so many rationalize or ignore the slaughter of children is disgusting and shameful. It may seem pointless but the only thing we can do is continue to speak for peace and sanity and answer hate with love. Be the change, as a wise person once advised. Violence is never the answer.
These events have also forced Muslims in the West to confront our place here yet again. There are millions of us who have grown up here, across multiple generations. We have in many ways become embedded into Western society and culture. But our increased numbers and influence did not matter. The leaders we voted for betrayed us and the alternative is even scarier. What are we to do?
I can only speak for myself, and I have decided to vote with my feet and leave. I do not counsel this lightly, particularly since the Muslim world is not a very attractive place either. In an ideal world, we could take the skills and capital we have acquired during our stay in the West and return to our homelands to stimulate a much needed renaissance. But the Muslim world is a repressive place and many of us would quickly run afoul of its stifling rules. The same blasphemy laws, political repression, and corrupt, backwards economies that make it so weak would make for a tough transition and risky investment.
But at some point, we may not have a choice. There are 20 million AR15 style assault rifles floating around America. When it finally collapses under the weight of its massive spending and debts, things are going to get ugly. If another war in the Middle East hastens these trends, Muslims will suffer for it. There is a dark side to Western civilization that is often ignored. Westerners have a history of committing brutal violence against those they consider inferior or find suspicious and those suspicions are often rooted in racial and religious bigotry. The Inquisition, the era of violent colonial conquests, the Holocaust, the reign of the KKK in the American south and South Africa’s and Israel’s embrace of apartheid are just a few examples of this history. To expect that Muslims will continue to prosper and remain safe given this pattern and America’s current trajectory is simply not realistic. As much as we have all grown to love our homes in the West, we must face the fact that we are not wanted and may not always be safe here. There will always be elements who view us as outsiders and these same elements own a lot of those AR 15s. Escape, especially when it is properly planned for, may be the best option. The real dilemma is figuring out the destination.
The author is a US Navy veteran and lawyer who usually writes about ways to modernize the Muslim world on his blog, www.mirrorsfortheprince.com
Here’s a statement most Americans will probably disagree with: America is the wealthiest and most powerful empire the world has ever known. Acknowledging that our wealth and power are without rival is easy, we just have a hard time with the empire part. Especially since we are ruled by an elected president and legislative body instead of a monarch. According to the Oxford Dictionary, that means we cannot be an empire.
No disrespect to the folks at Oxford, but their definition seems limited. Yuval Harari’s definition of empire in his book, Sapien, as “a political order” that rules “a significant number of distinct peoples, each possessing a different cultural identity and a separate territory” is a better one. Based on Harari’s description, a polity that includes territories as varied as Hawaii, Alaska, Puerto Rico, Diego Garcia, Southern California, Louisiana, and Massachusetts certainly qualifies as an empire.
Our refusal to self-identify as one is primarily rooted in our democratic ethos and the fact that we once had to fight to break free from the British empire. It also detracts from the idea of American exceptionalism since it forces us to admit our similarity to empires of the past. Despite our historical and philosophical aversion to being described as such, it seems clear that America has evolved into an empire. Without an honest assessment of ourselves, accurately diagnosing what ails us becomes impossible. And the reality is that our empire is in trouble.
We are following a pattern many others have followed. We have expanded over vast territories and built a very expensive military to protect this territory. Doing so required creating a central government with the power to tax and marshal resources on a scale that was far beyond anything envisioned by the creators of our federal system of governance. This also led to the development of interest groups with the means and incentives to push for a massive amount of continuous military spending. Just as the Romans, Ottomans, and British before us, we are slowly collapsing under the weight of maintaining our military. In fact, much of our $30 trillion debt can be traced to this spending. As this number grows, it will continue to weaken the economic foundations that are the true source of American power.
The curious part to all of this is that, unlike the British, Ottomans, or Romans, most of our empire is easily defended. The Pacific and Atlantic oceans and the Canadian shield have always been our best military assets. Yet, our military leaders have developed a force posture and military doctrine that requires twenty aircraft carriers, over a million personnel, thousands of fighter jets and bombers, and around 4,000 nuclear warheads at a cost of $700-800 billion a year.
The size of our military traces its roots to WW2 which saw America ally itself with the Russian, French and British empires to prevent Germany, Italy, and Japan from creating empires for themselves. We did so by building a massive military capable of simultaneously fighting its way onto continental Europe and controlling the Pacific. Part of that process entailed establishing a network of forward bases throughout Europe and Asia. Once the war ended, America did not completely stand down. Instead, it found itself fighting the Cold War against its former allies in the Soviet Union. This conflict led to the entrenchment and expansion of the military infrastructure created to fight the Axis powers.
The Cold War ended over thirty years ago, but America still refused to shrink its military. Instead, shortly after the Soviet Union’s collapse we invaded the Muslim world and began building a network of bases to secure its energy supplies. As a result, our empire has been in a nearly continuous state of war for most of the past 80 years. Our war against the Muslim world is finally wrapping up but instead of talking about a peace dividend, our leaders seem intent on using China to justify maintaining our aggressive military posture.
Our military is no longer designed to defend us but to project American power throughout the world in pursuit of vaguely defined “interests.” As our mounting debt shows, the cost of maintaining our military dominance over the rest of the world is starting to add up. Instead of dealing with the reality of our worsening finances by admitting that it is time for America to finally stand down, our leaders passionately argue against such measures. Their refusal to do so will likely doom us to the same fate suffered by every other empire that has come before us, whether we are willing to admit it or not.
The author is a US Navy veteran. He usually provides improbable and implausible musings about the Muslim world and international affairs on his blog, www.mirrorsfortheprince.com.
Author’s note: I wrote most of this article over a year ago but have been unable to publish it until now. Instead of updating it, I decided to publish it as is because developments over the past year merely support my conclusions. For example, as discussed below, a year ago America’s debt was $20 trillion. It has now climbed to $28 trillion. Similarly, America’s withdrawal from Afghanistan and its refusal to get involved in the latest round of fighting between Israelis and Palestinians both support my central argument: America’s military withdrawal from the Muslim world is inevitable. If I were a betting man, I would wager that America’s military presence throughout the Middle East and North Africa will be a shell of what it is today 15-30 years from now:
INTRODUCTION
Due to a combination of political and economic factors as well as its shifting national security priorities, the US will eventually withdraw its military from the Muslim world. It is not a question of whether America will withdraw its forces, but of when and how. Economically, the financial shocks of the COVID-19 Pandemic combined with the high levels of debt held by the US government and America’s diminished manufacturing capacity will necessitate a sharp reduction in US government spending. Politically, America’s right wing wishes to withdraw from the Muslim world due to its isolationist and nationalist views while its left wing favors a withdrawal due to its anti-imperialist views. They may disagree on why and how, but neither end of America’s political spectrum wants to keep troops in the Muslim world. Finally, America’s military deployments to the Muslim world are no longer supported by pressing national security interests. The combined effect of these factors will inevitably lead to a withdrawal of American troops from this part of the world.
The United States has become the dominant military power in the Middle East and throughout much of the Islamic world. It currently has troops stationed in several Muslim countries such as Pakistan, Iraq, Syria, Oman, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, Turkey, and Saudi Arabia. Its naval forces control the Persian Gulf and its allies in Israel and NATO control the Mediterranean. It is the main arms supplier to many Muslim nations such as Jordan, Turkey, Egypt, and the UAE which gives the US significant leverage over these militaries while its allies in Europe supply weapons to many other Muslim states such as Morocco and Algeria. It also regularly conducts military operations and drone strikes throughout Africa as well as Yemen. Iran is the only Muslim country that actively refuses to accept this situation and, as a result, is subject to brutal economic sanctions and clandestine military operations. In other words, the United States and its allies have effective military control over a substantial portion of the Muslim world. The problem is that America’s robust military presence comes with a steep price tag that is becoming increasingly unaffordable[i].
In addition to the $6 trillion cost of America’s wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the constant deployment of troops to the Muslim world has forced its military planners to fund and arm a military that is much larger than would otherwise be needed. These extra funding requirements have been a feature of US defense budgets for decades. Even the official budgets for America’s military underestimate the true cost of its military spending because they do not include all the funds spent on nuclear weapons or intelligence activities[ii]. Although it is difficult to gauge how much of America’s military spending is tied directly to the Muslim world, given its extensive military infrastructure in this part of the world, the long duration of its presence, and large number of troops involved, it is reasonable to assume the true amount significantly exceeds the $6 trillion spent in Iraq and Afghanistan the past two decades.
WHY AMERICA HAS NO CHOICE BUT TO WITHDRAW FROM THE MUSLIM WORLD
ECONOMIC FACTORS:
America’s withdrawal will primarily be driven by its finances. The COVID-19 Pandemic has brought the unhealthy debt levels of the US government into focus once again; however, America’s debt has loomed over it for years. Rather than making the tough compromises necessary to devise balanced budgets, America’s leaders have resolved the age-old debate of guns versus butter by liberally borrowing money to ensure they lacked neither. At the same time, America’s business and political leaders have entered into trade agreements that resulted in severe reductions to its manufacturing capacity. The result has been skyrocketing levels of debt and unsustainable trade imbalances. The staggering amount of resources America pours into its military combined with the significant reductions to its manufacturing base[iii] have drained its economy and, together, pose one of the biggest threats to its continuing prosperity.[iv] At its height, American power was largely derived from its economic, political, and cultural dominance as well as its ability to apply overwhelming military force, as it did in WWI and WWII. Since the end of the Cold War, the US has reacted to its greater freedom of action as the sole remaining superpower by increasingly relying on military power to achieve foreign policy goals. This sustained dependence on military power combined with the gradual dismantling of America’s manufacturing base has diminished its older and more important power centers of their vitality, decreasing the real basis of American power. Over the long run, the continued reliance on military power that is no longer supported by a strong manufacturing base has placed a heavy burden on resources. It has also led to a disconnect between perceptions of American power by its policymaking elites versus the realities and limits of this power.
As a result of America’s weakened financial position, its policymakers must re-prioritize how its military resources are used. Calling for deep cuts to spending may strike some as overly alarmist given the economic growth the US experienced prior to the COVID-19 outbreak. But America’s strong economic growth since the end of the Great Recession has diverted attention from the fact that its massive military spending, particularly since 9/11, has seriously undermined its fiscal position since this spending was only made possible through deficit financing. As the debt burden from this spending grows, it will limit the ability of the US government to meet its spending obligations. As a result, US policymakers must confront serious decisions regarding how to use America’s resources before their policy options become substantially more constrained. American policymakers face two choices. They can proactively adjust their foreign policy goals and military commitments to manage the changes its weak finances require, or they can wait until its debt is so burdensome that they will have no choice but to drastically cut military spending. The former option provides some ability to manage this transition, the latter does not.
POLITICAL FACTORS
In addition to its financial concerns, political trends within the US will also compel a withdrawal from the Muslim world. The increasing prevalence of arguments that favor withdrawing troops from the Muslim world, regardless of the potential impact on the region, show that many segments of American society have no desire to maintain its presence in the region. For example, when discussing the Middle East, Doug Bandow suggests “Washington should accept instability in the region[v]” as part of its efforts to reduce troop levels. These sentiments illustrate that Americans are tired of their military involvement in the Muslim world. America’s right wing sees its involvement as an unnecessary waste of resources that would be better spent in the US. America’s left sees its involvement as immoral and a continuation of ineffective neo-colonial policies. As such, both left and right favor withdrawing American forces from the Muslim world. In fact, this may be one of the few topics that America’s divided political factions agree on. These political trends are a result of growing dissatisfaction with America’s policies and will add pressure to withdraw troops from the region.
THE MUSLIM WORLD IS NO LONGER A NATIONAL SECURITY PRIORITY
Troop levels in the Muslim world are no longer supported by pressing national security interests. US policies in the Middle East have largely been shaped by the confluence of interests of the defense industry, energy industry, Israel, and the dictators that rule much of the region. Together, these groups have prevented the rise of a Muslim hegemon capable of taking over America’s security responsibilities. Instead, they have pushed the US to become the primary hegemonic power in the region by arguing that 1) increased military spending and arms sales to foreign countries are healthy for the US economy 2) American military forces were necessary to ensure the US had access to energy supplies 3) American troops were necessary to protect Israel and 4) American troops were necessary to provide stability by providing security guarantees to many of the governments of the region. These reasons do not make sense. Because of policies meant to appease these interest groups, the US has spent trillions of dollars and much political and moral capital in pursuit of policies that are too expensive and counter to its long-term interests. The influence of these groups has led to policies that have allowed them to make hundreds of billions of dollars but at a cost of trillions of dollars to American taxpayers. Since each of the interest groups primarily responsible for the development of US policy acts according to its own logic, it will be necessary to analyze them individually.
THE NEED TO SUPPORT THE DEFENSE INDUSTRY
After entering WWII, the United States converted its massive civilian manufacturing base into one that could supply its military with the weapons and supplies needed to defeat the Axis powers anywhere in the world. The ability to harness its extraordinary industrial capabilities for military use propelled it towards victory but also laid the seeds for many of the problems confronting it today. The creation of an industrial complex geared exclusively towards military production created companies with a vested interest in continued military spending and the political and financial means to influence US government policy to ensure high levels of military spending. The defense industry has therefore benefited from US policies in the Muslim world by filling the larger orders for weapons and supplies that were necessary to maintain America’s presence in the region and by supplying weapons to the governments of the Muslim world allied to it.
High levels of military spending have typically been justified on the basis that this spending, even if high in absolute terms, is relatively small as a proportion of US GDP and that such spending boosts both manufacturing and scientific research within the US. Though there is merit to these arguments, these policy justifications are no longer sufficient to support high levels of military spending due to the large debt the US has accrued. The Congressional Budget Office estimates the US government’s debt will reach $20.3 trillion by the end of 2020[vi]. These figures will increase as further stimulus packages to fight the COVID-19 Pandemic are approved and tax revenue shrinks due to reduced economic activity. In light of the rapidly increasing debt held by the US, arguments that justify high levels of military spending or debt by highlighting their relationship to overall GDP levels are no longer persuasive because they ignore the reality of America’s worsening finances. Instead of relying on distorted statistics that argue high levels of debt and military spending are acceptable, as a matter of common sense, it should be obvious that continuing to add to an already bloated deficit will only make repairing America’s financial strength more difficult. As such, even if military spending continues to hover around 3% of GDP (a level some argue is affordable), this spending must be considered too high if it is paid for by more deficit financing when the debt will soon pass $20 trillion! Even if the US has the capacity to borrow more, doing so must be tied to pressing economic needs such as dealing with the COVID-19 Pandemic, not unnecessary military spending.
Again, it is difficult to gauge the percentage of US military spending directly attributable to the Muslim world, but it is much easier to track weapons sales by US companies to foreign nations. The US has consistently been the biggest exporter of weapons to the world and many of its sales have been directed towards governments in the Muslim world. Saudi Arabia is one of the biggest consumers of US weapons, accounting for a fifth of total US weapons sales for the five-year period ending in 2017. Half of America’s weapons sales during this period went to customers in the Middle East or North Africa[vii]. Weapons sales to Islamic nations are justified on the basis that they are necessary to support America’s allies and contribute to economic development.
The problem with this reasoning is that the allies in question are exceptionally incompetent when it comes to engaging in modern warfare[viii]. As a result, selling weapons to these nations does not make them more secure or better able to resist attack from another nation. As the Arab Spring showed, these weapons are primarily meant for use against the people that have been forced to obey the region’s many dictators. Weapons sales to these dictators adds to the instability of the Muslim world by providing its despots with the means to intimidate and murder their people. Supporting these dictators contributes to instability in the region by propping up rulers who cannot adequately protect their nations, reside over extremely weak political and economic institutions, and can only govern based on fear and violence. Though these sales may subsidize the costs of America’s military infrastructure, the long-term moral and political cost is too high to justify the economic gains. Instead of selling weapons to the dictators of the Muslim world, the US must develop policies that can allow it to disentangle itself from the region by focusing on trade that does not involve weapons used by rulers to murder their own people. Aside from the fact that profiting from the pain and suffering of others is morally and ethically disgusting, it also creates a reinforcing loop that forces the US to maintain its military presence in the region. Despite their massive weapons purchases, the region’s dictators are not strong enough to retain power without American support. America’s military presence and weapons sales to the region only reinforces its instability by supporting the dictators that are the primary cause of this instability.
ACCESS TO ENERGY SUPPLIES
The primary justification behind US policies towards the Islamic world has always been the need to secure access to energy supplies. This justification is not valid for two reasons.
The first is that the Muslim world is incentivized to sell its mineral resources to the West because of the laws of supply and demand. Most energy exporting Muslim countries have been unable to diversify their economies away from their dependence on selling oil and gas. As such, they rely on this revenue to pay for the government services they provide, and do not have the domestic demand necessary to consume their own supplies. As a result, Muslims are just as eager to sell oil to the US as the US is to buy it. The Arabs have only used their oil as a weapon once and the effect of their boycott was just as traumatic to their economies as it was to Western economies. Consequently, they have never used oil as a weapon again. Withdrawing American troops would not affect the ability of the US to import as much oil has it needs for its own consumption. Arguments that rationalize the use of military assets to secure access to these resources or that justify support for dictators on the basis that they can guarantee timely oil deliveries are not persuasive because they ignore the basic laws of economics that should govern such transactions. They also ignore the simple fact that a weak, authoritarian government will be just as incentivized to sell oil as a strong, democratic one.
The second reason the US does not need to maintain its military presence is that it is no longer as dependent on Middle Eastern energy supplies. The US has developed its own domestic energy production capabilities and diversified its oil suppliers away from Muslim producers to such a degree that in 2019 only 11% of its crude oil imports came from the Persian Gulf[ix]. In fact, over half of US crude oil imports now come from Canada and Mexico. The increased ability of the US to satisfy its energy needs through domestic production and diversified suppliers means that it no longer needs to waste military resources securing these energy supplies.
THE NEED TO PROTECT ISRAEL
Part of the reason the US has sought to prevent the rise of an Islamic hegemon is to ensure no power can threaten Israel. The logic underlying this policy does not hold up to scrutiny for two reasons. The first is that Israel has developed a sophisticated nuclear triad that would deter even a powerful Muslim nation. It is Israel’s nuclear capabilities, not American support, that act as the ultimate guarantor of its survival and independence. As such, US efforts to ensure no Islamic nation or political entity can develop enough power to threaten Israel are an unnecessary waste of resources. The second is that the lack of a Muslim hegemonic power has removed any pressure on Israel to compromise with the Palestinians under its control. Israel’s right wing may see this as a victory, but it will eventually turn into a pyrrhic one because it will either lead to the inclusion of millions of Palestinians into Israel as equal citizens (a result many Israelis do not want) or it will lead to the creation of a new Apartheid regime in the Middle East. Israel’s right seem intent on creating the latter scenario even though doing so will turn it and its supporters in the US into international pariahs and ensure that it remains involved in low level conflict in perpetuity.
Israel has overwhelmingly won its conflict with the Palestinians and its Arab neighbors. There is almost no prospect for the creation of a viable Palestinian state because Israel has resoundingly defeated the Palestinians politically and militarily. The last vestige of meaningful Palestinian resistance offered by Hamas cannot match Israel’s military capabilities. Its policy of continued resistance plays directly into the hands of right-wing Israelis who seem intent on creating small cantons of weak and divided Palestinians like the homelands created by the Apartheid regime in South Africa. Israelis have managed to create a state that has allowed its Jewish citizens to prosper while maintaining military control over millions of Palestinians who have been denied their basic rights while having to endure decades of military occupation. Despite their long running conflict, the Palestinians are still fragmented and weak and have been unable to develop military capabilities that could force Israel to change its policies. The political and diplomatic influence of the United States has neutralized attempts to gain international support and the political dynamics within the Middle East have deprived them of support from the surrounding Arab states. The result has been Israel’s complete subjugation and/or neutralization of the Palestinians living under its control or in surrounding territories. This victory may turn to defeat in the long run because it is so complete that it has incentivized Israel’s right-wing government to pursue policies that will allow this conflict to fester with no end in sight. Without a meaningful political solution that addresses the legitimate concerns of the Palestinians, Israel will be involved in low level conflict against an opponent that cannot defeat it but will have no incentive to stop fighting it either.
As explained above, a Muslim hegemonic power would not threaten the existence of Israel due to its formidable nuclear arsenal. It would; however, limit the ability of Israelis to attack, either overtly or clandestinely, its neighbors and it would force Israel to treat its Arab citizens with dignity and justice. Aside from not being contrary to American interests, such an outcome would greatly help them by finally creating the conditions that could lead to sustainable peace between Israelis and Palestinians. Israel has taken advantage of the lack of a Muslim hegemonic power to grind Palestinian opposition into the dirt and, in doing so, has ensured the region will suffer from low level violence and instability for the foreseeable future. Its complete and total military victory has empowered it to refuse even the smallest compromises with the Palestinians and has created a situation with no end in sight that necessitates continued American involvement in the region.
INFLUENCE OF RULERS WITHIN THE MUSLIM WORLD
Many of the Muslim world’s governments expend a tremendous amount of resources in order to secure American support for their rule. For example, Saudi Arabia is estimated to have spent $60 million since 2016 to retain lobbyists, public relations firms, and fund think tanks[x] to maintain American support. This influence has ensured that criticism of Saudi Arabia’s brutal war in Yemen, abysmal human rights record, and financial support for extremist Muslims does not lead to a withdrawal of US support. In fact, the US has actively helped Saudi Arabia prosecute its war in Yemen despite the catastrophic effects on Yemen’s civilian population[xi]. Though considered the most proficient, the Saudi government is not the only authoritarian Muslim government to take advantage of America’s lobbying and PR firms. Nations such as Egypt,[xii] the UAE, and Qatar[xiii] also spend millions of dollars to make sure that America supports their interests.
This is problematic because the interests of these governments are often counter to the interests of the US. While arms sales to these nations may support economic activity within the US, their destabilizing effect also forces the US to maintain its costly military presence in the region. The Islamic world’s dictators and despots are the primary cause of its instability and weakness because of the inherently weak and violent nature of authoritarian and autocratic political institutions. These institutions have concentrated political and economic power in the hands of small groups of elites throughout the Muslim world that do not respect human rights, the rule of law, or freedom of expression. They use the machinery of the state to maintain their control and inflict violence on any citizens who oppose their rule even if that opposition is peaceful in nature. The rule of these elites has prevented Muslim nations from providing the government services necessary to support dynamic economies. It has also fueled the growth of extremist non-state actors that have reacted to the oppression and blatant theft of their governments by articulating violent ideologies that have plunged many Muslim nations into a state of chaos and anarchy which has, in turn, driven millions of Muslim refugees out of their homelands. American support for these rulers helps to keep the political institutions responsible for the Muslim world’s weakness in place and this weakness has directly led to the US military presence in the region. As such, it is in the long-term interests of the US to support the creation of democratic institutions in the Muslim world that can finally stabilize the region.
Some have looked at the actions of the US and seen a conspiracy to keep Muslims weak. The most likely explanation for America’s actions is much more mundane. The sad truth is that America’s politicians are for sale due to its corrupt (though technically legal) political system that incentivizes short term thinking focused on election cycles and obtaining the funds necessary to effectively contest these elections. The interest groups discussed above have manipulated America’s legislative process by exploiting these weaknesses to their own advantage. America’s policies towards the Muslim world are therefore best explained as resulting from the undue legislative influence of groups that have prioritized their own narrow self-interests over the long-term strategic interests of the US or the human suffering their actions cause. These groups have used their control of the legislative process to secure access to resources in a way that has subverted many of America’s basic ideals and principles and resulted in policies that are counterproductive and unsustainable. However, the arguments of those advocating for a continued American presence in the region can no longer outweigh the urgent need to fix America’s finances, the fact that so many Americans simply do not want to maintain its presence in the region, or the fact that most of the arguments used to rationalize current troop levels are not tied to national security needs.
Given these economic, political, and national security dynamics, the only real question is how and when America will withdraw its troops. Despite agreeing on the need to withdraw, the differing perspectives of its political factions will likely lead to conflict regarding the manner of America’s withdrawal. As such, while America’s withdrawal may be inevitable, the nature and timing of this withdrawal is uncertain. If the US does not adequately plan for and manage its withdrawal from the Islamic world, the results could be dire. Instead of following the same path they followed in Afghanistan, US policymakers must make an objective and realistic assessment of their policy options given the looming reduction in financial resources. They must stop engaging in the same arrogant behavior that prevented them from acknowledging the reality of their position in Afghanistan for so long. Turkey, Iran and Pakistan have already reacted to America’s inconsistent policies and hostility by developing close relationships with China. This is a foreshadow of what will happen if the US abandons the region without a plan in place.
CONCLUSION
The US must realize that due to its weakened finances and increasingly isolationist political trends, it can no longer continue as the dominant military power in the Muslim world. As such, it needs to develop and implement policies that will incentivize the creation of inclusive and pluralistic political and economic institutions and it needs to develop meaningful alliance relationships with these countries based on mutual respect rather than the traditional neo-colonial dynamic. The fundamentally imperial perspective of US policy makers must change; instead, they must treat the governments of the Islamic world as equal partners rather than clients to be bullied or cajoled. This will only be possible once these governments are run by competent officials that have been placed in power through the result of free, fair, and transparent democratic processes.
America’s reluctance to protect Saudi oil facilities from Iran as well as its desire to withdraw from Syria, Iraq, and Afghanistan indicates its withdrawal is already under way. To better manage these changes, policies need to be clearly explained and agreed upon. Currently, America’s policies are a mix of hawkish rhetoric and haphazard military deployments that are not part of a clear strategy. America’s military leaders have explained their reduced commitment to the Middle East by referencing the need to focus on China but have yet to develop a new strategy that accounts for its lower importance and the smaller budgets likely to characterize military spending in the future. Instead, America’s military elite and their political and business allies have historically fought against serious cuts to military spending even as its debt was growing exponentially[xiv]. Given America’s high debt levels, massive military spending, the political infeasibility of raising taxes, and the refusal of its military and industrial elites to drastically reduce military spending, its long-term economic outlook was extremely precarious before the COVID-19 outbreak and is now particularly bleak. This is compounded by the fact that the aforementioned economic recovery was largely based on monetary manipulation (printing money, a.k.a., quantitative easing, borrowing money, and artificially keeping interest rates low to incentivize more borrowing) rather than strengthening America’s manufacturing base and overall fiscal position.
These pressing economic concerns combined with the growing belief among Americans across the political spectrum that American troops have no business in the Muslim world and its changing national security priorities will force it to withdraw from the Muslim world. The need to re-allocate resources to the Pacific, America’s energy independence, Israel’s dominant military capabilities, and the seemingly permanent instability of its Arab allies will outweigh the arguments traditionally used to justify its presence in the Islamic world. Having discussed the many factors that will lead to an American withdrawal from the Muslim world, the next step is to discuss the potential impact on the Muslim world and how Muslim nations should react to the coming changes. This discussion is available here.
[iv] This sentiment is partially shared by former Secretary of Defense James Mattis and former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Mullen who also see America’s debt as a threat to its national security. See: Kazda, Adam, “Military Spending: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly,” Pursuit, June 19, 2018, https://www.ourpursuit.com/military-spending-the-good-the-bad-and-the-ugly/.
[viii] For a more detailed discussion of the performance of various Arab militaries since WWII see: Pollack, Kenneth, Armies of Sand, (New York: Oxford University Press, 2019).
Reports coming out of Afghanistan regarding the Taliban’s celebrations are extremely confusing. The end of any war is always cause for joy because it brings hope for peace. But anyone who thinks the Taliban’s “victory” is worth celebrating as a triumph of Muslim military prowess is a fool with extremely low standards. Glorifying events in Afghanistan is an implicit acceptance of the Muslim world’s unbelievably weak military abilities.
America conquered Afghanistan with such ease that one could almost forgive its leaders for underestimating the Taliban’s ability to re-group. It only needed a few special forces troops and air power to conquer a nation that is over 650,000 square kilometers in the span of a few weeks. The Taliban were completely outmatched and ran away almost immediately. Its conquest was so easy that it never even bothered to station more than 20,300 troops there during the first five years of its occupation.
America withdrew from Afghanistan because, as explained here, it shot itself in the foot in a variety of ways, leading to the Taliban’s resurgence. It then realized it did not care enough to stay and clean up its mess. So, it left. It decided long ago that Afghanistan was not worth the effort but only stayed for so long due to its stubborn pride and corporate interests. And yet it still took the Taliban twenty years, an estimated 50,000 dead soldiers, and 40,000 dead civilians to convince them to leave. That is not a victory worth celebrating.
Afghanistan was easily conquered and occupied by both Russia and America because it has never been able to build an industrial base capable of generating the military capacity to deter these invasions. It has been unable to do so because a significant number of Afghans are philosophically opposed to the type of reforms needed to modernize. The Taliban’s views are not an aberration within Afghan society or the Muslim world either. They are just an extreme manifestation of the authoritarian tendencies that have prevented Muslims from instituting the changes necessary to thrive in the modern world. As such, the debacle in Afghanistan is an indictment of Afghan society and a reflection of the weakness that has consumed the entire Muslim world.
While it was occupying Afghanistan, the US decided to invade Iraq too. Using fabricated evidence, it concocted a tale to justify an invasion that led to the slaughter of between 200,000 – 1,000,000 innocent Iraqis. No one is sure how many Iraqis died because no one bothered to count all the bodies. It was able to violently maintain control over both nations simultaneously for many years, and only left after it grew tired of wasting resources on countries that were not part of its core national security interests.
America’s embarrassingly easy conquests and overlapping occupations of Afghanistan and Iraq and the inability of the entire Muslim world to prevent these attacks are just one piece of the puzzle. The tiny nation of Israel has established complete military control over the Eastern Mediterranean and bombs its Arab neighbors with impunity when it is so inclined. It also launches clandestine and aerial attacks against Iran, which can only respond with threats and impotent, asymmetric gestures. Pakistan has tried and failed to take Kashmir from India three times. The string of military defeats suffered by Muslims is too long to list in its entirety. But they are all related to the same root causes.
The simple fact is that Muslim societies would not be so prone to conquest if their institutions had not already rotted from within.
There are still too many Muslim nations living under the tyranny of dictatorship. The violent authoritarian control exercised by the region’s military and/or religious elite[1] has crippled the ability of Muslims to build effective governments and social institutions capable of nurturing the economic and technological development necessary to end their appallingly weak military abilities. Until Muslim societies wholeheartedly implement serious reforms to their political, legal, educational, social, and economic systems to free themselves from the shackles of dictatorship, they will continue to be subject to the same pattern of conquest they have endured these past five centuries. Instead of blaming outsiders, Muslims must accept responsibility for their failures. The simple fact is that Muslim societies would not be so prone to conquest if their institutions had not already rotted from within, making them such inviting targets.
The military incompetence of Muslim nations represents an existential threat that can no longer be ignored.
America’s occupations were but the latest in a long line that all prove a simple point. It is time for change. The military incompetence of Muslim nations represents an existential threat that can no longer be ignored. Imagine what would have happened if Afghanistan and Iraq were actually important to the US. It has already proven it will do anything to win a fight, even if that means dropping atomic bombs on an island full of emaciated women and children. America may not care about the Muslim world today, but the world is volatile, and things change. If it decided to come back, no one could stop it.
America is not the only country Muslims should worry about either. Any Muslim welcoming China, given its treatment of the Uighurs, is a hypocrite and an even bigger fool. In some respects, Russia has been an even more brutal conqueror of Muslims than the West. The Czars conquered vast Muslim populations who have repeatedly tried and failed to throw off the yoke of Russian occupation. These examples highlight a glaring pattern of weakness prevalent across nearly the entirety of the Muslim world. The Taliban and those with similar views may see events in Afghanistan as a vindication of their beliefs, but that only proves how foolish they truly are.
Afghanistan’s new rulers appear to have learned how to deal with Western media. One can only hope they have also studied the deeper causes of the Western world’s military dominance, which is the result of its democratic forms of government, inclusive political and social institutions, secure property rights, and free speech protections. These have allowed the West to create governments, schools, and private companies capable of stimulating the economic and technological development necessary to develop advanced military capabilities. Until the Muslim world implements reforms that can lead to similar capabilities, it will continue to be a victim of conquest.
Instead of celebrating, the Taliban should ask themselves why their nation was so easily conquered and why it took so long to evict Russia and America. Doing so requires deciphering why it has been unable to modernize or develop a system of government that allows its diverse people to work together. Until they solve these riddles, they will be unable to develop policies that can ensure they are never conquered again. By extension, the rest of the Muslim world should be asking, to varying degrees, why it has been so weak for so long. If Afghanistan was a victory for Muslim arms, I shudder to think about what a defeat would look like.
Having discussed the problem of the Muslim world’s military incompetence, here are some ideas to correct these issues.
The author is a US Navy veteran and creator of the blog www.mirrorsfortheprince.com where he examines the causes of the Muslim world’s sustained weakness and suggests reforms that can help it modernize.
[1] Kuru Ahmet, “Islam, Authoritarianism, and Underdevelopment,” (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2019), 3-6, 9-12, 93-101, 225.
There is no denying that Islam is in crisis. Comments by France’s President Macron last year may have been cynically timed for political gain but that does not make his statement less true. Anyone looking at a map of the Muslim world would be hard pressed to find a part that is not dealing with a crisis of some sort.
For example, the author recently wrote a lengthy essay arguing that the Palestinians have resoundingly lost the struggle to create their own state here. But Palestine is not the only part of the Muslim world dealing with a violent military occupation. Muslim lands in the Caucasus, Western China, and Kashmir have all been conquered by non-Muslims and forcibly integrated into Russia, China, or India. What made the conquest of Palestine so galvanizing was that it represented the heart of the Muslim world and it was conquered by a band of destitute refugees. Despite fielding a poorly equipped militia (the Haganah), these refugees were able to defeat the forces of six Arab armies and conquer the third holiest city for Muslims, cutting the heart of the Islamic world out in the process. Taking a bird’s eye view, one can easily see that the Islamic world is not only in crisis but that much of it is on fire.
Military losses on the periphery may not elicit the same emotional response as the conquest of Palestine but they stem from the same root causes because the same factors that led to the Russian, Chinese and Indian conquests of the Muslim world’s extremities also led to the conquest of Palestine. As such, these issues are all related and will only be resolved by policies that can address their common root causes. Until the underlying issues causing Islam’s crisis are fixed, there is little hope for the Muslim world. Anyone interested in resolving the Palestinian issue (or the Kashmir issue, or the Uyghur issue, etc.) must therefore resolve the issues that have afflicted the entire Muslim world first.
The conquest of Muslim lands may be the most visible indication of its weakness, but it is just the tip of the iceberg. Civilizations are rarely conquered by outsiders until they have sufficiently rotted from within. The history of the Islamic world over the past few centuries confirms this view. The same weakness that allowed for the conquest of Palestine and the Muslim world’s periphery has manifested itself throughout it in different ways such that nearly the entire Islamic world is consumed by conflict and instability. Ethnic rivalries such as those between Turks and Kurds or Arabs and Persians have consumed the geo-politics of the region. Afghanistan, Syria, Somalia, Yemen, and Libya are torn by civil conflict and no longer meet the definition of a functioning state while Nigeria, Iraq and Lebanon are perpetually on the cusp of disintegrating too.
Even those Muslims living in supposedly peaceful or stable nations are subject to extreme levels of repression and marginalization. Most Muslim nations feature authoritarian governments that have abysmal human rights records and underdeveloped economies characterized by extreme levels of wealth inequality. These economies have left most of their people stuck in poverty. The intellectual environment, whether measured by the number of patents filed, innovative technological breakthroughs, or freedom of expression is not inspiring either. Until these foundational issues are resolved, Muslims will continue to find themselves subject to violence and repression either at the hands of outside powers or each other.
The military weakness of the Muslim world is the combined result of the underlying weaknesses listed above and has impacted the ability of Muslims to develop advanced armaments industries or perform effectively on the battlefield. Muslims have been unable to develop advanced armaments industries because these capabilities cannot develop without strong economies fueled by technological innovation. They have been unable to develop strong economies because this cannot happen without well run government agencies that can provide a regulatory environment, fiscal policies, and dispute resolution mechanisms conducive to such growth. The autocratic and authoritarian governments prevalent throughout most of the Muslim world have been unable to provide these government services thus they have been unable to oversee economic growth conducive to developing such capabilities.
They have also been unable to nurture technological development because this cannot occur without educational institutions capable of helping students develop their critical thinking and technical skills. But educational institutions cannot thrive without a culture that embraces intellectual honesty and vigorous debate. The combination of authoritarian governments and cultural norms that limit intellectual debate and freedom of expression have therefore prevented the development of educational institutions that can support technological innovation.
These same factors have also contributed to the poor performance of Muslim soldiers even when they are equipped with modern weaponry because they have prevented them from developing the critical thinking skills necessary to thrive in combat. Muslim soldiers, particularly its Arab soldiers, have repeatedly proven themselves to be incompetent on the battlefield. Whether equipped with aging Soviet weapons or fancy American ones, most Muslim armies (there are a few notable exceptions) have shown no ability to master combined arms operations or properly operate or even maintain the weapons they buy. These poor tactical skills have led to numerous military defeats.
The weakness and instability of the Muslim world is the combined result of its repressive political institutions, underdeveloped economies, stagnant educational institutions, and a political environment and culture that stifles intellectual debate. Though independent, these factors work in unison to keep Muslims weak. Until they are resolved by deep rooted legal, political, and social reforms designed to empower and educate the masses of the Muslim world, Islam will continue to find itself in crisis.
On April 13, 1919 British General Reginald Dyer ordered his troops to open fire on a crowd of unarmed Indians in the city of Amritsar. They murdered 379 men, women, and children that day. Despite the inevitable calls for revenge, Mahatma Gandhi worked tirelessly to convince his countrymen that non-violent resistance was still their best chance for freedom. It took nearly thirty years and countless more deaths, beatings, and unjust imprisonments, but Gandhi’s tactics eventually freed the Subcontinent from the evils of imperialism. Martin Luther King borrowed many of Gandhi’s ideas to finally free African Americans from the evils of segregation. Though primarily grounded in value systems that abhorred violence, the choices Gandhi and King made were also a reflection of the fact that they were outgunned by men who had no problem murdering women and children. Non-violence was not just a moral choice, but a necessity born of weakness.
The parallels between these examples and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict should be painfully obvious. The latest fighting claimed the lives of over 250 Palestinians compared to just 12 Israelis. While some may find it crude to compare casualty figures, the huge disparity in these numbers highlights the power differential between both groups and is consistent with numbers from previous conflicts as well. For example, in 2014 Israel killed over 2,100 Palestinians while suffering only 73 fatalities. The lopsided casualties suffered by the Palestinians is based on their inability to match Israel’s military capabilities. They do not have the heavy weapons required to challenge the IDF in a conventional fight and have proven incapable of developing effective guerilla tactics that can do so either. From a military perspective, the Palestinians are incredibly weak while Israelis are incredibly strong.
One of the few American media personalities to correctly diagnose this state of affairs is comedian Trevor Noah who poignantly highlighted on his Daily Show that the Palestinians simply do not have the military ability to protect themselves. Hamas’ ability to attack Israel with rockets may grab headlines but homemade rockets are not going to significantly change the balance of power in this conflict as long as Israel has all the tanks and warplanes. Consequently, the only real path to peace and dignity for the Palestinian people lays in civil disobedience and non-violent resistance aimed at dismantling the Apartheid state most of them have been forced to live in since 1967. Given the serious military imbalance between the parties, this is the only chance for the Palestinians to secure their rights. It also represents their best chance to use the political momentum and sympathy generated from the latest violence to their advantage.
For the most part, the latest round of fighting was depressingly similar to previous bouts of violence that always seem to feature massive Israeli bombardments and disproportionate Palestinian casualties. However, there was one crucial difference this time. For the first time, the Palestinians had vocal support from within the US political establishment. For the first time, Americans are having a conversation about their government’s unequivocal support for Israel. These changing sentiments are still not enough to challenge the vested and powerful interests within America that have always supported Israel, but it shows there is a chink in the armor. And the best way for the Palestinians to exploit this opening is by adopting widespread civil disobedience in which they peacefully refuse to comply with Israel’s Apartheid policies. Doing so would not only secure the moral high ground (given their lack of weapons, this is the only high ground they can hope for), it would also give them new political momentum and significantly change the current dynamics of the conflict which still heavily favors Israel.
Non-violence is the only tactic that has the potential to change the pattern of violence between both parties. Otherwise, these periodic conflagrations will continue repeating themselves because the fundamental dynamics of this conflict will remain unchanged. And the one unchanging fact shaping this conflict for the past 16 years is that Israel has overwhelmingly won both militarily and politically. It won when it crushed the second Intifada and locked Hamas in an open-air prison (along with two million innocent Palestinians for good measure).
The recent détente between Israel and various Arab states and the muted reaction to Israel being labeled an Apartheid state by Human Rights Watch also highlight the degree to which it has won this conflict politically. The sad reality is that the Western world has become numb to the devastation being inflicted upon the Palestinian people. Until this latest round of violence, America’s unwavering support gave Israel carte blanche to do as it pleased to the Arabs under its control and it seemed there was no red line it could cross that would change this, even attacking Islam’s third holiest site during Ramadan. Non-violent resistance is therefore the only path left that has any chance at ending the cycle of violence and securing a favorable outcome for the Palestinians.
The biggest barrier to effectively using such tactics is the fact that no amount of civil disobedience will result in the creation of an independent Palestinian state. Israel’s colonization of the West Bank destroyed that option. The presence of roughly 760,000 settlers and the extensive network of settlements and infrastructure they built across the entire area integrated the West Bank with Israel, creating “facts on the ground” that make building a viable Palestinian state impossible. Many Israelis are adamantly opposed to a one-state solution, but the truth is that their leaders set them on this path the minute they started building settlements in the West Bank (to say nothing of the fact that a nation built in the heart of the Arab world should probably expect to have a few Arab citizens). Israel and the West Bank are already a single state in all but name, controlled by a single political authority. Israel has just hidden behind the legal fiction of the Green Line to create an Apartheid state that denies the Palestinians their fundamental rights.
For non-violence to work, it must be used with a realistic goal in mind that forces Israelis to decide if they would rather live in a Jewish state or a democratic one. And the Palestinians must understand that just because they refuse to resort to violence does not mean Israel will play along. The British did everything they could to goad Indians into fighting back. Similarly, attempts at non-violent protest in Gaza were met by sniper fire in 2018. Israel will do everything in its power to get the Palestinians to keep fighting for the false promise of their own state because violent resistance, even in self-defense, plays into the hands of right-wing Israelis looking to justify their unbelievably hypocritical policies. Despite these obstacles, civil disobedience still represents the best chance for the Palestinians to end their suffering by creating a genuinely democratic state in which all of Israel’s citizens are treated as equals.
There was a time when America pretended to be a neutral arbitrator in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. There was a time when Arab nations that pursued normalization with Israel were ostracized by their fellow Muslims. Those times are now a distant memory and the changing dynamics of this conflict illustrate a simple fact: Israel has overwhelmingly defeated the Palestinians both politically and militarily. This defeat is so complete that there is no chance the Palestinians will ever be allowed to create a viable nation of their own. As such, the two-state solution is no longer a realistic path to peace. The only remaining option that can safeguard the interests of the Palestinians is inclusion in Israel as equal citizens. This is also the only option that will allow Israel to remain a democracy instead of becoming an apartheid state. If Israelis continue to prioritize maintaining their state solely for the benefit of Jews, they will create a new apartheid regime that will ultimately lead to the demise of everything that once made Israel worth fighting for. Both sides can continue down the path of war or they can start to make the tough choices that may lead to peace. As such, it is time for the Palestinians to give up their hopes of having their own state. Instead, they must realize that inclusion into Israel’s dynamic society as equals is their best chance at having a prosperous future. For their part, the Israeli people must realize that their choice to create their nation in the heart of the Islamic world means they must abandon their dream of a homeland exclusively for Jews.
It is therefore time for all armed Palestinian groups to unilaterally lay down their arms and unequivocally renounce the use of violence. It is also time to abandon the façade of the Palestinian Authority and incorporate the entirety of the occupied territories into Israel as an equal and undivided whole. Both Hamas and the Palestinian Authority must abandon their governmental responsibilities and allow the Israeli government to assume responsibility for necessary government services in the Gaza strip and the West Bank. In short, it is time for the Palestinians to surrender and abandon all resistance to Israel in exchange for full inclusion into Israeli society.
In order to facilitate the integration of these territories into Israel, the Palestinians should be given their fair share of political power within the structure of the Israeli state so that its Arab communities can participate in its political institutions. Power should be apportioned fairly based upon transparent democratic principles to ensure that political power is fairly distributed among all of Israel’s communities, including its Arab ones. All citizens of Israel should be treated equally under the law and given the same access to educational and occupational opportunities. Discriminatory policies that place Palestinians at a disadvantage with respect to such opportunities must end so that the socio-economic disparity between the two communities can be addressed over time. This can only be achieved by allowing both groups their fair share of political and economic power and access to resources.
The security apparatus of the state will obviously be needed to combat extremists on both sides that will always seek to use violence to justify their continued separation. But the presence of such extremists must no longer be used to rationalize their forced segregation. Instead, they must learn to share their resources and work together for a more vibrant and inclusive Israel.
THE PALESTINIANS HAVE BEEN COMPLETELY DEFEATED MILITARILY
The Palestinians have lost the struggle to create their own state. Despite being at war for decades, they have yet to develop the military capacity to defeat Israel. They are under an effective military blockade that has prevented them from importing the heavy weapons they would need to confront the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF). Nor do they have the industrial infrastructure necessary to build heavy weapons themselves. Since they cannot build or import the heavy weapons needed to fight the IDF, they do not have the ability to wage a conventional war to secure their freedom.
They have also proven incapable of developing asymmetric warfare capabilities that can challenge the IDF. Their lack of political support in the surrounding Arab states means they cannot use these countries as a base to support a guerrilla campaign. Without support from allies outside Israel they do not have the logistical capacity or territorial depth to wage an effective guerrilla campaign. The terrain and the ease with which Israel can control access to urban centers has also made developing effective guerrilla tactics difficult. Consequently, the only remaining choices are slaughter or surrender.
There is no valor in allowing yourself to be slaughtered, particularly when the battlefield is full of women and children. The only realistic option is therefore surrender. At this point, the Palestinian people and their armed forces, such as they are, have become nothing more than punching bags for Israeli forces. There is no chance the large difference in power between the two sides will change any time soon. As such, it is time for the Palestinians to give up their armed struggle. Instead of waging war, the Palestinian people must commit to only using non-violent tactics to peacefully convince Israelis to change their policies. Doing so will force Israelis to confront the hypocrisy of their policies towards them and finally decide if they would rather live in a democratic state or a Jewish one. By choosing to build their new nation on Palestinian lands, Israelis made it impossible to have both and it is time for them to confront this contradiction.
NEITHER SIDE HAS ACTED LIKE PEOPLE WORTHY OF THE HOLY LAND AND YET BOTH DESERVE SYMPATHY
Both sides have committed barbaric acts of violence against each other. Neither has acted like people worthy of the Holy Land. Israeli security forces have committed serious human rights abuses. It has been a military aggressor on numerous occasions and engaged in the unlawful killing and excessive use of force against civilians. The Palestinians are guilty of equally atrocious behavior, having intentionally targeted civilians on numerous occasions as well. Both sides refuse to see the humanity in each other and have resorted to murdering each other’s children without remorse. As such, both sides must stop pointing fingers and allow for a general amnesty for all parties.
As a Muslim, the author has always sympathized with the Palestinians who have endured decades of military occupation and been forced to live as second-class citizens while having most of their homeland taken from them. However, he also sympathizes with the Jewish people who have seen the worst humanity has to offer and still managed to create a vibrant and powerful homeland for themselves. Israel was not created as part of an expansionist conquest of the Muslim world. It was created because Europeans refused to let their Jewish neighbors live in peace. The desperate souls who began the Zionist movement were not bloodthirsty warriors looking for new land to conquer. They did not choose to return to the Holy Land to seize its riches or capture strategic territory. They returned to Israel because they had no place else to go. Europe’s Jews often had to endure discrimination and violence at the hands of their neighbors. Despite this history, no one could have predicted the scale of the horrors unleashed by the Nazis that eventually led to the industrialized murder of roughly 6 million Jews. Though the Zionist movement predates the Nazis, it was their actions that provided the strongest catalyst for creating Israel.
When Muslims look at Israel and the actions of its people, we must never forget how the evils of the Holocaust shaped their worldview. When we speak of the Holocaust we must not only focus on the evil of the Nazis. We must also understand that the Nazis had plenty of help from people willing to herd Jews into death camps out of nothing more than jealousy and greed. Obviously, the murder of innocents on such a large scale is truly evil. But the complicity of those that helped and the refusal of so many others to stand up for their neighbors simply because they were a different religion is an equally horrific form of evil. After escaping from the horrors of the Nazis, Jewish refugees literally had nowhere to go. Even if migrating to America was an option for some, America during the 1930s and 40s was still tolerant of anti-Semitic views and would hardly have been appealing to someone fleeing anti-Semitic persecution in Europe. The only choice Jews had was to try and create a new homeland for themselves. They chose to create this homeland in Palestine due to the historical connection they felt to the land and because they had no other realistic options.
Muslims often lament that we are paying for the sins of the German people. This might be true, but we are also paying for our own sins. Rather than welcome Jewish refugees as fellow humans in need of help, many Palestinians echoed the same hateful rhetoric of the Nazis, vowing to push them back into the sea. Jewish refugees were not blameless either since many of them brought European attitudes of racial superiority with them. Many viewed their new Arab neighbors with the same sort of colonial disdain as so many other Europeans. Neither community was interested in building a healthy relationship with the other. The poor reaction of the Arabs to their new neighbors, particularly once the stream of refugees increased, likely solidified the feeling among Jews that they could not trust them. At the same time, newly arrived Jews exhibited a level of disregard for the Arabs that could only lead to acrimony and conflict.
This dynamic of mistrust has come to characterize the relationship between Jews and Arabs today and has made solving this conflict considerably more difficult. Despite the bad blood between both communities, they have no choice but to find a way to come together. This should start with a change of attitudes on both sides and an honest reckoning of how the actions and racism of both have fueled their conflict. Muslims must end the hateful and one sided rhetoric that is often used when discussing Israel and acknowledge the extreme historical circumstances that led to its creation by showing compassion towards a people that have seen the gruesome consequences of humanity’s tribalism and violent instincts. Even if one adamantly believes that Israelis have treated the Palestinians unfairly, it is time to accept the reality that there are now over 6 million Jews living in the Holy Land and continually threatening to push them into the sea is counterproductive and cruel. It is time for Muslims to accept responsibility for their role in this conflict by addressing how their refusal to accept their new neighbors caused Israelis to arm themselves and seek to create a state that excluded as many Arabs as possible.
Rather than constantly cast ourselves as victims, Muslims must also realize that our refusal to modernize directly led to the conquest of Palestine. Instead of blaming the poor refugees who, despite their meager circumstances, were able to carve a state for themselves out of the heart of the Muslim world, we must take responsibility for our own shortcomings. Chief among these was our refusal to extend the hand of friendship to those in need during one of humanity’s darkest hours. This is indicative of a culture that no longer has compassion for the weak and no longer strives to protect the most vulnerable among us. By forgetting our core Islamic values and falling into the same trap of hate and selfishness as so many other societies throughout history, we laid the seeds for our own destruction. The same lack of compassion that showed itself in our dealings with Jews returning to the Holy Land has also shown itself in how we treat each other and the sort of governments we create. These governments have been so lacking in compassion and human decency that they have plunged the Muslim world into a cycle of war and poverty from which it has yet to recover. If the Muslim world is ever going to reverse its long decline it must first address the issues within its societies that have caused them to create such violent and repressive political institutions since these are directly responsible for its perpetual state of weakness. It is this weakness that allowed a group of destitute refugees to conquer Palestine.
Israelis must do their part to work towards peace as well by examining how their own conduct has contributed to the current situation. They must address the inherent hypocrisy in creating a homeland for themselves by taking the homeland of the Palestinians. And they must address how their own colonial attitudes have prevented them from working with the Palestinians they have conquered. Although Israel has overwhelmingly won its conflict with its Arab neighbors, it is on a path towards perpetual war because of its refusal to consider the legitimate grievances of the Palestinians. Israelis must realize that creating a just peace is in their interests and that their leverage to negotiate such a peace has never been better. Instead of using their dominant military victory to secure a lasting political settlement with the Palestinians, Israel has continued bullying and beating a Palestinian populace that is essentially defenseless. When Israel was young and vulnerable the tenacious fighting spirit of its soldiers was inspiring. Now that Israel is the dominant military power in the Eastern Mediterranean, it looks more like a bully when it saturates defenseless neighborhoods in Gaza with thousand-pound bombs and artillery shells that have a curious tendency to hit civilian targets.
Unfortunately, Israel’s right-wing government seems inclined to ensure that it remains Jewish at the cost of its democracy. The world has already witnessed the injustice of such a system. It should be obvious by now that political systems designed to exclude people based solely on their race, ethnicity, or religion are immoral and unsustainable. The Israeli people should know better than most how wrong it is to lock people in ghettos while denying them the rights and dignity that all people deserve simply because they are the wrong religion or race. Instead of using the same de-humanizing arguments the Nazis used to justify their treatment of the Jewish people, Israelis must break the cycle of racist fueled violence by starting to consider that their Arab neighbors may also deserve peace and justice.
Facing the horrors of the Holocaust has caused Israeli society to become consumed by fear. This fear has caused them to justify policies and attitudes rooted in the same sort of hatred and xenophobia that the Nazis used to justify their treatment of the Jews. Though vigilance and self-defense are the right of every people, Israelis have used their superior military power to bully the Palestinians based, in part, on racist justifications that have caused them to espouse the sort of values and prejudices that allow them to de-humanize the Palestinians. Rather than use their power to perpetuate war, Israelis should include the Palestinians into their society as equal citizens so that both groups can work to tear down their barriers and learn to live side by side. This is the only way Israel can meet the challenges of the future as a free and democratic society.
Those Israelis that oppose the inclusion of large numbers of Palestinians into their society have only themselves to blame. Israel’s victory has been so complete that it has made creating a viable Palestinian state impossible. If the Palestinians had been able to fight Israel to a stalemate, then perhaps a peace between two equal parties could have led to the creation of a state for each community. But the Israeli defeat of Palestinian resistance has been so complete that no such possibility exists. As a result, the only remaining option is a one state solution.
ONLY PEACE BETWEEN ISRAELIS AND PALESTINIANS CAN LEAD TO NORMAL RELATIONS WITH THE MUSLIM WORLD
The recent hostility between Jews and Muslims is in aberration in what has historically been a symbiotic relationship that has been referred to as a Judeo-Islamic civilization. Both groups must commit themselves to recreating the bonds that once allowed them to prosper by working to build a new Judeo-Islamic tradition that can allow them to work together. Rather than turn themselves into a European fortress in the heart of the Muslim world, Israelis must embrace the choice their ancestors made to return to the Islamic world by trying to build relationships with Muslims predicated on respect and equality. The improving relations between Israel and various nations within the Muslim world will never realize their full potential or expand to a significant number of Muslim nations until the Palestinian issue is resolved in a manner that reasonable Muslims find fair. Once this happens, both Israel and the Muslim world would benefit greatly from increased trade particularly given Israeli technical expertise in agriculture, IT, and water conservation and desalinization.
Peace would also render Israel’s policy of supporting the Muslim world’s many despots unnecessary. In order to ensure that no groups within the Muslim world can challenge its interests, Israel has supported many of the region’s dictators. Supporting the autocratic and authoritarian governments of its Arab neighbors will eventually backfire in the same way that the covert support its intelligence agencies provided for the creation of Hamas ultimately led to the bloody suicidal bombing campaign of the early 2000s and its invasion of Lebanon led to the creation of Hezbollah. Policies rooted in violence and repression always lead to more violence and intolerance. Likewise, the repressive policies of the Muslim world’s dictators are primarily responsible for the development of extremist non-state actors that refuse to accept the existence of Israel. Their oppression, theft, and horrible economic mismanagement combined with their refusal to give their citizens a voice in their governments are the primary sources of these groups’ appeal and support. Supporting these despots will only lead to more violence and more extremism. Instead of fearing democracy in the Muslim world, Israelis should help to spread it even if that leads to the assumption of power by Islamic oriented groups.
Assuming Israel’s Muslims are being treated fairly, Muslim governments comprised of non-violent Islamists, such as those that espouse Islamic modernists ideals, should present no problems for Israelis. The current animosity between the Muslim world and Israel is primarily based on the cruel treatment of the Palestinians. Once this stops, there will be no reason for continued hostility. Peace between Israel and Jordan and Egypt has not led to warmer relations between their people precisely because most Muslims believe the Palestinians are being treated unfairly. Once this changes, real and meaningful ties between the people of the region can develop.
The changes suggested above will require significant compromises by both parties; however, they also represent the best chance to secure lasting peace. Only ideologies that are inclusive and support the development of democratic institutions that allow for the participation of all Israel’s people can lead to sustainable peace. The policies pursued thus far have not worked because they are based on exclusionary and authoritarian policies. As such, it is time to consider a new path that realistically accounts for the current dynamics of this seemingly intractable conflict.
HOW THE MUSLIM WORLD FAILED THE PALESTINIANS
In closing, the author feels compelled to address the Palestinian people by apologizing on behalf of the Muslim community for being unable to come to your aid. We have failed you. Your brothers in Egypt are ruled by soldiers that care only for wealth and power and have shown themselves to be useless on the battlefield. Your brothers in Jordan are ruled by a man who pretends to be progressive but, based on his actions, also seems to care only about wealth and power. Syria is consumed by civil war because its ruler was so obsessed with these same pursuits that he preferred to slaughter innocent women and children rather than share power with his people. Your neighbors to the north are still rebuilding after the Israeli invasion of their lands and have yet to develop political institutions that can address the needs of their heterogeneous society. As a result, they are in no position to help. The rulers of the Arab Gulf nations are so weak and consumed by greed and their thirst for luxury that they can offer no help either. In order to ensure their fragile hold on power, they have sold you out. Though the leaders of Turkey, Iran, and Pakistan are more sympathetic to your plight, they still refuse to work together and, by themselves, they are too weak to challenge Israel and its American backers. Consequently, you are on your own and the only advice the author can give you is to surrender and seek peace on the best terms you can. Otherwise, you will continue to be slaughtered without pity, forced to live under a brutal military occupation or siege, or forced into poverty and servitude as punishment for your continued resistance. This will lead to the creation of a political and legal system designed to keep you permanently subservient to Israel. The longer you pursue the false promise of your own state, the more entrenched your weakness and servitude will become.
Though the rulers of the Muslim world will jump up and yell whenever they find a cartoon offensive, their refusal to help you proves they do not care about the wholesale imprisonment and slaughter of Muslims in Palestine or in any other parts of the world. Apparently, they find cartoons more offensive than the collective punishment meted out to you. Muslim leaders may “bravely” challenge the hypocrisy of the West and its love for free speech that stirs religious animosities while simultaneously trampling on the freedom of its Muslim citizens to practice their religion, but they can only sit by and watch as Israel’s blockade of Gaza slowly kills its children from malnourishment and disease. They watch impotently as Israel and its allies conspire to keep Gaza besieged while you slowly wither away in your open-air prison. You have suffered enough. Too many of your children have died and too many of your young men are rotting in Israeli jails. Since the rulers of the Muslim world are too busy fighting the evil cartoons of the West, they do not have time to help.
They spend their time yelling about cartoons instead of helping you because this allows them to pretend they care about their religion, but the truth is that all they really care about is money and power. They have refused to implement the deep rooted political and legal reforms their societies need because they refuse to share meaningful power with their people since doing so would make it harder for them to control and steal from them. As such, none of your fellow Arabs or Muslims have been able to develop the military capacity to ensure your freedom. Without serious political and legal reforms combined with increased spending on educational and scientific development designed to improve the critical thinking and technical skills of their people, the Muslim world will never be able to create the sort of culture and institutions that can lead to strong economic growth based on innovation and technological development. Without these ingredients, developing a modern armaments industry is impossible as is building armies capable of competently engaging in modern warfare. Since there does not appear to be any Muslim nation or ruler willing to implement these reforms, there is no hope that any of them will develop the power to help you.
IT IS TIME TO WAVE THE WHITE FLAG OF SURRENDER
The author must therefore beg you to surrender as quickly as you can. In order to ensure that Israel accepts your surrender, you must peacefully stop complying with all laws meant to further your oppression and occupation. Every Palestinian should unequivocally demonstrate the intention to surrender by waving a white flag and taking to the streets completely unarmed to peacefully ask the Israeli government to dismantle its occupation infrastructure and accept you into its country. It is time to trade in the IDF’s checkpoints for unhindered access to all parts of Israel as free citizens. The leadership of all Palestinian factions should lead the way by publicly surrendering their weapons to Israeli authorities. The only way that Israelis can be convinced to abandon their hopes of creating an ethnically and religiously segregated society in which they alone hold power is if you make it clear that you pose no danger to them. As such, all Palestinians throughout Israel must peacefully work together to convince Israelis to let you become equal citizens within their society by stating in the clearest possible terms that you surrender. It is only by having the courage to admit your defeat that you may finally free yourselves.
