Malignant Obsession
Odd how the world obsesses over the Palestinians. Which is not to deny their plight. Which, in turn, is not to overlook their complicity in their plight. Still, human beings often select an injudicious course. No reason, since we're all human, to deny them the opportunity to learn from the errors of their choice and select alternatively. And no reason to withhold aid.But an aid process that knows no end? When does a group of people become sufficiently mature and reasonable to take possession of its own destiny? How long must it take before the normal human wish to become responsible for oneself kicks in? Yes, there are 1.4 million refugee Palestinians living in a tiny sliver of land alongside Israel. As crowded as they are, there are areas in the world infinitely more crowded.
As hapless as they've been in determining their advancement and failing to account for themselves, it's time and long past time that they become sufficiently independent minded and determined to make something reasonable of themselves and to ensure a decent future for their children. The international community has supported them for far too long. Taking away incentive to support themselves.
The Gaza strip is full of 'refugee camps', many of which resemble small cities. The rough infrastructure is there, so why isn't there a responsible and reliable civil authority to ensure law and order and incentives for economic renewal and social progression? This is the natural order of things for most societies.
In sub-Saharan Africa is where we see true poverty, and truly squalid refugee camps. It's where great hordes of innocent people have been murdered throughout the years, for political and economic gain. In central Africa over four million people have died as a result of wars in the last 15 years. On that continent refugee camps consist of dilapidated tents.
Gaza is not a desert, it can produce, it can feed its inhabitants. The unlawful Jewish settlements removed by order of the Israeli government last year were adequate reminders that people had the potential to live well there. Agriculture thrived under the care of the Jewish settlers; they found markets for their produce and the settlements were profitable.
If Jews could accomplish this, why not Palestinians? Greenhouses left intact for an incipient Palestinian enterprise were looted and destroyed by Palestinians who chose to do that rather than work at producing food. Why don't the Palestinians wish to be gainfully employed, to make a decent life for themselves and their offspring, rather than produce a melancholy face of denial to the world?
Per capita patent production of countries in the Middle East is one-fifth that of sub-Saharan Africa. The people of the Middle East are unproductively engaged, a huge proportion not in the labour force. According to recent figures, even accounting for oil revenues, the entire Middle East generated a lower GDP in 2006 than Germany.
According to UN human development reports more books are translated annually into Greek than Arabic. The Middle East has the lowest level of Internet usage, well behind sub-Saharan Africa. It is foreign labourers imported to do work that Arabs deign beneath them that build the infrastructure in oil-rich principalities. They exert themselves in extravagant resentment of the outside world.
Talk about misplaced sympathies. Why are there such low expectations from the world at large of the ability of Palestinians to do something worthwhile for themselves? Why do Palestinians continue to feel so entitled to receive ongoing and endless financial support when they should be putting themselves forward to support their own needs?
They are needful because they allow themselves to be stagnantly unproductive. They look to the future only for restoration of what they say was once theirs. Historically not much was theirs but their fantasies of autonomy, ruled by neighbouring Arab states. Under Palestinian 'autonomy' and land ownership the land did not flourish; most managed only to eke out a bare livelihood.
They were not well-managing stewards of the land they were allowed by their overseers to look after. Nothing has since changed.
Labels: Middle East, Viewpoint
posted by Pieface @ Wednesday, June 20, 2007
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