Wednesday, January 16, 2013

Weaned on Hate: Why Morsi Means What He Says About Israel

Tiffany Gabbay has been a writer and communications specialist for the past decade. Her passion for politics was fostered at an early age by her father, a  […]
In today’s day and age where double standards reign supreme, Israel perpetually finds itself on the receiving end of criticism and condemnation above and beyond what any other world democracy (and, if we look to the UN’s member-states, a good portion of the world’s dictatorships) has ever had to endure. Indeed, the Jewish State is on the defensive, forever being expected to prove herself and explain why she has the right to exist. The frightening part is that the provocateurs from which Israel defends itself are not only Islamists bent on its destruction, but also Westerners whose worldview is mired in moral relativism, guided by propaganda, and crippled by the misguided notion of political correctness.

All is not lost, however, and the good can still prevail, but it requires a certain resolve and fortitude of spine to stand up and resist the real and present dangers at play.

Take, for instance, the Muslim Brotherhood. From the nascent stage of the Arab Spring the group was characterized by many, including National Intelligence Director James Clapper, as a largely moderate, “secular” organization. Of course the term secular is laughable considering the Islamist group’s very moniker bears the word “Muslim.” It is doubly so considering the it is also the grandfather of all jihadist groups including but not limited to al Qaeda, Hamas and Hezbollah.

But alas, the Brotherhood, which allegedly sought to usher in a new era of democracy and tolerance in the Middle East, succeeded in staking its claim across much of the region: Egypt elected Muslim Brotherhood leader Mohammad Morsi to be the country’s president; Muammar Gadhafi was ousted in Libya only to be replaced by Brotherhood progeny, al Qaeda; and Brotherhood proxies are circling Assad’s Syria and King Abdullah’s Jordan like a vulture. This is all bad news for the West and worse news for Israel.

It is no mystery that since his ascension, Morsi has already put an unsettling frost over what was once a cool peace between Israel and Egypt. It is no mystery that his spiritual adviser, imam Yousef al Qaradawi is a rabid anti-Semite, and it is no mystery that Morsi is rumored to be soon coming to the White House for a meeting with the upper echelons of American government.

This is the same Morsi who in 2010 referred to Jews as “bloodsuckers” and “descendants of apes and pigs” and encouraged his fellow Arab nationalists at home to “nurse” their progeny on Jew-hatred as a means to furthering the destruction of the Jewish State.

“We must never forget, brothers, to nurse our children and our grandchildren on hatred for them: for Zionists, for Jews,” Morsi declared in a speech that is now making its rounds across the Internet. “[Egyptian children] must feed on hatred; hatred must continue…the hatred must go on for Allah and as a form of worshiping him.”

While some of Morsi’s past remarks concerning the Palestinian struggle against their Zionist “oppressors” came to light early on, the particular speech featured below has only recently reached the mainstream, prompting the White House to issue a swift and strong condemnation Tuesday. 

“The language that we have seen is deeply offensive,” said White House press secretary Jay Carney. “We completely reject these statements, as we do any language that espouses religious hatred….This kind of discourse has been acceptable in the region for far too long, and is counter to the goal of peace.” 
Of course the Egyptian president has maintained that he “respects” people of all walks, even people of Jewish faith — doublespeak that is nothing out of the ordinary for Islamists and their ilk.

So why is the fact that Morsi has been fomenting hatred of Jewish people among the countrymen he now leads a revelation? Well, for one, it isn’t. Anyone who has followed the Muslim Brotherhood knows that Morsi’s vitriolic comments and world view are entirely genuine and completely in line with the Brotherhood manifesto, which is, not coincidentally, equally in sync with all Islamist ideology.

That is why an Israeli-Palestinian two-state solution is a nonstarter. Morsi and his compatriots may talk a good game, acting like a champions of their disenfranchised red-headed stepchildren living in Gaza and Judea and Samaria, but the truth is, if it were up to them, they wouldn’t take the Palestinians either.

Consider the following excerpt from the Dutch newspaper Trouw published in 1977. In an interview, Palestine Liberation Organization executive committee member Zahir Muhsein was quoted as saying:
Between Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese there are no differences. We are all part of ONE people, the Arab nation. Look, I have family members with Palestinian, Lebanese, Jordanian and Syrian citizenship. We are ONE people. Just for political reasons we carefully underwrite our Palestinian identity. Because it is of national interest for the Arabs to advocate the existence of Palestinians to balance Zionism. Yes, the existence of a separate Palestinian identity exists only for tactical reasons. The establishment of a Palestinian state is a new tool to continue the fight against Israel and for Arab unity.A separate Palestinian entity needs to fight for the national interest in the then remaining occupied territories. The Jordanian government cannot speak for Palestinians in Israel, Lebanon or Syria. Jordan is a state with specific borders. It cannot lay claim on – for instance – Haifa or Jaffa, while I AM entitled to Haifa, Jaffa, Jerusalem en Beersheba. Jordan can only speak for Jordanians and the Palestinians in Jordan. The Palestinian state would be entitled to represent all Palestinians in the Arab world en elsewhere. Once we have accomplished all of our rights in all of Palestine, we shouldn’t postpone the unification of Jordan and Palestine for one second.
PLO leader Yasser Arafat confirmed Arab nationalist’s true intentions, which of course had naught to do with two neighbors living side-by-side in peace:
Since we cannot defeat Israel in war, we do this in stages. We take any and every territory that we can of Palestine, and establish a sovereignty there, and we use it as a springboard to take more. When the time comes, we can get the Arab nations to join us for the final blow against Israel.[...] We plan to eliminate the state of Israel and establish a purely Palestinian state. We will make life unbearable for Jews by psychological warfare and population explosion. . . . We Palestinians will take over everything, including all of Jerusalem.”Peace for us means the destruction of Israel. We are preparing for an all-out war, a war which will last for generations.”
Of course some might argue that Arafat, was, well, Arafat, whereas Morsi and this new contingent of Islamists seem so much more reasonable. That is precisely what makes them infinitely more dangerous than our favorite Nobel Peace Prize recipient. The times may change, and so too may the language or tone of voice, but the core beliefs and intentions remain the same, whether they emanate from a leader of the Muslim Brotherhood, an Iranian president, or the terrorist mastermind of al Qaeda. 

Golda Meir once said that there would only be peace in the middle east “when Arabs learn to love their children more than they hate Israel.”

Whether simply pawns in the game of Arab nationalism or made wretched by their own inherent malignancy, the Palestinians and their benefactors lost touch with their humanity too long ago. The last I checked, Islamic children are still being weaned on hate, swaddled in explosives and sent to their martyrdom.

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