What an insightful and maddening state of affairs that article describes, John. The Palestinians appear to be in a race to implode. Very sad.
But I understand feeling stuck and powerless, looking for some way to act that might be useful.
Fortunately, here, I could spell out my concerns about market bottoms posing ripe timing for Al Qaida because I had the choice to go to ethepeople.com and write to every rep and committee chair that seemed pertinent, from Senate to gubnor to mayor, and even the Prez hisself.
I dunno if it'll do any good. It might even get me thoroughly checked out by a team of shrinks <GG> in my very own rubber room.
But at times like this, I feel fortunate that, by an accident of birth in the right place, I have freedoms and better options to choose from, rather than the paralysis felt by Arien Ahmad and others like her.
The corruption of the powerful Palestinians, be it Arafat, the leaders of Hamas and other violent organizations, or whoever, that furthers the peer pressure to become violent or be branded a collaborator (itself a death sentence) is appalling. It reminds me of how prisoners act.
And in a sense, the Palestinians are prisoners. The blame for that is shared between their leaders and the Israeli leaders. And even our hands are dirty, because we've continued to back Israel, even when its hardliner extremists go overboard.
I recognize that the blame goes even further, through all the Arab leaders past or present that have insisted on making war with Israel. But it has become pointless to assess blame. Instead, it is time to seek out, to beg even, for a more visionary leadership to step forth from all sides.
Ms Ahmad fears her country will brand her a coward. Yet her last minute choice to not add more violence was actually more courageous than anything I've seen from the leadership on both sides. Risking censure and worse, she did the right thing.
I only pray there's enough like her on both sides. It is the only way to prevent what will become a rising slaughter of innocents, the longer things disintegrate.
And, as we've seen, such violence spills over borders and even crosses oceans now.
Toto thinks it's simple: "If only more leaders had a brain.... " |
