No, "defense" is your speculation, and it doesn't fit. If the bomber was blowing himself up to save his mother and father's life, that would be defense, but that's not the case here. A far more general rule is, "true believers" are willing to die for their cause. Because they are true believers, they know the cause is not hopeless; it must triumph in the end, and their devotion will secure its victory. In this case, the cause is jihad. That's the real new contribution of the Islamists to the world of ideas: jihad as a private act of worship, self-immolation and murder, all rolled into one.
The salient point of the struggle by the Palestinians, is that it is a war of liberation. In a war of liberation, people will resort to guerillar tactics, "terror" attacks and unconventional actions against a militarily more powerful opponent. Do some research on what motivates those bombers. While there are those whose motivation has religious underpinnings (Jihad), vast numbers (especially from the Al Aqsa brigades) have no religious motivation, rather, they see themselves as martyrs to the Palestinian cause - after seeing their families brutalized and their land occupied. Really a very similar dynamic the world over. So YES, emphatically, it is seen by them as a war of liberation, as an act of defense against a foreign invader. No doubt there are those with a strictly Jihad motivation, but even many of those can be traced back to a liberation theme.
You seem to be under the misapprehension that the Arabs recognize these borders, or have Israel on their maps in any way, shape or form.
The vast majority have exactly such ideas - see the Saudi offer of Pan-Arabic/Israeli peace based on pre-67 borders. Same for the PA. Yes, there are hold-outs, like Libya, Iraq etc.
Israel was inside the 1967 borders (themselves the truce lines of 1949), so why did Egypt and Syria and Jordan prepare to invade?
Nobody would claim that the Arab countries have made no mistakes and have not committed horrible blunders and crimes. Of course they have - although I doubt you'd like to go back over history... for Israel has a black one indeed. Never forget, it was created by violence and eviction of native peoples. So, yes, there was resentment and stupid actions by the Arabs, such as you cite. Remeber the context. But now is a different reality - they have sensibly come to accept Israel's right to exist. What they have not, and never will, is accept Israel's right to expand beyond the 67 borders. And for that matter, nor will the world... see U.N. positions on this. |
