I found this comment via a link on instapundit.com. I don't know this author, but I thought his comments on Friedman's column were good:
A domino has fallen! After weeks of promoting the transparently phony Saudi "peace plan" and thus encouraging the notion that the Palestinian Authority and its allies have reasonable goals that can be accommodated through diplomacy, Tom Friedman of The New York Times has waked up and smelled the cordite ("Suicidal Lies"):
The world must understand that the Palestinians have not chosen suicide bombing out of "desperation" stemming from the Israeli occupation. That is a huge lie. Why? To begin with, a lot of other people in the world are desperate, yet they have not gone around strapping dynamite to themselves. More important, President Clinton offered the Palestinians a peace plan that could have ended their "desperate" occupation, and Yasir Arafat walked away. Still more important, the Palestinians have long had a tactical alternative to suicide: nonviolent resistance, à la Gandhi. A nonviolent Palestinian movement appealing to the conscience of the Israeli silent majority would have delivered a Palestinian state 30 years ago, but they have rejected that strategy, too.
The reason the Palestinians have not adopted these alternatives is because they actually want to win their independence in blood and fire. All they can agree on as a community is what they want to destroy, not what they want to build. Have you ever heard Mr. Arafat talk about what sort of education system or economy he would prefer, what sort of constitution he wants? No, because Mr. Arafat is not interested in the content of a Palestinian state, only the contours.
Let's be very clear: Palestinians have adopted suicide bombing as a strategic choice, not out of desperation. This threatens all civilization because if suicide bombing is allowed to work in Israel, then, like hijacking and airplane bombing, it will be copied and will eventually lead to a bomber strapped with a nuclear device threatening entire nations. That is why the whole world must see this Palestinian suicide strategy defeated.
Like a good Timesman, Mr. Friedman goes on to urge that, once "the whole world sees" the suicide strategy's defeat, we should hide that fact from the Palestinians themselves by offering them the same terms that Bill Clinton and Ehud Barak put forward two years ago - an excellent way to ensure that no would-be terrorist anywhere learns the lesson. But we can argue later about what terms to impose in the wake of victory. We need to catch our victory first.
After the rapid campaign in Afghanistan, the Bush Administration has not been rushing into the next phase of the War on Terrorism. As I have noted previously (3/15/02), our armed forces, still weakened by Clinton era neglect, need time to recuperate and to prepare for what will surely be a more strenuous series of battles in Iraq. Unhappily, the enemy is not cooperating with our rhythms but instead wants to impose its own on the conflict. The escalation of Palestinian attacks on Israel is best understood as an attempt to derail U.S. action against Saddam Hussein, action that would, Arab leaders fear (probably, alas, too paranoically), be followed by a general American cleansing of regimes that have been helpful to terrorists, i. e., just about every existing Arab government.
It now looks like President Bush (probably overruling most of his advisors - another sign of how fortunate we are to have this "simplistic", "inexperienced" commander-in-chief) has decided to let Israel do whatever it finds needful for its own security, dissolving the Palestinian Authority de facto and rounding up its leaders.
The outcome of the war may well depend on what happens during the next few weeks. The immediate Islamofascist reaction - particularly after Yasser Arafat dies, is arrested or escapes into exile (to take the possibilities in diminishing order of probability) - will almost certainly be threats to expand the suicide bombing campaign beyond Israel. The chief of Fatah's Lebanese branch has already warned of suicide attacks in America.
Bombings are certainly possible - likely, I suppose - in the United States, but the potential for mass terrorism here seems pretty low. Rank-and-file Moslems in this country have displayed virtually no sympathy for Wahhabi fanaticism, despite the impression given by organizations that purport to speak in their name, and the pool of young men willing to commit suicide for Allah is minuscule. The real danger lies in Europe, where Arab Moslem minorities are large, unassimilated and violent, quite fearsome enough to intimidate spineless social-democratic politicians. It may take no more than explosions in a few hypermarkets to throw the European Union into a panic of appeasement and anti-Americanism.
Perhaps the time has come, as our allies grow irresolute, for the United States to treat this war as a real war, not as an unwelcome diversion from consumerism, and to go onto a war footing commensurate with the size and scope of the conflict. That means worrying about balanced budgets some other year and dealing with unemployment by conscripting the young men required to bring the military establishment back to at least its Gulf War level. It also means, since this is the first war in which we have faced a significant threat of partisan warfare at home, allowing Americans to arm themselves in their own defense. A nationwide concealed-carry law would impinge on states' rights but is well within Congress' militia powers.
War is very unpleasant. It restricts individual freedom, expands the powers of government, interferes with the legitimate pleasures of life and, of course, results in destruction and death. We don't have much choice, however, about whether to fight this war, only about whether we will fight seriously and win or dawdle about and either win at much higher eventual cost or - the worst option of all - lose and see the world take the first steps into an Islamofascist Millennium.
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