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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Dan B. who wrote (151615)	11/12/2004 6:42:06 PM
From: Sun Tzu	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 281500

From my answer on a different thread: >> Freidman argues that anti-Americanism in the Islamic world is a GIVEN: it is rampant and embedded. It is a result of 400 years of humiliation of Muslims by the West. Even if Israel were destroyed and Chechnya given independence, animosity to the U.S. - and the West - would remain. This is pure hogwash. As someone who has lived in several Muslim (and few ME) countries, I can tell you this is incorrect about most Muslims. Not only they do not ALL feel humiliated for the past 400 years, many of them actually consider themselves superior in many ways and see no reason to hate the average American or European. In short, a good chunk of them would not even want to be an American or like an American, let alone being jealous of Americans. In case you are forgetting, after 9/11, the Iranian people spontaneously held candle vigils in support of the 9/11 victims. I've seen the photos and it was an impressive crowd. I personally knew several Arab families who wept for the victims and saw their relatives call them from Egypt and Morocco who were expressing extreme anger at the terrorists for dishonoring Islam. Even recently, when I was in Casablanca I over heard a woman cursing the terrorist in Arabic while she waiting at the airport. But of course, peace and reflection is bad for some factions, so instead of images of candle vigils in Iran, you saw footage of dancing Palestinians in the streets. And while anger and anti-American sentiments were rampant in ME (around 50% immediately after 9/11 and 70% before then) they have since increased to over 90% of the population. It is not a God given fact of life that they hate America and forever will do so. I think you'd benefit from reading "Imperial Hubris" and "Through Our Enemies' Eyes".