[Cursing Islam in the UN Security Council]

Is this what Israel should be doing?
by
Musab B. Omar*

It is an unfortunate fact that many Muslim leaders' self-justifying and antagonistic attitudes toward Israel have contributed to causing stagnation of the so-called peace process in the Middle East. The late Iranian leader Ayatollah Khomeini apparently did not care much about resolving the Arab-Israeli conflict through constructive dialogue while he was arguing that there could be no peace in the Middle East so long as Israel was in it. Nor could current Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad possibly be looking forward to working with Israel toward a sustainable peace in the region when he uttered comments about wiping it off the map.

However, what is surprising is that there is hardly a shortage of equivalents of such leaders in the non-Muslim world doing almost exactly the same thing: using every possible means in their disposal to block any possible progress toward a sustainable peace in the Middle East. Moreover, what is disturbing is that one can find them even within the international organizations that are supposed to be the beacons of constructive diplomacy.

Gillerman's Israel

Dan Gillerman, the outgoing Israeli ambassador to the United Nations, stated that he wanted to start what was to be his farewell speech with describing how it felt to represent Israel at the United Nations and around the UN Security Council table. However, before doing that, Gillerman wanted to tell the audience what a beautiful country Israel was: "I invite each and every representative here […] to come to Israel. Everyone will see a country that is very different from the perceptions he sees on the television screens, […] where one sees only a country that seems to be a place torn by violence and bloodshed. Everyone will discover a very vibrant country of great excellence and innovation, where young people go about their lives enjoying themselves, while contributing to the country and to the world."

Israel is indeed a prospering country with highways, shopping centers, universities and high-rise buildings. As such, the country is hardly any different from a European country. In that, Gillerman is quite right. However, what he fails to recognize, if not purposefully distorts, is that what most outsiders view on their TV screens is not Israel, but the Palestinian territories torn by violence and bloodshed, overpopulated by the people who are hardly, if at all, hopeful for the future. One wonders if it is this part of Israel which Gillerman urges everyone to come and see.

Describing what it means to be an Israeli, Gillerman urged his fellow colleagues to "imagine being a grandfather like [him], who sometimes goes to the kindergarten to pick up his young grandchild and whose heart breaks when he sees the armed guard in front of that kindergarten and for a moment is not sure whether he will live to see the moment when he will embrace his grandchild alive." The feeling Gillerman described has unfortunately become a part of daily life in Israel for unjustifiable reasons. Nevertheless, there could be and still is a possibility to eliminate such a fear if whom he implicitly holds responsible for that feeling could ever have at least a portion of the formal education that his grandchild has at the kindergarten level.

Gillerman continues, "Imagine being a mother in Sderot whose children wet their beds every night out of fear and who, when she comes to collect them from school, is not sure they will be there." With this, Gillerman goes above and beyond his much deserved reputation of over-dramatizing issues. According to a local Israeli living near Sderot, the so-called Kassam rockets consist of two chambers, one for the fuel, and the other for explosive material. Those Kassam rockets reaching Sderot contain hardly any explosives since they are filled up with an amount of fuel just sufficient for them to reach Sderot. Therefore, what is described as the so-called Kassam rocket is basically a metal pipe with sufficient amount of fuel to fly it to Sderot. This small detail helps one better feel Gillerman as he stresses, "Imagine the terror we face and the fear we live with each and every day, and try to understand what it is like to be an Israeli."

The pearls of un-wisdom

For some incomprehensible reason, Gillerman all of a sudden changed the focus of his address and started to attack Islam, for apparently he had long disliked the very presence of one particular member of the UN Security Council, which he accused of being a sponsor of terrorism.

Gillerman uttered: "When I look around this [UN Security Council] table, I see people representing countries that gave the world great Asian art; that gave the world Emile Zola and Hector Berlioz; that gave the world alternative medicine; that gave the world Breughel; that gave the world Benjamin Franklin, the Declaration of Independence, Albert Einstein and Leonard Bernstein."

Gillerman asked, "What are the contributions of those terrorists to our world?" and argued, "Their biggest inventions and most advanced exports are airplane hijackings, hostage-takings, suicide bombings and, indeed now, using bulldozers as death machines."

Gillerman claimed: "We are here to make the world a safer and better place. But what we are truly witnessing today is no longer a clash of civilizations. We are indeed witnessing a clash of civilization, in the singular, because most of the horror, most of the bloodshed, most of the killing and most of the violence, sadly and tragically, is within Islam."

The reasons for one to become perplexed when looking at these statements are many. Pathetic ignorance, unlimited hostility, despicable ungratefulness and absence of ability to be constructive are the initial descriptions that come to one's mind. Certainly, nobody can or should condemn Gillerman for possessing all of these attributes. After all, it is his fundamental freedom to have them to whatever extent he prefers. Yet, one may be naturally disappointed by his comments given the fact that many times over the course history Gillerman and his fellow people owed their very existence to the civilization which he blames for breeding nothing but terrorism.

Dan vs. Da[m]n: Muslims should stop the Israel-bashing

There is unfortunately no end to Israel bashing in many Muslim societies. While it is to a degree understandable to see ordinary men on the street considering Israel and its seemingly colonial policies as the root cause of the overarching problems in the Middle East, it is disturbing to see many Muslim leaders bashing Israel in an apparent attempt to conceal their governments' inability to improve their nations' socioeconomic and political status. Similarly, due to his reportedly selfish approach to every international issue, most notably the plight of the Palestinian people and the Israeli bombardment of Lebanon in the summer of 2006, and, as he puts it, his over-dramatization of Israel's problems while almost totally ignoring those of the Palestinians, some may have tended to call Israel's former ambassador to the UN Da(m)n Gillerman as opposed to what should be Dan Gillerman. Neither the mockery of Israel itself nor that of its officials does any good in solving the problems of the Palestinians, much less those of the other Muslim nations, but only wastes the time and energy that could have been utilized in much more beneficial endeavors.

Finally, there is no need to mention that the state of Israel and its people certainly have a right to survive and prosper within their own borders determined by international law. However, it would be much easier for Israel to realize this objective if the Israeli officials were a bit appreciative of the religion and the civilization they have long despised.

* Musab B. Omar is an independent political analyst. omarmusab@gmail.com