Jun 4, 2009
Violence Only Works When We Do It
I’ll be boarding a plane in less than 12 hours in order to go to Pittsburgh. I need to pack, help clean up the house in case we have to show it this weekend, and tidy up two talks for this weekend, so please forgive me if I keep this short and don’t flesh all of the details out.
Driving to work this morning I heard part of Obama’s speech in Egypt. He said many noble things, tried to reconcile some differences, and generally walked a the fine line required by diplomacy that seeks to honor the interests of other nations, while remaining committed to the interests of your own land.
I get it. He doesn’t want anyone to bomb us, but he needs to get elected in four years. Such is the balancing act of every politician.
However, what I find deeply troubling is the double standard inherent to his approach to the Palestinians in this speech.
By comparing their plight to the civil rights struggles of African Americans and the South Africans, he tried to build a case for non-violent resistance. I can’t remember his exact words, but he made a point of saying that violence would not make things any better for them.
And then I thought about our surge in Afghanistan.
While we shoot up this country, gearing up for a lot more, we’re telling others to pursue the path of nonviolence. As if we really believe it could work…
I understand that Palestine/Israel and Afghanistan are different in many ways, however the rationale for violence can be the same. Both Palestinians and Americans claim to be attacked. Both claim the right to fight to protect themselves. It’s easy to sit back in our comfy homes, pontificating about nonviolence to these people who are penned up in refugee camps, staring at the barrels of guns.
I think Obama said some good things in Egypt. He certainly seems to be giving pragmatic diplomacy a go, which seems to be an improvement over preemptive war. However, I wonder how effective this speech will be at the end of the day. The hard truth is that our actions do not match our words.
Unless we’re willing to figure out ways to neutralize extremists without blowing them and the rest of the countryside up, we frankly have no business telling an oppressed people to pursue nonviolence. That shouldn’t be a tough one to figure out in my book.
I’m not anti-military, and I’m not 100% pacifist. However, I very much worry about the message we send to the rest of the world by pouring so many resources into military campaigns, laying aside half of our national budget for defense spending.
We have told the world that killing people doesn’t work unless we’re the ones pulling the trigger.
I do not spend enough time on this blog but I had to comment here.
I appreciate your thoughts and the posture you took. Agreed it’s a stretch to compare the South African to the Palestinian but both know pain. But while Afghanistan and Palestine-Israel are not the same thing, it seems worth speculating whether or not the solutions should be the same or similar. I submit they do not have to be and not convinced that he used a double standard. The duration of these respective feuds are significantly different, motivations are different, the history, etc.
I don’t see this as quite the inconsistency. Among other things, these extremist groups in Afgahnistan do not have diplomats that we can attempt to structure peace treaties with. I was quite the fan of the speech and thought that he addressed the US in Afghanistan part well. He even said we don’t want to be there and will only stay until it’s safe for Americans. I know that is a loose statement, “Well it depends how you define safe … etc.
Sorry to sound simplistic, for I respect your intelligence very much but at times fighting the terrorist with violence is the solution and sometimes not counter-striking with missiles from your national military for a bus bomb is also the solution. Further the agenda of Afghan extremists in do not represent of their (former) leaders and population while those that represent the Israelis and Palestinians do.
Indeed, these are extremely tough issues but to a certain extent I’m glad our minds are filled with these thoughts at certain parts of the day as opposed to which movie we plan on seeing this weekend.
I hope all goes well in Pittsburgh for you. Catch you soon.
If anyone ever had the “right” to use violence against their oppressor, its the Palestinians. If Obama wanted a non-violent response to the war, he could stand up to Israel and stop funding their war effort.
Still confused by conservatives have a problem with Obama, business as usual as far as I can tell.
Thanks for your thoughts Tim and Adam.
Tim, I hear ya. However, let me play out a possible scenario that may help explain what I’m getting at.
Let’s say there are some hardened terrorist leaders. These guys are mad at America policy, so they recruit folks to help them fight America. Now, we have recruits and hardened terrorists.
Our policy has been to bomb them. This kills civilians and stirs up hatred against America.
What if we worked with the local people and helped them reach their own development goals (education, jobs, infrastructure, etc.) and helped them isolate the extremists, eliminating their pool of recruits by getting them onto our side. Sure there may be some terrorists plotting to bomb us, but we have cut off their network, those people who are sent out to blow themselves up. Because remember, the leaders of these cells never do the bombing themselves…
And the encouraging point here is that everything I have described is happening in small pockets with Christians in the lead. Check out this Speaking of Faith show:
http://speakingoffaith.publicradio.org/programs/diplomacyandreligion/
Extremism and terrorism feeds on hatred and interventionism. More intervention only feeds terrorists. The transition to a non-violent approach may be difficult, but it is by no means impossible.
As far as the Palestinian problem goes, I think that America could do a lot to pressure Israel into abandoning illegal settlements and taking active steps toward peace, however no sitting politician would ever win reelection by taking such extreme measures with Israel.