Return-Path: <sentto-279987-2550-1001914107-fc=all.net@returns.onelist.com>
Delivered-To: fc@all.net
Received: from 204.181.12.215 by localhost with POP3 (fetchmail-5.1.0) for fc@localhost (single-drop); Sun, 30 Sep 2001 22:29:07 -0700 (PDT)
Received: (qmail 32043 invoked by uid 510); 1 Oct 2001 05:28:37 -0000
Received: from n34.groups.yahoo.com (216.115.96.84) by 204.181.12.215 with SMTP; 1 Oct 2001 05:28:37 -0000
X-eGroups-Return: sentto-279987-2550-1001914107-fc=all.net@returns.onelist.com
Received: from [10.1.4.52] by mk.egroups.com with NNFMP; 01 Oct 2001 05:28:27 -0000
X-Sender: fc@big.all.net
X-Apparently-To: iwar@onelist.com
Received: (EGP: mail-7_4_1); 1 Oct 2001 05:28:27 -0000
Received: (qmail 71937 invoked from network); 1 Oct 2001 05:28:27 -0000
Received: from unknown (10.1.10.26) by m8.onelist.org with QMQP; 1 Oct 2001 05:28:27 -0000
Received: from unknown (HELO big.all.net) (65.0.156.78) by mta1 with SMTP; 1 Oct 2001 05:28:25 -0000
Received: (from fc@localhost) by big.all.net (8.9.3/8.7.3) id WAA20377 for iwar@onelist.com; Sun, 30 Sep 2001 22:28:25 -0700
Message-Id: <200110010528.WAA20377@big.all.net>
To: iwar@onelist.com (Information Warfare Mailing List)
Organization: I'm not allowed to say
X-Mailer: don't even ask
X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.5 PL1]
From: Fred Cohen <fc@all.net>
Mailing-List: list iwar@yahoogroups.com; contact iwar-owner@yahoogroups.com
Delivered-To: mailing list iwar@yahoogroups.com
Precedence: bulk
List-Unsubscribe: <mailto:iwar-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com>
Date: Sun, 30 Sep 2001 22:28:25 -0700 (PDT)
Reply-To: iwar@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [iwar] [fc:Why.America.has.Already.Lost.the.War]
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit
Why America has Already Lost the War
by Moshe Feiglin
Arutz Sheva Israel National Radio <http://www.IsraelNationalNews.com
September 28, 2001 - Tishrei 11, 5762
In This Article:
1. Did I Hear Right?
2. Israel's Mistake
3. ...And the U.S. Mistake
4. Face Up: It's a Religious War
5. Self-Imposed Censorship
6. The Ad That Wasn't
DID I HEAR RIGHT?
That Thursday I already realized that America had lost the war.
I came to the US for four days for a meeting that was to have been held
in Manhattan on Tuesday evening, September 11. The meeting didn't take
place no one could get in or out of the great city. I'm not sure if all
those invited to the meeting are still alive. There were no flights
back home, and all that remained to do was to listen to the reports and
hope for a place on the first flight returning to Israel.
I never stay abroad on Shabbat. The trip is more costly and less
efficient, but that's the way it is; my own rule. I had now missed out
on Shabbat in Eretz Israel and I could only pray that I would be home in
time for Rosh Hashana.
It was impossible to get away from the reports of the massacre in
downtown Manhattan. The news was everywhere: on the air, at home, in
the car, in the shops. I entered the neighborhood grocery store. The
storekeeper's radio was on. President Bush was speaking to the American
people:
"I declare tomorrow to be a day of prayer," said the President. "I ask
every American, during lunch time tomorrow to pray for all the injured,
their families, and the American nation. Go to church, to the
synagogue, to the mosque and pray," ended the President.
"Did I hear right?" I ask the storekeeper, "Did he say mosque?"
She nodded.
"At this very moment you've just lost the war," I say to the astonished
storekeeper, and start looking for what I need on the shelves.
When the black boxes of the hijacked airplanes are recovered, we will
hear the pilots screaming "Allahu Akbar" in the last moments before the
crash. They slaughtered the Americans in the name of Allah, and now the
President calls on them to pray to him.
ISRAEL'S MISTAKE
During the first hours, it seemed that the American revenge would be
horrifying and terrible. But as the hours passed, and the days, the
American tiger turned out to be a helpless kitten. The American
President was busy running after the countries of the world, trying to
set up a strange coalition against a few cave dwellers in Afghanistan,
while senators explained on live television to the American people that
"we must remember that the enemy is the terrorists, not Islam."
America has been trapped by the same weakness that has visited Israel in
recent years: an inability to identify the enemy and fight it.
Regarding Israel: The State of Israel was founded on the notion that the
Jewish people are a "normal" people like all other nations, with similar
Western cultural values. Accordingly, Israel's disputes with its
neighbors are also "normal" territorial issues that could be resolved in
a logical manner.
But in truth, the Jewish people are not "normal" and their conflicts are
not "normal" ones. The war being waged against us is not about
territories, but rather about our very existence as a Jewish nation. It
is a war against our message and our mission. That is what our enemies
are fighting against - but we respond to them through our own subjective
interpretation of reality: we speak of security and of territories. We
fail to understand why they refuse to accept even all the territory.
"The Emperor has no clothes!" Arafat shouts at us and murders three
people in Netanya.
"Do you want us to wear something else in your honor?" Peres asks.
"He's naked!" shouts Arafat and murders a young mother from Alfei
Menashe.
"Perhaps we'll wear red for you?" asks Beilin.
Arafat continues to attack us, and we continue to propose solutions that
fail to admit the naked reality. It is no wonder we are losing the war.
…AND THE U.S. MISTAKE
The same is now happening to America. While America is not a Christian
country, it is the standard-bearer of Western culture which draws from
Christian culture. Why do the terrorists hate the US so much? Why are
they prepared to commit suicide in order to kill Americans? After all,
America has not conquered their country. On the contrary, many of them
receive generous aid from the US. How strange that even Arabs in New
Jersey, who are actually living in the fleshpots of America and were
liable to have suffered physically from the terrorist attack, rejoiced
at the sight of the horrible massacre.
Why this hatred?
Two daughters branched out from Judaism and left the fold to conquer the
world: Christianity and Islam. Judaism integrates the qualities of
strict justice and mercy, in harmony and in proper measure.
Christianity took only the quality of mercy, while Islam took the
quality of strict justice.
The Moslems see with jealousy how the culture based on Christian mercy
succeeds in gaining control over the world. Let everyone come and
benefit from the cornucopia open to all, the American-Christian culture
says; to everyone we proffer the other cheek, and even the whole body.
Come and take your part in the wealth, come and enter the gates of the
World Trade Center. We aren't conquering you with the sword, but with
gold.
"Why are they bringing their wars here?" a soot-covered broker shouted
into a CNN reporter's microphone. He didn't understand that he himself
was engaged in conquering, not territories, but the opposing culture,
straight from there - from the Twin Towers.
But every Moslem child understands it clearly. What the political
commentators and senators in the US fail to realize is crystal clear to
the other half of the world. America is not at war with a single
individual - Bin Laden - but with every child that will be born tomorrow
in Cairo, Amman, Beirut, Gaza and, if he is a Moslem, even in New
Jersey.
FACE UP: IT'S A RELIGIOUS WAR
America will never admit that it is involved in a war of cultures, in
fact in a religious war. Such an admission implies that American values
are fundamentally at question. But the fact is that they are not as
universal as Americans would like to believe. The happiness they pursue
in the name of all humanity may be happiness for a specific group based
on Christianity, but it means hell for another group that is just as
large.
But it appears that this other half is now beginning to attempt to
actualize its own aspirations for happiness (via rivers of blood).
America will never admit it, and consequently will be unable to fight
back, because they have failed to identify the enemy. They seek the
terrorists just as Sharon is pursuing individual terrorists. They are
pursuing the wasps instead of destroying the nest, because they are
afraid of the nest. They are afraid of a real confrontation between
their values and those of Islam.
They want a coalition with moderate Arab countries. The situation is so
ludicrous that even Arafat is being wooed - Arafat, who invented
hijacking; Arafat, the father of 20th-century terrorism. They want to
make a coalition with him, if only to avoid facing reality.
They will in fact catch the wasps. Bin Laden doesn't stand a chance.
He won't be able to escape the power of the US. And then what? Today
every Arab child wants to be a Shahid, a martyr for Islam. Bin Laden
will enter the pantheon of the Shahids, but another million are waiting
their turn and they are impatient. America is waging a physical war
against a metaphysical enemy. They are incapable of understanding what
we in Israel witness every day -- overjoyed parents of suicide bombers.
In the coming months, we will see a lot of military planes take off and
land. We will see destroyers and missiles and millions of tons of TNT
exploding in the Iraqi desert and in Afghanistani caves. They will kill
thousands of innocent people and in the end America will lose -- because
it failed to identify the true enemy.
This campaign is called Infinite Justice - but this justice has no aim,
and will therefore actually lack justice. If only America had the
clairvoyance and the moral fortitude to face up to reality, America
could win easily, without a coalition, without deploying armies and
without senseless killings.
SELF-IMPOSED CENSORSHIP
America is too busy deceiving itself. Not only the politicians, but
everyone in the population. An interesting phenomenon I noticed was the
self-imposed censorship of the American media. I sat and watched as the
drama unfolded live on television. In the first hour, there were live
broadcasts from Ramallah and Shechem, in which the "Palestinian" masses
could be seen rejoicing over the massacre in Manhattan. I was pleased
to see the pictures broadcast for all to see. Suddenly the reports
ceased as if they had never happened. I don't believe that the American
administration contacted the media networks and told them not to screen
them. It happened naturally: don't show the American people a reality
that conflicts with its fundamental values. "We shall preserve the
American way of life and win" was the message.
Instead of the joyous footage from Ramallah, there began to appear an
endless stream of interviews with American professors having Arab names
and speaking with Arabic accents. The message was this: Here is a
Moslem professor called Ahmed - but he is also an American. "I
vehemently condemn this attack," one said, "and the majority of Arabs
are not like these despicable terrorists. But," he continued in a
knowledgeable manner, "when you aid the Israeli occupation of Palestine,
you cause more Arabs to be on the side of the terrorists, rather than on
my side".
Hence Israel is out of the coalition. Even the offer of a crack rescue
unit from Israel that was ready within hours to come and help was
courteously declined [ed. note: likely causing the deaths of additional
Americans under the ruins.] Israel is the mistress that must be hidden,
while Arafat, the king of terrorism, is courted as the legitimate wife.
It's actually better this way, since at the end of the day America is
not truly Israel's ally - but we'll leave that issue for another time.
THE AD THAT WASN'T The day after the attack, a wealthy American
acquaintance approached me and asked for my comments on the situation.
He then surprised me by making this offer: "I'll pay for a full-page ad
in the New York Times - and I want you to compose it." I didn't want to
do it, because America's war isn't my war and because I had hoped that
this well-meaning Jew would direct his financial resources to far more
important endeavors in which we are engaged in the Land of Israel.
However, the man persisted, so I composed the following quick draft:
I T ' S A C U L T U R A L / R E L I G I O U S W A R
We can kill a million Bin Ladens, but they will continue to
celebrate. [Photo of Arabs celebrating in the streets.]
They have destroyed our symbols. [Photo of the twin towers going
up in flames]
We must destroy their symbols. [Photos of the El-Aksa mosque on
the Temple Mount and the Kaba building in Mecca.]
Shocked? Americans don't do such things?
Right.
Therefore, America will continue to be destroyed until we understand.
(end of ad)
My friend was astonished, "But they'll start a religious war!" he
exclaimed, "Can you imagine what acts of vengeance will result from
this?"
"And what have you suffered just now?" I asked him. "Do you think that
they only killed several thousand people, because at the moment they
don't hate you so much?"
"This is a religious war," I explained to him, "They aren't afraid to
die. They have sanctified death, they die with the name of Allah on
their lips, and seventy virgins are waiting for them in Paradise. You
don't frighten them with your bombs. At best, you'll turn them into
Shahids. They have directed their attack against your god. You have no
alternative but to direct your attack against theirs. When you destroy
their god, they will become powerless and come back down to this world.
They will suddenly be frightened by the sound of footsteps and by the
drop of a pin. They will know that not only do they understand your
language, but you understand theirs, and you are fighting them according
to their own rules."
"Think about it," I added. "How many people are you going to kill in
vain, and how easy it would be to win this war without killing anyone."
My friend was convinced, but in the end decided not to run the ad.
-----
I am worried by what is to come. Since America is going to lose,
tremendous frustration is going to build up in the American population.
The Twin Towers will only be the beginning. The success of the
terrorist attack will create an unconquerable desire among every Arab
child to claim his share of martyrdom. Terrorist attacks will increase
and America won't have an answer.
The Arab professor's words of incitement will then start ringing true to
American ears: Israel is the problem and, by extension, so are the Jews.
There won't be large-scale pogroms in America: small ones maybe, but not
the kind we became accustomed to in Europe. After all, there is
something too good about the American people that won't allow it. But
how will a Jew show his face in the street when every American is
convinced that he has lost his job and his property and that his
relatives are being killed in terrorist attacks and in an endless war -
all because of the Jews?
My return trip to Israel was no picnic. I sat at the airport in
uncertainty for nearly 24 hours with thousands of others, until I
managed to board one of the El Al shuttle flights returning the stranded
Israelis home.
"If this is the line of Israeli visitors wanting to go home," I thought
to myself, "how long will the line be when American Jews rush to come
home to Israel?"
I always kneel and kiss the ground when I return home.
Our holy land had never received as warm a kiss from me as it did this
time.
* * * * * * *
Moshe Feiglin, founder of Manhigut Yehudit, The Jewish Leadership Movement
<www.manhigut.org, led the campaign of mass civil disobedience against
the Oslo accords in 1995. He is currently championing the registration of
thousands of new members to the Manhigut Yehudit bloc in Likud to create a
Judaism-based leadership for the State of Israel.
------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor ---------------------~-->
Get your FREE VeriSign guide to security solutions for your web site: encrypting transactions, securing intranets, and more!
http://us.click.yahoo.com/UnN2wB/m5_CAA/yigFAA/kgFolB/TM
---------------------------------------------------------------------~->
------------------
http://all.net/
Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.2 : 2001-12-31 20:59:53 PST