America Strikes Back

[Georgia Bard]

GRRRRRR ... Did Arab paper predict attack?

http://star.arabia.com/article/0,5596,87_1970,00.html
Sep 09, 2001, 12:38 PM

By Uthman Tynes

ÇáÃÑÏä (Star) - IT IS inevitable. Despite their best intentions, Americans, are going to find themselves physically part of the conflict in the Middle East. What will happen then, especially in light of the American convention of protecting their own? Even recently when a young man was accused of possessing and dealing drugs in Russia, he knew he could count on his President to whisper in the ear of President Putin for a get out of jail free card.

And now Israelis are hitting Palestinian-Americans in their continuing aggression. It was inevitable. Will President Bush come to their aid the same way he did for the American accused of drug crimes? It is curious to most outside the US, outrageous to others, that American citizens continue, day to day, to sit in their homes eating dinner, watching television and allowing the violence to continue in the Occupied Territories. How can Americans sit back and watch a people ‘targeted’ by weapons their very government supplies? Are they unaware they are financing this aggression? Haven’t Americans realized their silence makes them as much a part of this as their President and his ill-defined policies? Truth is, they don’t. Americans’ relation to the world is complicated. It is a complexity that is perhaps best understood in the Middle East, where complexity is a way of life. It is complicated by a media that sees its job as entertainer first and then as a very selective informer. It is complicated by a society that seems to value pop culture and the Weather Channel over global warming and the ill-effects of globalization. It is a nation of consumers whose power is unknown to them. Many live in a vacuum unaware of the brutality outside. And now, largely unbeknownst to them, they are playing a role in the way a war is being waged. It is not a declared war; to label it so changes political dynamics. Though most involved would feel a sense of relief at calling a spade a spade. Are Americans aware that no response still counts as a response, leaving them complicit in actions they would surely find reprehensible? Right now Americans are worried about their dollars. The US economy is in the doldrums. Afraid to say the word ‘recession’, a struggle continues as the budget surplus promised by the previous administration dwindles and the finger pointing begins.

With all this in mind, will Americans remain mute when one of their own comes in harm’s way? Western media reports change their tone and direction when an American face or voice tells the tale.



:=) Gary Swancey