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- Khaled Abu Toameh: Urgently Needed: "Fill the Vacuum" for Israeli Arabs So The Extremists Will Not
- N. M. Guariglia: How to Privatize Nation-Building
- Julien Balkany: Terrorism In France
Urgently Needed: "Fill the Vacuum" for Israeli Arabs So The Extremists Will Not
by Khaled Abu Toameh
April 3, 2012 at 5:00 am
http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/2987/israeli-arabs-extremists
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Radicals are are making every effort to drag Israel's Arab citizens toward a confrontation with the Israeli establishment. If If Israel does not build a kindergarten or school in Nazareth, someone else will -- either secular extremists or Muslim fundamentalists.
Some of the leaders of the Israeli Arabs have caused tremendous damage to relations between Jews and Arabs inside Israel.
These leaders are responsible for the fact that a growing number of Jews today view Arab citizens as a "fifth column" and an "enemy from within."
The Arab members of Knesset should be fighting for equality and better services for their constituents, and not spending most of their time defending Fatah and Hamas and issuing fiery statements against Israel.
Participating in a flotilla aid ship to the Gaza Strip does not help improve the living conditions of Israeli Arabs. Nor does participating in Fatah rallies held in Ramallah and other parts of the West Bank.
Some of the Arab Knesset members have obviously forgotten that they were elected by Arab citizens of Israel and not by Palestinians living in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
There is nothing wrong, of course, with expressing solidarity with the Palestinians there. After all, Israeli Arabs see themselves as part of the Palestinian people.
But there is a feeling among Israeli Arabs that at least half of their representatives in the Knesset care more about their Palestinian brethren in the West Bank and Gaza Strip than their constituents.
Israeli Arabs would like to see their representatives fighting to solve the many problems they are facing, such as poverty and unemployment. They would like to see Arab parliamentarians struggling for improved infrastructure and more government funds for Arab municipalities.
Israel, also, can play a role in undermining the radicals among its Arab community. The best way to weaken the radicals is by embracing the Arab citizens rather than alienating them.
Embracing Israeli Arabs would boost their confidence in Israel and drive them away from radicals who are making every effort to drag Israel's Arab citizens toward a confrontation with the Israeli establishment.
If Israel does not build a kindergarten or school in Nazareth, someone else will. And in this case, the someone else could be secular extremists or Muslim fundamentalists. If Israel does not build a community center in Baka Al-Gharbiyya, the Islamic Movement will do so.
Israel needs to start working on repairing the damage that has been caused to relations between Jews and Arabs inside the country. The PLO and Hamas have damaged relations not only between Jews and Palestinians, but also between Arabs and Jews living inside Israel.
In recent years, Israeli governments have taken a number of decisions aimed at rebuilding mutual confidence between Arab and Jewish citizens.
These decisions include allocating additional public funding to Arab municipalities, and investment in infrastructure in Arab villages and towns, as well as incorporating Israeli Arabs in jobs in the public and private sectors.
When the Arab citizens see that their state cares about them and does not relate to them as an enemy, they will keep a distance from the radicals. The radical leaders of the Arab community find fertile soil among disgruntled Israeli Arabs, especially young people who are looking for a better life and paying jobs.
The overwhelming majority of Israeli Arabs remains loyal to the state even though they do not identify with its national anthem. Peaceful coexistence between Jews and Arabs inside Israel is not a lost cause.
Related Topics: Khaled Abu Toameh
How to Privatize Nation-Building
by N. M. Guariglia
April 3, 2012 at 4:45 am
http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/2990/privatize-nation-building
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"Free Cities" takes the Pentagon and the State Department out of the nation-building business and places nation-building in the realm of the private sector.
Last year, the Libyan people rid themselves of a tyrant and international menace. Today, the Syrian people stand poised to do the same. In each revolutionary instance, there occurs a three-act play. The first act is the downfall of the dictator. The second act is the people's efforts at self-rule. The inevitable third act now seems to come in the form of insurgency and violence, with al-Qaeda, the Muslim Brotherhood, and other would-be dictators attempting to undermine any transition to democracy.
Most Middle East power vacuums involve a struggle between democrats and jihadists. There are those in the West who say we must support the democrats. This is true, but how? With troops and weapons? The United States cannot commit itself to costly exercises in occupation and reconstruction time and again. We must develop a more cost-effective strategy, an alternative to nation-building. The State Department might be able to implement new, innovative ideas, such as the Free Cities concept.
The objective of Free Cities is to overhaul U.S. foreign aid as the current system is counterproductive:
The U.S. now gives billions to a foreign government to buy loyalties or feed millions. The foreign government, in turn, takes that aid and puts it to its own misuse. The money is wasted and not invested properly. With dictators, the aid goes to lavish palaces, murals of praise, drugs and women, and military expenditures often used against their own innocent citizens.
The current foreign aid numbers are not pretty. Despite billions of dollars in assistance, the Arab states routinely vote against U.S. interests at the United Nations. This policy has fallen victim to diminishing returns and is in need of a radical change (what Hagerty calls "global welfare reform"). Hagerty quotes former World Bank economist William Easterly as saying "foreign aid results in less democratic and less honest government, not more… People respond to incentives—all the rest is commentary."
This might have been the price to pay during the Cold War, when we would do anything to prevent Soviet expansion in the Third World. But there is no strategic reason to continue it.
Free Cities is based on an example from history: Hong Kong. After the Second World War, the British encouraged Hong Kong to implement free market economics. Taxes were low, regulations were kept at a minimum, and consequently Hong Kong flourished, especially compared to its mother-country, China. In 1984, the British signed an agreement with the Chinese whereby Hong Kong would keep its free political and economic system for another half-century -- a plan called "One country, two systems."
Free Cities would seek to replicate the Hong Kong model elsewhere. It is a revolutionary idea, first enumerated by Ken Hagerty, the president of a global venture investment firm, and Theodore Roosevelt Malloch, CEO of The Roosevelt Group. Newt Gingrich also endorsed the concept in an article for the National Review.
For the Free Cities strategy to work in practice, it would be wiser to reach out to "moderate" autocracies before their downfall and consequent power vacuum. For instance, this strategy has little chance to work in Egypt, now that the Muslim Brotherhood is ascendant and trying to push secularist military government out of Egyptian politics. The same is true of an empowered Hezbollah in Lebanon, and the Islamists in Libya and Syria. To profit religiously, politically and materially, they appear to prefer ideology.
The most applicable way to showcase to the Middle East that democracy is preferable to theocracy, freedom superior to tyranny, is to reach out to an allied state such as Jordan. With Free Cities, the Jordanians could sign a bilateral agreement with the United States. A "free city," perhaps Al Karak, would serve as the Middle East's Hong Kong.
according to Hagerty, Al Karak could implement institutions of "democracy, rule of law, limited government, low taxes, reliable prosecution of corruption, public registration of real property, freedom of faith, speech and press, a merit-based civil service, multiethnic meritocracy, free trade, and an American university." As such, the city would thrive economically, politically, and culturally, just as Hong Kong prospered for so long compared to China. By its very example, Al Karak could undermine the outposts of corruption and dictatorship surrounding it.
Should the Jordanians sign such a bilateral agreement with the United States, they would be bringing in significant amounts of foreign money—not hand-out money, but money earned—thereby surpassing their neighboring states. The Jordanian government could also be undermining the Islamist political opposition by using democracy rather than the more muscular tactics Mubarak used, which only served to make the Muslim Brotherhood more popular.
Free Cities takes the Pentagon and U.S. State Department out of the nation-building business and places nation-building in the realm of the private sector. It is a uniquely American idea, worthy of pursuit in the Middle East.
Related Topics: N. M. Guariglia
Terrorism In France
Let's Not Pretend Jews Aren't The Targets
by Julien Balkany
April 3, 2012 at 4:30 am
http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/2988/terrorism-in-france
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Measured reason and thoughtfulness then look as if they have become the extreme view.
As the serial killing saga of self-styled Islamic extremist and al-Qaeda sympathizer, 23-year old Mohammed Merah, comes to a close in Toulouse, France, it might help to look at the lessons this event unwittingly provides, particularly as political correctness is all too often impedes doing so.
First, let us start by being honest about who the real victims are: not "the nation of France," not "people of all races," not "unity," but Jews. As Yann Moix, in the French magazine, "La Règle du Jeu," stated: "When a Jew is assassinated because he is a man, it is an assassination. When a man is assassinated because he is a Jew, it is an act of anti-Semitism."
This is hardly the first time violence has rocked a French political election – and it is not the first time French people of the Jewish faith have been targeted for death during such a period. During the 1981 campaign season that saw Francois Mitterrand take power from President Valery Giscard D'Estaing, terrorists bombed a Jewish synagogue in Paris, killing four people and injuring 40 others. Jews were the overt targets. The perpetrator did not set out to assassinate "French society" or "national unity"-- just Jews.
In last month's event, people of the Jewish faith – a Rabbi and three young children -- were again targeted in one of the three sets of killings. The targets of the other two killings were French military personnel of North African and Caribbean origin who had put their lives on the line to defend France, and whom the killer possibly deemed worthy of the same fate because of the courageous foreign policy of President Sarkozy in his fight against terrorism.
These incidents can create a public panic that automatically increases the range of acceptable responses. Measured reason and thoughtfulness then look as if they have become the extreme view. The correct reaction is indeed not to accept such acts -- but to respond surgically, with considered, specific measures. This is precisely the strategy for which President Nicolas Sarkozy can be credited for proposing: precise, new, targeted legislative actions.
We are learning, for example, that Merah had spent considerable time in Afghanistan, where he was arrested and subsequently repatriated. Despite being on the French authorities' watch-list since 2008 after making yet another trip to the Afghanistan-Pakistan border last year, and despite squirrelling away in his home enough weapons to supply a small army, he was reportedly considered "harmless" by security services.
One hopes that questions are being asked about why this case was permitted to progress to the point of disaster. Sarkozy, however, understanding the need for strategically applied surgical reinforcement through new legislative action, announced in the immediate aftermath of the standoff that "any person habitually consulting websites promoting terrorism, hatred, or violence will be lawfully punished" as will anyone who goes overseas "for the purposes of indoctrination in terrorist ideology," as determined by due process consistent with democratic values.
As I have traveled across North America over the past several months, I have met with French nationals of all backgrounds who, like me, have been "adopted" with open arms. In this spirit, we should all act and speak relentlessly to defend and protect our Jewish brothers and sisters who are repeatedly targeted on account of their beliefs.
Julien Balkany is a French National Assembly currently campaigning to represent French citizens living abroad in the United States and Canada, and New York based co-founder and managing partner of private investment firm, Nanes Balkany Partners.
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