troll - I understand what you are saying, for sure, although I would partially disagree with much of it. You are viewing it all through a certain prism, and probably have not read some of the articles I have, representing the more progressive forces in the Muslim community (I'm assuming that you haven't read them...I may be wrong).

Yes, the Arab oil states are extremely wealthy...for the few at the top. One of the reasons why the wealth is not shared with the general populace is this: the USA and Britain have traditionally supported autocratic rule by compliant dictators in many Muslim countries (and elsewhere in the 3rd World too), supplying them with weaponry in return for oil and military bases.

Some examples: Saudia Arabia, Egypt (not for oil, but for other strategic reasons), Kuwait, Pakistan, Indonesia, and until fairly recently, Iraq. Iran when the Shah was in power. There have been some genuine initiatives toward democracy in some of those places from time to time...crushed by people on an unofficial USA payroll.

Britain did the same thing when they were ruling the roost in the Middle East. They talked democracy, supported autocracy and feudalism.

Neither the USA nor the dictators they support have any intention of allowing democracy to develop in those countries. Democratic regimes are way too hard to control. (When they do arise of their own accord, as happened in Chile and Nicaragua and began to happen once in Iran, they are ruthlessly destroyed by whatever means possible...a war, a coup, an assassination, an economic blow, whatever it takes.)

The Saudi government spends millions on religious facilities...yes...to distract its people and keep them in line while a few rich people live like emperors...in collusion with their rich western friends who own the multinationals. They get together in places like Monaco and Paris and gamble or play polo. A lovely time is had by all. The building of more religious facilities is a cynical exercise, meant to shore up popular support, and it works...for a while.

It is precisely because collusion between the West and the local sheiks and bully boys have rendered the development of local democracy impossible that fanatical Islamic revolutions have occurred, like that in Iran. The common people see it as the only avenue left to them to institute change and achieve real national sovereignty. This further imperils the chances of liberalizing and modernizing those societies, and is a great tragedy for the Islamic moderates who dream of achieving a peaceful, progressive, modern society. There are many such moderates, but you don't hear much about them on the news, because they aren't killing people.

Is there any reason why the USA should not support Israel? Well, sure there is...a host of reasons. The USA should not support either aggressor in this useless conflict, they should show no favoritism at all, but bring all possible influence to end the fighting by negotiation and equivalent concessions from both sides, and by not arming or funding the combatants on either side. This, of course, would be VERY bad for business, so it absolutely ain't gonna happen! It would likely also help lead to the collapse of several compliant Arab regimes in fairly short order...it's US supplied armaments that keep them in power.

Yes, the Arabs have been beaten badly again and again...but they might well have won in 1973, had not the USA massively resupplied Israel with new tanks in a matter of a few days. This is not lost on the Arabs. They had to go it alone. Israel did not.

Israel has precisely the advantage in battle that a thoroughly modernized military has over a half-modernized one every time. I've played very accurate simulations of many Middle Eastern battles with tanks, etc....the Arab armies are so technologically outclassed by both the USA and Israel that all they can do, generally speaking, is show that they know how to die bravely. This is what has happened again and again when colonial European forces, a generation or 2 ahead of their opponents in the techniques of war, slaughtered Africans, Asians, or Arabs with more advanced weaponry. It's not really something to be particularly proud of...it's rather like shooting fish in a barrel. This is why you see suicide bombers these days. They feel it is the only way they can strike back effectively and do real damage. For them to fight openly with tanks, etc. is basically suicidal in any case, just as it was for the Japanese after 1943, which is why they too adopted planned suicide tactics on a large scale.

The Arabs are not going to stop fighting unless they are all killed, and that is not going to happen...or until there is real substantial negotiation and positive change in the status quo...give and take on both sides. Israel is not particularly interested in that, because they figure they have the power to get what they want by force. They may change their minds if the suicide bombings continue indefinitely.

I agree that Israel wants and needs defensible borders, and I understand that concern, particularly as regards the Golan heights. I think that those areas should be demilitarised and strongly occupied for at least a generation (or longer than that, if necessary) by not Israel but a multinational peacekeeping force of well-armed soldiers from neutral countries...but Israel would not hear of it...(nor, perhaps would the Arabs) and the world community is too probably too fractured to agree on how to do it anyway. Too bad. The fighting will go on until something like that is done or until there's a nuclear conflict and everybody in the region gets fried.

If Israel was not expansionist, they would not be putting Israeli settlements into various of the occupied areas. Sounds like "lebensraum" to me....remember that? It's on a much smaller scale of course...but the intention is rather similar, I think. "We took this land, so let's use it. Well, now that we live here, we aren't leaving. Too bad for you!" That's expansionist. The same thing happened in America with the Indian lands. They were also outgunned.

Lastly, Osama Bin Laden was a rich kid...yes. So? So was Fidel Castro. Most of Castro's rich family repudiated him and fled to Florida when he threw out the Mafia and the multinationals and divided the land up among the farmers who had worked it for generations, on a starvation wage. Why did he do that when he was already a rich kid with a guaranteed easy life at the top of the heap?

Well, it happens. Rich people are not necessarily immune to acquiring social ideals, and some of them become fervent revolutionaries despite putting themselves in personal danger and risking losing everything. Washington and Jefferson did. It often happens. What is so surprising that it happened in Bin Laden's case? His religious viewpoint is his form of social conscience. You don't agree with it. I doubt that I do either. But for him, it is a high ideal that is synonymous with having a social conscience. He was an exception to the rule among his peer group. Most of his foot soldiers come from the poor, and I trust that most of his rich relatives have disinherited him. He is a noble who decided to opt out of the club...and that is unforgivable when you're in that club, I believe, but it still happens. Revolutions are often led by the sons of the rich, because rich people have the time and the educational opportunities to read in depth, to think, to philosophize, and to develop theoretical passions and ideals of every kind...if they are so inclined. A few of them always are. Buddha was the son of a king. He chose complete renunciation of all that luxury and privilege, and launched a philosophical revolution that changed the world.

But the real key to all of this is that the West (and Russia as well) have pursued foreign policies which pretty well guaranteed that democracy would have no chance of developing in the oil-producing countries, but that they would remain obedient clients of Big Business, ruled by autocrats, and keep their poor people superstitious, helpless, poor and oppressed.

It is precisely that which has led to the rise of ever more fanatical and dangerous muslim religious extremists. The West sometimes has used those extremists to fight its dirty wars in places like Afghanistan in the 80's...but later discovered that the scorpion they created will not stay quietly in its box.

It's a long, twisted, and sad story. Power has been served. Money has been served. Privilege has been served. Business has been served. Democracy has never been served. There are no good guys among the major players in this Middle Eastern fiasco. Not one. They all have the blood and misery of millions on their hands.

- LH