July 27, 2006
Fear-based public policy is again at work, and as always, the interests of the American people—or anyone else—will not being served in a positive way. In this case, the administration is sending an expedited shipment of precision-guided bombs to Israel, to target Hezbollah, but which will harm many others. (NYTimes.com, July 22, 2006)
Some of our nation’s policies make all Americans proud and united: Our soldiers helping Lebanese civilians flee their war-torn country, the emergency care extended to Pakistan after the terrible earthquake in October of last year, or the Marshall Plan and the rebuilding of Japan after WWII, are just three such policies. These policies are founded on the Golden Rule—we do unto others as we would have them do unto us. The humanity and integrity of these policies represent what is best about Americans, and earn us respect on the international stage.
When instead our policies are based on seeking vengeance and an eye for an eye, they are destructive and divisive. They often involve violence and harm to others that fuel hatred toward the US and increase the number of fresh recruits who would, in turn, destroy us. These policies make us less safe.
On October 16, 2003, Donald Rumsfeld wrote his closest confidents and asked, in our Global War on Terror, “[a]re we capturing, killing, or deterring and dissuading more terrorists every day than the madrassas and the radical clerics are recruiting, training and deploying against us?” It was policies based on vengeance and an eye for an eye, not policies based on the Golden Rule, that gave rise to Rumsfeld’s question—one that is as valid today as it was three years ago.
If the US is to win its “war on terror,” it must cease eye-for-an-eye policies that escalate the number of the recruits dedicated to terrorizing us. Despite the sound bites and rhetoric to the contrary, these policies undermine our national security. Last year in Pakistan, positive public opinion toward the US soared in response to US military assistance in the aftermath of the earthquake. That changed suddenly in January of this year, when CIA drones bombed a Pakistani village in a failed effort to kill a target. Instead, innocent people died and Pakistanis took to the streets to profess their hatred of Americans—the perfect condition for terrorist recruiters.
For Americans to be secure, we must not support eye-for-an-eye policies of our own or any other nation, be it Israel seeking vengeance against its Arab neighbors or its Arab neighbors seeking vengeance against Israel.
Vengeance and an eye for an eye will never, never bring peace to Israel and its neighbors. And until there is peace in the Middle East, Americans are forced to live in fear. We, the American People, must demand that our policies support only those in the Middle East willing to do unto others as they would have others do unto them.
Eva
