Civil War on the American Right

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The rise of Donald J. Trump over the past 12 months has impacted almost every area of American political life. But nowhere is his impact more apparent than on the culture of American Conservatism – the political right; a culture that was – prior to the billionaire’s rise – ostensibly united in thought and action, but which has since split into combatant political blocs.

On one side of this divide is the Paleo Right (PR), Trump’s own favoured niche, which stresses what is good for the American Republic itself over what is good for the world. On the other is the Neo Right (or neoconservative right), which stresses more the cause of liberty and democracy abroad than the condition of America at home. These two camps have sat awkwardly together for over two decades now. It was always inevitable that they would split. It just so happens that the chisel is Trump-shaped.

Both schools of thought have much to recommend them. The Neo Right has played a vital role in preserving the Pax Americana against the threats of Islamism, Communism and Dictatorship. Israel, Japan, Ukraine and Georgia, as well as many other democratic states in undemocratic neighbourhoods rely on the American Neo Right for their prosperity and security. Democrats in non-democratic countries look to the NR for moral and financial support. The net effect of the Neo Right is positive. Few conservative movements have been so charitably international.

Prominent Neo-Cons: Condoleezza Rice, Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld

The Paleo Right, meanwhile, has safe-guarded (or where they have failed, attempted to safeguard) the uniqueness of America, battling against moral and social subversion from within, and maintaining America’s spirit of patriotism and peculiarity. They are motivated by core social issues like abortion, gay marriage, keeping prayer and the pledge of allegiance in public schools, the need to defend the sacredness of the Star-Spangled Banner, and so on. Foreign affairs is to them a secondary concern, if a concern at all. They tend to favour a non-interventionist policy in regard to the Middle East, even while being generally supportive of Israel and other pro-Western regimes. Paleo rightists objected (and were right to object) to the war in Iraq, and have no desire to repeat the experiment with Iraq’s elephantine neighbour. They favour a strong, advanced military, but believe the army should be retained for life and death confrontations, as opposed to constabulary duties. Many Paleos also nurture an obsession with civil liberties, viewing the US government as semi-tyrannical and bloated out of constitutional design. On this matter, too, they are providing a vital voice of caution which all should heed.

Paleo-Con icon Pat Buchanan

As I said, it is a wonder how these two inclinations managed to sit politely together for so long. Now that they have parted, it seems unlikely they will re-unite any time soon. If Donald Trump clinches the White House, the Paleos will have control over the GOP for the next 4 to 8 years.

Neo Rightists are not taking this development well. Fox News – which despite its tangential forays into abortion and homosexuality – is a solidly Neo Right entity, has been thrown into a frenzied identity crisis. The over-publicised ‘spat’ between Donald Trump and Fox Anchor Megan Kelly is just a symptom of the underlying divide. Fox, just like every other part of the conservative establishment, is uncomfortable with Trump’s candidacy and secretly wishes to stall or destroy it.

Fox coverage of candidates Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz has been tainted with bias from the very beginning. With the partial exception of Sean Hannity, most anchors have treated Trump with rubber gloves, as if handling radioactive waste. Trump was never being paranoid or irrational in protesting this treatment.

Megyn Kelly

The Neo Right is substantially more powerful than the Paleo Right in material terms. Most conservative TV networks are Neo Right, as are most Think Tanks, magazines and newspapers. This is the legacy of the long period of uncontested domination of the conservative universe by academic, economic and intellectual elites that is now being ripped to pieces by the Trumpsters. This is why (to the untrained eye) Trump supporters appear to be ‘anti-intellectual’. If the conservative era is to switch from Neo to Paleo, there is a lot of hierarchy to tear down in the process. This is intellectual and ideological regime change. It was always going to be messy.

How valid are Neo Right objections to Donald Trump? Let’s go through a few of them.

Charge 1: Donald Trump is insufficiently supportive of the State of Israel.

On the subject of the Middle East, Donald Trump has said he thinks it unhelpful to frame the conflict as being between ‘a good guy and a bad guy’. Whilst I disagree with the spirit of this quotation (Hamas certainly qualifies as a ‘bad guy’ in my opinion), it seems more rooted in a sense of fairness and pragmatism, than in any bad will towards the Israelis or Zionism. Trump’s beloved daughter Ivanka is Jewish (by conversion) and Trump has spoken of her adopted ethnicity with pride and understanding. There is no direct evidence that Mr Trump has an anti-Semitic bone in his body. Rumours about his keeping Hitler’s collected speeches by his bedside have never been corroborated outside of delirious chat-rooms. Until they are, we should treat them much like we treat rumours that the Earth is a pancake.

Pro-Israel donors obviously prefer Marco Rubio because he is so malleable. Rubio will do whatever his backers tell him to do. This is not meant as an anti-Semitic dog-whistle. It is a fact of politics that donors influence policy, and not only foreign policy. The Koch Brothers, as the left never stops bleating on about, have enormous influence over social and economic issues. Donors – of all varieties – hate Trump because they can’t buy him. Donors also invest in media networks. Media networks hate Trump because they are told to. I adore America. But let’s call a spade a spade here. Trump is battling against a corrupt political establishment.

Ivanka Trump

Charge 2: Donald Trump is not pro-free market.

Donald Trump has stated his determination to bring back manufacturing jobs from Asia and Mexico. When asked how he intends to accomplish this, the GOP front-runner explains that he will impose taxes on US companies that outsource jobs. This is not a violation of the free-market, nor of the regular rules of capitalism. It is a common sense measure to maintain prosperity for the American working class. It is also no different to what China and Mexico have done for several decades without American complaint.

Charge 3: Donald Trump is anti-mass immigration.

Guilty as charged. Donald Trump has been admirably clear on the subject of open borders. He opposes the idea, top to bottom. He wants to build a wall, and make Mexico pay for that wall. He wants to put a freeze on Muslims entering the United States. He also wants to deport the illegal immigrants already resident in the country, only allowing to return those who have clean criminal records and a professional command of English. This should be the default conservative position. No objections to this policy make for any sense.

The Neo Right’s love of open borders isn’t quite treachery, but it is moral and ideological confusion. Yes, Muslim immigration should be avoided as a special case, but this doesn’t mean the entire non-Muslim world is suitable for Western settlement. We have a good thing going here in the Western, Modern world. Allowing in people from regressive or intolerant cultures (of which Islam is only one example) is counter-productive. It jeopardizes what is precious to us.

Other objections to Trump by the Neo Right are similar to those made by the Political Left. The idea that Trump is akin to Mussolini is wildly popular on both sides of the ideological aisle. What evidence is there to support this idiotic claim? Some point to the enthusiasm whipped up at Trump rallies, but then if this is a crime, we’d better convict the Dallas Cowboys, Manchester United and Oprah Winfrey while we’re at it.

Viral photo from Trump rally

People are so refreshed by Trump’s style that they are overjoyed by his message. Joy is not an offence. Emotion might be rare at formulaic rallies with tedious politicians, but Trump is anything but formulaic or tedious. There is real contagious enthusiasm being generated by this man. Politics is being rejuvenated.

The patronising distaste with which the media and economic elite view the pleasures and aspirations of ordinary people is scandalous. People are people. Americans are Americans. All deserve to be heard, appreciated and spoken to, whatever their race, faith or economic category.

If Donald Trump wins the nomination, the Republican Party will never be the same again. The Neo-Con racket – the art of calling oneself a conservative whilst being left-wing on everything except foreign policy – will have been exposed and replaced with a straight-shooting honesty more in line with the fine history of the Grand Old Party.

D, LDN

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Islam and Petroleum: An Old Alliance and its Future

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The collapse of the price of oil over the past few months has sent shockwaves through an already vulnerable global economy, slowing the ascent of China, threatening the recovery of America, and causing stock markets from London to Shenzhen to wobble precariously on their foundations. But surely no part of the world is more affected by fluctuations in the oil market than the Muslim Middle East, specifically the nations of Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia and the Emirates of the Persian Gulf.

If the downward trajectory in oil prices continues for just a few more years, the economies of these countries will be plunged into crisis, their social order, military upkeep and political power undermined and potentially destroyed. And there is something else to consider in all this. Seeing as oil and Islam have been locked in a very profitable alliance for the past 50 years, what will this decline mean for the civilizational balance of power? Can Islam’s political and military ascendance survive the shock of a post-oil era?

Optimists imagine that without oil, states like Saudi and the UAE would be without influence in the world. Since their economies are based entirely on energy revenues, they reason, such countries would – in the case of an oil collapse – be reduced to the diplomatic grade of Burkina Faso or Zimbabwe. This is not entirely accurate. While it is certainly true that without oil the nations of the gulf will see a massive decline in standards of living, this will not necessarily mean the end of their mischief-making in world affairs. Saudi Arabia, to take a prominent case, has invested much of its gargantuan wealth in blue-chip Western companies – companies which will continue to reap the Saudi state considerable profit for as long as they are trading. The Saudis have also purchased an astonishing array and quantity of modern weaponry, including – according to some – nuclear missiles from Pakistan. This military power will in the short term (or with nuclear weapons, in the very long term) guarantee the country a louder voice than it deserves.

As for Iran, Saudi’s arch-enemy, the outlook is rosier in some respects, and murkier in others. Since the revolution of 1979, the Islamic Republic of Iran has faced the boycott of its energy industry by much of the developed world. This has meant that Iran’s state finances have remained in poor shape, and also that they haven’t managed to buy up stocks in Western companies to the extent that Saudi has. On the other hand, this long period of boycott has forced Iranians to build an economy unreliant on the energy sector – a post-oil economy, if you will – and this will give the country a very important head start in the rush to regional economic diversification. The same is also true of Iraq, which has until very recently functioned without a petroleum economy.

Taken overall, the Islamic world will only face a sub-regional decline in diplomatic power from the collapse of oil. Outside of the oil-producing area itself, many Islamic countries have high economic growth rates even without energy reserves – these include the nations of Turkey, Egypt and Indonesia, all of which also possess considerable military strength to increase their bargaining power. Thus, the collapse of oil will sink Islamic power in the short-term, only for the power lost to be replenished later in different places. Given that these places will be less extreme than Saudi and Iran, the prospect for a general moderation of Islam is very real, if hardly as curative as liberal commentators would have us believe.

Here in the modern world, the end of oil politics is surely something to celebrate. A nasty and corrupt stench is about to be cleared from the air. The Islam-Oil alliance, even in so brief a period as it has existed, wrought real damage on the world at large. It is directly responsible for the 9/11 attacks in America, as well as for the crippling of Western economies in the 1970s. It has perverted American and British politics, enriched soulless monarchs and dictators, and radicalised much of the Islamic world against its will.

Good riddance.

D, LDN

ISIS: After the Fall

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Friday’s attack did not occur without a greater context. Though it’s too soon to speak with certainty, it would appear that ISIS (aka Islamic State, aka ISIL) is beginning to weaken and may soon collapse. The evidence for this proposition is plentiful. After years of superhuman military performance in which towns fell to the group in a matter of hours, often having been emptied of resistance beforehand by the sheer (justified) terror of remaining, great swathes of IS-held territory are now falling (just as rapidly) to Syrian and Kurdish troops. The controversial Russian intervention seems to have greatly diminished ISIS morale and the US and UK drone strikes (which today disposed of a particularly vicious fool known as Jihadi John) are steadily picking off the group’s here-today, gone-tomorrow leadership. And while ISIS boasts of being the penultimate destination of all Muslim believers, the number of ‘Western’ Muslims travelling to Syria to join the nascent Caliphate has been falling consistently for months, perhaps a reflection of a declining reputation on its part.

Let’s be optimistic and presume this is the case. Let’s presume that ISIS has but a few more blood-soaked months of life left in it. What happens then? What should happen to the thousands (and there are still many thousands) of ISIS members when their protective unity is no more? Obviously, this will initially require one of the largest mass arrests since the fall of Nazi Germany. But what comes after that? What sentence or punishment would be sufficient for the crimes these savages have delighted in committing over the past five years?

You’ve probably guessed my answer already, but I’ll detail it regardless. If an ISIS militant is captured in the midst of combat, he should face the death penalty. If this sounds excessive (and I’m sure you don’t think so), remember that had any of the medieval crimes ISIS members have committed over the last few years been committed in America, a death sentence would have been issued in every case. This really is no different. Furthermore, we’re already issuing death sentences from the air with our drone strikes. I can think of no valid counter-argument to this.

After the fall of ISIS, captured fighters should not be extradited to their home countries, but promptly turned over to the Syrian military (the Kurds, Russians and Jordanians are too humane). Given the moral standards of the Assad regime, we can be sure the correct action will be taken, and with little compassion or fanfare. ISIS members have lived by the sword, and they shall die by it, too. For over half a decade, they have massacred uncountable civilians, beheaded them, cut their arms off for ‘witchcraft’ and other imaginary offences, thrown gays from the top floor of bombed-out buildings, gang-raped non-Muslim women, and sold others into sexual slavery. They have recently shot 200 CHILDREN in the head and uploaded footage of the crime onto the internet. Before that, they butchered Christians on the shores of the Mediterranean, turning the sea a dark shade of red. They fed other Christians to dogs, watching gleefully as they were agonisingly ripped apart.

Just as the Nazis were hung for their crimes, so must ISIS hang for theirs.

D, LDN

Saudi Arabia: The Brat Country

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As you’ll be aware, two major disasters have afflicted Saudi Arabia in the past fortnight, each causing multiple fatalities. First, a crane ‘inexplicably’ crashed onto the most sacred Mosque in Islam, killing dozens. Then, a stampede during the traditional ‘stone the devil’ ceremony (not far from the site of the first incident) killed hundreds more.

On the off chance anyone finds this incompetence surprising, let’s build a context for it. In the first case, the Saudi construction industry is globally regarded as an institution of thinly disguised slavery. The workers, usually imported from impoverished areas of the Indian sub-continent, are provided with little training, guidance, insurance or protection. In this sense, the only wonder is why cranes aren’t falling on the hour.

In the second case, this is far from the first time that Saudi security forces, in total numbering barely 100,000 men (and only men, of course), have found large-scale co-ordination projects impossible to manage. A wave of animal chaos condemns countless families to an early, pious demise every year.

And this dysfunction, of course, is not isolated but general. Saudi Arabia is plainly not a developed country. Not by any measure. Though the Human Development Index continues to mistake wealth for sophistication, the nation is merely a third world state splashed with unlimited resources.

Like any crackpot regime, the Saudi government – knowing no better – wastes every dollar of (unearned) revenue on a bloated military and on spreading propaganda abroad (the result of which has been the rebirth of Sunni Islamic militancy and the deaths of thousands of Western citizens). Security and policing are brutal, often savage and yet also notoriously inefficient. The education system is appalling. Illiteracy is rife. Women are granted no rights whatsoever. Obesity is a national characteristic. Despite all the investment available, the national life expectancy is the same as in penniless Libya. The hospital system, while slightly better than the school system, is little more than a crude institutional plagiarism from the civilised world, and one that would collapse without that world’s continued instruction. Agriculture is non-existent (though, as other barren countries have shown, not impossible). If oil is subtracted from the equation completely, the economy is less productive than Jordan (a country with population of 6 million to Saudi’s 31 million).

Saudi Arabia is a brat country. A spoilt, lazy, bloated brat. Unaccustomed to ever working for a living, a brat never develops intelligence or a worthwhile skill. Money comes in whatever the case. So why do anything other than grow fat and play computer games? Why move with the cultural times at all? Why not freeze the clock at the very moment black gold first ejaculated from the ground?

I am an Islamophobe, admittedly. But I do nevertheless feel bad when innocent people die. Saudi incompetence has cut short the lives of a great number of people this week; people with futures, dreams and histories. They firmly deserve the blame of their co-religionists, as well as our unending contempt for their staggering lack of competence, compassion and innovation.

D,LDN

Slovakia Says No

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It was of course inevitable that the great nation of Slovakia would one day perform a feat of political daring bold enough to inspire Europe as a whole. The only wonder is how long we have had to wait for it. Now it is here, let us savour it and seek to deepen its impact.

As you’ll be aware, the Slovakian government announced last week that its country will only be accepting Christian refugees fleeing the Syrian civil war, and not Muslims. You’ll also be aware that this then led to kind of acrobatic stupidity only Western governments appear to be capable of.

“The attitude underlying this is to be condemned.” One EU drone remarked “It is unhelpful and does not display solidarity.”

In saying this, the drone was compacting the general response of the EU establishment. By staggering coincidence, it is also the view of the European business elites, globalist charities, humanitarian lobby groups, and (of course) the establishment media.

But outside this bubble of cheerful unaccountability, most reactions to the Slovakian stance have been extremely positive. Wherever the story has ben reported in the English press, the reader comments underneath each individual article salute and commend the Slovakian government for its bravery, timeliness and fidelity to the wishes of the Slovakian electorate. Often tacked on to the end of these commendations are hopes and wishes (against all odds) that other European states will follow suit, including – perchance –  the regimes of Western Europe. Needless to say, such fantasies are just that – fantasies.

In the face of EU criticism, Slovakia has justified its policy in the following way: Slovakia is a Christian country. There are no Mosques or Madrassas in Slovakia, nor are there Muslim schools or traditions compatible with the Muslim experience. Muslims therefore wouldn’t like it in Slovakia. They are being denied access to Slovakia as much for their own good as for the good of the native population.

I know what you’re thinking. If only our government had reasoned the same fifty years ago. How much trouble, bloodshed, innocence and economic disruption would have been spared?! As the Slovaks have shown, all it would have taken was a bit of (inoffensive) common sense.

It is of course far too late for our own countries to use this elementary good judgement, or at least to endorse it in the shrugging, devious and friendly manner in which the Slovaks have. We are five decades too late, and while other countries can get away with being sensible, it is no longer a luxury we can afford.

Given this reality, out of the hundreds of thousands of Syrian and Eritrean Muslims currently trekking across the green fields of Europe, I suspect a great proportion will eventually live in English neighbourhoods, their progeny eventually attending English schools, voting in English elections, and (some of them) going on to violently avenge English foreign policy.

All the while, Slovakia will carry on – grinning, living, persisting – as if nothing had ever happened. There has surely never been a greater, more saddening illustration of the failure of the European idea.

D, LDN.

The Demolition of Nineveh.

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When he established the religion of Islam in 630 AD, the Prophet Muhammad is said to have smashed the statues of ancient Arabic Idols in the territory now venerated as the Masjid al-Haram in Makkah. In doing so, he set an example that would ripple through the ancient Middle East like an earthquake.

Energized by the faith he imparted them, Muhammad’s followers charged the tired-out nations of humanity’s first golden-age, burning or smashing to pieces anything that attracted veneration or that stood for rival theologies. Their justification for this vandalism was the same used by the Prophet; nothing should be venerated except the qualities of God.

Wahhabis take this anti-idolatry stance to the wild extreme. In the modern city of Makkah, the Saudi religious establishment has ordered the bulldozing of numerous buildings venerated by millions of less orthodox believers. This includes the house Muhammad was born in and many other buildings connected with the Islamic Salaf (original or ‘rightly guided’ generation).

What is currently occurring in the ancient Assyrian city of Nineveh is therefore completely in keeping with Islamic theology as promoted by Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the UAE.

The Mail has posted pictures today depicting ISIS barbarians smashing statues in an Iraqi museum, some of which date back hundreds of years before the birth of Jesus. The surprised comments in reaction to them are shame-faced. Assyrian activists have been reporting the destruction of Nineveh for some time. The media has been pathetically slow to catch up.

The ancient city of Nineveh, whose ruins are located within the neighbourhood of the ISIS-controlled city of Mosul, was capital of the Assyrian empire and is mentioned throughout the Hebrew Bible. Its famed city walls are on the ISIS hit-list and may be blown up at any time. Should ISIS proceed all the way to Baghdad, the city of Babylon – to the South of the modern capital and an equally famed centre of ancient culture – will be treated the same way.

The question forming from the smoke of this destruction is whether we, the human collective, have any respect for our past, for the treasures that served as mileposts on the way to our present complexity. I do. I think we all should.

Death to Wahhabism. Death to the preachers of nihilism. Death to ISIS.

D, LDN.

Oh What a Lovely War.

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As I write, the forces of the modern world are busily engaged in its defence. In the skies over Mesopotamia, F-22 Raptors – those beautiful, sleek monsters of war – are releasing smart bombs destined for the hide-outs of civilian-killers and child rapists.

I’m pleased and slightly surprised to see this. Obama and Cameron have had to make a tortuous about turn to arrive at the current (correct) poise. It wasn’t so long ago that these men were advocating the arming of Jihadist groups in the same region. Now they are pledging to roll such forces back into the middle ages where they belong. Hooray for common sense (at last).

The babyish pacifists are already whingeing of course. Some are warning of ‘mission creep’ and eventual ‘boots on the ground’. But why would anyone object to that? Of course I’d much rather that we could defeat ISIS entirely from the air, but it’s far from certain that we can. We must prepare for whatever this war may ask of us.

As acts of violence go, this is as close to moral violence as can be imagined. The democratic forces of the West are mowing down the ambitions of an anti-democratic evil. The edges we enjoy in technology are finally being made to count. The modern world is showing its worth and I for one am loving every minute of it.

D, LDN.

Do the Palestinians Want Palestine or Israel?

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“Man can do what he wills but he cannot choose what he wills.” – Schopenhauer.

So, another war is raging between the Jews of Israel and the Arabs of Gaza.

We know the routine from here. When the guns eventually fall silent and the silos close, Western elites will pontificate to Israel as if they themselves were virgins to violence; the UN will achieve nothing at a furious pace; Hamas meanwhile will probably claim a strategic ‘victory’ and won’t – I suppose – be wholly unjustified in doing so.

It seems the Israelis have once again been suckered into a publicity nightmare for zero strategic gain. Only a concerted effort to topple Hamas will prevent rockets being fired into Israel. Hamas knows this, and starts these wars on purpose, daring Israel to make a move. Israel also knows this, or should do by now.

But I don’t want to talk at length about this current dispute. Rather let’s use the occasion to broaden our view and ask a question about the fundamental clash of interests underlying this cycle of violence.

The standard view of the Israel-Palestine conflict (or that upheld by the UN and Western public opinion) is that it involves a claim by two peoples to the same territory. The troubles of the region originate from this simple contest, and are only later exacerbated by religious belief.

The radical or revisionist view of the conflict claims it is the other way around. The territory is secondary and religion (in particular Islam) motivates most of the violence.

A third view, and one I’d like to advance today, considers the economic factors of the divide and proposes that the advocates of at least one of the competing peoples are purposely deluding themselves.

Anyone who has read or studied basic psychology will be well-placed to judge the capacity human beings have for self-deceit, and that the thing one ‘wants’ is not necessarily what one claims to want or even what one wishes to want. If a problem-drinker, for example, goes to the corner shop for a bottle of gin, he may sincerely believe along the way that he is going to buy a newspaper. The human mind is so fallible that it can be manipulated even by itself.

In this context, consider this: Do the Palestinians really want ‘Palestine’ with its olive groves, rolling hills and ancient alleyways? Or do they in fact desire Israel, with its shopping malls, freedom and high standard of living?

It’s surprising how rarely this question is put to the world, and tragic too, since it can illuminate a hidden simplicity behind a seemingly complicated problem.

Given its strategic urgency, there have been innumerable remedies suggested for the Israel-Palestine conflict over the previous few decades, from the UN-backed ‘return to 1967 borders’, through the ‘Arab peace plan’ sponsored by Saudi Arabia, to the ‘three-state solution’, to the US ‘Roadmap’, to the most recent Lieberman Plan.

The last of these is most relevant to the context we have set ourselves.

The ‘Lieberman plan’ – named after its author Avigdor Lieberman, leader of the nationalist Yisrael Beiteinu party – suggests that a two state solution include the exchange of the Arab-populated areas of Israel for the Jewish populated areas of the West Bank, thus avoiding the need for a population ‘transfer’.

According to this plan, the Galilee region of Northern Israel would be attached to the bloc of West Bank inhabited by Palestinians. The Israeli Arabs in the area of Israel to be detached would lose their Israeli citizenship and become citizens of Palestine instead. The Jewish settlements of the West Bank would be attached to Israel proper. A Jewish majority in Israel would thus be assured, and the ‘problem’ of Jews on the West Bank would be solved at a stroke.

Personally, I don’t think this idea is workable in practice, but the reaction the policy has provoked is almost worth the effort put into proposing it.

The Arab citizens of Israel have branded the plan philosophically ‘racist’ and morally outrageous. The Palestinian establishment outside of Israel’s borders has also condemned the plan, presenting a claim of native descent specifically to the land currently tended to by the Jews, and re-stating a commitment to the return of refugees to towns within the same territory.

Let’s be clear. If, as it is routinely claimed, the Palestinians merely want a state of their own, the Lieberman plan should be sweetly palatable to them. It delivers immediately the state they claim to crave, and even supplies the Palestinian people with a social unity they have arguably never before experienced. Hamas in particular would get its wish of a Judenrein Islamic state, emptied of democracy, development and dirty Kuffar. The PA would be given full political sovereignty over its own citizens. What is there to object to?

The answer can only be that it leaves a highly developed, wealthy and democratic society living next door to them. This society and its high level of living is what is craved, and only by its destruction or infiltration can the Palestinian blood-lust be satisfied.

It has been well noted by travellers for many centuries that Islamic countries tend – almost without exception – to be dirt-piles. Places where nobody of depth or youthfulness could happily spend a week. Why then did any Leftist imagine Gaza could turn out differently?

For years, the PA and its Western cheerleaders squealed for the liberation of that strip of coastline. Now they have it and the rockets never stop coming.

Is that really due to those IDF troops calmly patrolling the other side of the border? Or does it actually involve those skyscrapers towering in the far distance, tortuously superior and forever out of reach?

In some dusty and eccentric corner of the Palestinian mind, does the thought arise that those sparkling buildings are the natural fruit of the territory, and not the work of those who have settled it? Do they imagine that they would be enjoying that same prosperity had the Jews never returned?

I don’t believe the Palestinians will ever be satisfied with gifts of land, however extravagant. There are countless states they could relocate to, and if it really was peace they craved, they would already be in them. But that is not and was never the point. They have glimpsed a better life through a forest of watchtowers and cannot now forget it.

D, LDN.

Muslim Rage: Conviction or Cognitive Dissonance.

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One of my favourite characteristics of the English language is its abundance of idioms and ‘folk expressions’; phrases which can be used to express very complex ideas with simplicity and brevity, provided the other party is of a cultural kin.

You’ll no doubt have your own favourite example. Mine is the old phrase ‘Sour Grapes’.

As with other elements of our language, this idiom is now commonly used incorrectly. Many people believe ‘sour grapes’ to mean being bitter or annoyed about losing a game, when actually it is much more beautifully nuanced than this.

The ‘sour grapes’ idiom derives from a story in ‘Aesop’s Fables’ about a fox who tries to reach a high-hanging vine of perfectly ripe grapes. When he is unable to do so, he dismisses the grapes as being sour, in order to delude himself out of his own disappointment.

To lose a chess game and be angry therefore is not sour grapes. To lose a chess game and then dismiss the concept of ‘winning at chess’ as invalid – is.

This idiom is very useful – I find – to the modern situation as we confront it.

How much of Muslim rage against the West derives from a genuinely held belief in cultural superiority, and how much of it is – like the fox and the grapes – merely cognitive dissonance? Do Islamists hate the West because they genuinely love their poverty, or do they detest the West because its glistening fruit is beyond their capability?

To pursue an answer, let’s try a thought experiment:

Imagine a Pakistani youth walking down a high street in London. In the course of his journey he notices all the furniture of a modern, secular culture; a group of lightly clothed women congregating together without a family chaperone; smartly-dressed business people of both sexes enjoying a red wine lunch; young lovers walking hand in hand, having chosen each other freely, without filial or tribal consideration; and all about him rises the glassy architecture of an affluent, free and developed nation, built by people other than his own.

Isolated and confused by all this, he thinks to himself:

“Look at all these soulless, decadent sinners!” and pledges his energy to their collective destruction.

But then suddenly, out of nowhere, a magical figure appears in a puff of smoke and offers the startled fanatic a bargain –

“I feel sorry for your discomfort” the figure whispers “….And so I’m going to give you two ways to alleviate it… The first is for you to be born again in Pakistan, away from all this horrific liberty, and never to learn of it. Or, alternatively, I can make you one of these very people, in appearance, identity and lifestyle, so that it no longer bothers you and this tension is resolved.”

As to which option the Muslim would take, it is impossible to give numbers. We can nevertheless provide case studies of ideological weakness which suggest the latter option might often be more likely than the former.

Before embarking on the deadliest attack against the West this century, some members of the al-Qaeda hijack-squad are believed to have engaged in numerous un-Islamic practices on American soil, such as attending strip-clubs and getting blind drunk at liquor bars. Similarly, their ring-leader Osama Bin Laden, according to the Navy Seals who disposed of him, is said to have kept a large stash of Western pornography at his Pakistani compound. Meanwhile, the main regime credited with exporting the ideology utilised on 9/11, the Saudi Royal Family, routinely sends its younger members to Europe for a ‘private education’, during which their licentious, playboy behaviour has become notorious in London hotels and German brothels.

Closer to home, we have the following example: According to the Daily Mail, numerous students who attended University with the figurehead of British terrorism, Anjem Choudary, allege that the fanatic – despite his professed devotion to Sharia – was known to engage in extreme sexual promiscuity and drunkenness when away from the prying eyes of his family.

Finally (and most horribly), the Jihadi death squads who stalked unguarded neighbourhoods of Baghdad after the overthrow of Saddam Hussein were widely reported to have executed dozens of young men for possession of alcohol whilst under its influence themselves.

I could go on of course, but I don’t think I need to.

Is it enough to write all this off simply as hypocrisy; or might we justly infer a motive outside of the official excuse of religious piety? To tidy it up into a question: Do Islamists actually believe they are right, or are they merely thrashing around in a fit of nihilism and self-denial because they recognise they are wrong?”

My favourite novelist Martin Amis wrote against this idea in his masterful history of Stalinist genocide ‘Koba the Dread: Laughter and the Twenty Million’. ‘Koranic rule’ he wrote ‘is meant to work’. It is meant to result in affluence, ‘swimming pools and atomic bombs’.

According to Amis’s position then, when Muslims erect a society like that attempted by the Taliban in Afghanistan, they sincerely and unironically believe that Sharia law – harshly applied – will eventuate in a Utopia that shames the West by its own example.

As much as I admire Amis’s gifts, I must disagree with him here. Islamists might be fanatical, and psychopathic, and unreasonable, but I don’t believe they are stupid.

More likely for me is that they, like the fox, cannot admit to themselves that they have failed and – worse – that a great historic rival has got to the fruit instead. To concede as much would require a renunciation of the superiority of Sharia law and thus of their deepest held convictions.

Trapped between this terrible humility and an intolerable status quo, their violence is merely music to drown out the sound of their contradiction.

When George W. Bush suggested in a post-9/11 speech that al-Qaeda ‘hate us (America and the West) for our freedom’, he was roundly mocked, including by those on the right who otherwise agreed with him. It sounded implausible and contradictory. Why would people become suicidally angry about another culture’s success?

Cognitive dissonance is the answer, and I hope you’ll agree that (on this at least) President Bush is owed an apology.

D, LDN.

Dubai: Money Can’t Buy Civilisation.

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Abudhabi, American Liberty, Canada, Christianity and Islam, Christopher Caldwell, Civilisation, Civilization, Counter-Jihad, Cultural Marxism, Defend the modern world, Dubai, KFC, Middle East, Multiculturalism, No to Turkey in the EU, Qatar, Race and ethnicity in the United States Census, Rihanna Muslim, United Arab Emirates

What is ‘Civilisation’?

Some people, typically on the Political Left, claim (and presumably believe) that ‘Civilisation’ is fundamentally indistinct from ‘affluence’.

By implication then, ‘Civilisation’ is at base just a commodity, available for purchase to every culture and people the world over. The essence of a ‘Civilised country’ meanwhile isn’t Literature, Human Rights, Liberty, or Justice, but simply skyscrapers, fast cars, cable TV, and KFC Restaurants.

These people are wrong of course, and no better pursuasion of this can be found than the modern City-State of Dubai.

This blog is called ‘Defend the Modern World’. I should probably clarify then, exactly what I classify as ‘Modern’.

Imagine if you met an apolitical simpleton and showed him two photographs, the first of the small town of Fleming, Saskatchewan in Canada, and the second of Dubai in the United Arab Emirates.

If you then asked him which city of the two is more ‘ modern’, the simpleton would almost certainly pick the latter.

He’d be wrong.

Modernity for me, has little to do with technology or convenience. While I would gladly live in a Scandinavian village without electricity, I could never live happily in Abu Dhabi or Qatar. This is because the first would doubtlessly be more ‘modern’ and Civilised than the latter (with the first term here qualified by the criteria above).

Every year, Great hordes of Westerners (permanent settlers among them) travel to Dubai or Abu Dhabi. Their reasons for doing so (and this needs clarifying) have only a little to do with tax, and a lot to do with immorality.

In Dubai, after-all, you can not only exercise the mod-cons of a millionaire, but the cruelty of a medieval King.

Dubai has an entire class (by some estimates making up a majority of those resident in the country at any given time) of East and South Asian slaves. Yes, that’s right, slaves…

But maybe that’s unexeptional. Many African countries – after-all – still operate systems of slavery and then there’s the ‘caste system’ of India etc….

Where Dubai is different is in the way the slaves are treated by their masters, and by the laxity of the law in protecting them.

Regard the words of the Guardian’s Tanya Gold:

“There are 250,000 foreign workers in Dubai, drawn mostly from India and Bangladesh. They are indentured servants, in other words, slaves. The usual way to recruit them is to draw them a picture of joy — great wages, fabulous working conditions — and charge them an enormous recruitment fee. Then, when they arrive, the construction companies often steal their passports, deny them their wages and say they must work endlessly to pay for their return home, while living 10 to a room and working in the terrible heat. In Dubai, they cannot change jobs, and they cannot strike; those who do face violence or deportation. Last year, 113 Indians committed suicide in Dubai, or one every three days.”

To return to the photo comparison thought-experiment, when was the last time a migrant worker jumped off an unfinished building in Canada?

Alongside slavery, Dubai also offers lengthy prison sentences for adultery, kissing on the beach, homosexuality, transvestism, and possession of such horrific drugs of abuse as Benadryl. These prohibitions too, demonstrate a great lag in cultural time, perhaps (relative to the West) of more than a century.

Civilization, to conclude, is not a commodity. It cannot be bought. It develops inside the psyche of a population over many centuries. The desert Sheikdoms of the Persian Gulf then, skyscrapers and underwater hotels aside, have a long distance to travel.

D, LDN.