In the film Is Paris Burning? -- which pre-dates the rise of Islamic terrorism, and thus Gore Vidal and Francis Ford Coppola's script could not have had a political agenda, at least not this one -- the German general, desperately trying to defend the city in the face of both a rapidly advancing American army and an armed uprising of French citizens, consistently refers to the Resistance as -- what else? -- "terrorists."
Thus in Gaza, each side refers to the other as "terrorists," and for once, both are right. Each side is obviously terrified.
It wasn't always thus. I can remember in the 1990s, when there was a peace process worthy of the name, thousands of Palestinians entered Israel each day to work, and Israelis drove, unarmed and unescorted, the winding road, open to all, from Jerusalem to Jericho for a night of fun at the casinos. And no cars were ever attacked. No one was ever killed.
How long ago that seems. Now the so-called "peace process" rests in the hands of Misters Olmert and Abbas, who seem to have in common only their unpopularity among their own people and a desperate need to save their political hides. Well, who knows? Nothing else has worked. And they do have President Bush behind them. That should help.
I'm a great admirer of the Jewish people. From Moses to Spinoza to Marx to Einstein -- and why not, while I'm at it, mention Jesus, St. Paul, Bob Dylan -- no fair-minded person can deny the astonishing contribution this small nation has made to human art, science, and history over a span of thousands of years. In America, no group has been more insistent that equal rights must be shared by all. Their determination to continue as a people in the face of centuries of unrelenting persecution is unmatched (although to be fair, that persecution has not come at the hands of Muslims, in the main). And the tradition of tolerance and generosity of spirit which endures in so many, if not all, in spite of all those centuries, is to me nothing short of awe-inspiring. There is much we could all learn from the Jewish people.
But I'm afraid in the long arc of Middle Eastern history, the modern state of Israel may eventually be seen as a blip, much like the Crusaders, who also once succeeded in establishing themselves in the Holy Land. But after about 100 years, they vanished almost without a trace, leaving just the picturesque ruins of a few castles behind -- monuments to the folly they could be saved by force of arms.
By that reckoning, the life of the state of Israel may already be more than half over. It may appear invincible against its neighbors now, but that may not always be so. The power of its patron is waning. That was partly inevitable. No nation or empire, no matter how great, has ever gone long unchallenged, and certainly not when its industrial base was decimated, its currency devalued, and it was awash in a sea of debt.
But it is also partly the result of some extremely bad decisions that have been made in just the last few years. And while the decline can be mitigated, I doubt that it can be entirely reversed. The mistakes have been too big, the foresight too small, and it will take too much time to fix. And for Israel, without its patron, the numbers just don't add up.
Even its nuclear weapons will not be able to save it. The threat is just too close. It would be the ultimate suicide bombing. They might wipe out some distant Arab cities, but mostly they would just be scattering the sand.
So I would advise making peace -- now, while there is still time. It's not too late.
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