Israel and Hezbollah – Existential Anxiety Aroused by the Existence of “The Other”!
For over a week now we have been consumed by the news of Hamas and Hezbollah shelling Israel and the counter strikes by Israel. Hamas seems to have been overshadowed now by Hezbollah. Perhaps this is good for Israel in that Hezbollah is Shiite. Many Sunni Arab states, at least on the top, are making some sympathetic statements toward Israel. Islamist terrorism however is nothing new in this region. Israel is an island of democracy in a sea of monarchies and dictatorships.
What is more interesting is that in the Sudan Muslims have been waging a war of genocide against the Christians and no one gives a damn!
Perhaps because the victims are Black! But then again you would expect the liberals to take up the cause. Recently some have but for the most part no one seems to care! Perhaps liberals would have to face their own cognitive dissonance in that they label Islam as a “religion of peace”! Christian Fundamentalists, in their ever zany eschatology of the world’s end, choose to focus on having Israel occupy all of Palestine so as to fulfill end time prophecy! Their reason for supporting of Israel is not based on true friendship. Meanwhile Islamist fundametalists are also killing in Kashmir and the Philippines. Not to mention the attack against the night club in Indonesia some time back. While back home Bush recently called for the turning over of our ports to Dubai!
Some in this country say we should act like Israel. My answer is where have you been the last few years? Remember “shock and awe”? What about Iraq and Afghanistan? Even if there were no Iraqi WMD taking down Hussein may not have been a bad idea. But then again fighting the genocide of the Christians in the Sudan might have been a better usage of our national and moral resources. Israel however is only in the “shock and awe” stage. They have not yet defeated their enemy while we did! The problem is what comes after? If Israel occupies southern Lebanon then several years latter we can compare her strategy to ours. The last time Israel occupied southern Lebanon she had as many problems as we have now in Iraq. I am hearing news reports that our country may play a role in a post war UN force occupying the south of Lebanon.
We must give a loud NO! I applaud Israel for taking a strong stand for defending itself from shelling and the kidnapping of her soldiers. But this is not our war. We have enough global commitments already. The news has been “hijacked” by the Israel vs. Hezbollah conflict. If we are so willing to send our troops what about the defenseless Christians in the Sudan? Who is standing up to fight the genocide?
Recently both a relative and a friend said that all this killing is caused by “religion”! That is a simplistic answer. How do you explain the genocide by Hitler, Stalin and Mao? Should we then label “all” atheists as mass murders? Liberals would then reply that “oh no those guys are just bad atheists and don’t represent all atheists”. Well why not apply the same tolerance to religious believers?
The issue is not religion but “idealism” be it theistic or atheistic. How do we deal with our “EXISTENTIAL ANXIETY”? Does the existence of the “non-believer”, the “infidel”, the “non pc type” arouse such a high level of “EXISTENTIAL ANXIETY” that murder is the only method to lower our cognitive dissonance to their existence? How do we deal with those who are not members of the “in-group”? Gulags and genocide have been humanity’s answer regardless if the “in-group” was religious or communist. Shunning was practiced by the pilgrims of yore and the “politically correct” of today.
What is needed is a heavy dose of “secularization AND democracy”. Islam has generally not yet undergone secularization as has Christianity and Judaism. But we cannot militarily impose secularization as our resources are not up to the task of nation building for the whole Muslim sector of the third world. The issue is not Islam per se. The very existence of the non-believer raises the existential anxiety of the “true believer” today as well as yesterday. The non-believer violates some how the implied “social contract” that says: “I will not raise your existential anxiety concerning how you get “meaning” if Thou willst not raise mine”.
Learning to accept cognitive dissonance without the usage of murder is a new invention of the human race. Observe please:
Deuteronomy 20:16
16 However, in the cities of the nations the LORD your God is giving you as an inheritance, do not leave alive anything that breathes.
Leviticus 24:16
’Moreover, the one who blasphemes the name of the LORD shall surely be put to death; all the congregation shall certainly stone him. The alien as well as the native, when he blasphemes the Name, shall be put to death.
Joshua 6:21
21 They devoted the city to the LORD and destroyed with the sword every living thing in it-men and women, young and old, cattle, sheep and donkeys”
Please note I am not saying that current day Israel wants to commit genocide. Far from it. My point is that murder as a PSYCHOLOGICAL DEFENSE MECHANISM to reduce existential anxiety has been with us forever. When Christians took the self identity of the “new Israel” we had to deal with the issue of the “outsider” also. We merely used the very same passages that were used by the old Israel. Thank God today in the west, both Christian and Jew, have for the most part out grown literalism and learned “transcendence” as our means to deal with the existential anxiety aroused by the existence of “the other”!
Muslims are accused of being terrorists so they can get the 72 virgins by and by in the sky when they die! Hey we are superior! We do not have to wait till death!
Numbers 31:17
17 Now kill all the boys. And kill every woman who has slept with a man, 18 but save for yourselves every girl who has never slept with a man.
You might say that “Holy Writ” teaches a virgin is a terrible, TERRIBLE thing to waste! Why not ravage one for the Lord Today?
Well this Ranting Bald Hippie is just trying to raise the cognitive dissonance of fundamentalists.
If we took the Bible less literally we would be funding stem cell research and trying to make life better for all on this planet. But ah alas that is a topic for another post! Let us allow Israel and the Muslims to create their own solution while we use our national resources to deal with Afghanistan and the fiasco of Iraq! The time has come for Islam to face her existential anxiety, that it is not a
sin if a Muslim converts, nor for one to be a non-believer! Lets demand an end to the genocide on the Sudan.
But then again if the politicians and news media where to focus on the Sudan that might create some moral shock and awe!
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