"The biggest myth is the centrality of the Palestinian-Israeli issue to the region"
He might rue the day he longed for such a renaissance. But Ambassador LeBaron has no doubt imbibed many prevailing historical myths -- tolerant Muslim Spain; tolerant Ottoman Empire; 1001 Muslim inventions; the conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Arabs is over land, and has nothing to do with Islam's antisemitism and jihad doctrine; jihad is an interior spiritual struggle, and more -- that have led him to this view. No one has told him, and he has never read, about the jihad imperative to wage war against and subjugate unbelievers, or about the fact that non-Muslims have never enjoyed and can never enjoy equality of rights with Muslims in an Islamic state. So absent all that, what's not to like about an Islamic renaissance?
"U.S. Ambassador Joseph LeBaron: 'The Arab Spring is the Start of a Long, Uncertain Path to Structural Change in the Middle East,'" from Arabic Knowledge@Wharton, June 28:
[...] Arabic Knowledge@Wharton: What myths about the Middle East has the Arab Spring dispelled?LeBaron: I think that the biggest myth is the centrality of the Palestinian-Israeli issue to the region. What we saw, first in Tunisia and then elsewhere, was extraordinarily revealing: Arabs focused on Arab issues in Arab states without reference to the United States, or Israel, or foreign policy. The focus was not outward but inward, on governance, the relationship between government and its citizens, on domestic reform associated with government, social justice, human rights, and the freedom of expression. That was extraordinary.
For decades, the assumption both inside and outside the region has been that the key to peace and stability in the region was a solution to the Palestinian-Israeli issue. But what 2011 has showed us is there are other issues of structural importance to peace and security in the Middle East.
Of course, there's great interest in the Palestinian-Israeli issue throughout the region. But the region moves in response to things far beyond this single issue that so convulses the Levant. If you look at the region, from Morocco to the Gulf, you'll see that other important forces are at play. We cannot ignore those. [...]
Arabic Knowledge@Wharton: Most of the oil-rich Gulf nations are trying to reduce their economic dependence on natural resources. What's your sense of that transition and where you do see it going?
LeBaron: Let me give you a 30-year perspective. Since I first came to the Gulf in 1980, I have seen the Gulf states pursue a pattern of growth that is leading, whether consciously or unconsciously, towards a highly ambitious goal: a renaissance of Arab and Islamic thought in science and technology. It's extraordinary, actually. The amazing thing is that both the resources and, increasingly, the vision are there to accomplish this renaissance....
Duh! And what about the Jews, Christians, Seculars, Atheists? Hussein Obama, like GWB, is aiding and abetting the rise of islamonazism. The enemy's endgame is: setting up an array of nuclear tipped ICBMs, aimed at the US heartland. Future generations will hold pilgrimages to spit on the wretched graves of Clinton, Bush and Obama.
Islamic applications of "science"? Ayatollah-Hizbollah has placed 50,000 missiles in South lebanon. And, with Israel void of infantry means to counter the missile threat, the next conflict will escalate. For the first time, an American President will be on the side of the genocidal enemy.
Lebaron says:
Pure horseshit; gibberish. Is this guy another product of the Ivy League?
I'll answer my own question:
This turd has a PhD from Princeton. And has been in the State Department's Foreign Service since 1980.
Obviously, that PhD didn't include logic and reason.
BTW: I have a BS from another superb University that begins with the letter 'P' (100 miles up the Wabash River.) Where pork ribs and beer rule! And no Saudi Wahabbi money [yet].
"Israeli-Palestinian issue" is code for the Muslim hatred of Jews and their desire to eliminate Jews from the region. If the US government actually admitted this truth what would that mean? It would mean admitting that there really is no difference between the governments in the middle east and the imams, so there's no point in bribing the Arab governments anymore. And our government would have to stop playing this amnesia game with the US public so we can continue importing Arab oil and not go completely crazy over what we are doing. Is that why we have to keep demonizing Israel, while keeping American Jews placated as much as possible with aid to Israel's military, while pretending we don't understand the middle east crisis? Or now creating a new myth of modernization of Arab societies? If I've learned anything from JW, it won't matter if they change the government structures if the religion is still in control.
"...a renaissance of Arab and Islamic thought in science and technology.." But not, of course, in the arts or humanities which might lead to a Arab or Islamic society even a little less genocidal, xenophobic, misogynistic or oppressive of minorities. That would be in direct conflict with the koran,un-islamic, and therefore haram. Seems they believe that science and technology is the only thing that puts western societies in the superior position. Nothing at all to do with the tradition of free inquiry that propels science and technology.
Such a renaissance may produce some equivalent of the Medicis or Borgias, maybe even a political philosopher along the lines of Machiavelli. But don't expect them to become the patrons of, or even be open to, a daVinci, Michelangelo, Bacon, Shakespeare or Cervantes and all that flowed from the work of the later.
Build a better bomb, squeeze another drop from an oilfield?Halal.
Develop a political theory that may do away with dhimi status or misogyny? Portray a Jew, Christian or polytheist in a work of art as sympthetic, as a victim of injustice at the hands of a believer or islamic community? Haram.
Assuming the ambassadors core observation is correct expect nothing more than the invention of better tools (some of which may be quite useful to islamic supremacists) unless widespread education in science in islamic cultures produces a unbearable cognitive dissonance in those cultures. Scientific knowledge and islamic faith have little common ground. This could possibly result in the rejection of islam. Which is punishable by death in islam. Gotcha.
I have my doubts that this cognitive dissonance will produce a backlash against islam, given the number of jihadis we have seen with advanced science based degrees. Seems to be quite the reverse if recent events are any indication.