BREAD AND CIRCUSES

Enough of Grievance Politics - David Howell (Japan Times)
British Prime Minister Blair has been in the Middle East recently, asserting that the Israel-Palestine dispute is "the most important issue facing the world today." Most Arab leaders would certainly agree with him.

This is a blame game. Mideast opinion formers find it easy to externalize the region's problems. All the difficulties in the area - political instability, violence, religious extremism, poverty, slow growth - arise from wicked outside forces.

Arab rulers have a choice, between developing the habits and institutions of restraint and moderation in Arab societies, and letting grievance politics and ranting against the West remain center stage by blaming Israelis, Americans, capitalism, Zionism, globalization (and anything else that comes to mind) for poisoning everything.

Solving the Israel-Palestine dispute would be wonderful, but the dispute should never be allowed to justify grumbling inertia, excuse ducking other changes, or become the sole key to utopia.

I AGREE. THE ARAB DICTATORSHIPS KEEP THEMSELVES IN POWER BY DISTRACTING THEIR PEOPLE WITH A BOGEYMAN ENEMY (ISRAEL). THIS ALSO EXPLAINS THEIR REFUSAL TO ABSORB PALESTINIAN REFUGEES AND INSISTENCE ON KEEPING THEM IN SQUALID CAMPS. FREE SOCIETIES ARE WHAT THE ARABS NEED, NOT BREAD AND CIRCUSES.