The History Of Other Cultures Is Non-existent

The History Of Other Cultures Is Non-existent Until It Erupts In Confrontation With The United States.

The Just Response To This Terrible Event [9/11] Should Be To Go Immediately To The World Community, The United Nations. The Rule Of International Law Should Be Marshaled, But It's Probably Too Late Because The United States Has Never Done That; It's Always Gone It Alone.

I Have Never Known What Is Arabic Or English, Or Which One Was Really Mine Beyond Any Doubt. What I Do Know, However, Is That The Two Have Always Been Together In My Life, One Resonating In The Other, Sometimes Ironically, Sometimes Nostalgically, Most Often Each Correcting, And Commenting On, The Other. Each Can Seem Like My Absolutely First Language, But Neither Is.

Take A Young Man From Gaza Living In The Most Horrendous Conditions - Most Of It Imposed By Israel - Who Straps Dynamite Around Himself And Then Throws Himself Into A Crowd Of Israelis. I've Never Condoned Or Agreed With It, But At Least It Is Understandable As The Desperate Wish Of A Human Being Who Feels Himself Being Crowded Out Of Life And All Of His Surroundings, Who Sees His Fellow Citizens, Other Palestinians, His Parents, Sisters, And Brothers, Suffering, Being Injured, Or Being Killed. He Wants To Do Something, To Strike Back.

There Is Also This Great Sense Of Triumphalism, That Just As We Defeated The Soviet Union, We Can Do This. And Out Of This Sense Of Desperation And Pathological Religion, There Develops An All-encompassing Drive To Harm And Hurt, Without Regard For The Innocent And The Uninvolved, Which Was The Case In New York.