Cal Thomas is supposedly one of the fastest rising
"stars" of conservative commentary on politics, values and ethics in
America according to Townhall.com Columnists. But if his way of
handling the Palestinian conflict is an indication of how he thinks,
he has no values and certainly no ethics and he has probably made
his way up to the top by stepping over the dead bodies of his
enemies.
It is not enough that Thomas completely ignores the
plight of the Palestinian people. He calls Palestinian President
Yasser Arafat and his "cohorts" terrorists and goes on to say in his
article in the Jewish World Review, that the PA attempts to disguise
terror with words of peace while inciting the Palestinian people to
hatred and violence.
It seems that Thomas has a different concept of what
terror really is. Apparently he has not had Israeli tanks positioned
right in front of his home. He has not been shelled by air, land and
sea. He has not been bombed by F-16 Israeli Jets made in America. He
has not had his water supply cut off, his sewer is still working,
and he is able to get all the food and medical care he needs. His
children are free to go to school without fear of being shot dead by
an Israeli sniper and he is not cut off from his fellow Americans by
medieval trenches dug around his house. He is not under siege on his
own land by an alien force and by intruders who just decided that
what is his is theirs instead.
He makes the Palestinians look ungrateful for not
accepting former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak’s generous offer
that met 95% of Arafat’s demands when in essence, Barak failed to
give the Palestinians control of less than 8% of their own land.
The only "violence" that Thomas talks about is
Palestinian. The war that Sharon has been waging on the Palestinian
people has no definition except one of restraint and patience for
Palestinian intransigence according to Thomas.
Thomas has a solution to Palestinian freedom
fighters who are struggling for their independence from the Jewish
invaders who continue to confiscate Palestinian land, to pollute the
environment and to uproot trees, destroy fertile land, and kill and
maim Palestinian civilians. The solution of this ethical and moral
American, who is a Zionist in disguise, is for Israel to declare war
on the Palestinians. This war should be "relentless". It is to be a
war of attrition until "Arafat has had enough and takes concrete,
irreversible steps to stop the violence."
But the thought of Israel waging an all out war
against unarmed Palestinian civilians is not enough for Thomas. He
has a better idea. He claims that Israel cannot tolerate a "huge
Arab population within its borders, so a political decision must be
made."
His solution is to either exterminate the
Palestinians or expel them from Palestine completely. In this way,
Israel would have security from the restless natives that simply
refuse to lie down and let the Israelis kill them off without
resistance.
As he continues to rant in his article, Thomas tries
to make the Palestinian people look like they are a state, with
borders of their own, that they have an army and weapons at their
disposal. Not only this, he tries to give the impression that
wherever they go, the Palestinians make trouble for their host
countries. He fails to mention that it is the Palestinians who
through their hard work and sweat built up every Arab country they
entered and that they are the elite of the Arab nation. If it were
not for the Palestinians, Jordan would still be a desert nomadic
country almost devoid of life and any kind of stable existence. It
was because of the influx of Palestinian refugees in 1948 and 1967
that Jordan became a county of bustling activity and it was through
the Palestinian refugees that the government was able to steal the
funds meant for the refugees and line their own pockets with
billions of dollars.
Palestinians have helped build every country they
entered. For more than 30 years, they supplied the teachers and
professors and the elite professional work force to the Bedouin
countries they went to. Had it not been for the discovery of oil,
these Bedouins would still be impoverished, barefoot, and living in
their primitive clay structures or tents. The Palestinians are a
people of culture and intellect. They are an informed people who
seek justice and freedom wherever they go. They make the best and
most conscientious workers in their host countries.
When some Palestinians vocally supported Saddam
Hussein during the Gulf War, they did so because they were convinced
that he was on their side. They did not betray the Kuwaitis. They
did not betray the Saudis. But because Arafat sided with Saddam
during the Gulf War, the Palestinians were punished by the Kuwaitis
and Saudis regardless of their personal feelings about the Iraqi
invasion of Kuwait. Many Palestinians were killed in Kuwait simply
because they were Palestinian. Many more were tortured and
imprisoned.
But because the Palestinians have suffered and been
the victims of the persecution of various Arab regimes, this does
not mean that they are collectively bad and should be collectively
punished. Had the invading Jews not taken away their land and
slaughtered them, they would not have become refugees in the first
place. Of course, this is a fact that Thomas so conveniently
ignores.
What Thomas should really question is why is it
considered ethical if a Jew from Europe, Russia or America settles
on Palestinian land and takes Palestinian rights away from the
indigenous inhabitants? Why can a Jew from no matter where, have the
right to live in Palestine while a Palestinian is evicted from his
own land or killed because he is Palestinian? Why can’t Palestinians
even buy back the land that the Israelis have stolen from them?
Why doesn’t Thomas ridicule Sharon’s hypocrisy when
he pretends to be the victim of his own brutality and when he
pretends to be a sincere partner for peace?
Why doesn’t Thomas search his own soul and demand
that the Palestinians be given an autonomous state of their own and
that the Israelis cease their brutal aggression against innocent
children?
Since he is unable to see what is fair and right,
since he preaches his own version of bigotry and hatred why not
expel Thomas to an African country or simply exterminate him? After
all, doesn’t he endorse terrorism in its greatest form which is war?
What is good for the goose is definitely good for the gander and
Thomas is nothing more than a gander who promotes his own coalition
of terror.