God's Warriors

I watched last night this amazing program produced by Christiane Amanpour on CNN about the religious fundamentalists in the three major monotheist religions that are sharing the same holy grounds in Jerusalem, and draw on similar prophets like Abraham and others. The segment last night was on the establishment of the jewish state of Israel and how the Israelis are establishing religious fundamentist settlements in the middle of the occupied territories belonging to the palestinians. Some of these settlements have been authorized by the Israeli governement for security reasons against legal opinions that these settlements were illegal. These settlers are claiming that these lands have been given to jews by their God, Yaveh, as it is written in their holy books and the Bible. They are also claiming that arabs should be re-settled to other arab countries in the area. Politics has been hijacked by religion.

The segment was also extremely interesting in terms of its focus on the Israeli support lobby in Congress, and how this has influenced US foreign policies. There is aven a combined lobbying effort and financial support being provided by christian fundamentalist groups linking with US jewish support groups.

Every US administration since the 1967 war, and the 1973 war, has condemned these israeli settlement but these very public position statements in the UN or through presidential press conferences have not modified the level of US support in terms of military aid to the gross level of $3 billion a year. The US/Israel connection could be on reason an mong many for the negative feelings toward the US throughout the Middle East. When is the US political leadership going to recognize that this strong alliance is detrimental to the safety of US interests? The US should put pressure on Israel to return to its pre-1973 war borders, and to accept the Palestinian aspirations for statehood. Israel is an occupier of arab lands. This situation has no future and they should understand that this is a strong factor against lasting peace in the area.

The program will present tonight a segment on arab fundamentatlists. Stay tuned.