Sometimes War IS the Answer- Ask any Recovering Victim of Abuse

There is some indication that I have struck a significant nerve with my last two posts. This, I believe is a window into a new understanding of an old situation. I want to review what I am hearing, add some more thoughts that are suggested by the feedback I have received and ask for more responses.

My first significant response came last Thursday. It is, in fact, one the most gratifying emails I have ever received.

It was addresses to my personal email and read:

I spent 1 year denying the violence & threats, & another year planning very carefully how my son, mother & I would escape in a way that we would not be stalked.

one of your statements was too powerful......I was left breathless. I made a song of it. it is attached.

Sanity must prevail, LONG LIVE Israel!
Peace, & thank you, Esquecida

"Esquecida" also included an mp3 of the song.
(Listen to it here)
‘dialog is a death trap’ (4/4 / serious DISCO BEAT)


Here are the lyrics (my words) and her musical directions as she rendered them:

“Any part-time social worker
in a woman’s shelter
can tell you that
dialog is just fine
when you are negotiating
how to share the house work.

(12 bars)
(Catchy little hook 2 make the masses bob-in-unison / 8 measures 4/4 funk-disco-Bass-solo)

When violence
has happened more than once
and is escalating,
when that certain someone
is declaring an intention
to kill you, .....................................
dialog is a death trap..."

(repeat vamp OUT until ‘they‘ get it!)

This was heady stuff for a stodgy old blogger. I've never inspired music before, and I don't get such a powerful personal endorsement of one of my ideas everyday. 

I wrote back to Esquecida and expressed my gratitude that she is now safe and I asked permission to post her note as a comment to the first post. Here is her reply"

of course!!!! YES......we have linked back to you also.

please use this file, it has all info..
please credit the band, They Blink in Unison
from their not yet released CD 'UNKNOWN'......@ this URL...
http://www.weatheroutpost12.com/members/They_Blink_in_Unison

if there is any kind of problem, please contact us.

we are safe now....thank you for asking.
Very powerful writing Yaacov
....cuts to the bone!! Peace, Esquecida

A positive response from an actual abuse victim meant a great deal to me. Then, if I still had any doubt, someone with a different but just as credible showed up.
Therapydoc a Ph.D. and practicing Social worker chimed in with a comment calling it an "apt comparison".

This got me to thinking about what I had done in publishing the idea of linking these two sorts of phenomena that share many deadly aspects but are of vastly different hierarchic levels. 

I had actually started thinking about it in the first place because of the pattern that we seem always to observe in any negotiation or confrontation that takes place with an Arab/Islamist entity. The prime example is the, so-called "Peace Process" between Israel and the entire Arab world but there have been so many other examples. Saddam Hussein's prevarications leading up to the current Iraq war, Iran, Syria and Hezbollah's cynical, murderous gambit in Lebanon- the list goes on and on.

My original thought was to draw a superficial comparison. I wanted to ask (especially of the feminists and people of the left) why, if it is so obvious to everyone that the common and well-documented cycle of pathological denial, minimization, deflection and projection that domestic partner abusers employ to keep control of their victims and to avoid punishment for their episodes of violence must be met by confrontation or, at the very least, the safe escape of the victim, can't they recognize the need for confrontation and punishment for the analogous behavior by the Arab/Muslim world against Israel. 

As I thought about it, though, I saw more points to address. For instance, those behaviors cannot succeed without the complicity of the victim. It appeared to me that I needed to open up a discussion of whether, in their blindness and paralysis, Israel, America and the west act as "enablers". Then too, that would make the very people to whom I wanted to address the original question part of the "enmeshed" dysfunctional family of the victim nation. I began to see that it was important to go further with the comparison- that there is something very fundamental that we can learn about the underlying nature of both the intimate and the international forms of abuse by looking at the comparison more deeply. 

In contemplating the way that most reasonable and fair-minded Westerners view the situation, I recalled one of the better known quotes from the the Israeli statesman Abba Eban. back in the early Seventies Ebban once described the pattern of the relationship with the Arabs this way, "The Arabs never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity". Eban's summation only makes sense if he believed in the hopeful but enabling assumption "they want what we want". Eban took the Western/Israeli view that peace, equity ad prosperity were the goal. Eban spoke those words in 1973, though, and I would submit that experience has taught us that his point of view did never squared with the facts and that hard experience by now should have disabused us of that soothing fiction. 

This is the same degree of self-deception as believing that a wife-beater, given one more chance, will suddenly begin to value intimacy and love over his compulsion for control and dominance. Unfortunately, we know that that level of self-deception, incredible as it may seem, is possible.

For example, in the current Gaza situation, the facts are, roughly:

• Egypt brokered a "cease fire" between Hamas which is the government on the ground in Gaza. (Great news! We're back in therapy!)
  
• Qassam rockets continued to hit Israel from Gaza. (He's still hitting me but not nearly as often or as hard as before)
  
• Israel closed border crossings in the mildest possible response to the rocket fire. (I told him that I'm only going to make tuna for dinner instead of his favorite steak if he hits me again)
  
• Ismail Haniyeh, the prime minister of Gaza, accuses Israel of not living up to its part of the truce. and says, "We still say that maintaining the calm is a national interest, but the Israelis must commit to lifting the siege and opening the crossings," (He says not making the steaks makes him angry so its my fault that he hits me)
  
• Another Hamas official announces that he is freezing the talks on freeing Gilad Schalit, the Israeli soldier kidnapped and held hostage over two years ago because Israel has "violated the calm agreement by closing the crossings," (He said if I don't make the steak, he's going to lock the baby in the closet and not let me feed him)
  

So, the cease fire really amounts to Israel offering Hamas an opportunity to begin a constructive dialog and Hamas seizing the opportunity to get a break from Israeli military pressure while continuing terror against Israeli citizens, deflecting the blame on Israel and torturing the illegally held Shallit (and his loved ones and all decent people everywhere).

Eban, thoroughly western, well educated, elegant and fair-minded as he was, could not see that The Arabs are actually very good at seizing opportunities- he simply could not believe that they are that uncivilized. By the way, if you object to my use of the word "uncivilized" in this connection, you do not understand the problem yet. 

This is one lesson we need to learn: It is not a matter of respecting their culture, it is a matter of understanding why they cannot understand and respect ours. If we understood their culture we would see that.

So they get away with pretending to play our game while consistently acting on their own agenda and relying on our assumption of good-faith and humanistic pricipals to protect them from punishment. 

It works for them- even when we often overhear them saying things like "Israel must be obliterated" or "We will conquer the west and institute the new Caliphate" or "the whole world will be under Shari'a". We explain it away- "those remarks are just rhetoric", "there are more moderates than extremists", "Islam is a religion of peace" or, my favorite new one, (I call it the Obama/Wright ploy) "you are using small selected quotes from some Arab leaders".

They strike us over and over and we don't feel free to doubt their intentions. Some of us have even gotten adept at questioning our own sincerety and good faith. 

So, it has begun to seem to me that there is a deep and fundamental human psychological weakness at work here that we need to understand better.

Then, last night, a comment came in from Barbara who writes the blogs Barbara's Tchatzkas and Abuse Sanctuary (she is also another former abuse victim). She included a link to her post about why she has broken away from her Progressive friends on the issue of Israel. Here is a piece of that post:

I saw Israel as a abuse victim. A classic abuse victim who is blamed and shamed for the abuse they are taking! Just like me. A victim whom no one wants to admit they are using and hurting. A victim who was being smeared as the aggressor. It was right in my face. To this day I find it mind-boggling how others don't see this very same thing... I've claimed Israel as one of my anti-abuse advocacy 'clients.'

Barbara mentions the public aspect- the smearing of the victim by others outside the abusive relationship. This also throws a different light on those who will say they are not anti-Semitic but "only" anti-Zionist. But a smear is a smear and they too must be aware that the Arabs chant "Death to the Jews" not "Death to the Zionists" What do they have in common, really, other than hatred of "The Jews". Jew hatred (no matter how thinly disguised as anti-Zionism) is a cornerstone of the otherwise unlikely alliance of Islamist Jihad and Leftist Progressivism. 

But Barbara also reminds us that there is a subtle intersection of the two levels of abuse. The "public" face of abuse that she mentions is based on "shame". Shame is  a complex emotional area where cultural behavior and psychobiology meet in an explosive and elemental way. When an individual feels shame for a cultural failure, that feeling can become a biological effect such as an uncontrollable rage or high blood pressure. The reverse is also true. Physical affect that has been damaged by shame reactions such as poor posture, bad complexion, depression and confusion can (actually, almost always does) lead to cultural failures (poor job performance, inability to relate to others, etc...).

It is becoming apparent to me that what is being revealed here goes beyond similar patterns of behavior. It seems to me that we have actually laid open an entryway into the understanding of how how central culture is to survival and how vulnerable it is when its integrity is minimized by intellectual misconceptions (multiculturalism, moral relativism) or damaged by psychological disorders.

A domestic abuser is one who behaves outside of cultural ideals but is able to maintain enough of a culturally parallel behavioral appearance (affect) that he can keep his illusion of control and superiority alive and, at the same time, avoid punishment and censure. Islamists are attempting the same balancing act.

A commenter to the second and most recent post who posted her comment under the name "Ruth"  added this which gave even more dimension to the idea:

The comparison is eerily spot on:

The terrorist murderer was once involved with a Jewish woman.

<"I can't believe he did what he did; he was a good, caring person," the Jewish ex-girlfriend of Hossam Dawyyat said Thursday, a day after the bulldozer driver's killing spree in downtown Jerusalem left three people dead.>

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3563682,00.html

This good, caring person was convicted in court for assaulting this same woman and threatening her with murder. He served a prison term on this.

You see the battered woman syndrom in action...

Least the glimpse into this abyss of human frailty depress you too much, let me remind you that, as I pointed out in my first post on this subject, 

People hid their shame much more back then and suffered greatly for it. Women were much more trapped and had far less opportunity to escape situations like this back then. There are many more shelters now, the law enforcement, therapeutic community, social welfare professionals and the society at large are much more sensitive and aware. There are web sites, books, radio shows, movies and even classes in school. Not that the problem is solved, but as a culture we have made a commitment to a fundamental correction of the cultural weaknesses that allow it to go on.

If we have been able to raise awareness of and take action against domestic abuse, we we should be able to do the same about cultural abuse. The key is, just as we had to shake off toxic orthodoxies like "Divorce is not the answer" "Keep the Family Together at all cost" and "A wife's place is with her husband" and "he's a good provider" and "she probably deserved it" we have to expose the idiocy of neo-orthodoxies like "War is Not the Answer" and "All cultures are equally valid" and "we probably deserved 9/11" and the "Israelis are colonists" or "Israel is an Apartheid State". They do mean it and have to be willing to say that "Sometimes War IS the Answer!"

A New Name for the Beast

Well, I’m still working on another big post but this idea actually came out of that one the other night. When I say "came out", I mean, it tore it’s way out like one of the baby aliens in the movie of the same name. The problem is that I have become very frustrated at the lack of what I feel to be a truly accurate and descriptive name for the enemy. Here is my attempt to solve that problem. I’d like to know what you think. If anyone would like to add new warning signs to the list at the end, I’d like to see them…

Despite my defense of the term Islamofascism (which I stand by as a definition of the repressive and terrorized totalitarian condition of much of the Islamic world) I have been unable to settle on a terminology that adequately describes and isolates the strain in Islam that poses a grave danger to freedom and liberty in today's world. I like “Islamofascism” still but I’m afraid that the word fascism has lost a lot of its impact, not because it is not accurate but because its meaning has become blurred by the constant misuse it receives. I have also used “Islamism” but it strikes me that it is not informative enough- even something of a tautology. Political Islam has some value too. It is especially good in that it reminds us that the politicization of any religion leads to the same place. Thus it also suggests a commonality with the Presbyterian and Episcopalian Churches, in their movement to divest from Israel. In fact, all the mainstream liberal churches seem to be having an attendance problem because of their political nature LINK . However, in the sense that it does not specify the violence that goes along with the current variety, of political Islam, Political Islam too does not satisfy. Radical Islam has been somewhat useful too but the word, radical, is also over-used and as become fuzzy with constant misapplication.

I have come to believe that we still lack a title that focuses on the critical difference between the kind of Islam that gives rise to terror and intolerance and the rest of Islam that to some degree is amenable to living in the modern world with co-operation and tolerance.

The name I keep coming back to is “Caliphate Islam” (or Caliphatism). Here is my reasoning. As far as I am concerned, anyone is entitled to believe that their religion (whatever it may be) is the “one true faith”. What they are not entitled to is, in any way, to believe that non-members of that blessed faith should have any fewer rights or less human dignity than “the faithful”. It is the underlying assumption of those who believe in The Caliphate that the entire world should live under Muslim rule and Shari’a law and you can only be a good Muslim if you believe in bringing it about.

The Caliphate, by the way, is not the jolly, rollicking world of Walt Disney’s Aladdin. Nor is it even the hell on earth that was Afghanistan under the Taliban or the Insane purgatory of today’s Iran. The world-wide Caliphate is the entire earth gone mad. Women being beaten, hung and stoned to death for no other crime than having been raped by a gang of perverted Caliphists who have been raised to think of women not as human beings but as “meat” or weapons of the devil. The Caliphate will be a place where the ancient dhimmi status will be revived. Dhimmi-hood in the ancient Caliphate meant that Christians, Jews and anyone else who is not a Muslim will have protection under the law only in so far as the mercy of the local mullah allows.

It is Caliphate Islam that won’t accept a Jewish state in the Middle East because it is considered an affront to the will of Allah that Jews should not only not be subject to Islamic rule but might have Islamic citizens living in a Jewish country. It is Caliphate Islam that so stultifies the lives of its people that they have to emigrate to western countries only to reject the values that make those countries better places to live. Belief in the Caliphate justifies the mass murder of innocent office workers in Manhatten, school children in Beslan and tribal rivals in sub-Saharan Africa. The belief in and desire for the Caliphate is the difference between conservative Islam and the pernicious terrorists that endanger all of mankind for the sake of a utopian nightmare.

Is it fair to call it a Utopian nightmare? A cursory reading of Islamic history proves that the Caliphate idea deserves to be thrown into the same garbage dump of bad ideas and hideous failures that now holds Communism and Nazism. Would it be peaceful as they claim? Well, we know that the track record is not good. The Prophet Mohammad established a vast and secure Caliphate across a great expanse of territory, yet as soon as Mohammed died people began murdering each other to determine his successor. Right down to the present day, the issue of who the true leader should be (and should have been) is the primary divider in the Islamic world. Shias and Sunnis kill many more of each other than Americans do of either over it; and the Sunni,/Shia divide is entirely derived from the original disagreement about who should have been the first Caliph after Mohammed. Still, some Muslims continue to believe that as soon as they get Israel out of the way and they take over the western governments by demographic means there will be a world-wide peaceful caliphate. That way lies ruin and madness.

A word of caution, Caliphists are sometimes aware that this belief may be a red flag. Often their belief is so strong and insensitive to reality that they acknowledge and talk about it openly. The ones who are most dangerous know enough not to mention this belief in public. In these cases it is important to know how to recognize them by other behavior. At the risk of being accused of behavioral profiling, lets look at a few of the indicators that come to mind:

1. Dehumanizing language- calling non-Muslims names like kuffar (nonbeliever) or referring to them as pigs, monkeys dogs etc…

2. Inability to engage in reasonable discourse without flying into a rage- see my post Don’t Just Stand There, Dhimmi, Humiliate Me about Imam Al Husainy. (below)

3. Refusal to accept the existence of Israel.

4. Extreme Misogyny and gender inequality

5. Blaming all of the incompetence, inefficiency, misfortune, and rage in the Islamic world on: a. The Jews, b. America, c. The West, d. Women, e. Anybody else, f. All of the above

I know there are a lot more but you get the idea… Send me your suggestions!

Don't Just Stand There, Dhimmi, Humiliate Me!

When the Imam Husham Al-Husainy appeared on Sean Hannity’s radio show he burst into a explosive rage when Hannity respectfully but insistently tried to get him to answer a couple of simple questions about his political views. Don’t take my word for this, here it is from Little Green Footballs.

I do not bring this incident up here for any political hay that might be made from the fact that the remarks the Imam is being questioned about here were made as part of a “prayer” he offered at the Democratic National Convention. That has been done to death already. I want to point it out because it is a very valuable opportunity to learn something basic about the Islamist rage in the Arab Street that we hear so much about.

Toward the end of his tirade the Imam accuses Hannity of humiliating him. I found this very interesting and provocative. In western terms we might have accused someone of attempting to humiliate us but if we are convinced we are right and prepared to reason our case and present facts, we would never jump to humiliation voluntarily. We would also, I think, take humiliation, once established, as a sign that we have been shown to be wrong or venal in some way, albeit unkindly.

Truth is, it is uncannily easy for Hannity to Humiliate him. The Imam is simply unwilling to speak directly to Hannity’s questions. Instead of telling Hannity and the world that he simply won’t answer the questions, he attempts a long, abusive counterattack that features intimidation, religious condemnation and what can only be termed “damnation to Hell”. Why, I want to ask, is the Imam so extraordinarily quick to take on the mantle of humiliation and what can he hope to accomplished by it?

Humiliation is the key to understanding the Islamist Jihad. They are always humiliated because they invite it. Actually, they insist on it. Just listen to the way the conversation goes between Hannity and the Imam. When Hannity asks him direct questions about his own words the Imam launches tirade after meaningless tirade until he is so embarrassed and exhausted that he has no choice but to hang up and get himself out of the situation.

This man, who claims to know the words and mind of God, can’t even acknowledge his own words let alone explain them. He is so unused to being questioned or having to explain the nonsense he talks, that he becomes outraged in the event. These Imams are not religious leaders as we know them in this century, rather, they evoke dark centuries past. Each of them is a small Torquemada who would condemn you to death and damnation at the drop of a hat.

Just as any other fascist (see Islamofascism post below) would, Imam Husham felt compelled to utter the standard, irrational, central mythos of his movement. It is a circular argument, they hate us because they say we humiliate them while they insist on humiliating themselves. In the true fascist style they dare us to help them humiliate themselves by holding fast to obviously idiotic beliefs and positions- one of which is that we are the ones who humiliate them.

How easy it is to humiliate the average Islamist! A beautiful woman walking down the street in a modest dress but with no burkha to cover her humiliates him. If his sister were to so much as say one word to an unrelated male; he is humiliated. If Danish cartoonists draw cartoons poking fun at The Prophet; he is not just outraged, angry or hurt, he is humiliated. It is so easy for us to humiliate them because they are using us as a scapegoat for their personal shamefacedness. This is a shame that is drawn from a different, unspeakable place in their culture. It is clear to me that they are only using the interaction between us and them to express that deep, permanent humiliation that precedes any thought of or interaction with us. That is a deep wound indeed. I am working on another post that will begin to explore the evidence for that wound.

Christians and Jews are especial targets for scapegoating because, as the Imam points out several times, we are all Abrahamic peoples. That makes us theological cousins. The Islamists remember better than we do that for centuries we were their dhimmis, (not quite slaves but not free men and women either). They held the sword over our heads and called us apes, pigs, monkeys and dogs to our faces. Now, the west is ascendant. The U.S. is the lone superpower and Israel is the most successful, freest and most powerful country in that region.

They still call us apes, pigs, monkeys and dogs but not to our faces any more. They only dare do that in Arabic when they think we aren’t listening. They are perfectly capable of lording it over us again if we let them. This rare moment in time in which we live, when might is also on the side of the right must not be frittered away. The Islamic population bomb and the Islamic nuclear bomb must be defused while we have the opportunity.