Anti-Americanism in the Arab World

Last night’s Smith Family Foundation debate, “Responding to Anti-Americanism in the Arab World: Have we Been Effective Since 9/11?” betrayed a sense of moral clarity and candor for the sake of amicability. As is usually the case, panelists were from both sides of the political divide.

The first to speak was David Frum, a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, former speechwriter for President Bush, and one of the ideological fathers of the unilateral approach to fighting the war on terror. He started with a brief anecdote characterizing the culture of the Arab world: An athletic Algerian bicycle rider training for the Olympics was riding on a country road, when a car struck him, ran over and shattered both his legs. Four passengers got out of the car, savagely beat on his legs, and shouted that there were no bicycles in Mohammed’s time. The injury left the prospective athlete disabled for life.

Frum warned that Arab cultural prestige along with the political extremism originating from within the Arab world is infiltrating and upstaging indigenous cultures and spreading deep into Europe as well. In fact, Turkey and neighboring countries are embracing more of the Arab vernacular, and as signs of the growing radicalism in Britain, 78% of the Muslim population believes there should be legal punishment for the desecration of the prophet Mohammed and 40% want sharia law introduced. Since the conflict between modernity and the culture of the Arab world finds its mode of expression in anger, violence, and terrorism, we needn’t embrace solipsistic perceptions, judging that everything revolves around America, either chauvinistically on the one hand, or in a guilt-ridden fashion claiming that every global problem is traceable to American causes.

Leon Hadar, a journalist and research fellow in foreign policy studies at the Cato Institute, argued that the anger of the Arab world directed at America is a result of our foreign policy and the flawed democratization project in Iraq that has led to the radicalization of the Shia and Sunni factions as well as promoting the rise of Hezbollah terrorism. The final speaker was Craig Charney, Ph.D., president of Charney Research, a leading pollster of Islamic attitudes. He declared that it all comes down to how we perceive each other and that there is reason to be optimistic if we change our policies and narrow-minded views to reflect a more nuanced look at a diversified Arab world. For instance, much of the Arab world turned away in revulsion from the violence and extremism of the al Queda movement. Focus groups and polls found that Arabs don’t dislike Americans or our values, but “it’s the foreign policy, stupid” that they hate. The culprit is the perception that America aims to achieve hegemony over the region.

Disappointingly, the panelists never mentioned the word “enemy” nor did they entertain the notion that we were fighting a war against our civilization, and even Frum seemed too browbeaten to do so. So during the question and answer session, I brought this up. I asked the panelists to explain the reason for all this concern and anxiety over “why they hate us” when 10% of the global Muslim population is wedded to a radical ideology of hate. Don’t they hate us regardless of our foreign policy, even as it plays out in the Iraq War and our support for Israel? In fact, as recent history shows, doing nothing to retaliate for the USS Cole bombing and a halfhearted show of force in response to the 1998 U.S. Embassy bombings in Africa has inflamed and radicalized the Arab world against the perceived spineless U.S. paper tiger, more than any subsequent aggressive Middle East foreign policy. So rather than obsessing over our foreign policy and how we’re perceived by the Arab world why don’t we do battle with this ideology of hate not only with guns, but right here in the free marketplace of ideas, as well?

I didn’t get much of an answer except that Charney asked where did I hear that statistic of 10%? But I received a big applause from the audience. Perhaps even in this relatively academic, cosmopolitan New York audience, many were rather frustrated that no one addressed the real issues of war and the battle of ideas with the enemies of America.

The statistic of a radicalized 10% segment of the Muslim world came from Dennis Prager, one of America's most respected radio talk show hosts. I quote from his article, Does Religion Make People Better or Worse?:

There are many millions of decent and kind Muslims in the world. But there are also at least a hundred million Muslims (i.e., 10 %) who support killing innocents in the name of Allah and Islam. And there are more than that who believe in the ideal of using force to spread Islam throughout the world.

Also a quick check into The Pew Global Attitudes Project public opinion surveys on this issue confirms that popular support for violent Islamic extremism runs between 13% to 57% in predominantly Muslim countries.

In fairness to Dr. Charney, I have offered him an opportunity to respond and answer my original question, and I will post his response if he chooses to do so.