We Don’t Need America's Help
By Reem Mohammed Al-Faisal
29 April, 2003
A few days ago I was asked by a concerned American what she could do to help the Palestinian people. For the first time, I understood how Malcolm X would have felt when he was asked by a white American what she could do to help blacks in America. Malcolm X’s answer was "Nothing."
Naturally he apologized later and I today apologize for what I thought but did not say. Nonetheless, I can no longer suffer the excuses my American friends give me for their country’s blind and uncritical support for Israel. They tell me that Americans are ignorant of the facts about the Arab-Israeli problem. They say that the Arabs have failed to get their message across to the American public and that we Arabs should try harder.
I find this very hard to believe. America is the strongest nation on earth today. It has been at the forefront of most major developments in science and technology. It is home to great universities and institutes of learning and the American people have easy access to them. Finally, Americans now live in the age of information which they themselves were the main creators of.
Given all this, if the Americans are incapable of finding out the truth for themselves on any subject, then they are either dumb or criminally negligent.
My friends say the Americans know very little about Islam and that is why they are hostile to it. I wonder if they know more about Buddhism or Hinduism or any other religion for that matter. Does America’s ignorance of these other religions and civilizations result in hostility toward them?
My friends say that the Jewish lobby dominates American politics and that we should create our own lobby to influence American politics in our direction. I thought human rights were given equally to all and in a democracy that every individual was free to influence the politics of his country. Is the American democracy a dysfunctional one in which the people no longer have a say in their government’s policies?
At the end of World War II, the Germans claimed they had not known what crimes their government was committing. The Allies, however, refused to accept this as an excuse. Fines were levied on Germany which are still being paid today. If Germans’ excuses of ignorance of crimes which took place over some 10 years were unacceptable, why should we accept the Americans’ excuses for crimes that have been committed against us for the past 50 years?
(Reem Mohammed Al-Faisal is a Saudi photographer. She is based in Jeddah.)