Monday, December 29, 2008
A letter to the Editor: THE CLASH OF CIVILISATIONS IS NOT DEAD - By Ghulam Muhammed
Tuesday, December 30, 2008
A letter to the Editor:
THE CLASH OF CIVILISATIONS IS NOT DEAD
Samuel Huntington is dead. But the clash of civilisations is not dead.
Picking up from the British Jewish strategist, Bernard Lewis, who could see the world only in terms of wars --- perpetual wars for perpetual peace, and who could make out, that after the dethronement of Communism as the most menacing ideological threat to the Western world, the world's next most intractable division will be along the fault-lines of civilizations grown up around organised religions. Bernard Lewis termed it as 'Clash of civilizations'. With Jews, history is sacrosanct. Just as in the millenniums of the past, when the King was confronted with the prophecy that he will be destroyed by a first born child, the King ordered the wholesale slaughter of all first borne in his realm. However, the prophecy has to be fulfilled, even after shedding so much blood. In modern times, the Jews and Christians are acting like that Egyptian King, and unleashing bloodshed all around the globe, trying to fight a prophecy, that another civilization, will threaten them and will take them over. But the inevitable is bound to happen. Not for reasons of the stars managing the changeover, as stars are only the signs, but even they, the Jews and Christians and their supporters, will make that change inevitable, by their own evil deeds.
Samuel Huntington had gone into some detail, putting flesh on the bone structure of Bernard Lewis's prophetic warnings. And no longer that the 'enemy' was identified by the soothsayers; all that remained was to order the wholesale slaughter of the first borne, so that that inevitable could be either be postponed or derailed. Peace-loving Brahmins would prefer to do havens, to ward off the inevitable. Jews and Christians do not let the spirituality intrude into their secular regime and indulge in blood sport as a means to fight destiny.
Palestinians will die by Israeli bombings, but the way they are defending themselves with rockets that are as if meant to avoid human suffering and do with shock treatment only, it is going to be a long drawn battle; unless they get their hands on some lethal weaponry and match the excessive firepower that Israelis are inflicting on them. But that will bring in a second level of engagement.
The world has stake in the maintenance of peace in the region. In this connected world the flutter of butterfly wings could trigger storms half a world afar. It should move fast to bring justice to the victims and not use the conflagration to trigger wars and strife around the world.
Ghulam Muhammed, Mumbai
www.ghulammuhammed.wordpress.
