The Problem
American scholars of the Middle East, to varying degrees, reject the views of most Americans and the enduring policies of the U.S. government about the Middle East.
Examples:
There may be a war on terrorism underway, but the scholars downplay the dangers posed by militant Islam, seeing it as a benign and even democratizing force.
With only one exception, every American president since 1948 has spoken forcefully about the benefits to the United States from strong and deep relations with Israel. In contrast, American scholars often propagate a view of Middle Eastern affairs that sees Zionism as a racist offshoot of imperialism and blames Israel alone for the origin and persistence of the Palestinian problem.
While Americans overwhelmingly supported the war to liberate Kuwait in 1991, the Middle East specialists just as overwhelmingly rejected that use of force; and the same divide has recurred in 2002 with the prospect of a military campaign against Iraq.
Scholarly offerings frequently present in a benign light such hostile actors as the Islamic Republic of Iran, the Syrian Ba'th regime, and other Middle East despotisms. In contrast, they emphasize and often exaggerate the faults of Israel, Turkey, Egypt, and Kuwait. They blame Washington, not Tehran, for the hostile relations between these two states.
Here are some choice but typical quotations:
Stanford University's Joel Beinin, who also serves as head of the Middle East Studies Association (MESA), blames U.S. foreign policy for the attacks of September 11, 2001, rather than militant Islam. Specifically, he finds that the attacks stemmed from Israel's use of American weapons to defend Israeli civilians from Palestinian terrorism: "The sight of American-supplied F-16 fighters and Apache helicopters bombing civilian targets and carrying out over 50 extra judicial assassinations has raised anger over the American-Israeli alliance to new levels."
Source:
http://www.peaceandjustice.org/nowar/1beinin.html
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John Esposito of Georgetown University condemns President Bush's description of the terrorists as "evil". He claims: "the use of 'evil' all the time … in religious terms translates into, 'You're a believer or you're a non-believer.' It is us and them, forces of good against forces of evil, and what this does is it leaves no middle-ground for anyone, whether it is countries or people. In effect, that is either the explicit or the subtle message that this administration has been giving out." One wonders, how would Professor Esposito have Mr. Bush characterize Al-Qaeda? As misguided?
Source:
http://www.asiasource.org/news/special_reports/esposito.cfm
