In my capacity as Arabist and flak, I want journalists to know that two MIT students are in Ramallah, Palestine, this week to promote MIT to young Arabs, in Gaza by teleconference on Saturday morning, and to West Bank students after that– between 10 and 3. They are part of a tour of Arab lands by six MIT students. Anyone who’s interested should contact me at weissphilip@yahoo.com and I can hook them up with the MIT alum who has arranged the tour. Heart and minds, but mostly minds.
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If we had had a competent president who really wanted to transform the Middle East, he or she would have taken the $500 billion spent so far directly on the invasion and occupation of Iraq, and endowed in the region 500 Western-style universities at $1 billion each.
Nobody would have died, and thousands upon thousands of young Arabs over many generations would have received an education that would allow them to understand their world, and ours — along with giving them skills necessary for economic progress.
But, no. What a waste.
Michael Blaine
http://www.rudelystamped.blogspot.com
I wish those young MIT recruiters luck. But they've got a hard sell on their hands. It costs $131.00 to apply for a US visa, and you don't get your money back if turned down. There's also an $85.00 fingerprinting fee, if those are required.
Palestinian students can expect to be submitted to harsh scrutiny. At a pre-interview, they will be warned that any false statements will result not only in visa denial, but permanent blackballing from ever entering the U.S. If approved after the personal interview, they will be subjected after arrival in the U.S. to a monitoring regime which rivals that of the former Iron Curtain countries. Even missing a domestic flight can set off a "Muslim student at large" security alert.
Nevertheless, their chances of getting into MIT might be better than their prospects of studying at Technion, the highly-regarded Israel Institute of Technology located just a few miles across the wall from them.
How come there is not a single University in the entire Arab world for them to aspire to go to?
Why does tiny Israel have Hebrew University, Technion, Ben Gurion University and Weitzman
Institute and the Arab World with all its gazillions of dollars and hundred of millions of people has no University that a smart Arab would want to go to???
Maybe those MIT kids can answer this question.
Gee, Ashley, maybe you could try seeing past your bias and get a clue. There are many universities in the Arab world. Just because YOU don't know about them doesn't mean they don't exist. And BTW there are many Israeli students at MIT. By your logic, that must mean that there are no Israeli universities that a smart Israeli could go to, despite the billions of foreign dollars that have gone to Israel. Or does your pig-ignorance only apply to Arabs?
Why does 'tiny Israel,' with its excellent universities, not emulate the U.S. in welcoming foreign students, both to educate them and to establish cross-cultural goodwill?
Does zionist tribalism and exclusionism run so deep, as to wish continued underdevelopment on the muslim world? What a sad, angry group of people.
What am ignorant of? Israel cranks out Nobel Prizes from all of their top universities and the Arabs can't even pump their own oil (they need foreign engineers).
Even the Universities that the Arabs have thrown together are all staffed by foreigners.
"there are no Israeli universities that a smart Israeli could go to"???
Hebrew University, Technion, Ben Gurion University and Weitzman Institute
"BTW there are many Israeli students at MIT"
…and Harvard and Princeton and every other top university in the US.
How come there are so few Arabs at top schools in the US???
Please tell me!
Ashley's right.
Look who runs UAE's Zayed University:
http://www.zu.ac.ae/html/leadership.html
Almost all westerners.
Jim,
"Why does 'tiny Israel,' with its excellent universities, not emulate the U.S. in welcoming foreign students, both to educate them and to establish cross-cultural goodwill?"
Israeli Universities actively recruit foreign students from all over the world. However, most courses are taught in Hebrew, although there are English language MBA and Law Programs.
Also, check out the www.idc.ac.il/eng/ for a great (and cheap) three year Bachelor's degree taught in English.
If you have the brains to get into the tougher schools, foreign students are welcome and encouraged to apply.
How come there are so few Arabs at top schools in the US???
Ha. Very funny. I see that you have totally flip-flopped your argument in order to sustain your bias. First you insist that the existence of Arab students in US universities proves that the universities in the Arab world are no good. Of course, when its pointed out that there are also Israeli students in US universities, that, apparently is no longer a sign of inadequate universities in the home country, but on the contrary it just means that Israeli students are smart. Two vastly different reasons given for the same result, with the only difference between the students being whether they came from Israel or an Arab country. From Israel? The Israeli students must be smart. From an Arab country? The Arab universities must be deficient. This is a sure sign that you have a big self-awareness problem in regards to your biases.
Then, after insisting that all the smart Arab students have to go to the US to get training, you change your tack and insist that there are few Arab students in the US. Whereas, with your first argument, the existence of Arab students must mean that the Arab universities are deficient, now you complain about a "lack" of Arab students here, which you imply must mean that the Arab students are deficient, rather than the Arab universities being adequate to the task. Arab students in the US? Must mean that Arab Universities are bad. No enough Arab students here? That must mean that the Arab students are deficient. So Arabs are deficient either way, but Israelis are apparently exemplary for the very same things. If they aren't here, it must mean that they have great Universities in Israel. If they are here that must mean that they are smart. That's called bigtime bigotry on your part, my dear.
BTW, there are over 11,000 students in the US on student visas from Saudi Arabia alone. I'm sure you can twist that to mean something negative about Arabs. What's sad is that you can't even recognize your own bigotry.
Wow, Ashley, you are disgustingly dismissive of Arabs:
"Israel cranks out Nobel Prizes from all of their top universities and the Arabs can't even pump their own oil (they need foreign engineers)."
Let's say Israelis in general were inherently smarter than Arabs in general; so what? That's no reason to look down your nose at them.
And the brandishing of the "name brand" schools — pure chauvinism.
This roiling cess pool of Israel/Arab/Jew/Muslim polemics and insults, tossed in with nasty East Coast bias (in the academic not the sports sense) sort of makes me wish I'd never left Minnesota.
It least it's place where we tend not to worry about such rubbish.
Michael Blaine
www.rudelystamped.blogspot.com
Uggh!!!!
This is from a source called "Jewish Magazine", which lists all the Arab/Islamic Nobel Prize winners, followed by all the Jewish Nobel Prize Winners, and then asks the question:
"After reviewing this list, can you supply a reason for the large discrepancy between the Arab/Islamic population's contribution to the world body and that of the Jew? There are 165 Jews listed as opposed to 6 from the Arab side."
No, I can't supply a reason. Culture must play a large part, along with the nature of the governments Arabs live under. There may even be an innate difference.
But to trumpet acheivement like this in order to denigrate another group is disgusting.
I'm sure Scandinavians have won a disproportionate share of Nobel Prizes, but I can't imagine them rubbing anybody else's nose in the fact.
Ugly stuff, that triumphalism.
Michael Blaine
www.rudelystamped.blogspot.com
P.S. I'd like to issue a blanket apology for all my past and future typos.
"The Jewish Magazine" also says the following:
"Become part of the Jewish Magazine. Help yourself and others to experience impartial information about being Jewish.
. . .
May you be blessed from heaven for your support of our magazine."
"Impartial"? Not the way Arabs were denigrated in the post cited above.
"Blessed from heaven" for supporting this magazine? If only subscribing to "The Economist" offered such benefits!
Michael Blaine
www.rudelystamped.blogspot.com
BTW, Ashley and Ed, this reminds me of an internet conversation I had awhile back with some right-wing Israelis about Birzeit University. Their Israel-centric view was that the students of Birzeit didn't realize how much they owed to Israel. Their bigotted reasoning was that there was no university in the West Bank until after Israel occupied it in 1967. Without really knowing any of the facts of the university's origin, or the fact that it existed as a college prior to its upgrade to university status, they conjectured that Israel brought them the enlightenment of university life that Jordan had failed to provide. What they didn't know, and frankly didn't care to know, was that the University was not founded by Israel, but by Palestinians, and upgraded itself to university status because Palestinians in the West Bank, after Israel's occupation, no longer had easy access to Jordanian universities because of Israel's oppressive actions towards the people of the West Bank. They couldn't see beyond their own prejudices about the "ignorant" Palestinians, and the "benevolent" and "superior", but misunderstood, Israelis.
You ought to get a job at one of those Arab universities teaching a course on "Arab Apologists"
Your subjective reasoning is so bizarre that it is actually funny.
Why not stick to the core of why the Arab world is screwed up:
"Culture must play a large part, along with the nature of the governments Arabs live under" and address this.
Fix the problem- don't worm around it and say it doesn't exist and that it's biased to identify it.
"Your subjective reasoning is so bizarre that it is actually funny."
Darlin', all I did was quote back your cockeyed reasoning to you. You started out,in response to the existence of Arab students at MIT, asking, "How come there is not a single University in the entire Arab world for them to aspire to go to?" and ended up insisting that there are few Arab students at US schools. Both of your comments are borne of your ignorance of the existence of Arab Universities and your ignorance of the many Arab students in the US. YOUR ignorance, dear, not any one elses.
In case you haven't noticed, there are very, very few women Nobel prize winners, especially considering they make up half the population of the planet. Ashley darling, do you think that means that women have inferior intellects?
How come there is not a single top University in the entire Arab world?
I wasn't "reasoning" anything. I asked two questions, stated two facts (the Arabs can't even pump their own oil-they need foreign engineers- and the Universities that the Arabs have thrown together are all staffed by foreigners) and you started a debate about my "faulty reasoning" and "flip-flopped your argument"
What is your problem are you A.D.D.?
I did not say that there are not Arab students in the US.
11,000 Saudi students? How many of them do you think hate America and/or would commit Jihad?
For the casual observer of this blog's comments section, it is humorous to read how Zed and Michael Blaine and others get upset with the sloppy and pigheaded arguments of an Ashley and his blatherings about Arabs, yet say nothing when similar arguments and libels are made against Jews.
These distinctive subsets of philo and anti semitisim are quite interesting. And also quite sad. By no means are they limited to these individuals, this comment section, or to any position within the conflict.
Any student of rhetoric could have a field day with Mr. Weiss's writings and those of his commenters.
Perhaps some contextual perspective is needed regarding Mr. Weiss's most personal writings–how about something from a main contender to be our next POTUS who has not been alive long enough to be another intricate Weiss? Here you go:
In his first memoir, "Dreams," Obama included a description of black student life at Occidental College in Los Angeles.
"There were enough of us on campus to constitute a tribe, and when it came to hanging out many of us chose to function like a tribe, staying close together, traveling in packs," he wrote. "It remained necessary to prove which side you were on, to show your loyalty to the black masses, to strike out and name names."
He added: "To avoid being mistaken for a sellout, I chose my friends carefully. The more politically active black students. The foreign students. The Chicanos. The Marxist professors and structural feminists."
Obama said he and other blacks were careful not to second-guess their own racial identity in front of whites.
"To admit our doubt and confusion to whites, to open up our psyches to general examination by those who had caused so much of the damage in the first place, seemed ludicrous, itself an expression of self-hatred," he wrote.
"Any student of rhetoric could have a field day with Mr. Weiss's writings and those of his commenters."
Have at it, then!
Michael Blaine
www.rudelystamped.blogspot.com
I have decided to repost Ashley's response and instead of Israeli I replaced it with White and instead of Arab i replaced it with Black. It gives you an idea of the level of racism that people, stoop too when discussing Arabs generally. The worst offenders tend to be American Jews who supposedly pride themselves on their racial politics. But please read ahead.
"What am ignorant of? White people cranks out Nobel Prizes from all of their top universities and the Blacks can't even pump their own oil (they need foreign engineers).
Even the Universities that the Blacks have thrown together are all staffed by foreigners.
"there are no Israeli universities that a smart Israeli could go to"???
Hebrew University, Technion, Ben Gurion University and Weitzman Institute
"BTW there are many white students at MIT"
…and Harvard and Princeton and every other top university in the US.
How come there are so few blacks at top schools in the US???
Please tell me!"
So the Brits sentenced Samina Malik, a 23 year-old Muslim woman, to nine months of probation for the crime of… writing a poem. But what a poem!
Here it is:
How to Behead
It’s not as messy or hard as some may think.
It’s all about the flow of the wrist.
Sharpen the knife to its maximum.
And before you begin to cut the flesh.
Tilt the fool’s head to its left.
Saw the knife back and forth.
No doubt the punk will twitch and scream.
But ignore the donkey’s ass.
And continue to slice back and forth.
La la la. Islam means peace. Now to be fair the Brits, they didn’t exactly arrest this lovely young woman for writing a poem. They came down on her for “possessing records likely to be used in an act of terrorism,” which included “an al-Qaida manual, a booklet on mujahedeen poisons and bomb-making instructions.” And guess what? This poetess of peace worked at London’s Heathrow Airport as a shop assistant, and was familiar with security procedures designed to protect heathen donkeys from, oh, murderous Muslim radicals and other terrorists.
The poem was read on NPR this morning in a piece about the emergence in Britain of “militant Islamist feminism”—which makes about as much sense as “radical gay heterosexuality.” When the poem was read I about choked on my toast. I fly into Heathrow now and then and there are always lots of women working in headscarves and I suppress my… well, I suppress my worst impulses. They’re in the West, I tell myself, they’ve immigrated for a reason, they’ve embraced Western values, and the nice woman in the headscarf selling me my International Herald Tribune at Heathrow isn’t thinking about sawing off my pole-smoking, beer-swilling, apostate head.* (The charming and talented Ms. Malik, however, “spent much of her time at work writing about her desire for martyrdom,” according to NPR.) They’re here, they’ve immigrated, they’re used to us!
But when I heard this next bit on the radio, well, I made up my mind to fly into Shannon next time I go to Europe:
Recent polls have shown that as many as four in 10 British Muslims want Sharia, the Islamic law, applied in Muslim-populated areas of Britain.
Sharia, which is practiced in many parts of the Islamic world, is a religious code of living. But it also specifies stoning and amputation as normal punishment for some crimes.
Sharia also specifies the beheading as “normal punishment” for homosexual acts.**
La la la. Islam means peace.
As much as I hate to sound like a member of the National Front… gee… I just gotta say this: There’s no shortage of backwards, fucked up, unpleasant shitholes where Sharia is practiced. If someone longs to live under Sharia, why the fuck would that someone emigrate to Europe or remain in Europe? Why not emigrate to, say, Pakistan or Iran or Saudi Arabia or Sudan or Nigeria or a whole host of islands in Indonesia? If you long to attend public amputations and beheadings, if you think the victims of raped should be imprisoned and whipped, what the fuck are you doing in Britain? Or the Netherlands? Or Belgium? Or France? Or Germany? Wanna live under Sharia? Well, get thee to a Sharia-enforcing shithole already.
I’ll be accused of being xenophobic, of course, for typing what any sensible person thought to him or herself listening to NPR this morning. I am not xenophobic. Or Islamophobic—unless being afraid of particular Muslims, like Ms. Malik, makes one Islamophobic.***
One of the things I love most about the good, ol’ US of A and thoroughly modern Europe—and miss most living here in Seattle—is the ethnic, racial, and religious diversity. But the price of admission to a pluralistic, multi-ethnic society has to be… a desire to live in that place. And a desire to live and let live, and a certain base-level tolerance for people that look, pray, and fuck differently than you do. You should, of course, be free to impose Sharia on yourself and yourself alone (not your daughters, for instance), just as Christians and Jews should be free to impose the most conservative interpretations of their faiths on themselves alone.
And if you can’t hack that…. if you can’t handle pluralism… if you hate us punks and donkeys and fools much… and if you long for Sharia so terribly… then get the fuck out.
••••••••••••••••••••••
* I don’t have this reaction when I see women in headscarves in American airports—all of that here-in-the-West-for-a-reason actually applies to American Muslims, it seems. (Someone please inform the Department of Homeland Security.)
** Yes, there’s some “kill the homos” crap in the Bible, but no predominantly Christian states are executing homosexuals.
*** I’m afraid of some Muslims. But I’m afraid of some Christians, some Jews, some men, some women, some of my relatives, and many, many homosexuals too. Does this make me Christophobic, Jewophobic, guyophobic, girlophobic, uncleophobic, and homophobic as well?
Persistent suicide bombings in Iraq. Attacks on London subways. Explosions at an Egyptian resort.
Whether related or not, these recent incidents have heightened global concern about the spread of radical Islamist militancy. And they raise questions about the current reach of Al Qaeda and groups with similar ideology. Today and tomorrow, the Monitor examines the origins of Islamic terrorism and how it is evolving now.
What is Al Qaeda today compared to five years ago?
In some ways it is less like the Al Qaeda of 2001 than like the Al Qaeda of the mid-1990s, before it was able to build up organizationally with a base of operations in Afghanistan. It is best understood as a radical ideology loosely inspiring a disparate and very decentralized set of localized Islamist extremist organizations.
For some terrorism experts, Al Qaeda as an organization simply no longer exists. Its Afghan training and indoctrination sites are gone. Key leaders have been killed or captured, or are on the run. Yet Al Qaeda as an ideology of global confrontation and jihad, "struggle" or "holy war," still exists.
"That is why I speak of 'Al Qaedaism' as more of a factor today than Al Qaeda," says Magnus Ranstorp of the Center for the Study of Terrorism and Political Violence at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland.
Who are Al Qaeda's leaders?
Osama bin Laden, still at large, founded the organization in 1988, along with Mohammed Atef (aka Abu Hafs al-Masri), an Egyptian who was killed in a US airstrike in Afghanistan. The group has a shura, or consultative council, the composition of which is unknown. But some of the people "most wanted" for organizing operations under Al Qaeda's name or ideology, such as Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, are not believed to be part of any centralized leadership.
Are they still organizing operations?
The Al Qaeda leadership may maintain some command-and-control capability from suspected locations in or near Pakistan – despite Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf's recent declaration about a smashed Al Qaeda. One possible example: In a tape released June 17 by the Arab television network Al Jazeera, Al Qaeda No. 2 Ayman al-Zawahiri called for revenge against Britain for allying with the US. Some experts believe such tapes are directives to proceed with an operation. In any case, the London bombings soon followed.
What do the militants want?
For Islamist militants, the long-term objective is an Islamic superstate, or caliphate. Narrower objectives include the end of the state of Israel and toppling secular Middle Eastern regimes like Egypt's. It is an article of faith that the US and all secular Western states stand in their way, and weakening those states is seen as positive for all their objectives.
Who is their main enemy?
The global jihad has long named two types of targets: the "near enemy" (Israel or secular Arab regimes) and the "far enemy" – America and its allies. Zawahiri was always more interested in the "near enemy" that stood in the way of an Islamic state in his homeland, Egypt. Bin Laden was more interested in the "far enemy," because he felt success could not be achieved closer to home until US financial and military backing for these regimes was eroded. When Zawahiri merged his Egyptian Islamic Jihad with Al Qaeda in 1998, the two trends were brought together.
What Is their ideal society?
They want a society that applies the Koran literally and adheres to the social practices that prevailed at the time of the prophet Muhammad. It would not be democratic in any modern sense, though there are provisions for shura, or consultation – generally interpreted to mean the leader should take advice from trusted community members. In their interpretation of Islam, women and men have defined roles, and women generally have fewer rights.
Their views stem from the Salafi movement within Islam's Sunni sect, the religion's largest. For a Salafi adherent, interpretation of the Koran stops 1,300 years ago, with Muhammad, his companions, and the three generations that followed them.
What about Wahhabi thinking – is that behind Al Qaeda?
While many in the West use the term Wahhabi, practitioners of this Sunni school reject the notion that they belong to any particular sect. To their thinking, they are simply following the true path of Islam. They are Salafi followers of Mohammed ibn abd al-Wahhab, an 18th century Arabian preacher. Although the vast majority of Salafis are not involved in violence, almost all attacks linked to Al Qaeda have been carried out by people under the Salafi umbrella. The House of Saud helped this school become Saudi Arabia's dominant interpretation of Islam. Many Saudis refuse to view Osama bin Laden as a Wahhabi, rejecting his thirst for overthrowing the Saudi regime. Wahhabis are supremely intolerant of Shiites, seeing practices such as the veneration of historic Imams Hussein and Ali as a breach of monotheism.
What are the roots of violent jihad?
Ibn Taymiyah, a 13th century scholar, is an intellectual forerunner of the modern Salafis. He rejected Sufi and Shiite Muslims, describing the latter as apostates who deserved death. Appearing in an era when crusaders remained in the Middle East, he advocated a muscular approach to Islam that called on believers to fight infidel invaders. The modern Salafi revival is generally traced to late 19th and early 20th century opposition to colonial rule, and was particularly taken up by Egyptian thinkers, who saw in it a way to oppose Western colonialism and modernize without giving up Islamic values. The foundation of Israel was seen by most Muslims, of all strains, as a hostile act that undermined Islam. For Salafis it was a call to jihad, to regain the land and holy places they felt had been usurped. Frustration mounted with the 1967 Arab defeat by Israel, which many Muslims interpreted as a sign of God's displeasure.
But the Salafi group around bin Laden really took hold after the 1991 Gulf War. Bin Laden was a wealthy Saudi who had helped support Afghans and Arab volunteers in the jihad against the Soviet Union in the 1980s, with financial support from Pakistani intelligence and the CIA. He wanted to lead an Arab and Muslim effort to end Saddam Hussein's occupation of Kuwait. He and his followers were enraged and humiliated that a US-led coalition repelled Hussein and that US troops were then stationed in Saudi Arabia, home to Islam's holiest places. Citing this issue, bin Laden and Zawahiri announced the "World Islamic Front for Jihad Against Crusaders and Jews" in 1998.
What does the Koran say about violence against civilians?
As with most religions, it is a question of where emphasis is placed. The Koran has fairly clear injunctions against murder, including "Whoever slays a human being, unless it be for murder or for spreading corruption on earth, it shall be as though he had slain all mankind" (5:32). Suicide is warned against even more strongly: "Do not kill yourselves … whoever does so, in transgression and wrongfully, we shall roast in a fire" (4:29). Warfare in certain circumstances is condoned, even urged, just as in the Old Testament, but there are limits. "Fight in the cause of God against those who fight against you, but do not transgress limits. God loves not transgressors" (2:190) and "let there be no hostility, except to those who practice oppression" (2:193).
In the most widespread interpretations, such verses bar both attacks on civilians and suicide attacks, while allowing Muslims to fight against those who directly attack them. But how does one define the meaning of "those who practice oppression" or "spreading corruption on earth" or even "those who fight against you?" It is here that the minority of Islamist radicals who attack civilians find their wiggle room.
An Al Qaeda timeline
1988:
Osama Bin Laden establishes Al Qaeda ("the base") to channel arms and funds to the anti-Soviet Afghan resistance.
1989-1991:
Bin Laden becomes involved in movements opposing the Saudi monarchy, fueled by the kingdom's acceptance of US troops after Iraq invaded Kuwait.
1996:
Bin Laden joins the Taliban in Afghanistan as they seize Kabul. He now has a base for his training operations.
AUG. 7, 1998:
East African attacks: Nearly simultaneous car bombings hit US embassies in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, and Nairobi, Kenya, killing 224 on the anniversary of the Saudi King's 1991 invitation to US troops to defend his country from Iraq.
OCT. 12, 2000:
Suicide bombers ram the USS Cole off Yemen, killing 17.
SEPT. 11, 2001:
Al Qaeda hijackers fly jetliners into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, while a fourth hijacked jet crashes in a Pennsylvania field. Nearly 3,000 are killed.
OCT. 12, 2002:
In an attack blamed on Jemaah Islamiyah, a Southeast Asian group linked to Al Qaeda, 202 are killed bombing on the Indonesian island of Bali.
2003 through present:
Iraq becomes a locus for radical Islamists, as insurgents battle the fledgling Iraqi government and the US-led forces that ousted Saddam Hussein. A key mastermind, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, aligns himself with Al Qaeda.
MARCH 11, 2004:
Bombs hit four commuter trains in Madrid, killing 191 people and injuring more than 1,600. Attacks are blamed on Islamic militants with suspected ties to Al Qaeda.
JULY 7, 2005:
A group calling itself the Secret Organization of Al Qaeda in Europe claims responsibility for bus and subway bombings in London that killed 56 people. Two weeks later another coordinated London subway bombing is attempted.
Just curious, what does the last umpteen Al Qaeda bombings, sharia law and all of the miscellaneous information from Joshua Crawford and SJF's posts have to do with those MIT students in the West Bank? As far as I know, sharia law is not practiced in the West Bank, and MIT does not have a quota for Al-Qaeda members. Although they do seem to have a very high quota for physicists and engineers to be war criminals for Lockheed Martin, but that along with everything that SJF and Joshua Crawford has posted is completely irrelevant to the article in question.
–"I wasn't "reasoning" anything. I asked two questions, stated two facts (the Arabs can't even pump their own oil-they need foreign engineers- and the Universities that the Arabs have thrown together are all staffed by foreigners) and you started a debate about my "faulty reasoning" and "flip-flopped your argument""–
Your first "question" implied that because some Arab students come to the US to get an education, that must mean that there are no decent universities in the Arab world and when I pointed out that there are Israeli students that come to the US to likewise get an education, you implied that in the Israeli students case, that only implied that they were smart. I agree with you, you weren't "reasoning", you were spreading bigotry. If an Arab student comes here it means that Arab schools are no good, ut if an Israeli student comes here it means that Israelis must be smart. Same circumstances, different conclusions based solely on your prejudice.
Your second "question" was why are there so few Arab students at top schools in the US. Frankly, I doubt you know how many Arabs are at top schools in the US. You simply assumed that there weren't because such an assumption supports your bias. It wasn't a real question, it was merely a statement of your uninformed prejudices.
As to your two "facts", neither one of them are, in fact, true facts. There are some foreign engineers in various Arab oil-producing countries, mostly employed by foreign owned companies, but there are numerous native-born Arab oil engineers as well. The conceit that oil would stop flowing if the Arab countries banished all foreign engineers is really just laughable. Several years ago I worked for a Japanese company in the US when half of its employees, and all of its managers, were from Japan. Little did I realize that this was because Americans were too stupid to develop their own film, like your twisted logic would imply. As for all the Arab Universities being staffed by foreigners, it really just shows your total lack of knowledge about any Arab Universities. I doubt you could name one without resorting to a quick Google search. The one that your associate Ed brought up, which I have no doubt you had never heard of before he posted, is, BTW, a new university for women in the UAE and is completely bilingual, Arabic and English, which would account for the high number of native English-speakers on the faculty. To save you the time looking for other examples, here is a link to the member Universities of the Association of Arab Universities: link to aaru.edu.jo
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You can get Google to translate the page for you and see that most Universities have a majority of in-country administrators and faculty. BTW, not all Universities in the Arab world are members of the Association, so it is not an exhaustive list of all Arab Universities.
–""What is your problem are you A.D.D.?""–
No, apparently I can follow and expound on your "reasoning" better than you can. My attention is fine. You just don't me pointing out where your "reasoning" leads.
–""11,000 Saudi students? How many of them do you think hate America and/or would commit Jihad?"" –
Talk about ADD, there's a racist leap for you. Oops, your losing your argument , so just change the subject. I don't have an answer for that question anymore than I would have an answer to a question about how many Israeli students would be willing to spy on the US for Israel. Frankly, I wouldn't ask either question, but you just go on digging your little hateful hole deeper. Good luck with that.
–""For the casual observer of this blog's comments section, it is humorous to read how Zed and Michael Blaine and others get upset with the sloppy and pigheaded arguments of an Ashley and his blatherings about Arabs, yet say nothing when similar arguments and libels are made against Jews.""–
If there were similar arguments about Jews being stupid and backward, I'm afraid I missed them. I see the goalposts have now moved. Apparently, not rushing in to condemn what "Observer" thinks is an anti-semitic comment is now considered to be anti-semitic all by itself. Frankly, I've seen much more anti-goy and specifically anti-Arab comments here than anti-semitic ones, and the anti-semitic ones mostly fall in the vein of overstating the extent of Jewish solidarity and support for Israel uber alles. My sister is an Israeli Jew, and through her experiences, and visiting her, I've come to be appalled at the overwhelming racism that exists in Israel, and I am likewise appalled that it is being encouraged to spill into American dialogue as well. (Which isn't to imply that Americans can't be pig-headed racists without any help from others.) That racism is what I believe is most important to oppose. As for those who think that all Jews believe that "support" for Israel is the most important part of their lives, I think it is easier to prove that point wrong by openly going against the tide, as Phil does, that to simply insist that it isn't the case, especially when there are so many "defenders of Israel" who seem so intent on proving me wrong and the anti-semites right. As an example, a white person during the early 60's could simply state that not all whites were racists, but it was much more effective to prove it oneself by one's own actions, than to simply mouth words. And to imply that NO whites were racist was just plain stupid, wrong, and counterproductive.
Were I an Arab, the very last place I would choose to go to school would be the US. But I am not an Arab, only a white Canadian: still, my encounter with the Homeland Security boys at the Hawaii airport made me experience how well the politics of fear really work. The experience of our Maher Arar and Omar Kadr aren't helping me get over it either. I think the above comment about Israel possibly encouraging smart Palestinian youth to study at Israel's excellent schools is a suggestion worth considering.
Zed you ARE right.
The Arabs have great universities and have made great contributions to the world other than selling their oil (which they ARE capable of pumping out of the ground themselves).
Nobel prizes don't signify anything, anyway, they discriminate against women and are culturally biased.
Thanks for changing my point of view, I was so full of hate that I could not see the truth until you so carefully dissected my questions and answered them so convincingly.
Damn. Except for the period when I was a teen in the US combat engineers, when my immeidate bosses were all black males, as a civilian since then all my bosses have been female. And now I'm retired. Who speaks for me?
Whites tipped the war against American racism, as well as South Africa racism. The test is coming again–where are the jews now?