Melançon Enterprises • a multidivision multinational since 1980

Juan Cole writes clearly what I have frequently said before— the right wing nutjobs with access to military weaponry in both the Israeli (primarily the government) and Palestinian populations consciously try to provoke a cycle of violence that keeps them in power (without having to provide anything that people actually want, like meaningful work and health care and in some cases food and stuff).

He says it better, and spells out just a little of the murderous cost this evil really means.

Of course, it's not just the small chunk of land known as Israel and Palestine where we have this problem with our leaders. It can happen anywhere, and the U.S. government's massive support of Israeli government violence (and in some senses Egyptian and Colombian government repression, including Mexican government violence against social movements supported by "drug war" money) are immoral actions that are predictably likely to end up harming people in the United States too.

They are counting on the rest of us to irrationally hate entire groups of the targeted if any of their number strike out, while not punishing the perpetrators in our own halls of power.

To make the obvious point one more time: from the perspective of you, me, or anyone else not hell-bent on power at the cost of many others' lives, violence (and I reserve the meaning for killing and wounding) is both morally wrong and strategically stupid.

We need to stop letting people who claim to speak for us – be they terrorists in government or out – get away with it.