They Run with the Strong Horse

Columnist Daniel Pipes offers a thought-provoking look at the fundamental flaw in how the West is attempting to deal with Radical Islam.

The violence and cruelty of Arabs often perplexes Westerners. Not only does the leader of Hizbullah proclaim “We love death,” but so too does, for example, a 24-year-old man who last month yelled “We love death more than you love life” as he crashed his car on the Bronx-Whitestone Bridge in New York City.

As parents in St. Louis honor-killed their teenage daughter with 13 stabs of a butcher’s knife, the Palestinian father shouted “Die! Die quickly! Die quickly! ... Quiet, little one! Die, my daughter, die!” – and the local Arab community supported them against murder charges.

A prince from Abu Dhabi recently tortured a grain dealer whom he accused of fraud; despite a video of the atrocity appearing on television internationally, the prince was acquitted while his accusers were convicted.

On a larger scale, one accounting finds 15,000 terrorist attacks since 9/11. Governments throughout the Arabic-speaking countries rely more on brutality than on the rule of law. The drive to eliminate Israel still persists even as new insurrections take hold; the latest one has flared up in Yemen.

In his book, The Strong Horse: Power, Politics, and the Clash of Arab Civilizations, Middle East correspondent Lee Smith, takes as his proof text Osama bin Laden’s comment in 2001, “When people see a strong horse and a weak horse, by nature, they will like the strong horse.”

What Smith calls the strong-horse principle contains two banal elements: Seize power and then maintain it. This principle predominates because Arab public life has “no mechanism for peaceful transitions of authority or power sharing, and therefore [it] sees political conflict as a fight to the death between strong horses.” Violence, Smith observes, is “central to the politics, society, and culture of the Arabic-speaking Middle East.” It also, more subtly, implies keeping a wary eye on the next strong horse, triangulating and hedging bets.

Smith argues that the strong-horse principle, not Western imperialism or Zionism, “has determined the fundamental character of the Arabic-speaking Middle East.” The Islamic religion itself both fits into the ancient pattern of strong-horse assertiveness and then promulgates it. Muhammad, the Islamic prophet, was a strongman as well as a religious figure. Sunni Muslims have ruled over the centuries “by violence, repression, and coercion.” Ibn Khaldun’s famous theory of history amounts to a cycle of violence in which strong horses replace weak ones. The humiliation of dhimmis daily reminds non-Muslims who rules.

Smith’s prism offers insights into modern Middle East history. He presents Pan-Arab nationalism as an effort to transform the mini-horses of the national states into a single super-horse and Islamism as an effort to make Muslims powerful again.

Israel serves as “a proxy strong horse” for both the US and for the Saudi-Egyptian bloc in the latter’s cold-war rivalry with Iran’s bloc. In a strong-horse environment, militias appeal more than do elections. Lacking a strong horse, Arab liberals make little headway. The US being the most powerful non-Arab and non-Muslim state makes anti-Americanism both inevitable and endemic.

WHICH BRINGS us to policies by non-Arab actors: unless they are forceful and show true staying power, Smith stresses, they lose. Being nice – say, withdrawing unilaterally from southern Lebanon and Gaza – leads to inevitable failure. Walid Jumblatt, a Lebanese leader, has half-seriously suggested that Washington “send car bombs to Damascus” to get its message across and signal its understanding of Arab ways.
Smith’s simple and near-universal principle provides a tool to comprehend the Arabs’ cult of death, honor killings, terrorist attacks, despotism, warfare and much else. He acknowledges that the strong-horse principle may strike Westerners as ineffably crude, but he correctly insists on its being a cold reality that outsiders must recognize, take into account, and respond to.

I reiterate my opinion that America's current philosophy in dealing with radicalized Islamic regimes like Iran, Syria, Saudi Arabia, and the Palestinians totally misses the realities mentioned above. The only way these regimes will back down is when they are slapped down! That sounds harsh, but we live in a harsh world.

However, looking at the situation as a Bible-believing, Christianized follower of the one true Messiah, there are some other principles we can apply. Here they are.

1. God loved the (entire) world so much, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever (Muslim, Jew, or any other Heathen) believes in him would not perish but have everlasting life.

2. We are called to pray for our enemies! (That doesn't mean we shouldn't defend freedom and militarily discourage their attempt to take over the world.) However, prayer changes things.

3. We are called to share the gospel (see #1) to everyone, including Muslims, Jews, and any other Heathen. (By the way, we were once a member of heathenry)

4. Pray for the PEACE of Jerusalem! In other words, pray for the arrival of the Prince of Peace to the Planet.

Stay alert! Things are quickly moving to a defining moment, not only in the Middle East, but for the entire world.

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Dealing with headlines from the Middle East and comparing them with Bible Prophecy

Jimmy Root Jr

Author: DISTANT THUNDER Book One of the Lightning Chronicles

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