Is The UN The Root of Global Terrorism?
How did terrorism, which has been around for centuries, go from a sporadic, often localized, atrocity to a global threat in the 21st Century? Are terrorists recruiting more vigorously? Do terrorist have more reasons to hate? Or have terrorists gotten more support than ever before?
A close look at some events in recent years seems to indicate it's the latter. What's most disturbing, though, is that the greatest motivational support has come not from internal sources or Arab countries, but from a somewhat unexpected source -- the United Nations.
To understand the progression of events leading up to global terrorism, it would help to look at the motives of some mass killers in the U.S., which are somewhat similar to those of international terrorists.
On December 5, 2007, eight people were killed in an Omaha, Nebraska, mall. The shooter's suicide note read, in part, "Everyone will remember me as some sort of monster. ... [But] just think ... I'm gonna be ... famous." Michael Welner, an associate professor of psychiatry at NYU School of Medicine, pointed out, "'My fame is more important than your life,' that's basically what he said."
An FBI investigation into the infamous 1999 Columbine massacre showed that the Oklahoma shooter's demented yearning for fame was not unique. The Columbine killers, according to the FBI, were out to create a devastating nightmare just to gain infamy of global proportions, a far cry from the public's perception of kids being picked on and out for revenge.
Imagine what would happen if mass killers were honored, instead of remembered as monsters, and cops were censured for using excessive force against them. Well, it's been done. And the results have been devastating.
It's a well documented fact that Palestinian parents have often spoken proudly of their suicide-murderer children and openly implored their other children to follow suit. Palestinians customarily hang up pictures of suicide murderers in schools and laud them as heros. And, on top of that, Palestinian murderers are often promised bliss in the hereafter.
How well have these incentives worked? From September 2000 to September 2005, over 26,000 (average of 14 a day) terrorist attacks were perpetrated against Israeli targets. While playing down the plethora of incentives they showered upon mass murderers, Palestinians perfected the art of spouting "grievances" for public consumption -- things like "oppression" and "occupation," which caught on like the Columbine "being bullied" rumors. And, thus, terrorism in the Middle East grew into more than a cottage industry.
It then took the ingenuity and creativity of an international "peacekeeping" organization -- the UN -- to bring this deadly game to the world arena.
How?
The intifada that began in September 2000 was trumpeted by the Palestinians as a response to then-Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's walk on the Temple Mount, a Holy site for Muslims and others. The UN convened in October 2000 and passed Resolution 1322, which read, in part:
"[the UN] Deplores the provocation [Sharon's walk] carried out at Al-Haram Al-Sharif and the subsequent violence ... ;
"[the UN] Condemns acts of violence, especially the excessive use of force against Palestinians, resulting in injury and loss of human life;"
This Resolution placed violence and total anarchy on the same level as an "offending" walk, which is absolutely mind-boggling. According to the UN, if you walk into a house of worship where "your kind are not welcome," that's the same as going into someone's neighborhood and attacking anyone and everyone in sight.
The Resolution, in effect, gave Palestinians the right to savagely butcher people for the slightest provocation, and restrained a victimized party from defending itself no matter how brutal the attacks against her. With the gist of this Resolution expressed repeatedly throughout the years of the intifada, the Resolution became a downright sanction of terrorism.
What's worse, Israel's use of force to defend its citizens from deadly violence is referred to in the Resolution as "excessive" and is, in the UN's view, worthy of condemnation. This is like telling Columbine security personnel that they're use of force against would-be mass killers is excessive. Exactly how much force is excessive when you're defending yourself against being killed?
Furthermore, with the UN's definition of excessive, wouldn't Palestinian barbarism in response to a "walk" be far more excessive? But this is never even mentioned, let alone condemned. The green-light to terrorism couldn't have been more blatant if the UN had told Palestinians, "Go ahead, kill whomever you want, we've got you covered."
The UN's utterly depraved message was then carried across the globe by the news media in what would be the equivalent of a multi-billion dollar ad campaign.
That the Palestinians go the message, there can be little doubt. In the 12 months after Resolution 1322 was passed there were, according to the most conservative estimates, over 100 Palestinian terrorist attacks against Israel (the previous 12 months, less than a dozen).
Over the next five years, over 1000 Israelis were savagely murdered and over 6000 maimed and wounded. And, to add insult to injury, throughout this massacre of Israelis, Israel was unjustly and continually held in contempt by the UN. The Palestinians, on the other hand, despite unleashing the most inhumane carnage upon Israelis, were never condemned even once by the UN.
It took Osama bin Laden only one year to capitalize in a major way on this new-found license to butcher people. Not that he needed anyone's permission before. But now he could massacre as many totally innocent people as he liked and, as long as he had a "grievance," he could blame his victims and even come out with dignity and respect.
So on September 11, 2001, Osama bin Laden became the most "respected" name in some parts of the Muslim world and to who knows how many terrorist wannabes and terrorist now-decided-to-be -- all with the tacit endorsement of Kofi Annan, then-Secretary-General of the UN, and the rest of his corrupt enterprise.
As of January 2008, with no shame left in being a terrorist, we've seen several terrorist plots around the world by even "ordinary" people. Peter Newman of London University's War Studies Institute, on the July 7, 2005, London bombers: "I certainly think this is a new dimension. These are people who grew up in Britain ... a novelty we haven't seen in this country so far."
The damage wrought upon the world by the UN, and Kofi Annan in particular, by sanctioning terrorism is incalculable. To find another country or entity in modern history that generated so much racism, bigotry and anti-semitism on such a massive scale, you'd probably have to go back to the days of the Third Reich. If we're going to take fighting terrorism seriously, we must prosecute all those responsible for it's proliferation, regardless of what physical or legal barriers they hide behind. One step in the right direction would be to try Kofi Annan for crimes against humanity.