Global Fundamentalism and Global War
By Edwin L. Young, PhD
July 15, 2006

This idea was first proposed during the 1985-866 incident of hostage taking of Americans by the Iranians when Ayatollah Khomeini proclaimed America as the ‘Great Satan’.

What a critical state the world is in, particularly Israel and the Palestinians and Lebanese, The protracted neglect of this issue by the Bush administration could make a terrible world situation even far worse.

My perspective on the global state of affairs has shifted over the last couple of decades. Economic factors such as the rapidly growing demand for oil, exploitation of cheap labor, the exploitation of natural resources in under-developed countries, redistribution of wealth, and altering the ‘Balance of Power’ among nations all have a role in causing the current crises. However, it seems to me that another even more critical factor is that religious fundamentalism in all religions is undergoing a ’last gasp surge and starting a digging-in-last ditch-stand’. They are facing a worldwide threat from the global reach of western media that they see as a form of information invasion and from the western modernization of their cultures, which is destroying their deeply held traditions and conventions.

Prior to this, the countries of the world used to change ever so slowly. Now change in so many things has been escalating more and more rapidly and yet the people’s religious beliefs and loyalties, one of the major fomenters of the world crisis, have reacted by becoming retro-oriented, violently defensive, and they all have become ever more entrenched and extreme in the age-old fundamental tenets of their religions. They now see this development as a case of Christianity and Judaism being aligned against the rest of the world’s religions. The Eastern religions traditionally have not seen themselves as either supreme, the exclusive route to immorality, or commissioned to convert and save the world. Consequently, they have not been militant or evangelistic. On the other hand, Islam, as a western religion, does see itself in these Christian and Jewish like terms. The Eastern religions are much less violent in their defense against western incursion. When the Titans of the world’s western religions see each other as threats to their implicit doctrine of pre-eminence and as potentially leading to a dilution of the loyalty of their followers, the result is the un-holiest and deadliest of holy wars. America and Israel have strategic, economic, political, and even religious ties and, therefore are allies. Unfortunately, they and Islam are in an alliance of mutual destruction.

The British and Americans have a long history of carving out the Middle Eastern nations and then, not only intruding into, but also dominating their political life. In the early twentieth century, they had these Middle Eastern countries, who were virtually under their suzerainty, sign contracts giving them perpetual mineral rights that allowed them to perpetually exploit their oil reserves. Adding insult to injury, the US and the British have actually had an ongoing role in setting up and taking down their monarchs, setting up military bases on their lands, fueling, funding, and supplying weapons for wars between them. Worst of all from the point of view of the Middle Eastern peoples has been the American and British attempts to westernize their culture and religion. Tiny Israel was established to be a barrier against the flow of Middle Easterners into the European continent. Being a tiny nation, an ally of the west, and a symbol of western economic, political, and religious domination, Israel inevitably would become the focal point for the Arab nation’s vitriolic hatred for the west, since they knew they could not openly defy the west. Israel, suffering perpetual hostility from the Arabs, added another reason to be hated by them. The homeless Palestinians, prevented from settling in Arab nations, tried to make ambiguous territories inhabited by the Israelis their home. Unfortunately, they settled right on top of land claimed as the holiest of sites by Jews, Muslims, and Christians. An even tinier plot of land became the flashpoint within the focal point of mutual hostilities between the east and west.

Jimmy Carter’s analysis of this problem and his proposed solution, while facing the very apogee of opposition from the west, is, fatefully, the only one possible. There one unequivocal condition that first must be met before this possibility can become a reality. This solution will never be attempted until the world’s religions outgrow their anachronistic fundamentalism.

I hope leaders here or abroad can learn to use negotiation and mediation between the Middle Eastern and Western nations. I hope they can find the patience gradually, diplomatically, with the aid of sophisticated media and education experts, and with a minimum semblance of crude imposition, to provide individualized instruction programs to the peoples of the world. Such programs should be voluntary but intriguing and will move them away from literalist fundamentalism while at the same time preserving their need to believe in some religious formula for gaining immortality.