New at Reason

Michael Young asks why 9/11 had, and continues to have, so little lasting impact in the Arab world

Comments

shecky | September 11, 2006, 3:04pm | #

Of course, it's never safe to generalize. But what th heck, let's do it anyway.

Dan T. | September 11, 2006, 3:06pm | #

Young writes, "It was momentous because the Arabs' refusal to understand why the United States reacted as it did presaged a disconnect between the region and the Americans."

Yet it seems that he has very little understanding himself (as do most Americans) as to why the 9/11 attacks happened in the first place.

Todd Fletcher | September 11, 2006, 4:57pm | #

Dan T, it's nice that you recognize your own comment as contentless liberal boilerplate, for why else would you need to explain what you mean?

anon | September 11, 2006, 6:22pm | #

Why do you expect Arabs to take the gruesome death of 3000 people as a "monumental crime against humanity," when the gruesome death of 3000 Iraqis every month is considered by the neo-cons, you, and many Americans as a necessary collateral damage in building the empire?


America's forcible entry into the Middle East soon became a case of mutual shunning, conscious or not.

America's entry into the Middle East did not happen after 9/11. It happened years before 9/11. Are you that ignorant or you just have selective memory?

Grand Chalupa | September 11, 2006, 11:57pm | #

America's entry into the Middle East did not happen after 9/11. It happened years before 9/11. Are you that ignorant or you just have selective memory?

You are so right. Before 9/11 America was giving billions of dollars a year to Egypt and Jordan and saved Kuwait and the Saudis asses from Saddam. Those arrogant Americans, they had it coming.

MUTT | September 12, 2006, 12:20pm | #

yup, Chalupa. The US underwrites corrupt thugs such as the police states of Egypt & Jordan. Tortures, murders and dissappears any challenge to thier autocracies. Said autocrats live fat, the other 95% live skinny.
After many years of funding Saddam, and giving him carte blac in the UN, he slipped his leash.
After US troops removed our former ally/client from Kuwait, the ruling degenerate came back, hunted down, and had killed those Kuwaitis who stayed beghind & resisted Iraqi occupation, recognizing they were a threat to thier racket, i mean, monarchy.
Ungrateful wretches, the lot.

anon | September 12, 2006, 2:16pm | #

You are so right. Before 9/11 America was giving billions of dollars a year to Egypt and Jordan and saved Kuwait and the Saudis asses from Saddam. Those arrogant Americans, they had it coming.

My bad. I guess the 200,000+ soldiers that the US sent to the region in 1990 were members of the peace corp not the US military and they were dropping food not bombs.

And if you think that supporting the kings in Saudi Arabia or Egypt will win you support of the Arabs in the street then you are sadly mistaken. Better change that strategy and save your money.

I didn't say anything about whether the "Americans had it coming or not." The Americans in the towers certainly didn't. I was just responding to the idiotic claim that Michael made.