How the Red-Green Alliance was formed

Submitted by Dave (United States), Jun 8, 2020 at 11:36

The 1960s were a time of protest and upheaval from the Left, mainly as a reaction to the Vietnam War. While many objected to the war for tactical reasons, others went further and rationalized that the war reflected the evils of America and western civilization itself. Some even went so far as to sympathize with Communism and America's foes; examples were Jane Fonda in Hanoi, and Bernie Sanders with his honeymoon in the Soviet Union.

While the Vietnam war was going badly, Israel had a smashing victory in the '67 war. At first, Israel garnered immense popularity, providing a point of pride in the West as a winning American ally. The Soviets then came up with a clever propaganda ruse, as high-ranking Romanian defector General Pacepa later revealed. The idea was to portray Israel as the Goliath persecuting the Arab David, since, in this scheme, Israel's adversaries were not actually a collection of larger Arab states, as one's senses would reveal, but really just a pathetically small number of persecuted Palestinians. This brilliant propaganda also dovetailed nicely with the contemporary phenomena of persecuted African-Americans. The Left, angry and ripe for exploitation by anti-Western forces, took the bait and has been running the line out ever since.

Leftists then leveraged their academic positions - many preferred academia to corporate careers
- to influence the minds of millions of young people. This influence has eventually percolated into the media, the pulpit and other areas of authority. Of course, Islamists have found a warm home in the hate-America Left, especially in academia. As for financing, a flood of petrodollars from Muslim donors has funded and significantly influenced academic studies which have not surprisingly been sympathetic to Islamic ideology and causes (ex. John Esposito at Georgetown).

El Fadl is correct to see the Christian Right and Zionists as foes of Islamism, but Islamism hasn't needed any special financing or shady conspirators to explain the animosity to it. It's due to the violence, hatred and repression perpetrated in the name of Islam. The Christian Right are Christians who have a strong religious identity, are generally aware of attacks on churches and Christians by Muslims around the world, and who often are unapologetically furious about it. They usually stand in solidarity with Israel as a sort of fellow martyr. Fadl's lame excuses for "Islamophobia" illustrate how Islamists are unwilling to entertain any king of meaningful self-criticism - Islam violently discourages criticism as blasphemy. Conspiracy theories and other attempts at self-delusion show the intellectual stagnation of Islamic culture.

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