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Amr Moussa, the Arab League's Utterly Predictable Leader
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As James Fallows has noted, who could have guessed that Amr Moussa and the braver-than-brave Arab League might now have doubts about military action against Libya? Well, just about anyone who has ever dealt with the Arab League. Does anyone believe that the Arab League, whose members include Bashar al-Assad, the Saud family, Yemen's Ali Abdullah Saleh, Muammar Qaddafi (now suspended for non-payment of dues and an overly-gauche defense of his regime) and until a few weeks ago Tunisia's Ben Ali and Egypt's Mubarak, is a force for progressive politics and humanitarianism? That it would ever stand with the West when it was uncomfortable to stand with the West?
One quick Amr Moussa story: In October of 2000, I visited him at the headquarters of the Arab League on Tahrir Square, during an emergency Arab League summit called to protest the Israeli response to the second Palestinian uprising. This was a moment in which Arab leaders and clerics were endorsing suicide bombing as a legitimate response to Israeli repression. (It wasn't the first time Arab leaders had endorsed suicide bombing against Jewish targets, just the latest).During this mostly forgettable interview, I asked Moussa if he thought the widespread endorsement of suicide bombing might come back to haunt the members of the Arab League. I laid out the idea (not my own, I if I recall correctly) that terrorists would one day use a tactic currently reserved for use against Jews against non-Jewish, and even Muslim targets; it was a simple slippery-slope, Pandora's box sort of argument.
Moussa, according to my notes of the conversation, was adamant that no, suicide terrorism would not become widespread. "The circumstances of the Israeli occupation are unique in the world," he said. "The cruelty has no parallels." In any case, he said, Muslim leaders "have made it very clear that this form of resistance is to be used only as an absolute last resort."
A year later, of course, suicide terrorists attacked the World Trade Center. And since then, Muslim suicide terrorists have made their primary targets other Muslims, most notably in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan. I tell this story only to illustrate the point that Amr Moussa lacks many of the qualities one would like to have in an ally.
One quick Amr Moussa story: In October of 2000, I visited him at the headquarters of the Arab League on Tahrir Square, during an emergency Arab League summit called to protest the Israeli response to the second Palestinian uprising. This was a moment in which Arab leaders and clerics were endorsing suicide bombing as a legitimate response to Israeli repression. (It wasn't the first time Arab leaders had endorsed suicide bombing against Jewish targets, just the latest).During this mostly forgettable interview, I asked Moussa if he thought the widespread endorsement of suicide bombing might come back to haunt the members of the Arab League. I laid out the idea (not my own, I if I recall correctly) that terrorists would one day use a tactic currently reserved for use against Jews against non-Jewish, and even Muslim targets; it was a simple slippery-slope, Pandora's box sort of argument.
Moussa, according to my notes of the conversation, was adamant that no, suicide terrorism would not become widespread. "The circumstances of the Israeli occupation are unique in the world," he said. "The cruelty has no parallels." In any case, he said, Muslim leaders "have made it very clear that this form of resistance is to be used only as an absolute last resort."
A year later, of course, suicide terrorists attacked the World Trade Center. And since then, Muslim suicide terrorists have made their primary targets other Muslims, most notably in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan. I tell this story only to illustrate the point that Amr Moussa lacks many of the qualities one would like to have in an ally.
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