The Solution to Middle East Chaos [View all]

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The Solution to Middle East Chaos
by: Tala Haikal and Saliba Sarsar on July 30th, 2014

Aggression and war insidiously and savagely consume the hearts of humanity. Huge amounts of energy, ingenuity, resources, and sacrifice are continuously wasted as people fight in the name of freedom, self-defense, self-determination, God, righteous conquest, justice, national security, and power, typically to no avail.

The specter of vicious but pointless conflict is today most evident in the Middle East, where extremism is on the rise and antagonisms are often fierce. Such dynamics make history, to paraphrase a line from James Joyce’sUlysses, a nightmare from which we are trying to awake. The record of human suffering there is long, and in many ways, it is getting worse.

Gaza, Syria, and Iraq are pained by that same disease of extremism and conflict. Civilians, more specifically children and women, are bearing the brunt of the injustices. In today’s Middle East, we have sacrificed a generation to the flames of rage.

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We have an obligation to move beyond violence. We must become part of a new culture of peace that celebrates people, rather than dehumanizing and repressing them. This is an essential part of upholding the principle of compassion which, according to the Charter for Compassion, “impels us to work tirelessly to alleviate the suffering of our fellow creatures, to dethrone ourselves from the center of our world and put another there, and to honor the inviolable sanctity of every single human being, treating everybody, without exception, with absolute justice, equity, and respect.”

More here: http://www.tikkun.org/tikkundaily/2014/07/30/the-solution-to-middle-east-chaos/#more-49777