I certainly hope that someone in the White House is paying close attention to how ridiculous it is that Arabs who vote in a democratic process are now being told that democracy is only democracy so long as greater powers agree with the results.

Didn't the Soviets do the same bullshit when an election in their bloc didn't go their way?

I hate sounding cliché about this, but it's a total outrage that both the United States and Israel (which loves to tout itself as the Middle East's only democracy) are engaged in a campaign to overthrow the new Palestinian power structure because of the victory of Hamas. And they're not even quiet or subtle about it, which means that Israel (after all these long years) is finally a true Middle Eastern country: despotic.

I am not here to defend Hamas in terms of their actions against Israel. I am writing this note to defend the right of Palestinians to vote for whom they want, regardless of what Israel or the United States thinks. It's outright immoral that Israel wants to now punish the Palestinians with economic blackmail, but then again, they've been into corporate punishment as a policy for some time now. I find it especially ironic that Israel wants to kill Hamas by any means necessary, given that they turned a blind eye to its growth well over a decade ago. Frankenstein, meet thy creation.

If the Israelis want to blame anyone, they should took a long look in the mirror. Palestinians under Arafat and his party have achieved nothing, which is precisely what Israel wanted and what Israel got. Now they're faced with a reality that they helped form, and are quick to deny the legitimate vote of the Palestinian people while simultaneously holding themselves superior above the savage dogs that are the Arabs. They've withheld so much for so long from the Palestinians, that it's difficult to see their point of view at all. They are the dominant power, and now they're trembling because Palestine has become the mouse that roared.

You know very well (or at least should by now) how the Muslim Middle East is going to piece all this together: European newspapers gleefully print caricatures of the Prophet Mohammed (PBUH) and then the Western powers push through a resolution that sends Iran to the principal's office.

Conspiracy, conspiracy, conspiracy!

While I personally don't subscribe to it, you can bet that many are thinking all of this is just too coincidental. And they'll interpret it as just another Western assault against Islam in general and Muslims in particular. The West wants to keep Muslims down, so the reasoning will go, and it has no problem defaming the Prophet (PBUH) and spanking an Islamic country in the process. It's almost like a 2-for-1 special.

While I steadfastly reject calls for murdering anyone associated with the publication of the cartoons (why do these fucking idiots who espouse this always get on camera?), the insult is wide and deep. Muslims feel beleagured and seeing their religion bandied about like so much entertainment (whether as perennial Arab terrorists on television or in the movies) or as an object of fear and mistrust (Patriot Act, anyone?). Europeans want Muslims to integrate into their societies but keep them at two arms' length and stuck in run-down suburbs. The West demands that Turkey stop being so "Muslim" and more like them in order to get into the European Union, but then adds stipulation on top of stipulation, mostly out of a fear of even more immigrants streaming into the heart of the continent.

If Europe and the West want Muslims to integrate and help fight extremism, perhaps it would be better to stop insulting and attacking Muslim culture and ideas. Hey! There's a novel idea.