Democratic Universality and Its Adversaries

(Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs) Joel Fishman - Judaism and Christianity provide a foundation of thought which effectively supports the proposition that democracy is for all. Islamic adversaries of democratic universality reject man-made law, see democracy as foreign to the Arab tradition and part of the "immorality of the West," and view it as belonging to the "Crusaders" [Christians] and Jews. The prevailing idea in majority American culture is that the foundations of modern democratic thought are predominantly, if not exclusively, Christian. In addition, the State Department and the EU have propagated the fiction that the Palestinian war against Israel is totally separate from the greater Islamic jihad against the West. If we reverse these propositions, stating instead that the idea of equality represents an original Jewish contribution to world culture, fully or even partially, and that the militant Islamic assault against the West, America, and Israel are one and the same, the facts begin to make sense.


2005-07-29 00:00:00

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