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View from the Eye of the Storm: Terror and Reason in the Middle East

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The author is a theoretical physicist. His interest has been in neutrino interactions and oscillations, solar neutrinos, atmospheric neutrinos, neutrinos as dark matter candidates, neutrino masses, mixing angles and possible decays, models for neutrino mass patterns, and astrophysical and cosmological implications of neutrino properties. Sounds fascinating!

But this book is on a somewhat, um, heavier topic than neutrinos.

The author's great-great-grandmother was one of those who lived in Jerusalem in 1844, back when it was a little town in the Syrian province of the Ottoman Empire. Back when a census showed it had 7120 Jews, 5760 Muslims, and 3390 Christians (by the way, back then, these 7120 Jews all lived in what some folks today mistakenly call "traditionally Arab East Jerusalem").

Harari was sometimes amazed "by the successful penetration of so much fiction into the facts of the Middle East." He points out that "if someone in the world of science is caught even once in a deliberate lie, he or she is excluded, forever, from the scientific community; no scientist would ever listen to or employ him or her again."

I think this is what we need to do with those "scholars" who spread antizionist lies.

Harari tells us about what is behind the suicide murders in Israel. It is money, power, and cold-blooded murderous incitement. It has nothing to do with poverty and despair. Now, what does one do about suicide murderers in wartime? If you are convinced that a man in a heavy coat approaching a big group of children is about to kill a large number of them, do you shoot to kill him? You don't have much time to decide! Harari says that one has to use common sense here. And he's right. Sooner or later, that is what people will do. And what does one do, asks Harari, when faced by a bunch of stone-throwing children, right behind whom are a bunch of adults who are shooting at you? As usual, enemy television is showing you and the children, but not the shooting adults.

Harari shows that international organizations that ought to help with such problems have been corrupted, including the United Nations, the International Red Cross, the International Court of Justice, and the UN Human Rights Commission.

The author also points out that many in Europe say that Israel is defended by the United States, even though Israel has never been protected by American troops. Meanwhile, much of Europe's prosperity has been been supported by American troops on European soil, protecting Europe!

The author says that the way to defeat the terror networks is to have an absolute united commitment among the nations of the free world, eliminate the ringleaders, isolate or liberate the countries who support the terrorists, emancipate women, ban indoctrination of children, prevent systematic brainwashing by media, and open the relevant countries to the world at large.

There are some great lines. God ought to let the terrorists know that He doesn't exist! Immediately! And as for the international organizations that intend to judge Israel, "The jury is out. It better not come back!" Two wrongs do not make a right. But two Rights (the Arab Far Right and European Far Right) can make a Wrong.

Meanwhile, Harari notes that "something is very sick with" the European Far Left, which "spends so much energy attacking Israel without ever protesting any of the true evils coming from the Middle East."

There is a good section about the use of the media by the terrorists. That includes reporting lies as if they were truth and carefully omitting anything that might make the terrorists look bad. I am convinced that to have anything remotely resembling peace in the region, we need to crack down on these lies, with a full-scale Truth and Reconciliation that includes all the major media.

But the lies extend to well-known history. And I think we need to condemn "scholarly books" that include some of the more preposterous ones. As Harari says, "if I told you that the towers of the World Trade Center never existed, that Julius Caesar was British, and that the American Civil War did not happen, would you ever pay attention to anything else I told you?"

The author tells of many of the anti-Israeli lies that are told. Some are shocking. But what is more shocking is that no one stands up and says to the perpetrators in front of everyone (I'm sitting down right now, but I'll say it, and you should too!):

"You are lying. You are deliberately spreading dangerous, vicious lies. Lies like these kill."

In April 2004 internationally known physicist Haim Harari was asked by a meeting of the International Advisory Board of a large multi-national corporation to present his own personal view on events in the Middle East. He spoke candidly.

Without his knowledge a copy of his remarks was leaked and posted on the Internet. It caused a worldwide sensation and was translated into more than half a dozen languages. (The article is seven pages long and can be obtained by going to the FrontPageMag website, clicking on Archives, setting the date drop-downs to March 15, 2006 and clicking on Go. The article is at the bottom of the page.)

Due to the widespread interest in the article, Prof. Harari went on to write an expanded version, which resulted in "A View from The Eye of The Storm". This is not a scholarly treatise with bibliography and footnotes (although there is a very good index), but the perceptions of a fifth-generation Israeli-born observer. Yet Harari is no ordinary observer. He is a brilliant scientist, trained in objective and precise analysis. And he is a man not only of great acumen and scruples, but a man deeply concerned about human events and the future of humankind.

Prof. Harari believes we are already into a World War with Muslim Extremists, but that a few more years may pass before everybody acknowledges this is a fact. He outlines four main elements of the present World conflict: 1, suicide murder; 2, lies; 3, money and 4, the total breakdown of law. The role of each of these elements is examined in detail in the 211 page book.

Following is Harai's eminently sensible solution to the Israeli-Palestine conflict:

"There are certain immutable facts in the Middle East. Peace can arrive only if the Palestinians except the existence of Israel. Peace can materialize only if the Palestinians have their own state - next to Israel not instead of it. The densely Jewish areas will be part of Israel; the densely Palestinian areas will be part of the Palestinian state. Israel will have an Arab minority. Many Israeli settlements in the West Bank and Gaza will have to be abandoned. Most of Jerusalem will remain in Israel, and it will continue to be the capital city. Some heavily populated Arab neighborhoods of the greater Jerusalem area will be in the Palestinian state and may form its capitol city. A carefully planned demilitarized strategy must be developed; it will take a substantial number of years and can be lifted only by mutual consent. Descendents of Palestinian refugees will be settled in Arab countries, many of them in the Palestinian state. All Arab countries bordering with Israel will have peace agreements with it, and no unresolved disputes will remain. The borders between Israel and its Arab neighbors will be protected by some kind of fence...because no open border can survive a 20:1 income ratio."

Later in the book Harari provides a concise prescription for treating the problem of international terror. He admits "it's easy to list these things...it's far more difficult to apply them worldwide." But "it's just a matter of time until all free countries unite and recognize they are facing a life-threatening, global problem."

Read this book, and you will learn the clear-headed professor's answers - answers that he urges are "simply the only possible solutions" to the international terror of our present World War.

Haim Harari is a great internationally known theoretical physicist. He was the director of the Weizmann Institute from 1988 to 2001 and received important honors as a leading scientist, including the prestigious Harnack Medal, awarded by the Senate of the Max Planck Society in an unanimous decision.

But this book is not about Physics, its about terror and reason in the Middle East. In my opinion, it is by far the best review of terrorism ever written.

Harari is a fifth generation Israeli. His grandmother was born in Jerusalem in 1872, and so was her grandmother. So where his children and grandchildren. He writes in Chapter 1:

"For seven generations we have lived here, in the eye of the storm. We have survived more wars and terror attacks than any other nation. But now we are informed by the former French ambassador to London that we are "a shitty little country" endangering the world; at the same time we learn that the rulers of Iran want to replace our "shitty little country" by yet another Shiite country.

So writes this gifted and deep observer of the reality of the Midle East today. Every page of this book has deep and extremely intelligent observations, whose truth is undeniable. Harari's reasoning is always compelling, like that of any great scientist. He starts each one of the 32 chapters of this extraordinary book with a short citation. These themselves are little gems. For example here is the gem that starts Chapter 30: "You cannot punish a suicide murderer by [the] death penalty; You cannot bomb into the Stone Age somebody who is already there."

Indeed, the war between radical Islam and the West is waged by people yearning to go back to the past. They reject modernity above all.

Or here is the gem starting Chapter 13: " The incredible economy of China creates an entirely new "South Korea" every three years. Why can't the rest of the poor rural areas of the world do the same?"

World War III already started though many people do not realize it yet. A relatively new totalitarian movement has grown and gained roots in the Middle East, financed by Saudi Arabia, Iran and other oil-rich states. Like the totalitarian regimes of the past, whether in Mao's China , Stalin's Soviet Union, Pol Pot's Cambodia, Hitler's Nazi Germany, fascist Italy, or Tojo's Japan, the adherents of this Islamic form of fascism are prepared to kill a large part of Humanity in order to bring forth the Islamic "paradise" that is supposed to triumph in the entire World. All fascists, it seems, are megalomaniacs, and the new Islamic fascists are no different.

This book is living proof that the pen is mightier than the sword, and a potent weapon against the Islamic totalitarians of today in World War III. Just like Nazi Germany, fascist Italy, Tojo's Japan, Pol Pot's Cambodia, or Stalin's Soviet Union were defeated, ultimately reason will win over this new form of religious fascism and barbarism. World War III already started, but the victors are going to be the same ones as the victors in World War II.

This book is highly recommended. It should be read and reread by every thinking person on Earth.

This is a penetrating analysis of the components of terror. The book offers a survey of the landscape of middle-eastern conflicts. It is, however, not a pedantic rendition. The author presents a complicated issue in an easily understandable form.

Haim Harari's book is very readable. He writes like a scientist trying to explain difficult concepts to laymen. The tone he seeks to achieve is that of the proverbial taxi driver explaining his part of the world to the comfortable, well-educated and somewhat ignorant passenger (of American or Western European origins).

A 5th generation Israeli whose ancestors have long lived in the Holy Land, Harari puts his finger on the key issues that inflame the region. He is tired of 'even-handedness' and European soft-peddling of Palestinian terror. But because he is so put off by 'on the one hand, on the other hand' Western academic accounts and the alleged Arab factory of lies about the Arab-Israeli conflict, he constructs a bald, counter-narrative that pins all the ills that afflict the region on Arab politics and Persian perfidy.

According to Harari, we are fighting World War III, but the sides are not clearly delineated and Iranian, Syrian and Saudi supported and funded terrorists exploit tools of globalisation and the shadow line between civilian and military.

Harari believes that international cooperation is the key tactical tool to win the war, while at the strategic level, education and fighting intellectual poverty will do the trick. Just as the nuclear bomb helped the allies win World War II, Harari believes that educating the Arab world is the strategic weapon of choice. Millions of young Arabs stuck in a medieval culture of hate must be brought up to date. Intellectual poverty must be replaced by intellectual property.

Harari's political position and prescriptions are Shimon Peres redux. Economic development and cooperation is a rising tide that will lift all boats in the region. The alternative is to continue with suicide bombs that will blow up all the boats in the region.

Much of Harari's writing depends on a clever turn of phrase, anecdotes and memorable analogies. There is much common sense wisdom in Harari's analysis and I found myself agreeing with him whenever he pointed out Arab hypocrisy. However, the Arabs do not hold the exclusive monopoly on hypocrisy and double-standards. Harari's major flaw is that he gives a carte blanche to the US and to the Israelis and does not examine in any detail the historical role played by French and British policy in breeding the hatred that inflames the region. Of course, he would argue that this is not his objective. It is after all, only a view from the eye of the storm. Yet, the book would more accurately be titled a blinkered view from the bruised eyes of the storm - the terror of reason in the middle east. As he himself says, "if a truth is only a selected small part of the whole truth, it may not be a truth".

An example of this selectiveness? Harari claims that Palestinians do not deserve underdog status compared to the Israelis. That's because its a case of a few million Israelis versus hundreds millions Arabs. He also repeats the old chestnut of most Israeli hawks that Israel is losing the public diplomacy battle. Perhaps in Europe there may be less sympathy for Israel, but that's certainly not the case in the world's sole superpower. For example, a recent study shows that ABC, CBS and NBC gave 3.0 to 4.4 times more coverage to Israeli deaths than they gave to Palestinian deaths in 2000-2001, at the beginning of the intifada or popular uprising against Israeli occupation, and again in 2004.

As with everything to do with Israel and Palestine, there is no middle ground, and Harari's account makes a virtue of the fact that it stands its own ground a few centimetres left of center.

At last an unbiased intelligent analysis of the situation in the middle east and the events that brought to that situation. A must read for anyone interested in world affairs.

This is the most objective analysis on events in the Middle East I found in years. Prof. Harari is a great internationally known theoretical physicist. He was the director of the Weizmann Institute from 1988 to 2001 and received several honors as a leading scientist. His analysis is cristal-clear. I already bought 4 books to give to friends.

Haim Harari, the proverbial taxi driver, helps others to reason on mid-east events and history. PREREQUISITE: The reader is required to have at least enough sense God gave a goose. How Harari thinks this situation will be brought to a successful resolution is contrary to what he developed in the body. He feels men will suddenly defy their hundreds-of-years old track record and work this situation out either by negotiation or by the after-management of a man-made horrifying event.

He forgot this:

(Daniel 2:44) "And in the days of those kings (the ones that are ruling at the end times) the God of heaven will set up a kingdom (government) that will never be brought to ruin. And the kingdom itself will not be passed on to any other people. It will crush and put an end to all these kingdoms, and it itself will stand to times indefinite;.."

The best to you Haim.