I had a conversation with a close friend about his disgust with Israel recently–just prior to the attacks that took place this weekend.

It was an eye-opening experience for both of us, I think.

After some heated back and forth I came to realize something I didn’t expect but should have: his disgust with Israel was driven by the belief that Muslims are savages and that their hideous behavior was to be expected, while he expected Jews to be “better” than their savage neighbors. Jews, as civilized people, should just sit back and take the abuse.

In a weird way, his attitude was driven by nothing more than thinly disguised racism against Arabs. It was a variation of the anti-racism theme, where Whites are expected to accept anti-racist discrimination as a form of reparations to a victimized group.

In his mind, Israelis had an obligation to be victimized by savages because the alternative–aggressive self-defense–was unworthy of a civilized people. His hatred of Jews, oddly, was driven by their unwillingness to act their proper role as victims to be sacrificed in recompense for the sins of Western civilization. It was his frank opinion that we couldn’t expect better of Arabs, but we could of Jews.

Does this make sense? Not to me. Does it reflect a widespread view of modern (primarily White) progressives? Absolutely.

You see this attitude manifested in many ways. The unwillingness to enforce the law, which is thinly based upon the belief that “they”‘–being the criminals–can’t learn to behave as civilized people. White people have, in their view, been oppressors, and hence it is the job of modern Whites to abase themselves for the sins of prior generations. People with darker skin will, correspondingly, never learn how not to commit crimes and behave in a civilized manner, so we should simply sit back and take whatever abuse they choose to heap upon us.

This attitude is insulting to non-Whites and demanding the impossible of White people.

The truth is both simpler and more complicated. On the one hand, White people have at times committed horrible crimes that have been aimed at non-Whites. This is undeniable.

On the other hand, these crimes were not committed because they were Whites, nor have non-Whites been nothing but victims of circumstance. The crimes committed by Whites are in fact universal–the capacity for both good and evil are universal and part of human nature.

All human beings, all cultural, racial, national, and other groups no matter how they are sliced and diced have both good and evil within their souls and in their history. No race, religion, or national group is uniquely good or evil. Barbarism is always a human possibility.

Human beings are fallen, and all human beings are children of God. The story of the fall is an allegory that applies to us all.

My impression of Palestinian immigrants I have met–obviously they are a high-quality subset of the population described as Palestinian–is that they are smart, entrepreneurial, and tremendous assets to America. I have never discussed politics with them, but as with any other population, it is clear that there is nothing to indicate that Palestinians, Arabs, Persians, or any other “racial” group is inherently more or less capable of being productive, civilized, or enlightened than any other group.

Nor are they any more likely to be morally better or worse than others. The group differences we see are the product of cultures and individual differences.

Unfortunately, as the West has given up on integrating immigrants and encourages them to retain their cultural values from “home,” we have begun to import the dysfunction that drove those immigrants here.

Oh it’s over. pic.twitter.com/2zDACcFHx2

— Blake Flayton (@blakeflayton) October 9, 2023

The reason why Palestinians as a group in the Middle East are less civilized than Jews in Israel is not racial, but the product of the culture in which they have been raised. A sick, twisted culture that celebrates violence, embraces victimhood, and defines itself by hatred. We often hear about the awful conditions in Gaza, but nobody asks why the people who live there still live in squalor. Most people would build an economy and a civilization once they settle a region; the Palestinians seem to have chosen to stew in a poisonous cauldron of hate.

Radical Islamist culture is evil, just as German culture in the 1930s and 40s was fundamentally evil. Germany was the most civilized and advanced culture in Europe until its defeat in WWI. It transmogrified into a death cult, and was transformed back into a civilized country–at least in the West–postwar.

It wasn’t that Germans were any more or less capable of being civilized; it was the culture. Only through total, unconditional defeat was the cancer excised. I fear the same may be true of the current Palestinian culture.

So anyway, we spent 20 years sacrificing blood and treasure in the global war on terror and this is how American cities ended up looking pic.twitter.com/DqVMOfznZv

— Oilfield Rando (@Oilfield_Rando) October 8, 2023

Failing to hold people responsible for their actions and culture is the opposite of treating them with respect. It is a signal that we disdain them as less-than-human.

We should hold everybody to high moral standards. If Israelis abuse people we should expect better. If Palestinians do, we must expect better. We also should expect that no group is perfect, as they are composed of human beings. What makes a culture, though, is the aspirations embodied in its values. The West doesn’t aspire to embracing hate; the Palestinian culture is utterly driven by hate.

On the streets of Brighton today this woman said that the murderous mayhem of Hamas terrorists in Israel was “beautiful” and a “success”.

They killed 600 Israelis in one day which she said “we need to celebrate”.

In Britain. In 2023. Absolutely despicable. pic.twitter.com/DaRYspP7Ru

— Heidi Bachram (@HeidiBachram) October 8, 2023

In recent decades a large swathe of Muslim culture has been characterized by an indulgence in the worst of human impulses, not the best. Christian cultures have at times indulged in some of the worst of human tendencies, as Muslims have at times been more civilized than Christian Europe. Much of our knowledge of Classical Greece and Rome exists thanks to Muslim preservation of Western history and knowledge.

We must acknowledge that much of the Islamic world–not all–has descended into barbarity. ISIS, Hamas, the Taliban, and the Iranian mullahs are utterly uncivilized and need to be vigorously opposed.

The West needs to and deserves to defend itself, and our civilizational values.

A striking contrast between German and American papers:

Der Spiegel: “A targeted massacre – at least 260 confirmed dead at festival near Gaza”

Die Zeit: “Hamas Now Has an Awful Ransom”

NYT: “Israel Battles Militants as Netanyahu Warns of Long War”

WaPo: “Both Sides Reeling.” pic.twitter.com/h2XQgCnmCb

— Yascha Mounk (@Yascha_Mounk) October 8, 2023

Right now the West itself is engaged in a form of civilizational suicide, based on an unwarranted notion that we can dispose of civilizational discipline and liberate our basest desires, and at the same time pretend that expecting civilized behavior from others is a form of oppression.

Both tendencies could lead us into a dark age, where civilized countries reject the conditions that made our civilization possible, and also indulge the worst impulses of those cultures hell-bent on destroying what we have built. Our most prestigious cultural institutions are becoming toxic.

This statement by a bunch of Harvard student groups saying that Israel is "entirely responsible" and "the only one to blame" leaves me shaking my head. Sure, criticize Israeli policies, but excusing Hamas is so absurd it veers into self-caricature. https://t.co/YiTSq0hvOD

— Nicholas Kristof (@NickKristof) October 8, 2023

Barbarism is the default condition of mankind, not civilized behavior and progress. The modern Left embraces the barbarism of the worst outside the West while fighting the preconditions for civilization within the West.

Israel, with all its human flaws, is a small outpost of civilization in a neighborhood filled with barbarians. Right now the barbarians have broken through the gates, and it is the obligation of everybody who is a friend of civilization to support them. Not because their culture is perfect, but because it is civilized.

Muslims, Arabs, and indeed people of all races are capable of being civilized, which also means that there are no excuses for not striving to be. And that we should quit making excuses for the worst excesses that erupt from their barbarity.

Race, religion, or even a real or imagined history of oppression is no excuse for being barbarians–and should be no shield to facing the consequences of being one.