Poverty breeds terrorism. That lie has been one of the most insidious, most destructive lies ever promoted by anti-Western progressives and their meek, sniveling Republican abuse victims. That lie has caused more American lives and resources to be thrown needlessly away than any other lie.
According to the World Bank, approximately 23% of the global population, or 1.8 billion people, live below the poverty line. In the West Bank and Gaza Strip, 29.2% of the population lives below the poverty line, making these populations only slightly more impoverished than the global average (Israel is only barely ahead at 22.0%).
In contrast, countries that fare far worse include Guatemala (59.3%), Zambia (60.0%), Congo (63.0%), Honduras (64.1%), Central African Republic (68.8%) and South Sudan (82.3%), to name a few. By the logic of the lie that poverty breeds terrorism, we should be witnessing far more Hondurans and Congolese stabbing children in parks and plowing their trucks through Christmas markets and NOLA crowds.
Yet of the 1.8 billion poverty-stricken people that the lie tells us should be prime candidates for offing kindergarteners and blowing up gay nightclubs, only a small handful of these ever do engage in terrorism.
Rather, the terrorists almost all hail from the same cultural background.
The terrorists almost all harbor a particularized misogyny and ethnic supremacism.
The terrorists almost all practice the same death cult fundamentalism.
And the terrorists almost all have an identical goal, which is not the alleviation of economic suffering but the subjugation, enslavement, and eventual genocide of literally every other group on the planet.
Had some white supremacist committed an act of terrorism, you can bet his actions wouldn't be blamed on "poverty."
During the press conference following his meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu, President Trump quipped that a way to break the impasse would be to assume stewardship of Gaza to rebuild and create a thriving economic zone. Per the Associated Press, the proposal was "stunning" and "extreme," no doubt leading to many clutched pearl necklaces and smelling salts applied to the journalists present. "They instead can occupy all of a beautiful area with homes and safety, and they can live out their lives in peace and harmony," said Trump. "Create an economic development that will supply unlimited numbers of jobs and housing for the people in the area. Do a real job. Do something different."
Create jobs to foster peace, stability, and prosperity. How stunning. How extreme. Not even Hitler himself was that fascist. Best stick to the tried-and-true status quo, in which Israelis are expected to tolerate mass pogroms on a regular basis in return for a barely acknowledged right to exist.
On its face, the proposal is noble but naïve (more on that below) due to one glaring problem: the terrorists and their "civilian" sympathizers in Gaza don't want jobs. They want to kill infidels. Their handlers and paymasters in Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and Iran, long since unencumbered by "poverty," have for decades used their wealth to spread militant Islam throughout the region and across the globe.
They're happy to start with the closest available targets, Israeli Jews, but once done with them, they will effortlessly switch gears to focus on the Western infidel with whom they're temporarily aligned, to include the Queers for Palestine types, the privileged campus Marxists, and, yes, the short-sighted "conservative" isolationists.
Trump's proposal is improbable. But my gut tells me that Trump knows this full well and, like so many other proposals, this is his opening bid. Trump has made clear that he expects Hamas to be dealt the final blow when they violate the cease-fire. And this economic proposal is thinking outside the box as well as a public display to show the world we're giving Gaza a real opportunity for economic prosperity and peace — if they want it. And when they inevitably show the world that they don't, that's on them, not us. We gave peace a chance.
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Trump's suggestion to relocate Palestinians to other Muslim nations is also part of this opening bid. The Islamic world's "solidarity" with Palestinians is identical to American progressives' "solidarity" with illegal aliens, i.e. solidarity, but from a distance. Trump's relocation hint carries an underlying threat to these Islamic nations: no more interfering from the sidelines without consequence. If you can't guarantee Israel's safety from Palestinians, then we can't guarantee yours. Nice little oil sheikhdom ya got there — shame if 50,000 of your Palestinian "brothers" were to suddenly be dropped off on your shore.
As long as Trump sees the threats and understands the motives for what they are (and I'm convinced he does), I've full confidence in him to use his statements and opening bids as political levers to effect our desired outcomes. But none of us should be lulled into the complacency of misplaced trust. A snake is a snake. Islamic terrorists seek global supremacy, not beachfront condos. Any peace in which the Palestinian people wish to live can only be in a world without Hamas.
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