Is The Middle Just To Different;Can’t We Just Get Along? Essay, Research Paper

Glen Gemeniano

COM100

12-1-98

Persuasive rebuttal speech

I am refuting my previous speech where I tried to persuade you that the United States didn’t need to take military action aganst Iraq, because by doing so we would be imposing our value system upon them. I felt I needed to refute my previous speech, because It is important to understand the whole situation before drawing a conclusion.In _______’s speech he introduced the issue of terrorism.In his speech he argued that the Iraqi crisis wasn’t about the United States trying to impose it’s values upon the Middle Eastern People but rather a situation that endangered our national security. I agree with ________that the problem in the Middle East is terrorism, but it’s not their actions that are the root of their problem but rather their system of belief. To understand how they believe you must first understand the situation in which they are in.

source(cnn interactive)

Ok imagine yourself growing up in a world where there has been constant war for centuries, because of conflicting religious beliefs. People pray often and go to temple daily. You would probably grow up to be very religious and strong in your faith.

In Iraq and in Iran this is the setting. Iran and Iraq are Muslim countries.

source(World Assembly of Muslim Youth Web site)

The let’s take for example the Muslim religion which calls for it’s people to pray regularly, fast, give charity, and to convert others to the religion of Islam.Some of fundamentalists do the highest form of worship and that is Jihad. Jihad means”struggle” or others put it “holy war” as written about in the Koran is the Jihad which is the converting of non-believers to the religion of Islam. By doing this they seek to obtain God’s blessing of paradise. Islamic terrorist are Islamic fundamentalist who are also very devout in their beliefs.

When Islamic fundamentalist took over Iran during the Iranian revolution it was it was not contested by any other nation because it was seen as a fulfillment of the prophecy written in the Koran which said” The state the adopts the ideology of Islam bears the responsibility of carrying to new lands”.

source(abcnews.com)

One of the Islamic fundamentalist who fought on the front lines of the Iranian revolution was the billionaire Osama Bin Ladin. He is the most wanted man in the world having been suspected in connection with the bombings of the world trade center and the U.S. embassies in Sudan + Lybia. This man has a great deal of influence amongst many muslims here in America as well as in the middle east. He issued a fatwa a holy order for muslim people to kill all americans during his interview with Oliver Miller of ABCNEWS somewhere in Afganistan.

evidence

When he did this he endangered our way of life by calling upon all the people of islam to target us. Whether or not they are an fundamentalist who strictly adheres to the teachings of the Koran or a muslim who has inspired by the Iranian revolution that you join the fundamentalist movement which is to bomb major American metropolitan places.

Because you don’t know if your muslim neighbor for years might one day come knocking at your door with rifle in hand coming to kill you, That example might be a little exaggerated but what if he were one of those muslims who actually took his words seriously. Although most arabians living in the United States aren’t fundamentalist, but an average American would not be able distinguish one.

The next one country will possibly be Iraq, because it’s defenses are only at 8% of what it was during the Gulf War, because UNSCOM destroyed most of them during the last 7 years and it wouldn’t be hard to gather support form the muslims within Iraq who are fed up with Saddam’s insults. It’s the ideal time to take-over Iraq, because it is weak and vulnerable. They are vulnerable because the people of Iraq are poor and hungry. They would not think twice about revolting against Saddam. Saddam is ruling Iraq for his own selfish reasons.

(source London Gazeteer)

An interview with Abbas Al Janabi ,the Iraqi defector who was the former secretary of UDAY Hussein who is Saddam’s son who is also the head of department of General Welfare.

” Uday is the sole beneficary of the U.N.Sanctions, and he is also the biggest oil smuggler in Iraq”

“Uday indirectly owns about fifty vessels that are used for smuggling oil through the Gulf, using Iranian frontmen. He pays approximately one hundred dollars for each ton exported. In addition, Uday uses a fleet of trucks to smuggle oil to Turkey, coordinating his activities with certain Kurds. ”

It shows that Saddam is letting many millions of Iraqi’s die for his own greed.

Because Sddam is benefiting from the sanctions he would not let Islamic Saddam would not let Islamic fundamentalist take-over Iraq voluntarily.

In my previous speech I said that the Iraq and Iran had the 2nd and 3rd largest oil supply respectively. If a future Iranian invasion of Iraq were to happen and Iran won then it would control the world’s largest oil supply and be able to to jack-up prices causing economies to tumble. Many countries hold oil concession sin Iran ie. Russia, France,United States, Britain.

Iran could easily takeover Iraq because Iraqi people would not support a leader who mistrated them for the last 7 years. Most people in Iraq are muslims already so they would invite the fundamentalist movement in Iraq.

It would cause such terrorist leader’s such as Osama Bin Ladi to have more power, because it influence many muslims to become involved in the fundmentalist movement. The exaggeratted statement I gave earlier about your muslim neighbor shooting you will become much more of a possibility.

From a few fundamentalist grew millions. They rule the countries of Afganistan and Iran. The muslim fundamentalist threat is very dangerous, because many middle eastern people are being converted to the religion that has changed from a religion of peace into one of war. Other Islamic fundmentalist argue that they don’t force other people to the religion. In the Koran it states” Had God not checked one set of people by means of another, the earth would indeed have been full of mischief; but God is full of bounty to all the worlds” (2:251). ”

We can’t attack Iran because most of Europe’s oil comes from Iran and would be outraged if the United States were to take such action. We can’t take-over Iran but only protect the rest of the middle eastern countries from further Islamic invasion.

Most of you would agree that by causing our economy to tumble and the destruction of many American buildings would be seen as nothing less than as affecting our way of life. The American consitution defines an individual’s rights only extends to where somone else’s begins. Islamic terrorist bombing of World Trade Center and Pan American Flight 103 are violation of our rights, because they are killing us.A take-over of Iraq would cause paranoia of Arabian desent in the United States as portrayed in the movie “seige”.

This how one author described his view of the Islamic fundamental movement in Iran.

Another theme of the new fundamentalism has been an attempt to get Islamic history back on the right tack and to make the umma [Muslim community] effective and strong once again. The Iranian revolution was not just an atavistic return to the past, but an attempt to impose decent values in Iran again. — p. 265

If their religion our value system rationalize such acts as bombing the World Trade Center and U.S. embassies then something is wrong with their beliefs.