Terrorists and Relativists

One of the greatest destructive forces on our society and on our ability and will to fight the War on Terror is the moral relativism of the Left. For them, all cultures are equal. Their constant refrain to the condemnation of Islamist terrorism is that we are just as bad (if not worse); we have racism, and inequality, and violence. Ralph Peters challenges these notions, specifically relating to the recent church bombings in Iraq. The main difference he cites is in the society's acceptance of these outrages.

Apologists for terror will even point out that America has had its share of hate graffiti scrawled on the walls of mosques or synagogues. The difference is that we don't welcome it. Hate crimes repulse us. We prosecute. In the Middle East, they applaud (while in Europe they quietly snicker).

We've had our church bombings, too. Forty years ago, four little girls were killed in Alabama. We are — rightly — ashamed of it to this day. But we didn't celebrate the Ku Klux Klan's terrorism. We broke the KKK and changed America.

This is what differentiates cultures. While we condemn attacks on innocents, the Islamists, as well as the supposedly "mainstream" and "moderate" Arabs of the Middle East, are at best silent, and oftentimes find some reason to validate these slaughters. The only way towards progress for them is to realize that such barbarity will bring them nothing but continuing despotism and misery.

Even in wartime, our soldiers went to great lengths to spare religious facilities, despite their cynical use by terrorist criminals. Nor did the Israelis destroy the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem when Palestinian militants used it as a bunker.

Relativists may whine all they want, but such restraint is the hallmark of a superior civilization — cultures are not all equal.

One way or another, the future will be shaped by the forces of terror — either because Muslims embrace their madness and the comforting addiction to blame, or because populations, beginning in Iraq, reject the cult of hatred and human sacrifice the forces of terror revived within Islam.

A quarter century ago, violence between Christians and Muslims tore apart Lebanon, the loveliest country in the Middle East. The terrorists hope to recreate that "success" in the streets of Baghdad. And we can't stop them. It's up to the people of liberated Iraq.