Comment 1: Even decorum can be approached with ideological passion, and that the desire to remain above the fray, to remain pure, can often be quite hypocritical. For change cannot be wrought out from High Heaven, that’s why “gods” always had interlocutors on the ground and why they often descended there themselves. Change can only be wrought out from within the fray, at the risk of ending up with a guilty conscience.
Comment 2: Robert Fisk says Western leaders are “cowardly” and that “ordinary people, activists,” are taking “decisions to change events.” I say Western leaders were cowardly too when they embraced Bashar Al-Assad in Paris in July 2008, right when his troops were busy perpetrating a massacre against political dissidents in the Saydnaya Prison. Everybody knew about it, nobody cared. But, in a world where Western leaders are cowards, and, Eastern leaders, for the most part, are thugs, there is indeed room and need for “ordinary people, activists, to take decisions to change events.” Unfortunately, to many people, you’re only portrayed as a hero when you adopt this philosophy vis-à-vis Israel. You adopt it vis-à-vis the authoritarian rulers of your country and you’re more often seen as a trouble maker and a nuisance.
The Ammar Abdulhamid Archive 