The region referred to as the "Middle East," i.e., between Europe and the Far East, has long been one of those places that produce more history than can be consumed locally. It is, after all, the birthplace of two of the world's great evangelical religions: Christianity and Islam (the other being Buddhism). It is also the birthplace of civilization. Jared Diamond's marvelous book Guns, Germs, and Steel, provides at least part of the explanation for the last fact. Animals and crops can be exported east and west more easily than north and south, due to climate. The fertile crescent turned out to be the ideal place to gather the greatest collection of herd animals and cultivated crops that powered the rise of the first cities.
Another reason the Middle East ties so much history together is that it is the crossroads between three of the world's most important regions: Europe, East Asia, and Africa. It is no accident that this folding of continents should create a lot of pockets for oil to collect in.
It is Islam, as much as oil, that explains the contemporary importance of the region. Islam has come to be a womb of nihilistic violence that represents the single most serious threat to modern civilization. This is evident enough in Iraq. It is evident also in this weeks most newsworthy political murder. From Time.Com:
The streets of Beirut filled with cars fleeing the city as soon as news spread that one of Lebanon's most prominent Christian politicians, Pierre Gemayel, had been assassinated in the capital. The killing of his uncle, President Bashir Gemayel, in 1982, marked the beginning of a particularly bloody chapter in Lebanon's 15-year Civil War. And the fear now spreading through the country is that this latest attack could usher in a similar period of heightened violence.
Just right now, the birthplace of civilization is a very uncivilized place. Only a few months ago I was far more hopeful that the Middle East might be about to follow the path of India and Japan. Now I have to ask whether a Saddam Hussein, who knew how to skewer all the right people on meat hooks in basements, might not be the best that Lebanon or Iraq can hope for. That is a very bleak thought. But it is hard to avoid thinking it.
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