Aug. 9, 2001

MARINA DEL REY, CA--The Palestinians are the initiators of force, an indiscriminate violence in which they do not care whom they kill, whether soldier or child, said Professor Edwin A. Locke, a senior fellow at the Ayn Rand Institute. Israel, in contrast, is acting in self-defense, in retaliation for such terrorism; and its response is aimed at those responsible for the violence.

It is an utter perversion for the tribalist Palestinians to claim that they are acting in defense of their rights, when their aim is to obliterate rights--the rights of Israelis as well as of Arabs, said Dr. Locke. Virtually every Arab country is a monarchy, theocracy or military dictatorship (like the military dictatorship of the Palestinian leaders). Israel is the only country in that entire region that recognizes individual rights. The two sides in this conflict, to put it mildly, are not morally equivalent.

The only way this conflict can be resolved, short of all-out war, is for a radical change in philosophy on the part of the Palestinians, continued Locke. They need to choose individual rights and a free society--as their core political principles. If they don't, they will bring about only further death and destruction.