# If you oppose the corrupt bigotry of Arab tyrants, why support their positions? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [August 5, 2002, 9:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-oppose-the-corrupt-bigotry-of-arab-tyrants-why-support-their-positions/122480 "2002-08-05T21:43:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2002, 3:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-oppose-the-corrupt-bigotry-of-arab-tyrants-why-support-their-positions/122480/121 "2002-08-09T15:03:53Z")
To clarify - The European press uncritically accepted the portrayal of a massacre at Jenin and to this day I think that if you polled a thousand random EU college students, a majority would say that they believes that Israel committed a massacre there. It is my belief (and we’ve debated this ad nauseum in the past) that the European Press and public opinion is biased against the Israeli POV, and that such is reflected in funding with no strings attached. There is little doubt that monies have funnelled through the PA to terror organizations. [http://query.nytimes.com/search/abstract?res=F30B1FF8355D0C748DDDAC0894DA404482](http://query.nytimes.com/search/abstract?res=F30B1FF8355D0C748DDDAC0894DA404482) May 17, 2002 > [@](#): > > [According to a State Department report the] ‘weight of evidence’ suggests Palestinian leaders knew their subordinates were involved in violence and did little to rein them in or punish them; also notes that senior Palestinian officials were involved in unsuccessful effort to smuggle sophisticated weapons into West Bank and Gaza that could have dramatically escalated level of Palestinian violence; semiannual report, sent to Congress as required by law, does not cover most intense period of Palestinian violence and Israeli raids and reprisals of last two months This report did not report conclusive evidence that Arafat himself ordered the terror. But the evidence later was conclusive that he was personally signing off, such was what provoked Bush’s “Arafat must go” stand. [http://query.nytimes.com/search/abstract?res=F60716FF3F5A0C758EDDAF0894DA404482](http://query.nytimes.com/search/abstract?res=F60716FF3F5A0C758EDDAF0894DA404482) > [@](#): > > June 26, 2002 > MIDEAST TURMOIL: DIPLOMACY; AIDES TO BUSH SAY ARAFAT FINANCED A TERRORIST GROUP > Senior administration officials say Pres Bush decided to call for Yasir Arafat’s removal after receiving intelligence information showing that the Palestinian leader had authorized $20,000 payment to Al Aksa Martyrs Brigades, group that claimed responsibility for most recent suicide attack; say that as result, aggressive diplomacy that had originally been expected to follow Bush’s speech, including trip to region by Secretary of State Colin L Powell and Middle East peace conference, will now be delayed Meanwhile the EU funds the PA. [http://www.thejewishpress.com/news\_article.asp?article=1275](http://www.thejewishpress.com/news_article.asp?article=1275) > [@](#): > > EU To Release Funds To Palestinians > Posted 6/26/2002 > LONDON — Israel reacted angrily last week to a European Union decision to release $18 million in aid money to the Palestinian Authority. > > Israel has accused Europe of funding terrorist activities through its payments to the PA. Those payments are designed to replace tax revenues that the Israeli government withheld following the outbreak of the intifada in October 2000. > > After a debate in the European Parliament, the members of the legislature’s foreign affairs and budgetary committees voted to release the latest installment of aid money, which had been on hold pending an EU investigation into Israel’s accusations. > > “We have found no evidence of EU funds being used for any purposes other than that for which they were intended,” said EU External Relations Commission Chris Patten. > > Patten told legislators the European money was helping to prevent the financial collapse of the PA. > > Although the measure passed, several legislators voiced complaints about the PA. > > Armin Laschet, a member of German’s center-right Christian Democrat party, said that Europe should not send **a message to the Palestinians that “whatever happens, however much tensions escalate, Europe carries on paying.”** (Bolding mine) The EU’s position sounds good, superficially- [http://www.europaworld.org/issue62/pattendefends211201.htm](http://www.europaworld.org/issue62/pattendefends211201.htm) > [@](#): > > Two things were crucial: first the Palestinian Authority had to take concrete steps to arrest and bring to justice those who commit terrorist acts. The EU would continue to press for this. It had called clearly for the dismantling of the terrorist networks of Hamas and Djihad. > But secondly, it was equally crucial that Israel withdrew its military forces, stopped the extra-judicial killings; and ended the closures and restrictions on Palestinian people, particularly the senseless bombing of property and infrastructure. … > The European Union had contributed more than EUR 3 billion to the West Bank and Gaza Strip since 1994 and thereby provided some grounds for hope. In recent months it had provided EUR 108 million in budgetary aid to keep the Palestinian Authority alive and in place. But it is clear that the EU prefers to pretend that the PA is other than run by a group of corrupt thugs who line their own pockets while being driven around in luxury cars and funnelling money away from real state building and into a perpetuation of the terror reprisal cycle. Those monies are not contigent upon the the PA taking “concrete steps to arrest and bring to justice those who commit terrorist acts”, they are there no matter what. Now if you have some reason to believe that the EU will do other than continue to fund a corrupt structure that minimally allows money to be funnelled to terrorism, and that takes no concrete actions to stop it, then please educate me … oh, they did threaten over some schoolbooks once … ---
**Author:** ![Sparc](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/65b543/32.png) [@Sparc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sparc)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2002, 3:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-oppose-the-corrupt-bigotry-of-arab-tyrants-why-support-their-positions/122480/122 "2002-08-09T15:27:01Z")
OH Dseid, I won’t contest that. That wasn’t my point, but yours is well made and I agree that more pressure should be applied to the PA and that the EU is being too flippant on this issue. My point was that the PA receives funds from many sources, the EU being only one. Your previous statement made it look like the PA was a subsidiary to the EU, _that_ it is not. Sparc ---
**Author:** ![IzzyR](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/2acd7d/32.png) [@IzzyR](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IzzyR)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2002, 2:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-oppose-the-corrupt-bigotry-of-arab-tyrants-why-support-their-positions/122480/123 "2002-08-13T14:18:34Z")
Just happened to see this, from the AP: [Uprising Leader Marwan Barghouti to Go on Trial Wednesday](http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGAQ8TKTT4D.html) > [@](#): > > After the Palestinian Authority was established in 1994, Israel stopped arresting and putting senior Palestinian figures on trial. The Palestinian Authority was largely permitted to handle law and order issues in areas under its control, an arrangement that held until the Palestinian uprising broke out. And re Barghouti: > [@](#): > > Barghouti has not been accused of carrying out attacks himself, and Israel has not yet detailed the evidence it has against him. But Negbi, the legal analyst, said Israel “chose to put him on trial after they made sure there was impressive evidence.” Time will tell about that, of course. ---
**Author:** ![december](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/838e76/32.png) [@december](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/december)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2002, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-oppose-the-corrupt-bigotry-of-arab-tyrants-why-support-their-positions/122480/124 "2002-08-16T17:11:33Z")
> [@](#): > > Tayseer, as we’ll call him, a 21-year-old Gazan whose constant smile tries to conceal watchfulness, learned early on that to be gay in Palestine is to be a criminal. Three years ago his older brother caught him in bed with a boyfriend. He was beaten by his family, then warned by his father that he’d strangle Tayseer if it ever happened again. > > It happened again a few months later. Word gets around a refugee camp, and a young man he didn’t know invited Tayseer into an orange grove. The next day he received a police summons. At the station Tayseer was told that his sex partner was in fact a police agent whose job is to ferret out homosexuals. If Tayseer wanted to avoid prison, he too would have to become an undercover sex agent, luring gays into orchards and turning them over to the police. > > Tayseer refused to implicate others. He was arrested and hung by his arms from the ceiling. A high-ranking officer he didn’t know arranged for his release and then demanded sex as payback. Tayseer fled Gaza to Tulkarem on the West Bank, but there too he was eventually arrested. He was forced to stand in sewage water up to his neck, his head covered by a sack filled with feces, and then he was thrown into a dark cell infested with insects and other creatures he could feel but not see. (“You slap one part of your body, and then you have to slap another,” he recounts.) During one interrogation, police stripped him and forced him to sit on a Coke bottle. Through the entire ordeal he was taunted by interrogators, jailers, and fellow prisoners for being a homosexual. > > When he was released a few months later, Tayseer crossed into Israel. He now lives illegally in an Arab Israeli village and works in a restaurant. His dream is to move to Tel Aviv. “No one there cares if you’re gay,” he says. [http://thenewrepublic.com/doc.mhtml?i=20020819&s=halevi081902](http://thenewrepublic.com/doc.mhtml?i=20020819&s=halevi081902) ---
**Author:** ![capacitor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e47774/32.png) [@capacitor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/capacitor)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2002, 11:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-oppose-the-corrupt-bigotry-of-arab-tyrants-why-support-their-positions/122480/125 "2002-08-16T23:21:57Z")
_The New Republic_ cares about gay people all of a sudden??? Hah ha ha. december you are aware that the magazine is the #1 advocate of Palestinian and Arabic cleansing. ---
**Author:** ![december](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/838e76/32.png) [@december](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/december)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2002, 12:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-oppose-the-corrupt-bigotry-of-arab-tyrants-why-support-their-positions/122480/126 "2002-08-17T00:59:23Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by capacitor \* > \*\*_The New Republic_ cares about gay people all of a sudden??? Hah ha ha. > > december you are aware that the magazine is the #1 advocate of Palestinian and Arabic cleansing. \*\* This response isn’t just a river in Egypt. _The New Republic_ is a liberal magazine, not conservative, but they are demonized in order to ignore their message. What I find striking is the widespread unwillingness to criticize Palestinian culture. I could understand someone posting that they deplore Palestinian homophobia and other negative aspects of their culture, but justice demands supporting the Palestinian position regardless. However, I see no such criticsms. There is an unwritten political correctness rule that criticizing the culture of certain groups automatically brings forth a charge of “racist.” Maybe the Palestinians are one of these groups. ---
**Author:** ![capacitor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e47774/32.png) [@capacitor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/capacitor)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2002, 12:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-oppose-the-corrupt-bigotry-of-arab-tyrants-why-support-their-positions/122480/127 "2002-08-17T12:45:51Z")
Oops, got a little confused with _The Weekly Standard_. These news magazines are not as distinctive as they claim to be anymore. Oh well. ---
**Author:** ![DMC](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dmc/32/18049_2.png) [@DMC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DMC)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2002, 4:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-oppose-the-corrupt-bigotry-of-arab-tyrants-why-support-their-positions/122480/128 "2002-08-17T16:06:29Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by capacitor \* > \*\*_The New Republic_ cares about gay people all of a sudden??? Hah ha ha. > > december you are aware that the magazine is the #1 advocate of Palestinian and Arabic cleansing. \*\* While you’re incorrect on their stance toward gays, you’re not too far off on their analysis of the middle east situation. Of course, when the boss is Jewish, you’d hardly expect them to take the other side. And december, they’re not considered to be a far-left bastion of liberal thought anymore, except by themselves and a few conservatives. With the current staff, including the fairly new second-in-command, they are all over the map in their views, with one exception, that being their middle east stance. An institution’s desire to be associated with a certain mindset doesn’t make it so. The Cato Institute would like you to believe that they are “market liberals”, but most of us just refer to them as “bought.” ---
**Author:** ![december](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/838e76/32.png) [@december](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/december)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2002, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-oppose-the-corrupt-bigotry-of-arab-tyrants-why-support-their-positions/122480/129 "2002-08-17T16:31:23Z")
I again find it noteworthy that **DMC** took the trouble to point out that the New Republic is not _far_ left (although nobody said they were) and that they’re pro-Israel. However **DMC** cannot spare a sentence to deplore the bad treatment of gays by the Palestinian Authority or to acknowledge the better treatment by Israel. If someone posted an anti-gay _statement_ by Jerry Falwell, a dozen posters would immediately pile on (and rightly so.) But, faced with anti-gay _torture_ by Arafat’s government, there’s just silence. Does being “open-minded” and not pro-Israel require closing one’s eyes to what the Arafat regime actually does? ---
**Author:** ![Sparc](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/65b543/32.png) [@Sparc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sparc)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2002, 4:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-oppose-the-corrupt-bigotry-of-arab-tyrants-why-support-their-positions/122480/130 "2002-08-17T16:41:34Z")
I don’t think you’re going to manage this one december. Nobody wants to be hard balled into taking a stance… that doesn’t mean everyone disagrees with you, it just means that your position is getting what it deserves… no comment. Sparc ---
**Author:** ![december](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/838e76/32.png) [@december](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/december)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2002, 4:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-oppose-the-corrupt-bigotry-of-arab-tyrants-why-support-their-positions/122480/131 "2002-08-17T16:52:49Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Sparc \* > \*\*I don’t think you’re going to manage this one december. Nobody wants to be hard balled into taking a stance… that doesn’t mean everyone disagrees with you, it just means that your position is getting what it deserves… no comment. > Sparc \*\* **"Nobody wants to be hard balled into taking a stance"** – That’s a good point, **Sparc** – _now._ However, when the link and quote were first posted, there had not yet been pressure to criticize the PA’s treatment of Tayseer. Nobody had been “hard balled” yet. What I see on this thread is no criticism of the PA _without_ pressure and no criticism of the PA _with_ pressure. In short, no criticism of the PA. ---
**Author:** ![Sparc](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/65b543/32.png) [@Sparc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sparc)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2002, 4:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-oppose-the-corrupt-bigotry-of-arab-tyrants-why-support-their-positions/122480/132 "2002-08-17T16:56:24Z")
The OP was already perceived as a pretty hard serve right in the solar plexus of many members. ---
**Author:** ![DMC](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dmc/32/18049_2.png) [@DMC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DMC)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2002, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-oppose-the-corrupt-bigotry-of-arab-tyrants-why-support-their-positions/122480/133 "2002-08-17T17:22:45Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by december \* > **I again find it noteworthy that DMC took the trouble to point out that the New Republic is not _far_ left (although nobody said they were) and that they’re pro-Israel.** Actually, you’ve used them in the past to try and give the viewpoint of the opposite stance you took. Anyone who is truly the opposite of you is about as **farrrrrrrrr** left as I can imagine. While I don’t agree that that describes their viewpoints, your prior use of them in that fashion led me to believe that you did. > [@](#): > > **However DMC cannot spare a sentence to deplore the bad treatment of gays by the Palestinian Authority or to acknowledge the better treatment by Israel.** The day a poster on this board puts up a thread titled: “Resolved: Gay treatment by the Palestinians is fully justified”, is the day I’ll tear them a new one. I deplore many things, but I don’t make it a habit to put a “me too” post in every thread remarking on them, nor do I list them all in an encyclopedic sized post. It’s called Great Debates, not Great Agreements. I have stated many times that I find fault with the Palestinians in many areas, but the difference between you and I is that I also find fault with many Israeli policies. For the record, regarding your thoughts on the Palestinian’s treatment of gays, I’ll have to say “me too”, which is more than you’ve said regarding the bigotry of the Israelis against their own Arab citizens. Bigotry sucks shriveled donkey balls, but both sides in the Middle East are guilty of it. One proudly claims not to be, and uses that to garner support, so I argue against their position. > [@](#): > > \*\*Does being “open-minded” and not pro-Israel require closing one’s eyes to what the Arafat regime actually does? \*\* No, but supporting Israel in everything it does does require a lowering of the lids. Do I really have to link to every single post I’ve made denouncing this or that regarding the Palestinians and Arafat? Most of them have been in your threads, so if you’d actually read them, you’d be fully aware of where I stand. If you haven’t read them, then at least I have a better understanding of why you seem to never answer most of the questions that are raised. ---
**Author:** ![DMC](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dmc/32/18049_2.png) [@DMC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DMC)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2002, 5:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-oppose-the-corrupt-bigotry-of-arab-tyrants-why-support-their-positions/122480/134 "2002-08-17T17:27:55Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by december \* > **I again find it noteworthy that DMC took the trouble to point out that the New Republic is not _far_ left (although nobody said they were) and that they’re pro-Israel.** Actually, you’ve used them in the past to try and give the viewpoint of the opposite stance you took. Anyone who is truly the opposite of you is about as **farrrrrrrrr** left as I can imagine. While I don’t agree that that describes their viewpoints, your prior use of them in that fashion led me to believe that you did. > [@](#): > > **However DMC cannot spare a sentence to deplore the bad treatment of gays by the Palestinian Authority or to acknowledge the better treatment by Israel.** The day a poster on this board puts up a thread titled: “Resolved: Gay treatment by the Palestinians is fully justified”, is the day I’ll tear them a new one. I deplore many things, but I don’t make it a habit to put a “me too” post in every thread remarking on them, nor do I list them all in an encyclopedic sized post. It’s called Great Debates, not Great Agreements. I have stated many times that I find fault with the Palestinians in many areas, but the difference between you and I is that I also find fault with many Israeli policies. For the record, regarding your thoughts on the Palestinian’s treatment of gays, I’ll have to say “me too”, which is more than you’ve said regarding the bigotry of the Israelis against their own Arab citizens. Bigotry sucks shriveled donkey balls, but both sides in the Middle East are guilty of it. One proudly claims not to be, and uses that to garner support, so I argue against their position. > [@](#): > > \*\*Does being “open-minded” and not pro-Israel require closing one’s eyes to what the Arafat regime actually does? \*\* No, but supporting Israel in everything it does does require a lowering of the lids. Do I really have to link to every single post I’ve made denouncing this or that regarding the Palestinians and Arafat? Most of them have been in your threads, so if you’d actually read them, you’d be fully aware of where I stand. If you haven’t read them, then at least I have a better understanding of why you seem to never answer most of the questions that are raised. ---
**Author:** ![ethic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/977dab/32.png) [@ethic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ethic)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2002, 6:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-oppose-the-corrupt-bigotry-of-arab-tyrants-why-support-their-positions/122480/135 "2002-08-17T18:01:39Z")
> [@](#): > > **December** : > What I find striking is the widespread unwillingness to criticize Palestinian culture. Aright, good december. Again, your showing your true colour. It’s not only the PA want to criticize, but Palestinian culture per se. Your point seems to be to dehumanize Palestinians, demonstrate how they are inferior in all regards. Their culture is so moraly reprehensible that defending their right to self-determination is defending everything one aught to be against. You will latch on to any information you can find to achieve this goal. I think Sparc has already mentioned this: if you were to judge entire peoples by single incident of gay bashing, few would come away clean. Certainly, its especially troubling that the authority that is supposed to defend the public was involved. But the problem is that the Rule of Law is so unestablished in Palestine that there are few checks on what individuals in a position of authority do. They are free to live out their darkest fantasies. Which is certainly very troubling. But that the Rule of Law is not esablished is not a consequence of the degenerate nature of Palestinian culture! If the Rule of Law was not more established in America, we would still be lunching blacks on street corners and shoving broomsticks up every gay person found showing their sexuality in public. So the question is: how does one begin the arduous process of establishing the Rule of Law in Palestine? I’m beyond supsecting that “sand nigger” is a word that might accidentally slip from your lips. Have you ever even been in a country with a culture of Arabic origin? ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2002, 6:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-oppose-the-corrupt-bigotry-of-arab-tyrants-why-support-their-positions/122480/136 "2002-08-17T18:34:45Z")
I think we should create a new variant of Godwin’s law, for people who must constantly invoke racism. The use of the term ‘sand nigger’ is particularly offensive, as it seeks to associate anyone critical with the culture in the Arab world or Palestine in particular with a disgustingly virulent form of racism. I’ll be happy to criticize Palestinian culture, thank you. And I don’t have a racist bone in my body. The culture in Palestine has nothing to do with ethnicity or skin color or any other defining group characteristic, any more than Amish culture is determined by the white skin color of its main adherents. Palestinian culture is the result of, A) a long, difficult occupation, B) A state of almost constant lawlessless due to the ineffective policing of the PA, C) Active promotion of hatred by Palestinian leaders over many years. D) the lack of a solid economy, coupled with heavy financial aid from the rest of the world, much of which comes with strings attached (i.e. money for suicide bombers from Iraq and Saudi Arabia). After all this time, I’m convinced that Palestinian culture is sick. Children play suicide bomber games. Thousands cheer in the streets when innocent children die in Israel or the United States. Non-conformists are persecuted, tortured, and killed. None of this is defensible in the slightest. ---
**Author:** ![milroyj](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a88e57/32.png) [@milroyj](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/milroyj)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2002, 7:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-oppose-the-corrupt-bigotry-of-arab-tyrants-why-support-their-positions/122480/137 "2002-08-17T19:04:09Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by ethic \* > **If the Rule of Law was not more established in America, we would still be lunching blacks on street corners** I don’t think we ever had much of a cannabilism problem in America, Rule of Law notwithstanding. ---
**Author:** ![december](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/838e76/32.png) [@december](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/december)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2002, 7:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-oppose-the-corrupt-bigotry-of-arab-tyrants-why-support-their-positions/122480/138 "2002-08-17T19:36:15Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by ethic \* > I’m beyond supsecting that “sand nigger” is a word that might accidentally slip from your lips. I had earlier posted, _“There is an unwritten political correctness rule that criticizing the culture of certain groups automatically brings forth a charge of “racist.” Maybe the Palestinians are one of these groups.”_ Thank you, **ethic** for so dramatically confirming the practice of demonizing anyone who criticizes any aspect of Palestinian culture. Perhaps some of you felt intimidated. Maybe you chose not to criticize Palestinian homophobia, because you didn’t want to be called a racist. > [@](#): > > Have you ever even been in a country with a culture of Arabic origin? No. I would have liked to visit some when I was in the Middle East, but most of them would have barred me at that time. I’m Jewish and my passport stamp showed that I had visited Israel. ---
**Author:** ![december](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/838e76/32.png) [@december](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/december)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2002, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-oppose-the-corrupt-bigotry-of-arab-tyrants-why-support-their-positions/122480/139 "2002-08-18T20:07:26Z")
According to Palestinian, ex-treasurer, [Jawad Ghussein](http://www.nola.com/newsflash/international/index.ssf?/newsflash/get_story.ssf?/cgi-free/getstory_ssf.cgi?a0459_BC_Palestinians-Corrupti&&news&newsflash-international), Arafat moved up to $8 million to his personal account every month and was aware of widespread corruption. So, why does the EU continue to give Arafat money without adequate controls? ---
**Author:** ![DMC](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dmc/32/18049_2.png) [@DMC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DMC)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2002, 8:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-oppose-the-corrupt-bigotry-of-arab-tyrants-why-support-their-positions/122480/140 "2002-08-18T20:42:27Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by december \* > \*\*According to Palestinian, ex-treasurer, [Jawad Ghussein](http://www.nola.com/newsflash/international/index.ssf?/newsflash/get_story.ssf?/cgi-free/getstory_ssf.cgi?a0459_BC_Palestinians-Corrupti&&news&newsflash-international), Arafat moved up to $8 million to his personal account every month and was aware of widespread corruption. > > So, why does the EU continue to give Arafat money without adequate controls? \*\* Because, as you say “according to…” These are allegations, not facts. The documents he has that “proves” it haven’t been cited. For the record, they accuse him of stealing $6.5 million. Would you also have us believe that fact, since it’s also been alleged? Some of us would like some evidence, no matter which side it supports. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-oppose-the-corrupt-bigotry-of-arab-tyrants-why-support-their-positions/122480.md?page=6) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-you-oppose-the-corrupt-bigotry-of-arab-tyrants-why-support-their-positions/122480.md?page=8)