Justus For All

Michael J. Totten interviews a moderate Shia cleric, Sayyed Mohammad Ali El Husseini, in a Hezbollah section of Lebanon.  You definately need to read the whole thing, it is a breath of hope for those of us desperately looking for a successful and peaceful Middle East.  Here aree a few quotes:

“First of all,” he said, “I am a peace defender. I have faith in peace. I am against the wars and the violence because of my faith. Any violence, any terrorism.”

…

“I hope that my voice will be heard in the world,” Husseini said, “to separate between the two lines, the devil line, the killing line, the bad thoughts, terrorism, and the peaceful line, peace and love, living in dignity, all of that. I also hope that the State Department, and other people who can arrange this, if they would invite me and some of my friends to discuss the situation here in Lebanon. They think the Shia people here in Lebanon are all on Nasrallah’s side. That is not right.”

…

There are plenty of people among the Christians and the Muslims, Michael, who defend Christianity and Islam without knowing what Christianity and Islam are. Terrorism is not Islamic. Islam prohibits it. Osama bin Laden, Al Qaeda, the Taliban, the Muslim Brotherhood – Islam is innocent of them. Everyone calling for damage, killing, and blood is not from the religion. It is not from God. This is from the devil.”

There is plenty more.   Husseini also make a very good point about why the violent are succeeding that I think we as individuals and as nations really need to consider:

“The terrorists and bloody movements get support,” Husseini said. “Because my movement is peaceful and non-violent we don’t have anybody supporting us.”

He is referring here to support from outside Lebanon. Syria and Iran have never supported peaceful movements in Lebanon, and Westerners are mostly oblivious to fact that peaceful Muslim movements there (both Sunni and Shia) even exist.

“Hopefully you can help,” he said. “We need support. What did Hezbollah do to become popular up until now? They had four hospitals in the dahiyeh. They had 30 madrassas, or schools. They had 30 foundations for supporting work for the people. Also they bring engineers, doctors, and they have plenty of money. They have a TV channel, radio, newspapers, soldiers. They are a country inside a country, a government inside a government. They have all the money. They have the force to do this. They pushed so hard to help the people that all the poor Shia and some of the rich support them. Also, in the South the same situation. They built hospitals there, and also in Baalbeck. All the Shia places where there are many people they spend money, money, money, money, money. Hezbollah pays for the people to build and repair their houses. So the two reasons are money and services. They use those to gather the people around them.”

I am not sure what the best way to counter this.  Certainly it seems to me that private individuals and governments could contribute directly to people like Sayyed Husseini and working to get the governments of places like Iraq and Lebannon better able to provide for their own people as well helps.  It is certainly true that their is always more money for the violent then the peaceful though, given that it should hardly surprise us that so many are violent.

Certainly this interview has given me a lot of food for thought.  I hope that members of the Bush administration read Tottens site and realize what a potentially powerful ally they have here.

Also, I should point out that Totten’s work is entirely funded by reader contributions.  If this article isn’t worth a few bucks to you, I can’t imagine what would be.