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Tina Susman: For woodchuck rescuer, every day is Groundhog Day
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Yochonon Donn: In liberal New York City, fervently-Orthodox Jews may soon be getting a district to call their own
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Katy Hopkins: New budget rules may affect how much money you get for college
January 26, 2012
Ed Koch: To the New York Times, calling for the murder of Jews by those capable of having their incitement taken seriously isn't news
Jeannine Stein: Mental illness struck one in five U.S. adults in 2010: Report
January 25, 2012
Richard Simon: House passes two bills endorsing the use of religious symbols at military memorials
Fred Weir: Putin: Multiethnic Russia cannot survive as a US-style 'melting pot'; must find its own way
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Caroline B. Glick: America lost most in 'Arab Spring'. Sadly, many voters still don't grasp the extent
Warren Richey: Drug criminal scores win in GPS ruling from conservative-leaning high court
Erika Bolstad: Black conservatives gather to talk about gaining strength
January 23, 2012
Melissa Dribben: Jewish voters to play a key role in Florida's Republican primary
Jordan Rau: In quest to grow, Catholic hospital system will announce this morning its break from church
Ali Safi: U.S. envoy gives Taliban terms for peace talks
January 19, 2012
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Frank J. Gaffney Jr.: No-kidding red lines: U.S. response to an Iranian nuke may be bluster, but Israel's won't be
David G. Savage: They sued their principals after slandering them online --- now the cases are headed to the Supreme Court
David Francis: Where to Invest in 2012: With stocks expected to rebound, opportunity abounds for investors
January 13, 2012
Ben Lynfield: Israeli lawmakers move to annex Jewish Judea, one museum at a time
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January 12, 2012
Warren Richey: Landmark Supreme Court ruling a 'resounding win' for religious groups
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Stephen Ceasar: Oklahoma's Islamic law amendment can't go into effect, court rules
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Reza Kahlili: From an ex-CIA spy: US must exploit new split in Iran's Revolutionary Guard
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Michael Doyle: Put through legal hell over dream home, couple fought back hard --- all the way to Supreme Court
January 6, 2012
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January 4, 2012
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January 3, 2012
Tom A. Peter: Release several Taliban leaders from Guantanamo Bay; give them headquarters as confidence-building measure?
Elaine Woo: Thomas T. Johnson, L.A. judge who ruled that Holocaust was a fact, dies at 88
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Jewish World Review
Jan. 4, 2005
/ 23 Teves, 5765
Arab Victories in the Language War
By
Daniel Pipes
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http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
We read that "Prime Minister" Mahmoud Abbas is running in the elections on Sunday to succeed Yasir Arafat as "president" of "Palestine."
Excuse me, but prime minister, according to the Encyclopedia Britannica, means the "head of the executive branch of government in states with a parliamentary system." Despite tens of thousands of references to Abbas as prime minister, he in not a single way fits this description.
Oh, and there is also the small matter of there being no country called Palestine. Arab maps routinely show it in place of Israel. The United Nations recognizes its existence. So too do such telephone companies as France's Bouygues Telecom and Bell Canada. Nonetheless, no such place exists.
One can dismiss use of these terms as symptoms of the same unrealism that has undermined Palestinian war efforts since 1948. But they also promote the Palestinian cause (a polite way of saying, "the destruction of Israel") in a vital way.
In an era when the battle for public opinion has an importance that rivals the clash of soldiers, the Palestinians' success in framing the issues has won them critical support among politicians, editorial writers, academics, street demonstrators, and NGO activists. In the aggregate, these many auxiliaries keep the Palestinian effort alive.
Especially in a long-standing dispute with a static situation on the ground, public opinion has great significance. That's because words reflect ideas — and ideas motivate people. Weapons in themselves are inert; today, ideas inspire people to pick up arms or sacrifice their lives. Software drives hardware.
Israel is winning on the basic geographic nomenclature. The state is known in English as Israel, not the Zionist entity. Its capital is called Jerusalem, not Al-Quds. Likewise, Temple Mount and Western Wall enjoy far more currency than Al-Haram ash-Sharif or Al-Buraq. The separation barrier is more often called a security fence (that keeps out Palestinian suicide bombers) than a separation wall (that brings divided Berlin to mind).
In other ways, however, the Palestinians' wording dominates English-language usage, helping them win the war for public opinion.
- Collaborator means someone who "cooperates treasonably" and brings to mind the French and Norwegian collaborators who betrayed their countries to the Nazis. Yet this term (rather than informant, mole, or agent) universally describes those Palestinians providing Israel with information.
- The refugee status normally applies to someone who "owing to a well-founded fear of being persecuted . . . is outside the country of his nationality," but not to their descendants. In the Palestinian case, however, children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren of refugees also merit refugee status. One demographer estimates that over 95 percent of so-called Palestinian refugees never fled from anywhere. Nonetheless, the term continues to be used, implying that millions of Palestinians have a right to move to Israel.
- A settlement is defined as a small community or an establishment in a new region. Although some Jewish towns on the West Bank and in Gaza have tens of thousands of residents and have existed for nearly four decades, settlement, with its overtones of colonialism, is their nearly universal name.
- Occupied territories implies a Palestinian state existed in 1967, when Israel captured the West Bank and Gaza, which was not the case, making these areas legally disputed territories, not occupied ones.
- Cycle of violence, a term President George W. Bush has adopted ("the cycle of violence has got to end in order for the peace process … to begin"), implies a moral equivalence between the killing of Israeli civilians and Palestinian terrorists. It confuses the arsonist with the fire department.
- The peace camp in Israel — a term that derives from Lenin's usage — refers to those on the Left who believe that appeasing mortal enemies is the only way to end Palestinian aggression. Those in favor of other approaches (such a deterrence) by implication constitute the "war camp." In fact, all Israelis are in the "peace camp" in the sense that all want to be rid of the conflict; none of them aspires to kill Palestinians, occupy Cairo, or destroy Syria.
Arabs may have fallen behind Israel in per capita income and advanced weaponry, but they lead by far on the semantic battlefield. Who, a century back, would have imagined Jews making the better soldiers and Arabs the better publicists?
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Every weekday JewishWorldReview.com publishes what many in Washington and in the media consider "must reading."
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JWR contributor Daniel Pipes is director of the Middle East Forum and the author of several books, most recently, "Miniatures: Views of Islamic and Middle Eastern Politics". (Click HERE to purchase. Sales help fund JWR.).
© 2005, Daniel Pipes
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