Looking at the Arabs

...As a result...

...In the end, The Arab Mind Considered is an unsettling work...

...While some Arab spokesmen deny a deliberate planned campaign, they nonetheless insist on the inevitability of the outcome...

...Readers who like their historiography on straight-er tracks are advised to consult the excellent introductory volumes by George Kirk and Bernard Lewis, among others...

...they really act within a dichotomy between the Realm of Islam and the Realm of War...

...Similarly, the Arab world at present is agog with excitement at the prospect of waging an unopposed oil war against the West...

...Of course, Orientalists have been saying this all along—with about as much success as the handful of Indochina experts had in warning American leaders against projecting our values onto the Vietnamese...

...Yet our most thoughtful foreign policy experts, all the way up to the Secretary of State, habitually propose solutions for the Mideast as if they were dealing with farmers from Iowa...

...frightened by them may be the more appropriate way of putting it...

...Notions of time, objectivity, violence, and culture are polar opposites of our own, not deviations...

...For we view the Arabs as backward...

...Kiernan's shows how much can be accomplished by someone willing to learn...

...This is not because John Laffin and Thomas Kiernan reveal any sensational information about the Arabs that overturns previous knowledge...

...One can hardly escape the ironic conclusion that intimate dialogues —our journalists' and diplomats' most celebrated method of gauging Arab intent—may be the surest way to misunderstanding...

...Especially touching is Kiernan's description of the horrors of Israeli bombing raids in Lebanon (which friends of Israel would rather not see), followed by his dismay over the "bestiality" of the Arabs among themselves (which their friends choose to ignore or deny...

...Devoid of Western meddling, familiar phrases and statements take on an ominous meaning...

...A Libyan Cabinet Minister once told him that "violence is the Moslem's most positive form of prayer...

...Whatever the case, at the moment the Arabs clearly prefer bleeding others to confronting themselves...

...It eagerly anticipates "turning Europe, Japan, the Americas into manufacturing provinces of the new Arab economic empire and the societies of these regions into subservient labor forces...

...Kiernan's objective is to present an Arab version of themselves, and about half of his study is an historical narrative from pre-Islamic days to the present as seen from an Islamic perspective...

...Pointing to the Islamic meshing of the sacred and the secular—so alien to our own idea of separation —Laffin details the wellsprings of the patterns of violence and authority that continue to baffle Westerners...

...Chapters of history alternate with pages of a journal the author kept during an extensive tour of the area...

...These are replete with perceptive sketches of the people, the places and the life...

...they view themselves as a Herren-volk...

...In fact, they merely affirm, albeit competently and provocatively, a wide and old consensus among serious students of the Orient...

...Reviewed by Gil Carl AlRoy Author, "The Kissinger Experience" and "Behind the Middle East Conflict" Consumers of the conventional wisdom on the Middle East, as it is dispensed in the media and even in the prestigious journals, would probably be startled by these two books on the area and its people if they took the trouble to read them...

...The Arabs very effectively conveys the feel and color of the Middle East...

...Kiernan feels that the direct application of American power is necessary to check the Arabs...

...policy makers, one gathers soon enough that "moderate" expressions suggesting acceptance of Israel's existence are actually references to what the Arabs view as a terminal case...

...Yet unlike most popular commentators and commentaries today—and unlike too many government "specialists'* in Near Eastern affairs—they do not assume that political behavior is the same everywhere, and that a political science derived from Western experience by Western minds has global validity...

...And Laffin observes: "For the Arab, violence in itself is consolatory...

...Where Laffin's book stresses the essential inadequacy of current expertise...

...He also offers fascinating insights into the dominance of rote learning in Arab society and the prevalence of "secrets" in Arab conversation...

...Egyptian President Anwar el-Sadat himself, the epitome of pro-Westernism according to our media, told Kiernan bluntly that an Arab takeover of the industrial nations "is already happening.'' Both Laffin and Kiernan are greatly impressed with the weight of atavistic compulsions in the Middle East...

...His discussion of language is useful in clarifying why Western modes of thought are not applicable to the Middle East...

...He does not put words in their mouths, or pressure them into saying things he wishes to hear...

...Summarizing the work of Western and Arab scholars, as well as drawing on extensive personal encounters, Laffin demonstrates in The Arab Mind Considered that the Arab mentality is not a peculiar or backward version of the West's, but rather a mature and radically different way of thinking...

...We see them acting within a framework of international order as taught in our political science courses...

...Kiernan's several conversations with Arabs of various backgrounds, including major politicians, are distinguished from the usual Western-Arab interviews by his willingness to let his interlocuters speak for themselves...

...Despite the optimism of numerous U.S...

...Although better acquainted with the Arab world than most popular writers, Kiernan is above all an intellectually honest reporter...

...Laffin detects a terrible malaise beneath their new appearance of global strength, and he believes that only the Arabs themselves, by facing up to their shortcomings with brutal frankness, can solve the problems he sees lying just below the surface...

...Laffin shows, for example, that the Koranic tradition has established roots of pervasive personal irresponsibility and self-indulgence...