PrintRamadan is not Christmas
When it's Christmas in America, radio and TV are filled with commercialized versions of peace on earth, good will to men. People watch The Grinch that Stole Christmas or Miracle on 42nd Street. Americans constantly argue whether Christmas is too commercialized, or too religious, or whether it still means anything real. But at least Christmas programming doesn't promote jihad.
It's a sad thing, but apparently Ramadan is different. Even in Jordan, the most peaceful of Arab nations, TV programming during Ramadan promotes paranoid conspiracy theories, straight from European fascism. It
"purports to tell the story of Zionism from 1812 up to the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948, and ... depicts a 'global Jewish government' that is described in the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. It also depicts the notorious blood libel — Jews slaughtering a Christian child to use his blood for Passover matzos."
This may seem like some grotesque joke to us, but even some educated Muslim s actually believe such garbage. Islamist hate propaganda has a straight—line connection to war and killing. And if we've learning nothing else from New York on 9/11, the subway bombing in London, the train bombs in Madrid, Bali , and the like, we should have learned that Islamist hatred is not confined to Israel alone. All infidels are fair targets ——— Hindus in the Kashmir, Jews in Jerusalem, Christians in Lebanon, Shiites in Iraq.
It's all terribly sad. Muslims can be perfectly peaceful, but they are constantly incited to commit war. By keeping the Islamic world in a constant state of feverish paranoia, hate propaganda also blocks normal economic development and even simple rational thought. Perhaps one goal for Islamic reformers, like the government of Jordan, might be to begin changing the meaning of Ramadan for its own citizens.
