MAURITANIA NOT THE THIRD MUSLIM NATION TO ESTABLISH DIPLOMATIC RELATIONS WITH ISRAEL
by Dr. Asher Eder
Jewish Co-Chairman, Islam-Israel Fellowship, Root & Branch Association
JERUSALEM, Yom Shlishi (Third Day - "Tuesday"), 5
Tevet, 5760 (Christian Date: December 14, 1999) (Muslim Date: Ninth
Month, Sixth Day, 1420), Root & Branch:
In a Jerusalem Post article
entitled "Mauritania, Israel Establish Relations" (October 29, 1999), the
author states that Mauritania "yesterday became the third Arab country to
establish full diplomatic relations with Israel".
While we welcome the establishment of diplomatic relations between
Mauritania and Israel, this statement must be corrected.
Mauritania is NOT an ETHNIC ARAB country. It is a MUSLIM country with a
NON-ARAB majority (as, for example, are Morocco and Turkey).
Nor is Mauritania even the third MUSLIM country "to establish full
diplomatic relations with Israel" (following Egypt and Jordan).
The Mauritanian Ambassador to Israel will have been preceded at his post by
the ambassadors to Israel of the NON-ETHNIC ARAB MUSLIM nations of Central
Asia: Kazakstan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.
The Uzbek Ambassador to Israel, Mr. Rustam Issaev, has stated: "We Uzbeks
rejoice that the Jewish People has returned to the Land of Israel after
2000 years of exile, in fulfillment of both Biblical and Qur'anic prophecies."
Turkey, another non-ethnic Arab country with a Muslim majority, has
maintained diplomatic relations with Israel for years. So has Nigeria,
Africa's most populous and powerful nation.
In Tel Aviv there is a Liason Office of the Kingdom of Morocco (non-ethnic
Arab Muslim), an Interests Office of the Republic of Tunisia (non-ethnic
Arab Muslim) and a Trade Representation Office of the Sultanate of Oman
(ethnic Arab Muslim).
Abdurrahman Wahid, the new president of Indonesia, the world's most
populous Muslim nation (non-ethnic Arab), also wants Indonesia to establish
diplomatic relations with Israel. This upsets Indonesian and other Islamic
fundamentalists, who would rather wage a worldwide holy war (jihad) against
the Jewish State.
Which comes to the core of the problem.
In my treatise "Peace is Possible Between Ishmael and Israel According to
the Qur'an", which I wrote many years ago and which carries a Foreword by
the eminent Muslim scholar, Shaykh Prof. Abdul Hadi Palazzi, Secretary
General of the Italian Muslim Association, I showed that the Islamic
fundamentalist doctrine of Jihad against Israel has no sound foundation in
the Qur'an.
Properly understood, the Qur'an could help pave the way to true peace
between Muslims and Jews in Israel and between Israel and Muslim nations,
based on an enlightened understanding of the teachings of Muhammed.
The poisonous Jihad psychosis MUST be overcome for TRUE peace to prevail.
As long as the Jihad psychosis festers freely in the (primarily ethnic
Arab) Muslim fundamentalist mind, nice dreams about a Benelux-style
confederation between Jordan, Israel and a Palestinian nation (as outlined
by Abba Eban on page A8 of same edition), bolstered by compromise after
compromise, and retreat from red line to red line, will be an elegant
exercise in national suicide gleefully applauded by Muslim fundamentalist
and European Jew-haters (anti-semites), G-d forbid.
Shalom from Jerusalem,
Dr. Asher Eder