Moral Compass Instability

It’s a long time since I’ve felt disturbed by anything. Not the soldiers in Iraq, not the Taliban in Afghanistan, not the Chinese in Tibet, not the present in Congo and Burundi, not the past in Rwanda, not Northern Ireland when I was growing up. I care, of course, in some abstract and rather comfortably detached sense but I’m not disturbed by it. These days I feel sick to my stomach, some kind of wrenching feeling right down deep. Why?

Is it because I have people I was close to as colleagues who have returned to their native Beirut? Is it because my lover’s family live in Tel Aviv?

It’s all of this, of course I worry and think about the news in a totally different way these days. Its no longer just news as a commodity to be consumed, as the people involved are no longer abstractions. They are K, a business consultant I’d bonded with while he was in Kigali. He told me how he and his wife were trying to start a family. They are A, who liked to make puzzle books. And they are D, the four year old girl I hope someday to meet. Now that they are real, the news is no longer news, it is raw and visceral and disturbing.

But there’s something more than the personal connection which disturbs me. That connection drove me to search for information, background and opinion on the current Israel-Lebanon crisis, from various sources. The last thing I did was check out one of my favourite surfing spots, an Irish citizen journalism site. Among all the articles and comments, it occurred to me that one of the reasons I was so disturbed was my own lack of ability to be polemic on any side. When faced with events such as have been unfolding in the last few days in the middle-east, there is a kind of comfort in strong opinions. In the moral maze and pervading murkiness, strong feelings and beliefs give us direction and a sense of purpose, if not a sense of righteousness. They also give us a sense of community, this indefinable sense of unity with others holding the same beliefs and opinions. It makes us feel better.

In younger days I was given to battling on many fronts and had quite defined views. These days things are less clear. But even going back a few years I despaired of Middle East politics. I shared a house with a North African Muslim guy, we were and still are very close. I was friends with a half-American, half-Israeli Jewish guy who I liked a lot. They never really talked to each other but they both talked to me. Neither was in the least bit extreme, they were very open minded, intelligent, educated people and in their opinions of a post 9/11 world, I found they were both correct and both a little paranoid in their interpretations of international events. My overriding conclusion in those days was that I was glad I didn’t have to sort out the Middle East mess.

And in this analysis, I was looking at the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in isolation. I did not have to factor in any other alliances or look at the broader global context. I had started to see back then, that which has become very obvious after working in Rwanda : In the world of real-politic there are no absolutes – the more knowledge you have the less you conclusions you can make…or at least the less you can be decisive on right and wrong. This is somehow the antithesis of scientific premise and although I accept it, it doesn’t sit well with me.

And it seems now that the real loss of innocence is not to discover that there are horrors in the world, but discovering that you can no longer be extreme in your opinions either for or against them. You can’t even be extreme in your condemnation of others who don’t take a firm stand…you can see clearly from all sides, you are blinded by it. And all you are left with is utter despair.

God help Israel, god help Lebanon and god help us all.