Failing to Learn from History Is Always Costly

Events this past weekend again remind us that the Arab world is very fragile.

In Libya, the bombings continue along the Mediterranean coast held by the freedom fighters. This morning two air raids killed at least 12 of them as Qadhaffi attempts to regain control of the oil-strategic east.

Saudi Arabia has announced through its council of religious elders that no demonstrations will be tolerated this coming Friday, a day which would-be protesters have called for as a Day of Rage.

Egypt is calm but skirmishes between pro and anti-Mubarak groups continue.

Yemen is becoming a battleground for those opposing the prime minister.

In all of this, we are told repeatedly by television news and European politicians that the Arabs, including the freedom fighters and protesters, do not want the West to intervene.

This leaves little choice but to passively watch while Arab regimes bear down ever more brutally to try to squelch the protesters who become more and more determined to prevail.

UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon is sending a Jordanian former minister of foreign affairs to Tripoli to try to open a dialogue with Qadhaffi. Good luck.

It is all eerily like the late 1930s, when everyone was watching Hitler but no one was doing anything else. That inactivity led to World War II. This time it may lead to a generalized war in the Middle East that would inevitably involve the entire world because of the region’s petroleum.

Do we never learn from history?