In this passionate editorial Caroline Glick outlines what she sees as a major cause of European self-destruction - multiculturalism. She has a good point, but I suspect there's more to the decline of Europe than just a commitment to "cultural diversity," as fatuous and insidious as that often turns out to be.
I think there is also a collective madness that seizes effete societies which have abandoned a belief in anything transcendent, and Europe is a confirming instance of that belief. How else to explain what Glick says here:
Wednesday's decision by Britain's University and College Union to call for a boycott of Israeli universities and colleges was not only hypocritical. It was suicidal. It is not simply that the British prefer to boycott Israeli universities than say, Palestinian, Egyptian, Syrian, Iranian, Saudi and Jordanian universities where students are indoctrinated to seek the annihilation of the Jewish people and the subjugation of Christianity through the destruction of Western civilization.
It is not merely that they ignored the poor, brave Iranian students who just three weeks ago were brutally attacked by regime forces as they sought to hold elections for their pro-democracy campus organizations.
By calling for a boycott of Israeli universities, Britain's academic establishment is turning its back not only on Israel, but on Britain. When Britain's professoriate rejects Israel's right to exist as a Jewish, democratic nation-state and glorifies Palestinian society which supports global jihad and the destruction of Western civilization, it is rejecting the British state.
Only those who are suffering some sort of psychological impairment which causes them to experience moral inversion can call for a boycott of Israeli academics while feting those from Muslim nations. I can come up with no other explanation.
Europe reminds me of a certain kind of schoolboy, a weakling himself, who always takes the side of the schoolyard bully in hopes of ingratiating himself to the tough so that he won't turn on him. This child is willing to sacrifice anyone else to the bully's abuse, and to abase himself in the process, but it's worth it to him if it avoids a beating. That's modern Europe, or at least much of the elite class in Europe.
They know they have nothing to fear from Israel but plenty to fear from the Palestinians and their allies, so they perversely play the role of protector and advocate of those who want to destroy them in hopes that the destroyers will change their mind and find the quavering Euros useful against Israel. It's cowardly and unprincipled but that's modern Europe.
RLC