Will Middle Eastern War Ever End?

The War in Iraq claims more lives each day than those lost at Virginia Tech. Five hundred people in the US die in traffic accidents each day. I’m sure other statistics are equally as high. How many lives does cancer claim each day?

Yet, the violence of the attack at Virginia Tech and the violence of the war in Iraq disturb me terribly. I guess traffic accidents are no less violent for those involved, and someone once said to me, “A drunk driver is like a loaded gun pointed at your head.”

We call for the withdrawal of troops from Iraq, for turning the government over to the Iraqi people. Let them build their democracy or their government. Let’s look at what might happen if we pulled out over a period of several months and were out of Iraq by the end of the year. The government is now run by one of the Muslim sects that fights violently with another. The Kurdish section in Northern Iran seems to be the only stable place in the country. They have lights and water and food and cars and relative safety.

Would the world have genocide in Iraq as the two sects of Islam fight to eliminate each other from the earth? The country’s military would not be strong enough to carry any substantial fighting out of the country, but terrorists would continue in the world – fueled by the disillusion of the people of Iraq and the disappointment of the world in the USA. Unless the fundamentalists of each group killed one another completely, the fighting would continue on and on – each family taking blood revenge for those killed by killing others-as the Hebrew men killed others to protect Dinah's honor.

I don’t understand why one sect thinks the other has no right to exist. Why is it, “Our way or death”? Those converting to the other sect or to any other religion are persecuted, imprisoned, often tortured and sometimes killed. All because some people think God isn’t big enough to deal with these kinds of pluralities.

I don’t understand this kind of war or violence, and my prayers, like those of the ancient Israelites, are for an end to war and violence. May each of us work towards peace.