The alpha heresy and Smith's book

 William Koestler wrote about the Alpha heresy in the communist world.  It was common among intellectuals to explain why they didn't write: 'If I came to understand something by myself, then only the others who have done the same will understand me and they don't need to hear it from me.'

In Lee Smith's book The Strong Horse, he has an Egyptian character who burns his own writing and expresses the same view as Koestler's communist intellectual.

The problem for me and my readers is that Smith's book falls into that same category.  You have either learned during your life that he is right or you never will.  Only a few people out of ten million will understand what Smith says.  I do because I spent many years living among Arabs, I paid close attention and I'm honest with myself.

 Smith tells us in clear and enticing language that Arab society is 100% tribal, it is based on tribal identity and fundamentally requires violence toward other tribes.  An Arab state leader is always duplicitous in keeping his own people focused on some other tribe's problems while secretly provoking trouble within other tribes.  The Arab world has always been tribes against other tribes and especially against minorities.  It is not going to change.

If you don't already know that, Smith's book is a waste of your time.  You may never understand why Israel needs a wall to keep Arab tribal warfare confined. You will not understand Israel's willingness to make war against any neighbor, for its own survival. Only strength, military strength and the willingness to use it, matters in the Middle East.  

The U.S. is a clumsy, incompetent government when it acts in the Middle East. This has been true for a long time, but the U.S. is so powerful that the current incompetence isn't very harmful to our own interests. President Obama's feckless, weak, pull-out-as-soon-as-possible posture is making everything worse in the Middle East, as Lebanon kisses the Syrian tyrants feet, while Afghanistan and everyone else tries to take sides with the emerging strong horse: Iran.