Outrage should be directed at the true human rights violators
It is noble of Noor Hashem to point out that human rights in our own country are being trampled in her column “Paranoia is getting out of hand” (Dec. 6). It is wrong that U.S. citizens are being treated as criminals in their own country, or being shipped off to prison without being allowed to exercise the rights to which every human being should be entitled.
But there is something hypocritical about painting, in the same article, a rosy picture of organizations that allegedly support terrorist organizations, be it monetarily or symbolically, when these organizations have no other aim than to deprive others of their human rights. Where is it put forward to Hamas to stop depriving Israelis and Palestinians of their inalienable rights?
While Hashem characterizes Islamic charities and organizations as the victims of a paranoid government, never examined is the idea that these charities and groups acted wrongly. With all the weight the article places on human rights, I was surprised to see little condemnation of charities that fund organizations that rarely fall in line with the U.N. charter. Human rights seem to be the last thing that organizations like Hamas, allegedly funded in part by American Islamic charities, concern themselves with.
If I discovered that there was a remote possibility that money donated to a charity was being used to purchase weapons or train fighters, I would cease support for that organization immediately, since I am opposed to the idea of a charity funding violence.
Likewise, if it were clear that an armband represented, among other things, solidarity with a violent terrorist organization, I would not wear that armband. It would be difficult to argue for human rights while wearing an armband representing a group whose primary aim is to deprive another group of their rights.
Claiming it is “paranoia” that makes the U.S. government freeze assets and “overreact” to charities that may be funding a group whose objective is the destruction of Israel and the United States is indicative of a greater problem: It isn’t paranoia if they want to destroy you.
Jonathan Cannon Fifth-year philosophy student