Former Iranian president and alleged moderate, Mohammad Khatami, is spending much of September visiting the United States, where he's making the rounds to various Islamic conferences, universities and other public forums. One of his main messages is that American policies spawn Islamic terrorism.



He's correct.



Islam has long seen the political and religious realms as but different sides of the same coin. Whether enforced conquest and dominance were enhanced in the name of an imperialist Islam or via various imperialist ethnic-national movements acting under its umbrella, the expectations were basically the same: all would yield in their respective wakes. If one consented, peace was possible.



Yet, in a nationalist era, this too would become far more complicated. While native Jews and Christians were simply expected to accept their dhimmi status, and all the subjugation and such that went along with it, fellow Muslims from different ethnic groups seeking their own political self-expression would also soon find themselves victimized by the more dominant national group. The plight of Black Africans in the Sudan, Berbers in North Africa and Kurds in Syria, Turkey, Iran and Iraq are but a few examples.



Resistance to this Islamic, Arab, Turkish or Iranian (and so forth) subjugation and dominance was tantamount to treason. Darfur, Halabja and such were the consequences. And anyone who dared to challenge this mindset was deemed the enemy, as well.



So, America helps create Islamic terrorism because it dares to suggest that non-Muslims, or non-majority ethnic groups, are entitled to their share of political rights in a nationalist age.



Let's not stretch this, however. America has still not designed a "Roadmap" for Kurdistan, for example. And the bloodshed and genocide in the Sudan continues with the world - including America - still looking on, virtually helpless. There will be no trials in Geneva over this. Those are reserved for the Jews building a fence to keep Arabs from blowing apart their kids.



Yet, America has taken steps in the right direction. And this has been enough to make it the Great Satan in many a Muslim Arab or Muslim Iranian's eyes. Just supporting, for example, the rights of Jews - half of whom were themselves refugees from the so-called Arab or Islamic world - to a resurrected state on less than one half of one percent of the real estate in the region has challenged the basic Dar Al-Islam vs. Dar Al-Harb mentality uniting the dominant religion and politics of the Middle East and North Africa (and fast spreading elsewhere).



Steps taken, if not to support, then at least not to actively oppose a decentralized, federalized Iraq, with a thriving, autonomous Kurdish area in the north, are seen by Arabs, Iranians and Turks alike as hostile acts. Thirty million Kurds are simply expected to remain stateless, politically deprived and culturally subjugated by others, who have conquered and incorporated their lands over the ages. And the birth of a free Kurdistan has been declared by Arabs to be the equivalent of that of "another Israel."



So, America indeed encourages the terrorism of those who believe that they have a monopoly on religious truth and political rights by simply opposing those views and supporting a wider concept of justice in the region. Thus, a 22nd Arab state should not be created on the ashes of the Jews' sole one. And a state for tens of millions of stateless Kurds willing to live in peace with their neighbors should be placed on the agenda far ahead of an additional Arab state that envisions itself taking the place of - not living side by side with - Israel.



Endorsing such things makes one an enemy of the dominant Islamic world outlook, and of those who use it to further their own nationalist causes. While there may be other reasons as well (i.e., the historical clash of non-native imperialisms with the various local varieties), this is by far the main reason America is now hated and victimized by the jihadists.



Which brings me back to Khatami's current visit.



Today, September 10, Khatami is scheduled for a presentation at one of the world's most prestigious universities ? Harvard. Since much of academia, the United Nations, media folks and such treat visiting Israelis far differently than they do representatives from Muslim countries, I have some concerns.



Whether the Israeli is from the far-left or the Right, he or she can expect a non-stop grilling during such visits. At times, they havebeen prevented from even speaking. Too often, those who confront the Jew of the Nations about every and all of its alleged sins cower when interviewing the Muslim world's counterparts. So, permit me to propose a few questions to Khatami that I fear won't be raised by others. I hope I'm wrong.



Why is it that Iran can demand a second state for Arabs in "Palestine" (Arabs historically never had one there, and purely Arab Jordan was created from some 80% of the original 1920 British Mandate's borders), support groups like Hamas and Hizbullah, which aim to destroy Israel (with Iran stating this as a goal itself - again, the Dar Al-Islam vs. Dar Al-Harb), yet millions of Arabs in what Iran calls (oil-rich) Khuzestan remain suppressed and certainly denied such aspirations? For centuries, Khuzestan has been known as Arabistan, because of the Arabs who have lived and, at times, ruled there. Not long ago, a neighboring Arab leader, Saddam Hussein, fought a bloody war with Iran over this.



Why are the rights of Arabs to that additional state in "Palestine" more important than those of millions of Kurds whose historic lands you acquired over the millennia via your own pre- and post-Islam imperialist actions?



And how do you deal with Azeris, Baluchis and all others you came to dominate in a pre-nationalist age, but who now have aspirations of their own, as well? These folks make up at least half of your own alleged nation.



What makes Iranian national rights more valid than those of others seeking their own small share of justice and fair play in the modern age - especially since they have not been permitted this within your own domain?



Why Palestine, but not Arabistan? Or Kurdistan? Or Baluchistan? Yet you call Israel, which is smaller in size than New Jersey, "expansionist," because it refuses to return to its imposed, suicidal 1949 armistice lines, making it a nine-mile wide, rump state.



In short, Mr. Khatami, when will you and your country drop the hypocrisy and double standards that characterize your foreign and domestic policies? The day that you grant independence to Arabistan or Kurdistan will be the day that you gain the right to lecture and accuse Israel. Unlike Iran, which had plans to even outlaw the Arab language over its own "Arab problem," Israel made Arabic the second official language of the state.



Unfortunately, your many accomplices across the world will continue to play deaf, dumb and blind on your behalf, allowing you to sit on your moral high horse while butchering and suppressing the rights of millions within your own borders.