Amir Taheri has a deeply convoluted argument, the nub of which is professed confusion as to why Muslims don't care about all of those conflicts around the world involving their coreligionists, and additionally they hate Israel because it supports the United States and not because their televisions show grim images from the West Bank and Gaza every night.

I have to admit that I don't see the logic here. First of all, the Muslims in Thailand aren't Arabs, and the Muslims in Palestine are, in fact, Arabs. It's not surprising that people would care more about people who look and speak like them. Never mind that some of the incidents he cites did, in fact, "inflame Muslim passions."

As to the second point, er, what? Why did all of those Arab countries attack the newly formed Israel in 1948, when the United States was barely involved in the region? For fun? I suppose that's why all of those people volunteered to fight in the Negev desert. And who buys all of these newspapers?

Finally, there is, in fact, data on this stuff ...

At the end of the column, we get to the gist:

Next time you hear someone say the US was in trouble in the Muslim world because of Israel, remember that things may not be that simple.

True, it's not so simple. No doubt a lot of Muslims are frustrated about their own powerlessness, and upset about U.S. support for secular dictatorships, too, etc.. But why is Amir Taheri trying to make it simple?