WE HEAR the word 'democracy' every day. If we look at the meaning of democracy in different textbooks then we can safely conclude that 'democracy is the form of government in which sovereign power resides in the people as a whole and is exercised either directly by people or by officers elected by people'. As Abraham Lincoln said, democracy is a 'government of the people, by the people and for the people'. Democracy is a method of deciding who should rule. It does not determine the morality of the resulting government. Popular support is no guarantee that a government will protect one's freedom. The majority must be limited in order to guarantee individual rights and personal autonomy.
   

Rule by the majority is not necessarily a fair or just system. For example, 51 per cent of the population, which is majority, has no right to oppress the remaining 49 per cent in the name of the majority or if whites have more votes than blacks, they cannot be allowed to deny blacks their constitutional rights. Winning an election should not permit the victors to assemble their votes and enact laws or govern in a way that strips those who lose of their liberty. Democracy does not guarantee freedom nor does it guarantee peace. In a true democratic society, majority rule must be coupled with guarantees of individual's human rights that, in turn, serve to protect the rights of the minorities - whether ethnic, religious or political. What we are witnessing now throughout the globe is that democracy is as often a cover for tyranny as it is a protection for liberty. In the Bush doctrine both democracy and freedom are used quite interchangeably. We are now living in a world where political milieu is becoming very complicated and has been changing constantly. In a true democratic society or country the following principles must be upheld at any cost to have a peaceful, harmonious relationship among various parties: sovereignty of the people, government based upon consent of the governed, majority rule, minority rights, guarantee of basic human rights, free and fair elections, equity as opposed to equality, due process of law, constitutional limits on government, social, economic and political pluralism, values of tolerance, pragmatism, cooperation and compromise.

We see over and over again that the champion of democracy in the world is always in violation of the principles of democracy. We are living in a unipolar world where nothing but might always reigns supreme in the name of democracy.

There are numerous examples before the world community how the new world order doctrine is destroying the peace and tranquility of the world after the collapse of the USSR. The world community is chained by US hegemony. The chains have kept billions as prisoners in their own countries either directly or indirectly. Double standards in US policy seem to be more obvious In the Middle East than any other places around the globe. The successfully-orchestrated media campaign by the US always generates American support for unjust causes and oppressive Israeli regime that is responsible for the anarchy in the Middle East.

The US continues to back Israeli aggression with weapons and aid, justified by claims made by pro-Israeli intellectuals that this conflict is a world war that includes the US. For the US, Israel is always the victim when at conflict with its Arab neighbors. The US, for obvious reasons, has tied its credibility and national interest to Israel's, and it seems that nothing can persuade the US to act in any other way than to further the cause of Israel's interest. The Western media, particularly the US media, have been playing a role in downplaying scenes of civilian casualties on the Palestinian side in this bloody conflict. Media in the US always sympathized with Israel or undermined the gravity of Israel's attacks. The downplaying of the civilian casualties in Palestine and the sort of acceptance that Israel is engaging in some kind of normal behavior in the name of self-defense by US media commentators are utterly ludicrous. The picture that general masses in the US usually get is that Israel is always the victim at conflict with its Arab neighbors. The Bush administration's contempt for the United Nations Charter, the Fourth Geneva Convention and the other fundamental principles of the international law has once again been exposed by its defence of the ongoing Israeli assault against innocent Palestinians. Last summer, in the war between Israel and Lebanon, President Bush blocked every effort to stop Israeli slaughter of Lebanese civilians. According to a Guardian report (July 19, 2006), Bush gave Israel the green light to attack Lebanon. The Bush administration is, in fact, enjoying the Israeli rampage the way it has been enjoying it in Iraq.

As a matter of fact, most Americans do not know that Palestinians are the ones whose land has been stolen by the Jewish state, whose men are constantly been humiliated, whose children are being shot down in the streets, whose women have been abused by the fanatic Jewish state. One of the reasons behind the Israeli aggression is people's ignorance. Paul Crag Roberts, the former assistant secretary of the Treasury in the Regan administration, has rightly said, 'Palestinians have been walled off into ghettos, who cannot reach their farmlands or medical care or schools, who cannot drive on roads through Palestine that have been constructed for Israelis only. They are Palestinians whose ancient towns have been invaded by militant Zionist settlers under the protection of the Israeli army who beat and persecute the Palestinians and drive them out of their towns. They are Palestinians who cannot allow their children outside their homes because they will be murdered by Israeli settlers. The Palestinians who confront Israeli evil are called terrorist. Israel never practises terror. Only those who are in Israel's way are terrorists.'

When president Bush, as part of his spreading democracy in the Middle East, forced free election on Palestine, the people chose the party that is not liked by the Israelis and hence the Bush administration. Victory of Hamas through democratic process has been rejected by both the US and Israel. Similarly, both the US and Israel cannot take easily the Hizbollah winning parliamentary seats in Lebanon. Both Israel and the Bush administration started punishing Palestinians by cutting off all funds to the new government and finally illegally ousting the democratically elected Hamas from the government. Democracy is permitted only if it produces the result Bush and Israel want. Israel which has one of the world's largest incomes is the largest recipient of US foreign aid. As Paul Craig Roberts said, the House of Representatives are bought and paid for by the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee which clearly indicates that America has become the puppet of Israel.

The world has never questioned the deadly weaponry that killed and continues to kill hundreds of civilians, mostly children and youth, in both Lebanon and Palestine while indiscriminately condemning Iran and Syria for allegedly providing arms and equipment to the Lebanese resistance movement. A recently released report by the World Policy Institute discussed how Washington provides billions of dollars worth military equipment and weaponry to Israel on a yearly basis and how the Israel's current arsenal is composed of US made equipment. US military aid for Israel stands at about $3 billion a year. That is about $500 for every Israeli citizen that the US provides on an annual basis. According to that report, ever since the Bush administration came to power, $6.3 billion worth of weaponry has been sold to Israel. According to the Bush doctrine, arming those who kill innocent Israeli civilians is wrong while arming those who kill innocent Lebanese and Palestinian civilians is highly encouraged.

Encouraging Israel's continued onslaught on both Palestine and Lebanon puts the US in the position of being blamed for mounting civilian deaths in both countries. Jimmy Carter, the 39th president of the US, wrote in an editorial in the Washington Post on August 1, 2006 that tragically the current conflict is part of the inevitably repetitive cycle of violence that results from the absence of a comprehensive settlement in the Middle East, exacerbated by the almost unprecedented six-year absence of any real effort to achieve such a goal. A major impediment to progress is Washington's strange policy that dialogue on controversial issues will be extended only as a reward for subservient behaviour and will be withheld from those who reject US assertions. Failure to address the issues and leaders involved risks the creation of an arc of even greater instability running from occupied Jerusalem through Beirut, Damascus, Baghdad and Tehran. The US foreign policy in the Middle East, and 'its-my-way-or-the-highway' approach have been a complete failure. The people of the Middle East deserve peace and justice and the international community should come forward and in one hand to solve this fiasco for good, as Carter said, 'No genuine and durable peace for any peoples in the volatile Middle East is possible as long as Israel continues to violate UN resolutions by occupying Arab lands.'

Zahid Zamir teaches at York College, City University of New York and a research fellow of the IERF.