"Ugly American" and the colonization of Mars

Sixty-seven years have passed since the novel "The Ugly American" was written by William Julius Leder and Eugenie Burdick at the height of the Cold War and the McCarthyite wave that gagged and spread terror within the United States of America. The novel is political par excellence, as its authors were preoccupied with politics and diplomatic work. In this novel, which was exceptional at the time and still is, the authors accuse American politicians, including ambassadors in particular, of arrogance, ignorance, and contempt for peoples, and of not understanding or sympathizing with them, and that American policy in general presents a distorted image of the good and humble American people - according to the novel, of course. Moreover, the authors attribute the people's revolutions against America and their hatred of it to the greed, avarice, and stupidity that American politicians show towards them. This talk was published in 1958, but to this day it is still true to a large extent, if not deepened and increased and appeared in a more ugly and hideous form.

We have seen the former US Ambassador carrying an axe to demolish a wall under Al-Aqsa Mosque, we have seen US ministers implementing Israeli policies, distorting facts and setting fires, we have seen support, coverage and funding with ammunition, positions and media narratives, we have heard public threats to the International Criminal Court and blind support for closing UNRWA to starve and impoverish millions of Palestinians. We have known the meaning and taste of US policy on our skins, in our fields and on the walls of our homes that have been demolished and razed to the ground.

President Trump is the pinnacle of all this, as he has opened fire on almost all sides. He wants the Gulf states to invest more than $600 billion in his country, a request that is like an order or a threat. He is asking Iran to stop its nuclear program, otherwise Israel is ready, and has been provided with bombs of more than 200 pounds, enough to blow up every underground tunnel. Trump is not satisfied with that, but rather threatens the BRICS countries not to think or take the initiative to issue a new currency for dealing, otherwise he will exhaust the group’s economy with taxes of up to 25 percent. He also wants to seize Greenland, the Panama Canal, and Canada. He also wants to cleanse his enemies inside the United States by overthrowing the bureaucratic apparatus, which forms a parallel government in the shadows that has a great influence on American decision-making. He also wants to invest in future industrial cartels, ignoring the middle and working classes, as if he were a president for the rich whites only. Not only that, but he has also signed decisions that will remove America from important international agreements such as climate and others. In other words, Trump, who wants to withdraw inward for the sake of prosperity and prosperity, can only do so by antagonizing others, imposing taxes on them, and forcing them to give their money for free. Trump's policy is actually based on the Monroe Doctrine, a colonial principle that allows America to do whatever it wants for its interests and influence in every region of the world, especially the Americas. But Trump is not satisfied with this principle, but rather expands it so that his influence reaches Mars, yes, to Mars, because the space program he is preparing for exceeds what former President Reagan proposed. The current program aims, as Trump said, to reduce the Russian and Chinese threat, and therefore this program may reach the colonization of Mars in search of power, influence, and perhaps wealth. No one knows. This is the madness of grandeur and arrogance we have seen before, because every ruler who talks about the stars has reached an advanced stage of complete detachment from reality. Empires that aspire to reach the stars usually fall into deep, bottomless pits.

As for us, the Palestinian people, the weak and forgotten people, who are antagonized by the world’s powerful politicians, industrialists, media figures, and legal experts, Trump strongly believes that he can solve the conflict with Israel by displacing us, replacing our state with economic privileges, aborting our dreams of freedom, dignity, and independence, and turning us into mere unknown subjects under every planet. Trump’s proposals seem extremely naive, and to the extent that this naivety makes us laugh, it also makes us cry, as this superficiality reflects a complete surrender to the Israeli colonial vision that sees displacement as a real solution to the conflict that has been going on for more than a hundred years.

The ugliness, hideousness and superficiality of American policy reaches its peak in talking about the Palestinians as a group of nomads, consumers or tenants who can move from one market to another simply because the market has declined or the service at the hotel has changed. We are not “consumers” according to American culture, nor are we just tenants of a dilapidated building. Rather, we are the Palestinians. We love this land. We love it without proof. We love it as we love our mother without documents or papers.

Finally, if Trump believes that he can force the region to accept his ugly offer, this will sooner or later lead to the demolition and termination of the relationship with Israel. Simply put: displacement will blow up normalization. In this sense, Jordan and Egypt, which constitute the broad current of Arab moderation and historical settlements, may find themselves facing two options, both of which are bitter, but one of which guarantees dignity, independence, and equality.