ABSTRACT
The right thing to do is not a western construct, but instead comes out of the culture of the Middle East itself. In America, there is the challenge of organizing cohesive, effective advocacy among diaspora Christian communities. There is much in the American context that makes it difficult to advocate on behalf of those suffering in the Middle East. Westerners sometimes perceive eastern churches as too dogmatic, fighting over petty differences, with a religious identity that is sometimes subordinate to ethnic identity. Put simply, if money is raised to help all good minorities who suffer at the hand of all bad Muslims, then the terrorists are further antagonized to kill, even as we insult the majority of Muslims who want to help. Across the Middle East and throughout the ages, Christians and other minorities, such as Jews and Persians, served as administrators in the imperial structures of Caliphates that stretched from South Asia to Southwestern Europe.
