Israel Matzav

Welcome to our world

A Wall Street Journal article about the weekend's attack on luxury hotels in Jakarta explains why the hotels are such attractive targets to Islamist terrorists.

In a modern hotel, for example, men and women are treated equally. More effort is expended on segregating smokers from nonsmokers than on segregating the sexes. The bar, the gym and the swimming pool are gender-neutral spaces. Nobody seeks to enforce special dress codes on women.

Nor would any international hotel dream of privileging one faith over another. By contrast, under the radical Islamic worldview Muslims are entitled to special privileges. This worldview provides the underlying principle for such things as Pakistan’s harsh antiblasphemy laws and Malaysia’s lopsided affirmative action program for its Malay-Muslim majority. True, a hotel in, say, Jakarta, may place a Koran by the bedside table, and mark the direction of prayer to Mecca on the ceiling. But these are innocent gestures, designed to convenience Muslim guests rather than to inconvenience, much less to actively discriminate against, those of different backgrounds.

For Islamic radicals, who seek to order all aspects of 21st century life—from banking to burqas—by the medieval precepts enshrined in Shariah law, the secular nature of a hotel is galling enough. But perhaps this would not matter as much if it weren’t appealing to local elites. In a place like Peshawar or Kabul, and to a large degree even in Jakarta or Mumbai, a five-star hotel represents an island of order and prosperity in a sea of squalor. It hints at the prosperity promised by free markets and a culture of individual liberty. It is living proof that the worldly can successfully be split from the divine. It also acts as a bridge to the West. For example, star players of Manchester United, the British soccer club, were scheduled to stay at the Ritz-Carlton before the attacks forced them to cancel their visit to Indonesia.

And the consequences of this kind of attack?

What, then, does the chasm between Marriott values and Shariah values portend? For the foreseeable future, leading hotels in Asia will continue to evolve in the direction of marble-floored bunkers. Metal detectors, sniffer dogs, undercarriage mirrors and armed guards in lobbies—all unimaginable barely a decade ago—will increasingly become part of the standard luxury hotel experience. If, as appears likely, the Jakarta attacks were carried out by hotel guests, then more intrusive background checks may also become necessary.

Welcome to the tip of the iceberg of our world here in Israel. Since the outbreak of the Oslo terror war in 2000, we've had armed guards and metal detectors at the entrances of our hotels.

But it's not just at hotel entrances. Recall how when terrorists attacked the luxury hotels of Mumbai last year, they went out of their way to attack the tiny, out of the way Chabad House and to murder its Rabbi and his pregnant wife. We Jews and Israelis are targets wherever we go in the world. We have armed guards at the entrances to restaurants, movie theaters and bus terminals. We are constantly going through metal detectors, removing cell phones and business card cases from our pockets. It still amazes me when I travel abroad that there are enclosed public places I can enter without having to take the cell phone and Palm Pilot off my belt.

Is it absurd that we have to live in constant fear of being blown up? Of course it is.

But I can't help but wonder whether all those business elites in luxury hotels in far off places like Jakarta and Mumbai will start empathizing with Israel if they realize that we experience constantly what they are only starting to experience on their business trips and vacations.

A silver lining in the cloud of luxury hotel terrorism? Perhaps.

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 4:02 AM