New Year Quick Takes

Larry W: We shall have spent $3 trillion dollars on Iraq, when all the accounting has been completed. Iraq has been a bonanza for recruiting not just your run of the mill low lifes, seeking their 72 virgins in paradise, but also for the raising of hundreds of millions of dollars from previously moderate Arab high rollers, for everything from establishing madrassas in Pakistan

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I would like to have someone offer a cogent explanation of how having a “free Iraq” as an “ally in the war on terror” is going to do one single thing to protect the USA from the true threats to its national security.

Perhaps it would be easier for you to see a cogent response if you started from an accurate point, Larry. I don’t know what year, or what PBS is trying to tell you other than what a madrassas contributes to recruitment of terrorists. But your statement on Iraq being a “bonanza” for recruiting is sheer fantasy. It is quite the opposite, in fact.

As Fareed Zakaria explained this past June:

The Simon Fraser study notes that the decline in terrorism appears to be caused by many factors, among them successful counterterrorism operations in dozens of countries and infighting among terror groups. But the most significant, in the study’s view, is the “extraordinary drop in support for Islamist terror organizations in the Muslim world over the past five years.” These are largely self-inflicted wounds. The more people are exposed to the jihadists’ tactics and world view, the less they support

Zakaria specifically then addressed a 2007 Afghanistan poll, and stated their decline in support may have been related to Benazir’s assassination. However this is not the first documentation of disenchantment with jihad by the Muslim population at large.

Around the same time, Philip Adams, on his blog for The Australian, mentioned a similar trend in London.

But the fact remains that leading figures in the Islamist movement are urging youth not to be seduced by bin Laden. Moreover, the Pew polls show that throughout the world, from Indonesia and Pakistan to Londonistan, Muslims are listening. Support for jihad among British Muslims plummeted after the London bombings of July 2005.

It’s too early to say the worst is over; and the Islamist leadership continues to insist that jihad is legitimate in support of Muslims from Gaza to Chechnya. However, the excesses of al-Qa’ida are strengthening the forces of moderation. Consequently, those waging the war on terror should also be reviewing their attitudes and tactics.

Now – let’s see. Where have those excesses been demonstrated? Wait a minute… thinking, thinking… don’t help. Oh… right. In Iraq. Not in Afghanistan where the US coalition ousted the Taliban. But in Iraq, where the jihad movements – in tandem with Ba’athists and the Saddam disgruntled, plus the wacky Mehdi Army – demonstrated their tactics so despicable that even Muslims found them repellent.

Then there’s the WaPo article in March of 2008 – Out of Guantanamo and Bitter Toward Bin Ladin. Story of one young recruit who realized he got suckered. However the telling and relevant paragraph in the midst of this young man’s story?

Hubayshi, 32, a Saudi native, was among the Arab fighters dug in with bin Laden in the mountains of Tora Bora during the U.S. bombardment of Afghanistan in 2001. He later spent time in the military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and in a Saudi jail.

He was released in 2006 into a world radically altered by the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. Muslim fighters were no longer viewed in Arab countries as larger-than-life heroes, and clerics had stopped urging young Muslims to fulfill their religious duties by fighting on behalf of their brethren.

Hubayshi had also changed. He had grown disillusioned with bin Laden, whose initial idealism had turned into terrorism, he said, adding that his family, “not bin Laden,” had suffered when he was at Guantanamo.

In 2006, he was released into a world radically altered… where Arab countries no longer had a “hero” view of jihad. My my

Another indication that even jihad supporters were more than royally PO’d at these violent radical methods of killing civilians and fellow Muslims came as Sayd Iman al-Sharif penned a scathing manifesto – “Rationalizing Jihad in Egypt and the World” – against the perversion of jihad, attacking his EIJ replacement, al Zawahiri at the end of 2007.

From one of Eli Lake’s NY Sun stories (he has been great on following the fractures in the jihad movements…) back in December of 2007, discussing al-Sharif’s public disputes and quoting from an interview with the author of “Inside Al Qaeda,” Rohan Gunaratna:

“He has had a genuine change of heart because we are seeing a trend today in Egypt where the original members of both of the major jihadist organizations are turning, the senior members of these groups, many have gone back and been remorseful,” he said. “He is not an exception because there is a trend. . . The traditional jihad movement is almost coming to an end. What has it accomplished in more than 25 years?”

Even the NYT’s ran an article in March 2008… Violence Leaves Young Iraqis Doubting Clerics”.

In two months of interviews with 40 young people in five Iraqi cities, a pattern of disenchantment emerged, in which young Iraqis, both poor and middle class, blamed clerics for the violence and the restrictions that have narrowed their lives.

“I hate Islam and all the clerics because they limit our freedom every day and their instruction became heavy over us,” said Sara, a high school student in Basra. “Most of the girls in my high school hate that Islamic people control the authority because they don’t deserve to be rulers.”

Atheer, a 19-year-old from a poor, heavily Shiite neighborhood in southern Baghdad, said: “The religion men are liars. Young people don’t believe them. Guys my age are not interested in religion anymore.”

What a “bonanza”, eh? Why do you think the latest incarnate of suicide bombers are women, children and the disabled? They’re having a hard time finding the young types, passionate about dying for jihad.

Even back in 2003 modern Muslims were starting to eye this method of jihad with wary eyes.

Moderate Muslims have been very clear in condemning al- Qa`ida tactics as a violation of Islamic tradition. Less well-covered in American or European media is the fact that some fundamentalists have also been vigorous in this regard. That is, there are those who share with al-Qa`ida a sense that a just public order must be governed by divine law only, yet who think al-Qa`ida’s tactics are problematic, on Islamic grounds.

For example, on July 10, 2002, the al-Jazeera network interviewed a well-known Saudi dissident, Shaykh Muhsin al- `Awaji. [1] Two others joined by telephone. All three had served time in prison for criticisms of the royal family and its policies of cooperation with the United States. All hold for government by divine law, in the strong sense. All have on other occasions expressed support for armed resistance by Muslims.

During the interview, the conversation turned to Usama bin Ladin. The three scholars indicate that, after initial approval of bin Ladin, they and many others have changed their opinion. Shaykh al-`Awaji comments that

“In the past, when he was fighting the Russians in Afghanistan, bin Ladin was the greatest of jihad warriors, in the eyes of the Saudi people and in the eyes of the Saudi government. He and the others went to Afghanistan with official support, and the support of the learned [the `ulama’ or religious scholars.]”

In some ways, this positive assessment of bin Ladin still holds. Given all the facts, however, al-`Awaji and his colleagues must revise their estimate. Bin Ladin, they say, is guilty of spreading discord among Muslims. He labels people heretics without proof, and some operations sponsored by al-Qa`ida bring harm to Muslims. Most critically, al- Qa`ida’s tactics violate the norms of honorable combat.

Again, it took them exposing themselves for the animals they are in Iraq… blowing up mosques while attempting to incite civil war, using them for ammo depots, and attacking fellow Muslims as apostates. Result, the charm of jihad for Muslims – most especially the youth – is wearing quite thin.

This also means that the global Islamic jihad groups have achieved great mileage for *not* motivating recruitment themselves…. just by showing their true colors.

Considering these facts, unbeknownst to you apparently, pretty much nullify the rest of the comment, you might want to start anew with your conclusions. And to tout int’l police.. which is another word for a law enforcement as a terrorist response… is sheer suicide. You do not prevent terrorism by waiting for it to happen, then cleaning it up in the int’l courts.

And oh, BTW… the intel and military budgets were gutted by Clinton and his admin, along with the help of the GOP majority Congress in the 90s. I like Ron Paul on some issues, and believe he and those of his libertarian bents are necessary voices in Congress. But before you start praising Mr. Paul for his isolationist ‘tudes, you might want to find how how he voted on slashing those budgets himself.

I hear Mata responds to these posts while doing one handed push ups.

… and lately, with a snow shovel in the other… LOL Such kind words from you both. Thank you.

Simply… YOUR topic was blogs… and the splintering of conservatives via blogs. And what *do* you consider No Quarter, Huffpo, DailyKO’s etal. Blogs, no? If you want to talk “splintering” blogs/party/factions of either stripe, try expanding your horizons.

Otherwise, spare me your inability to comprehend English.

Hard, you’re “right”… pun intended… LOL

Let me put this “simply” for “simple”tons…

Conservative blogs can never sell a Volkswagon (McCain) with Ferarri features (conservative Veep Palin) to a Ferrai buying audience. Therefore “splintering” has nothing to do with it. Quality of product was everything.

On the other hand, since “simple”ton was talking blogs and “splintering”…. I’d say the DNC was as fractured as possible. And they will continue to be so as the Pontiac (Obama) sold is not the Pontiac (PEBO) they bought (elected).