Karen Hughes welcomes falling Muslim support for terror

One of the most encouraging things to emerge from Iraq is growing resistance to al-Qaeda.  Al-Qaeda's brutality has appalled Sunni tribal leaders who have witnessed the terrible barbarity of Osama bin Laden's terrorist thugs.

Another encouraging development is the growing hostility of Muslim global opinion to terrorism.  Karen Hughes wrote about this in yesterday's Washington Post.  Hughes, US Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs, quoted evidence from the Pew Global Attitudes Survey:

• 90% of the populations of Iraq and Afghanistan have unfavourable views of al-Qaeda and bin Laden himself.
• "Support for terrorist tactics has fallen in seven of the eight predominantly Muslim countries polled as part of the Pew Global Attitudes Project since 2002; in most cases, those declines have been dramatic."
• "Perhaps most significant, Muslim populations are increasingly rejecting bin Laden's attempts to pervert their faith. WorldPublicOpinion.org found in April that large majorities in Egypt (88 percent), Indonesia (65 percent) and Morocco (66 percent) agree: "Groups that use violence against civilians, such as Al Qaida, are violating the principles of Islam. Islam opposes the use of such violence."

Comments

[Andrew Ian Dodge]

Wonder what its like in the UK.

[Tony Makara]

Terrorism, as a tactic, can only take a movement so far and it certainly cannot topple a state. Finding people brave enough to carry out a suicide bombing, and it is a brave act, will become increasingly more difficult when there is no end goal in sight. Terrorist groups rely on 'spectaculars' like 9/11 and the London and Madrid bombings to recruit. If spectaculars are thwarted this will dent recruitment and confidence.

We need to understand the rationale behind terrorist ideology. Their hatred of the west hasn't come out of thin air. Something has caused it. One we begin to understand cause and effect we will begin to understand the problem we face.

[billm99uk]

Support for terrorism seems to be falling in the Muslim world because it's pretty obvious to most followers of the Prophet that the vast majority of the victims of Osama and friends are... other Muslims. It'd be interesting to know whether they still support such actions against the Kuffar, wouldn't it?

[Steevo]

Tony you should read bin Laden's own writings, and even those of a women who was like a nanny with him as he grew up. He hates the decadent West. This was evident even at the age of 14. He hates our freedoms. Our freedoms of choice and of course religion if we so desire. His aims have not only been to get Americans and western influence out of the Middle East, but to expand, in the hope of imposing sharia law thoughout the world. His followers (those who will commit suicide) are really no-lifers: they are threatened and hate wherever they have lived and been recruited; from Africa to Europe to Asia to Australia to America to the Middle East.

And as bill points out they are so narrow in their acceptance of dictates to follow they are killing off variants of themselves and not necessarily those who are more 'moderate', in greater numbers than any non-Muslims.

Iraq is the central front for al Qaeda terrorists as their numbers of recruits bear this out. If a form of democracy succeeds in the middle of the fertile crescent, there is no greater threat to the followers of Mohammad's 7th century dictates. But they are being decimated: killed and captured in substantial numbers unabated. In both Iraq and Afghanistan.

[Tony Makara]

Steevo, good points. There is definately a clash of cultures here. What they define as decadent is certainly our freedom, and particularly the freedom of our women. I certainly wouldn't want a family member or friend of mine to be a lap-dancer, but if they were I would respect it as their free choice. In a similar situation certain extremist religious groups, christians included, would violently stone a girl for being a lap-dancer.

On the subject of suicide bombings, surely there must be a point where they will run low on volunteers? As a military strategy suicide bombings are counter-productive because they lose their best men. How far would the French resistance have got if they has used similar tactics against the German occupation?

[Denise]

Tony, even us women who are not lap dancers are offensive to them. Showing our hair, wearing shorts and short sleeved blouses that don't even show cleavage. So, yeah, I can imagine their reaction to a lap dancer.

One more thing I want to point out. It's ironic you should mention Christians, even in an extreme sense, wanting to violently stone girls lap dancing in the same sentence, since it was Jesus who said, "He who is without sin, cast the first stone". Any real Christian wouldn't want to do such a thing, regardless of how wrong they think something like that is.

[Tony Makara]

Denise, yes, you are quite right. They seem to have an negative attitude to all women. On the subject of Christians, I think there are certain groups in the pentecostal wing of the Christian faith who are on a ower trip and enjoy exerting dominance over others.

[bernard]

Curious to notice in the inset box that Turks preference for suicide bombings has gone up +3%.
Perhaps they think this will curry favour with the EU. If so, jolly good. Let's hope it rises to 100%, then we'll have even more reason to pull out.

[atheling]

Tony, can you give us an example of Christians who would stone a lap dancer or "exert dominance" over others?

[Kevin Sampson]

“As a military strategy suicide bombings are counter-productive because they lose their best men.” - Tony Makara

First, terrorism is not a ‘military strategy’ at all. It is a means to achieve political ends, not military objectives. The Madrid bombings forced Spain to pull it’s forces out of Iraq, but not by defeating the Spanish military in the field. It achieved this goal by bringing down the Spanish government, a political, not military, act.

Second, the ‘martyrs’ who carry out suicide bombings are not ‘their best men’. They are expendables, of no more importance than a bullet or an artillery shell. The people who plan the operations and build the IED’s are their best men, and they are not ‘martyrs’.

[Andy]

A bit of a digression but when reading the above this Churchill quote springs to mind: “An appeaser is one who feeds a crocodile, hoping it will eat him last.”

I think the Spanish response was misguided, and unlikely to buy them any long-term peace in the war against terrorism.

Al Qaeda consider southern Spain to be occupied Muslim land. Ayman al Zawahiri, referred to the loss of Spain (“Andalusia”) in the first Al Qaeda video released after 9/11, LONG before Spanish involvement in the war in Iraq.

[Kevin Sampson]

Since there have been at least three other attacks targeting Spain that have been foiled since the Madrid bombings, I'd say that's undeniable.

[bundyfan]

Aren't they building more mosques than church's in Spain now? They're baaaack. Ferdinand and Isabella can't be pleased.