From "The Battle for Lebanon" by Jon Lee Anderson in the New Yorker, interviewing Jamil Mroue, a secular Shiite and editor of Beirut's English language paper, the Daily Star. Mroue:
"Even after 9/11, there is this expectation in the U.S. and Israel that some unspoken middle class is just sitting there waiting to inherit the ruins of whatever country it is that they are obliterating. But there is no calculation that, if they flatten Lebanon and [Hezbollah leader] Nasrallah comes out of hiding and is given a microphone to deliver a speech, he can topple governments. He has been extraordinarily empowered by this. Israel and America are still obsessed with destroying hardware. But if you do this with Hezbollah you just propagate what you want to destroy.
Do I want to live under Hezbollah? No, I don't. But the same errors that the Americans made in Iraq are being made here. You get rid of Nasrallah not by destroying his guns but by helping to create a sustainable society."
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You get rid of Nasrallah not by destroying his guns but by helping to create a sustainable society.
"The war with Israel does not depend on cease-fires ... . It is a Jihad for the sake of God and will last until (our) religion prevails ... from Spain to Iraq,"
Al-Zawahri, July 26, 2006
Yeah, I think he's really going to go for that whole sustainable society approach...I mean it's not like Muslims fight among themselves after all.
And what does a Modern Mennonite with concerns of Church and State think about this sort of sustainable society?
"...until our religion prevails"
Were sorry, were sorry, were sorry..........can we apologize enough and make a difference?
Groom the beards of the great ones, walk barefoot to Mecca and confess our sins & kiss the bombs we drop on.
Build a sustainable pipeline filled with flowing words of God (oil) from Spain to Iraq. Bath in it's substance of Holy liquid, 'strap on' a suicide bomber vest and transcend the IQ of George W Bush.
hang on to your aluminum helmet kfingtree-- the good news is your condition is completely treatable.
I'm only crippled inside. There are as many ways to live as there are people. Now that's alot of Psychosis and alot of money for the only normal people (psychologists).
Yeah, I think he's really going to go for that whole sustainable society approach...I mean it's not like Muslims fight among themselves after all.
Al-Zawahri is not interested in a sustainable society. He’s interested in a totalitarian, religious extremist society, which history has shown is not a terribly stable way to organize a society.
But I’m not sure what he has to do with Lebanon. If you’ll remember, it was our action of invading Iraq that has allowed Al-Queda to operate in Iraq and recruit who knows how many now angry, radicalized people. Saddam’s Iraq was a terrible place, but we have made it worse by strengthening the religious extremists, which is what Mroue is saying.
And what does a Modern Mennonite with concerns of Church and State think about this sort of sustainable society?
I would argue that a country of extremism is not a sustainable one. Totalitarianism and religious extremism breeds violence and corruption and injustice, which are destabilizing.
Extremists gain power when they can recruit more people to their causes. Recruiting is made easier when bombs are dropped on innocent people. Hezbollah has been strengthened, not weakened by Israel’s destruction of Lebanon, because more people are inflamed, and the moderates, like the editor above, are being pushed to the margins.
Finding evil people or laws in the world via google provides no justification for unnecessary violence.
But I’m not sure what he has to do with Lebanon.
The war with Israel does not depend on cease fires...
He's referring to the Israel/Lebanon war, obviously. Read the whole article.
At least you admit Totalitarianism and religious extremism breed violence and corruption and injustice even while still back-handedly blaming the victims. If you think fighting terrorism creates terrorism, you may as well believe arresting rapists, creates rapists.
Besdies, they are not only pissed off at the US: They kill each other more than any foreigner kills them. Wahhabist vs. Shite vs. Sunni vs. Wahhabist... They're pissed off at the whole world; at peoples who have never even set foot in their god forsaken countries. They need no more than a short-skirt to incite fear and hatred and rally recruits, don't kid yourself. (I leave the Palestinians out of this b/c they really are fighting for resources, like water and jobs.) But they have their own corrupt gov'ts to blame for a large part of their afflictions, but thye foolishly allow their cause to be exploited by terrorist states (Syria and Iran) and alienate their real friends. But the majority of the angry arab world are angry for purely ego reasons. They're angry that they don't rule the world as they imagine they did in some golden age. They're angry that technology has rendered their primitive religion and world view (esp toward women) obsolete, and they can't accept it. By their own admission, they want to go down in a blaze of glory and take every man, woman, and child on earth with them.
What did the Buddhists do to the Taliban [before Bush, mind you] that incited them to blow up those 1000 year old cultural treasures of the twin Buddhas?
What did the Africans do to deserve being captured and sold as slaves?
Face it Dan; they need no excuse to exercise their hatred toward the world and attract recruits; they've been at it for a long time, long before they discovered oil, long before Iraq and the ugly truth is, they enjoy their misery.
While I agree that military action is often short-term and only modestly effective, it's not the cause of Islamic terrorism.
While I agree that military action is often short-term and only modestly effective, it's not the cause of Islamic terrorism.
Theo, I never said violence is the cause of terrorism. I said it feeds extremism by allowing terrorists to recruit, which makes the problem worse.
Your answer to this is that extremism exists, for which you like to provide some of the many fine examples that exist in the world today.
I really don't see the point in discussing this if you continue to ignore what I'm saying as a way to stand on your soapbox about how evil terrorists are, which is a point everyone in the world agrees with.
btw, I'll be without an Internet connection the next few days...
I never said violence is the cause of terrorism. I said it feeds extremism by allowing terrorists to recruit, which makes the problem worse.
Ok. Let's turn this logic around here a bit...and see if we're not employing a double standard.
I consider myself a pretty moderate person: a good Christian, appropriately offended by our commander-in-chief, and having a strong desire to see a world actually left for my children.
Then I see unthinkable acts of violence--thousands buried alive; my countrymen beheaded, women tortured, multilated, and forced into slavery; Coptic Churches looted and destroyed over a Danish comic, executions for those converting to Christianity, children and mentally disabled recruited to deliver bombs to pizza shops, ped-malls, and buses full of civilians (targeted because they are civilian); Yes, I could be here all day enumerating the atrocities in the name of this Islamic cultural imperialism.
The moderate me? gone. Hello extreme Theo, Crusader Theo, recruited and ready to stand behind anyone who vows to cut this cancer out of the world.
I guess that makes me a terrorist--bread from the violence and offense done to me, to my family, to my way of life--to my God.
Or is it not allowed to work that way? Is yours a double standard?
You wonder why this country voted for Bush do you? Incredulous are you that many moderates have abandoned moderation and tolerance for confrontation?
You said it best yourself... Violence feeds extremism. Or do you not extend your logic to your own neighborhood? just those crazies on the other side of the tracks?
I've always said, if only they would just try to create a sustainable society, maybe then I wouldn't be so extreme.
(Sorry to see you won't be around to reply; Godspeed my friend. : )
Ah, now we are getting somewhere. This is exactly right. Violence against us by fundamentalists feeds extremism on our side as well. The resultant violence by us feeds more extremism on their side, and the cycle continues. This is exactly what I'm saying - the only way to break the cycle is to stop using violence. Extremists will not stop hating us, but it will at least stop adding fuel to the fire and curtail the creation of more extremists.
Also, it seems a dangerous path to lump all Muslims in with the fanatics. It would be like defining Christianity by its crusades, inquisitions and abortion clinic bombers. Heck, I think it is inaccurate to define Christianity by the support most Christians give to the war on terrorism, which I don't believe is how Jesus would want us to act.
I have read in the Koran, that Jesus was a very violent guy. He, the son of God, grandson of God Sr. and great grandson to Mammon the 1st, had a short fuse and was capable of irrational behavior. Comparable to today's road rage.
This is exactly what I'm saying - the only way to break the cycle is to stop using violence. Extremists will not stop hating us, but it will at least stop adding fuel to the fire and curtail the creation of more extremists.
Kind of like Clinton's strategy...No retaliation for Kenya, no reaction to the Cole bombing, or the mutilation of US Marines in Sudan (which amounted to a green light with the message that terrorism would not be confronted by the US.) Yeah, that strategy really softened those terrorists, really put an end to that "cycle of violence"...That is, if you don't count 911 and the 3000 murdered civilians after a decade of unresponsive Democrats.
"It's all Clinton's fault" and "My Country Tis of Thee" is your argument in favor of using violence to stop violence?
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