Terrorism: What is your plan?

Great Debates
101

To my understanding the pakistani government is powerless in the mountains. So what good is diplomatic pressure on them, if they can’t do much anyhow?
As for the madrassas. My guess would be that the one who pays, has a say what they teach. So if Bill Gates funds one, kids will become computer wizzards, if bin Laden funds it, they’ll be terrorists. Maybe we should call Bill.

I don’t have to admit these things as I never disagreed. The missunderstanding between you and me was that I had the feeling that you meant some sort of military action when you said we need to deal with Pakistan. Maybe not so surprising after all this ‘nuke Mekka’ bullshit I had to read here. That was my concern when I wrote that I wouldn’t like to see Pakistan on a to-do list like Afganistan, Iraq, Iran etc. Now you clarified that you don’t neccesarily mean military action, so my mistake I guess.
Yes, if we could, we should do something about Pakistan. But this will take decades. It took 40 years to change things in the east block… And also I think that there are some (even) more important issues to address right now.

I’m working together with a whole bunch of Indians here. Two are Christians, the rest Hindus. Now maybe I’ve been jumping to conclusions but these guys have some very strange and strong attitudes towards muslims. So you can accuse me of judging hundreds of millions of people from knowing 10. But I actually didn’t:

And this statement was true until I met you!

102

swami, [bT.Mehr**, everytime you open your mouths, you demonstrate that you entered this “debate” with a total lack of honest intentions.

Whenever someone disagrees with you, you re-write their statements to slander your opponent.

As I have stated, I advocate a nuclear response to a nuclear attack.

I further advocate that the threat of destroying Mecca with a nuclear weapon be used to frighten the fanactic segement of the Middle East into refraining from launching that initial attack.

And I understand the motives of these terrorists very well–our culture offends them.

They don’t like a society where people can:[ul]
[li]Attend the theatre. {Forbidden in Saudi Arabia} That would be sinful![/li]
Well, I don’t care if it offends them. We have sent airplanes overhead to drop books onto them. Their children come to us, and desire to have a better life.

This terrifies the radical Muslims. We are a threat to their well-neigh totalitarian control of education, literacy and culture.

But we don’t force their kids to come to us. They come of their own free will.

And this infuriates men like bin Ladin.

I understand them very well, and I will never compromise with them.

If they will try to kill us, because they are offende4d then let them die.

As terrorists are criminals, let the moderate Muslims curb them. Ifr they do, I wish those people well. If they do not curb the extremists, let our government strike 5 blows for one, an “asymetrical response” strategy, until the attacks on us stop.

And if the Ultimate Weapon is used against us, then and only then, let us bring the full force and fury of our atomic arsnel against them.
[li]Read what they like without a Mullah acting as censor beforehand. That would be sinful! {Remember the sentance of death/assassination laid down on poor Salmon Rushdie? Or do you have a “convienent” memory here, too?}[/li][li]See an encensored movie. {Forbidden throughout the Islamic world} That would be sinful![/li][li]Go to a public library (forbidden in Saudi Arabia, and they have no non-religious libraries available in the whole country) That would be sinful![/li][li]Allow women to obtain an education (forbidden under the Taliban, and effective forbidden in rural areas throughout the Middle East) That would be sinful![/li][li]allow women to obtain medical care. That would involve taking their clothes off. That would be sinful![/li][/ul]

103

swami, [bT.Mehr**, everytime you open your mouths, you demonstrate that you entered this “debate” with a total lack of honest intentions.

Whenever someone disagrees with you, you re-write their statements to slander your opponent.

As I have stated, I advocate a nuclear response to a nuclear attack.

I further advocate that the threat of destroying Mecca with a nuclear weapon be used to frighten the fanactic segement of the Middle East into refraining from launching that initial attack.

And I understand the motives of these terrorists very well–our culture offends them.

They don’t like a society where people can:[ul]
[li]Attend the theatre. {Forbidden in Saudi Arabia} That would be sinful![/li]
[li]Read what they like without a Mullah acting as censor beforehand. That would be sinful! {Remember the sentance of death/assassination laid down on poor Salmon Rushdie? Or do you have a “convienent” memory here, too?}[/li][li]See an encensored movie. {Forbidden throughout the Islamic world} That would be sinful![/li][li]Go to a public library (forbidden in Saudi Arabia, and they have no non-religious libraries available in the whole country) That would be sinful![/li][li]Allow women to obtain an education (forbidden under the Taliban, and effective forbidden in rural areas throughout the Middle East) That would be sinful![/li][li]allow women to obtain medical care. That would involve taking their clothes off. That would be sinful![/li][/ul] Well, I don’t care if it offends them. We haven’t sent airplanes overhead to drop books onto them. Their children come to us, and desire to have a better life.

This terrifies the radical Muslims. We are a threat to their well-neigh totalitarian control of education, literacy and culture.

But we don’t force their kids to come to us. They come of their own free will.

And this infuriates men like bin Ladin.

I understand them very well, and I will never compromise with them.

If they will try to kill us, because they are offende4d then let them die.

As terrorists are criminals, let the moderate Muslims curb them. Ifr they do, I wish those people well. If they do not curb the extremists, let our government strike 5 blows for one, an “asymetrical response” strategy, until the attacks on us stop.

And if the Ultimate Weapon is used against us, then and only then, let us bring the full force and fury of our atomic arsnel against them.

104

:smack: I’ve re-written nothing! I quote and answer. Your intentions on the other hand seem to be simply to repeat your statements without considering what we others say about them.

I take it that you think the youth of islamic countries that flee to the west are smarter then their parents. They are not anti-american. Right?
But they’d be killed by your attacks/invasions just as well. Wouldn’t it make sense to use them as a stock of sensible people to build up radical countries towards something more western-style?

Bosda Di’Chi of Tricor I would realy apprechiate your opinion on my post earlier addressed explicitly at you and Read_Neckand Daisy Cutter!
Instead of accusing me and swami, participate in the debate!

105

Ah. Much better.

106

I hope you are sitting and writing up your answer.
going for a coffee in the meantime…

107

Actually, it did end the violence between the British and the Palestinian Arabs.

As for hatred, who cares? If you hate me, it’s your problem, not mine. You can eat yourself up inside or you can just get over it.

108

Bosda, my friend, I have to disagree. I do not believe Osama and his crew are good-faith Muslims. I believe they pay lip service to the religion in order to gain sympathy from a broader population and advance their political goals. Do you remember the reports which traced the movements of various terrorists before the 9/11 attacks? Getting shitfaced in bars and IIRC some visits to tittie bars for a couple of them. Things clearly prohibited to anyone who actually believed in the extreme version of Islam they claim to practice. If an American leader promised to nuke Mecca if America was attacked, instead of acting as a deterrent, I would expect these faux-Muslims to leap up and down with joy. I believe they would see it as a chance to truly gain widespread support among the mainstream Islamic community. As of now they have been condemmed and denounced by some of the most respected Islamic clergy and scholars. They remain a fringe, and the gap is growing as the mainly-peaceful mainstream Islamic population are revolted by continuing acts of violence committed in the name of Islam.**

If you were to make a list a thousand times as long as this one you still wouldn’t come close to listing all the possible grievances the terrorists may claim as their motives. For the most part though, as I noted above, it isn’t a cultural difference which is the problem. There are millions of Muslims in the US. The cultures can co-exist peacefully. I believe the primary motivations for the terrorists are NOT that they consider us sinners, but that they consider us meddlers in their nations(well, they consider them “theirs” at least). That we are preventing them from establishing the type of country they would like to have with our economic and political influence.

Enjoy,
Steven

109

[QUOTE]
*Originally posted by Alessan *
You - by which I mean the entire Umma - have to accept the fact that Israel is here, will always be here, and there’s nothing you or anyone else can do to change that - and thatwe deal with things on our own terms. Now, I don’t really think of this as much of a loss, and if you don’t either then more power to you./QUOTE]
I’m afraid that you are a bit behind in your history classes.

And so sorry to disappoint you, but I didn’t loose anything when Israel was established in a complete illogical panical reaction of those who felt oh so guilty about the holocaust, yet weren’t prepared to take the responsibility and the costs of it.

But I’m sorry, I’m not going to spend my time in giving free history classes to someone who clearly thinks he can talk to me as if I’m an idiot.
I’ll give you a hint: As a starter you can try the UN website for further information about what I consider the most unlucky and criminal decision ever made.
The cause of a criminal injustice that after the one side declaration of independence by Israel hardly can can’t be undone. But which formed the start of crimes and bloodshed that aren’t going to end soon.

Go blow some of your hot wind elswhere my friend. You can’t impress me with your steam.

By the way: in case you walk around with illusive dreams of Palestinians dying out or being all murdered by Butcher Sharon and comapny, with US weapons and US financial support for their crimes, or if you dream that the Palestinians will simply disappear as if there is no criminal colonisation and occupation going on overthere: You better wake up now. Time to grow up.

Shalom. A

110

Bosda with the long name,

The only thing I can say about your complete ignorance about what you write is that it amuses me endlessly.

I really like to see such an expert on the Islamic world spreading his amazing knowledge.

But try to answer this question:
How many States are there with a majority of Muslims and what is perceived in the West as “Muslim government” (I’m not debating this Western interpretation here).
Now I’m off to the forbidden movies.
Oh wait…

No…
I have to give my wives first the daily beating. They would be lost if I don’t come in time.
You see, we do that every day at a fixed hour.

Then I have to burn all the books, magazines, newspapers, whatever they read, burn their eyes out because they use them for such forbidden things, burn their diplomes, get their teachers injailed because they have teached them, do the same with and to my daughter and her teachers, got to kill the doctors who treat them when they are ill - even those who were there when my children were born - …

O God…What an immense task … I’ll miss my forbidden movie today.
And now that I think of it: I’ll have to burn all the places where they are programmed down…

But I see that you at least are in good company here so that is a comfort to me.
Reading this stuff is even better then buying forbidden movies.

Oh wait… Have to go out an kill Rushdie first of all…
By the way: Anyone around here informed that this writer isn’t even Muslim?
Did anyone even read his “Satanic Verses”.
And if so, is it understandable for those readers where all the commotion around this came from and what those who caused it - and especially the one who came with that fatwa - found so terrible about that book?

Don’t tell me you didn’t read it Bosda with the long name… Because if so, you have missed something.

Oh well, as shown in your posts, you do miss one and an other when it comes to insight and background information; and don’t care writing about it as if you are an expert. So I suppose it doesn’t matter to you.

Salaam. A

111

[QUOTE]
*Originally posted by Aldebaran *
**

As Nelson would say: HA-ha!

I wasn’t blowing off “steam”, I was just stating a simple fact. For someone who claims not to have lost anything you sure seem to have a bug up your ass about our existance - and that makes me a very happy man. If the fact I’m alive makes just one person furious, then I’ve achieved something with my life.

Now, seeing as we don’t see really eye-to-eye (in fact, I doubt we’re even percieving the same portion of the electromagnetic spectrum) I won’t get into a deep historic debate with you. Suffice to say, the UN had very little to do with the formation of Israel. The only thing the folk on the East River did was draw some useless, unenforced lines on a map so that Britain would have an excuse to get the hell out of the region. Israel was founded by the Jews by force of arms, it it would have happened anyway, UN or no UN. The best thing other nations did for us was to stay the hell out of the way.

I’d answer more of your post, but honestly, I have no Idea what you wrote. I seem to have driven you past the point of coherence.

Ciao. A.

112

Alessan,

Sure.
Of course I don’t know what the history books in your county teach. So if you are misled by them, then you have an excuse.

Nevertheless that doesn’t excuse your attitude overhere.

By the way: I don’t care where you are, who you are, what you are. I don’t care if you exist or not.

You seem to think I do care about all of that.
Which is at the very least extremely weird seen the fact that I don’t even know you and you don’t even know me.
For someone claiming that I’m writing incoherent, making such a strange statement that you know what I care about can count…

Tot nog eens. A

113

Alessan,
A couple of questions: Suppose Islamic terrorists managed to detonate a nuclear bomb in , say , Tel Aviv. Suppose also there was no good evidence linking them to a particular government. What do you think Israel’s response would be? What do you think it should be?

114

Cyber pundit,

Sorry, I have to correct your terminology.

There is no such thing as “Islamic” terrorists. These two words can’t be linked since terrorism is nowhere to be found in Islamic teachings.

There are however terrorists who create a fake version of what they say is Islam. One that suits their political goals.
The same with Judaism which brought forward Zionism and its terrorism.

If you would be a bit familiar with the situation in the Palestiane/Israel conflict, you would know that religion has basically nothing to do with the Palestinian side. It is only used to throw oil on the fire by those who want their political goals furfilled and by those who have enough of the criminal Israeli occupation- oppression- expansion and murder policy.
Sadly enough religion has everything to do with these Zionist-Israeli goals.

Salaam. A

115

Forgot to mention:

It is in fact Israel with its nuclear program - in the hands of a fanatical government - that forms a threat to the whole region.

Salaam. A

116

**

Nothing like setting high goals for oneself.

:rolleyes:

117

The purpose of opening up our “top secret” documents was not meant to disclose mundane details and blueprints of our constructs. The purpose was to reveal what are we constructing and why?

Let me illustrate what I meant by a simple example. Imagine you are a powerful tribe near a river. You decide to build a dam on the river and only let a trickle of water pass through for the other lesser tribes living down the river path. Obviously, you will create animosity that may even lead to “terrorism” by those lesser tribes. To resolve the conflict, I am not saying you should necessarily reveal the blueprint of the dam or who were the people that constructed the dam. What I am saying is for you to open up the files containing your rationale and reasons for building the dam at the first place and why? If the world community judges that you should not have built that dam at the first place, then you should not only remove your security forces and troops away from the dam, you should also remove the whole damn thing.

As one of the posters in this thread said: “Any viable solution to reducing terrorism would go counter to U.S. business interests”.

Did you get that ? And do you want to comment on it?

118

Wake up call - Yep, but that’s not the way the US model of capitalism works. What you state is more akin to old-style European so-called ‘ethical’ Christian Democratic capitalism – which may, or may not, be more about perception than reality.

US Administrations have no interest in ethics or morality. Policy is influenced by those who fund them in the election process as well as through the whole lobby system. And it’s ably supported by a compliant, unquestioning media – if the press doesn’t question the morality, you don’t need to worry too much about it.

http://www.opensecrets.org/index.asp - for the main policy funding mechanisms.

If you want to take a remotely ‘ethical’ approach, you need to do a whole lot of things – for example, some people are concerned about religion impacting policy in the US but the real issue is unrestrained capitalism not influencing but determining foreign policy – this happens in no comparable country. Got to reinvent the traditional ‘contribution’ approach.

Then you need a whole change in the relationship between media and Government in the US, and the culture of the media. Plus a lot of public education . . achh, it’ll never happen.

119

A meaningless distinction I’m afraid. Jihadists like ObL are not non-Muslim, they’re just lousy Muslims, constructing tortured religious justifications for their actions and claiming to war on behalf of their faith ( and most probably believing it ). It’s a bit like 2thick’s assertion that the Mujahadeen-i-Khalq are not Iranian because they are fighting the current government of Iran. You can’t define away Islamic terrorists so conveniently.

The issue isn’t whether they break one Islamic injunction ( or several ), which they do. But so do many Muslims and religious people generally do so all the time. The issue is whether a) they consider themselves Muslims, which is obviously the case b) they overall follow the normative tenets of the faith ( accept the Five Pillars, etc. ), which they do, far as I can tell and c) are considered Muslims by a wide segment of their peers, which they are in the MENA. A Muslim who drinks alcohol, can still be a Muslim ( I know a couple ), if not the best Muslim possible by many views. Similarly a Muslim who murders can still be a Muslim, despite the heinous nature of his crime - he just isn’t a good one.

I mostly agree, but I wouldn’t take quite such a firm stance. This was true 20 years ago and is still true to a very significant extent today. However, again, you don’t get to define Hamas and PIJ as non-Muslim and it is definitely true that Islamism is on the rise among the Palestinian populace today. Religion is way down on the list of motivators, just as in Northern Ireland - Mostly it is about tribalism and more importantly, territory. But I wouldn’t say it has nothing to do with it for everybody.

This however, is no more true than it is for the Palestinian situation. Religion is a motivator for a ( vocal ) minority. Many, if not most early Zionists were atheists and again it is primarily a struggle over land, not faith.

  • Tamerlane
120

The truth is not a “meaningless distinction” at all.
If you can find me one single shadow of a referation in the teachings of Islam towards promoting and endorsing terroristic actions, then I’m afraid you have to re-write one and an other.

There you said it yourself. Constructing tortured religious justifications and so on, doesn’t make the crimes “Islamic”.
It makes them their crime and not the crime of Islam or ordered or endorsed by Islam at all.

I don’t need to “define away” something that even can’t exist.
The good selling dramatical title “Islamic terrorism/terrorist” is a Western invention. That isn’t my reponsibility but the one of those who invented it, those who use it and those who endorse it.

a) People who considern themselves Muslims don’t need to be Muslims. I know someone who is a Mormon yet thinks - and declares everwhere - that he is also a Muslim. He knows little of Islam, yet finds obviously some values he appreciates…Thus he is convinced that he is Muslim.

b) Following what you name “the normal tenets of the faith” doesn’t make you a Muslim at all.
I know of Christian missionaries who are trained in doing this in order to mislead and abuse Muslims. (If my information is correct then they are actually trained to do this at US universities, by the way.) The goals is to pose as Muslims in order to be able to destroy the beliefs of Muslims because, as one person seemed to have declared: “That is the most horrible thing one can do to someone”. Others have only as goal to wipe Islam from the globe and others have only as goal to destroy Islam by their victims and replace it by the slogan “Jesus Saves”.
Are those Christians following “the normal tenets of Islam” Muslims. By your defenition one should think so.

c) You would be surprized that what you state here is actually as far from the truth as I am now at this moment far from where you are in person.
Further: I drink now and then wine (the discussion about this being completely prohibited is one of the subjects I found and still find very amusing to engage myself in) and of course I act now and then in opposition with certain commands.
Humans tend to be and stay humans.
But I don’t make killing innocent people my goal and sell it as something ordered by my religion.

Further: a criminal who is Muslim, like the murderer of your example, doesn’t commit the crime because he is ordered by the religion to do this and doesn’t declare that he is ordered by the religion to do this.

Terrorism has no place in Islam.
Nor is the crime terrorism specified/mentioned as such in its official jurisdiction upto now. While every other possible crime is.
If you know how Islamic jurisdiction works, then you know also that this alone is proof that terrorism as such doesn’t exist in Islam.

I didn’t say it has nothing to do with it. I said: it has little to do with it, but is used as an instrument to put oil on the fire.
About tribalism: you touch there an interesting point. One of the goals of the Israely occupation and policy in general is to destroy the tribal links and traditions. In which they succeeded rather well upto now. They destroy not only houses, villages, farming land, olive plantations. They destroy the very heart of the culture.

See above.
I disagree on your interpretation of Zionism. It was certainly one of the goals of the Zionist mouvement to create a homeland for Jews/Judaism.
At the beginning there wasn’t defined where that would be. But it was a Zionist who came to the idea to use Biblical referation to claim that they had “the right” to create a homeland right where they created it.
They still use that - for them historical and religious justified - claim. Ask one of the Israeli colonists why he is where he is… You’ll get your answer right away.

Salaam. A