British Islamists Speak Out!

[Doug]

Hear the voice of the oppressed victims of wicked British imperialism expounding the rectitude of their just struggle!

All live in Britain.

Thank God our society is committed to toleration and diversity!

http://www.lexpress.mu/display_article_sup.php?news_id=16947

and

http://www.washtimes.com/upi-breaking/2005...82616-6312r.htm

and

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/londonn...ning%20Standard

[kimmy]

The last two of your links aren't working, which is quite unfortunate because I was very interested. Could you try again? One thing that might help, if you can't get the links to work just by pasting them, would be a service like tinyurl.com that generates a shorter link to the article.

-k

[August1991]

The working link (to an obscure Mauritian newspaper) refers to this guy:

For two years, extremists like Sheik Omar Bakri Mohammed, a 47-year-old Syrian-born cleric, have played to ever-larger crowds, calling for holy war against Britain and exhorting young Muslim men to join the insurgency in Iraq. In a newspaper interview last April, he warned that "a very well-organized" London-based group, Al Qaeda Europe, was "on the verge of launching a big operation" here.

In a sermon attended by more than 500 people in a central London meeting hall last December, Sheik Omar vowed that if Western governments did not change their policies, Muslims would give them "a 9/11, day after day after day."

NYT

[Hawk]

Their kind should be hunted down and killed to the man/woman, they should NEVER be glorified, rationalized, or supported by any sane right or left winger.

[PocketRocket]

Sheik Omar vowed that if Western governments did not change their policies, Muslims would give them "a 9/11, day after day after day."

Has anyone ever bothered to ask which policies they want changed???

[Black Dog]

Filmmaker/author Jon Ronson spent some time with Omar Bakri Mohammed during the writing of his book THEM.

Ronson's portrait of Mohammad was that of a somewhat befuddled buffoon who could barely draw a crowd in Hyde Park's Speaker's Corner. It's a book that's worth looking at.

[August1991]

Has anyone ever bothered to ask which policies they want changed???

They don't want young men coming to the West and discovering that they can be openly gay, and they can even marry. This policy must change.

Ronson's portrait of Mohammad was that of a somewhat befuddled buffoon who could barely draw a crowd in Hyde Park's Speaker's Corner.

To a western audience maybe, but Sheik Omar Bakri Mohammed got 500 Muslim men into a London mosque, apparently.

[Argus]

The last two of your links aren't working, which is quite unfortunate because I was very interested.  Could you try again?  One thing that might help, if you can't get the links to work just by pasting them, would be a service like tinyurl.com that generates a shorter link to the article.

-k

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Try this one. Different source, same general topic.

London Standard

[RB]

If there was ever a time that I support the war in Iraq it is now.

Freeing the people in the Middle East also means that countries that promote democracy does not have to suffer vulnerabilities of those who make claims that Islam is a religion of Terror.

Those terrorists are drawing their strength from the middle east and the way to eliminate this terror is to eliminate the root of terror.

I mean the general view is that the US, London had this coming.

I was in London on Thursday; it was a very scary experience. With no regards for human life, these terrorist are fearful.

I don't know that people deseve what was coming, smoking and cleaning out terror just means people deserve a lot better.

[Black Dog]

FreThose terrorists are drawing their strength from the middle east and the way to eliminate this terror is to eliminate the root of terror.

By engaging in actions that will inevitably lead to more terrorism (like, say, invading their countries)?

[Argus]

FreThose terrorists are drawing their strength from the middle east and the way to eliminate this terror is to eliminate the root of terror.

By engaging in actions that will inevitably lead to more terrorism (like, say, invading their countries)?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Who has invaded the UK?

[Black Dog]

Who has invaded the UK?

William of Orange.

[Guest eureka]

Hitler, too! Remember the Channel Islands.

[Argus]

Who has invaded the UK?

William of Orange.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I posed a valid question. These were British born men. Yet they bombed their own countrymen because of their outrage over what was happening abroad - and not even in the country from which their ancestors came from.

My father came from the UK. Does that mean it would be understandable now for me to go out and blow up the local mosque in retaliation for the London bombing? It would be the exact same principal.

Except I don't think like that.

Because I'm not a Muslim.

[Black Dog]

I posed a valid question. These were British born men. Yet they bombed their own countrymen because of their outrage over what was happening abroad - and not even in the country from which their ancestors came from.

How many Cuban emigres oppose Castro, despite their never having set foot in Cuba? How many Americans of Irish descent supported the IRA? How about the Air India bombing? How many sectarian conflicts carry over across genarational and physical borders? Plenty.

Because I'm not a Muslim.

What's your point (other than your usual one that all Muslims, especially Arabs, are evil)?

As I said above, such behaviour is clearly not confined to Muslims.

[Argus]

I posed a valid question. These were British born men. Yet they bombed their own countrymen because of their outrage over what was happening abroad - and not even in the country from which their ancestors came from.

How many Cuban emigres oppose Castro, despite their never having set foot in Cuba?

Almost all the US Cuban exiles are immigrants or first generation Americans who grew up listening to their parents talk about the evil of Castro. And at least they aren't out bombing and murdering Cubans they can find in the US.

How many Americans of Irish descent supported the IRA?

How many of them set off bombs to kill British citizens because of their support?

How about the Air India bombing?

Commited by Sikhs who were born and raised in India. What's your point?

How many sectarian conflicts carry over across genarational and physical borders? Plenty.

None of your comparisons hold water. Maybe if your Irish descended Americans set off massive explosions in New York or Philadelphia because they were angry that the US had sent troops to - Australia - you might have something to work with. But as I said, none of the bombers were Iraqi descendants. None were even Arabs.

Because I'm not a Muslim.

What's your point (other than your usual one that all Muslims, especially Arabs, are evil)?

One of the columnists in the Citizen had a point recently. He compared the Muslim world to the Germans in Nazi times. Certainly not all Germans were Nazis, but enough of them were, and enough sympathised and admired what the Nazis said or what they thought the Nazis were trying to accomplish, to allow the Nazis to thrive. Likewise not all Muslims are extremists, but millions and millions admire them and respect what they are trying to do, and these sympathisers are what allow Muslim extremism to thrive.

As I said above, such behaviour is clearly not confined to Muslims.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Of course it is. You know, the IRA used to bomb London too. Just like the Basque seperatists bombed Madrid. But they invariably tried for material damage, and called in warnings. Muslim terrorists never call in warnings. They're not interested in material damage. They want to kill people, as many as possible.

[Guest eureka]

I suppose that Mountbatten was "material?" I suppose that all tose Northern Irish civilians who were murdered were just material>

[Argus]

I suppose that Mountbatten was "material?" I suppose that all tose Northern Irish civilians who were murdered were just material>

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Like it or not, Mountbatten was a legitimate target for an insurgency movement. And while I won't deny civilians were sometimes deliberately targeted by both sides, there was never slaughter of the sort routinely practiced by Muslim terrorists.

[Black Dog]

None of your comparisons hold water. Maybe if your Irish descended Americans set off massive explosions in New York or Philadelphia because they were angry that the US had sent troops to - Australia - you might have something to work with. But as I said, none of the bombers were Iraqi descendants. None were even Arabs.

Which speaks to the way this conflict has been cast: not as a conflict of nationalities or states, but as a "clash of civilizations". Islam versus the West.

Of course none of the comparisons stand up to scrutiny, as the situations are not directly analagous: there was no "war on Catholiscism" being preached in Ireland, nor were foreign troops occupying Indian soil.

It's not hard to grasp that some individuals will identify with the broader identity of Islam over national ones. And in the climate of the war on terror (seen by Muslims everywhere as another chapter in the west's historic assault on Islam itself), where an "us versus them" mentality is cultivated by leadership on both sides, it's easy to see why some of "us" would identify with "them".

One of the columnists in the Citizen had a point recently. He compared the Muslim world to the Germans in Nazi times. Certainly not all Germans were Nazis, but enough of them were, and enough sympathised and admired what the Nazis said or what they thought the Nazis were trying to accomplish, to allow the Nazis to thrive. Likewise not all Muslims are extremists, but millions and millions admire them and respect what they are trying to do, and these sympathisers are what allow Muslim extremism to thrive.

Okay: why? What is it that is so appealing about this ideaology? What is it's pulll on otherwise westernized individuals liek thos ebehind the London blast?

Of course it is. You know, the IRA used to bomb London too. Just like the Basque seperatists bombed Madrid. But they invariably tried for material damage, and called in warnings. Muslim terrorists never call in warnings. They're not interested in material damage. They want to kill people, as many as possible.

Actually it doesn't seem to be about casualties as much as it is about creating a climate of fear. The World Trade Centre wasn't selected for the number of people that it contained, but for its symbolic value. Casulaties are secondary.

[kimmy]

Actually it doesn't seem to be about casualties as much as it is about creating a climate of fear. The World Trade Centre wasn't selected for the number of people that it contained, but for its symbolic value. Casulaties are secondary.

Ramzi Yousef, chief architect of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, wanted to kill 250,000 Americans (not chosen at random-- this was the number killed when the Americans bombed Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Yousef believed that if he could kill 250,000 Americans, he would prove to the Americans that they were in a war.) He selected the WTC because it was the only target be believed was remotely close to the scale he envisioned.

-k

[mirror]

How many Iraqi have died in Iraq at the hands of US and the UK bombs since the Allies invaded their country?

And you're worried about a few Londoners and a few New Yorkers.

Doncha think we need to put things in perspective here?

[Argus]

How many Iraqi have died in Iraq at the hands of US and the UK bombs since the Allies invaded their country?

And you're worried about a few Londoners and a few New Yorkers.

Doncha think we need to put things in perspective here?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

How many of those Iraqis had Kalashnikov's in their arms?

How many were killed by the "insurgents"?

Take the remainder, and then deduct how many would have been executed by Sadaam in the last two years.

[Argus]

One of the columnists in the Citizen had a point recently. He compared the Muslim world to the Germans in Nazi times. Certainly not all Germans were Nazis, but enough of them were, and enough sympathised and admired what the Nazis said or what they thought the Nazis were trying to accomplish, to allow the Nazis to thrive. Likewise not all Muslims are extremists, but millions and millions admire them and respect what they are trying to do, and these sympathisers are what allow Muslim extremism to thrive.

Okay: why? What is it that is so appealing about this ideaology? What is it's pulll on otherwise westernized individuals liek thos ebehind the London blast?

Religion can be a dangerous thing in the minds of lunatics. And there are a ton of religious lunatics in the Muslim world. The Madrassas schools graduate tens of thousands of them every year, most of whom are useless as anything but religious teachers and mullahs since their education was entirely on the Koran. Take all those raving loonies wandering through the world and introduce them to all the dummies you're bound to run into and at least a few of those dummies are going to fall for their siren song of eternal paradise.

What makes Tom Cruise and John Travolta believe they are infested by the souls of dead space aliens?

[Doug]

The question of why young British Muslims would turn against their own country is an urgent one. I have not yet seen an analysis of the phenomenon that is completely convincing, however. I wonder what the situation is among young American, and young Canadian, Muslims?

The following articles are interesting and provide a starting place for understanding perhaps.

[1] New York Review of Books, 11 August 2005, which has the following articles:

--- Peter Galbraith, "Iraq: Bush's Islamic Republic"

--- A review-essay on 5 books on jihadis, by Max Rodenbeck

--- A review by Brian Urquhart of Richard Haaass's book, The Opportunity: America's Moment to Alter History's course

--- Christopher de Bellaige, "New Man in Iran" [the newly-elected Ahmaninejad.

Look at www.NYBooks.com

[2] Prospect August 2005 which has the following articles:

--- "Dying to Kill -- Interviewing a British Jihadist"

Much more than just the usual 'we want to cut your throats' stuff -- the interviewee talks about the background and motivations of the current generation of suicide bombers.

--- A critical review of "The Power of Nightmares" [reprinted from The Nation].

--- Two other articles on Islam in Britain

and

--- An article by Tamara Chalabi [a relation?] on the problems of the people working on Iraq's new constitution.

Look at www.prospect-magazine.co.uk

The Humanists got a shock at the UN when they tried to introduce a bland resolution which just expresses the views of any civilized human being:

http://www.iheu.org/modules/news/article.php?storyid=156

And in case you think support for the bombings is an isolated thing, and completely aberrant, look at this:

http://www.intelligence.org.il/eng/sib/7_05/london_b.htm

Finally, from the latest Weekly Standard, is this article by Irwin Stelzer

http://www.theweeklystandard.com/Content/P...1kbaxp.asp?pg=2

No one understands this phenomenon -- I have watched lots of TV interviews with "experts" and panel discussions, and the amount of vapid cliches, impotent hand-wringing, and platitudinous truisms uttered with great conviction and even indignation, which pour forth from "experts" and members of the public alike, is depressing.

No one whom I've read has as yet made a connection with Columbine -- but I think there is one, at the psychological level.

Doug