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No flames. I see OBL, the Talibans and the Al Quaida as the last desperate go for broke gamble of islam.

Sort of like the Sioux "Ghost Dancers" of 1890, or the Nazis' final run for the coast in the Battle of the Bulge.

Fundamentalist radical islamists know that they are losing their youth to Western culture. They are now attempting to smash and destroy that Western culture before it is able to complete the seduction of their next generations.

This is a classic example of "Strategic Over Reach", Napoleon in Moscow, the Germans at Stalingrad. The islamists may succeed in wrecking our developed ecomomies for a while, but while the cutoff in trade and travel will be painful to the West, it will be fatal to the islamic nations. They cannot eat petroleum.

I think that this episode will bring the end of the recent expansionist phase of islamism, which will be marginalized and on the retreat for centuries after their nations emerge from starvation, civil war, and economic depression.

Travis, perhaps it is time, and the passage away from immediate struggles with opposing ideologies, that mellow the great religions. I tend to agree, this is the last great gasp of radical Islamism trying to prevent movement into the modern world, trying to resist the advent of technology and scientific explanation of the universe. Since we in the West do not wholly embrace secular humanism (we Christians resist it when we see it clearly), I think rather inconsiderate to assume the world of Islam would embrace the same corrosive aspects that we still resist. But the adherents of the great religions will learn to co-exist, and may even learn to value each other's diversity of thought and scholarship someday.

As a Christian, I do not assume God has no plan for the salvation of such a vast segment of humankind. Though I don't know what His plan is, I do believe it is marvelous and not anywhere near as exclusionary of other faiths as some would promote. Faith is a force of the spiritual level of the universe; the power of it is well beyond our current comprehension, even to understand how faith found in another religion may be applied by the Creator through His Son to the glory of His Son. I conceive of God in three persons much the way I would explain my or your existence as expressed at three levels, body-soul-spirit. I don't think that is polytheism and I don't think God is offended if I hold that belief.

Yes, it will.

BUT, it's part of the "end times" Bible prophecies, in which God brings about these conditions, in order to bring His judgement upon the whole world -- at the time of the 7-year Tribulation (period of time). This was the time told about by Daniel and referred to by Jesus Christ (in Matthew).

What we are seeing -- to put it in perspective -- is that "end time scenario" in which all the "players" are being moved into position for that "last act" -- prior to the time of Jesus Christ's arrival and the setting up of His Kingdom on this earth, which He rules from Jerusalem over all the nations.

Islam is a Satanic religion -- being used by Satan, in his attempt to bring about the destruction of Israel, in order to prevent the "plan of God" from being carried out (as He has told us already). And in this, Satan will fail, along with his Satanic religion of Islam (which is dedicated to the destruction of Jews and Christians [by their own words in the Koran]).

God says He will prove His Name to be true and He will bring about the total and complete restoration of Israel to the land that He promised Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. God will not forsake them or forget His promises. This is being done right now. Islam will be totally destroyed and every such "believer" in it will be destroyed by the coming of Jesus Christ to set up His Kingdom and that such person thrown into the Lake of Fire.