Decline of Islamic extremism

Washington Times ^ | 5/21/02 | Sol Schindler

[kattracks]

If you ask a 10th Mountain Division member, just down from fighting in the snow at 8,000 feet or higher, what the future of militant Islam is, he will tell you bleak, very bleak. If you pose the same question to Gilles Kepel, a French academic who has spent the last five years writing "Jihad: The Trail of Political Islam," he will give you, surprisingly, the same answer. There are still many Islamic militants, they still believe in violence, but they are losing popular support. They reached their ascendancy about five years past but have lost ground ever since.

[McGavin999]

Actually, all it's going to take is freeing one more country and then it's all over for the Islamists. They can't keep pretending that America is the "Great Satan" when every time we come to town the local Muslims are dancing for joy in the streets.

[brat]

Someone ought to inform the UN and the EU....they seem to think its rising.

[bybybill]

This is very bad news because it will destroy the "kill`em all" reason for being. Obviously the traitor that wrote it is anti-Israel. Why, if these views become widely known, They might help promote peace. Can`t have that.

[luvbach1]

Praise the Lord, peace is at hand!

[The Great Satan]

There has never been any question about who is going to win this fight. The only question is how many more people get killed in the process. That remains to be seen.

[Drammach]

Islam's "political revolution" may be over, but the Religious one is still going on. ( My "humble" opinion )
The recent trend of Islamist revolutionism was an outgrowth of Islamist religious extremism.
That religious extremism comes from a rebirth of zealous introspection concerning the meaning and direction of Islam, which began some 50 years ago.
Islam itself is going through a great deal of change in the way it sees God, the world, and Islam's place in the scheme of things.
A simple concept like seperation of church and state, which Turkey, as head of the Ottoman empire, managed to understand centuries ago, is still inconcievable in much of Islam.
But, they are learning.

Hopefully, they will learn that lesson, and in turn, co-existance with other religions and nations before it is too late.
The nations of the world may just get sick and tired of waiting for Islam to "grow up" and get rid of it like a bad lunch.

[Monty22]

I really don't believe islam is 'growing up' whatsoever in any way. When apartment buildings and Walmarts start blowing up, maybe you'll understand.

[henbane]

The organizers of the [World Trade Center and the Pentagon] bombings had taken great care and used much ingenuity to commit these acts of violence, but their minds were blank as to the next step. This blindness illustrates the intellectual bankruptcy that prevents them from ever being anything other than a marginal — if deadly — political force.

Nice academic analysis--kind of marginalizes the Islamic terrorists as a small bunch of mindless kill-happy psychos slipping away into the shadows of history.

At least Schindler tossed in the word "deadly" somewhere in his very soothing, very PC discussion.

Unfortunately, this view from the ivory tower bears little relationship to the real world and its headlines--past and present.

For example:

Terrorists Spoke of Attack More Devastating Than September 11

A series of intercepted telephone conversations between suspected members of Osama bin Laden's al-Qa'ida network prompted George Bush's decision to order a general terror alert for the United States on Monday, reports said yesterday.

The calls indicated an attack against America that would be even more devastating than the 11 September assaults.

The CIA and the FBI presented the information to President Bush and his national security team on Monday morning. While the intelligence from the telephone calls was chilling, officials wrangled for hours over whether the public should hear about it.

Terrorists Spoke of Attack More Devastating Than September 11

[happygrl]

Unfortunately, this view from the ivory tower bears little relationship to the real world and its headlines--past and present.

Agreed. When will this "soothing" view reach the Wahabbi-funded mosques throughout the world ? Our actions in Afghanisan proved that definitive show of force and defeat is the convincing factor in shutting down these Wahabbi fantasies.

A kind hand extended to them in lieu of a definitive defeat is seen as weakness.

Once the defeat has been completed, we can be magnanimous in victory as we were in Japan and Germany.

[Trident/Delta]

While I will agree whole-heartedly with the treatise, the unfortunate fact is that the fundamentalists will continue to attempt to leverage violence as the mechanism of change. They have no plan beyond the next bombing. In affect, there is a "boom" and Abdul and Co. peek around to see what the effect is. If it is favorable, then another "boom" is heard etc.. It has been this way for time immemorial and will continue since that is the progressive mindset of the Arab/Musli mind.

Semper Fi

[Stallone]

History teaches us much about achieving Peace.

In the history of the world, lasting peace has only ever been achieved when:

1. The parties go to war

2. One side prevails

3. The victor imposes terms for peace on the vanquished

Any other scenario is fiction, because it has never happened and is contrary to human nature.

The Muslims must be crushed to achieve peace

[kaylar]

This is a very nice pretty article, and I hope its author is correct in the assumption that militant Islam is onthe decline ; however-

"EthnoEuropeans", especially women, are still being harrassed , even attacked, by antiwestern Muslim immigrants in France, Holland, Denmark...Pretty much throughout the EU.

In the Mollucas, whole villages of Christians are being forced to convert or be killed ; after "coversion", they are subjected to obscene mutilations.

In France, Algerian and North African Muslims feel so safe to express their views, they happily burn and bomb synagogues, gangrape French girls as gang initiation rites, boo the French anthem, pelt French politicians with garbage...

In Australia, the refugee camps have had numerous incidences of Muslim on Christian/nonmuslim violence. Our brave Muslim warriors for allah singled out a blind Christian man and Christian teenage girls for abuse. Outside the camps, gangrape is used to express antiaustralian, antiwhite hatred, to judge from the reported words of the assailants.

In the Sudan and in other parts of Africa, Muslim slavetraders are enslaving Christian and animist/pagan villagers...Again, mutilations are inflicted on the victims.

What if all these horrific acts aren't part of "militant Islam"? What if , as the most virulent antiIslamic posters have said all along, this is what most Muslims,including "moderates" , would do,if they felt they had the power to do so?

[COBOL2Java]

Interesting article. Here's the book the editorialist is referring to:

Jihad: The Trail of Political Islam

FWIW, here are two other books by the author, Gilles Kepel:

The Revenge of God : The Resurgence of Islam, Christianity and Judaism in the Modern World

Allah in the West : Islamic Movements in America and Europe (Mestizo Spaces/Espaces Metisses)

[happygrl]

Thanks for reiterating the facts to contrast with the ivory tower view of this article.