Tuesday, November 30 2004
THE STATE OF THE JIHAD: From Reuters yesterday:

DUBAI - Al Qaeda's deputy leader Ayman al-Zawahri said in a videotape broadcast Monday al Qaeda would continue to attack the United States until Washington changed its policies toward the Muslim world.

"We are a nation of patience and we will continue fighting you (United States) until the last hour," Zawahri said in the tape which was aired by Arab satellite television Al Jazeera.

Egyptian-born Zawahri is Osama bin Laden's right hand man and has been pictured traveling with the al Qaeda leader through Afghanistan. He is on the FBI's list of its 22 "most wanted terrorists."

In a Sept. 9 video-taped message he ridiculed U.S. forces which he said were "hiding in their trenches" in Afghanistan.

Tough talk coming from a guy who now lives in a cave. His boss lives in a cave, too. Neither can show their face in public and have to communicate to their troops using a handy cam. Two-thirds of Zawahri's fellow al-Qaeda leaders and henchmen are either dead or in prison and one of his most prominent terrorist colleagues, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, high-tailed it out of Fallujah just in the nick of time and is now on the lam in Iraq.

Ladies and gentlemen, the state of the jihad is not well. Last week as Zarqawi was making his retreat from Fallujah, he slammed Sunni clerics for their lack of support:

''You have let us down in the darkest circumstances and handed us over to the enemy. ... You have quit supporting the mujahedeen. Hundreds of thousands of the nation's sons are being slaughtered at the hands of the infidels because of your silence. You (the Sunni clerics) left the mujahadeen to face the strongest power in the world. Are your hearts not shaken by the scenes of your brothers being surrounded and hurt by your enemy?''

Today MEMRI has posted a letter from a Saudi Islamist condemning his fellow Muslims who "shirk jihad" and ridiculing them as women:

"You who shirk Jihad: I am saying to you what Ibn Al-Jawzi said to the people of his time: 'Oh people: the millstone of war is turning round and the call for Jihad was made and the gates of heaven have opened. And so, if you are not among the knights of war, then let your women grind the millstone of war and you go and makeup your eyes, you women with beards and turbans!'

All this public browbeating of fellow Muslims suggests the enthusiasm for terrorism, death and jihad isn't as great as the bad guys had hoped.

Meanwhile, U.S. forces in Iraq have been extremely effective in answering the jihadists' prayers for martyrdom.

More Iraqi troops are being trained by the day, and the effort to postpone January elections in Iraq has thankfully not gained steam.

Clearly, there is much more work to be done on the battlefield as well as in the boardrooms and classrooms of Iraq and beyond. But the progress being made is significant. More importantly, it marginalizes the terrorists and diminishes the attractiveness and influence of future calls for jihad.

Imagine what continued success could look like a year from now: the first freely elected government in Iraqi history, significantly reduced U.S. troop levels in Iraq, Israeli withdrawal from Gaza and movement toward settling the Israeli-Palestinian conflict with Arafat now out of the way. Where exactly would this leave Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahri and their grievances of the oppression of Muslims? Same cave. Same handy cam. But with far fewer followers and far less influence. - T. Bevan 10:30 am Link | Email | Send to a Friend