Big surprise here...

,,,Muslims are Muslims. Big charade.

Pakistan should understand that there has been a great increase in the knowledge of Islam, and in the new wariness toward Muslims, by non-Muslims in the West. That West can no longer be counted on to remain wide open for Muslim visitors to take advantage of the health care, or to send their children to American universities(as one Al-Jazeera executive confidently expects for his children --he has, one hopes , another think coming). Musharraf's own son has been permitted to live, and work as an accountant, in Canton, Massachusetts. "Pinky" Bhutto still remembers her roommates at Radcliffe. But the Pakistani elite has got to start acting like Ataturk, not just making the appopriate noises. Pakistan is a state completely dependent on foreign aid, remittances from abroad, and access to foreign markets. All of these can be closed or greatly diminished, almost overnight. No Western foreign aid, no Pakistanis allowed into the West to send money home (and those here subject to vigilant oversight), and markets for Pakistani rugs could be easily lost to the lower-priced rugs from China, and of course a little publicity, in the right places, about how all those Pakistani rugs are made by very little fingers, of very young rug-weavers, could have a powerful effect on potential clients. Overnight, Pakistani rugs and textiles could be supplanted by those from China, or India. From here on out, the janus-faced military that runs Pakistan have to be informed that their period of probation is just about running out. That A. Q. Khan affair, in which they were involved up to their necks, will never be forgotten nor forgiven. It is not a question of forgiving any more Pakistani debts, and certainly giving them warplanes should be out of the question. They should understand that they are now going to have to earn the right for Pakistan simply to continue to exist without a complete economic collapse -- which is well within our power. And if Khan's "Islamic bombs" are demanded by the Americans, with the alternative being economic ruin, the Pakistanis should understand that this is serious; those bombs could very well end up in all sorts of hands, and they must be delivered, or else. Begin with ending all Pakistani visas to the U.S., and if possible, allied countries. Then try to shut down its textile and rug trade. Then let the Pakistanis know that parts for their American weapons and planes will no longer be available. And keep ratcheting up the pressure. Eventually they will have to choose: those bombs, or their economic survival. Even the frenzied mobs, faced with starvation and ruin, will choose to bow to darura -- Arabic for "necessity."

After the A.Q. Khan affair, in which this supposed "rogue" was aided by members of the Pakistani army's intelligence services, there need be no more carrots, only sticks. No more weapons for Pakistan beyond some rifles and jeeps. No more military aid, no more economic aid. Instead: merely to keep their markets, and to obtain a few visas for the elite, they will have to shut those Saudi-funded madrasas, and turn them into vocational schools. It is time for Musharraf, who likes to let Westerners know that he spent part of his youth in Turkey, and that he enjoys reading biographies of Ataturk. Well, it is time qu'il fait son petit Mustafa Kemal, that he does his Ataturk.

And the mixture as before will not do, either, for the likes of such journalists as Ahmed Rashid. Articulate, no doubt secular, a writer of books on the Taliban and on Jihad, Rashid is unaccountably allowed to push the higher apologetics. Yes, Al Qaeda and the Taliban are bad, but of course Islam itself is not to blame. When, in the first few pages of "JIhad," Rashid defines it as primarily the internal struggle within a Believer's conscience, etc. you know you are in the wrong hands, you have come to the wrong place. In other words, now that we have the truth-tellers, such as Ibn Warraq and Ali Sina and others, we don't have to put up with the half-truth tellers. So cut it out, buster.

Meanwhile, as you try to decide where to take your own custom (you would not have bought a Volkswagen in 1938, would you? Or Soviet editions of Pushkin in 1958, giving the Soviet government some of that craved valyuta? No, of course not), in the matter of Indian restaurants, for example, look for for telltale signs: Does the restaurant sell liquor? Are the pictures on the walls in the usual Mother India vein, with Rama and Ganesha and so on -- or is there something about the decor that smacks of dar al-Islam? One Indian friend, a Hindu, claims that, from 30 yards, he can tell by the facial expression whether a man originally from the subcontinent, walking towards him, is Muslim or Hindu but he also says the distinctive features are a lot easier to detect in England than in America). Take your custom to those you suspect do not regard you wtih hostility, or worse.

And when it comes to Jammu and Kashmir, complete solidarity with the Hindus of India must be offered by non-Muslims, the same solidarity that Hindus subject to the :jizya-like Bumiputra system in Malaysia, or the Hindus in Bali, deserve. You don't need to be a believer in Vedic verities, or even the wisdom of the Easst, Beatles-style. No need for a sympathetic reading of the Mahabharata (which would take you ten years, in any case). No chanting or mantras involved. No need to be a connoisseur of Nirad Chaudhuri, or the Onegin stanzas of Vikram Seth's Golden Gate. No, all you have to do is know that whatever helps strengthen dar al-Islam, and Islam, must be opposed; whatever weakens it, must be supported. Besides, "wounded civilization" of India, in Naipaul's phrase, has already given at so many offices; during the period of Mughal rule, some 60-70 million Hindus were murdered. Ibn Battuta himself records, without the slightest embarrassment, in his Rihla the enslavement and murder of Hindus by the Muslims -- they killed them for their sport. Only Akbar, that tolerant syncretist (absolutely despised, as a result, by Indian Muslims) was the exception; the sinister Aurangzeb was the rule. If you read the pages of the Times LIterary Supplement, you know that for some damned reason one Francis Robinson -- perhaps favored by Robert Irwin, himself a translator of classical Arabic - almost has a lock on reviews of books on Mughal India. And he never fails to tell us of the romance and passion at the Mughal court (I often wonder if he really is such a Barbara Cartland fan, transposed to far-away India, as he seems to be), to pooh-pooh Muslim misbehavior, and to darkly hint that those who attack Muslim rule in India must have another agenda (Cowboy Bush? in England today, anything is possible). Try Bamber Gascoigne, K. S. Lal, or the scholarly anthologies that came out decades ago, on Muslim rule in India, by Elliott and Lawson. And the next time someone launches into an attack, as even Indian "intellectuals" -- aping those in London -- like to do, against the BJP and Hindutva, tell them you beg to differ. For mostly what they want (see Koenraad Elst, see Sima Rita Goel) is to undo the damage that Muslim rule did in India (it was the British who allowed Hindu India to redisover its own past, hidden after the Muslim conquest). HIndus, whatever they may wish to do in India, have no designs on the rest of the world. Muslims, however, do covet Bolivia and Japan, Iceland and the Congo, Vermont and Arizona. It is all land belonging to Allah and to the Believers; and now, I'm afraid, is time for that Miss-Clavel moment in Bemelmans' Madeleine: That's all there is. There isn't any more.

Hugh, right on the mark as usual.

I work with collegues from India, both Hindu and muslim. Who do you think the muslims support when Pakistan plays India in a cricket match?

Muslims have solidarity, so must non-muslims since the threat to us all is real. As I've said in an earlier post:

LONG LIVE HINDU JAMMU & KASHMIR!

Strategic logic dictates an alliance of India with the US in the "War on Terror". (Israel already maintains sound military and security links with India, Australia's are set to grow.)

However, the quisling Arabist establishment within the US State Department and Britain's Foreign Office have been paid and commanded by their Arab and Moslem masters to stymie the expansion of their countries' closer ties at all costs and they're labouring, 24/7, to do so.

Pakistan (when I was there about 33 years ago) was exceptionally shocking to me in its stinking squalour, routine corruption, abysmal ignorance, gratuitous brutality and sheer callousness towards life in general, even after seeing a slice of the rest of gravely-underdeveloped Southeast and South Asia.

Having been in Lebanon, Turkey, Iran, Afghanistan, Indonesia and (the then brand-new) Bangladesh, Pakistan was the first place where I encountered anybody seriously wanting to impose a Sharia state - there it was a common aspiration, across many classes of Pak society.

Moreover, it was the first place I ever witnessed "Mein Kampf" and the "Protocols of the Elders of Zion" (in English, Arabic and Urdu translations) openly advertised and for sale in shops and street bazaars - what's worse, with readers buying up.

My contemporary sources tell me that, though much of the remainder of Asia's improved very greatly, Pakistan's largely unchanged.

Musharraf, the architect of Kargil war, is part
of the problem. America has always been dismissive of terrorism that India faced fo 15 yrs coloring it as - ohh this India and Pakis
keep fighting (even though terrorism was sponsored by Pakistan in which 60,000 Indians
lost their lives and many more hindus displaced). One positive unintended consequence of terrorism that India faced was that India revised it anti - Israel policy of 80's and became far more understanding of problems Israel faces. Hopefully, after Sep 11, Americans will be less dismissive of India's problems but who knows ? Atleast, round one goes in favor of Pakistani charade of a supposed 'u-turn' on jihad. The entire world needs a sustained and civilized response to not let anyone use terrorism or jihad to resolve political disputes.

It was suggested recently that Palestinians be treated in the same manner as North Koreans by the US. The US forbids travel to North Korea or for North Koreans to travel or study in the US. Trade with the North is also forbidden. Think if such restrictions were placed first on the Palestinians then on other unfriendly places in the Middle East. Insolent and ungrateful Palestinians would no longer be allowed to study or visit in the US. No more aid money or access to western technology or education, then what will Muslims do?

There was only a pathetic $140 mil invested in the Palestinian Authority last year. More money then that is spent on some films here in the US. Most of the aid money to the Palestinians comes from the US and EU just think if that money was cut off. The fact that people are beginning to openly talk about travel bans and other restictions on people from the Middle East, should give Arabs and Muslims pause. People are getting tired of the hypocrisy, threats and violence of those from the Middle East. Perhaps the world will adopt a policy of disengagement where the Middle East is concerned.

Atef:

There's no way that the hypocrits and somnambulists of the EU will disengage from the PA/PLO - they're mesmerized - like a rat by a snake - head over heels in infatuation with the "Palestinians", every bit as much as they despise Israel and Zionism (but won't admit to being overtly antisemitic - oh no, never that).

The EU has grand plans: basically, to sell Israel, as soon as it's opportune, down the river to the "Palestinians" and Arabs, thinking that this "sacrifice" will buy them permanent peace and amity from the Arabs and Moslems. (The way that the Munich Pact of 1938 ditched Czechoslovakia and obtained, what, as much as 1 extra year of the illusion of peace for Europe from the Nazis!)

Any money or assistance, etc, that the US withdraws, they'll be delighted to make up, at once and in spades, ingratiating themselves even further. They'd be thrilled for America to be thrashed in Iraq and for it to quit the Mideast, leaving all of the running to them (in their inane, defeatist -suicidal - "Euro-Arab Dialog", their rubric for creeping, state-supported Islamization of their Continent).

They can then get on, undisturbed, with accommodating the dar el-Islam in gross contortions so spectacular that such grotesque twists and inversions might never have been witnessed before!

That said, I agree that America ought, on principle, to sever links with the "Palestinians", despite the EU champing at the bit to fill in. The EU's probably already far too compromised to save itself anyway; having put itself squarely in the antagonists' camp, it may have to share the enemies' fate.

However, if it can manage to pull back from the Islamo-fascist embrace in time, let it signify this by sincerely mending the fences with the USA that it's damaged and seriously committing NATO (including weighty French, Spanish and German contingents) to Iraq, commencing from June 30, dismissing and overriding the thunderously stupid UN "plan" of sending in Arab League "peace-keepers".

You Americans really need to open your eyes fully and take an interest in historical matters. The reason that the European Union is dedicated to finding peace is that they have compassion for the truth and not worried about the Jewish vote. Israel has taken land that is not rightfully theirs and this is much of the problem since the 1960's. The USA policy in the middle east is derived from paranoia and a greed.