The article states,

"...“modern and liberal education with Islamic values”,..."

Modern and liberal? Like the madrasas of Afghanistan and Pakistan?

I must agree with the Nobel laureate. The current regime is and never has been our friend.

The "politics of oil" can only be swept away when the US population demands an alternative energy source.

Posted by: Moe's Foe at January 22, 2005 6:08 PM

Saudi Arabia needs to understand that it has to stop this. No more funding of madrases world-wide. Otherwise, the royal family may find that all the information that has been collected about its decadent doings will find its way to the Internet, for the delectation of Saudis who, of course, in deploring their rulers, will first identify them as Infidels. And it can't be much fun to be a member of the Al-Saud family once those palaces start being attacked, and even those villas, and country estates, in Western Europe. Even Bandar's Planatagenet hunting lodge in England, or that house in Aspen where he had the mountain removed so as to get a better view -- all of that can be most unpleasant.

And then of course there are the oilfields of Al-Haza, not to mention the recent explorations by -- was it Elf or Total fina that signed the contracts -- in the Rub al-Khali. The former are right on the Persian Gulf, and unlike Iraq, there are not long distances for the oil to travel or to be sabotaged. And as for the natural gas in the Rub al-Khali -- the natural point of exit is Oman, and for the right cut Sultan Qaboos, who doesn't much are for Saudi Arabia anyway (remember the Dhofar rebellion, aided and abetted by Saudi Arabia?), might strike a deal. Oh, there is a good deal that can be done to Saudi Arabia. And that will be, if it doesn't stop that funding.

What's that, you say? Saudi Arabia has always been a "staunch ally"? How, exactly? Tell us how, tell us what Saudi Arabia has done by way of curbing the threat posed by its very own ideology to the entire Infidel world?

We can't appeal to the wisdom or goodness of Saudis. We can only threaten them, either the ruling family itself -- in other words, instead of protecting them, throwing them to the wolves, and seizing all of their overseas assets for they, in this war, are enemy aliens and their property can be seized (go back and see what happened to German-owned property during World War II). There are so many ways to make Saudi Arabia behave, if only we stopped pretending.

Posted by: Hugh at January 22, 2005 6:16 PM

Today's headline: Saudis to build 4,500 madrasas in South Asia.

Near future headline: Non-Muslims torch 4,500 madrasas in South Asia in widespread reaction to jihad inspired violence.

Posted by: Hulegu Khan at January 22, 2005 7:20 PM

Just watched John Kasich of Fox News grilling Ibrahim Hooper of CAIR ... made me smile. Kasich is definetely not politically correct.

Posted by: disillusionised_german at January 22, 2005 8:29 PM

4,500 Madrasas spawning hundreds of thousands more brainwashed
Jihadis!!
Time Saudi Arabia was taken out and that evil black rock blasted to smithereens...

Posted by: Morgane at January 22, 2005 8:40 PM

Hugh says:

Saudi Arabia needs to understand that it has to stop this{/i}

How do you prose that message will get across when your beloved President is friends with, and his father is a business parter with the Saudi Royals.

It is for a geasonthat the Bush family fondly refers to Prince Bandar as Bandar Bush.

The Bush-Saudi links are many, and include direct links between members of the Bush family and members of the Bin Laden and Mahfouz families -- two billionaire clans whose power in Saudi Arabia approaches that of the ruling Saud clan.

James Bath was in the National Guard with George W. Bush and left at about the same time under suspicious circumstances. He made a career investing large amounts of money for the Mahfouz clan. (Mahfouz money played a big role in the BCCI financial crimes, which along with the U.S. Savings and Loan frauds pioneered the kinds of management looting which we have been forced to accept as normal.) It seems likely that Bath funneled Mahfouz money into George W. Bush's early business ventures, though (as often) the investigation was squelched and no smoking gun has been found.

Up until shortly after 9/11 Bin Ladens were part owners of the Carlyle Corporation, for which George H. W. Bush (the father) did some very lucrative consulting which was presumably mostly "access capitalism" or influence peddling. As it happened, at the moment of the 9/11 attacks, the elder Bush was at a Carlyle meeting with Bin Laden's brother Shafig. Shortly after this, the Bin Ladens were asked to leave the group.

Neil Bush, as usual, was the one who brought the bad publicity. Not long after the 9/11 attack he made a speech in Jeddah explaining that the Saudis had a P.R. problem and needed to do something (presumably involving a job for Neil) to get their point of view out.

The Saudi ambassador to the U.S., Prince Bandar, is so close to the Bush family that he is sometimes called "Bandar Bush", and in August of 2002 he was invited to visit the Bush ranch in Crawford, Texas. Bandar was probably responsible for the high-level arrangements for the evacuation of all Bin Ladens from the U.S. on 9/13 -- a complex task, since the Bin Ladens were scattered all over the country. Bandar and his wife were also responsible for distributing millions of dollars of aid to Saudis resident in the U.S., some of which ended up in the hands of two of the hijackers.

James Baker (Bush loyalist) defends Saudi princes against 9/11 survivor lawsuit; Limbaugh and others spread disinformation
www.johnjemerson.com/zizka.survivor.htm

Oil lobbyist is US ambassador to Saudi Arabia

http://www.commondreams.org/views03/1205-14.htm

Picture of Bandar Bush with Dubya at Crawford, How cozy and friendly.

My question is when will his base wake up and realize that they have been had.

Our Prez is buddies with the chief financiers of Jihad,iyyah, and ya'll still blindly believe and support him. Incredible.

Posted by: Giaour at January 22, 2005 9:03 PM

4500 terrorist factories, 4500 new bulldozer assignments.

Posted by: Prickzilla at January 22, 2005 9:30 PM

German, did Kasich kick Dougie Hooper's hams?

Posted by: Prickzilla at January 22, 2005 9:32 PM

Giaour:

Unfortunately there was not much choice in the last presidential election. If George W. is weighed down with all the baggage you attribute him to be carrying--and images of him cavorting at the Crawford ranch with robed Saudis is one undeniable piece of evidence--the only choice the American electorate had was between worse and "worser."

More evidence is his refusal to name the ideological engine that drives his ineptly named "War on Terror." He cannot possibly be as ignorant as he appeared when he included the Koran in his inaugural address as elemental to the theme of bringing freedom and liberty to the oppressed of the world. Even if he does not have a first-hand familiarity with the Koran, he surely has people on staff that know better. The speech writer(sSSSSSS) certainly should have caught the incompatibility between the submission to predestination and freedom.

In Islam--an ideology that acts as a straightjacket--there is no room for freedom of choice.

Not that we had that freedom in the last presidential election. The alternative to G W. Bush was one who had plans but never even hinted at what those plans were. Moreover his turncoating during the Vietnam war, whether brought on by remorse at having killed an enemy or political ambitions, did not inspire confidence in the man as one who would define our enemies and take the appropriate actions to defeat them. His recent utterances bear this out.

The Saudi grip on the United States will be difficult to break. It is abetted by the US State Department and a multitude of well-connected agents and lobbyists, recompensed by the Saudis. The fall of the Saudi princelings would not result in a freedom-loving democracy. It would most likely give rise to an Islamic theocracy dedicated to the destruction of the United States.

Knocking Bush to "wake up" the Bush base that "has been had" and those who voted for Bush because the opposition inspired no confidence and included such liabilities as Michael Moore and Jimmy Carter does not help.

A positive solution to the problem of the Muslim onslaught against us is needed. Can you provide one?

Posted by: unicorns62000 at January 22, 2005 11:50 PM

Saudi Arabia *is* trying to spread its militant version of Islam around the Muslim world. In Sarajevo, for example, the Kingdom offered keepers of one of the most famous destroyed mosques funding to rebuild it -- on the grounds that they begin preaching Saudi-style fundamentalism.

However, it's important to note that they were refused, as they are refused and resisted in many places. Islam is not an ideological straitjacket, it does not lead inevitably to jihad, and it is not immune to reform. Like Christianity, it has its fundamentalist and authoritarian elements, which are in constant battle for the 'soul' of the relgion against more liberal elements (witness conflicts between the SBC and the ABA in this country). Like Christianity, some of its members feel charged with spreading the religion around the globe, while others are coming to view it more rationally as one unique approach to the problem of life. The Islamic world is further behind in this process of evolution than we are, especially with regards to women's rights. They are still experiencing their own equivalent of the Reformation, for a variety of reasons:

One of those is poverty, which means less money to counter radical groups with education and sane civil society, and fewer opportunities outside joining militant groups. One is support from political leaders whose interest is in terrorizing the population with these radicals. One is the fact that these countries have been colonies of countries that preached democracy while mostly exploiting them, which has left them cynical about its potential and susceptible to propaganda that blames too many of their problems on those former oppressors. One, often overlooked reason is that their populations are predominantly young. I read an interview with a Muslim father whose adolescent son was turning into a fundamentalist. They would have loud arguments at the dinner table that would end with the father forcing him to use the Koran to back up his arguments, which he would fail to be able to do. It was an excruciating process, and he was terrified of losing his son to a militant group. Think of how many of these kids don't have parents or stable families, due to war or economic dislocation, and you see a huge part of the problem right there. Finally you have the fact that even secular Muslims hate us, because frankly we're beating the pants off of them in every possible way, which is pretty humiliating.

But I think blaming the religion as a whole is like those people in the U.S. blaming Christianity for bigotry or narrow-mindedness. The people who do so clearly don't understand Christianity or the way it operates in people's lives, and how something that seems dogmatic or irrational from the outside can be very liberating from the individual. The same's true for Islam. I lived in a Muslim country for a year (Indonesia), and I can tell you that in the right conditions, Islam is a tremendous source of pride and spiritual strength for its practitioners, often a huge motivator for a 'jihad' in the form of social work and charity designed to make the world a more holy place (much in the same way modern Christians interpret 'take up thy cross' less literally).

But I also agree that the politically correct impulse to view the religion as inherently *good* or culturally equivalent obscures the fact that most of these Saudi-funded madrasses *are* political tools, and ought to be regarded with cynicism. Further it ignores the fact that even some of the better Muslims treat women horribly. Important distinctions have to be made. But we should recognize how long and difficult a process it was for us to get this far and seek to support moderate Islamic movements, and movements for democratic reform within existing Islamic institutions, rather than trying to smash their countries and establish purely secular governments with close American ties that the people won't trust or participate in.

Islam contains a self-correcting faculty, the notion of the fatwah, which is kind of like the ammendment system on our constitution. Recognized spiritual leaders earn the right to ammend the Koran, essentially, so reform is possible even within a theocracy--perhaps especially within a theocracy, if the people feel more involved with it. Which leaders earn that authority--and which schools of Islam they represent--will determine the course of future history in the Muslim world-- whether they end up fatwahing in equal rights for women or the death penalty for drinking coca-cola.

Ordinary American Christians could do a lot by getting involved in the interfaith movement, looking for like-minded Muslims on the internet to exchange letters with. Also because it can help to defuse some of the hate we feel toward them, which is part of the problem. Just look at what's going on in Maluku, or what happened in the former Yugoslavia. Those of us who believe in sanity, progress, and peaceful coexistence owe it to each other to not allow those who do not to turn us against one another.

-j

Posted by: william_james at January 23, 2005 2:03 AM

Saudi Arabia *is* trying to spread its militant version of Islam around the Muslim world. In Sarajevo, for example, the Kingdom offered keepers of one of the most famous destroyed mosques funding to rebuild it -- on the grounds that they begin preaching Saudi-style fundamentalism.

However, it's important to note that they were refused, as they are refused and resisted in many places. Islam is not an ideological straitjacket, it does not lead inevitably to jihad, and it is not immune to reform. Like Christianity, it has its fundamentalist and authoritarian elements, which are in constant battle for the 'soul' of the relgion against more liberal elements (witness conflicts between the SBC and the ABA in this country). Like Christianity, some of its members feel charged with spreading the religion around the globe, while others are coming to view it more rationally as one unique approach to the problem of life. The Islamic world is further behind in this process of evolution than we are, especially with regards to women's rights. They are still experiencing their own equivalent of the Reformation, for a variety of reasons:

One of those is poverty, which means less money to counter radical groups with education and sane civil society, and fewer opportunities outside joining militant groups. One is support from political leaders whose interest is in terrorizing the population with these radicals. One is the fact that these countries have been colonies of countries that preached democracy while mostly exploiting them, which has left them cynical about its potential and susceptible to propaganda that blames too many of their problems on those former oppressors. One often overlooked reason is that their populations are predominantly young. I read an interview with a Muslim father whose adolescent son was turning into a fundamentalist. They would have loud arguments at the dinner table that would end with the father forcing him to use the Koran to back up his arguments, which he would fail to be able to do. It was an excruciating process, and he was terrified of losing his son to a militant group. Think of how many of these kids don't have parents or stable families, due to war or economic dislocation, and you see a huge part of the problem right there. Finally you have the fact that even secular Muslims hate us, because frankly we're beating the pants off of them in every possible way, which is pretty humiliating.

But I think blaming the religion as a whole is like those people in the U.S. blaming Christianity for bigotry or narrow-mindedness. The people who do so clearly don't understand Christianity or the way it operates in people's lives, and how something that seems dogmatic or irrational from the outside can be very liberating for the individual. The same's true for Islam. I lived in a Muslim country for a year (Indonesia), and I can tell you that in the right conditions, Islam is a tremendous source of pride and spiritual strength for its practitioners, often a huge motivator for a 'jihad' in the form of social work and charity designed to make the world a more holy place (much in the same way modern Christians interpret 'take up thy cross' less literally).

But I also agree that the politically correct impulse to view the religion as inherently *good* or culturally equivalent obscures the fact that most of these Saudi-funded madrasses *are* political tools, and ought to be regarded with cynicism. Further it ignores the fact that even some of the better Muslims treat women horribly. Important distinctions have to be made. But we should recognize how long and difficult a process it was for us to get this far and seek to support moderate Islamic movements, and movements for democratic reform within existing Islamic institutions, rather than trying to smash their countries and establish purely secular governments with close American ties that the people won't trust or participate in.

Islam contains a self-correcting faculty, the notion of the fatwah, which is kind of like the ammendment system on our constitution. Recognized spiritual leaders earn the right to ammend the Koran, essentially, so reform is possible even within a theocracy--perhaps especially within a theocracy, if the people feel more involved with it. Which leaders earn that authority--and which schools of Islam they represent--will determine the course of future history in the Muslim world-- whether they end up fatwahing in equal rights for women or the death penalty for drinking coca-cola.

Ordinary American Christians could do a lot by getting involved in the interfaith movement, looking for like-minded Muslims on the internet to exchange letters with. Also because it can help to defuse some of the hate we feel toward them, which is part of the problem. Just look at what's going on in Maluku, or what happened in the former Yugoslavia. Those of us who believe in sanity, progress, and peaceful coexistence owe it to each other to not allow those who do not to turn us against one another.

-j

Posted by: william_james at January 23, 2005 2:04 AM

@ Prickzilla:

I did get the impression that he would have kissed Mr. Hooper - on the contrary. He put several questions come statements to him but didn't give Hooper much chance to indoctrinate the viewers. It seems some people (including Kasich) know what CAIR's agenda really is and they're not going to give them the chance to spread more lies.

Posted by: disillusionised_german at January 23, 2005 2:10 AM

South Asia is a 'goner'... swallowed by muslim hordes. As long as these hate centers are kept out of Western societies maybe we can curtail our scourge of jihad. muslims everywhere are being profiled and they will continue to live under an umbrella of suspicion as long as the jihad continues. Eventually life will become very uncomfortable for them and hopefully they'll leave willingly. Sooner or later muslims will learn "how to pick their jihads".

Posted by: Just_Linda at January 23, 2005 5:04 AM

Delenta est Saudi Arabia!

Posted by: Franze at January 23, 2005 6:13 AM

Where does Saudi Arabia gets the money to build mosques? From US. We drive our big gas-guzzler SUVs, do not like car pooling or public transportation. We are sowing the seed of madrasas. Just like Muslims, we too need to think how we contribute to spreading Saudi terror. Lets not blame the poor Saudi-indoctrinated Muslims - they are poor and do not have choice other than taking Wahabbi pison pill. But we do have a choice but we do nothing beacuse car pooling and public transportation does not suit our life style.

Posted by: buddha at January 23, 2005 1:15 PM

Hmmmm. Let's see...they have HOW many madrassas right now? And they are about to build 4500 more?

And we have HOW many schools where the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth about Islam is taught?

Hmmm. Let's see...that would be...zero.

Posted by: cubed at January 23, 2005 7:40 PM

A poster above (“william_james”) makes a number of remarks in defense of Islam, or rather, urging us not to be unduly harsh on Islam. Not one of those remarks can withstand even the briefest critical scrutiny.

In the first place, he assures us that "poverty" is one of the reasons for the bad behavior of some Muslims. Really? All the detailed studies, which analyze one by one the actual participants in terrorist activities, rather than rely on airy generalizations -- i.e, that emulate Sir Lewis Namier's prosopographic studies -- show that on the whole they are much better off, and much better educated, than the run of Muslims. It is, precisely, the completely illiterate villagers in remote places in, say, Afghanistan, or Indonesia,who have not yet been exposed to, for example, audiocassettes and videocassettes, who have no access to madrasas, Saudi-funded or otherwise, who do not even possess, perhaps, much in the way of a mosque, who are least susceptible to the siren-song of the Jihad. Last I looked, it was the richest Muslim country of all, Saudi Arabia, that was a mortal threat, given its bankrolling of mosques, madrasas, and all sorts of louche undertakings, including bribing C.I.A. officials, Western diplomats, and journalists, as previously it had employed ARAMCO as its exclusive public relations agent, to present itself as a "staunch ally" of the Western world when it is in fact a permanent enemy -- with or without its completely corrupt ruling family -- not only of the West, but of the entire non-Muslim world.

In taking the name of one of America's most distinguished thinkers, William James, who could never have emerged from a Muslim society, and would not have lasted a minute in such a society (see Jacques Barzun's tribute-cum-study, A Walk with William James, or the beautiful short obituary by John Jay Chapman, in whichhe described James has having "so unexpectedly and incredibly died”) the blogger then makes a second point. It is the usual Tu-Quoque thing, about how all religions have their problems, and Christianity managed to have its “reformation” and now Islam is having “its reformation.” What reformation? The “reformation” in Islam – the return to purity of practice, including the purity of the unadulterated application of the Shari’a – is called “Wahhabism.” There is no reform of Islam. There are those who speak about “reform.” When Islam was seen, much more clearly, as weak, in the period 1900-1930, many more “Muslm reformers” were in evidence. They got nowhere. How could they? What texts could they have changed? Could they change the facts of Muhammad’s life? Could they change the Hadith deemed “authentic”? Could they have touched one hair on the head of the Qur’an? How, pray tell?

Anyone who speaks blithely of Muslim reformation has got to tell us what he means. What texts, precisely, will be changed, and by whom? And with what authority? If these questions cannot even begin to receive a plausible answer, then that itself is telling.

Finally, the blogger above assures us that we should join “interfaith groups” and reach out, blah blah blah.Nonsense. Those “interfaith groups” are invariably the tool of Muslims, who use them for the purposes of presenting more wool over more Infidel eyes, of engaging in outwardly sympathetic, and inwardly deeply deceptive and hostile, acts toward Infidels, who are being placated only in order to keep everyone from studying too closely what Islam is all about, and to maintain those conditions in which Muslims can establish themselves, or to use the power of inveigled Infidels (including an appeal to a phony “Arab-American” identity, a transparent attempt by Muslim Arabs to exploit the larger numbers, and far greater acceptance in American society, of the descendants of the Christians of the Middle East, especially Maronites and Copts, whose own ancestors came here precisely in order to flee the persecution by Muslims) to their own malevolent ends.

No, there is no more need to play the fool. If it is shown that large numbers of Infidels have managed to educate themselves about the nature of Islam, and above all in its immutable attitude – grounded in Qur’an, Hadith, and Sira – toward Infidels, the Muslims themselves will have to change their strategy. And it may be too late for them to do so. An aroused Western – or even non-Muslim world – will not permit the criminal negligence of the past, and will demand much greater resistance and counter-pressure, not because the West is conducting “a war on Islam” but because Islam has been conducting a war, not on the West but on the entire non-Muslim world, for 1350 years. What has changed is that, after the Cold War when Islam was seen as a “bulwark” against Communism, and after the farce of the de-colonisation period when fabulously rich Arabs presented themselves as among the world’s “victims” (save for Algeria, there was no colonial presence anywhere in the Arab world that lasted for even a half-century), after the terrorist attacks, we have begun to see what was there to see all along. But which we did not see, until after millions of Muslims had been allowed into our countries. And that presence has created a situation that makes life for the indigenous Infidels more unpleasant, expensive, and physically dangerous than it would have been had such immigration been stopped before it began.

Posted by: Hugh at January 23, 2005 9:37 PM