Has Rice ever heard of the word “jihad”? Has she ever read the Hamas Charter? Does she really believe that the ever-expanding concessions she is demanding of Israel will slake the thirst of the jihadists there and bring peace to the region? Has she really never noticed that the same ideology that motivates the jihadists in that region also motivates Osama bin Laden, the London bombers, the Bali bomber, and jihadists from Indonesia to Bosnia?
When will official Washington stop mistaking wishes for facts? When will there come a politician, Republican or Democrat, with the guts to call jihad what it is and do what is necessary to fight it? When will the outmoded, inadequate models of realpolitik, constructed for other wars against other foes, be discarded?
Or will we simply continue on this path of concession and negotiation with those who would subjugate us until they succeed in reducing us all to dhimmi status, and only then will we finally realize that they all along considered the willingness to negotiate a weakness to take advantage of, rather than a sign of good will? If Rice would simply read a biography of Muhammad — even one by a Muslim like that of Martin Lings or one beloved of Muslims like that of Maxime Rodinson — she might begin to realize that those who consider themselves mujahedin in the same mold as the mujahedin whom the Prophet sent out into battle just do not think the way she and her State Department functionaries think.
But no doubt she can’t tear herself away from the learned analyses of the likes of Karen Armstrong and Thomas Friedman long enough to do that.
From AP, with thanks to the Constantinopolitan Irredentist:
WASHINGTON – The Bush administration is watching warily, but supportively, as Israel withdraws from the Gaza Strip in an effort to reinvigorate the Middle East peace process.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice called Prime Minister Ariel Sharon “extremely courageous” for honoring the commitment to the pullout.
Rice, in an interview with The New York Times published Thursday, said, “Everyone empathizes with what the Israelis are facing.” She added that in the interest of advancing peace, “it cannot be Gaza only.”