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Exposing the role that Islamic jihad theology and ideology play in the modern global conflicts

Marketing jihad: bin Laden wanted to re-brand al-Qaeda

Jun 25, 2011 12:39 am By Marisol Seibold

“At the White House, the documents were taken as positive reinforcement for President Barack Obama’s effort to eliminate religiously charged words from the government’s language of terrorism,” like “jihad.”

You can’t challenge an ideology you can’t name or acknowledge to exist. And to constantly misdirect efforts by insisting the enemy isn’t what he says he is, is to fight an imprecise, misguided war that is needlessly wasteful of blood and treasure.

The connection between bin Laden’s use of “jihad” and why the Obama administration thinks its non-use of it constitutes a victory isn’t ever really stated here, unless they feared they would be validating al-Qaeda’s position by calling them jihadists. But we all know how much al-Qaeda looks to Pennsylvania Avenue for validation. To call jihad for what it is would be to put a stop the semantic shell game, at home and abroad.

“Osama wanted new name for al-Qaida to repair image,” by Matt Apuzzo for the Associated Press, June 24:

WASHINGTON (AP) “” As Osama bin Laden watched his terrorist organization get picked apart, he lamented in his final writings that al-Qaida was suffering from a marketing problem. His group was killing too many Muslims and that was bad for business. The West was winning the public relations fight. All his old comrades were dead and he barely knew their replacements.

Faced with these challenges, bin Laden, who hated the United States and decried capitalism, considered a most American of business strategies. Like Blackwater, ValuJet and Philip Morris, perhaps what al-Qaida really needed was a fresh start under a new name.

The problem with the name al-Qaida, bin Laden wrote in a letter recovered from his compound in Pakistan, was that it lacked a religious element, something to convince Muslims worldwide that they are in a holy war with America.

Maybe something like Taifat al-Tawhed Wal-Jihad, meaning Monotheism and Jihad Group, would do the trick, he wrote. Or Jama’at I’Adat al-Khilafat al-Rashida, meaning Restoration of the Caliphate Group.

As bin Laden saw it, the problem was that the group’s full name, al-Qaida al-Jihad, for The Base of Holy War, had become short-handed as simply al-Qaida. Lopping off the word “jihad,” bin Laden wrote, allowed the West to “claim deceptively that they are not at war with Islam.” Maybe it was time for al-Qaida to bring back its original name.

The letter, which was undated, was discovered among bin Laden’s recent writings. Navy SEALs stormed his compound and killed him before any name change could be made. The letter was described by senior administration, national security and other U.S. officials only on condition of anonymity because the materials are sensitive. The documents portray bin Laden as a terrorist chief executive, struggling to sell holy war for a company in crisis.

At the White House, the documents were taken as positive reinforcement for President Barack Obama’s effort to eliminate religiously charged words from the government’s language of terrorism. Words like “jihad,” which also has a peaceful religious meaning, are out. “Islamic radical” has been nixed in favor of “terrorist” and “mass murderer.” Though former members of President George W. Bush’s administration have backed that effort, it also has drawn ridicule from critics who said the president was being too politically correct….

The purpose of jihad in all of its forms is to impose Islamic law on all levels of society, from the individual to an entire country; only the means vary. Therefore, it is inaccurate to believe one can neatly parse off non-military means of jihad from its armed form, when the goal is the same.

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