French Terrorist Attacks

[britbox]

80 dead so far... after a 31 year old man drove his truck into a crowd and and started firing. Believed to be originally of Tunisian descent and islamic.

 

[DarthFed]

Another despicable and cowardly attack. Kind of goes back to the discussion earlier this year that here in the US you have to worry about random nuts going on a shooting rampage while in Europe the Islamic terrorist threat is very high as it is free passage anywhere and everywhere for anyone. Just brutal even for their standards. Thoughts and prayers go out to the hundreds killed and hurt today.

 

[Billie]

What a terrible thing. How do you protect citizens from this? He was speeding for 2 kilometres hitting spectators at random. Apparently they found ammo and grenades in this truck. So sad.

 

[britbox]

Another despicable and cowardly attack. Kind of goes back to the discussion earlier this year that here in the US you have to worry about random nuts going on a shooting rampage while in Europe the Islamic terrorist threat is very high as it is free passage anywhere and everywhere for anyone. Just brutal even for their standards. Thoughts and prayers go out to the hundreds killed and hurt today.

That is true... but France's response to increase bombing isn't going to solve it. The west need to look at their own policies because they are currently fermenting the extremism and you end up in a neverending cycle of violence and death.

 

[britbox]

Interesting article and video:

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2015/03/what-isis-really-wants/384980/

 

[DarthFed]

That is true... but France's response to increase bombing isn't going to solve it. The west need to look at their own policies because they are currently fermenting the extremism and you end up in a neverending cycle of violence and death.

This is very true. It's a difficult decision/s to make (limiting immigrants or standing down on the fight against ISIS) but if they do nothing they are inviting the wolves to dinner. And to answer Billie's question there is nothing that could be done to stop this aside from finding out beforehand. From the bad guys' perspective this was a highly effective way to inflict maximum damage. Scary stuff

 

[isabelle]

thanks for your support, all France cries after this awful attack
we"ll never surrender, we have to stay strong and fight

 

[Mary]

thanks for your support, all France cries after this awful attack
we"ll never surrender, we have to stay strong and fight

Horrified and so sad for those injured and who have lost loved ones.

 

[Murat Baslamisli]

Another horrific mindless attack. I am very sorry for all the loss of life in France Isabelle. I am hoping you and your family were nowhere near Nice.

 

[isabelle]

Another horrific mindless attack. I am very sorry for all the loss of life in France Isabelle. I am hoping you and your family were nowhere near Nice.

thanks for thinking of me, it's difficult for us but I'm lucky, I lost no one in NIce but I'm shocked by this violence, it's just terrible

 

[Mary]

thanks for thinking of me, it's difficult for us but I'm lucky, I lost no one in NIce but I'm shocked by this violence, it's just terrible

The pictures in this mornings papers moved me to tears. I hope today you can find a little peace from this horror. Sending love and support

 

[Asmodeus]

we"ll never surrender, we have to stay strong and fight

Sorry, France surrendered long ago. Unfortunately, it's not only over for France but all of Western Europe. Time to start considering an exit plan. Yet, can one consider an exit plan when they are in the process of committing suicide? Not likely. You allowed the Hun is inside the gates and they own you lock, stock, and barrel. Welcome to the end of the world.

 

[EdbergsGhost]

80 dead so far... after a 31 year old man drove his truck into a crowd and and started firing. Believed to be originally of Tunisian descent and islamic.

Isis takes credit for the killings saying he was one of their soldiers. There is a fifth column of the "radicalized" dwelling in every Western European country. While I am not a supporter of profiling, better measures have to be developed in monitoring the goings on within these enclaves. And (imo), further resettling of refugees should be within Moslem countries, that also share similar faith - i.e. Shite with Shite and Sunni with Sunni.

 

[teddytennisfan]

What a terrible thing. How do you protect citizens from this? He was speeding for 2 kilometres hitting spectators at random. Apparently they found ammo and grenades in this truck. So sad.

how? IT IS SO SIMPLE -- nations need to get RID OF AMERICAN IMPERIAL INFLUENCE AND PRESENCE.


read and weep.

=====================================

journal-neo.org
An Ominous Truth: Obama’s America Stands for No One | New Eastern Outlook
Author: Phil Butler
Secretary of State John Kerry met last week with Russian President Vladimir Putin. The meeting in Moscow was to discuss potential US-Russia cooperation on destroying ISIL. Despite the billing, this was a final scene for a Barack Obama détente finale, a useless gesture to put on a show. The world chaos drama that Barack Obama produced and directed, it winds down with no hope of a lasting peace anywhere on this planet. The carnival act that is United States diplomacy, it registers in the sardonic grin of Putin. The Obama plan to “join” Russia in blasting ISIL together is nothing more than a ploy to detract attention away from America’s role in the spread of terror to Europe and beyond.

“I have resisted calls for military action, because we cannot resolve someone else’s civil war through force, particularly after a decade of war in Iraq and Afghanistan. The situation profoundly changed, though, on August 21st, when Assad’s government gassed to death over a thousand people, including hundreds of children.” – Barack Obama, September 10th, 2013 (No inquiry, so far, has proven Assad used deadly saran gas on his own people. On the contrary, the presence and testimony of extremists like Georgian war-fighter Tarkhan Tayumurazovich Batirashvili, better known as Abu Omar al-Shishani, is systemic of the lies of Washington)

Three years ago Vladimir Putin wrote an Op-Ed for the New York Times entitled, “A Plea for Caution from Russia”. It was an appeal to the American people not to invade Syria over still more “weapons of mass destruction”. Back then, the Obama administration assured us Syria’s President Assad was using on his own people. The Congress, and Obama relented, agreeing to a Putin plan for Syria to destroy any and all chemical weapons. Putin should have won a Nobel Peace Prize for the effort. The White House strategy to get rid of Assad remained in tact. America’s allies simply boosted aid and intelligence for “so-called” freedom fighters, instead of invading. There was no news, no administration revelation that the CIA or the White House were arming the same Al Qaeda Bush had labeled our enemy. Bush orchestrated the circus of death that became the fictitious “war on terror”, this quote is illustrative:

“You can’t distinguish between Al Qaeda and Saddam [Hussein] when you talk about the war on terror.”

Barack Obama has doubled down on the lies and subversion George W. Bush and Dick Cheney unleashed on us. In the wake of the notorious Benghazi affair, Obama has described Al Qaeda as having been “decimated,” “on the path to defeat” dozens of times. As Vladimir Putin was pleading with the American people to stay out of war in Syria, alternative media began informing us of what was really going on. This Washington Times article ten days after the Putin one tells us of Obama’s resolve to destroy Syria’s Assad. The American president was resolute, even if it meant arming America’s bitter enemy. In any other period in America’s history, an American president turning traitor would have been on every front page on this world. Barack Obama resended a law designed to prevent weapons being given to terrorists. In his efforts to arm Al Nusra (Al Qaeda), the president circumvented Congress. Another president might have been impeached for such a break with morality and law. But Obama’s team used a loophole to aid and abed the same people killing Europeans, Russians, Belgians, Americans and 100 nationalities around the world. It is vital that the people of the world come to terms with what I am saying here.

“This is a core principle of my presidency: if you threaten America, you will find no safe haven.” – Barack Obama, September 10, 2014 – (Until Russia began air operations against ISIL, Central Command essentially flew air cover for ISIL oil transportation)

Two years after the Putin plea, USA Today caught up with the news ISIL and other jihadists in Syria and Iraq were getting aid in one form or another. Two years, and a footnote tells some Americans their president is either criminally negligent, or a war criminal and traitor to the dead buried at Arlington National Cemetery. In the report, a U.S. Central Command officer responds to the notion “U.S.-trained rebels in Syria handed over American-supplied vehicles and ammunition to an al-Qaeda linked group”. Two years after every Syria researcher on this world knew Obama was arming ISIL, and the Pentagon first denied, then admitted arms and the jihadists carrying them were ending up with ISIL. Let this sink in. Barack Obama and the western leadership effectively swapped sides in the so-called “war on terror”. This report (PDF) by the Citizen’s Commission on Benghazi (CCB) is based on a former CIA officer’s revelations about “gun running” by the US in the Arab Spring revolts. The details of the report are damning not only for Barack Obama, but for former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton as well. This was released in 2014, a year before USA Today began telling America about our nation having changed sides. Libya and Syria are the equivalent of Reagan’s “Iran-Contra” debacle, only a million times worse, and with the arms going to barbarians who chop off heads. The Reagan administration sold guns to Iran, to hide the money the US gave the guerillas fighting in Central America, supposedly against Communism. The Iran-Contra scheme saw President Ronald Reagan apologizing openly to the American people for his responsibility in the mess. Caspar Weinberger, Secretary of Defense, was indicted on two counts of perjury and one count of obstruction of justice on June 16, 1992, and then pardoned by George H. W. Bush, the father of George W. Bush, who invaded Iraq and Afghanistan after 9/11. I’ve not space for a history lesson here, so pointing out the lack of accountability in Washington today is my end point on this.

“Shortly after NATO officially entered the Libyan revolt on the side of the rebels on 19 March 2011, former Libyan ruler Muammar Qaddafi expressed willingness to discuss directly with AFRICOM the possibility of abdication, exile, and an end to hostilities.” – Rear Admiral Charles R. Kubic, CEC, U.S. Navy on Qaddafi’s white flag to discuss abdicating and exile – Hillary Clinton and the orchestrators ignored him – his fate was sealed)

First, money and aid was hidden by US allies in this Arab Spring scheme. Jihadists against Qaddafi, and then Assad were armed and trained outside Syria. Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and Jordan were used part of the new “war for terror” Obama’s people cooked up. This all comes to light now, but by the time Putin penned a NYT article, the cohesive Middle East reboot had been years old. Iraq and Afghanistan were as much a test of the American people’s resolve (and gullibility) as anything. Then in 2015 hundreds of millions of people around the world are affected by these “strategies” bent on unlimited chaos. The US role in killing ISIL off is clearly a charade by now. It becomes clear by this time that Allied Central Command is bombing sand dunes. The roles of Turkey and Saudi Arabia prove central in the plan to oust Assad. Meanwhile, Central Command still claims to be decimated ISIL, when only the Russians show the proof of blasting ISIL to hell. Putin made utter fools out of Obama’s strategists, and his military commanders. By televising the destruction of thousands of ISIL oil tankers in route to Turkey, the Russians broadcast the truth. I wrote on my personal blog, while RT ran stories about the Russian Ministry of Defense’s YouTube broadcasts. Western media was mute, if you will recall. Then Central Command and the Obama team tried to take credit for Russia’s efforts, and later criticized Putin for killing Al Nusra. If not for the ownership of corporate media, there would have been world revolution by the time the Paris attacks occurred in November, 2015. It is fair to say America’s leadership cause the whole mess, and that Obama will leave a legacy of a new Cold War for our grandchildren to enjoy.

When Libya’s Muammar Qaddafi was overthrown by the Obama administration, everyone in his cabinet know of the close affiliations the al-Qa’eda-dominated rebel militias we supported in the 2011 rebellion. Qaddafi’s opposition openly spoke beneath the familiar black flag banner of jihad. Obama, and Hillary Clinton in particular, would have had to have been deaf and dumb to ignore the implications. Their refusal to even talk with Qaddafi to orchestrate a peaceful settlement on the eve of his death, that fact galvanizes their absolute intentions to overthrow the government. America put on the black hat out in the open for the first time ever in our history. Now Syria is a bloodbath. Today Europe bleeds not just money stability over refugees, but real red blood from victims in Paris, Brussels, and now Nice. Having created this chaos for myriad business and strategic reasons, now Obama’s foreign relations lackey goes to Moscow to do nothing. Nothing will come of his meetings with Vladimir Putin and Sergey Lavrov last week. The US is simply jockeying for PR positioning for when the world realizes what has really gone on. “We tried” is always the rationale of losers, and America is going to be the biggest loser in all this chaos. The killing and discord is already started, racial tension being sparked, in a land where constitutional law has been suspended. Many looking on agree, the American hegemony is crumbling. News that Turkish President Recep Erdogan has blamed Turkish leader in exile Muhammed Fethullah Gülen for the coup attempt is a harbinger. Turkey is set to peel off from NATO, and if it does the United States will have lost the grand strategy game after all. Some say Erdogan concocted this “quasi-coup” himself, in order to realign with the greater Middle East, and with Russia too. Other experts think Erdogan will make a final play on Syria, and that the break with the US will only be to distance Washington from the coming fray. Whatever the the cloak and dagger script is, there is no obscuring the fact Barack Obama and his administration stand behind. This is world war in the digital age, and his planned successor’s Clinton Foundation takes contributions from all over. Hillary Clinton should be in jail, this is the moderate American stance. No one out there has really investigated how the Clinton money machine truly operates. I was even astonished to learn, that money from Fethullah Gülen flows to the Clinton Foundation.

The war on terror is nothing more than an expansion on the ideology that delivered Korea, Vietnam, and the other “police actions”. America has been in a constant expansionist state since WW II. Every president since JFK has contributed incrementally, to the clear malfeasance of leadership we see metastasized today. Americans have thrived in a way, being afforded cheap commodities and entertainment these last decades. However, the final cost of subsidized super-capitalism are laid bare now. The desperate measures we see Obama taking, these are curatives of the symptoms of a dying organism. That is another story though. What is significant here is the utter abuse of power we see. With the solution to the “terror” situation so close at hand, America’s leadership persists in failed world policy. Nice streets run red with innocent blood because American, British, French and Russian jets did not unleash hell onto the barren deserts of Syria. The enemy was not hidden. ISIL oil tankers were bumper to bumper, carrying stolen oil to Turkey, then Israel, and on to Europe. America’s policy of overthrow, is more important than innocent lives. This is now irrefutable. America is not for anyone, she is against everyone, and I challenge anyone to argue otherwise. You cannot name any nation better off today, because of the policies of Barack Obama. Not even America. This latest diversion with Kerry in Moscow is simply aimed at deflecting French and European ire over Obama’s role in fueling terror, rather than destroying it. Look for the “unified” command being set up near Jordan to muck up Russia’s effective bombing. Then Russia will be blamed for being spoilers once again.

Come November, the situation will grow more ominous.

Phil Butler, is a policy investigator and analyst, a political scientist and expert on Eastern Europe, exclusively for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”.

7

 

[Billie]

Whether we want to admit it or not, but the foreign policies and actions of the Western countries have been disastrous and led to all this chaos. This is an example of Lybia, one of the most prosperous countries in Africa, which is now sadly reduced to disaster and misery. And why? Gaddafi warned them about the consequences but they wouldn't listen. He was also a proud and devout Muslim who didn't hate other religions.

http://www.counterpunch.org/2015/10...afi-to-terrorist-haven-after-us-intervention/

In 1967 Colonel Gaddafi inherited one of the poorest nations in Africa; by the time he was assassinated, he had transformed Libya into Africa’s richest nation. Prior to the US-led bombing campaign in 2011, Libya had the highest Human Development Index, the lowest infant mortality and the highest life expectancy in all of Africa.

Today, Libya is a failed state. Western military intervention has caused all of the worst-scenarios: Western embassies have all left, the South of the country has become a haven for ISIS terrorists, and the Northern coast a center of migrant trafficking. Egypt, Algeria and Tunisia have all closed their borders with Libya. This all occurs amidst a backdrop of widespread rape, assassinations and torture that complete the picture of a state that is failed to the bone.

Libya currently has two competing governments, two parliaments, two sets of rivaling claims to control over the central bank and the national oil company, no functioning national police or army, and the United States now believes that ISIS is running training camps across large swathes of the country.

On one side, in the West of the nation, Islamist-allied militias took over control of the capital Tripoli and other key cities and set up their own government, chasing away a parliament that was previously elected.

On the other side, in the East of the nation, the “legitimate” government dominated by anti-Islamist politicians, exiled 1,200 kilometers away in Tobruk, no longer governs anything. The democracy which Libyans were promised by Western governments after the fall of Colonel Gaddafi has all but vanished.

Contrary to popular belief, Libya, which western media routinely described as “Gaddafi’s military dictatorship” was in actual fact one of the world’s most democratic States.

Under Gaddafi’s unique system of direct democracy, traditional institutions of government were disbanded and abolished, and power belonged to the people directly through various committees and congresses.

Far from control being in the hands of one man, Libya was highly decentralized and divided into several small communities that were essentially “mini-autonomous States” within a State. These autonomous States had control over their districts and could make a range of decisions including how to allocate oil revenue and budgetary funds. Within these mini autonomous States, the three main bodies of Libya’s democracy were Local Committees, Basic People’s Congresses and Executive Revolutionary Councils.

The Basic People’s Congress (BPC), or Mu’tamar shaʿbi asāsi was essentially Libya’s functional equivalent of the House of Commons in the United Kingdom or the House of Representatives in the United States. However, Libya’s People’s Congress was not comprised merely of elected representatives who discussed and proposed legislation on behalf of the people; rather, the Congress allowed all Libyans to directly participate in this process. Eight hundred People’s Congresses were set up across the country and all Libyans were free to attend and shape national policy and make decisions over all major issues including budgets, education, industry, and the economy.

In 2009, Mr. Gaddafi invited the New York Times to Libya to spend two weeks observing the nation’s direct democracy. The New York Times, that has traditionally been highly critical of Colonel Gaddafi’s democratic experiment, conceded that in Libya, the intention was that “everyone is involved in every decision…Tens of thousands of people take part in local committee meetings to discuss issues and vote on everything from foreign treaties to building schools.”

The fundamental difference between western democratic systems and the Libyan Jamahiriya’s direct democracy is that in Libya all citizens were allowed to voice their views directly – not in one parliament of only a few hundred wealthy politicians – but in hundreds of committees attended by tens of thousands of ordinary citizens. Far from being a military dictatorship, Libya under Mr. Gaddafi was Africa’s most prosperous democracy.

On numerous occasions Mr. Gaddafi’s proposals were rejected by popular vote during Congresses and the opposite was approved and enacted as legislation.

For instance, on many occasions Mr. Gaddafi proposed the abolition of capital punishment and he pushed for home schooling over traditional schools. However, the People’s Congresses wanted to maintain the death penalty and classic schools, and the will of the People’s Congresses prevailed. Similarly, in 2009, Colonel Gaddafi put forward a proposal to essentially abolish the central government altogether and give all the oil proceeds directly to each family. The People’s Congresses rejected this idea too.

For over four decades, Gaddafi promoted economic democracy and used the nationalized oil wealth to sustain progressive social welfare programs for all Libyans. Under Gaddafi’s rule, Libyans enjoyed not only free health-care and free education, but also free electricity and interest-free loans. Now thanks to NATO’s intervention the health-care sector is on the verge of collapse as thousands of Filipino health workers flee the country, institutions of higher education across the East of the country are shut down, and black outs are a common occurrence in once thriving Tripoli.

Unlike in the West, Libyans did not vote once every four years for a President and an invariably wealthy local parliamentarian who would then make all decisions for them. Ordinary Libyans made decisions regarding foreign, domestic and economic policy themselves.

America’s bombing campaign of 2011 has not only destroyed the infrastructure of Libya’s democracy, America has also actively promoted ISIS terror group leader Abdelhakim Belhadj whose organization is making the establishment of Libyan democracy impossible.

The fact that the United States has a long and torrid history of backing terrorist groups in North Africa and the Middle East will surprise only those who watch the news and ignore history.

The CIA first aligned itself with extremist Islam during the Cold War era. Back then, America saw the world in rather simple terms: on one side the Soviet Union and Third World nationalism, which America regarded as a Soviet tool; on the other side Western nations and extremist political Islam, which America considered an ally in the struggle against the Soviet Union.

Since then America has used the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt against Soviet expansion, the Sarekat Islam against Sukarno in Indonesia and the Jamaat-e-Islami terror group against Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto in Pakistan. Last but certainly not least there is Al-Qaeda.

Lest we forget, the CIA gave birth to Osama Bin Laden and breastfed his organization throughout the 1980’s. Former British Foreign Secretary Robin Cook told the House of Commons that Al Qaeda was unquestionably a product of western intelligence agencies. Mr. Cook explained that Al Qaeda, which literally means “the base” in Arabic, was originally the computer database of the thousands of Islamist extremists who were trained by the CIA and funded by the Saudis to defeat the Russians in Afghanistan. The Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) used to have a different name: Al Qaeda in Iraq.

ISIS is metastasizing at an alarming rate in Libya, under the leadership of one Abdelhakim Belhadj. Fox News recently admitted that Mr. Belhadj “was once courted by the Obama administration and members of Congress” and he was a staunch ally of the United States in the quest to topple Gaddafi. In 2011, the United States and Senator McCain hailed Belhadj as a “heroic freedom fighter” and Washington gave his organization arms and logistical support. Now Senator McCain has called Belhadj’s organization ISIS, “probably the biggest threat to America and everything we stand for.”

Under Gaddafi, Islamic terrorism was virtually non existent and in 2009 the US State Department called Libya “an important ally in the war on terrorism”.

Today, after US intervention, Libya is home to the world’s largest loose arms cache, and its porous borders are routinely transited by a host of heavily armed non-state actors including Tuareg separatists, jihadists who forced Mali’s national military from Timbuktu and increasingly ISIS militiamen led by former US ally Abdelhakim Belhadj.

Clearly, Gaddafi’s system of economic and direct democracy was one of the 21st century’s most profound democratic experiments and NATO’s bombardment of Libya may indeed go down in history as one of the greatest military failures of the 21st century.

 

[teddytennisfan]

response to BILLIE.

=======================

THE REAL SIN of gaddafi was in creating and calling for the GOLD DINAR for africa...and free african countries from having to serve the ''us dollar hegemony" .

or l for that matter EUROPEAN attempts to continue to ''influence' african affairs..

and plunder and pillage it some more...and THEN when teh CONSEQUENCES of centuries of european and western pillaging COME WASHING on the 'northern shores'

the oh-so-civilized europeans or ''west" -- are HORRIFIED -- how DARE these africans and brown skinned savages COME TO OUR SHORES?

THAT is the ultimate european and western DISEASE.

 

[Billie]

Well it's sad, Teddy. I just can't understand such need for greed that they are willing to destroy country after country for monetary gain. There should be some limit to this. And when I mean country, I mean people living there. And then we wonder about these lone attackers. The hate is so powerful that it doesn't take much for lunatics to act out, no matter where they are or how many of them are there and all in the name of religion.

Just read a blog from antiwar.com and I agree with author's conclusion about war.


What It Means To Be a Muslim Today

Blowback, terrorism, and the evolution of a religion

by Justin Raimondo, July 20, 2016

I was reading my local rag this [Tuesday] morning, when I came across a very small item buried somewhere between an ad for a for-profit college and a story about the acquittal of yet another police officer in the death of Freddie Gray. The three-paragraph article had the following headline: “Bastille Day attacker had interest in jihad.”

I thought to myself: No sh*t, Sherlock!

The piece informs us that “Mohamed Lahouaiyej Bouhlel drank, ate pork, and had an ‘unbridled sex life.’ But his computer and phone showed online searches relating to IS and other jihadi groups.”

Recall the initial reactions in the media to the Bastille Day horror, once the identity of the truck-terrorist was known and details about his life began to come out: there were plenty of doubts about his motives. After all, those who knew him said he wasn’t at all religious: he was a “loner” who often exhibited the telltale signs of being somewhat sociopathic. He beat his ex-wife. He did un-Islamic things. He hooked up with men as well as women! How could he be a Muslim, never mind a devout one, let alone part of some jihadist group intent on establishing Sharia law?

And yet it turns out that his phone yielded messages at least strongly implying that he had confederates who were part of some organized jihadist group. And the Islamic State dutifully claimed him as one of their own.

We went through the same exculpatory process with the Orlando shooter, who was said to have sexual “issues”: his attack on a gay nightclub was depicted as “homophobia,” albeit of the internalized variety, and his decidedly un-Islamic habits and lifestyle were characterized as evidence that he was just another “lone nut.” Yet a search of his dwelling turned up lots of Islamic literature and his contacts with the first American born suicide bomber as well as two interviews with the FBI showed that he did indeed have an “interest in jihad.” And this “interest” translated into a vicious attack that killed and injured over a hundred people. The Islamic State claimed him, too – in spite of his alleged psychological “issues.”

This dissonance between the personal habits of terrorists and their alleged religious beliefs is nothing new: it can be traced all the way back to the archetypal jihadists who pulled off the 9/11 attacks. They, too, partied it up: gambling, drinking, etc., right before they took down the World Trade Center and targeted the Pentagon. And yet they were acting as soldiers of a terrorist outfit that wants to impose Sharia law, ban alcohol, veil women, enslave unbelievers, and generally take the world back to conditions that prevailed in 12th century Saudi Arabia.

How do we account for this curious phenomenon of cognitive split personality?

There are two factors at work here. First, Islam is evolving under the pressure of modernity and the “war on terrorism” itself. Adherents must coexist in the world with Western mores and it’s inevitable that they’ll be influenced: after all, they are not apart from the society they supposedly hate and want to “purify.”

More importantly, however, Islam itself is undergoing a transformation from a set of religious principles embodied in its holy books into a full-fledged political ideology. While the more quietist strands of Islam may be largely exempt from this transformational process, the fact is that the West has been waging a war in the Muslim world – and this is seen by many as a war against the Muslim world. The invasion and occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq have played right into the hands of al-Qaeda and its offshoots, so that the theological justification for jihad has been seemingly verified – and the thin line between religion and ideology has been effectively erased.

In any case, that line was always vague when it came to Islam, which, unlike Christianity, or Buddhism, or any of the other great religions, has a prescription for how society ought to be organized as well as how the individual can lead a virtuous life. Sharia law describes a comprehensive social system, validated in the holy texts, and the devout are motivated to impose it on unbelievers. This hasn’t always been the case, and Islam isn’t alone in this tendency toward statism: there are elements within Christianity (and other faiths) that have inspired militant adherents to impose religiously-inspired regimes on the unwilling.

However, this has largely been characteristic of the earlier stages in their development, when the zeal of the newly-converted has conjured visions of a “virtuous” society ruled by religious strictures. Yet this militancy has been ameliorated over centuries, certainly in the case of Christianity, until the separation of church and state has been established, enabling a policy of peaceful coexistence.

What has happened in the case of Islam – and this is a simplification – is that 1) The line of demarcation was never clearly established, and, 2) the perception that the West is at war with Islam has politicized and fundamentally transformed what was a religion into an ideology.

Therefore we get controversies like this one about a reporter for a British broadcaster covering the Nice massacre while wearing a hijab. The PC left is in an uproar over this piece that appeared in the Sun – a rightwing tabloid of dubious reputation – seeing it as a symptom of “racism” and “Islamophobia.” What they don’t get, however, is that while this sort of thing is reprehensible, they are missing the larger issue – which is that the viewer sees the hijab as an ideological symbol, and not a religious one. The hijab in this instance is perceived as making a political statement, and the audience is left wondering whether the coverage they are listening to is biased or colored. To give another example of the same phenomenon turned on its head: viewers had every right to wonder whether reporters who were wearing American flags on their lapels in the wake of the 9/11 attacks were filtering the news through an ideological prism.

The “war on terrorism” has transformed our lives in many more ways than we see at the moment, and religion is hardly exempt: it is now possible for a “soldier of Islam” to drink, be promiscuous, and indulge in other decidedly un-Islamic behavior, while engaging in “jihad” as a religio-ideological act of “devotion.” It also allows some in the West to engage in systematic denial: to aver that the Orlando shooter and the Nice truck-terrorist weren’t really jihadists, they just had psychological problems that caused them to “go postal.”

War poisons everything it touches: religion, journalism, and everyday life itself. It distorts our perceptions, and makes it nearly impossible to think clearly about anything. It changes us in ways that are not immediately apparent, and certainly not for the better.

The irony is that those who warn us that Islam is inherently violent and anti-Western, and advocate a “global war” of endless military intervention in the Muslim world, are engaging in a self-fulfilling prophecy. They and the policies they urge us to pursue are the catalyst that has set these forces in motion.

Reversing this process is going to be a long and drawn out process: just as the progress of a disease, even once it is checked, continues to have its effect on the body, so the body politic is not easily drained of the poisons that have accumulated due to war. What is required is a fundamental reversal of our foreign policy of perpetual war: then and only then can the healing process begin.

 

[britbox]

Some good points... there has been a consistent pattern that any threat to the hegemony of the US Dollar has been quashed pretty quickly... I know oil and resources are considered the primary motives, but I disagree - I think propping up the financial status quo is even bigger. Any proposed alternative to the Dollar is dealt with harshly...

Libya - as mentioned, Gadaffi was laying plans for a Pan-African currency. The fact he had already got rid of his WMDs probably worked against him, not for him.
Iraq - Saddam was going to trade outside the dollar for oil
Syria - no central bank and all but abandoned the petro dollar.
Russia - strong advocates of trading with a basket of currencies rather than strictly with the dollar.
China - ditto above and making the Yuan freely convertible with the Swiss Franc

Why is this important... because the dollar as the only standard gives the USA license to print a lot of money.