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Exclusive: To Seek a Newer
World – Confronting the Reality of Terrorism June 17, 2008 On September 11, 2001, this
nation was attacked by an enemy whose vision of the future, whose culture and
value system, and whose concepts of life and death are a universe apart from
ours. In Gaza City recently, an Israeli air strike killed two Hamas terrorists
who were about to launch missiles at the Israeli cities of Sderot and Ashkelon.
One of those killed was a son of senior Hamas leader Khalil al-Haya. At the
funeral of his son, al-Haya said, "I thank God for this gift. This is the
10th member of my family to be martyred". And in Pakistan, another Salafist
wrapped a baby in an explosive belt and detonated it killing scores of
Muslims. If it is not yet clear, the
rules of war have changed. Until this enemy has been vanquished, there can be
no Islamic Renaissance. And unless this enemy is vanquished, the horrors of the
20th century will pale in the face of what lies ahead. Whether we choose to
believe it or not, we are engaged in the defining ideological war of the
21st century with an enemy much of our leadership fails to understand.
Historically, the enormous changes in the West that took place during and after
the Renaissance in the 16th century barely made a ripple in the Arab world, and
only with the dawn of the 20th century did the Arabs finally begin to realize
the implications of their backwardness at which point, they chose to portray
themselves as victims, searching for scapegoats and excuses rather than
confront their own inadequacies. As the Reformation, the Renaissance, the
Scientific and Industrial Revolutions took root in Western Europe, the West grew
in wealth, power, scientific and technological achievement. It broke the
monopoly of the Church, separated church from state, and created, for the first
time in modern history, an educated, secular, free thinking middle class
unfettered by religious dogma - a middle class that was prepared to challenge
ancient traditions of learning in virtually every field of human endeavor. It
was this Renaissance in thought that led to the supremacy of Western
civilization - and, in doing so, it left the Arab world far behind. Prof. Bernard Lewis of
Princeton University argues that the success of Muhammad in establishing not
merely the Muslim religion, but a state dominated by and inseparable from that
religion, created a society and a culture that was totalitarian by its very
nature, bound by rules and restrictions that simply made it too static to adapt
and compete with a West where Christianity, after the Reformation and the
Renaissance, no longer demanded absolute control over all spheres of life, as
does Salafism today. Napoleon wrote that when his
forces landed in Egypt in 1799, there was not one single printing press in that
country. Centuries of Western learning and scientific advancement had simply
passed the Arab world by. Few Muslims visited Europe and their governments
didn't even establish consulates in the Christian West, because Muslims were
taught to regard Christianity and Judaism as inferior religions, so they simply
didn't think much of anything useful could be learned from these infidels.
After all, Islam represented the final word of God, and Christianity and
Judaism were simply flawed precursors, and one doesn't go forward by going
backwards - or so they believed. As a result, Islamic religious law began
closing in on itself, prohibiting any imitation of or any interaction with this
inferior European culture. Any discussion or debate designed to adapt Islam to
a changing world was considered heresy. And even as the last caliphate that
theologically guided Sunni Muslims for more than 500 years ended at the
beginning of the 20th century, the Ottomans still failed to grasp the
significance of the dramatic changes in the Christian West. Instead, they
squandered their vast wealth that had been accumulated during the days when
they controlled the trade routes between west and east, and never allowed mass
education or industrialization to become part of the social fabric of their
empire. Literacy, instead of becoming a universal right, was restricted only to
male study of the Koran - an activity wholly inadequate to establish a modern
society - and the Ottomans compounded the problem by importing the guns,
military advisers and factories from the West, but not its culture or its
values. Centuries of isolation from
Western Enlightenment have now taken their toll on the Arab world. According to
the UN Arab Human Development Reports, the amount of literature translated into
Spanish in all subjects, in a single year, exceeds the entire corpus of
everything that has ever been translated into Arabic in a thousand years. And
according to a recent UN study, fully 1/3 of the Arab world or 99.5 million
Arabs are illiterate which, in large measure, accounts for the appeal of Salafism
today. Since the superiority and
invincibility of Islam had always been considered a given in the Arab world,
the Arabs were hard-pressed to explain their military defeats at the hands of
Christians in Spain in 1492, and again at Vienna in 1683, or by Jews in 1948
and 1967. But these Salafists had an explanation. The Arabs could
restore and expand their ancient Empire, they said, by returning to the pure
word of Allah as laid down in the Koran 1,400 years ago. Thus, Arab defeats
throughout the centuries could be easily explained. They were simply Allah's
punishment for Muslim faithlessness. As a result, "Islam is the
Solution" has now become the battle cry in the mosques and madrassas of
Europe, the Middle East and Asia. In Egypt, for instance, in 1986, there was
one mosque for every 6,000 Egyptians. Today, there is one mosque for every 700
Egyptians - and with a largely unemployed, young and religiously conservative
Arab population, they have become easy pickings for the Salafists.
Either Arab governments on their own or in conjunction with their tribal
councils will gradually begin delivering the benefits of democracy, freedom and
education to their people, or they will be replaced by these Salafists
who will offer them the virtues of Paradise...and we know what that means. Today, we are witnessing an
escalation of religious intolerance across the Middle East, Europe and North
Africa and the rise of Salafism as a credible religious force. It is a
movement whose proponents believe it is the duty of every Muslim to promote Jihad
by using whatever means necessary to compel the world's submission to Islam.
Accordingly, all non-Muslims are "infidels" whose destiny is to
convert, die, or live under Islamic rule as second-class citizens or d'himmis.
While it is true that there are many pluralistic verses in the Koran,
unfortunately, there is only one interpretation acceptable to the Salafists...and
that is why we are at war. The fact that the vast majority of Muslims in this
world does not believe or act what they believe and act is irrelevant. The Salafists
believe it and use terrorism to further their aims, and that is why they are
the enemy of Western civilization. They are prepared to sacrifice their lives
and the lives of their children to achieve the subjugation of the non-Islamic
world and the glories of the Afterlife. Those who beheaded Daniel Pearl,
Nick Berg, Paul Johnson and the others, and who turned our planes into cruise
missiles on 9/11 were taught in the Salafi mosques and madrasses of
Riyadh, Hamburg, Lahore, Peshawar and Islamabad to believe that mass murder of infidels
is not evil because it is justified in the name of Allah. By doing so, they
have reintroduced the pagan ritual of human sacrifice into the modern era. They
brainwash their children into believing that the most important goal to be
achieved in their life is to become a human grenade - a shahid - a
martyr for Allah. They have created a culture of death that justifies
conducting war without mercy; that targets civilian populations and uses them
as human shields for propaganda purposes, that barters body parts of fallen
soldiers to gain the release of captive terrorists, and would have no problem
in sending anthrax through our mails, pouring botulism into our water supplies,
or detonating radiological 'dirty bombs' in our cities because it can all be
justified in the name of Allah - Geneva Accords be damned. To combat them, we must not
only defeat those who would commit such acts, but discredit their
interpretation of the Koran that justifies them, and punish those countries who
sustain, support and train them. They are as much the enemies of Western
civilization as they are of the Muslim world, and they must be vanquished as
were the Nazis before them. Only after Salafism has been defeated and
discredited (in that order) will the door be opened for an Islamic Renaissance,
and a more pluralistic interpretation of the Koran. Because of these factors, we
now find ourselves engaged in a religious war, the goal of which is to drive
Western civilization back to the Dark Ages - a world devoid of democracy,
freedom, individuality, human rights and the modest pleasures of life. Salafists
like bin Laden, Zawahiri, Ahmedinejad, Nazrallah and Haniyeh intend to
change the world irrevocably. With only slight variations, each believes that
the West is weak, beset by contradictions, and lacks the inner drive to achieve
victory at all costs (as Churchill and Roosevelt did in World War II). They
believe that all Western cultural influences must be expunged from the Muslim
world and that only absolute, unquestioned obedience to 7th century Islam will restore
their ancient Empire and force the infidels (be they Christians in Spain
or Southern Europe or the Jews in Israel) back into the d'himmitude
status that they once held, when Islam ruled over them centuries ago - when
non-believers were considered legal second-class citizens and were protected by
Islamic law provided they paid a tribute tax to the Caliph as d'himmis,
wore special clothing designating their inferior status, agreed to pass Muslims
only on the left (or the impure) side, not on the right side, and to build
their churches or synagogues lower than the minarets of Islam. In January 2004, Bin Laden told
Al Jazeera TV: "Let the whole world know that we will never accept
the loss of Andalusia (Spain)." Less than three months later, on March 11,
2004, al Qaeda suicide bombers self-detonated in Madrid's train station killing
191 commuters and have no doubt, there is more to come and it will not only be
in London and Madrid. In December 2005, the Wall Street Journal carried
an interview with the leader of Hamas in Bethlehem, who described the tribute
tax that would be imposed on all infidels in the Islamic state of
Palestine that was to be built on the ashes of democratic Israel. And on
February 4, 2008, Hamas spokesman Mahmoud Zahar said that Hamas (which is the
Palestinian Branch of the Moslem Brotherhood and the ideological cousin of al
Qaeda) would never accept the reality of Israel or the European Union,
since both occupy lands once ruled by Islam. D'himmis it seems, even
after the passage of 1,400 years, whether they are Christians or Jews, will
never be allowed to rule over lands that once formed part of the Muslim ummah
- so long as Salafism continues to rule Islam. In short, despite everything
you may have heard and read, Israel does not have a border problem with these Salafists,
but these Salafists have a border problem with Israel as well as Spain,
Portugal, Hungary, Croatia, Bulgaria, Roumania, Serbia and most of Southern
Europe over which they once ruled. The Islamic passion is directed not at
nation-building (as we had hoped) but at Jihad-building. That's why
billions of dollars in aid given to the Palestinians by Europe and the U.S. has
been, for the most part, wasted, while the Jihad directed at Israel and
the West continues. For these Salafists, the restoration of their
ancient Empire is not a dream; it is a plan of action and in our response (or
our lack of response), we are facilitating their victory. Theirs is an ideology
of conquest. Ours is an unswerving devotion to negotiation and compromise. Many
in our State and Defense Departments, the Council on Foreign Relations and even
our intelligence services argue that we can reduce the level of violence and
lessen the threat to our foreign interests by establishing a dialogue with
regimes that support and shelter these Salafists. What is needed, we're
told, is a better mix of carrots and sticks when dealing with countries like
Iran and Syria - but in this belief we are committing the same strategic error
we made in pre-World War II Germany - when our leaders believed that even Adolf
Hitler could be bought. The unfortunate truth is that
this approach against this particular enemy is a recipe for disaster, because
it represents the same thinking that led to 9/11. Western diplomats are like children
playing with dynamite, because they do not understand that these Jihadists
seek only two things - submission to Islam through the use of ruthless terror,
and the restoration of their ancient Islamic empire - first regionally, then
globally. In these goals, there is no room for compromise, discussion or even
mercy unless each represents progress toward these goals. Yet, even after 9/11,
16 U.S. intelligence agencies and even the Democrat nominee for the Presidency
of this country, Senator Barack Obama still don't get it. If they did, they
would know how to deal with these Salafists, and they would understand
what Frederick the Great of Prussia meant when he said that diplomacy without
arms is like music without instruments. To this enemy, words mean nothing
without the realistic expectation that military force will be used to back them
up. That's why Hamas in Gaza is seeking a ceasefire with Israel. That's why, in
the aftermath of the U.S. invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq in 2003, Libyan
dictator Muammar Qaddafi announced that he would dismantle his WMD programs.
That's why Tehran halted its nuclear weapons program in 2003 believing that
they were next on the U.S. hit list, but when the Iranians realized the
strength of the anti-war movement in this country, and that they could sap our
will by sending in their suicide bombers without fear of American retribution
that would topple their regime, they re-started their conversion and uranium
enrichment programs. Perceived American weakness in
the Middle East has consistently led our enemies to attack American interests
and American citizens - from Beirut to Mogadishu, to the first attack on the
World Trade Center, to the Khobar Towers bombing in Saudi Arabia, to the U.S.
embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania, to the USS Cole in Aden Harbor, all the
way to the NIE, including hundreds of bombings, murders, kidnappings,
hijackings and hostage-takings that have cost thousands of American lives. We
have reinforced the belief in our enemies' minds that terrorism works, and that
Americans, despite our great power and technology, are just, as bin Laden says
- "paper tigers." For the past three decades, we have been so worried
about what our enemies can do to us; we have neglected to consider what we
should be doing to our enemies. U.S. and Western leaders must
confront the reality that Salafism is, first and foremost, not a problem
to be resolved by discussions and negotiations. It is a religious phenomenon
that has grown powerful enough in the Islamic world to threaten the continued
progress of the American experiment in the Middle East and even the European
Enlightenment. We have created the perception of weakness in the minds of these
Salafists by allowing them to intimidate us, by seeking an accommodation
with them, by using everything short of military power to convince them to
change their ways, and by forcing our ally Israel into making dangerous
concessions to appease them. There is a fundamental sickness in turning on your
friends in the hope of appeasing your enemies. If this is the true measure of
our nation, then we are sorely in need of leadership. It is a sickness born of
cowardice and fear. That is how our enemies see it. Bullies bully because they
can get away with it. Terrorism exists because we refuse to stop it. For all
these reasons, they are convinced that terrorism works, and they believe that
all we are prepared do is to impose ineffectual sanctions that Switzerland,
Russia, China, Germany, Singapore, Malaysia, the United Kingdom and the United
Arab Emirates are circumventing anyway for purely economic reasons (at least
according to the January 16, 2008 GAO Report). And that's why the Iranian
mullahs continue to train their "martyrs" and to pursue their Jihad
in Europe, the Middle East, Africa, Asia and the Americas. That's why the
Iranians sent their children scurrying through Iraqi mine fields (during the
Iraq-Iran War in the 1980s) with little yellow plastic keys to Paradise wrapped
around their necks. That's why Hamas today uses children to protect their
weapons and their leaders, knowing that the Israelis will never intentionally
target children even when they are being used as human shields to protect
terrorists. That's why Iran trains, equips and sends its Jihadists into
Iraq, Lebanon, the Palestinian territories and the Sudan - because they believe
we are weak. And yet, our State Department believes there is a basis for
dialogue here, and that we can convince them to change their minds or moderate
their Jihad by imposing more Carter-like sanctions, and issuing NIEs
that make us look like fools, or worse, cowards. Our leaders continue to
maintain that, by correcting misunderstandings, kind words can turn terrorists
into friends....and that's why the Iranians and the Syrians are convinced we
are destined to lose. This brings us to Iran. What is
there to discuss with Iran other than more lies, more nuclear cover-ups, and
eventually our defeat and expulsion from the Middle East? What is there to
discuss with the leader of an apocalyptic Shiite sect who believes that his
divine mission on earth is to bring about a nuclear Armageddon that will usher
in the Coming of the Islamic messiah? What is there to negotiate with a leader
who threatens to wipe Israel off the map with nuclear weapons and who argues for
a second Holocaust, even as he denies that the first ever occurred? What
credibility does such a leader have when his country passes death penalty
legislation for converts who leave the Islamic faith? Of what value is another
meaningless agreement with another tyrant? Or perhaps, we can discuss the terms
of our coming d'himmitude by following the example of the Europeans who
are mortgaging the Western enlightenment, and accommodating the Islamists
hoping against hope, that there won't be another catastrophic terror attack in
London or Madrid and that, perhaps, just perhaps, if they can appease these Salafists
enough, they can avoid another catastrophe in Paris, Lisbon, Rome or Berlin.
Even after the Dutch murders, the Muhammad cartoon riots, the pope's remarks,
and the Iranian kidnapping of British sailors, we now have to listen to the
Archbishop of Canterbury telling his country that the implementation of Islamic
law in Britain is useful, even inevitable. Never has so much, been surrendered
by so many, to so few. In short, we have nothing to offer these Salafists
except our defeat and subjugation. Our continued existence as
Western civilization should not be dependent upon the good will and pleasure of
those who seek to destroy our way of life in the name of religious colonialism.
Our failure to understand their vision and to respond to it is our single
greatest strategic failure in this war. What we see, we believe. That is our
culture. What they believe - they see. That is theirs. There is no
middle ground here. And they see us as weak, unless they are convinced
otherwise - in the short term, by ending, once and for all the Islamic
regime in Iran which will not only eliminate Iranian support for global Jihad,
but will put other Salafists on notice that the West will act to
preserve its way of life, and that regimes that shelter them will pay
dearly unless they crush the Jihadists in their own countries. When they
can no longer run, hide or find sanctuary, when they are shunned by both Sunnis
and Shiites because of their ruthless disregard for human life (as is now
happening, by the way, in Anbar Province in Iraq and the tribal regions of
Northwest Pakistan and even in Helmond province in Afghanistan where the
Taliban are destroying Sunni mosques, homes and hospitals) - then, and only
then, will their defeat begin. States that continue to harbor
Islamic terrorists must be told that henceforth they will do so at their peril
- and Iran will become the poster child to convince them that we mean it. And
over the long term, Muslims themselves must bring about an Islamic
Renaissance capable of adapting their religion to life in the 21st century. We
make a fatal mistake when we take the military option off the table as we have
done in the NIE. In that region of the world, strength and fear is what
determines policy, and that's why the Sunni leaders of Saudi Arabia, Egypt and
the Gulf Emirates are heading to Tehran and not to Washington. We are told that a major part
of our problem in the Middle East is that we are not liked. In my view, the
problem is that we are not respected. And we are making other mistakes.... First, the West must end its
dependency on foreign oil. Our war against Salafism will be fought for
many years, but its defeat will never be achieved so long as we continue to
transfer petro-wealth to our enemies. Second, we must develop better
intelligence capabilities in the Islamic world. That is, we must ferret out
those who recruit the suicide bombers, the explosives experts, those who decide
on the targets, who send agents to case them; who transport them across
borders, and those who drive them to their missions. Third, Western media must
recognize that we have the legal and moral obligation to destroy the terrorist
infrastructures of our enemies even if those infrastructures are being
protected by human shields. International law provides for it for a reason. If
we do not; we make our enemies invincible. Fourth, the Muslim community
must be told to focus their indignation on Muslims committing violent acts in
the name of Islam, rather than on those who draw these acts to the world's
attention. Fifth, we must update the 1978
Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) and provide retroactive liability
protection to private companies that share information on suspected terrorists
with our intelligence agencies for patriotic reasons, but fear being sued for
having done so. Sixth, we must use the internet
to plant bogus e-mail messages and Web site postings to sow confusion, dissent
and distrust among Salafist organizations that use the Internet to
recruit and train their Jihadists. Seventh, we must shut down Salafi
financial networks in Europe, the Americas and Asia, especially in the US by
facilitating a two-way flow of information between the banking community and
our government agencies and scrutinizing the activities of foreign banks that
operate on American soil. Eighth, we must monitor
American mosques and Islamic academies for the dissemination of Jihadist literature
given that an estimated 80% of American mosques are flooded with Wahhabi
literature from Saudi Arabia, and we must begin comprehensive international
programs in mosques all over the world to teach against the ideas of Salafism. Ninth, we must monitor the US
Muslim chaplaincy program in our penitentiaries and in our military to stop Salafist
development in both. That includes investigating all military and penitentiary
chaplains endorsed by Abdurahman Alamoudi who is now serving 23 years in an
American prison for funding Salafist terrorism. Tenth, we must stop federal
funding to institutions that accept grants from countries like Saudi Arabia
that support Salafism. Eleventh, we must freeze the
assets of Salafi supporters including Islamic foundations that act as
Salafi fronts. Twelfth, we must investigate
the selection process of Arabic translators working for the Pentagon and the
FBI. Thirteenth, we must examine the
non-profit status of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (or CAIR), which
has had several of its officials convicted on Jihad terror-related
charges, and was named an un-indicted co-conspirator in a Hamas funding case. Fourteenth, we must make it an
act of sedition or solicitation of treason in this country to preach or publish
materials that call for the death of Americans. Fifteenth, we must cancel the
scholarship student visa program with Saudi Arabia until they reform their
textbooks which preach hatred and violence against non-Muslims. Sixteenth, as is happening in
Europe, we must restrict religious visas for imams who come from countries that
don't allow reciprocal visits by non-Muslim clergy and who are recognized as
proponents of Salafism. Seventeenth, we must cancel
contracts to train Saudi police and security services in U.S. counter-terrorism
tactics. Eighteenth, we must block the
sale of sensitive military munitions (like JDAMs) to Saudi Arabia. And lastly, we must recognize
moderate Islamic organizations and scholars in this country and around the
world - Islamic scholars who believe that democracy and Islam are indeed
compatible; who reject violence in pursuit of Islam's goals; who condemn
terrorism; who advocate equal rights for minorities and women; and who accept
pluralism within Islam, and if the Saudis want American protection (and believe
me, they do), they had best stop promoting Salafism in their mosques and
universities and exporting their Salafist imams and suicide bombers to
Western countries including 15 of the 19 9/11 terrorists. The tragedy of our time is that
Salafism continues to rule Islam by fear. By ignoring this threat, the
West will merely postpone, not escape, the inevitable conflict. For the sake of
our children, and for the sake of the billions of Muslims who seek a benevolent
Islam, but fear being condemned as apostates, and who fear for their lives, we
must assist them in bringing about an Islamic Renaissance. #
# Mark Silverberg is an
attorney with a Masters Degree in Political Science and International Relations
from the University of Manitoba, Canada. He has lectured extensively on
subjects of counterterrorism, Jihadism, homeland security issues and
intelligence matters. |
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