[IslamCity] Jihad and Propaganda

Thu, 11 Aug 2005 15:17:28 -0700

Jihad and Propaganda

Leader
Friday August 5, 2005
The Guardian

http://www.guardian.co.uk/attackonlondon/story/0,16132,1543118,00.html


It was hard to suppress a shudder at the sight of Ayman al-Zawahiri, Osama bin Laden's finger-wagging deputy, warning of more attacks like those which brought mass murder and chaos to London on July 7. Zawahiri's remarks, broadcast on al-Jazeera TV yesterday, are guaranteed massive media coverage. So it is very important to challenge what he said: the responsibility for atrocities in Britain or elsewhere belongs directly to those who organise them and carry them out.

 

Zawahiri's comments, made nearly a month after the event, suggest an attempt by al-Qaida to claim credit, if not direct responsibility, for something it may have had little to do with. Evidence from the London attacks is still being gathered, though there is no sign of any foreign "mastermind". Most experts say little is left of the pre-9/11 al-Qaida as a coherent, hierarchical organisation after the losses of the war in Afghanistan.

 

Nevertheless, beyond any bandwagon or propaganda effect, this latest videotape provides cruel confirmation of what this newspaper has long argued: that the disastrous war in Iraq has supplied new motivation for Muslims angry at western policies in the Middle East. Last week the government reacted with outrage to a report by the Chatham House think tank which made precisely that point, though only days later Jack Straw edged towards the truth by admitting that the British presence there was "part of the problem".

 

Iraq is a bloody and uncontrollable mess. Hints of a staged pullout of US and UK forces from next year are welcome, even if George Bush and Tony Blair will not give a timetable for full withdrawal. But then there is the rest of al-Qaida's disingenuous wish list - "stop stealing our oil", "security in Palestine", ending western support for "corrupt rulers" and "infidel armies withdrawing from the land of Muhammad" - as Zawahiri enunciated it. Even if you accept these terms of reference or prefer sharia law to democracy, such goals are impossible to achieve in a free, interdependent world. And tackling the real issues behind them will not be helped by slaughtering innocents anywhere in the name of jihad.

 

AB

[EMAIL PROTECTED]

 

"For to us will be their return; then it will be for us to call them to account." (Holy Quran 88:25-26)

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