| | I apologize to Andrew Bissell for misinterpreting his comments taken from the thread "Riots in France: The Barbarians at the Gates of Paris." I will strike the passage from my post above.
Michael Marotta had claimed in that thread that "This recent spate of Muslim-bashing on SOLO is not about rational philosophy versus traditionalist religion. It is about xenophobia and nationalism and literal, actual anti-Semitism."
Andrew replied:
"This has absolutely nothing to do with race, and
everything to do with the fact that Western culture,
the most rational, benevolent, and humanistic culture
in the history of the world (whether practiced in
London or New York or Hong Kong or Bombay or Dubai) is
under assault by the adherents of a backwater creed
they themselves call 'Submission.'"
WSS
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It's interesting to note Jordanian reaction to the Amman hotel bombings, as with this story in Al-jazeera. The Scotsman also reports "Al-Qaeda on defensive as bombs begin to backfire."
Excerpts from the Scotsman story:
An immediate result of the Jordan attacks may be a
split between al-Qaeda and Palestinian militants, he
said, adding that it was significant that Palestinians
in Gaza had moved immediately to put daylight between
themselves and al-Qaeda.
Nafez Azzam, of the Islamic Jihad group, said: "We
condemn the style, the random killings. We condemn the
killing of innocents anywhere regardless of belief and
religion."
Hamas urged al-Qaeda to limit itself to striking
against the US in Iraq and to avoid killing Arabs and
Muslims.
[ . . . ]
Al-Qaeda's 'explanation' of its attacks in Jordan was
its second within days. Last week two Indonesians
arrested over the bombing of the Marriott Hotel in
Jakarta in August, which killed 12, also expressed
remorse in the face of a huge wave of popular
revulsion.
Significantly, one of them said sorry not only to the
victims and their relatives, but to other Muslims. The
man, known as Tohir, whom police say is a member of
Jemaah Islamiyah, the South-east Asian branch of al-
Qaeda, said on television: "I apologise to families of
the victims sincerely and to the Muslim community, who
have felt the slander and negative impact of my
actions."
A Western intelligence official said: "The bombings in
Amman will do a lot of damage to the reputation of al-
Qaeda. Until now al-Qaeda has had some success. Many
Muslims have been alienated from the US because of the
invasion of Iraq and its support for Israel. The idea
of violent jihad has spread to parts of the world far
from Iraq, and there is even talk of a global Islamist
insurgency.
"But there is evidence of a backlash. Most of the
bombings attributed to al-Qaeda kill far more Muslims
than Westerners, and it will not be able to carry the
bulk of Arab opinion with it when so many Muslims are
dying as a result of its activities."
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