THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
An Online Journal of Political Commentary & Analysis
Volume XIII, Issue # 75, March 23, 2011
Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
Government Committed to & Acting in Accord with Conservative Principles
Ensures a Nation's Strength, Progress, & Prosperity
THE PINACLE OF INCOMPETENCE
By Efraim Karsh
WESTERN LEADERS MISREADING THE IDEOLOGICAL WORLDVIEW OF THE MEMBERS & SUPPORTERS OF THE GLOBAL
ISLAMIST MOVEMENT: A DANGEROUSLY DELUSIONAL MISREADING OF MILITANT ISLAM & ITS STRATEGY FOR
ACHIEVING POLITICAL CONTROL & DOMINATION OF THE ENTIRE WORLD -- FLAWED ANALYSIS OF SUCH ISLAMIST
ORGANIZATIONS AS AL-QA'IDA, HAMAS, & THE MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD
FULL STORY:
It is commonplace for the views of people in power to receive widespread exposure. Having presumably won their stripes
in an arduous climb to the top, they are believed to know best what's going on.
This presumption, however, is not only wrong, but is often the inverse of the truth. Given bureaucracy's predilection for
conformity, it is rarely the best and brightest who reach the top, but rather the yes-men sycophants – whether by rising to
their level of incompetence, as the Peter Principle famously asserts, or by stumbling upward through successive failures,
or by simply "being there" long enough.
Thus, we have England's national soccer team manager, Sven Goran Eriksson, putting Wayne Rooney on a par with
soccer's best-ever player, the legendary Pele. Yet, rather than have his professional judgment questioned, the overpaid
manager was allowed to lead his underperforming team for three more trophy-less years.
Or take U.S. Director of National Intelligence James Clapper's astounding description of the Muslim Brotherhood as a
"largely secular" organization.
Shouldn't he know what countless newspaper readers know full well – that the Brotherhood is probably the world's
foremost Islamist organization, committed to the establishment of a worldwide caliphate. How else is one to interpret its
motto:
"Allah is our objective. The Prophet is our leader.
The Koran is our law. Jihad is our way. Dying in
the way of Allah is our highest hope"?
Now Baroness Eliza Manningham-Buller, former Director of MI5 (Britain's FBI equivalent), has joined the march of folly.
In her first television interview since leaving her job four years ago, she argued that the "war on terror" is unwinnable,
and urged the British government to "reach out" to al-Qa'ida. "It's always better to talk to the people who are attacking
you than attacking them, if you can," she explained.
This gives the idea of appeasement a whole new meaning. Even the most notorious incident – the Anglo-French
surrender of Czechoslovakia to Adolf Hitler in the 1938 Munich agreement – took place prior to any German military
aggression. Once the Nazis invaded Poland on September 1, 1939, London and Paris attempted no further talks, but
declared war on Germany.
In contrast, by the time Manningham-Buller made her startling suggestion, al-Qa'ida had massacred tens of thousands in
the name of Islam – from the 9/11 attacks, to the ongoing slaughter in Iraq, to bombings in Yemen, Bali, Sharm e-Sheikh,
and Madrid. Yet, neither these atrocities nor the July, 2005, London bombing, which took place under her watch, seem to
have shaken the former Director's belief that outreach to the Islamist group would curb its murderous zeal:
"If we can get to a state where there are fewer attacks,
less lethal attacks..., fewer young people being drawn
into this, less causes – resolution of the Palestinian
question, less impetus for this activity, I think we can
get to a stage where the threat is thus reduced."
This judgement of al-Qa'ida's worldview is as delusional as Clapper's take on the Muslim Brotherhood. It is true that,
during the 1970s, Western Europeans bought partial immunity from Palestinian terrorism by indulging the PLO. But, then,
the PLO's goal has always been limited to the "liberation of Palestine" (that is, the destruction of Israel), while al-Qa'ida
seeks nothing short of worldwide triumph. As such, the idea that Israeli-Palestinian peace will take away one of Islam's
primary gripes against the West totally misreads history and present-day politics.
It is not out of concern for a Palestinian right to self determination, but as part of a holy war to prevent the loss of part of
the "House of Islam" that Islamists inveigh against Israel. In the words of the covenant of Hamas, the Palestinian
offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood:
"The land of Palestine has been an Islamic trust [wakf]
throughout the generations, and until the day of
resurrection.... When our enemies usurp some Islamic
lands, jihad becomes a duty binding on all Muslims."
In this respect, there is no difference between Palestine and other parts of the world conquered by Islam throughout
history. To this day, for example, many Muslims unabashedly pine for the restoration of Spain, and look upon their
expulsion in 1492 as a grave historical injustice, as if they were Spain's rightful owners. Small wonder that Osama bin
Laden evoked "the tragedy of Andalusia" after the 9/11 attacks, and the perpetrators of the March, 2004, Madrid
bombings, in which hundreds of people were murdered, mentioned revenge for the loss of Spain as one of the atrocity's
"root causes."
Indeed, even countries that have never been under Islamic rule have become legitimate targets of Islamist fervor. Since
the late 1980s, various Islamist movements have looked on the growing number of French Muslims as a sign that France,
too, has become a potential part of Dar al-Islam, the House of Islam.
In Britain, even the more moderate elements of the Muslim community are candid about their aims. As the late Zaki
Badawi, a doyen of interfaith dialogue, put it:
"Islam is a universal religion. It aims to bring its
message to all corners of the earth. It hopes that
one day the whole of humanity will be one
Muslim community."
This goal need not necessarily be pursued by the sword; it can be achieved through demographic growth and steady
conversion to Islam. But, should peaceful means prove insufficient, physical force can be brought to bear.
Nor is this vision confined to an extremist fringe. This has been starkly demonstrated by the overwhelming support for
the 9/11 attacks throughout the Islamic world, in the admiring evocations of bin Laden's murderous acts during the 2006
crisis over the Danish cartoons, and in the poll indicating significant sympathy among British Muslims for the "feelings
and motives" of the London suicide bombers.
To deny this reality is the height of folly, and to imagine that it can be appeased or deflected is to play into the Islamists'
hands.
LINKS TO RELATED TOPICS:
Islamism & Jihadism -- The Threat of Radical Islam
Page Three
Page Two
Page One
The Islamist Fifth Column -- Internal Enemies of America & the West:
Disloyalty, Subversion, Sedition, & Treason
Lawfare -- The Use of Law as a Weapon in War & Politics:
Islamist Lawfare & the "Legal" Jihad Against America & the West
Israel & the Arabs -- The Israeli-Arab Conflict
Middle East -- Arabs, Arab States,
& Their Middle Eastern Neighbors
American Foreign Policy -- The Middle East
American Foreign Policy -- Political & Psychological Warfare
International Politics & World Disorder:
War, Peace, & Geopolitics in the Real World:
Foreign Affairs & U.S. National Security
Page Two
Page One
Islamist Terrorist Attacks on the U.S.A.
Osama bin Laden & the Islamist Declaration of War
Against the U.S.A. & Western Civilization
Islamist International Terrorism &
U.S. Intelligence Agencies
Counterterrorism & U.S. National Security
U.S. National Security Strategy
Dr. Efraim Karsh, Editor of the Middle East Quarterly and author most recently of the book, Islamic
Imperialism: A History (New Haven & London: Yale University Press, 2007), is Professor and Head of the
Department of Middle East and
Mediterranean Studies at King's College, University of London, U.K. A graduate in Arabic and Modern Middle
East History from Hebrew University in Jerusalem and holding the M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in International Relations
from Tel Aviv University, Dr. Karsh has held academic posts at Harvard University, Columbia University, the
Sorbonne, the London School of Economics, Helsinki University, the International Institute for Strategic Studies in
London, the Kennan Institute for Advanced Russian Studies in Washington, D.C., and the Jaffee Center for Strategic
Studies at Tel Aviv University.
Founder and Editor of the scholarly journal Israel Affairs, Dr. Karsh has written extensively on Middle East
politics, Soviet foreign policy, and European affairs. A regular media commentator, he has appeared on U.K. and U.S.
television and radio and contributed articles to leading newspapers in Britain and the U.S.A., among them the Wall
Street Journal, the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, the Daily Telegraph, and The
Times (of London).
The foregoing article by Dr. Efraim Karsh was originally published in the Jerusalem Post, March 23, 2011, and
can be found on the Internet website maintained by the Middle East Forum, a foreign policy think tank which seeks to
define and promote American interests in the Middle East, defining U.S. interests to include fighting radical Islam,
working for Palestinian Arab acceptance of the State of Israel, improving the management of U.S. efforts to promote
constitutional democracy in the Middle East, reducing America's energy dependence on the Middle East, more robustly
asserting U.S. interests vis-à-vis Saudi Arabia, and countering the Iranian threat.
(URL: http://www.meforum.org/2856/pinnacle-of-incompetence)
Republished with Permission of the Middle East Forum
Reprinted from the Middle East Forum News
mefnews@meforum.org (MEF NEWS)
March 23, 2011
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Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
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