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The United States is hated across the Islamic world because of specific U.S. government policies and actions. That hatred is concrete not abstract, martial not intellectual, and it will grow for the foreseeable future. While important voices in the United States claim the intent of U.S. policy is misunderstood by Muslims, that Arabic television channels deliberately distort the policy, and that better public diplomacy is the remedy, they are wrong. America is hated and attacked because Muslims believe they know precisely what the United States is doing in the Islamic world. They know partly because of bin Laden’s words, partly because of satellite television, but mostly because of the tangible reality of U.S. policy.

We are at war with an al Qaeda-led, worldwide Islamist insurgency. None of the reasons have anything to do with our freedom, liberty, and democracy, but have everything to do with U.S. policies and actions in the Muslim world. Keep in mind how easy it is for Muslims to see, hear, experience, and hate the U.S. policies bin Laden repeatedly refers to as anti-Muslim.

- U.S. support for Israel that keeps Palestinians in the Israeli’s thrall.

- U.S. and other Western troops on the Arabian Peninsula.

- U.S. occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan.

- U.S. support for Russia, India and China against their Muslim militants.

- U.S. pressure on Arab energy producers to keep oil prices low.

- U.S support for apostate, corrupt, and tyrannical Muslim governments.

The Persian Gulf regimes – especially Saudi Arabia – are among the earth’s most corrupt, dictatorial, and oppressive. They rule peoples eager to be free of their yoke and who think their torturers survive because of U.S. protection. Washington and the West have supported the Muslim tyrannies bin Laden and other Islamists seek to destroy. We have nothing in common with the regimes; the tie is based overwhelmingly on the West’s obsession with cheap oil.

Few Muslims would oppose the destruction of these apostate governments that are among the planet’s most brutal, repressive, corrupt, and hypocritical, family ruled regimes that have the profits from oil sale to fund their own debauchery and rent the loyalty of their bankers, businessman, and academics.

The U.S. has allied itself with regimes whose barbarism has long earned the Muslim world’s hatred. It is America that is on bin Laden’s bull’s-eye; at this time, Russia, China, and India are not. We are in fight to the death with al Qaeda whether or not these states approve, and our support for them makes the fight harder because it again validates bin Laden’s contention that the United States is attacking Islam and supports any country willing to kill or persecute Muslims.

Washington’s half-century record of safeguarding tyrannies entirely discredits for Muslims any claim we make of intending to build democracies. The creditability issues that result from America’s proven taste for any Muslim tyrant who maintains internal order and stability, peace with Israel, and low oil prices destroys what little democracy-building potential we may possess.

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Thursday, June 28

Imperial Hubris Series

by mammon on Thu 28 Jun 2007 09:51 PM AKDT

Imperial Hubris by Michael Scheuer, 2004, Excerpts

America has moved from being the much admired champion of liberty and self government to the hated and feared advocate of a new imperial order, one that has much the same characteristics as nineteenth-century European imperialism: military garrisons; economic penetration and control; support for leaders, no matter how brutal and undemocratic, as long as they obey the imperial power; and the exploitation and depletion of natural resources. Muslims have seen this before.

While U.S. leaders will not say America is at War with Islam, some of Islam is waging war on the United States, and more is edging closer to that status. The war is being waged against us for specific, quantifiable reasons and not as our leaders claim because a few Muslim fanatics hate democracy and freedom. This claim belittles the Muslims opposing us and thereby weakens America’s ability to resist by underestimating the brains, patience, and religion-based fortitude of our foes.

Reality for America is that there is a large and growing number of Muslims who hate our policies and actions toward the Islamic world, many of whom have or will take up arms against us as a result. Muslims believe what Muslims believe, and today tens of millions of Muslims believe their faith is being attacked by the U.S.-led Western Crusaders and that Islam will be changed beyond recognition, if not eradicated, if each Muslim does not step forth to defend with his life.

We cannot talk or negotiate our way out of this mess; the enemy has listened for thirty years and believes U.S. promises of fairness for Muslims have been lies. Simply put, the enemy wants war and is not listening; he has no reason to listen, he is winning. We have no choice but to fight; it is the decision about current policy that will determine the fight’s length and cost.

The military is now America’s only tool and will remain so while current policies are in place. No public diplomacy, presidential praise for Islam, or politically correct debate masking the reality that many of the world’s 1.3 billion Muslims hate us for actions not values, will get America out of this war. This war has the potential to last beyond our children’s lifetimes and to be fought mostly on U.S. soil.

In October 2002, bin Laden said the war must go on because U.S. leaders and people show no understanding of “the lesson of the New York and Washington raids” and were not changing U.S. policies. “Whether America escalates or de-escalates the conflict, we will reply in kind. The youth of Islam are preparing things that will fill your hearts with fear. They will target key sectors of your economy until you stop your injustice and aggression or until the more short-live of us die.”

Reasons and Policies

Bin Laden Islamic Hero

Economic Objectives

Description of Al Qaeda

American Elites Blinded

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Sunday, June 17

Salam Fayyad – Economic Hit Man

by mammon on Sun 17 Jun 2007 08:14 AM AKDT

Economic Hit Man Series

Wikipedia Salam Fayyad

Salam Fayyad, a Palestinian politician, on June 15, 2007 was appointed the Prime Minister of the Palestinian National Authority. Fayyad had been the Finance Minister in the Fatah government from 2002. Fayyad is highly respected in the Israeli establishment and has close ties with the Bush administration. His Ph.D. in economics is from the University of Texas at Austin, a student of William A. Barnett, did early research on the American Divisia Monetary Aggregates [growth rate of the aggregate is the weighted average of the growth rates of the component quantities], and was on the staff of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. An economist and a former World Bank official who lived in the United States for twenty years, he was an official of the World Bank from 1987-1995 and subsequently became the International Monetary Fund representative to Palestine until 2001, before becoming Finance Minister of the Palestinian National Authority.

2007.06.18: US, EU Restore Palestinian Ties

The US and the EU are to normalize ties with the new Palestinian government, lifting embargoes on aid to support an administration without Hamas. Speaking in Washington, Ms Rice congratulated Mr Abbas' choice as Palestinian Prime Minister, Salam Fayyad. As a result of his appointment, she said, the US would resume diplomatic contacts with the Palestinians, suspended since Hamas came to power after winning elections in January 2006.

2007.06.17: Abbas Signs New Government Decree

Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president, has signed a decree allowing a Palestinian emergency government to take office without parliamentary approval. The decree came after reports that Abbas was expected to swear in Salam Fayyad, an economist. A US envoy told Abbas that the US would lift a direct ban on aid to the government once the new administration was announced. Jacob Walles, the US consul-general in Jerusalem, said: "I expect that we are going to be engaged with this government.”

2007.06.15: Abbas Appoints New Palestinian PM

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has appointed a new prime minister, a day after dissolving the Hamas-led coalition. Finance Minister Salam Fayyad has been asked to take over and form an emergency government. It comes amid political upheaval in Gaza, where Hamas has forcibly taken control from its Fatah rivals.

Wikipedia Hamas

Hamas is listed as a terrorist organization by Canada, the European Union, Israel, Japan, and the United States.

2007.06.15: Gaza: Not Just a Prison, a Laboratory by Naomi Klein

Israel’s economy isn’t booming despite the political chaos that devours the headlines, but because of it. This phase of development dates back to the mid-nineties, when Israel was in the vanguard of the information revolution - the most tech-dependent economy in the world. After the dot-com bubble burst in 2000, Israel’s economy was devastated, facing its worst year since 1953. Then came 9/11, and suddenly new profit vistas opened up for any company that claimed it could spot terrorists in crowds, seal borders from attack and extract confessions from closed-mouthed prisoners.

Overlooked is Israel’s huge and expanding export business. Israel now sends $1.2 billion in “defense” products to the United States-up dramatically from $270 million in 1999. In 2006 Israel exported $3.4 billion in defense products-well over a billion more than it received in US military aid. That makes Israel the fourth-largest arms dealer in the world, overtaking Britain.

Much of this growth has been in the so-called “homeland security” sector. Before 9/11 homeland security barely existed as an industry. By the end of this year, Israeli exports in the sector will reach $1.2 billion-an increase of 20 percent. The key products and services are high-tech fences, unmanned drones, biometric IDs, video and audio surveillance gear, air passenger profiling and prisoner interrogation systems - precisely the tools and technologies Israel has used to lock-in the occupied territories.

The chaos in Gaza and the rest of the region doesn’t threaten the bottom line in Tel Aviv, and may actually boost it. Israel has learned to turn endless war into a brand asset, pitching its uprooting, occupation and containment of the Palestinian people as a half-century head start in the “global war on terror.”