> Letter to a Young Muslim
> by Tariq Ali
> The Iranian ayatollahs dealt severely with Muslims who preached >in favour of a social radicalism. If I genuinely believed that >this radical Islam was the way forward for humanity, I would not >hesitate to say so in public, whatever the consequences. I know >that many of your friends love chanting the name "Osama" and I >know that they cheered on September 11, 2001. They were not >alone. It happened all over the world, but had nothing to do with >religion.>>
Tariq Ali seems to imply that a very large number of muslims (even a majority) are Al-Qaeda sympathisers or fundamentalists. That's not my impression. What is frequently not realised that South Asia and Indonesia account for 650-700 million (or about 2/3) muslims in the world. AQ does not have any mass base in these regions. I suppose for Tariq Ali the Muslim World = the Middle East + North Africa.
Ulhas