[lbo-talk] "Holy Jihad Brigades" (was Re: Love)

[Yoshie Furuhashi]

I said a while ago to Joel:

On 8/4/06, Yoshie Furuhashi <critical.montages at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 8/4/06, Joel Schalit <managingeditor at tikkun.org> wrote:
> > This was posted to Michael Lerner's Current Thinking blog this morning
> > on the Tikkun site - its by one of our contributing editors, Mark
> > LeVine. Timing is hilarious, especially with Yoshie's forwarding of the
> > Cecilia Lukas piece.
> >
> > Joel
> >
> > Has the Left Gone Mad?
> > By Mark LeVine
> <snip>
> > The situation was worse a year later, when Italian peace activists
> > Simona Toretta and Simona Pari, whose brave commitment to non-violence
> > and grass roots peace building I saw firsthand during my time in Iraq,
> > were kidnapped by insurgents. At the very moment they were being
> > threatened with beheading
>
> With Hizbullah and its likes, Western leftists can cultivate contact
> and try to listen to and talk to them if we wish.  Noam Chomsky, As'ad
> AbuKhalil, etc. have met Hasan Nasrallah.  In contrast, you cannot try
> to meet and reason with sectarian jihadists of an apocalyptic tendency
> who, with Washington, have made Iraq FUBAR -- you'd be lucky if you
> went to Iraq now and didn't get kidnapped and beheaded by them.
>
> If the Tel Aviv-Washington axis succeeds in defeating or weakening
> Hizbullah, Hamas, Iran, etc., the Islamist Right, backed by Saudi
> money, will step into the vacuum, recruiting more angry Arab and
> Muslim youths into its sectarian jihads not just in the Middle East
> but all over the world.  Hard as it may be for you to believe, it is
> Hizbullah, et al. who stand between us and apocalypse.

Now, it looks like we are about to reap what the Tel Aviv-Washington
axis has sown in Palestine, too, not just in Iraq, precisely in the
fashion that I feared we would:

<blockquote><http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/0,,1856960,00.html>
Fox News hostage video released

· Unknown Gaza militants call for release of Muslims
· Men appear healthy as weekend deadline looms

Rory McCarthy in Jerusalem
Thursday August 24, 2006
The Guardian

A previously unknown militant group in Gaza said yesterday it was
holding two kidnapped Fox News journalists and demanded that the US
release "Muslim prisoners" within 72 hours.

The Holy Jihad Brigades released a video showing Steve Centanni, an
American, and his cameraman, Olaf Wiig, from New Zealand. During the
90-second video they appeared unhurt and said they were in "fairly
good condition". They asked their families to apply political pressure
to secure their release.

It was the first time anyone had claimed responsibility for the
kidnapping nine days ago. The two men were seized outside the offices
of the Palestinian security services in Gaza City. The incident
surprised the Palestinian authorities, who said they did not know who
was behind the operation.

The kidnappers issued a two-page statement with their demands. "We are
going to exchange the Muslim female and male prisoners in American
jails in return for the prisoners that we have. We are going to give
you 72 hours, beginning midnight tonight, to take your decision," it
said.

The group did not say what would happen to the two journalists if the
US did not meet the Saturday deadline. "If you implement and meet our
condition, we will fulfil our promise. If not, wait, and we are going
to wait with you," it said.

Although foreign aid workers and journalists have been kidnapped
during a rise in lawlessness in Gaza over the past few months, this
incident is more troubling because it has lasted so long. The video
released yesterday had uncomfortable echoes of the many videos
produced by kidnappers in Iraq. The kidnappers' statement was filled
with rhetoric and religious quotations, a change from the usual terse
ones issued by Palestinian militants.</blockquote>
-- 
Yoshie
<http://montages.blogspot.com/>
<http://mrzine.org>
<http://monthlyreview.org/>