--- On Sat, 11/8/08, Doug Henwood <dhenwood at panix.com> wrote:
> From: Doug Henwood <dhenwood at panix.com>
> Subject: [lbo-talk] why Obama will have to kill some Muslims soon
> To: "lbo-talk" <lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org>
> Date: Saturday, November 8, 2008, 2:42 PM
> <http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/08/world/middleeast/08jihadi.html>
> New York Times - November 8, 2008
>
> Jihadi Leader Says Radicals Share Obama Victory
> By MICHAEL SLACKMAN and SOUAD MEKHENNET
>
> DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — The leader of a jihadi
> group in Iraq argued Friday that the election of Barack
> Obama as president represented a victory for radical Islamic
> groups that had battled American forces since the invasion
> of Iraq.
>
> The statement, which experts said was part of the
> psychological duel with the United States, was included in a
> 25-minute audiotaped speech by Abu Omar al-Baghdadi, leader
> of the Islamic State of Iraq, an umbrella organization that
> claims ties to Al Qaeda. Mr. Baghdadi’s statement was
> posted on a password-protected Web site called Al Hesbah,
> used to disseminate information to Islamic radicals.
>
> In his address, Mr. Baghdadi also said that the election of
> Mr. Obama — and the rejection of the Republican candidate,
> Senator John McCain — was a victory for his movement, a
> claim that has already begun to resonate among the radical
> faithful. In so doing Mr. Baghdadi highlighted the challenge
> the new president would face as he weighed how to remove
> troops from Iraq without also giving movements like Al Qaeda
> a powerful propaganda tool to use for recruiting.
>
> “And the other truth that politicians are embarrassed to
> admit,” Mr. Baghdadi said, “is that their unjust war on
> the houses of Islam, with its heavy and successive losses
> and the continuous operations of exhaustion of your power
> and your economy, were the principal cause of the collapse
> of the economic giant.”
>
> The audio statement came amid a very public discussion in
> the Middle East over what Mr. Obama’s election meant for
> the future — and what it said about the past. Most of the
> public reaction, in newspapers and on television and radio
> stations, was euphoric, with many commentators marveling at
> the election of a black man whose father was from a Muslim
> family. There was a general assessment that Mr. Obama’s
> election was a repudiation of the course taken by President
> Bush and his inner circle over the past eight years.
>
> “Obama’s election was a message against such
> destruction, against unjustified wars, wars that are fought
> with ignorance and rashness, without knowledge of their
> arenas or the shape of their surroundings,” wrote Ghassan
> Charbel in Thursday’s issue of the Saudi-owned, pan-Arab
> daily newspaper Al Hayat. “It was a message against the
> pattern that became a burden on the U.S. and transformed the
> U.S. into a burden on the world.”
>
> Some even pointed to Mr. Obama’s election as a lesson to
> the rest of the region. In Kuwait, Sheik Hamed al-Ali, an
> Islamic scholar known for his support of jihadi fighters,
> posted a message titled “We Want Change!” on his Web
> site.
>
> Sheik Ali said, “It remains the obligation of our Islamic
> nation to benefit from this example and request change,
> also, and to get rid of any regime that leads with ignorance
> and injustice, plunders from the country, enslaves the
> worshipers, drives us to destruction.” The comments were
> then circulated on other Islamic Web forums.
>
> But there was also a growing chorus of caution, as
> commentators began to try to tamp down expectations of any
> change in American policies in the region. And other
> commentators echoed Mr. Baghdadi’s view that the election
> was a victory for the insurgents in Iraq, the Taliban in
> Afghanistan, Hamas in the Gaza Strip and Hezbollah in
> southern Lebanon.
>
> “It would be no exaggeration to say that we Arabs and
> Muslims were the main unseen voters who decided the outcome
> of these elections,” wrote Abdelbari Atwan in
> Wednesday’s issue of the London-based pan-Arab daily
> newspaper Al Quds Al Arabi.
>
> He wrote, “The transformation that will begin in the U.S.
> starting today in various political, economic, military, and
> social domains may well have been delayed for decades, had
> the new American century been crowned with victory, and had
> the situation in Iraq and Afghanistan taken the directions
> sought by the neo-cons — in other words, had there been
> political stability and economic prosperity, and had the
> citizens of the two countries targeted by the U.S.’s
> designs been totally subjugated by it.”
>
> Mr. Baghdadi also used his address to offer Mr. Obama an
> unlikely deal, one certain to do little to bring any
> resolution to the conflict between radical Islamic groups
> and the United States. He offered a truce of sorts in
> exchange for the removal of all forces from the region.
>
> “On behalf of my brothers in Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia
> and Chechnya, I offer you what is better for you and us: you
> return to your previous era of neutrality, you withdraw your
> forces, and you return to your homes,” Mr. Baghdadi said.
> “You do not interfere in the affairs of our countries,
> directly or indirectly. We in turn will not prevent commerce
> with you, whether it is in oil or otherwise, but with
> fairness, not at a loss.”
>
> Faris bin Hizam, an expert on Al Qaeda, said the offer of a
> trade relationship had struck a new note. “How can he call
> for establishing a relationship with the United States if it
> withdraws?” Mr. Bin Hizam said. “The main principle of
> Al Qaeda prohibits any relation with infidels.”
>
> Marwan Shehadeh, a Jordanian researcher and expert in
> radical Islamic groups, said that Al Qaeda leaders outside
> Iraq might balk at such a relationship, but that jihadis
> might view Mr. Obama’s election as an opportunity.
>
> “Of course there is a shift, because there is a new
> president who came from an oppressed class, and people who
> had little opportunity,” Mr. Shehadeh said. “He wants to
> give Obama the chance to make a change, since Obama has no
> previous animosity with Islam.”
>
> Intelligence officials working in the region said that they
> did not see Mr. Obama’s election as having any fundamental
> effect on Al Qaeda, and that any talk of a truce was likely
> to go nowhere. But two intelligence officials who spoke on
> the condition of anonymity because of the nature of their
> work said that they were concerned that any step that could
> be perceived as a victory for Al Qaeda, like pulling troops
> out of Iraq right away, would only strengthen its ability to
> recruit.
>
> “If he withdraws the soldiers from Iraq before the
> country gets really stable, Al Qaeda will see it as their
> victory, and they might get stronger again,” one regional
> intelligence official said. That dynamic was already
> beginning to play out on Al Hesbah.
>
> As with other Web sites, it is impossible for an outsider
> to verify the identity, or integrity, of posted comments.
> But experts recognize Al Hesbah as the one remaining online
> forum for those aligned with Al Qaeda, after two other Web
> sites were apparently hacked and taken offline.
>
> On the same day Mr. Baghdadi posted his statement, others
> chatted about the need to continue the fight against the
> United States. “All of them are low and dirty, and their
> hatred of Islam is the same,” one participant wrote. Of
> Mr. Obama, he wrote, “Even in his speech rejoicing his
> victory he said, ‘To those who fight us, we will defeat
> you.’ Let us see who will be victorious.”
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