"Judgment
Day in Mystery Babylon?"
"Let's be clear about why this bien-pensant anti-American onslaught is such appalling rubbish. Terrorism is the murder of the innocent; this time, it was mass murder. To excuse such an atrocity by blaming U.S. government policies is to deny the basic idea of all morality: that individuals are responsible for their actions." (Salman Rushdie)
News and commentary on anti-Americanism and anti-West sentiments..
Part 1: 2001/09/12 - 2001/09/29
Part 2: 2001/10/01 - 2001/12/28
Part 3: 2002/01/08 - 2002/06/28
Part 4: 2002/07/01 - 2002/08/30
Part 5: 2002/09/03 - 2002/09/30
Part 6: 2002/10/03 - 2002/11/30
Part 7: 2002/12/01 - 2003/01/15
Part 8: 2003/01/17 -December 2001
"Egyptian Government-Sponsored Scientific Journal: On American and Israeli Bio-Warfare and Jews Spreading AIDS to Asia and Africa" (Special Dispatch No. 322, MEMRI, 2001/12/28)
"Bin Laden's Private TV Channel" (Amir Taheri, The Wall Street Journal, 2001/12/28)
"New York: a tale of two cities" (John Ibbitson, The Globe and Mail, 2001/12/24)
"Radical Sheik" (Shelby Steele, The Wall Street Journal, 2001/12/10)
"Pipe Dreams" (Seth Stevenson, Slate, 2001/12/06)
"We are not risking world war so women can show their ankles" (Barbara Amiel, The Daily Telegraph, 2001/12/03)
November 2001
"American academics get it wrong, again" (Helle Bering, The Washington Times, 2001/11/28)
"A War Like No Other? You Bet!" (David Graham Du Bois, BlackElectorate.com, 2001/11/27)
"The new Islamic fascism" (Robert S. Wistrich, The Jerusalem Post, 2001/11/16)
"Isn't It Time for the Truth?" (Harry Browne, Antiwar, 2001/11/14)
"In Pakistan, It's Jihad 101" (Thomas L. Friedman, The New York Times, 2001/11/13)
"Holy fools" (Peter Mullen, The Spectator, from the 2001/11/10 issue)
"Hamas Weekly: Anthrax should be put into America's drinking water" (Special Dispatch No. 297, MEMRI, 2001/11/07)
"Chomsky Attacks U.S. Double Standards on Terrorism" (tehrantimes.com, 2001/11/06)
"Beijing produces videos glorifying terrorist attacks on 'arrogant' US" (Damien McElroy, The Daily Telegraph, 2001/11/05)
"British Muslim support for terror" (The Sunday Times, 2001/11/04)
"More Muslim enemies from within" (Michelle Malkin, TownHall, 2001/11/02)
October 2001
"Elitist contempt for American values" (Walter Williams, TownHall, 2001/10/31)
"Idiocy Watch #8" (The New Republic, 2001/10/29)
"Noam Chomsky Volunteers to Serve as Domestic Propaganda Chief for Taliban War Machine" (David Horowitz, FrontPageMagazine, 2001/10/29)
"It's a Crime That Some Don't See This as Hate" (Paul Hollander, The Washington Post Outlook, 2002/10/28)
"Islam Can't Escape Blame" (Amir Taheri, The Wall Street Journal, 2001/10/27)
"The Sentry's Solitude" (Fouad Ajami, Foreign Affairs, from the November/December 2001 issue)
"Brutality smeared in peanut butter" (Arundhati Roy, The Guardian, 2001/10/23)
"When America-haters become Americans" (Martin Peretz, Jewish World Review, 2001/10/23)
"We will not be silenced" (George Galloway, The Guardian, 2001/10/20)
"It is a clash of civilizations" (Robert S. Wistrich, The Jerusalem Post, 2001/10/19)
"Campus protesters ignite U.S. flags" (Patrick Johnson, The Union News, 2001/10/19)
"Questions for the Anti-War Crowd, Part II - What if someone took them seriously?" (Michael Long, Jewish World Review, 2001/10/19)
"The New Cold War" (David Pryce-Jones, National Review, 2001/10/17)
"Of course it's a war on Islam" (Faisal Bodi, The Guardian, 2001/10/17)
"Anti-Americanism Revisited" (Paul Hollander, The Weekly Standard, from the 2001/10/22 issue)
"Koran and Country" (BBC News/Panorama, 2001/10/14)
"Muslims and the West - The need to speak up" (The Economist, 2001/10/11)
"The Sick Mind of Noam Chomsky: Part II Method and Madness" (David Horowitz, FrontPageMagazine 2001/10/10)
"Fighting Islam's Ku Klux Klan" (Kanan Makiya, The Observer, 2001/10/07)
"The Politics of Rage: Why Do They Hate Us?" (Fareed Zakaria, Newsweek, from the 2001/10/15 issue)
"People who hate people" (Mark Steyn, The Spectator, 2001/10/06)
"Towers of Intellect" (James Bowman, The Wall Street Journal, 2001/10/05)
"Idiocy Watch" (The New Republic, 2001/10/05)
"Preemptive Peace" (Chris Mooney, Tab Online, 2001/10/02)
"Not Ready for Prime Time: Peaceniks" (James P. Pinkerton, Los Angeles Times, 2001/10/02)
"Fighting the Forces of Invisibility" (Salman Rushdie, The Washington Post, 2001/10/02)
"The Best and the Brightest" (The Wall Street Journal, 2001/10/02)
"An Arab Moment of Truth - Which way the Islamist fantasy?" (David Pryce-Jones, National Review, from the 2001/10/15 issue)
"Grand Illusion" (Richard Brody, The New Yorker, 2001/10/01)
"Blame America First" (Ramesh Ponnuru, National Review, from the 2001/10/15 issue)
"Campus hand-wringing is not a pretty site" (John Leo, Town Hall, 2001/10/01)
"Egyptian Government-Sponsored Scientific Journal: On American and Israeli Bio-Warfare and Jews Spreading AIDS to Asia and Africa" (Special Dispatch No. 322, MEMRI, 2001/12/28)
Translation of a "scientific" article on Bio-Warfare by Dr. Husniya Hassan Moussa, published in the the November issue of the Egyptian science magazine Al-'Ilm: "The cases of anthrax infection in the U.S. emerged simultaneously with the beginning of the American war against Afghanistan. News coming from Afghanistan mentions symptoms of a strange disease… causing fever, headaches, and hemorrhaging. ... Also, Jewish tourists infected with AIDS are traveling around Asian and African countries with the aim of spreading the disease. ... It is no coincidence that the U.S. is the only member of the United Nations that has not signed the agreement on punishment for the collective annihilation of people… Israel continues to use germ warfare to destroy the Palestinian people on its occupied land, while it challenges the international community.""Bin Laden's Private TV Channel" (Amir Taheri, The Wall Street Journal, 2001/12/28)
"The secret of al Jazeera's undoubted success, however, lies not in its craven approach to Arab leaders, but elsewhere. It tells Arabs what they already think the mythical "Arab street" feels. It assumes that radical Islamism is on the rise in all Arab countries and that it's secretly supported by the majority. This is why al Jazeera talk shows, the backbone of its programming, favor radical Islamists. The situation also takes for granted that the average Arab is deeply anti-West and especially anti-American. The channel creates the impression that the West, and the U.S. in particular, are behind all of the Arabs' woes, including the presence of incompetent and corrupt regimes.""New York: a tale of two cities" (John Ibbitson, The Globe and Mail, 2001/12/24)
"There are those who argue that we need to get past this, past these 3,000 horrid deaths, that we need to gain some perspective. There are larger issues, they say, issues of what they claim is America's complicity in the disaster, of wrong horses backed, right ones ignored. They argue, passionately, that we need to concentrate, instead, on the innocents killed in the Afghan campaign, which they say is an evil at least as great as that of the terrorist attacks. Some of them go far. John McMurtry, a professor of philosophy at Guelph University, recently delivered an address at the University of Toronto in which he claimed that the American and coalition response to the attacks was simply "the latest expression of a deeper and wider terrorist campaign of an emergent totalitarian pattern of instituting world corporate rule." Comparing Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda to President George W. Bush and the American government, he said "there is little difference in moral substance between these atavistic gangs. Both are mass killers." And he suggested that "the evidence confirming U.S. and allied security awareness of, and possible complicity in, the 9/11 attack is considerable." He also doesn't like professional sport.""Radical Sheik" (Shelby Steele, The Wall Street Journal, 2001/12/10)
"But there is another message as well: that traditional American history, culture and religion are without any special authority. Worse, historic racism and sexism may leave these American offerings with less moral authority than foreign options. In these precincts, a little anti-Americanism becomes a sophistication, a mark of authenticity. ... Cultural liberalism serves up American self-hate to the young as idealism. And this idealism, along with the myth of the victim-sage, was the context of Walker's young life. It's too much to say that treason is a rite of passage in this context. But that is exactly how it turned out for Walker. In radical Islam he found both the victim's authority and the hatred of America that had been held out to him as marks of authenticity. He liked what he found. And when he turned on his country to be secure in his new faith, he followed a logic that was a part of his country's culture.""Pipe Dreams" (Seth Stevenson, Slate, 2001/12/06)
"A theory making the rounds on the Internet, on the airwaves, and in the press claims that the bombing of the Taliban has nothing to do with a "war on terrorism" but everything to do with the oil pipeline the West wants to build through Afghanistan. ... Why does the bombing-for-pipelines theory hold such appeal? For the same reason the supporting-the-Taliban-for-pipelines theory attracted so many: There's evidence that points in that direction. Unocal did want to build a pipeline through Afghanistan and did cozy up to the Taliban. Bush and Cheney do have ties to big oil. But theories like these are ridiculously reductionist. Their authors don't try to argue conclusions from evidence- they decide on conclusions first, then hunt for justification. ... What's absurd about the pipeline theory is how thoroughly it discounts the obvious reason the United States set the bombers loose on Afghanistan: Terrorists headquartered in Afghanistan attacked America's financial and military centers, killing 4,000 people, and then took credit for it. Nope - must be the pipeline.""We are not risking world war so women can show their ankles" (Barbara Amiel, The Daily Telegraph, 2001/12/03)
"But the darkest aspect of the Left these days is a virulent anti-Americanism, exemplified in America by Noam Chomsky, and in this country by Harold Pinter. On September 10, Pinter gave a speech at the University of Florence. ... He said that America was a murderous state, a vast gulag of torture and rape. Without a scrap of evidence, he asserted that the bombing of a southern Yugoslavian market town was not a mistake, as America claimed, but a deliberate act of murder and part of Nato's policy to terror-bomb. ... His speech also listed the agenda of the Left, from the Kyoto Accords to the International Criminal Court of Justice, and stated that, by rejecting these initiatives, America had "come out of the closet" as an "authentic rogue state . . . the most dangerous power the world has ever known". ... In conclusion, Pinter, a man whose life and liberty have been largely guaranteed in the past century and this new one by America, told his audience in Florence: "But we are free. And I believe that this brutal and malignant world machine must be recognised for what it is and resisted." ... Of course, there was no direct relationship between his speech and the bombing. But for years Pinter's words, in speeches such as these, have been an incitement to violence. No amount of bon mots can quite distance him morally from what took place the next day." (See also: "Degree Speech to the University of Florence 10th September 2001" (Harold Pinter, haroldpinter.org, 2001/10/10): "Arrogant, indifferent, contemptuous of International Law, both dismissive and manipulative of the United Nations - this is now the most dangerous power the world has ever known - the authentic ' rogue state' - but a 'rogue state' of colossal military and economic might. ... It is certainly true that the police action in Genoa recently made it clear that the forces of reaction and repression remain savage, vicious and merciless. But we are free. And I believe that this brutal and malignant world machine must be recognised for what it is and resisted.")"American academics get it wrong, again" (Helle Bering, The Washington Times, 2001/11/28)
"The September 11 terrorist attack "was no more despicable than the massive acts of terrorism . . . that the United States has committed during my lifetime." Who said this? A crazed Muslim extremist? Or a professor at a major American University? ... But all three of the quotations above originated on American colleges campuses in the days and weeks after September 11 and are quoted in a recent report, "How Our Universities Are Failing America and What Can Be Done About It," by the American Council of Trustees and Alumni. Given the awful losses Americans had just sustained in the worst terrorist attack the United States had ever seen, such sentiments may come as a surprise. Then again, given the rampant suspicion bordering on hatred of everything American that has been nurtured by the academy for decades, such reactions are as predictable as they remain shocking." (See also: "How Our Universities Are Failing America and What Can Be Done About It" (Jerry L. Martin and Anna D. Neal, ACTA, November 2001))"A War Like No Other? You Bet!" (David Graham Du Bois, BlackElectorate.com, 2001/11/27)
An anti-American (or rather anti-Western) article by Du Bois, who is a professor of Afro-American studies at the University of Massachusetts: "This "war against terrorism" is in fact an open declaration of war against the peoples of the developing world; initially the peoples of the Middle East and Africa, and ultimately the peoples of South and Central America and the Caribbean, all Asia, the South Pacific and the islands of the Seas - some four-fifths of humanity. It is a desperate attempt to meet and overcome this developing world's growing challenge to the continuation of four centuries of European and American hegemonic domination, exploitation, suppression, insult and injury by its executors in America and Europe.""The new Islamic fascism" (Robert S. Wistrich, The Jerusalem Post, 2001/11/16)
"There is something apocalyptic about the sheer scale and seismic shock effect of the Twin Towers massacre in New York. The Islamic terrorist perpetrators of this act, like the Nazis and fascists 60 years ago, speak a language of unquenchable hatred for the Jewish people, for America and the West, indeed for civilization itself. They, too, enjoy - at least in the Muslim world - the acclamation of significant sectors of the population. ... The conspiracy theory at its heart, which links plutocratic capitalism, international freemasonry, Zionism, and Marxist Communism, is almost identical with the mythical structure of Nazi anti-Semitism. For contemporary jihadists, a "Judaized" America and Israel, together with heretical, secular Muslim regimes are the godless spearhead of these dark occult forces that seek to destroy Islam and undermine the cultural identity of Muslim believers." (UPDATE: The link is down, but the article can be found here, via the Wayback Machine.)"Isn't It Time for the Truth?" (Harry Browne, Antiwar, 2001/11/14)
Just as I had managed to forget Mr. Browne, he returns with his twisted version of "the Truth": "President Bush says, 'You're either with us or against us.' Does that mean he'll bomb neutral Switzerland – the island of freedom, privacy, and security in the midst of socialist Europe – if it doesn't confiscate private bank accounts and otherwise act on every whim of our President? Why doesn't he simply tell the truth: 'America rules the world and I rule America. You will do as I say or I'll kill your people.'" (See also: "When Will We Learn?" (Harry Browne, Antiwar, 2001/09/12))"In Pakistan, It's Jihad 101" (Thomas L. Friedman, The New York Times, 2001/11/13)
"In 1978 there were 3,000 madrasas in Pakistan; today there are 39,000. ... The teacher asked an 8-year-old boy to chant a Koranic verse for us, which he did with the beauty and elegance of an experienced muezzin. What did it mean? It was a famous verse: "The faithful shall enter paradise and the unbelievers shall be condemned to eternal hellfire." I asked one of the students, an Afghan refugee, Rahim Kunduz, age 12, what his reaction was to the Sept. 11 attacks, and he said: "Most likely the attack came from Americans inside America. I am pleased that America has had to face pain, because the rest of the world has tasted its pain." And his view of Americans generally? "They are unbelievers and do not like to befriend Muslims and they want to dominate the world with their power." ... I am all for reviewing our policies, but only the Pakistanis can rebuild their schools so they meld modernity, Islam and pluralism. Bin Laden is a sideshow, but one we must deal with. The real war for peace in this region, though, is in the schools.""Holy fools" (Peter Mullen, The Spectator, from the 2001/11/10 issue)
"Where do most prominent churchmen locate blame for the atrocities of 11 September? With Osama bin Laden and al-Qa’eda? With the Taleban? With global terrorism? By their public utterances, it is clear that they lay responsibility firmly at the feet of the US. ... It is axiomatic among the bishops that the US is oppressor-in-chief. So the Bishop of Guildford says we "need to look at the long-term causes of such terrorist acts". And he doesn’t mean envy, hatred and malice on the part of the terrorists; he means the capitalist system which pays his stipend. ... The Archbishop of Wales said, "There is no final security without the redistribution of power" (CT, 28 September). In other words, reward the countries which sponsor terrorism for their terrorist acts.""Hamas Weekly: Anthrax should be put into America's drinking water" (Special Dispatch No. 297, MEMRI, 2001/11/07)
A column which gives a vivid insight into the mindset we are up against: "In his weekly op-ed, Dr. 'Atallah Abu Al-Subh, a columnist for the Hamas weekly Al-Risala (Gaza), writes open letters to prominent figures, ideologies, and events. His most recent letter, No. 163, was titled "To Anthrax": "...Oh Anthrax, despite your wretchedness, you have sown horror in the heart of the lady of arrogance, of tyranny, of boastfulness! ... Our hearts, repressed, exiled, and oppressed, were filled with belief that Allah is capable of defeating America by means of the weakest of his earthly soldiers, after he used you to sow horror in their hearts... ... You make the U.S. appease us, and hint to us at a rosy future and a life of ease... through a [new] Marshall Plan. ... May you continue to advance, to permeate, and to spread. If I may give you a word of advice, enter the air of those ‘symbols,' the water faucets from which they drink, and the pens with which they draft their traps and conspiracies against the wretched peoples… ... I hope that we only hear about you when you enter the body of every base man among the arrogant and their agents.""Global Thinker" (Megan Rosenfeld, The Washington Post, 2001/11/06)
An interview with Benjamin R. Barber, author of "Jihad vs. McWorld" (1995): "In it, Barber describes how the cultural differences between tribalism - ethnic and religious fundamentalism - and global capitalism are (or were) headed inevitably for an explosion of violence. Both are threats to democracy, he argues, and thus intertwine to create the conditions and the motive for combustion. By "McWorld" he means not just the multinational corporations for whom national boundaries are more or less obsolete but also the American values wrapped in such low-culture packaging as pop music, movies, fast food and video games. "Jihad" is those forces who fear and oppose that modernism, people who see themselves engaged in "a holy struggle against something that is seen as evil," Barber says." (See also: "Jihad vs. McWorld" (Benjamin R. Barber, The Atlantic, March 1992)"Chomsky Attacks U.S. Double Standards on Terrorism" (tehrantimes.com, 2001/11/06)
Noam Chomsky is on a "lecture tour" in Central Asia, preaching his anti-American gospel. One would hope that his fanaticism finally stands exposed for all to see by his Post-September 11 stance: "Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) professor Noam Chomsky launched a stunning attack on Washington double standards on terrorism. According to the statesman, an English daily published from New Delhi, Chomsky in his clearest voice of dissent in contemporary America described the U.S.-led attacks on Afghanistan as a "silent genocide", affecting millions of innocent civilians. "They are not the Taleban," he told an overflowing audience at the Fifth D.T. Lakdawala memorial lecture on 'peering into the abyss of the future' which included Indian ministers, diplomats, members of the academia in a 70-minute lecture at the Ficci Auditorium in New Delhi recently. "Terrorism is terrorism that is directed against the U.S. and its friends and allies," he said before reeling out a string of statistics on the misery of the Afghanistan people and U.S. neo-imperialist policies over the decades. ... Chomsky, who kicked off his fortnight long lecture tour of the subcontinent, which will also take him to Pakistan, highlighted the use of brute military and economic might by the U.S. against indigenous people in various parts of the world, particularly Central America. "In the Reagan years alone, U.S.-sponsored state terrorists in Central America left hundreds of thousands of tortured and mutilated corpses, millions on maimed and orphaned, and four countries in ruins, he said." (See also: "Brendan - Manufacturing dissent: Chomsky dissembles on Afghan hunger" (SpinSanity, 2001/11/05): "Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary Online defines genocide as "the deliberate and systematic destruction of a racial, political, or cultural group". It is a grave charge that Chomsky completely fails to prove. The lack of food aid to starving Afghans is neither deliberate (if it was, why would the US be increasing its food aid efforts?) nor systematic (most of the lack of food aid is attributable to the Taliban blocking its distribution). Moreover, the "genocide" is not "silent". On October 9, shortly before Chomsky's speech, USA Today, the Los Angeles Times and the Washington Post, among other papers, all ran stories on relief officials who believed the US airdrops of food were inadequate. This coverage has continued in the mainstream US press. In fact, the Washington Post recently reported that an international food airlift is now being planned to bring greater supplies into remote regions of the country. Millions of Afghans are undoubtedly at risk, creating real moral dilemmas. Unfortunately, Chomsky's deceptive and inflammatory rhetoric adds little to the debate.". Also: "Noam Chomsky Volunteers to Serve as Domestic Propaganda Chief for Taliban War Machine" (David Horowitz, FrontPageMagazine, 2001/10/29))"Beijing produces videos glorifying terrorist attacks on 'arrogant' US" (Damien McElroy, The Daily Telegraph, 2001/11/05)
"The Chinese state-run propaganda machine is cashing in on the terror attacks in New York and Washington, producing books, films and video games glorifying the strikes as a humbling blow against an arrogant nation. ... As rescue workers pick through the rubble of the twin towers, the commentator proclaims that the city had reaped the consequences of decades of American bullying of weaker nations. He said: ''This is the America the whole world has wanted to see. Blood debts have been repaid in blood. America has bombed other countries and used its hegemony to deny the natural rights of others without paying the price. Who until now has dared to avenge the hurts inflicted by unaccountable Americans.'' ... On the unofficial films the commentary is even more callous: 'Look at the panic in their faces as they wipe off the dust and crawl out of their strong buildings - now just a heap of rubble. We will never fear these people again, they have been shown to be soft-bellied paper tigers.'""British Muslim support for terror" (The Sunday Times, 2001/11/04)
"Four out of every 10 British Muslims believe Osama Bin Laden is justified in mounting his war against the United States. And more than one in 10 say the attacks on the World Trade Center were justified... A Sunday Times survey, the first large-scale poll of the Muslim community since the start of the bombing campaign against Afghanistan, shows 40% believe Bin Laden has cause to wage war against America and a similar proportion say Britons who choose to go to fight alongside the Taliban are right to do so.""More Muslim enemies from within" (Michelle Malkin, TownHall, 2001/11/02)
"There was a venomous hatefest in the nation's capitol on Halloween night. It was hosted by Malik Zulu Shabazz of the militant New Black Panther Party. Deadly rhetorical spores of anti-Americanism and anti-Semitism permeated the air for more than four hours. ... If this event had been an anti-Muslim rally, the story would be front-page news. Editorialists and academics would be decrying racial and religious intolerance. ... Instead, the Muslim marathon of malevolence I watched Wednesday night on C-SPAN-2 received absolutely no mainstream media criticism. In fact, it got no mainstream newspaper press coverage at all -- an especially ugly irony since it was held at the prestigious National Press Club in the heart of Washington, D.C. ... Shabazz defended Osama bin Laden, blamed President Bush for the 9-11 attacks, called our founding fathers "snakes" and likened them to terrorists, lambasted Catholicism, Christians and Jews, and repeated his avaricious call for societal reparations to blacks. ... One audience member claimed that the hijackings, destruction and deaths were "nothing more than a Hollywood lie." An "imam" named Abdul Alim Musa agreed, assailing the "Zionists in Hollywood, the Zionists in New York, and the Zionists in D.C." who "all collaborate" to oppress blacks and Muslims.""Elitist contempt for American values" (Walter Williams, TownHall, 2001/10/31)
"College campuses are home to elitists who are out of touch with and have contempt for American values. ... A California Chico State College professor said that President Bush wants to "kill innocent people," "colonize" the Arab world and capture "oil for the Bush family." ... Adam Goldstein, University of Wisconsin-Madison's former campus relations committee chairman, said in a letter to the editor of the Badger Herald that "before you preach at us about the evil terrorists, why don't you try getting your facts straight and face up to the reality that our leaders are war criminals just as much as people like Hitler, Stalin and other monsters of the 20th century." ... As parents, we cough up to $30,000 and sometimes more in tuition money to have our youngsters taught that America is not only a racist, sexist and homophobic nation, but a terrorist nation as well, and an international monster creating world poverty and destroying the planet." (See also: "Al Qaeda's Unwitting Allies" (Young America's Foundation, 2001/10/24) "Rutgers University Professor Barbara Foley wrote that 'whatever its [the terrorist attacks] proximate cause, its ultimate cause is the fascism of U.S. foreign policy over the past many decades.'", "Academic Freedom: A Time for Reform" (John Taylor, Virginia Viewpoint, October 2001) "For the last three decades, parents and taxpayers have paid ever-increasing amounts for the rising generation to be taught that all cultures are of equal merit; that values are merely social constructs; that morality is relative; that reason and truth are nothing more than tools used to perpetuate white male domination; and that America is racist, sexist, homophobic, and not nearly vegetarian enough", "FIRE and the Aftermath of September 11" (FIRE, October 2001) "Across the nation, in response to the atrocities of September 11, 2001, and to the debates and discussions that have occurred in their wake, many college and university administrators are acting to inhibit the free expression of the citizens of a free society.")"Idiocy Watch #8" (The New Republic, 2001/10/29)
The eighth installment of "the dumb and outrageous things being said and written about America and the terrorists", this time focusing on winners of the Nobel Prize: "'Conjuring the spirit of November 9, 1938.' - Gunter Grass (1999 Prize for Literature) describing the Bush administration's rhetoric in the war on terrorism in The Daily Telegraph. [Grass refers to Kristallnacht, the Nazis' notorious anti-Jewish pogrom.]""Noam Chomsky Volunteers to Serve as Domestic Propaganda Chief for Taliban War Machine" (David Horowitz, FrontPageMagazine, 2001/10/29)
Chomsky outdoes himself in the genre of lunatic anti-American conspiracy theories: "Well, let’s start with right now. So I’ll talk about the situation in Afghanistan. … Looks like what’s happening is some kind of silent genocide. It indicates that whatever will happen, we don’t know, but plans are being made, and programs implemented on the assumption that they may lead to the deaths of several million people in the next – in the next couple of weeks. [i.e, by October 25]. Very casually, with no comment here [i.e. in the US] .… Well, that’s what’s happening now. What’s happening now is very much under our control.… that we’re in the midst of apparently trying to murder three or four million people…" (Noam Chomsky, 2001/10/11) (See also: "The New War Against Terror" (Transcription of "An Evening with Noam Chomsky", zmag.org, 2001/10/18), "The Sick Mind of Noam Chomsky" (David Horowitz, FrontPageMagazine.com, 2001/09/26), "The Sick Mind of Noam Chomsky: Part II Method and Madness" (David Horowitz, FrontPageMagazine 2001/10/10), "On the Bombings" (Noam Chomsky, zmag.org, 2001/09/16))"It's a Crime That Some Don't See This as Hate" (Paul Hollander, The Washington Post Outlook, 2002/10/28)
"The champions of global peace and social justice readily rise to moral indignation and anger against the United States, but appear incapable of similar sentiments against the terrorists. Concern for the unintended victims of American action against the terrorists and the nations that harbor them greatly outweighs compassion toward the actual and wholly intentional victims of Sept. 11. ... At the core of these attitudes is anti-Americanism, which I define as a historically specific expression of a universal scapegoating impulse, a type of bias similar to racism, sexism or antisemitism, and a largely irrational, often visceral aversion to the United States and its government, domestic institutions, prevailing values, culture and people, fueled by a variety of frustrations and grievances. It culminates in the feeling, memorably expressed by a Hamas leader, that "America is the problem that lies behind all other problems." Those within our shores who harbor these sentiments have seized on the events of Sept. 11 to express renewed hostility toward our society. America's homegrown critics hold the peculiar conviction that if hatred of the sort that led to the destruction of the World Trade Center is directed at the United States, there must be good and justifiable reason for it. Yet these same critics never seem to take such a position in regard to victims of other hate crimes.""Islam Can't Escape Blame" (Amir Taheri, The Wall Street Journal, 2001/10/27)
"Anyone familiar with textbooks in most Muslim countries would know the twisted view of the world they propagate and the hatred they promote. Anyone who follows the media in the Muslim world would know that the verbal version of the Sept. 11 attacks is an almost daily fare. Go to the Internet and check the editorials of virtually any Muslim paper on Sept. 10 and see what they were saying about the West in general and the U.S. in particular. Anyone listening to a sermon in virtually any mosque, including many in the West, would be shocked by the vehemence of the anti-Western, especially anti-American, sentiments expressed. ... The Muslim world today is full of bigotry, fanaticism, hypocrisy and plain ignorance - all of which create a breeding ground for criminals like bin Laden. The principal victims of these criminals are Muslims, who are prevented from developing a modern political culture without which they cannot reform their societies and rebuild their economies.""The Sentry's Solitude" (Fouad Ajami, Foreign Affairs, from the November/December 2001 issue)
"There were men in the shadows pulling off spectacular deeds. But they fed off a free-floating anti-Americanism that blows at will and knows no bounds, among Islamists and secularists alike. For the crowds in Karachi, Cairo, and Amman, the great power could never get it right. A world lacking the tools and the political space for free inquiry fell back on anti-Americanism. ... This kind of fury a distant power can never overcome. Policy can never speak to wrath. Step into the thicket (as Bill Clinton did in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict) and the foreign power is damned for its reach. Step back, as George W. Bush did in the first months of his presidency, and Pax Americana is charged with abdication and indifference.""Brutality smeared in peanut butter" (Arundhati Roy, The Guardian, 2001/10/23)
Arundhati Roy seems to be sort of a female Noam Chomsky, combining moral equivalence and anti-Americanism with an inverted view of modern history: "The International Coalition Against Terror is a largely [sic] cabal of the richest countries in the world. Between them, they manufacture and sell almost all of the world's weapons, they possess the largest stockpile of weapons of mass destruction - chemical, biological and nuclear. They have fought the most wars, account for most of the genocide, subjection, ethnic cleansing and human rights violations in modern history, and have sponsored, armed and financed untold numbers of dictators and despots. Between them, they have worshipped, almost deified, the cult of violence and war. For all its appalling sins, the Taliban just isn't in the same league." (See also: "The algebra of infinite justice" (Arundhati Roy, The Guardian, 2001/09/29))"When America-haters become Americans" (Martin Peretz, Jewish World Review, 2001/10/23)
"The governments of the Arab world have been surprisingly effective and unsurprisingly brutal in their attacks on their religious zealots, and that has forced many of the people who deeply hate America to flee here for survival. ... Ours is not a country with which they identify or whose values they share. The American flag has been a flag of convenience for them, the flag of a patsy country that lets them in without scrutiny, lets them work, go to school, organize, harangue, hate, and, then, foolishly tries to fit them into some fanciful mosaic of gorgeous diversity. ... Scrupulous observers estimate that there are as many as 5,000 actual or potential terror operatives in Britain today, and probably more in Germany. It's anybody's guess how many reside in the United States. ... The grim truth is that we will have great trouble combating the war that the terrorist international has now brought to our shores. ... The struggle at home will be as difficult as the struggle in the mountains of Afghanistan. And no less important.""We will not be silenced" (George Galloway, The Guardian, 2001/10/20)
The Labour MP speaks out against the "new imperialism" with some highly selective examples: "So what are the "allies" bombing? The four UN mine-clearing staff, the shepherds and their families in the village of Khorum, the Red Cross compound in Kabul, the residents of Kandahar, the trucks full of terrified refugees. More of these human and public relations disasters will conspire to "bury" the government's message. An already restless audience here, never mind among the 1.3bn Muslims nursing their wrath, will not sit through this unequal fight with equanimity. And without a change of policy, the winter snows will soon begin to tilt this disaster into an international catastrophe.""It is a clash of civilizations" (Robert S. Wistrich, The Jerusalem Post, 2001/10/19)
"The fact is that America and Israel have long been twinned as the "Great" and the "Little" Satan by a resurgent Islam. Since the Islamic Revolution in Iran of 1979 (a pivotal event in 20th century history), both have been demonized and targeted as the source of all evil in the world and the greatest single danger to the Muslim umma (nation). ... Like most of the Western establishment, many Jews (and even some Israelis) are equally reluctant to grasp how profoundly anti-Semitic the Muslim radicals - and indeed the bulk of the Muslim world (by no means only the Arabs) - have become as a result of more than two decades of relentless intoxication by their medias, by their own intellectuals and religious as well as political leaderships." (UPDATE: The original link is down, but the article can be found here, via the Wayback Machine.)"Campus protesters ignite U.S. flags" (Patrick Johnson, The Union News, 2001/10/19)
Anti-American quote of the day. In fact, this one will be hard to beat: "Amherst College students were stunned moments after a pro-America rally involving more than 100 people ended yesterday when several protesters emerged from the crowd to set fire to a U.S. flag. ... Most of those protesting the flag declined to be interviewed. One who did, 19-year-old Dan Griffin of Minneapolis, Minn., said the protest sought to show that the United States is responsible for much of the pain and suffering in the world. The United States has helped continue a spree of genocide that dates back to Columbus in 1492, he said.""Questions for the Anti-War Crowd, Part II - What if someone took them seriously?" (Michael Long, Jewish World Review, 2001/10/19)
"Here's a flash for the anti-war movement: politics is rarely a matter of pure choices between good and evil. The protesters are afraid of moral imperfection, so they damn anything less than the ideal. And while they wait for that ship to come in, innocent people pay the price; lately in the form of greater exposure to terrorism. Because she is imperfect, the protesters cannot stand the thought of supporting her. But the question is not of America's perfection. She isn't perfect. The real question is this: Is America - or any other nation, for that matter - good enough and tolerant enough to merit defending against her enemies?""The New Cold War" (David Pryce-Jones, National Review, 2001/10/17)
"The moment the new organizing principles emerged, the same Cold War objectors of yesterday appeared as if they had been ready in the wings for a reprise. That too is spooky. Without a hiccup, the professors and students, actresses and clergymen, and all who used to hold that an aggressive United States was responsible for starting and pursuing the Cold War against a peace-loving Soviet Union, have adapted this self-accusation to present circumstances. The Left is again collecting petitions against war, mobilizing demonstrations in major cities, pleading that humanitarian considerations ought to exclude any military measures — never mind the victims of September 11 — and calling for bin Laden to be brought before a court, an Alice-in-Wonderland prospect.""Of course it's a war on Islam" (Faisal Bodi, The Guardian, 2001/10/17)
Bodi argues that the war on terrorism is really a war on Islam and "against liberty" (the liberty to commit massmurder?): "For the rank and file believer, a drawn-out military offensive against terrorist groups and those that harbour them can only mean one thing: the extirpation of Islam as a political threat to the west's exploitation of our countries. With the help of a handful of western states, the US-led coalition is attempting to deal once and for all with those who refuse to yield to the American world order." (See also: "Koran and Country" (BBC News/Panorama, 2001/10/14))"Anti-Americanism Revisited" (Paul Hollander, The Weekly Standard, from the 2001/10/22 issue)
"...I suggest that the suicide attacks were the purest expression of pathological hatred and fanaticism, the most intense and irrational manifestation of anti-Americanism legitimated by religious beliefs and the conviction that modernity, with all the moral uncertainties it creates - embodied by the United States - is the source of evil in the world. Understanding the pathology of murderous hatred does not require a new round of collective self-flagellation and guilty soul-searching. These crimes were committed by individuals who chose their actions freely and with utmost deliberation and under no compulsion other than the prodding of their irrational beliefs. The perverted idealism of the perpetrators no more legitimates their actions than other types of idealistic beliefs justified the mass murders of the past, also undertaken to cleanse the world.""Koran and Country" (BBC News/Panorama, 2001/10/14)
An excellent documentary about sentiments in the Muslim community in Birmingham on the war against terror: "Dr Naseem: We were with them in mourning that tragedy. We are not with them in executing a further tragedy. This is barbarism. This is the route which Hitler took. He justified his action because he believed that he was right and he had a right to cross through different countries because he believed so. This kind of one sided belief was not acceptable to the civilised community then, it should not be acceptable now. We condemn it wholeheartedly. White: And afterwards, the elders, from the Committee of the Mosque agreed that it was reasonable in this case to compare President Bush to Hitler." (Full transcript)"Muslims and the West - The need to speak up" (The Economist, 2001/10/11)
"In other words, the West can live in peace with Islam. What is unclear is whether Islam can live in peace with the West. Many Muslims in many parts of the world flatly say it cannot. The anti-western and specifically anti-American rage that animates the most militant strands of Muslim fundamentalism brooks no compromise. ... It helps Arab governments no doubt to blame that [material] failure on outsiders. Plenty of western intellectuals are happy to agree that the economic plight of North Africa and the Middle East is more to do with American oppression than with its real, domestic, causes. (Causes that do not include Islam, by the way: blame decades of socialism followed by statism, corruption and incompetence.) Yet to think this way—to see the West as an infidel oppressor and capitalist exploiter, rather than as a partner with whom a fruitful friendship is possible - is to rule out all possibility of peaceful coexistence. Arab leaders and their western apologists should reflect on that.""The Sick Mind of Noam Chomsky: Part II Method and Madness" (David Horowitz, FrontPageMagazine 2001/10/10)
As Noam Chomsky's anti-American writings are very influential I think it's important to post Horowitz' examination of them: "The illusion that socialism promises a better future is also the cause of the Chomsky cult. It is the illusion at the heart of the messianic hope that creates the progressive left. This hope is a chimera, but insofar as it is believed, history presents itself in terms that are Manichaean -- as a battle between good and evil. Those who oppose socialism, Marxism, Communism embody worldly evil. They are the party of Satan, and their leader America is the Great Satan himself. Chomsky is, in fact, the imam of this religious worldview on today’s college campuses. His great service to the progressive faith is to deny the history of the last hundred years, which is the history of progressive atrocity and failure. In the 20th century, progressives in power killed one hundred million people in the attempt to realize their impossible dream. As far as Noam Chomsky is concerned, these catastrophes of the left never happened." (See also: "The Sick Mind of Noam Chomsky" (David Horowitz, FrontPageMagazine, 26/9))"Fighting Islam's Ku Klux Klan" (Kanan Makiya, The Observer, 2001/10/07)
"Arabs and Muslims need today to face up to the fact that their resentment at America has long since become unmoored from any rational underpinnings it might once have had; like the anti-Semitism of the interwar years, it is today steeped in deeply embedded conspiratorial patterns of thought rooted in profound ignorance of how a society and a polity like the United States, much less Israel, functions. ... Today, it has become a murderous brew of passions fuelled by paranoia and frustration. ... To argue, as many Arabs and Muslims are doing today (and not a few liberal Western voices), that 'Americans should ask themselves why they are so hated in the world' is to make such a concession; it is to provide a justification, however unwittingly, for this kind of warped mindset.""The Politics of Rage: Why Do They Hate Us?" (Fareed Zakaria, Newsweek, from the 2001/10/15 issue)
"But bin Laden and his followers are not an isolated cult like Aum Shinrikyo or the Branch Davidians or demented loners like Timothy McVeigh and the Unabomber. They come out of a culture that reinforces their hostility, distrust and hatred of the West - and of America in particular. ... The problem is not that Osama bin Laden believes that this is a religious war against America. It’s that millions of people across the Islamic world seem to agree. ... The third, vital component to this battle is a cultural strategy. The United States must help Islam enter the modern world. It sounds like an impossible challenge, and it certainly is not one we would have chosen. But America - indeed the whole world - faces a dire security threat that will not be resolved unless we can stop the political, economic and cultural collapse that lies at the roots of Arab rage.""Elitist contempt for American values" (Walter Williams, TownHall, 2001/10/31)
"College campuses are home to elitists who are out of touch with and have contempt for American values. ... A California Chico State College professor said that President Bush wants to "kill innocent people," "colonize" the Arab world and capture "oil for the Bush family." ... Adam Goldstein, University of Wisconsin-Madison's former campus relations committee chairman, said in a letter to the editor of the Badger Herald that "before you preach at us about the evil terrorists, why don't you try getting your facts straight and face up to the reality that our leaders are war criminals just as much as people like Hitler, Stalin and other monsters of the 20th century." ... As parents, we cough up to $30,000 and sometimes more in tuition money to have our youngsters taught that America is not only a racist, sexist and homophobic nation, but a terrorist nation as well, and an international monster creating world poverty and destroying the planet." (See also: "Al Qaeda's Unwitting Allies" (Young America's Foundation, 2001/10/24) "Rutgers University Professor Barbara Foley wrote that 'whatever its [the terrorist attacks] proximate cause, its ultimate cause is the fascism of U.S. foreign policy over the past many decades.'", "Academic Freedom: A Time for Reform" (John Taylor, Virginia Viewpoint, October 2001) "For the last three decades, parents and taxpayers have paid ever-increasing amounts for the rising generation to be taught that all cultures are of equal merit; that values are merely social constructs; that morality is relative; that reason and truth are nothing more than tools used to perpetuate white male domination; and that America is racist, sexist, homophobic, and not nearly vegetarian enough", "FIRE and the Aftermath of September 11" (FIRE, October 2001) "Across the nation, in response to the atrocities of September 11, 2001, and to the debates and discussions that have occurred in their wake, many college and university administrators are acting to inhibit the free expression of the citizens of a free society.")"Idiocy Watch #8" (The New Republic, 2001/10/29)
The eighth installment of "the dumb and outrageous things being said and written about America and the terrorists", this time focusing on winners of the Nobel Prize: "'Conjuring the spirit of November 9, 1938.' - Gunter Grass (1999 Prize for Literature) describing the Bush administration's rhetoric in the war on terrorism in The Daily Telegraph. [Grass refers to Kristallnacht, the Nazis' notorious anti-Jewish pogrom.]""Noam Chomsky Volunteers to Serve as Domestic Propaganda Chief for Taliban War Machine" (David Horowitz, FrontPageMagazine, 2001/10/29)
Chomsky outdoes himself in the genre of lunatic anti-American conspiracy theories: "Well, let's start with right now. So I'll talk about the situation in Afghanistan. … Looks like what's happening is some kind of silent genocide. It indicates that whatever will happen, we don't know, but plans are being made, and programs implemented on the assumption that they may lead to the deaths of several million people in the next – in the next couple of weeks. [i.e, by October 25]. Very casually, with no comment here [i.e. in the US] .… Well, that's what's happening now. What's happening now is very much under our control.… that we're in the midst of apparently trying to murder three or four million people…" (Noam Chomsky, 2001/10/11) (See also: "The New War Against Terror" (Transcription of "An Evening with Noam Chomsky", zmag.org, 2001/10/18), "The Sick Mind of Noam Chomsky" (David Horowitz, FrontPageMagazine.com, 2001/09/26), "The Sick Mind of Noam Chomsky: Part II Method and Madness" (David Horowitz, FrontPageMagazine 2001/10/10), "On the Bombings" (Noam Chomsky, zmag.org, 2001/09/16))"Islam Can't Escape Blame" (Amir Taheri, The Wall Street Journal, 2001/10/27)
"Anyone familiar with textbooks in most Muslim countries would know the twisted view of the world they propagate and the hatred they promote. Anyone who follows the media in the Muslim world would know that the verbal version of the Sept. 11 attacks is an almost daily fare. Go to the Internet and check the editorials of virtually any Muslim paper on Sept. 10 and see what they were saying about the West in general and the U.S. in particular. Anyone listening to a sermon in virtually any mosque, including many in the West, would be shocked by the vehemence of the anti-Western, especially anti-American, sentiments expressed. ... The Muslim world today is full of bigotry, fanaticism, hypocrisy and plain ignorance - all of which create a breeding ground for criminals like bin Laden. The principal victims of these criminals are Muslims, who are prevented from developing a modern political culture without which they cannot reform their societies and rebuild their economies.""The Sentry's Solitude" (Fouad Ajami, Foreign Affairs, from the November/December 2001 issue)
"There were men in the shadows pulling off spectacular deeds. But they fed off a free-floating anti-Americanism that blows at will and knows no bounds, among Islamists and secularists alike. For the crowds in Karachi, Cairo, and Amman, the great power could never get it right. A world lacking the tools and the political space for free inquiry fell back on anti-Americanism. ... This kind of fury a distant power can never overcome. Policy can never speak to wrath. Step into the thicket (as Bill Clinton did in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict) and the foreign power is damned for its reach. Step back, as George W. Bush did in the first months of his presidency, and Pax Americana is charged with abdication and indifference.""'Brutality smeared in peanut butter'" (Arundhati Roy, The Guardian, 2001/10/23)
Arundhati Roy seems to be sort of a female Noam Chomsky, combining moral equivalence and anti-Americanism with an inverted view of modern history: "The International Coalition Against Terror is a largely [sic] cabal of the richest countries in the world. Between them, they manufacture and sell almost all of the world's weapons, they possess the largest stockpile of weapons of mass destruction - chemical, biological and nuclear. They have fought the most wars, account for most of the genocide, subjection, ethnic cleansing and human rights violations in modern history, and have sponsored, armed and financed untold numbers of dictators and despots. Between them, they have worshipped, almost deified, the cult of violence and war. For all its appalling sins, the Taliban just isn't in the same league." (See also: "The algebra of infinite justice" (Arundhati Roy, The Guardian, 2001/09/29))"When America-haters become Americans" (Martin Peretz, Jewish World Review, 2001/10/23)
"The governments of the Arab world have been surprisingly effective and unsurprisingly brutal in their attacks on their religious zealots, and that has forced many of the people who deeply hate America to flee here for survival. ... Ours is not a country with which they identify or whose values they share. The American flag has been a flag of convenience for them, the flag of a patsy country that lets them in without scrutiny, lets them work, go to school, organize, harangue, hate, and, then, foolishly tries to fit them into some fanciful mosaic of gorgeous diversity. ... Scrupulous observers estimate that there are as many as 5,000 actual or potential terror operatives in Britain today, and probably more in Germany. It's anybody's guess how many reside in the United States. ... The grim truth is that we will have great trouble combating the war that the terrorist international has now brought to our shores. ... The struggle at home will be as difficult as the struggle in the mountains of Afghanistan. And no less important.""We will not be silenced" (George Galloway, The Guardian, 2001/10/20)
The Labour MP speaks out against the "new imperialism" with some highly selective examples: "So what are the "allies" bombing? The four UN mine-clearing staff, the shepherds and their families in the village of Khorum, the Red Cross compound in Kabul, the residents of Kandahar, the trucks full of terrified refugees. More of these human and public relations disasters will conspire to "bury" the government's message. An already restless audience here, never mind among the 1.3bn Muslims nursing their wrath, will not sit through this unequal fight with equanimity. And without a change of policy, the winter snows will soon begin to tilt this disaster into an international catastrophe.""It is a clash of civilizations" (Robert S. Wistrich, The Jerusalem Post, 2001/10/19)
"The fact is that America and Israel have long been twinned as the "Great" and the "Little" Satan by a resurgent Islam. Since the Islamic Revolution in Iran of 1979 (a pivotal event in 20th century history), both have been demonized and targeted as the source of all evil in the world and the greatest single danger to the Muslim umma (nation). ... Like most of the Western establishment, many Jews (and even some Israelis) are equally reluctant to grasp how profoundly anti-Semitic the Muslim radicals - and indeed the bulk of the Muslim world (by no means only the Arabs) - have become as a result of more than two decades of relentless intoxication by their medias, by their own intellectuals and religious as well as political leaderships." (UPDATE: The original link is down, but the article can be found here, via the Wayback Machine.)"Campus protesters ignite U.S. flags" (Patrick Johnson, The Union News, 2001/10/19)
Anti-American quote of the day. In fact, this one will be hard to beat: "Amherst College students were stunned moments after a pro-America rally involving more than 100 people ended yesterday when several protesters emerged from the crowd to set fire to a U.S. flag. ... Most of those protesting the flag declined to be interviewed. One who did, 19-year-old Dan Griffin of Minneapolis, Minn., said the protest sought to show that the United States is responsible for much of the pain and suffering in the world. The United States has helped continue a spree of genocide that dates back to Columbus in 1492, he said.""Questions for the Anti-War Crowd, Part II - What if someone took them seriously?" (Michael Long, Jewish World Review, 2001/10/19)
"Here's a flash for the anti-war movement: politics is rarely a matter of pure choices between good and evil. The protesters are afraid of moral imperfection, so they damn anything less than the ideal. And while they wait for that ship to come in, innocent people pay the price; lately in the form of greater exposure to terrorism. Because she is imperfect, the protesters cannot stand the thought of supporting her. But the question is not of America's perfection. She isn't perfect. The real question is this: Is America - or any other nation, for that matter - good enough and tolerant enough to merit defending against her enemies?""The New Cold War" (David Pryce-Jones, National Review, 2001/10/17)
"The moment the new organizing principles emerged, the same Cold War objectors of yesterday appeared as if they had been ready in the wings for a reprise. That too is spooky. Without a hiccup, the professors and students, actresses and clergymen, and all who used to hold that an aggressive United States was responsible for starting and pursuing the Cold War against a peace-loving Soviet Union, have adapted this self-accusation to present circumstances. The Left is again collecting petitions against war, mobilizing demonstrations in major cities, pleading that humanitarian considerations ought to exclude any military measures - never mind the victims of September 11 - and calling for bin Laden to be brought before a court, an Alice-in-Wonderland prospect.""Of course it's a war on Islam" (Faisal Bodi, The Guardian, 2001/10/17)
Bodi argues that the war on terrorism is really a war on Islam and "against liberty" (the liberty to commit massmurder?): "For the rank and file believer, a drawn-out military offensive against terrorist groups and those that harbour them can only mean one thing: the extirpation of Islam as a political threat to the west's exploitation of our countries. With the help of a handful of western states, the US-led coalition is attempting to deal once and for all with those who refuse to yield to the American world order." (See also: "Koran and Country" (BBC News/Panorama, 2001/10/14))"Anti-Americanism Revisited" (Paul Hollander, The Weekly Standard, from the 2001/10/22 issue)
"...I suggest that the suicide attacks were the purest expression of pathological hatred and fanaticism, the most intense and irrational manifestation of anti-Americanism legitimated by religious beliefs and the conviction that modernity, with all the moral uncertainties it creates--embodied by the United States--is the source of evil in the world. Understanding the pathology of murderous hatred does not require a new round of collective self-flagellation and guilty soul-searching. These crimes were committed by individuals who chose their actions freely and with utmost deliberation and under no compulsion other than the prodding of their irrational beliefs. The perverted idealism of the perpetrators no more legitimates their actions than other types of idealistic beliefs justified the mass murders of the past, also undertaken to cleanse the world.""Koran and Country" (BBC News/Panorama, 2001/10/14)
An excellent documentary about sentiments in the Muslim community in Birmingham on the war against terror: "Dr Naseem: We were with them in mourning that tragedy. We are not with them in executing a further tragedy. This is barbarism. This is the route which Hitler took. He justified his action because he believed that he was right and he had a right to cross through different countries because he believed so. This kind of one sided belief was not acceptable to the civilised community then, it should not be acceptable now. We condemn it wholeheartedly. White: And afterwards, the elders, from the Committee of the Mosque agreed that it was reasonable in this case to compare President Bush to Hitler." (Full transcript)"Muslims and the West - The need to speak up" (The Economist, 2001/10/11)
"In other words, the West can live in peace with Islam. What is unclear is whether Islam can live in peace with the West. Many Muslims in many parts of the world flatly say it cannot. The anti-western and specifically anti-American rage that animates the most militant strands of Muslim fundamentalism brooks no compromise. ... It helps Arab governments no doubt to blame that [material] failure on outsiders. Plenty of western intellectuals are happy to agree that the economic plight of North Africa and the Middle East is more to do with American oppression than with its real, domestic, causes. (Causes that do not include Islam, by the way: blame decades of socialism followed by statism, corruption and incompetence.) Yet to think this way—to see the West as an infidel oppressor and capitalist exploiter, rather than as a partner with whom a fruitful friendship is possible - is to rule out all possibility of peaceful coexistence. Arab leaders and their western apologists should reflect on that.""The Sick Mind of Noam Chomsky: Part II Method and Madness" (David Horowitz, FrontPageMagazine 2001/10/10)
As Noam Chomsky's anti-American writings are very influential I think it's important to post Horowitz' examination of them: "The illusion that socialism promises a better future is also the cause of the Chomsky cult. It is the illusion at the heart of the messianic hope that creates the progressive left. This hope is a chimera, but insofar as it is believed, history presents itself in terms that are Manichaean -- as a battle between good and evil. Those who oppose socialism, Marxism, Communism embody worldly evil. They are the party of Satan, and their leader America is the Great Satan himself. Chomsky is, in fact, the imam of this religious worldview on today’s college campuses. His great service to the progressive faith is to deny the history of the last hundred years, which is the history of progressive atrocity and failure. In the 20th century, progressives in power killed one hundred million people in the attempt to realize their impossible dream. As far as Noam Chomsky is concerned, these catastrophes of the left never happened." (See also: "The Sick Mind of Noam Chomsky" (David Horowitz, FrontPageMagazine, 26/9))"Fighting Islam's Ku Klux Klan" (Kanan Makiya, The Observer, 2001/10/07)
"Arabs and Muslims need today to face up to the fact that their resentment at America has long since become unmoored from any rational underpinnings it might once have had; like the anti-Semitism of the interwar years, it is today steeped in deeply embedded conspiratorial patterns of thought rooted in profound ignorance of how a society and a polity like the United States, much less Israel, functions. ... Today, it has become a murderous brew of passions fuelled by paranoia and frustration. ... To argue, as many Arabs and Muslims are doing today (and not a few liberal Western voices), that 'Americans should ask themselves why they are so hated in the world' is to make such a concession; it is to provide a justification, however unwittingly, for this kind of warped mindset.""The Politics of Rage: Why Do They Hate Us?" (Fareed Zakaria, Newsweek, from the 2001/10/15 issue)
"But bin Laden and his followers are not an isolated cult like Aum Shinrikyo or the Branch Davidians or demented loners like Timothy McVeigh and the Unabomber. They come out of a culture that reinforces their hostility, distrust and hatred of the West - and of America in particular. ... The problem is not that Osama bin Laden believes that this is a religious war against America. It’s that millions of people across the Islamic world seem to agree. ... The third, vital component to this battle is a cultural strategy. The United States must help Islam enter the modern world. It sounds like an impossible challenge, and it certainly is not one we would have chosen. But America - indeed the whole world - faces a dire security threat that will not be resolved unless we can stop the political, economic and cultural collapse that lies at the roots of Arab rage.""People who hate people" (Mark Steyn, The Spectator, 2001/10/06)
"Why do some people look at a smoking ruin and see the lives lost - the secretary standing by the photocopier - and others see only confirmation of their thesis on Kyoto? ... ...in bringing war to the East Coast for the first time in two centuries the terrorists have also brought the fellow travellers home. It was easy to slough off the dead in the gulags, far away and out of sight. But could they do the same if the dead were right here on this continent, and not in some obscure cornpone hicksville but in the heart of our biggest cities? Yes, they could, and so easily. ... The President gets teary in the Oval Office, the Queen chokes up at St Paul’s, David Letterman and Dan Rather sob on CBS, New Yorkers weep openly for their slain firemen, but the dead-eyed zombies of the peace movement who claim to love everyone parade through the streets unmoved, a breed apart.""Towers of Intellect" (James Bowman, The Wall Street Journal, 2001/10/05)
"Thus, taking their comforts and the freedoms that produced them for granted, the professors can write airily of the 'cycle of violence' - or, as Prof. Zinn puts it, 'a hundred years of retaliation, vengeance, war, a hundred years of terrorism and counterterrorism, of violence met with violence, in an unending cycle of stupidity.' Talk about a cycle of stupidity! Does a policeman who has to subdue a violent criminal by force become guilty of the same crime? Is he perpetuating 'the cycle of violence'?""Idiocy Watch" (The New Republic, 2001/10/05)
Another installment of "the dumbest, most outrageous comments made about the terrorist attacks on America and our response": "'But the people, the American nation that Bush is invoking, is a people which is bloodthirsty, vengeful and calling for blood. They don't care whose blood it is, they want blood.... There will be no emancipation for women anywhere on this planet until the Western domination of this planet is ended.' - Sunera Thobani, professor at the University of British Columbia, speaking at a feminist conference in Ottawa, October 1.""Kumbaya Watch: Feminists for the Taliban" (Ross Douthat, National Review, 2001/10/05)
"So, to sum up, Professor Thobani believes that the U.S., not the Taliban, practices "patriarchal racist violence." (Apparently, stoning people for adultery doesn't make the cut.) She believes that the U.S., not the Taliban, wants to "slaughter people into submission." She believes that the U.S., not the Taliban, represents the "forces of darkness, uncivilized, intent on destroying civilization, intent on destroying democracy." And she believes that her fellow feminists, champions of women's rights all, ought to ally themselves with the Taliban, and not the U.S.""Their Amerika - The song of the 'counter-tribalists.'" (John O'Sullivan, National Review, from the 2001/10/15 issue)
"'Who is responsible for the attack on the World Trade Center?' I was asked on Counterspin, Canada's version of Crossfire. 'The men who hijacked the planes and flew them into the buildings, and those who financed and assisted them,' I replied. It was the wrong answer. Another guest swiftly explained that though the terrorists were indeed partly to blame, we must understand that they were themselves responding to deeper causes - the general poverty and hopelessness of Afghanistan and many other Muslim countries, of course, but also America's interventions in Afghanistan and the Persian Gulf.""Liberal nonsense has no place in the war on terror" (Janet Daley, The Daily Telegraph, 2001/10/03)
"Some of the utterances of the past weeks have been so startlingly stupid that only the erudite could entertain them. One species of this irrationality has been a variation on the great liberal refrain, "We are all guilty". If anyone, for whatever criminal or maniacal reason, commits an outrage - whether it is the brutal mugging of an old woman or a suicidal terrorist attack - it must be somehow the fault of the most privileged class or the wealthiest nations. The perpetrator, however individually self-determining (or rich, in the case of Osama bin Laden) he may be, is simply a helpless victim of the dominant culture that we control.""Idiocy Watch" (The New Republic, 2001/10/02)
The first installment of "the dumbest and most outrageous comments made about America’s war on terrorism": "'America, America. What did you do - either intentionally or unintentionally - in the world order, in Central America, in Africa where bombs are still blasting? America, what did you do in the global warming conference when you did not embrace the smaller nations? America, what did you do two weeks ago when I stood at the world conference on racism, when you wouldn't show up? Oh, America, what did you do'--Former San Francisco Supervisor Amos Brown, speaking at a memorial service for the victims on September 17.""Preemptive Peace" (Chris Mooney, Tab Online, 2001/10/02)
"But then, we shouldn't expect much charity toward the president from protesters capable of airing slogans like "The Real Terrorist Works in the White House." I consider George W. Bush a dim bulb, even an impostor - and certainly oppose many aspects of his foreign policy - but calling him a terrorist is a truly vile form of moral equivalency. Yet it frequently fit the tone of the protests, where I watched some organizers label those who disagreed with them undercover government agents, and one 21-year-old told me, in his pacifism, that we shouldn't have fought Hitler.""Not Ready for Prime Time: Peaceniks" (James P. Pinkerton, Los Angeles Times, 2001/10/02)
"Others were more serious, such as Karly Whittaker, 25, a University of Iowa student. I asked her the same question: What changed on Sept. 11? 'It brought home to me the fragility of our situation,' she answered. And so what to do? 'Let's not fight the wrong war. Let's get to the root causes. Let's evaluate sanctions on Iraq, our support for Israel and for military dictatorships around the world.' Another 25-year-old, Chris Shephard, a schoolteacher in Tampa, sounded similar themes: 'We can't turn tragedy into war.' We must also, he said, 'directly address the crimes of the U.S.' He was sorry about the 6,000 people killed in New York City, but wanted to talk more about the '1 million Iraqis killed by sanctions.'""Fighting the Forces of Invisibility" (Salman Rushdie, The Washington Post, 2001/10/02)
"A country which has just suffered the most devastating terrorist attack in history, a country in a state of deep mourning and horrible grief, is being told, heartlessly, that it is to blame for its own citizens' deaths. ... Let's be clear about why this bien-pensant anti-American onslaught is such appalling rubbish. Terrorism is the murder of the innocent; this time, it was mass murder. To excuse such an atrocity by blaming U.S. government policies is to deny the basic idea of all morality: that individuals are responsible for their actions.""The Best and the Brightest" (The Wall Street Journal, 2001/10/02)
"At a recent University of North Carolina 'teach-in,' one lecturer told students that if he were President, he would first apologize to 'the widows and orphans, the tortured and the impoverished and all the millions of other victims of American imperialism.' Over at Yale, Professor Paul Kennedy asked the audience to understand the reasons people had for their hatred of America--notably our military and economic power, our culture, and more. University of Texas Professor Robert Jensen wrote that the attack 'was no more despicable than the massive acts of terrorism . . . that the U.S. government has committed during my lifetime.'""An Arab Moment of Truth - Which way the Islamist fantasy?" (David Pryce-Jones, National Review, from the 2001/10/15 issue)
"A fantasy is loose in the world, the fantasy of an Islamic supremacy destined deservedly to triumph everywhere. Like Communism before it, this Islamic fantasy aims to impose its vision on others - and call it peace. ... The Left blamed the United States for the Cold War and the division of Europe, and for unrest in the Middle East, Africa, and elsewhere. Whatever happened, the Soviet Union was innocent and peace-loving. This same Left - in the Sontags and Pinters, these same people - follows an unbroken line in its attitude towards extremists in the Arab and Muslim world. Happy to leave millions at the mercy of Communism, they are happy to leave millions at the mercy of Islamist terror, so lining themselves up as ever on the side of oppression and lies.""Grand Illusion" (Richard Brody, The New Yorker, 2001/10/01)
A report from France about anti-American sentiments: "An academic at the prestigious National Center for Scientific Research, in Paris, Marie-José Mondzain, wrote a piece for Le Monde called 'I Don't Feel American.' 'As in any murder screenplay,' she wrote, 'the investigator asks: who profits from the crime? The Palestinians? Of course not. The Afghans? ... The poor? The oppressed? Of course not. ... Those who come out more arrogant and stronger than ever are Bush, Putin, and Sharon. What a success!'""Blame America First" (Ramesh Ponnuru, National Review, from the 2001/10/15 issue)
"America is guilty. America is always guilty. Even when it's attacked. So it appears, at least, to a certain type of commentator. When the Towers fell, when the Pentagon was pierced, when thousands of our countrymen were slaughtered - the America Last pundits were there to explain how we had brought these calamities on ourselves. ... What has drawn the most fire, of course, is America's alliance with Israel. Critics of that alliance, on both the left and the right, have argued that but for it we would never have been attacked. ... Yet the fundamental problem in the Mideast is not the existence of the Israeli state. It is the despotism of the Arab states.""Campus hand-wringing is not a pretty site" (John Leo, Town Hall, 2001/10/01)
"The campus flight from reality takes many exotic forms. One is the notion that the terrorists did not really mean to attack America. 'Students in my classes see this as an assault on international trade, globalization,' said the dean of Columbia University's international affairs school. ... A speaker at a University of North Carolina teach-in called for an apology to 'the tortured and the impoverished and all the millions of other victims of American imperialism.' Georgetown is holding a debate titled 'Resolved: America's Policies and Past Actions Invited the Recent Attacks.'"
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"When
people accept futility and the absurd as normal, the culture is decadent.
The term is not a slur; it is a technical label."
Articles
of the week
"Losing the Enlightenment" (Victor Davis Hanson, OpinionJournal, 2006/11/29)
"Allah’s England?" (Daniel Johnson, Commentary. November 2006)
"'Sex in the Park': The latest doings of the Danish imams" (Henrik Bering, The Weekly Standard, 2006/11/18)
"Narcissism on Stilts" (Harold Evans, New York Sun, 2006/11/16)
"Terrorists are recruiting in our schools, says MI5 boss" (Philip Johnston, The Daily Telegraph, 2006/11/10)
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From the archives
Oriana Fallaci, R.I.P.