US, Israeli, attacts on same day boost Muslims' veiw of war against Islam

http://www.philly.com/mld/inquirer/8707579.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp

Posted on Thu, May. 20, 2004

Israeli and U.S. attacks on the same day only boost Muslims' view of a war against Islam.
By Warren P. Strobel and Jonathan S. Landay
Inquirer Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON - In a single, awful day in the Middle East yesterday, Israeli forces killed unarmed Palestinian protesters and Arab news reports said that a U.S. Army helicopter killed more than 40 people at a wedding party in Iraq. Other than the calendar, there was no connection between the two events, and the facts of the second one are very much in dispute. U.S. officials acknowledge that about 40 people died near Iraq's border with Syria but said American forces had attacked suspected foreign fighters, not a wedding party.

In much of the Islamic world, however, three facts may help transform two incidents into the "clash of civilizations" so desired by Osama bin Laden and other Islamic terrorists: Christian or Jewish troops killed Arabs, they used American-made weapons, and the attacks were reported on television. As a result, many ordinary Arabs are likely to see the events in Gaza and Iraq as one, helping fuel perceptions that Islam is under attack from the West, Middle East experts said.

The United States took the rare step yesterday of not vetoing a U.N. Security Council resolution condemning Israel's tactics in Gaza, and President Bush has said repeatedly that the "global war on terrorism" is not a war against Muslims. Nevertheless, the failure of the U.S. occupation to bring stability to Iraq, the Iraq prison-abuse scandal, and Bush's past support for Israel's tactics against Palestinians have led many Arabs to question that.

"The way we are going is leading us toward the very thing we say we want to be against, which is clash of civilizations," said Edward Walker, a former U.S. ambassador to Israel and Egypt and now president of the Washington-based Middle East Institute.

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Have to say that while the bulk of Americans couldn't care less - there are elements within this administration who want exactly that.....

The drug war just wasn't cutting it, so the Islamic
Fundies are being drafted. Unlike Russia, the Islamic
fundies seem willing to be our "enemy"; however it is not
at all clear if they really fill the requirement, as
there is no chance of them ever fielding a conventional
military capability. Still, they are the best available
these days, nobody else is stupid or annoyed enough to
be willing to fight with us.