An extended, clearheaded excerpt from this week’s Plaintext (not on the web site yet), from Mike Antonucci:
So much ink has been spilled about Western efforts to understand why Islamic extremists might feel and act the way they do, but no one yet has suggested ignorance. America is an open society, with a free press, freedom of speech, and more information about everything than one person can reasonably assimilate. Most of the Middle East is a closed society, with controlled press and institutions, and extraordinarily limited information, particularly about America.
Read the words of Mahfouz Walad Al-Walid, an Al Qaeda leader who was interviewed this month by Al Jazeera television. “In our opinion, America has entered the phase of the beginning of the end,” he said. “America is talking about wanting to uproot terrorism in Afghanistan, but the truth is that those in Afghanistan have succeeded in uprooting America from its fortresses and bases and have dragged it, humiliated and shame-faced, to Afghanistan, where their hands, bayonets, and weapons can reach her.”
Another Al Qaeda member, Abu-Al-Hasan Al-Masri, also challenged America on Al Jazeera. “If you are true men, come down here and face us,” he said. The legless sheik on the bin Laden tape said: “Thank Allah America came out of its caves.” He also interprets the news reports from America on September 11 this way: “They were terrified, thinking there was a coup.”
These are guys who are dramatically misinformed about America. And no wonder. Much of their conversation revolves around ex post facto dream interpretation, as if they had just gotten off the phone with Miss Cleo (say, that turban looks familiar…)