Informed Comment Homepage

Thoughts on the Middle East, History and Religion

Header Right

Donate

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Google+
  • Email
  • RSS
  • Featured
  • US politics
  • Middle East
  • Environment
  • US Foreign Policy
  • Energy
  • Economy
  • Politics
  • About
  • Archives
  • Submissions

© 2023 Informed Comment

  • Skip to content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
Uncategorized

Radical Militants On Planet Al Qaeda

Juan Cole 12/25/2004

Tweet
Share
Reddit
Email
0 Shares

Radical Militants on Planet al-Qaeda Wanted Bush to Win US Election

Georges Malbrunot, one of two French journalists recently released by radical Muslim fundamentalists in Iraq, spoke to CNN on Friday:

Malbrunot quoted his captors as saying Bush’s re-election “would improve our ability to fight . . . We vote for Bush because Bush help us a lot by intervening in Afghanistan. So, from that point we could spread all over the world and we are now in 60 countries,” Malbrunot cited one of the militants as saying on October 15, two weeks before Bush defeated Democrat John Kerry. Malbrunot, 41, quoted the same militant as saying: “Our main targets are Saudi Arabia and Egypt. And because of Bush, if he is re-elected, we are sure that American soldiers will remain in Iraq for years.”

Malbrunot said that the group that held him was not Iraqi nationalists but rather internationalist jihadis and that he felt as though he were on Planet Bin Laden while in captivity.

Actually, that the radical Muslim fundamentalists much preferred that Bush win was self-evident, since Bin Laden and his fellow travellers want to sharpen contradictions between the Muslim world and the West. It is in that extreme polarization that they know they will find the best chance to pose as champions of Islam and ultimately to take over. They know very well that Bush has decided to make a long-term US push into the Muslim world, involving probably several wars and more occupations. If Bush had stopped with Afghanistan and rebuilt the country properly, he could have dealt a death blow to al-Qaeda. By occupying Iraq militarily, he has given al-Qaeda unprecedented access to the Sunni Arabs (and some Kurds and Turkmen) of Iraq. They hope to use this new base not only to roil Iraq but ultimately to throw Saudi Arabia into turmoil, as well. It is not that far from Mosul to Jidda, where al-Qaeda recently attacked the US consulate in revenge for the assault on Fallujah. Three years ago, an al-Qaeda attack on a US consulate in Saudi Arabia would have horrified most Saudis. Now? I’m not so sure.

Filed Under: Uncategorized

About the Author

Juan Cole is the founder and chief editor of Informed Comment. He is Richard P. Mitchell Professor of History at the University of Michigan He is author of, among many other books, Muhammad: Prophet of Peace amid the Clash of Empires and The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. Follow him on Twitter at @jricole or the Informed Comment Facebook Page

Primary Sidebar

STAY INFORMED

Join our newsletter and have sharp analysis delivered to your inbox every day.

Twitter

Follow Juan Cole @jricole or Informed Comment @infcomment on Twitter

Facebook



Sign up for our newsletter

Informed Comment © 2023 All Rights Reserved

Posting....