Froma Harrop: Islamic Terror's Endless "Root Causes"

[ColonelTom]

This piece of idiocy appeared in the Richmond (Ky.) Register today as its featured commentary:

Froma Harrop: Islamic Terror's Endless "Root Causes"

* * *

Since that gruesome blue-sky day, Islamic radicals have staged more attacks and have been foiled in others. But try to find a connecting theme, other than psychosis. There's only a pile of shifting motives.

Denmark just arrested nine Muslim men preparing explosives for some new outrage. Why, no one knows for sure. Could be the Danish cartoons of Muhammad. Could be because Denmark has troops in Iraq. Could be something else.

When German authorities caught two Lebanese men planting bombs on trains, they assumed the motive was the war in Lebanon. Turns out it was the cartoons. The suspects did tack Lebanon onto their grievance list, but actually, the attack had been planned before the war began.

* * * (numerous other examples of "shifting motives")

Given this Wal-Martian selection of motives, one must smile at the five-years-after editorial in The Economist, which states the number of jihadis has multiplied since Sept. 11, "partly as a result of the way America responded." By that, the British magazine means the war in Iraq.

We can agree that the war was based on trumped-up evidence, that it was poorly planned and that it is going badly. But Islamic terrorists are attacking people on nearly every continent -- many who have little or nothing to do with U.S. foreign policy. Multicultural, huggy-bear, we're-not-in-Iraq Canada has uncovered a plot by 17 Muslims to invade its Parliament and chop off the prime minister's head.

Perhaps terrorists see countries that make sensitive analyses of their complaints as easy marks. If so, then the eagerness to prettify mass murder with "root causes" could itself be a root cause.

Nice logic - if there's not a single clear motive, it must simply be general "psychosis." In other words, it wouldn't matter what we're doing in the world - "they" are simply "evil" (or "psychotic") and would attack us regardless of what we do. The inevitable implied conclusion - they're crazy psychos, so let's kill 'em all. Lovely.

[orwell]

1. You would be surprised...

...at how many people believe this, more than a few who post right here.

The last thing anyone wants to look at is their own actions, which are the only actions they can truly control.

If I smash you in the face repeatedly and you finally pull out a knife and stab me, am I justified in calling you a knife wielding psycho?

Of course, they hate us for our freedoms, the knife wielding psychos...

[sam sarrha]

2. you need to understand that Islam is not interested in logic..pure dogma

there was never an 'Age of Reason' in islam.. they dont need it and dont use it.

westerners keep trying to project our logical nature to Islam, it is like comparing dates to oranges..never the twain shall meet. there's is a religion of faith, reason is needless mentalizing..

i am sure there are some scholars and intellectuals, but in tribal village life.. what you know is dictated by the religious leaders and it is not healthy to mentalize about it.

[sam sarrha]

3. maybe they are not simply psychotic. maybe it is 'us' that's psychotic, at

least in their eyes..

[bhikkhu]

4. more ramping up the fear for November...

are Islamic terrorists really attacking people on every continent? The mosques in my region are as mild mannered and frankly dull as the catholic churches. Based upon probabilities, how much more appropriate would it be to fear being struck by lightning?

[Igel]

5. I read this a day or two ago.

RCP linked to it; I read on both sides of the aisle, and on various sides of various oceans. Always have.

"Psychosis" is the wrong word. But much of the article seemed "pointful": The reasons listed for justifying the hatred Islamists have for us varies. For a given act, the excuses vary. It depends on the audience. They've mastered the art of PR, and tell us what they think will work.

But all the excuses, all the reasons, all the justifications, boil down to one or two principles. No psychosis need be posited; the motives for the hate (I'd call it contempt) are easily understandable, and the impetus to action is well grounded. But Harrop, IIRC, doesn't do any better than touching upon it. And I'm not even sure Harrop does that. Harrop can't see across the cultural boundaries. But at least she sees that the shifting excuses aren't the actual reason: they're only sufficient in conjunction with something else, however much people want them to be sufficient by themselves.

As for 9/11, with many reasons adduced by many sources, it seems one motivation was the killing of Muslims in Bosnia. Westerners did the killing, and the view is that other Westerners could have stopped it earlier, had they wanted to; but they preferred to see Muslims killed and humiliated, and by implication Islam dishonored. Not a reason that's widely talked about outside of Islamist circles, however.