Whether we wish to acknowledge it or not, jihadism is attractive to tens of millions of people in what is called the Muslim world. Out of a total population of about 1.3 billion, that may not be a very high percentage (although I daresay it is higher than we like to think). But it is the ideology that attracts recruits. Grievances are just rhetoric. If the bin Ladens did not have Iraq, or the Palestinians, or Lebanon, or Pope Benedict, or cartoons, or flushed Korans, or Dutch movies, or the Crusades, they’d figure out something else to beat the drums over. Or they’d make something up — there being lots of license to improvise when one purports to be executing Allah’s will.
It is bad enough when the Muslim charlatans opportunistically use American policies they don’t like for militant propaganda purposes. It is reprehensible when American politicians do it.
Jihadists hate us because they hate us, not because of Iraq.
If you actually read the report, you see that there is nothing definitive about their conclusions--despite what the New York Times says (no surprise there). After reading this, I'm a little worried about our intelligence service. Is this the best we can expect? I agree with John Hinderacker and Glenn Reynolds: we should fire the leakers and the people that drafted the report, which is "a meaningless document full of empty bureaucratic twaddle." Indeed, generalities abound. One of Prof. Reynolds's readers provides an apt analogy:
You're on target in your scorn for the NIE assessment as released in nonclassified form. It sure contains a lot of "coulds," "likelies," and "mights." As for what the US government is supposed to do, it reminds me of those sportcasters who, whenever someone misses a pass, says, "You've got to catch those." Uh, yeah.
Go here for a roundup of reactions. The New York Times has once again reported a leak to an absurd level of distortion.
UPDATE: Sioux Falls blogger Jay Reding has more thoughts here and here. Ed Morrissey also has some observations worth reading.
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