# Saudi Jawa Said: May:02:2011 - 14:13 ...Americans are (understandably) celebrating, but the effect on Saudis (and Muslims in general) is curious indeed. Most Saudi and Muslims Ive talked to seemed kind of shell shocked at the moment. While most of them did not agree with his acts, OBL had become a symbol of the Anti-American Muslim. Its an often used tactic when debating how powerful the US is by saying: They cant even find OBL!. I wouldnt be surprised to see Che Guivara style postmortem worship cults to arise. Expect to see conspiracy theories breed like rabbits.
# Solomon2 Said: May:02:2011 - 14:31 So for most Saudis and Muslims OBL represented a never-dying ambition for domination over all others? A goal they feel is suppressed only by the power of non-Muslim nations? And thus these Muslims feel shocked and depressed by the demise of this symbol of their hope, whose tactics they disagreed with but whose publicly-declared goals they shared?
Having lived in Saudi Arabia and being in touch with a many people there, let me give you another unadulterated view point.
Sheikh Bin Baaz, one of the most influential clerics in the much maligned Wahabbi establishment had given fatwa against bin Laden back in the late 1990s and reiterated it in the 2000s for his ideas.
Lets crystalize the dichotomy to make it simple for people to understand here.
First: Al Qaeda's and OBL ACTIONS are abhorrent to muslims. The two main tactics of killing civilians muslims or non muslims and using suicide bombings to target muslims or non-muslims have been condemned and fatwas passed declaring it Haram. Infact, suicide bombing was declared haram by bin Baaz back in the 80s when this tactic was first used against the Israelis. So no non-muslim/muslim diffrentiation there.
Secondly, the other side OBL and Al Qaeda were able to EXPLOIT LEGITIMATE griveances of mainly Arabs but muslim in general as well.
I don't want to go into an extensive essay on this, but mainly US dispropotional support to Israel in the Israeli-Palestinan issue, support of dictatorships in the middle east for its own interests or subverting regimes that are not liked by the US(for example the overthrow of democratically elected Mosaddeq of Iran in 1954 by the CIA) and the main reason for the explosion of Al Qaeda recruitment - The Iraq invasion on false premise and the HR abuses that followed.
So no its not about dominating the whole world with a world wide caliphate. Its an anti-colonial feeling mainly in the Arab world, but also now in Pakistan to be masters of their own desitiny without the US remote controlling them. I think that sentiment is not very hard to understand given the anti-american sentiment in other areas were the US has acted the same way like Latin America for example.
Fareed Zakaria did an article a week after 9/11 on "Why they hate us?" in NewsWeek that I recommend everyone to read. Multiple times if needed to understand its theme.
The Politics Of Rage: Why Do They Hate Us? - Newsweek
Again to be clear, no muslim who follows his faith or has read the Quran can justify killing theologically the killing of civilians (non-muslims included) or suicide bombings. These are explicitly declared forbidden in the Quran. Even for an armed Jihad - the Quran explicity states these rules akin to Just war theory where civilians, religious places, priets and monks including livestock or farms should not be harmed.
This is why you have the disbelief that how could a muslim, particularly those claiming to be "devout" like OBL ever do such a thing like doing 9/11.
The dichotomy is because he was sucessfully able to exploit the legitimate griveances against the US. He would never claimed directly that he did this ofcourse and in a way it was true - it was his minions who did the dirty work. But it allowed him to channel the popular sentiment which was not expressed by Arab leaders because none of them were democratically elected and depended more on the US than on their people.
With the Arab Spring, Al Qaeda TACTICS have failed to enthuse them. They know its a failed strategy on top of being antithetical to Islam and the Quran. Now, with the emergence of flegling imperfect democracies, the seeds have been put for the griveances to be addressed. The lack of democracies is eventually something that HAS to be addressed by the Arabs themselves and not the US. Egyptians were surprised when the US agreed/forced Mubarak out because they could'nt believe that the US would not back Mubarak to crackdown on them as he had done in the past by raising the "Islamic militants" bogey.
The PA-Hamas deal and if possible the creation of the Palestinian state will go further to resolve this. Al Qaeda killed eight times more muslims than non-muslims and the real defeat it got is not the assasination of OBL but the rejection of its ways by the muslim community in general and Arabs in particular.Ofcourse, the crimes comitted in Iraq about the falsehoods that were used to manufacture the war would probably never see justice but we can only expect so much.
In the case of Pakistan again, its the deep rooted issue of unelected leaders - mainly the army/ISI and also the civilian - who depend on the US - making a joke out of Pakistan's soverignity. The anger is directed to the leadership in Pakistan but also to the US by extension for "controlling" Pakistan. But the other things mentioned for Arab states also are valid for Pakistan too.
Imran Khan himself seems to have been comprimised by intelligence agencies as well with his hobnobbing with suspcious characters and unfortunately this will again lead to the disenfranchisement feeling even if he does come to power if he is going to be remote controlled by the PA/ISI like Zardari and Gilani are now. His rhetoric again is distracting people from the real issue and focussing on Zardari and Geelani and the US when what he should be is looking at the root cause of the disenfranchisement and the lack of strenght of elected officials.
