A Tale for two Tunisia:Adla Massoud and Anne Applebaum Offer Opposing Views For The Future of the Arab Nation

Byline Blog / January 19 2011:

This past week all eyes turned towards the north-African nation of Tunisia as the country erupted in violent riots that culminated in the ousting of president Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, Tunisia’s leader for over 23 years.

In the wake of Ben Ali’s departure, numerous voices from around the world have offered their commentary on the future of Tunisia. Yet the majority of those voices have been male. This past week, two women published columns that stood apart from the crowd: Adla Massoud in the Huffington Post, and Anne Applebaum of the Washington Post.

Massoud, a Lebanese/British journalist, published a column in the Huffington Post titled The Awakening of the Arab World, arguing that the riots in Tunisia are an indication that the educated youth of Arab nations have reached a “boiling point.”

According to Massoud, the social and political circumstances across the Arab world make the region ripe for revolution. Arab nations currently hold the highest unemployment rate in the world, and twenty five percent of youth between the ages of 15 and 29 are without jobs. As a large conglomeration of educated youth enter a world without job prospects and no future, Massoud argues “the Arab people are finally rising up.” Indeed, the revolution in Tunisia is believed to have been sparked by the suicide of a young man who could not find a job and was barred from selling fruit without a permit.

In contrast to Massoud’s hopeful and deterministic rhetoric, Anne Applebaum of the Washington Post published a column warning against placing blind faith in the ability of the Tunisian revolution to usher in a new era of secular, democratic leadership.

Applebaum argues that although the rapid and dramatic developments in Tunisia this past week have been exhilarating, it is important to remember past consequences of similar popular uprisings. Citing the 1979 revolution in Iran, the Orange revolution in Ukraine in 2004, and the 1989 protests in Tiananmen Square, Applebaum warns that street demonstrations often result in continuing violence and a worsening of the political situation.

Although Applebaum, like Massoud, sees the educated youth as the leaders of the revolution, she argues that the developments in Tunisia don’t represent a democratic revolution. Instead, Applebaum argues that we are witnessing a “demographic revolution: the revolt of the frustrated young against their corrupt elders.” Although Applebaum finds hope in the ousting of Ben Ali, she argues that a peaceful and orderly transition of power would have present a far more hopeful prospect for the future of Tunisia.

Whether Massoud’s optimism or Applebaum’s warnings prove more prophetic, it is great see two such distinct, insightful women leading the debate over the future of Tunisia on the op-ed pages. If you have a different opinion or insight on the future of Tunisia and its impact on the rest of the Arab world, take the plunge and voice it!

Interview: Richard Barrett

By Adla Massoud
Al Jazeera.net/english (January 2010)

The failed Christmas Day airliner attack has resuscitated fears of terrorism in the US. But that fear is no longer focused on Afghanistan, where 68,000 US troops are stationed, or on Iraq, with 120,000 US troops. For now the focus has switched to Yemen.

Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the Nigerian man accused of trying to blow up the US airliner bound for Detroit, had spent the few months before the attack in Yemen and al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) has claimed responsibility for the attempted attack.

Four months ago, a suicide bomber from the same group, using a similar explosive, nearly killed a top Saudi counterterrorism minister.

Former British intelligence official, Richard Barrett, the UN's highest ranking official responsible for monitoring the activities of al-Qaeda and the Taliban, tells Al Jazeera, that AQAP is the most dangerous of al-Qaeda's regional offshoots and that its mission is to destabilise the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. He recently spoke with Al Jazeera.

Al Jazeera: How strong is AQAP compared with al-Qaeda's presence in Afghanistan and Pakistan?

Richard Barrett: AQAP has until recently focused on targets in Saudi Arabia and Yemen, and may continue to do so. But the attempt to bring down an aircraft over Detroit on December 25 shows that, where the means exist, AQAP may also launch attacks outside the region.

It remains to be seen whether they have the capacity to do so on a continuing basis.

AQAP, however, is like the other al-Qaeda affiliates in that its main objectives are local.  Al-Qaeda in Iraq is now a marginal group which is as unlikely as it ever was to have any meaningful influence over the political process there. It still appears to be sectarian and backward looking, apparently now working with ex-Baathists.

Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb has been increasingly pushed to the ungoverned areas of Southern Algeria and Northern Mali and has not managed to get active operational supporters in Europe. Its agenda remains local.

Al-Shabab in Somalia claim allegiance to al-Qaeda, but the al-Qaeda leadership has not recognised this and the fight in Somalia seems to have remained, so far, local and tribal.

The al-Qaeda leadership in the Afghan/Pakistan border area is constrained by military action and is not in a position to plan and mount major attacks.

So my conclusion is that compared to the even weaker state of other parts of al-Qaeda, AQAP is currently probably its strongest part.

You recently said al-Qaeda operatives hiding in Yemen are the most dangerous ...

I do believe they are very dangerous - they are young, they are hotheaded and of course as the Saudi Arabian authorities have being successful in pushing al-Qaeda supporters out of Saudi Arabia, they have tended to go to Yemen and join with Yemenis there who are keen to support their attacks in Saudi Arabia over the border.


And that area there is difficult for the Yemenis to control and the Yemenis of course have a great deal on their hands with the rebellion in the North and the separatist movement in the South, with all the economic and social problems they face in addition.

Has the government of Yemen done enough to combat AQAP? Should the international community have done more to stop the growing threat AQAP poses in Yemen?

The Yemeni authorities have a lot of problems on their plate and it is very difficult to deal with because, of course, they need to have the cooperation of the tribes to deal with it.

But I think the involvement of the international community inside Yemen is a delicate issue that the Yemenis should be fully in control of - so maybe we should have responded more to Yemeni requests for assistance and I see that the US and the European Union have increased their support for Yemen over recent months which suggests perhaps they could have done this earlier.

I am not sure Yemen sees it as such a threat - certainly not as much as the rest of the world does following the December 25 attempt. But I think the international community was very well aware of al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula and the threat it could be posing.

And of course Saudi Arabia in particular was because it was made up of Saudis and their objectives were to attack targets in Saudi Arabia.


Why is Saudi Arabia their main target?

Saudi Arabia is the heartland for al-Qaeda. It has always been a target for them.

I think it is both the Western dependence on Saudi Arabian oil but also the alliance between Saudi Arabia and the West, which is very strong, and I think what the al-Qaeda people see is that if they could attack the economic infrastructure in Saudi Arabia they would be achieving two aims: that is weakening the West but also weakening the authorities in Saudi Arabia which, of course, they don't support at all.

Do you think al-Qaeda remains a global threat?

Al-Qaeda is still very determined that's the thing. I think they are very weakened and they have been unable to mount big operations as they would like to but it's still a threat.

And the leadership in the Afghan-Pakistan border area is still very very keen to link up with people elsewhere in the world who it can persuade and help to mount major attacks.

And what the al-Qaeda leadership would like to do is to establish some sort of control over their operations to make it more strategic rather than these sort of small attacks as they occur at the moment.

Are they succeeding?

I don't think they are. They remain under a great deal of pressure.

There is this threat that the al-Qaeda leadership could link up with people who can travel easily to other countries to commit attacks. And it's difficult for authorities to maintain watch over all these people. Although we have been successful in stopping attacks over the last couple of years, major attacks, perhaps also we've been lucky.

Which enemy should be the greater priority for the US in Afghanistan: the Taliban or al-Qaeda?

I think for the US they've made it clear that al-Qaeda is the greatest enemy and their attacks on the Taliban seem to follow their desire to defeat al-Qaeda. In my opinion I think that's probably right.

Clearly there's a great design in the international community to ensure that al-Qaeda doesn't have any safe havens from which to attack and operate, whether locally or elsewhere.

The question is whether the Taliban would give them these safe havens if they controlled in any sustainable way territory in Afghanistan or even the whole country.

But generally speaking I think that the Afghan Taliban have made it absolutely clear, if we believe them, that they are only interested in the future of Afghanistan and not in disturbing the future of their neighbours or indeed any other country.

Will the inversion of the groups' traditional power dynamic lead to better or worse relations?

I think that the relations are obviously very well established over many years, we have to accept that. And these people are very used to one another and to a certain extent share some objectives - you know what they think is the right sort of government and what they don't like in the sense of outside influences.

But essentially as the Taliban come closer, if they do, to some sort of political accommodation with the rest of the Afghan community, then they will find the weight of al-Qaeda around their necks - or the perception that al-Qaeda remains around their necks - a hindrance and this will probably lead to some sort of tensions and I am hoping that certainly that will be true.

And al-Qaeda has made it very clear that their battle is a global one whereas the Taliban have made it clear their battle is a local one.

I think also we've seen some differences of opinion because al-Qaeda are very much interested in attacking Pakistani troops and Pakistani targets as are the Pakistan Taliban people they work with.

As for the Afghan Taliban, they have always made it clear that that's not their objective, that they believe the battle is against foreign forces and the Karzai government in Afghanistan and that it has nothing to do with the Pakistani forces or army.

The Saudi Arabian government maintains that the Taliban would become moderate in due course. Do you agree?

I think what the Taliban will become is perhaps more sophisticated and more practiced in government.


I think that when they were running the country before - or large parts of it before - I don't think they were very sophisticated and I think were still very much in a learning stage and really in a developmental stage and they weren't quite clear what their policies should be. I hope they learn from that.

The trouble to me is that now for many many years - for over a generation - the Afghan people have known nothing but conflict and it will be very difficult for everybody to settle down in a sort of peaceful, civilian type government.

Is capturing Osama bin Laden the key to defeating al-Qaeda?

I am not sure it's the key to defeating al-Qaeda, I am not even sure it will make a big difference to al-Qaeda.

Certainly Osama bin laden has remained an inspirational character though I don't think he has much operational control over what al-Qaeda does.

Whether he was imprisoned, dead, hiding in those remote areas in Pakistan/Afghanistan, I am not sure what difference it will make.

What we have to do is to ensure that the global community understands that what al-Qaeda offers is purely destructive, negative, a hopeless philosophy and if we want progress, security and prosperity then the last people we should be looking to to help us is al-Qaeda.

They offer nothing but further disadvantage.

And it's making that clear to people that al-Qaeda lack any relevance to life today and they lack any credibility as well I think that's the main thing - that we shall do whether Osama bin Laden is captured or not.

Iran's Slow Revolution

By Adla Massoud
Al Jazeera.net/english (December 2009)

Six months after Iran's disputed presidential election triggered widespread demonstrations, the country's pro-democracy movement is as strong as ever, experts say.

As this week's protests show, opponents of Iran's regime have taken to using officially sanctioned demonstrations to turn out in large numbers and publicise their message.

But do not expect another revolution.

"This is a civil rights movement working through self-propelling acts of civil disobedience," Hamid Dabashi, a professor of Iranian studies at Columbia University, says. "It will change the very political language of the region."

Asef Bayat, a sociologist and Middle East expert, agrees. Speaking at a panel discussion last week, he argued that Iranian society is beginning to shed its revolutionary tendencies.

"Iranians once saw liberation as simply overthrowing an unjust shah, without much thought as to what would come next," he said. "Thirty years later, that definition has grown to include concepts of individual civil liberties. This has led to a far more mature civil society, that seeks change in increments, not explosive revolution."

Forged in opposition

The so-called 'Green Movement' was formed after hundreds of thousands of supporters of Mir Hussein Mousavi, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's main rival in the presidential elections, took to the streets to protest the result of the poll.

They believed that Ahmadinejad had orchestrated a massive campaign of vote-rigging that returned him to power unfairly. The demonstrations were met with a brutal crackdown, sanctioned by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran's supreme leader.

Eventually the protests died down and the 'Green Revolution' lost its news value. The Iranian opposition disappeared from the mainstream media and went back underground, manifesting itself in postings on Facebook and Twitter and in snippets of mobile phone video posted to Youtube.

While it may not be visible, some believe it is effective. Behzad Yaghmaian, an Iranian author living in the US, says that a more politically mature and multi-layered movement is emerging, and that its strength derives in large part from its non-violent character.

Even Iranian children are setting an example, he says, recounting the story of a 12-year-old student who refused to step on an American flag before entering the classroom. "People of another country love this flag. Why should I disrespect them?" she asked her teacher.

Yaghmaian believes the grassroots movement has bypassed the limited political demands of Mousavi and other reformist leaders and has become a more profound movement fighting for human rights. There is, he says, little desire to work within the framework of a theocratic political regime.

Taking risks

For the first time in 30 years, people on the streets of Iran are openly rejecting the constitution of the Islamic Republic and demanding a secular republic.

"There's a call for political secularism emerging in Iran, a call that is coming out of the movement itself," he says.

In making that call, the demonstrators are taking a risk. Iranians are well aware of the regime's willingness to use force against them, and as a result, much of the political organising is done out of view of the authorities.

"They cannot have a fully fledged organised structured movement in the way that you have in Western countries, because they would easily be the target of appraisal and repression," Asef Bayat explains.

Instead, Iran's Green Movement operates through loose networks of friends, family, and colleagues, says Yaghmaian. The risks are enormous.

In the first half of 2009 alone, there were 196 executions in Iran. Former officials, intellectuals and journalists have received long prison sentences after brief televised trials and torture by the authorities is commonplace.

"The human rights situation has deteriorated considerably," says Hadi Ghaemi, a spokesman for the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran. "Capital punishment is on the rise and execution sentences for political prisoners has resumed. Torture and even rape of detainees have taken place."

Despites this, Ghaemi believes nothing will deter Iran's burgeoning civil rights movement. He says: "It will seize every opportunity to display its resilience."

Out of Beirut

By Adla Massoud
Al Jazeera.net / July 19 2006

When Lebanon's 15-year civil war ended in 1990, we all hoped that the nation had finally transformed itself from a byword for urban violence into the "Ibiza" of the Middle East.


Beirut was attracting hordes of tourists, its land values were rocketing and its citizens were relishing the prospect of long overdue wealth.

As a Lebanese expat, Beirut has always been my summer destination. But by my second week there, I was sadly planning my exit strategy as Israel retaliated with waves of air and sea attacks - bombs and missiles  after Hezbollah killed eight Israel soldiers and captured another two.

I spent the first two days hoping that the situation would improve. I got phone calls from people in south Lebanon saying that their power was out and that Israeli jets were swooping overhead.

The question everyone was asking: what will happen next? What do we do if Israel really hits Beirut? Do we stay, or go?

Day four

By Saturday, our house started shaking under the increasing air raids. Israel had vowed to take Lebanon "back a good 20 years".

My hopes for a ceasefire began to wither away.

I was stranded with my brother and his wife in Beirut with 10 children under the age of seven – Greek, French, British and American.

I checked with the American and British embassies about possible evacuation plans. They responded calmly: Do not attempt to travel and certainly not to Syria.

It was not what I wanted to hear. Many Beirutis had evacuation plans. They all had small bags packed and were ready to move to the mountains.

But with Israeli warships attacking ports and Beirut's airport, we were virtually cut off from the outside world.

If we wanted to take the Syrian route, then we would have to take back roads through the high mountain passes, or head north up the coast road towards the Syrian city of Homs. But if Israel attacked Syria, we would have nowhere to go.

Open war

When Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah declared an "open war", we decided to flee from Beirut on a small bus with 10 kids in tow. It was now a make or break opportunity especially after Israeli air strikes hit the Beirut - Damascus highway.

Thirty minutes after our departure, the IDF began attacking our route to the border. We heard and saw the bombings. The older children cried out of fear, but the younger ones did not seem to understand what was happening.

My heart was breaking at the thought of possibly not being able to get these children back to their parents, some of whom were out of Lebanon at the time. Who can explain a mother's anguish during these terrible times?

Finally we reached the Syrian border.

Border chaos

At the border post, the atmosphere was relatively calm, but people seemed dazed.

There were hundreds of bus loads of Lebanese and foreign refugees. Around them, people crossed the border into Syria carrying their belongings in Hessian sacks on their backs.

A bus ticket from Lebanon to Syria shot up from $15 to about $200. Taxis were charging upward of $700 per person for the four-to-six-hour trip.

We spent five hours at Syrian customs in a small room with hundreds of people seeking an entry visa. Syrian authorities were clearly unprepared for such large numbers of refugees. They sent us from one room to another.

Meanwhile, the children who were waiting in the bus grew frustrated. There was no more water nor food and no shop nearby to buy any. We had to try and pacify them while trying to find a way.

We were then told that the Syrian government had instructed all official agencies to facilitate entry procedures at the borders for Lebanese nationals. So we used our Lebanese passports instead of the British, French and Greek ones. Within 30 minutes our 13 visas were issued.

But many Americans, British, German and French tourists were still waiting to get theirs. Some gave up, but others were relentless.

Syrian support

Leaving them, we crossed the border and drove to Lattakia where our plane to London was waiting. Syria's support for Hezbollah was clearly evident: Picture posters of Bashar al-Assad and Hassan Nasrallah hung side by side.

In the airport, with 10 exhausted children screaming for food and water, Syrian television reporters besieged us with questions and cameras: "what were you doing in Lebanon?" "were you on a holiday?" "do you always come to Syria?

We scrambled onto the plane, heartbroken, dishevelled and shocked by what has become of Lebanon.


Adla Massoud, a regular contributor to Aljazeera.net, was vacationing with her two children in Beirut when hostilities broke out between Hezbollah and Israel.

Author says Iraq worse than reported

By Adla Massoud
Al Jazeera.net / July 6 2006

The author of In the Belly of the Green Bird tells Aljazeera.net that the conflict in Iraq is far more terrible than reported and could spill over and threaten the entire Middle East.

Nir Rosen - who speaks Arabic and has Middle Eastern looks - went to Iraq in April 2003, just days after Baghdad fell. Entering mosques and tribal meeting halls, and afforded access to fighters' secret meetings and Iraqi homes, he documented the deadly behind-the-scenes manoeuvring in the post-Saddam power vacuum.

He is also a fellow at the New America Foundation.

Aljazeera.net: Let's start with the title of your book. What is the green bird?

Rosen: When I was in Falluja, and other parts of Iraq where the resistance was very strong, you would often hear this quote in mosques, or see it in resistance propaganda - that the martyrs were in paradise.

You often saw or heard the statement that the martyrs die with a smile on their faces, die with smelling sweet and the martyrs went to paradise in the bellies of the green bird.

To write your book, you gained access to both Sunni and Shia resistance more than any other American reporter. How did you do that?

I have a very good smile (he laughs). I definitely had more access than many other people. Some of it was because I am Middle Eastern; my father is Iranian.I looked like everybody else which I think is an important advantage because you get to places more easily. People don't notice you.

I think it's mainly having the right friends. Friends from the right Sunni tribes, friends from the right Shia neighbourhoods who could introduce me to the right people. You need somebody from the right tribe, from the right neighbourhood, from the right sect. More and more, that's what determines whether you can survive.

Has al-Zarqawi's death impacted the insurgency?

I think it's insignificant. I don't think he was so important in the first place. If anything, he was sort of an advertisement. He came into Iraq tokill infidels and the Shia, become a martyr and go to paradise. He
succeeded.The Americans created Zarqawi, sort of the Zarqawi myth. Right at the beginning, they refused to accept the fact that the Iraqis had liberated or supported popular resistance so they had to blame
everything around foreign fighters for the sake of the American [public].

So it seemed for a while like every suicide car bombs was been blamed on Zarqawi. And I just think that created a myth throughout the Arab world. It only helped his cause.

Osama Bin laden recently warned in an internet message Iraqi Shia of retaliation if they continued to attack Sunnis. How seriously should we take his warning?

I don't think Osama bin laden matters much either. First of all, Iraqi Shia are being killed every day anyway.
Every day by the end of 2003, they were being slaughtered on the streets by the resistance and of course by Zarqawi. But I don't think Osama bin laden commands any fighters. He is hiding in some cave somewhere in Pakistan issuing these statements, trying to sound important but he is not the leader of anybody anymore. So it's kind of ridiculous.

I didn't see anyone in Iraq take Osama bin laden seriously. It's definitely true that Shia are resented because they are perceived as the beneficiaries of the occupation. And in many ways, they are in charge now; they control Iraq so everything has been reversed.

In a recent article, you wrote "The occupation has been one vast extended crime against the Iraqi people and most of it has occurred unnoticed by the American people and the media". Can you explain?

Well Abu Ghraib, Haditha, these are the kind of things that get attention. These are only two incidents so they make them seem like the crimes are exceptions. In fact the occupation is a daily crime, it is little Abu Ghraibs, little Hadithas, being forced to do what the Americans tell you to do.

Having American machine guns pointed at you everywhere, having American security convoys shoot at you when you're off the streets, having American tanks block off your roads, American concrete barriers block off your city, American helicopters fly over your house, American soldiers break into your house and raids.

So many little acts and so many innocent Iraqis killed or arrested or humiliated or terrified. Probably hundreds of thousands have been traumatised by this, especially children. I was "embedded" for two weeks of my entire time in Iraq but for me that was the most traumatic experience that I had in Iraq.

Normally, if I'm on the streets and I see someone pushing an old lady or bullying a child, I'd want to interfere. But here I was with soldiers and they were doing the same thing with Iraqis. I would just stand there and watch and not get involved. And Iraqis looking at me thinking I was some Iraqi collaborator and it made me feel even worse.

In a recent Washington post/ABC News poll, nearly half of all Americans support a timetable for withdrawal. Do you support a withdrawal?

I supported a withdrawal certainly until 2005. In my articles, I was saying that an American withdrawal would prevent a civil war from happening and would force Sunnis and Shia to step up and take responsibility and to co-operate. And it would allow Sunnis to participate in the government.

But now that I think the civil war is sort of open and intense, I don't think an American withdrawal would make much difference and it's possible that an American withdrawal would actually make things worse
because there will be nobody patrolling the borders and would allow even more foreign fighters to come into the Sunni areas.

It would allow greater intervention from Iraq's neighbours which will only increase the civil war. I think the Americans should leave. The Americans shouldn't be here occupying Iraq and killing Iraqis but an American withdrawal wouldn't make things better at this point because of the civil war.

In your book, you say that Iraq has been in a state of civil war shortly after the fall of Saddam Hussein's government. How bleak is the future of Iraq?

It's more difficult for me to feel more optimistic because as a journalist on the ground you see the bloodshed every day. You hear about people getting killed, people telling you about their neighbours getting killed; it seems like short-term there is no hope because I think things still have to get much worse before they might getbetter. The process of ethnic cleansing is only beginning.

I think all mixed areas of Iraq are going to be unmixed, are going to be cleansed like Bosnia before this ends. So there's still a lot left to go. I think Sunnis and Shia hatred at this point in Iraq are so intense that they are beyond the point of reconciliation and the fact that the Shia are so confident because they control the army and the police. I think you're going to see sectarianism spreading to the whole region.

Do you think Iraq should be split into three semi-autonomous provinces?

The Kurds certainly want independence. They don't feel Iraqi, they don't speak Arabic, they don't want to belong to Iraq. When you ask them about the Iraqi flag, they tell you it is a symbol of their pain. I've never heard a Kurd express any desire to belong to Iraq. And they have virtual independence anyway so it's only a
question of time for the Kurds.

But regarding the rest of Iraq, it's much more complicated because the Sunnis don't want to have some form autonomous province. They want all of Iraq just like the Shia want all of Iraq.

Everybody wants Baghdad. Sunnis of course want the oil and the Sunnis are so mixed that even if you divide it into autonomous provinces what would you do with Baghdad and Kirkuk? It would just be as bloody
because most of the bloodshed is happening in mixed areas. So there's no solution at this point I think.

How will the war in Iraq impact the Middle East in the long term?

The idea of a nation might be less important because you have Sunni Arab tribes in Iraq who have relatives in Syria, Jordan and Saudi Arabia and for them borders were never an issue in the first place.

Once the people start really being victimised by the Shia, you'll see their relatives coming in larger numbers to give them more support.I just don't believe that the Arab world is prepared to tolerate an aggressive Shia Iraq. We've heard statements from Saudi leaders, Jordanians and even from [Egyptian President Hosni} Mubarak warning about the Shia threat. I don't think you will see a Shia Iraq, the situation is only going to get worse.

How has the war in Iraq affected you personally?

My journalistic career began at the age of 26 when I got to Iraq. I'd never been a journalist before. So everything I've learned in the past three years was from Iraq. In some sense, it has made me an angry person. When I go back to the United States, I feel angry because people don't know how terrible the situation is.

Is the media to blame?

A little bit. They are too slow to expose America's crimes and they still are. I mean I was embedded for two weeks and I saw so many horrible things happen. There are journalists who have been embedded
for months, for much of the occupation on and off, and they must have seen things much worse than what I saw.

And not to write about them and glorify the hometown heroes from the US is in itself collaborating with the crime.

Lebanon divided over Hezbollah raid

By Adla Massoud in Beirut
Al Jazeera.net / July 2006

With aerial bombardment and a naval and land blockade of Lebanon intensifying, many Lebanese are divided over Hezbollah's capture of two Israeli soldiers.

Some politicians have expressed doubt about or condemned Hezbollah's cross-border raid on Wednesday.

Michel Aoun, a member of parliament who leads the Free Patriotic Movement, called the raid a "pure military action" but also condemned Israel's retaliatory attacks on civilian targets.

"The priority now is to stop military operations and move towards a solution through negotiations," Aoun, a former general who returned from exile last year, told Aljazeera.net.

Aoun, a Maronite Christian leader, signed an understanding with Hezbollah in February after arguing that the Islamist group should be integrated into political reforms in Lebanon.

Blame game

Walid Jumblatt, a Druze leader who opposed Aoun's arrangement with Hezbollah, called the group's raid an "outrageous" way to drag the country into war and said it was symptomatic of regional power-plays.

Iran and Syria are unfortunately using Lebanon as their proxy, and this is unacceptable," he said.

Jumblatt, who heads the Progressive Socialist Party, has since the assassination of former Lebanese prime minister Rafiq al-Hariri demanded an end to Syrian involvement in national affairs and for the Islamist Hezbollah movement to lay down its arms.

But Hezbollah officials say the only way out is through indirect negotiations.

Sayyed Ibrahim Moussawi, editor of the English service of Hezbollah's Al-Manar TV, blamed Israel for refusing to "limit any further escalations of aggression ... and starting a military aggression against Lebanon.

Angry, fearful memories

Once known as the Paris of the Middle East, Beirut was a popular tourist destination in the 1960s and 1970s.

After the civil war and the Israeli invasion of 1982, Lebanon's fortunes faded until a decade ago when the guns fell silent and foreign investment and tourism returned to the country.

But the recent bombings and talk of war have brought back painful memories.

"This brings back too many bad memories" says Hawa Shehadi, a 70-year-old grandmother."Lebanon will never know peace."

Kamil Makdissi, a taxi driver, says: "I feel sad about Lebanon being bombed. Deep down I am happy that Israel is feeling at least 5% of what we're going through."

Many in Beirut are also angry.

Ordinary Lebanese opposed to Hezbollah are incensed by the attack they knew from experience would invite Israeli reprisals.

"This whole saga has taken me back to my childhood and it's not a good feeling at all. I just want to get out," says Zina Bekdache, 38, who is in Beirut for her annual holiday.

"They seem to think that they run the country," says Walid Chahine, a 50-year-old engineer. "All the credibility Hezbollah had gained domestically over the years they have thrown away."

Despite the anger, few Lebanese feel they can openly oppose Hezbollah while their country is under bombardment.

Wide gulf

Yet the gulf is clear between Lebanese Shia - the largest religious community in the country - and those opposed to the raid.

Dalia Salaam, a Lebanese Middle East analyst, says, "Hezbollah is currently the only political party in Lebanon fighting to save the country."

"The US and Europe should ask Israel to restrain itself. After all, no one, not even President George Bush or the Israeli government, can afford to escalate the situation."

But Ramzi Salha, a travel agent, says: "Whatever the agenda of Hezbollah is, it is not necessarily the agenda of the Lebanese people.

"They have not been designated by the Lebanese people to decide what is best for the country."

With the 22-year Israeli occupation over, many Lebanese say it is time for Hezbollah to lay down its weapons as demanded by UN Security Council resolution 1559.

Few are suggesting a return to war is coming, but Hezbollah's rivals are increasingly complaining that the only Lebanese group that was allowed to keep its weapons after the civil war has become more powerful than the state.

Lebanon's New Electoral Law Will Impact Christians

By ADLA MASSOUD, Middle East Times


Oct 14, 2008 - 9:07:33 AM


BEIRUT -- Lebanon's new electoral law could define the role of the country's Christian electorate and directly impact the ongoing Sunni-Shia power struggle, experts say.


"The Christians can flip the balance one way or another. Because the Shiites are attached to Iran and Syria and the Sunnis to Saudi Arabia, so as to lessen the attachments, the Christians can balance it out in the national interest of the country," said former Lebanese ambassador to Washington, Abdullah Bouhabib.

Adoption of the new election law – which is still pending approval of parliament – is the final element of the Qatari-mediated deal between rival pro- and anti-Syrian factions in Lebanon after prolonged wrangling brought the country to the brink of civil war.

The new law overrides the standing 1960 electoral act and mandates the redrawing of electoral boundaries into smaller voting districts – a major concession to the opposition which they believe will entitle a bigger representation for the Christian community.

Christian voters will have diverse alternatives to choose from: first, the March 14 camp, the Christian Phalangists and the Lebanese Forces, led by Amin Gemayel and Samir Geagea respectively who joined forces with the largely anti-Syrian movement headed by Saad Hariri, son of slain former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri and Progressive Socialist Party leader Walid Jumblatt.

Hezbollah made the Druze community as a whole their target during their May campaign. Jumblatt reinforced his alliance with rival Druze leader Talal Arslan during and after the Hezbollah attacks on their community. Arslan is a friend and supporter of the Syrian regime and the opposition.

At the other end of the spectrum is the pro-Syria opposition, consisting of Michel Aoun's Free Patriotic Movement (FPM), Suleiman Franjieh's Marada movement and Hezbollah. And there is also the soon to be announced candidates affiliated with the new president, General Michel Suleiman.

Marada leader Suleiman Franjieh said the new election law is the beginning of the rights of the Christians:

"We now need our deputies to be elected by the Christians themselves."

Inexplicable alliances have long been a tradition of Lebanese politics, defined by short-sighted tactical partnerships rooted in the intense rivalry of opposing parties, communities and political families.

Such alliances have played a key role in the struggle for power among the various Christian factions.

Lebanon's former President Amin Gemayel, head of the Christian Phalangist Party and one of the stalwarts of the anti-Syrian coalition believes the outcome of the elections will depend mainly on political alliances.

"The political map is going to change in 2009. There will be a big reshuffling."

The Doha Accord situates the opposition today as a significant minority in the cabinet with one third of the seats. Should the opposition win in the 2009 parliamentary elections, the opposition will become the ruling majority.

According to Nadim Shehadi, Lebanon expert at the London-based Chatham House, the real electoral battle will be in seven constituencies: Metn, Zahle, Beirut, Koura, Saida, Batroun, West Bekaa.

"Nineteen out of the 26 constituencies are considered 'safe' with predictable results. It is in the other seven, mainly in the Christian dominated constituencies, that will determine the next parliamentary majority."

Free Patriotic Movement leader Michel Aoun, is currently the frontrunner in the Christian dominated areas, elections expert Kamal Feghali says.

The former general who won one-third of the popular vote in the 2005 parliamentary elections, claims the support of 50 percent of Lebanon's Christians, and "looks set to win the majority of the Christian votes in 2009" he added.

But Aoun's alliance with Hezbollah has many Christians worried about their future.

Carlos Edde, leader of Lebanon's National Bloc, an independent party formerly part of the majority movement, believes Aoun's alliance with Hezbollah, Syria and Iran will be the main factor for the end of "a Lebanon where the Christian community will have a substantial influence in the political decision making and it will be the last phase in which Westernized political institutions and culture will play an important role in this country."

Edde said: "After the takeover of Beirut by Hezbollah, it is unfortunate that many Christians prefer to side with the strongest, without considering the long-term effect on the society they are living in."

"One thing is for sure, if one considers the many factors that led to the failure of the Cedar Revolution of 2005, I would single out by far the defection of General Aoun to the pro-Syrian side," he added.

In fact, Aoun took the Christian community by surprise when he allied himself with Hezbollah, backed by Syria and Iran, shortly after he returned to Lebanon from a 15-year exile in France.

During his exile, he had repeatedly opposed the Syrian presence in his country and returned home only once Damascus withdrew its troops following a 29-year presence and as a result of domestic and international pressure in the aftermath of Hariri's assassination in February 2005.

"There has always been a trend or current amongst the Maronites which is anti-clerical and anti-feudal and I think Michel Aoun represents this" said Shehadi.

In an interview at his home in East Beirut, MP Samir Franjieh, a breakaway leftist member of the powerful far-right Franjieh clan led by Suleiman Franjieh in northern Lebanon, said the Christian pro-Hezbollah opposition unfortunately brought the Christian community back to where it was before 1990, ensnared by inter-Christian power struggles.

"What is disturbing is that they [the opposition] did not take Lebanese or Muslim positions but an Iranian one. They actually stood against their own democratic beliefs."

Gemayel concurred that Aoun's alliance with Hezbollah is dangerous for Lebanon, particularly the Christian interests, since Hezbollah works to "achieve the Iranian strategic scheme in the Middle East."

Defending their alliance, former Interior Minister Suleiman Franjieh said:

"The Shiites came and said they were prepared to stand by us. They stood by us in Doha and through all the tricky times. It's an alliance that has helped the Christian community. But it's not an alliance against the Sunnis. The Sunnis would be wrong to think that. It's an alliance of minorities that should help bring more balance to the country."

Bouhabib, who heads the independent Issam Fares Center think tank, said the agreement between Aoun and Nasrallah brought Hezbollah into the mainstream of Lebanese politics, rather than taking the FPM leader to the fringes.

"Imagine Aoun did not ally himself with Hezbollah, then the Shiites would be cornered and when the tiger is cornered, he attacks. So this agreement between Aoun and Hezbollah gradually convinced Hezbollah that they should play the political game in Lebanon. And this is in the interest of everybody not only of the Shiites." Aoun insists he has not entered into an alliance with Hezbollah, rather he has signed an MOU – or message of understanding.

Many Christians are still hoping that the disengagement of Syria from Lebanon following Rafiq Hariri's murder would signal the political revitalization of the community.

"The real test" said Arz al-Murr, founder of Al-Nashra, a Beirut-based news Web site, "are the 2009 elections."

Oil may fuel Sino-US Conflict

By Adla Massoud
Al Jazeera.net / June 29 2006

China's quest for oil in the Middle East is threatening US energy and security interests in the region and increasing the risk of a conflict between both nations, analysts say. Flynt Leverett, senior fellow at the New York-based Saban Centre for Middle East Policy, told Aljazeera.net: "There's a force of increasing tensions in the Sino-American relationship and if you carry that trend out long enough, you do begin to run a more serious threat."


As the dominant geopolitical power in the Middle East and the Arabian Gulf, America's main concern is not only the acquisition of cheap fossil fuel but also the growing involvement of China's energy sector in a number of ''problem" states such as Iran, Sudan and lately, Syria. George Bush, the US president, recently told the American public that "addiction to oil is a matter of national security concerns".

"Some of the nations we rely on for oil have unstable governments, or agendas that are hostile to the United States. These countries know we need their oil, and that reduces our influence, our ability to keep the peace in some areas."

Kenneth Pollack, a former CIA and national security council Middle East analyst, told Aljazeera.net that just as the US oil needs had helped to keep dictatorships in power in the past, China was buying into oil in places where those purchases supported governments of countries seen as hostile to the West. "It can be very detrimental to the US, particularly if the Chinese were to adopt the role that the Soviets did during the Cold War, supporting whichever state opposed the United States," he added.

Investing in Sudan

China has invested more than $8 billion in Sudan, which now supplies over 7% of the Asian giant's oil. It has also invested another $70 billion into Iran's oil and gas industry, which meets 11% of its energy needs. In return, Beijing offers powerful incentives for these countries' energy resources: Economic and military aid, access to Chinese markets, and support at the United Nations where Beijing wields veto power at the Security Council.

China has also shown willingness to oppose US policies as it did in 2004 when it threatened to veto a US proposed resolution to impose sanctions on Sudan, or when it signalled resistance to any UN measure that would include the threat of military action against Iran. Analysts say China's need for oil has been a major factor in Beijing's refusal to support stronger action against those countries and that it has an interest in seeking peace in the Gulf to ensure the security of its growing energy investments.

"The US' argument to China, which the Chinese recognise, is that Iran with nuclear weapons would be very destabilising to the region and that could jeopardise China's number one priority in the region which is the flow of cheap oil," Pollack said.

As the world's third largest oil consumer, China relies heavily on the Middle East, which provides about 45% of its total oil imports, with Saudi Arabia accounting for about 17%.

Growing industrialisation

While China still consumes far less oil than the United States, increased production in industries such as steel, aluminium, and cement have driven up its energy consumption and oil prices. According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), Chinese oil imports will rise more than six times between 2002 and 2030, from 1.7 to nearly 11 million barrels per day. In other words, China's oil imports will rise by an amount nearly equal to Saudi Arabia's total current oil production capacity.

Meanwhile, Middle Eastern energy producers are looking to China as an alternative to US hegemony in the region. "I think there are a lot of Arab states in the region who are looking to China not just as a potential economic partner, but also as a potential political counterweight to the US. The more they bring the Chinese into the region and the less they will have to do what the US tells them to," Pollack said.

Even the staunchly anti-communist Saudis - whose oilfields were developed by US companies - is cultivating China as a consumer of its oil and gas to hedge against further deterioration in US-Saudi diplomatic relations. Said Pollack: "In the aftermath of 9/11, if you look at the anti-Saudi backlash in the US, the Saudis had to take seriously the possibilities that their strategic partnership with the United States might deteriorate. Fundamentally they needed an alternative."

Sino-Saudi ties boosted

In late April, Hu Jintao, the Chinese president, flew to Saudi Arabia for talks with Saudi Aramco, the world's largest oil producer. The visit marked the latest episode in a continuing Chinese effort to ensure access to Saudi Arabia's 9.5 million barrels per day of oil production. That visit, coming just after meetings between Hu and George Bush, the US president, was closely monitored in Washington.

Ted Galen Carpenter, vice-president for defence and foreign policy studies at the Cato Institute, told Aljazeera.net that "the Saudis regard China now as a very important customer for oil and will be increasingly important in the coming decades".

"I don't think that's a terribly smart thing for US interests. The US has made an economic and political competitor again on the global scene which is something we've really not had since the end of the Cold War in 1990," Carpenter, who is also the author of the book America's Coming War with China, said.

China-US rivalry

The IEA predicts that by 2015, 70% of China's oil imports will come from the Middle East. And more than half of its oil will have to transit the Malacca Straits, one of the busiest shipping lanes in the world, located between Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia. The US navy controls the sea lines of communication (SLOC) or primary maritime routes, in all the major energy transit junctions, including the Straits of Hormuz, the Malacca Straits and the Southeast Asian sea lanes.

US analysts say there is an expectation among Chinese strategists that the US will use its naval leverage to disrupt its energy imports should any conflict over the status of Taiwan arise. The Chinese are reinforcing their navy, concerned with the insecurity of the maritime routes upon which almost all of China's energy imports travel. But "it will not be a threat to the US unless China has a very large modern and capable navy which it has not remotely done to this point", Carpenter said.

Hoping to avert a new war of the Pacific, Beijing is developing alternative oil delivery routes that are meant to avoid US naval control. China has bankrolled more than 80% of a $248 million project to develop a deep-sea port in Gwadar, Pakistan. This would lessen its reliance on sea routes by allowing oil to be transported overland through Pakistan to western China. China also recently opened a 1000-km link carrying 190,000 barrels per day of Kazakh oil, providing its first direct access to potentially rich central Asian fields.

Retaliation "Monstrous and Disproportionate"

By Adla Massoud in Beirut
Al Jazeera.net / July 23 2006

Lebanon's social affairs minister is appalled by what she sees as the "monstrous and disproportionate retaliation" of the Israeli military against her country.


But Nayla Moawad, the Christian Lebanese widow of Rene Moawad, a former president who was assassinated just days after taking office in 1989, also lambasted Hezbollah's decision to capture Israeli soldiers, saying it pushed Lebanon into a war its people never wanted. Interview by Adla Massoud.

Aljazeera.net: Hezbollah claims its actions aim to defend the interests of the Lebanese people. Do you support such a view?

Nayla Moawad: I think that we have to define our interests together and only the Lebanese government - where Hezbollah is a partner - and representatives in parliament, who have been elected by all the Lebanese people - only the government can decide for peace or war.

Hezbollah initiated the attack without the knowledge of the Lebanese government. How can that be?

That's why we clearly stated that we did not approve of the operation and we did not know about the operation and we did not adopt or support this operation.

We have reiterated numerous times very clearly that the Lebanese government is the only Lebanese entity that should decide whether there should be peace or war.

Only the Lebanese army and the Lebanese security forces have the right to be armed. And only the Lebanese people represented by their government can decide when and how to use these arms.

But many blame the war on the Lebanese government for not having disarmed Hezbollah in the first place as required by UN resolution 1559. Do you agree?

We never pretended that we could disarm Hezbollah.

We were elected by a big majority of the Lebanese people who participated with the March 14 [reformist] group.

We also obtained the support of the international community after the assassination of the late prime minister Rafiq Hariri.

On the contrary, sovereignty and independence could be achieved with the participation of Hezbollah in the government, in the decision-making, and that little by little they would understand that only strong state institutions would represent an important sectarian community in Lebanon.

Israel has called for the Lebanese government to come down and take control of the southern border, the border with Israel. Do you believe your government is strong enough to do it?

I think the government cannot go to the status quo ante [bellum] and now we are asking for a ceasefire and we certainly have to take strong measures because all the problems are now on the table and we have to take responsible decisions supported by the Lebanese people.

What of a ceasefire? Do you think an international peace force will help?

It's one of the suggestions that are being studied by Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora who is in charge of leading all negotiations and who will choose which suggestions given by the UN Security Council we could discuss and decide all together to adopt.

Relief agencies have warned of an impending humanitarian crisis. What is the government planning to do?

It's not only a humanitarian crisis. It's a humanitarian disaster. And the government has put in charge the committee for relief to organise all relief effort under the monitoring of the ministry of social affairs and with the help of NGOs and the civil society.

Prime Minister Fouad Siniora criticised the world for not stopping the Israeli offensive. Do you agree?

I agree, especially when you are living this dramatic war and this very disproportionate Israeli retaliation. Regarding the Hezbollah operation - the capture of two Israeli soldiers - that started before the Israeli attacks, I affirm again that we did not want it and did not know about it.

Certainly, we are looking first to get a ceasefire and simultaneously asking the international community to help us with humanitarian aid because Lebanon is under siege and blockaded by land, sea and air.

And we are also asking for humanitarian aid within Lebanon because many of the villages on the southeast of the Lebanese territories are totally cut from other areas and are cut from each other and we are having small dreadful cases that are being lived by the people.

Do you think Hezbollah is gaining support due to Israel's response?

What I can tell you is whatever our political opinion is regarding the Hezbollah operation that has started this war and whatever differences of opinion we might have with Hezbollah, we did not agree with some of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah's statements during his interview earlier with Aljazeera.

He said first of all that they are fighting not only to defend Lebanon but they are fighting for the whole Arab region.

He also said the war will continue whether the Lebanese people like it or not.

We strongly disapprove of this and do not support such statements. We are single-handedly facing a humanitarian disaster that has befallen us because of the war and most of all because of the monstrous Israeli retaliation.

Originally Published on Aljazeera.net: http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/73269661-A536-4EE8-A50D-F8472C6E772E.htm

Analyst says bin Laden 'desperate'

By Adla Massoud
Al Jazeera.net / April 24 2006

In The Far Enemy: Why Jihad Went Global, his latest book on al-Qaeda, Middle East analyst Fawaz Gerges says that by the mid-1990s, the jihadi movement was nearly a spent force, having been ruthlessly repressed by "the near enemy" - Egypt, Syria, and Saudi Arabia.

To revive their flagging movement, al-Qaeda decided to take its fight to the West, "the far enemy", but this caused a rift with other militant movements who feared US military power would ultimately destroy them.

On Sunday, al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden released an audio tape accusing the West of mounting a "Crusader war" on Muslim nations.

Gerges, who holds the Christian Johnson Chair in International Affairs and Middle Eastern Studies at New York's Sarah Lawrence University, believes bin Laden may be growing desperate.

Aljazeera.net: What are we to understand from Osama bin Laden's message about a crusader war against Muslims?

Fawaz Gerges: Bin Laden is desperately trying to capitalise on America's and the West's woes in Iraq and elsewhere to convince young Muslims that the West is waging a "crusader war on Islam", and that they should resist the new imperial crusade militarily.

For bin Laden, the current struggle is more than political or economic; it is existential and civilisational. His mission, as he clearly states, is to incite young Muslims and remind them of the stakes involved in this global conflict.

He sounds deeply disappointed that his messages have fallen on deaf ears. The caravan of jihad has left him behind, and it is moving in a dramatically different direction than he had expected. He feels an urgent need to remind his followers and the Muslim community that he is still alive, that he exists.

But the truth is that there are few takers for his civilisational war. Neither Iraqis nor Palestinians are willing to wage a war on bin Laden's behalf; nor do they subscribe to his vision. They have much more limited goals than bin Laden's ambitious and convoluted rhetoric.

In your book you state that the 9/11 attacks were bin Laden's idea but that other jihadi leaders disagreed with him. Why did they remain silent?

9/11 was carried out by a tiny faction - al-Qaeda - which represents a minority within the jihadi movement and its strategies have been vehemently criticised and opposed by religious nationalists. They preferred to concentrate on changing the Muslim world rather than taking the fight global.

The majority of lieutenants decided to go their own ways because they disagreed with the merger between the Egyptian Islamic Jihad, Ayman al-Zawahiri's organisation, and al-Qaeda.

Some of them in internal correspondence wrote to al-Zawahiri and said "listen we'll go on our own way but we will never air our dirty laundry in public, we will never try to discredit you".

I think this is a kind of a secret universe, a universe that does not function according to rational means. They have a deep sense of loyalty and brotherhood towards each other.

Why did bin Laden and al-Qaeda decide to focus on the West?

The catalyst that turned bin laden against the far enemy (The Christian West) was the American military intervention in the Gulf war in 1991 and the permanent stationing of US troops in Saudi Arabia.

You begin your book by critiquing the 9/11 Commission report and stating that the United States sees the jihadi movement as monolithic.

I think the 9/11 Commission report focused on the criminal investigation. It presented a partial portrait of how the 9/11 conspiracy unfolded: Trying to piece together the various threads of the plot such as when the orders were given, who gave them, who were the leading conspirators behind the plot. I think the Americans wanted to know who did what.

So the 9/11 report started with the micro details and made very sweeping generalisations not about the conspiracy itself but about the nature of the threat that the United States faced.

In other words, the report stopped short of illuminating the big historical and sociological questions of how and why jihadi movements decided to attack the United States. It lumped indirectly the jihadi movement with the Islamist movement as a whole.

I think it was highly dangerous to make sweeping generalisations and to lump all jihadis together with al-Qaeda as well as the Islamist movement.

Why do you consider that to be dangerous?

The US is no longer facing a tiny dangerous faction within the Islamist movement that is al-Qaeda. The US faces now an ideological enemy which encompasses all jihadis, local jihadis and trans-national jihadis and even radical Islamists.

In many ways this basically sets the US on a highly dangerous track because it's one thing to say that the US faces al-Qaeda which is a highly dangerous enemy and it's another to say that the US faces an ideological threat which encompasses all jihadis and even all Islam.

It changes the nature of confrontation and basically convinces Americans who know very little about the nuances and differences between jihadis and the Islamists that somehow we're facing what I call an existential threat, a strategic threat. And this is not true.

You speak of other militant groups. Are Lebanon's Hezbollah and the Palestinian Hamas part of the jihadis movement?

Yes, however, Hezbollah and Hamas are the radical Islamists who basically focus their energy and militancy on the [Israeli] occupation. They do not believe in the expansion of jihad outside the Arab-Israeli conflict.

How central an issue is the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to these jihadi movements?

In the book, I show that the overwhelming majority of clerics, Islamists and civil society leaders were opposed to the 9/11 attacks.

But when it comes to the question of Palestine the opposite is true. The overwhelming majority of clerics, opinion makers, and religious leaders look at what Hamas and Islamic Jihad are doing against the Israeli occupation as legitimate forces of resistance.

The Israeli six day war in 1967 was really one of the pivotal factors in the rise of the Islamist and jihadi movement. No doubt about it. Palestine has inspired generations of Arab and Muslim activists and radicals and jihadis and militants ... even secular militants.

Has the war in Iraq strengthened al-Qaeda?

Well, I don't think the war in Iraq has strengthened al-Qaeda. I think what the war in Iraq has done is to create a new generation of jihadis who basically subscribe to a similar ideology to that of al-Qaeda.

I think the American war in Iraq has played into the hands of al-Qaeda's trans-national ideology on global jihad. In many respects, Iraq is slowly and gradually replacing Afghanistan as a recruiting tool and ground for jihadi action.

Let's remember though that the overwhelming majority of fighters in Iraq are Iraqi nationalists or Islamists who are trying to end the US occupation in Iraq.

But powerful factions of jihadis who are lead by [Abu Musab] al-Zarqawi have basically received a great deal of public and popular support as a result of the war that has raged in Iraq for the past three years.

So in many ways, yes it has supplied ammunition to the ideology of global jihad.

And of course it has deepened and widened anti-Americanism throughout Arab and Muslim lands. It silenced moderates who basically went on the offensive against the ideology of global jihad after 9/11.

What is the best way to defeat al-Qaeda?

The American war against al-Qaeda cannot and will not be won on the battlefield. The US is not facing a conventional army. This is an unconventional war and I think in many ways al-Qaeda is totally highly adaptable and dynamic.

The only way for the US and the international community to win this war is by creating coalitions and alliances with Arab and Muslim societies, not just counter-insurgency tactics.

The US must really endeavour to address the legitimate grievances of the floating middle and Arab and Muslim public opinion and create alliances by addressing regional conflicts like the Palestinian predicament.

It does this by keeping a healthy distance from Arab and Muslim dictators and by building bridges with the largest constituency in the Arab Muslim world - Arab and Muslim youth.