XPost: alt.flame.airlines, alt.politics.immigration, alt.airline
XPost: rec.travel.air, alt.travel.uk.air
From: malc@gelt.org
On Thu, 1 Jul 2004 23:19:10 -0700, "Matt"
wrote:
>> As a matter of fact, Bin Laden's Al Qaeda's primary beef is about the
>> westernization of the Moslem holy places in (particularly) Saudi
>> Arabia (following, particularly, Gulf War 1). Hamas is the group that
>> cares primarily about Israel.
>Saudi Arabia is hardly "Westernized". I lived in Saudi Arabia for a couple
>years in the early 1980s and I don't think it has
>become any more "Westernized" since then.
You fail think incorrectly. In 1990/1991 a whole bunch of Westerners
moved into Saudi Arabia. Perhaps you missed it? It was mentioned by
most of the news channels, often using the names "Desert Shield" or
"Desert Storm".
Now, granted, it's not very western by our standards, but the very
idea of letting western troops run around the Moslem holy places is
very disturbing to a number of Saudis, including OBL and the majority
of the people who hijacked those aircraft.
>You may be correct about OBL wanting Taliban style theocracies, but he is
>using the US support of Israel to benefit his cause indirectly.
I think you'll find that what you are referring to is a case of "the
enemy of my enemy is my friend", which works in a strictly limited
fashion...
>Either way, if you did a poll of
>typical Arab men
>throughout the region and asked why they don't like the US, do you think the
>number one reason will be:
>
>A) Because of the US support of Israel
>B) Because of the Westernization that is occuring in the Arab world?
>
>I think the clear answer would be A.
Your problem is that you introduced a fallacy into your poll, which is
that "typical Arab men" are not the problem.
Had you polled, say, the people who funded and carried out the attacks
on 9/11/2001, you'd have found the answer was "B".
Which is the point.
>Matt
Malc.
--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)
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