Islam is big in the news lately because of a proposed mosque in lower Manhattan and a fiery speech by Newt Gingrich.
I'd like to state my
position. Islam is not the problem.
There are Muslims in many areas from Kosovo to India to Johor Bahru (next to Singapore) to Timbuktu (Mali) who are peaceful and sympathetic to the U.S. We have Muslim Kurds who love the U.S. and Israel.
Defining our enemies as Islamists doesn't improve the distinction. We have the Shia/Sunni divide with no religious groups on both sides.
Our current enemies at
the moment are Arabs, Persians and Afghans with very little in
common. The only commonality that I see is tribalism.
I personally believe
we are fighting all tribal people in the world. They like tribal
life. We in many guises disrupt their lives, often with our good
intentions (clinics, roads, electricity).
Tribal people do not like our disruptions to their stable meaningful lives. The dislike turns to resentment, then resistance and when we finally provide military training and weapons to tribal peoples, as we often do, it all turns to terrorism and warfare against us,
This has happened since our founding days with many of the tribes in the Americas. It has continued uninterrupted all over the world, most recently in Guatemala, Nicaragua, Nigeria, Afghanistan and in Vietnam. We are not the only targets; the Wiegers are targeting the Chinese.
We may have to learn to leave tribal people alone; lest the battle continue for centuries.