The Redhunter

The name "Ibn Taymiyya" will be familiar to readers of this blog who followed my 6 part review of Walid Phares' Future Jihad. Taymiya (spellings vary) (1263-1328) developed the doctrine of takfir, essentially the Muslim equivalent of the inquisition. This would later develop into the Salafi movement which would in turn spawn Wahabism and the Muslim Brotherhood, two branches of the worldwide jihad (the third being the Khomeinists).

Dr. Ahmed himself is an Aligarh. As described by Blankley, the Aligarth's "hoped to build a modern democracy, overcome tribalism and the more obscurantist aspects of Islam while still being "good Muslims."" Works for me.

The Deobands are the ones to worry about. Osama bin Laden and similar groups are part of this group.

The bottom line is that according to Dr. Ahmed, the bad guys are winning.

Meeting with people from presidents to cab drivers, from elite professors to students from modest schools (Dr. Ahmed holds a respected place in the Muslim firmament around the globe), he reports that 50 percent want Shariah law, support the Bali terrorist bombing, oppose women in politics, support stoning adulterers too death. Indonesia's secular legal system and tolerant pluralist society is being "infiltrated by Deoband thinking... Dwindling moderates and growing extremists are a dangerous challenging development." Although I dissent from several of Dr. Ahmed's characterizations of the Bush administration, Washington policy-makers and journalists should read this book because it delivers a terrible message of warning both to those who say things aren't as bad as Mr. Bush says, and we can rely on the moderate voices of Islam with a little assist from the West — winning; and for those who argue for aggressive American action to show our strength to the Muslims (because, in bin Laden's words, they follow the strong horse).

Unfortunately our president seems to have lost his way, and the left is to mired in Bush-hatred to get much out of analysis of this sort. The president now seems to want to make nicey-nice with those who hate him, making noises about joining the global warming crusaders, and now virtually allied with Ted Kennedy on immigration. The left argues that "they all hate us now because of Iraq", and that "there is no jihadist threat, it's all an invention of the neo-cons". They believe that if only we'd pressure Israel more and "work with our allies and the UN" everything will be fine. The president at one time wanted us to be the "strong horse", the left abhors the thought.

We need to be that strong horse. Part of being the strong horse is military power, not quitting in Iraq, and redoubling our efforts in Afghanistan. Part of it is also using "soft power", something we haven't done very well. Either way, the first step towards solving a problem is recognizing that it exists.