The Pope's Counter Narrative

International Analyst Network

24 Mar 2008

The Easter Sunday baptism of Madgi Allam, an Egyptian Muslim, by Pope Benedict looks to be a symbolic push back against militant Islam of the first order. Much of the symbolism seems to be lost on the media.

The peaceful images of the baptism beamed around the world form a powerful counter-narrative to the violent images associated with militant Islam of late. A head bowed in reverence vs. one about to be severed. Love vs. hate. Life vs. death. The contrast couldn’t be starker. Was it not Bin Laden himself that said something along the lines that you love life and we love death?

Pope Benedict XVI like his predecessor Pope John Paul II understands the power of global media and its ability to connect and move people to action. Choosing Easter Sunday was a master stroke in presenting contrasting perceptions without being overly provocative. While Europe is roiling over cartoons and the new anti-Islam movie “Fitna” by Dutch Politician Geert Wilders, the Vatican used one of its greatest rites to make a point.

By sending these images via satellite TV and Internet, the church was able to reach out and touch many of its 1 billion members--not to mention anyone else conscious on Sunday. That is important because a large portion of its members reside in the developing world where they are at odds with militant Islam. The Philippines, Indonesia, Sudan and Nigeria come to mind.

I find it interesting that Pope Benedict chose an Egyptian to make his point. The Coptic Christians and Chaldean Catholics are under increasing pressure throughout the Middle East. The Chaldean Archbishop of Mosul , Paulos Faraj Rahho, was captured and later found dead this month in Iraq. Pope John Paul II chose Poland as the starting point to push back against communism this Pope may have picked Egypt to begin pushing back against militant Islam.

Al Qaida's Stock Continues to Fall

Snop's Commentary:

The following article points to increased tensions between Al Qaida and the Taliban over the future of Afghanistan. It also indicates a much larger problem for Al Qaida and "the global jihadi movement".

Under great pressure in Iraq, Al Qaida has been effectively pushed out of Anbar province by local Sunni militia who turned against AQ after the price of supporting them got to high.

Currently, AQ is fighting a desperate battle against coalition and Iraqi troops up in Mosul. Much of its troubles stem from blow back caused by its indiscriminate use of extreme violence against civilians.

The daily global media diet of suicide bombings and its televised aftermath is beginning to take its toll.

Afghanistan: Al-Qaeda Bloggers' Sparring With Taliban Could Signal Key Differences
By Ron Synovitz
Wednesday, March 12, 2008

An Internet-fueled squabble between Taliban leaders and influential Al-Qaeda sympathizers over nonviolent tactics and foreign influence in Afghanistan hints at deep disagreements that could alter counterinsurgency efforts in that country.

Islamic extremists who regularly post messages to a pro-Al-Qaeda website in Egypt are accusing Afghanistan's Taliban of straying from the path of global jihad. Prominent Taliban have responded by lashing back with criticism of their own.

The development suggests a rift is emerging between the Taliban leadership and religious extremists in the Arab world -- including the Al-Qaeda network that the Taliban had hosted in Afghanistan while it planned the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks in the United States.

(Full Article)

Is Al Qaida's Stock Falling?

Snop's Commentary:

A New book by top al-Qaida strategist rebuts jailed militants rejecting violence. Ayman al-Zawahiri seems to be fighting a rear guard action against ex-jihadists that have turned against al-Qaida's violent ways.

This reaction by ex-jihadists is exactly what is needed to help delegitimize al-Qaida "the movement". According to the Militant Ideological Atlas, "Denouncements of prominent Jihadis by other prominent Jihadis are particularly damaging and demoralizing. "

"The treatise is a tacit admission that Al-Qaeda is facing an unprecedented ideological challenge." -- www.MEMRI.org

This is exactly the type of internecine spat that needs to be exploited to weaken al-Qaida's support base and reduce its recruiting pool.

The Associated Press
Published: March 3, 2008

CAIRO, Egypt: Al-Qaida's chief ideologue and strategist, Ayman al-Zawahri, has published a 212-page book on militant Islamic Web sites slamming his former radical colleagues in Egyptian prisons for disavowing armed struggle and turning their backs against violence.

The book, released on the Web sites Sunday, is the latest salvo in an intellectual war between the ideological founders of al-Qaida and Islamic militancy, many of whom are have become disillusioned with the suicide bombings and attacks on civilians that have become the hallmark of the movement.

"This message that I present to the reader today is the most difficult, if not the hardest I have written in my life," al-Zawahri wrote in the introduction to "Exonerations," published by al-Sahab, Al-Qaida's media wing.

He slammed a series of "revisions" renouncing violence published by prominent jailed Islamist thinkers, saying "it serves the interests of the Crusader-Zionist alliance with the Arab leaders to drug the mujahideen and drag them away from the confrontation."

The most recent renunciation came in 2007 from Sayed Imam, who was once a top leader in Egypt's Islamic Jihad group and an associate of al-Zawahri. Imam's writings in the 1980s laying an Islamic legal basis for violent action against "infidel" regimes, were highly influential among al-Qaida militants.

But his "revisions" argue that such violence is banned under Islamic law.

Imam followed in the footsteps of other jailed thinkers over the years from Egypt's radical groups that once fought a bloody guerrilla war against the state that resulted in over a thousand deaths and the imprisonment of tens of thousands but now condemn armed struggle.

Experts on Islamist movements say that these revisions could rob militant groups like al-Qaida of the entire ideological basis for their violent actions.

A video praising recently slain al-Qaida in Afghanistan leader Abu Laith al-Libi issued Wednesday included an advertisement for the book, describing it as a way to counteract an image of the Islamic world as "helpless, submissive, fearful," the way al-Zawahri said America and the West want Islam to be.

In the book, al-Zawahri maintains that far from being an internal reappraisal of the movement, these revisions are instigated by the United States to weaken a movement that has inflicted so many defeats on them.

"The entire crime of al-Qaida and the mujahideen is that they have faced the Americans, the Jews and the agents and so American-made propaganda, such as this document, have been unleashed so that the world would forget and ignore the real criminals," he wrote.

Al-Zawahri seen by many counterterrorism experts to be al-Qaida's operational chief, rather than Osama bin Laden is believed to play a large role in directing al-Qaida's strategy on the ground and issues frequent videos an audiotapes, often laying out the network's doctrinal line.

The former doctor was originally part of the Egyptian Islamic Jihad in the 1970s and was imprisoned and tortured by the Egyptian state before he escaped to Afghanistan and joined with bin Laden to form al-Qaida in the 1990s.