Should we forget the Bush strategy of using cold hard steel to push back the Islamist terrorists or can we win the war on terror by winning hearts and minds?
According to Daniel Pipes, winning hearts and minds isn’t going to do the job. Muslims the world over prefer to read only Muslim media and thus are impervious to western outreach through the media.
Many indications suggest that Muslims favor tuning in to or reading media prepared by their coreligionists, trusting these more than what comes from non-Muslims.
As an example of this Pipes offers the murder in 1994 of a Jewish boy, Ari Halberstam, on the Brooklyn Bridge by Rashid Baz, a Lebanese immigrant who killed Halberstam in revenge for the killing of 29 Muslims in a mosque in Hebron by Israeli Baruch Goldstein. It didn’t matter that the Israeli government had strongly condemned Goldstein’s attack. The Muslim media that Baz read never reported the Israeli condemnation. Instead they had encouraged revenge against an agent of the Israeli will.
Of course, everyone lives in a bubble. President Bush lives in a bubble, according to Newsweek. And liberals live in a bubble, according to Thomas Lifson.
One of the reasons people choose to live in a bubble is to stay focused on their goal. President Bush is focused on the war on terror. Liberals are focused on working towards a progressive millennium. Muslims are focused upon bringing Islam to the whole world.
All this focus is great. Unless it distracts you from noticing that you are heading into disaster. To avoid this fate it is best to keep a weather eye on what the other guys are saying and writing.
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