It is modern secular leftist philosophy, freed from the need to appear civilized.

Very well written column. Hits the nail right on the head.

I second Mr. Choudhury. Nature abhors a vacuum, and supernature is absolutely merciless on one.

Secular is the wrong word. fascist/communist (as if there was much of a difference) is the real term.

Well, maybe, but being a simpliste, I prefer to think that what's happening today is happening for the same reasons that it has been happening for 1,400 straight years.

Take away their "Wretched of the Earth," and they'd still want to kill us.

Up until 1707 (when the last Muslim monarch with a really powerful army died), the project of the religion was relentless.

Since then, Muslims have been quiescent, most of the time. There is no reason to think this has been the result of any change of opinion but merely because they have been overawed (most of the time) by the prospect of getting killed.

From time to time, as in 1898, they manage to whip themselves into a state of believing they won't instantly get killed, and they go back to the old ways.

Everything in the column may be correct, but it overexplains. What has happened is that technology has, for the first time since 1707, given substantial numbers of Muslims a prospect of pursing the project of the religion militarily again.

They're wrong (I think) in the long run, but it's plausible in the short run.

It isn't something we westerners did.

Harry: You're stretching. Muslims have generally sought to conquer other peoples and places for the same reasons as everyone else: money, power, political control and prestige.

Espousing religion was a good way to rally the troops and get support from the clergy but frankly the personal ambitions of would-be and actual conquerors has typically been far more important.

The guy who conquered Constantinople for example was far more interested in matching his heroes Cyrus and Alexander than in spreading the faith.

I seem to remember the Quran saying that Allah's will is satisfied only when the true believers--which doesn't include anyone posting here--rule the entire world.

No "blowback" there.

And even if there were, so what? Are you willing to give up freedom of speech and religion to avoid the blowback? I'll bet the French eventually will.

Jeff:

The French should--they'll improve their culture in doing so.

Harry:

Plausible? They can blow people up once in awhile, but die themselves in doing so. What strategist thinks that's the basis for a successful military campaign?

Mr. Judd;

The strategists who plotted the Madrid bombings?

aog:

The Spaniards are still going after al Qaeda, aren't they?

The Spaniards don't appear to be going after AQ, they're perhaps going after those currently in their country who have actively taken part in terror attacks. That's passive defense, and is very September 10.

Mr. Choudhury, point taken and agreed, up to a point.

While the idea of alienated Muslims in the West turning back to a religious trope may tell us something, it does not explain why equally alienated young Hindus are not blowing me up.

Philip Roth's "Eli the Fanatic" has something to say about the mental process.

However, the focus on al Quedaists who have touched modernism is narrow. Today Muslims are attacking infidels -- I mean violently -- on almost every border. Mindanao; East Indies; western China; the ancient emirates of Merv, Bokhara and Samarkand; east Africa; Sudan; Nigeria. Forgive me if I missed a place or two.

Hardly any of these fanatics grew up in the banlieus of Paris, and I'd be willing to bet that some of them have never even heard of it.

Harry:

Surely you've read about, if not cared about, the horrific attacks an Muslims and Christian by young Hindus in India?

You're right, I don't care about the attacks of fanatical Hindus in India, which are directed against other Hindus even more often than against Muslims or Christians.

Anyhow, that's irrelevant to this discussion. Young angry Hindus in India are not alienated.

Ones in America are, like all immigrants, somewhat alienated, or at least stressed. But they don't take it out on me. (When I got sick in college, my roommate, who was from Gujarat, gave me his copy of the Mahabbarata to read for comfort. Relating back to our discussion yesterday. He was artless and I was touched, but looking back, it's the funniest thing that ever happened to me.)

Harry:

You fail to comprehend globalization. Everyone who doesn't share our values is alienated because our values are taking over the world. You see the death throes of various other systems and mistake the convulsions for mighty attacks.

It isn't at all clear that our values are taking over the world. I have presented the example of Japan several times. You think Japan is dying. The Japanese do not think so and apparently are quite comfortable with an arrangement that rejects some of our deepest (and therefore seldom openly stated) values.

It remains true, whether that is right or wrong, that young angry Hindus in places like S. Africa, Trinidad and Fiji, are not strapping explosives around their bellies and blowing up women and children.

As Sahlins wrote in "How Natives Think" and as Huntington tried to write in "Clash of Civilizations," different cultures really are different.

Harry:

To the contrary, the Japanese do think they're dying off--they just don't mind.

Harry makes a good point. As was noted in another article, Sikhs don't make it a global point of blowing other people up, despite living in essentially the same environment as Islamists.

Africans, as well, are singularly disinclined to be terrorists outside the context of a very specific. local, political situation.

And despite their various awfulnesses, one could say the same of Basques, and Irish.

But not about Islamists.

How was the IRA any better?

The IRA has no universalist pretensions, so whether it is better or the same, it is not as much of a problem.

Neither does al Qaeda--they're willing to cut a deal if we just leave Arabia. How's that any different than the IRA?

OJ:

Have you read any Islamist web sites?

I am not making this up: they are willing to cut a deal if we just leave half the world. That is the moderate wing. The rest are willing to cut a deal if you are willing to swallow Sharia law, hook, line & sinker.

The difference with the IRA, whose aspirations were, by comparison, extremely limited, is very clear.

The question is, how French are you?

First, that wasn't al-Queda. Second, even if it was, they wouldn't hold up their side of the bargain.

One of the Indonesian leaders was asked by a reporter how good relations could be achieved between non-Muslims and Muslims.

The answer was, "Convert to Islam as quickly as possible."

They are offering no quarter, and your pal Sistani is a extravagant as any of them. His religion requires it, and I don't think he spent 60 years studying it to walk away now.