WHAT ISLAMICISTS GET AND ISLAMOPHOBES DON'T:

Al-Zarqawi attacks the 'silent' scholars (Stephen Farrell, 11/25/04, Times of London)

THE insurgent leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi has attacked Muslim clerics for failing to support attacks on United States-led forces in Iraq.

The outburst signals an apparent rift between Iraq’s most-wanted man and hardline Islamic scholars who had been united with him in opposition to Western troops in the country.

In a recording published on an Islamist website, a voice attributed to al-Zarqawi attacks the ulemas (theologians) for not speaking out against American actions in Iraq and Afghanistan. “You have let us down in the darkest circumstances and handed us over to the enemy . . . You have quit supporting the Mujahidin,” the voice says. “Hundreds of thousands of the nation’s sons are being slaughtered at the hands of the infidels because of your silence.”

The broadside appears to be motivated by bitterness that the Americans’ assault on Fallujah failed to rouse the same passions across the Muslim world as a siege last April.