"Messages to the World: The Statements of Osama bin Laden"

I was amazed to learn that most of bin Laden's speeches have been censored by western media. After reading this book, I just can't undertand it. It's not as if these speeches make bin Laden more palatable. I guess one of the reasons however, is that al Qaeda's war against the West is not commensurate with the Western narrative: they hate our freedoms.

What is important to learn about bin Laden is that he views all of the Muslim world (from Morocco to Indonesia) as one nation. This is a difficult concept for Westerners to grasp. We think in very nationalist terms. The second most important thing to understand regarding bin Laden, and hence the al Qaeda oranization is that their list of grievances against the West goes back to approximately 1917, or the Sykes-Picot agreement, where following World War I, Britain and France organized zones of influence and essentially redrew the map of the Middle East, including the beginnings of a Jewish state in the middle of everything.

The list is actually quite comprehensive and includes Western agreements with oil-producing autocratic regimes (Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, etc.) which helped to prop up these governments which brutally oppressed their people, overthrowing governments (Iraq, Iran, etc.), creating the state of Israel and evicting Palestinians in 1947, supporting (arming) Israel in the 1973 Arab-Israeli war, supporting Israel in its invasion of Lebanon, basing troops in Saudi Arabia, and supporting other nations which oppress Muslims (Russia, India and China).

What bin Laden has learned from this behavior is that while the West talks the good talk about freedom and democracy, the reality is that it makes things happen with its war machine.

So far, all of the above is hard to argue. The West, including America, has done all of the above. Where most rational people will depart with bin Laden is his decision to attack civilians in the West, because they pay taxes and vote for their respective governments which make these policies. In these cases, violence will beget violence. This is alright for bin Laden who does not fear violence and in fact is probably attempting to create an apocalyptic war to end the world. It is his firm belief (and supported by an awful lot of Muslim scholarship, including the Quaran) that he will be judged in the right.

For Westerners, the most difficult concept to grasp is that we (as predominantly Christians) believe in turning the other cheek, peace, doing good works, etc. will lead us to heaven. The Salafi branch of Islam believes that defending their nation against non-believers, converting new peoples to Islam, and doing good works (helping the poor,etc.) will lead them to heaven. This is not too different than Crusades-era Christendom who were promised, by the pope, no less, that Crusaders would be immediately sent to heaven upon their death.

Sometimes bad concepts are hard to extinguish.