In Reply to: Good point. posted by OldtiemrToo on July 01, 2004 at 19:13:50:
You think like me, Oldtimer Too. I keep asking if anybody has been reading the book I have, but not one soul has responded. If you can, you should read Terror and Liberalism by Paul Berman, it is an excellent read on the present brand of militant, fanatical Islamism and how and why they got to this point. It's fascinating. He talks about Sayyid Qutb and Mohammad Qutb. Sayyid, he says, is the "single most influential writer in the Islamist tradition, at least among the Sunni Arabs...." His brother, Mohammed, went to Saudi Arabia and guess who his student was? Osama Bin Laden. So, to understand the mindset - reading this book is a real eye opener and very informative. At first Saudi Arabia welcomed these religious figures, hoping to "keep their own country ona path of pure adherence to their antique and rigid version of Islam...." then they started exporting their Wahabism, now being taught all over the U.S. and the world.