<p>Alexandre, one thing bothers me about your arguemnets (and of some other users). for some reason you refuse to accept the fact that this terror thing is like an illness in muslim society yet instead of saying:"they have done to us this and that, lets fight them back like a war is being fought", muslim society result to terrorism when in fact it's the only society in the world to result to that measure. I don't argue the fact muslim has the right to fight the US or UK or which ever other nation, I do think that muslims are the only ones resulting to terrorism because of the specific elements of the way in which Koran and Islam principles are being thought in many places around the arab/muslim world. hence--> terrorism is a problem of muslim society and it should solve it, and the first step would be to admit to the prblem rather than finding excuses such as:"they have nothing left but there bodies" or stuff like that. one more thing, every now and then arab/muslim goverment will go aginst terror somewher in the world, say UK or US. the problem is that muslim society should unite against terrorism and declear that while fighting for a goal is o.k, using terorr to acheive it is wrong no matter what and against who, you can't approve of it in some part of the world and object it in another.</p>
<p>lets get back to the fundamentals of the situation</p>
<p>what is bin Laden's stated goal?</p>
<p>To have US military personnel withdraw from Islamic areas.</p>
<p>Instead of fighting an unending orwellian war, why don't we just withdraw. That would end terrorism. Pure and Simple.</p>
<p>DanC, I am a Christian Arab, but I have lived all my life among Muslims. There is nothing about them that is inherently violent. In fact, I find Christians to be far more agressive and violent. But I can say that since the 1950s, no group has been as violated as the Muslims. I am really not surprised at what is happening these days. I don't know about you Dan, but if somebody stole my land or killed my relatives, I would not stand quietly by and not fight back by which ever means possible.</p>
<p>once again, alexandre shows his superb debating skills</p>
<p>lest we forget, the mujahaden and bin laden are a product of US foreign policy during the Reagan Administration</p>
<p>I find this entertaining. People in the u.s. who are most likely still in high school arguing with someone from the Middle East who is in their 30's. If you are in the U.S. as much as you think you know what is in the minds of the people in the Middle East, you really don't know anything. You haven't grown up in the culture, and you have seen what Alexandre has seen. You are a point that really has no backup. You get your info from where? The news media? The politicans? He gets his point from living in the Middle East and seeing it with his own eyes. Just try to learn something from somone who is in the area. Try to learn something new from someone who is experiencing this first hand, only then you may actually be able to make a difference in the world. And not just argue a point that has no backup other then hearsay.</p>
<p>bigndude, you are right. I agree with Alexander because i myself stayed in the Middle East for some time. </p>
<p>off topic: Alexander, have you ever been to Bahrain? How is it there?</p>
<p>"DanC, I am a Christian Arab, but I have lived all my life among Muslims. There is nothing about them that is inherently violent" - inherently? are you crazy? do you think i claimed that muslims have some sort of genetical issue? that would be absurd and redicioulos. I am claiming that the way in which Islam is being thought in many places, in addition to the fact that no arab/muslim goverments admits to fully object terrorism results what we see today - terrorism everywhere.</p>
<p>Alex, you wrote "fight back by which ever means possible" - fight who??? </p>
<p>I am sorry to say but what you wrote is simply giving legitimacy to terrosim. from what i understand you simply don't object to the fact that terrorists choose to fight civilians instead of armies. well, bravo, that is what an exterme Imam somewhere will try to make his followers believe.</p>
<p>on top of that, how can you blaim the US/west for terrorism? there is no escaping the fact that most arab/muslim countries are third world countries with poverty and lack of modernism. the US has done nothing in many of those countries yet you see terrorists coming from there and harsh anti-west / anti-jewish propganda being broadcasted there.
why can't you admit that muslim / arab society has a problem that should be taken care of?</p>
<ul>
<li>one more thing, i really don't care wether you are a christian arab or a muslim american, i try to show the facts in order to proove a certain point, since the facts won't change according to who is writing them i really don't mind who is the person behind the name :-)</li>
</ul>
<p>bigndude, are you refering to me?</p>
<p>and if you are, let me get this straight:
you dismiss my calims and agree to those of, say, alex's, just because he lives / lived in the middle-east? does knowing who writes the claim, or should i say, where his location is, really makes a difference of how you relate to a certain calim? in other words, if one would write what i just wrote and would be a middle-eastern, would you consider those claims differently?</p>
<p>A man died and went to heaven. As he stood in front of St. Peter at the Pearly Gates, he saw a huge wall of clocks behind him. He asked, "What are all the clocks for?" St. Peter answered, "Those are Lie-Clocks. Everyone on Earth has a Lie-Clock. Every time you lie the hands on your clock will move. "Oh," said the man, "whose clock is at?" "That's Mother Teresa's. The hands have never moved, indicating that she never told a lie." "Incredible," said the man. "And whose clock is that one?" St. Peter responded, "That's Abraham Lincoln's clock. The hands have moved twice, telling us that Abe told only two lies in his entire life." "Where's John Kerry's clock?" asked the man. "Kerry's clock is in Jesus' office. He's using it as a ceiling fan."</p>
<p>Wow, confused. I've never heard that joke before. And what an appropriate thread to put it in.</p>
<p>danc, yes it does make a diff. You are not in college, you are just starting like me according to your posts in the past. You are in the U.S.. You don't have as much life experience as he does. You aren't in the Middle East either. Had you been in the Middle East and lived what he talks about you can use your so called "facts" It doesn't seem like you understand the true struggle of the Muslims in the region. Your too young to have lived what he has lived. Even if you did live in the region the age difference also plays a role. The older one is, the more life experience one has. Its kind of pointless to argue you know the peoples thoughts from over in the Middle East when you are not sitting there day after day for 30 years. How do you know that what he says is not what people think over there? Have you lived there for 30 years? Have you even been in the region, and being in Israel doesn't count because it is not a Muslim country, it is Jewish, so you can't say that things you heard there stand everywhere in the Middle East, because Jews don't know the struggle of Muslims and vice-versa.</p>
<p>"Kerry's clock is in Jesus' office. He's using it as a ceiling fan."
Yeah. I bet he is using Bush's as a turbine engine</p>
<p>if you only knew how wrong you can be.
first of all, regardless of this thread, all i am writing are FACTS. no one who opposes me ever argued with me about those, i don't think you are in a position to be the one. if you have a fact in which you think i might be wrong i'd love to hear it - don't dismiss my claims just because ###you think you know where i am from or how old i am (and obviously you don't)###, further more, don't believe any claim you hear just because whoever wrote them is from a certain location. Just talk to an Irani who was getting all the anti-Israeli / anti-america/ anti-jewish propoganda BS for ever since he was a child and let me know if you believe him even though he is "there".</p>
<p>if you think alex is right so make your give specific arguements to that, if you think i'm wrong at certain points so write those, but don't come over and say:"well he is right because he's an arab" - and that is exactly what you are doing, not giving much credit of your debating skills.</p>
<p>that fact that if some one from the middle-east would write what i wrote would be read differently by you is totaly absurd - you look at the person instead of what he claims. one like you would dismiss all of MLKJ claims because he is black, it's a thin line you are walking on.</p>
<p>Israelies don't know about the troubles of muslims? do you realize that you've just controdicted your own claim? how would you know what jews in Israel are dilling with regarding muslims and what they know as one living in CT going to huskees bball games? love the huskees btw but you get the point :-)</p>
<p>and for the matter of fact, alex said he is from Dubai - no one occupies Dubai, on top of that he is christian so if you still want to evaluate his claims according to the person he is you found the wrong person (christian) in the wrong location (dubai).</p>
<p>This has gone way off topic lol.....</p>
<p>I'm too lazy to argue, normally I would, but I'm just lazy. If you please you can make one solid post with all your views Danc and I will go through and tell you my thoughts. There is a reason why I have avoided saying things. My views upset people, and at the same time are quite true. I'm known to make it personal, and I like CC so I don't plan on getting banned.</p>
<p>i'll get it "on-topic" again:
alex, let me get it straight: so you believe muslims turned to terrorism due to western occupation and abuse through times? so there it's nothing special with the way Islam being thought, it's soly on the west? basically you say there nothing wrong about muslim society?</p>
<p>Alex, you wrote:"but if somebody stole my land or killed my relatives, I would not stand quietly by and not fight back by which ever means possible". Bravo, you just gave legitimacy for another septermber 11, and i am not being sarcastic, that is the meaning of what you said.</p>
<p>DanC, What is so wrong about Muslim society? If you are talking about the number of Islamic extremists, then perhaps you have a point, but every religion has extremists and fundamentalists. </p>
<p>To a degree, I agree with both you and Alexandre. I believe this mass effort by terrorists all over the world is due in part to wrongs we have done them in the past (perceived and otherwise), and our continued meddling in Middle Eastern affairs. To a large degree, though, I think this newer and stronger wave of terrorism is due to ignorance. Ignorance breeds hate, and some countries in the Middle East truly need to open their eyes to the world around them and other people's ways of living. I feel as if some countries are truly in a time warp, where the concerns and views of modern society cannot reach them. There is no logical reason to force women to cover their bodies, or to execute them in public for laughing, or to enforce such harsh and illogical principles that are enforced in some Middle Eastern countries. It is time for the Middle East to join the modern world and let go of some of the estreme views they hold in some aspects of their lives. </p>
<p>This is not a call to flower the Middle East with democracy; I was a strong opponent to the war in Iraq, and still believe it was a mistake. I don't believe it is America's role to police the world, and I don'e think war will mend what is wrong. </p>
<p>Unfortunately, it seems terrorism is becoming more pervasive everyday, and I really don't know if we will ever be able to eradicate all terrorists or bridge the gap between the Isalmic world and the Western World.</p>
<p>I was talking about the fact that all terrorists are muslim, this is the only society which produces terrorists, that is what wrong with it. I have nothing against Islam, just that for some reason (and many islam scholars think so as well) that due to the way Islam is being thought in parts of the arab/muslim world, terror accures.</p>
<p>*there is no reason to FORCE women to cover themselves up, but if they that's what they believe in so let it be, just like other religiouns have their wierd habbits.</p>
<p>*terror won't stop until muslim society will acknowleadge the fact that it has a problem, it should denounce terrorism everywhere and against anyone. until then we won't get over it, as i said, can't go against it in the UK and not go against it somwhere else. the way of terrorism is what i object, not the objectives for which it stands for (well, for most of those i do object as well but that isn't the discussion).</p>
<p>DanC, Not all terrorists are Mulsim. There are many terrorists who aren't Muslim. The US (Tim McVeigh, Ted Kazinski etc...), Ireland (IRA), Spain (Basque separatists) Japan (I forget the name of the goup) are all terrorists. I will not even go into countries that act as terrorists...countries that invade other sovereign states even when those soverigh states never attacked them. </p>
<p>I believe terrorsim can be almost completely wiped out in the Middle East if the US changes its policies and if Israel and Palestine both grow up and work hard on achieving a lasting peace. But that's not going to happen because the US has too much to lose with a stable Middle East and Israel and Palestine are not interested in peace.</p>