The phrase "they hate us for who are are" is probably more accurate, but only slightly less so than the "hate freedom" tag. The Islamic fundamtentalists certainly hate freedom. Islam, literally translated, means "submission", and they interpret this literally - all must submit to Islam, which they view as the true and final expression of God's law. But the hatred is very much a kind of racism, which see those who are not followers of their creed (be it extreme Wahhabism or Shiism or derivative thereof) as kuffurs.

The secular Muslim has as much to fear as we do, but we have to fear it first. Moreover, the Jews - history's 'canary in the coal mine' - have to fear it first among all. Regardless of Israel's existence, Judasim represents the original religion that Islam claims to supercede. It adherents have long been thorns in the sides of subsequent revisions to the Abrahamic tradition and their are the primary focus.

Bin Laden probably cares more for the Palestinians than any other Arab leader (including Abbas, and Arafat for that matter). However, that doesn't mean that he cares whether they live or die, and certainly doesn't mean that he cares that they achieve nationhood - he rejects nation states as anathema to Islam. The election of Hamas demonstrates just as clearly that the Palestinian people have ejected that aspiration as well.

Bush was wrong to call it the "war against terror". Guliani, as the only leader to personally experience the 9/11 terror attacks so close to home, is more correct. This is a war against radical/fundamentalist Islam. It is an infectious and virulent political/ideological desease and must be combatted on many levels. One is certainly cultural/social - but not poverty alleviation - there is far too much corruption for that to work, and besides the majority of the terrorists who have carried out successful attacks (suicide or otherwise) are demonstrably not from poor families - at best you can argue that they are rich kids with a guilt complex over their poor brethren. Why they couldn't go and do work in social services rather than kill innocents is a debate for the psychologists.

There is also, necessarily, a military component. These people do operate military units and have the support of various governments. They aim to attack civilians almost exclusively; the majority of their attacks across the world, even in Iraq, are aimed at defenceless civilians - particularly women and children - just watch the videos of those convicted of the attempted followup to the London bombings and see the chilling scene of the bomber turning his explosive laden pack towards a mother and child in the train. It shouldn't take anything more to convice a morally decent person that these people are scum. So they must be hunted down - their leadership must be destroyed, physically.

You are probably aware that an Arab could utilise much of this same rant and merely swap the words Muslim and Jew.

Of course, you would also have to swap goy for kuffur.

Islam is certainly a later derivative of Judaism, yet Judaism is also derivative of many religions that went before it. Like Islam, Judaism is not a single set of religious beliefs, but an umbrella term that includes many different factions. Jesus is thought by many to have been an Essene Jew. Is Christianity Judaism? The only major difference seems to center around whether Jesus is the prophetic Messiah, or whether He is yet to come.

Zionism is clearly a form of rascism. I don't have enough time this evening to discuss all of the reasons that this is so obvious, but the information is out there. Google it.

Guliani is a loudmouth who was in the right place at the right time to capitalize on a tragic event. He is completely useless and his statements are more so.

The war on terror is like the war on drugs. It is has no end and no real beginning either, and like the war on drugs, it is sure to give US corporate interests a great new way to take our tax dollars-and it sure has been quite the cash cow for friends of Bush.

So let me spell this out for you:

Terror is a TACTIC. The US has used it against the North American Indians for decades and it has been used by many nations against many peoples. You cannot stamp out a tactic-you can only identify who is using it and stop them.

Furthermore, WAR is another poor choice. When you attack a small group of criminals with a large army, you do serious collatteral damage to innocent people who are not supporting the terrorists. The result is that you generate more sympathy for the terrorists (and guess what-studies on the US invasion of Iraq indicate that terror has INCREASED as a result-it is now the "remember the Alamo" for Al Queida recruiters.

The best way to fight terror is with intelligence and with surgical strikes on known targets and NOT by carpet bombing the neighborhood where one of their leaders lives.

Who helps Al Queida? Well, George W Bush is a good start on the long long list.

If terror is a tactic then one can take steps to wipe out that tactic, waging a tactical war.

The trouble with waging such a war against the islamist terrorists currently arrayed against the United States lies in the entire tradition of Islam. I'm not suggesting that Islam be eradiated. What I am saying is that, in the same way some Catholics hear of a priest who uses the Latin mass and say "Well, it's good some people adhere to the old ways," it seems like many practitioners of Islam say much the same of the most extreme versions of their religion. They don't practice it, but the can't find themselves opposed to it. This raises a huge cultural barrier to gathering intelligence for the kind of surgical strikes you favor. Further, if the intelligence isn't made available to the public, immediately after the strike, and if it isn't incontrovertible, the Arabic press will say that those killed in the strike were innocent victims. In theory this would breed more terrorists.

I agree with you, however, that the way to stop terrorists is to eliminate them physically from the face of the earth. How do do this without creating more terrorists in the process is another problem.

I'm not certain how you define that the U.S. has used terrorism against the Native American population. The U.S. waged a dishonest and invalid war against them for the better part of 30 years at the end of the 19th century, but it wasn't terrorism in the conventional sense of the word -- it was more akin to total war like that waged 70 years later in Germany, where combatant and non-combatant alike were targeted and killed (in the latter case via carpet bombing).

The difference between terrorism as practiced by Al Qaeda, et al. today, and the methods used by our own troops (be they on the ground or in aircraft going after a leader's neighborhood) is that we make at least some effort to NOT target the non-combatant. Terrorists do the exact opposite, targeting the non-combatant first.

US soldiers of the Indian wars were known to shoot women and children with the idea that this eliminated the future generations of Indians-no Indians, no issue about who gets the lands. Furthermore they would generously provide them with blankets in the winter time which were loaded with the smallpox virus, wiping our whole villages. Terror is terror-an intentional effort to kill civilians in order to achieve military objectives.

As to the comparison today, what do you think "shock and awe" means? You think the target was ONLY the military when the objective was to unleash violent destruction in such massive displays that the enemy (and the civilian population) would be totally demoralized isnt terror? A lot of kids were killed and maimed in order to demonstrate how mighty the US military was before we went in. Having troops kick in doors and hand over people for "questioning" to the reprisal squads wasnt exactly a civil thing to do either.

The US may not use identical tactics, but the victims are the same.

RML Returns, Where did you come back from?

Must people in America today have noting to do with the Native Americans being Mass Murdered. This is not even close to being the same thing. Don't you see Al Qaeda and the likes, want to Mass Murder us? Your points on Native Americans are justified. And I am not proud of that part of American History. However the Native Americans are not crashing planes into buildings, teaching their young how to be human bombs. I could understand Why Native Americans Would Hate us Non-Native Americans.

Also I think we terrorized “them” (A lot of kids were killed and maimed in order to demonstrate how mighty the US military was before we went in. Having troops kick in doors and hand over people for "questioning" ) after they terrorized us. Al Qaeda has a lot to do with this so called U.S. Terrorism you speak of. So tell me with your best knowledge "Why does Al Qaeda hate us"?

Is Zionism so clearly a form of racism? Why can every country in the4 Middle East be Muslim and not racist, yet Israel be Jewish and thus racist. A test of anti-Semitism is if Jews are singled out and their actions or intent - your comment clearly falls in this range.

If your answer to it is "Google it" I think that your knowledge base is restricted to 'the web' rather than the real world. Try reading real history texts rather than Google or Wikipedia. It might take more time but it produces a more informed comment.

Don't know what your reply was to, except to take a shot at Guliani. If you read my post I said that the nomenclature regarding 'war on terror' was wrong.