[rudyzbt]

I don't see any other wanabees posting in this thread, so if I am out of line for speaking my mind, my apologies, I will erase this and not do it again.

No we are not in a war against Islam. You can search for countries that do not have citizens who are terrorists and be hard pressed to find one. But the issue is not if the country has those people, it is if the country itself supports them. If I can provide a short description of who these people are. Islamists (often referred to as Islamic Fundamentalists a word which is taken out of contest and originally applied to Christianity during reformation to use it in a different context of another religion is difficult, therefore a word such as Islamist is more appropriate and to it may be applied whatever connotations it acquires) are of various types and beliefs. As a whole, all Islamist groups use religious symbols to further a political ideology. There are multiple roots of the development of Political Islam. To start as was spoken of before in another post, there are two major sects of Islam: Sunni Islam and Shi'a. There are others, but they are less of a political force. There is no need to go into their history it would take too long, but the majority of Muslims in the world are Sunni, while the Shi'a are found mostly in Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, and Central Asia.

Now as to their politically ideological development, it follows a few different strains. Whabbism was mentioned, but that is less of a political movement and more of a religious movement that seeks stricter interpretation of Islam bypassing much of the later legal development of Islamic law previous to the adoption of western laws in the Middle East. It is a sect that follows the teaching of a man named Abd Al Wahab; anyway history is unimportant in this context. It was mainly able to spread because the majority of Muslims in Saudi Arabia are adherents to this practice of Islam. The clerics therefore are able to keep a hold on the Saudi monarchy that is dependent on the Wahabbi clerics to keep the peoples support. This enables a secure source of cash, which the Whabbis use to support the conversion to their vision of a "true Islam". Interestingly enough, most Muslim student organizations throughout North American Universities, receive funding from this source to teach the Wahabbi version of things. Anyway, in the case of Bin Laden, it is interesting to note that while Wahabbi, he seeks to overthrow the Saudi regime, mind you he is also part of their royal family.

Ok I am getting off the topic. The ideological foundations of Sunni Islamists can find their modern origins in a large part in the development of the organization known as the Muslim brotherhood founded by a man named Al Banna in Egypt. He was a reactionist to the secularization of Egypt. He himself did not write the definitive works that would later carry this movement. That fell to one of his successors, Saiyd Qutb. Qutb wrote mainly while he was imprisoned in Egypt and his writings later became the backbone of much of the Islamist movements. He died before he completed his works and later followers had different interpretations of what he meant. Some believed that the problem lay with the non-Muslim world. Redefining the world in Dar al-Islam and Dar al-Harb. Literally the house of Islam and the house of war. Anything not Muslim was therefore the enemy. The other body of thought professed that all Muslims who did not follow a particular set about "correct" Islam (Mawdudi was the main proponent) were in a state of ridda and jahyllia, harking back to how the new Muslims immediately after the death of the Mohammad fell apart and did not follow his laws until Abu Bakr (who followed him) was able to reconsolidate the fledgling empire. So each of these thoughts, hold different groups to blame, but both shared the same goal. The establishment of not just the Islamic state in each Muslim state (there is a difference between a state that has a majority of Muslims and one that is an Islamic state), but of a whole Muslim Nation.

From the Muslim brotherhood a large amount of other groups were formed, holding as their "bible" the writings of Saiyd Qutb. Among the Jammayat al-Islamiya which sought to mobilize students. Now oddly enough the traditional Muslim Ulema (scholars in a religious sense) led by the Muslim religious university Al-Azhar, was dead against the Islamist movement. A bunch of people with very little education in religion, ironically many were actually more western educated, were calling into question the way things had been studied and done for over 1000 years. They rejected the legal teaching of those that came before, with a few exceptions. They read two or three books by Ibn Taymmia and memorized the Qur'an and thought that they understood it better that everyone else had gotten it wrong. Part of the trouble they saw was in the rise of western institutions they saw as not fitting with Muslim society. Earlier in another post it was mentioned that Islam, Islamic Law, and Governance were not separable. That is exactly what the Islamists believe. Unfortunately they have obviously convinced many non-Muslims that this is true as well. Islam and Islamic Law are inseparable that is basically true. It is not true that the Muslim world must have Islamic Governance that is what Islamists would have everyone believe.

There are many who would state in an apologetic fashion that yes Islam as a religion says many bad things, but it is a religion of peace. This is not true. Islam is not a religion of peace, it is a religion that seeks converts and those who are not Muslim are wrong in their belief people of the book, Christians and Jews, are not forced to convert and are supposed to be accepted, but are still deemed wrong. But the same is true about most other religions. Islam is a religion, in such it is not fair to label it as a religion of either peace or war. If you have read your old testament you would find it to be one of the bloodiest most war inclined books written (or received as you like).

Again I find myself digressing. So from the perspective of these Islamists, coming mostly from the disillusioned middle class or poorer country people. They see the loss of the Khalifate with the fall of the Ottoman Empire and the establishment of the Turkish secular state as the end of true Muslim rule and see a need to go back not to the Khalifate but all the way back to an imagined Islamic paradise dreamed about in the time of the "four righteously guided Khailifs" who followed Mohammad in rule. Mind you this is only for Sunni Islam. So they would reestablish this pipe dream of an Islamic world. The truth is that it never really existed in the way they view it. There was never, except perhaps under the rule of Mohammad himself, a solely religious ruling of the people.

In the structure of Shar'ia (Islamic law), the laws were debated and regulated by a class called the Ulema mentioned earlier. Their law system was extremely intricate and its proper application no longer exists. Furthermore, while the head of state and nominal religious head could appoint judges, once those judges were appointed he was even subject to their will in decisions. Similarly not all laws were religious laws. The Khalif had control over a variety of laws that were deemed to derive from the state and its rule including the collection of taxes, administration of roads, the police forces, and many other things. Maybe a good example would be the division of laws in Israel today. Religious courts control certain function including marriage (you can not have a civil