www.byzcath.org Forums General Discussions Town Hall bin Laden tape

The bin Laden tape seems authentic enough. I guess his survival shows how tough it is to deal with someone who is being protected by so many people. It also may indicate the worldview differences between Islam and the rest of the world. What can be done?

BTW This is not intended to be a post about the upcoming elections. No one knows if Mr. Kerry would do better or worse. My interest is in trying to determine what the world is going to be like if radical Islam cannot be curbed.

Dan L

Hi,

This tape is very interesting, not only because it shows Bin Laden well and alive, but for many other reasons:

1. He speaks in secular terms, in modern Arabic. It is clear he intends this tape to be for a broader audience.

2. He states terms of peace. Of course this could be read in many different ways: Is he afraid? Is he offering surrender in echange for something? Is he sincere in this offer? Regarless of all of this, I think the positions of those who deem Bin Laden as an obsessed lunatic are severely undermined. The tape doesn't show one, and doesn't seem the act of one.

3. The terms of peace are reasonable: You leave us alone, we leave you alone. When asked by the U.S. President about what they wanted "us" to do, the Alien in Independence Day answered "Die!". On many ocassions, I've heard people thinkin of Bin Laden in fairly the same terms. The tape seems to contradict these. Bin Laden is not asking the Americans to "Die!", just to leave the Middle East alone.

4. The terms of peace are positive and entirely in the hands of the recipient of the message. The United States is asked to do something the United States can do.

Was this tape the "October surprise" this year? Well, I do not know if it was "the", but it certainly was "one", and one we need to see with hope.

But not much, as I think the American people in general is still more interested in revenge than in constructive efforts for world peace based in justice for all, even over particular interests, even over those of the Americans.

Shalom,
Memo.

Kerry his missed the real meaning of Friday's Bin Laden videotape. Bin Laden has been reduced to sending a video tape with wild threats. Bush has destroyed much of his base of power. If Kerry is elected he will employ the same Clinton people who let him escape three times. Bush is winning the war agaisnt terrorism.

The man responsible for unprecedented terror and mass murder our soil is - three years, hundreds of billions, and another thousand US lives later - flipping us the bird before our election. It would be nice to have a President who was resolute in the desire to get him. And who got the job done rather than let him get away after this crime.

LOL!

Bush wanted him dead or alive.
Then he got away.
Then Bush dismissed his concern over whether bin Laden was dead or alive.
Then denied this dismissal.

All the while this criminal is still at large.
These are facts, from the mouth of Bush himself.

I have btw read Cheney's charge - :rolleyes: he'll say anything to get elected.

I agree. President Bush is the only candiate who is resolute. Kerry is on all sides of every issue (except abortion). Did you know Kerry took a poll to determine what he should say about the tape?

Hey Gary K:
How did I respond to you at 5:06, before your post at 5:08? Either this forum has really brought my rehetorical skills to an amazing level, or there is something very peculiar in this software.

I deleted my post by accident when trying to add the part about Kerry waffling on everything except abortion. How do you add the little smileys?

Well, I thought I had seen it, but I really liked the possibility that I saw it before you posted it.

Smileys: point and click left of the UBB code (quote etc).

New calendar vs. Julian?

Dear All,

Maybe it is just me...but Bin Laden's Tape to the American people would have been the stuff of Jame's Bond Movies not too many years ago!!

A few years ago I read a rambling 'manifesto' of his to President Bill Clinton, who he also hated (he really is an 'equal opportunity' hater of U.S. Presidents), and in a very patronizing tone, calling him by his first name, he said, (and I will NEVER forget this) "the difference between your boys and mine is that yours don't want to die, and mine DO".

Alice

Hi,

True, and very wrong.

What do you have to do to somebody to have him or her willing to die, literally, just to have the opportunity to hurt you.

Doesn't that sound very, very wrong?

Shouldn't both sides take a look and see what went wrong?

Shalom,
Memo.

Ah, but you see, no one wants to know what's wrong! There is a book out by a man named Corey Robin, called Fear. He states that the government is using the war on terror to allow our liberties to be curbed.

But get this---it isn't the government who is doing the curbing. Instead, it is Government working in cooperation with PRIVATE COMPANIES to curb our liberties with fear.

Companies owned privately can do things the gov. can't. He states examples where women were kept from using the bathroom, and finally had to use toilet papaer, kotex and maxi pads, and paper towels to soak up their urine, because they would be suspended or fired if they were to use the restroom at any other time than their Break time. Many of the women got infections due to this. And that's only one example. He has many more, such as one where the current administration ordered called the shipping of toys from Asia an issue of national security, and told dock workers, who were threatening to strike, that he would send in federal soldiers to crush the strike on behalf of the shipping companies. There is so much information, analyzed in such a new way, I can't wait to actually read the book, and not just watch his remarks on Book-TV.

Now, considering Bin Laden, I have only one solution.

Leave Israel.

It is the entire reason Bin Laden hates, or at least the only plausible reason, is our support of Israel. Arab sentiment on this is much stronger than Bush would have us believe. 75% of Al Qaeda leaders have been brought to justice.

Great. Now, just have to deal with the fact that Al Qaeda isn't a centrally defined group, but more like a confederation of radical Islamist cells in different countries. Recruitment, by all accounts, is up for such terrorist organizations.
They are training new leaders as we kill them.

What is wrong? It is to me, the fact that people define themselves as an 'American', or 'Patriot', or by any label. Everything one does effects someone else, and vice versa. We must not ask how it effects us, but how it effects everyone. The world is now smaller than it has ever been, yet it hasn't ever been this divided.

We must pray for God's will, not ours. I can't say for sure, but I don't think God would consider anyone better or more pertinent because of their country of origin or birth, or where one holds citizenship.

What's wrong is radical Islam itself. When that is changed one way or the other the problem will be solved. As one Islamic leader said recently, "Not all Muslims are terrorists but one has to admit all terrorists are Muslim." Islam has az 1400 year record of terror. They have overwhelmed nation upon nation and the only thing that has ever stopped them is enough counter force to drive them back. It would make no difference to the radicals whether we left them alone or not they would still come after us.

One solution though which is intriging: Take our hands off of Israel and let them clean house on the radicals.

Here's the challenge: If all Christians were to go to the Middle East and South Asia and were able to find all of the Muslim leaders who want to kill people and we all offered the forgiveness of Christ to them for their violent ways then their behavior might be curbed. Short of that I think we must keep up the pressure.

For those who disagree with this policy I suggest you put your families in harms way. Please, don't volunteer mine.

Dan L