{"id":3275,"date":"2010-08-19T12:59:22","date_gmt":"2010-08-19T19:59:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/josemarquez.com\/xsml\/?p=3275"},"modified":"2010-08-19T12:59:22","modified_gmt":"2010-08-19T19:59:22","slug":"who-benefits-from-holy-war-the-extremists-on-both-sides","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.josemarquez.com\/etc\/2010\/08\/19\/who-benefits-from-holy-war-the-extremists-on-both-sides\/","title":{"rendered":"Who benefits from &#8220;holy war&#8221;? The extremists on both sides."},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Josh Marshall <a href=\"http:\/\/www.talkingpointsmemo.com\/archives\/2010\/08\/bin_ladens_willing_accomplices.php\">points out<\/a> that the anti-Islamic fear mongering being perpetrated by right-wing activists is hurting America&#8217;s counter-terrorism efforts. He concludes: &#8220;the furor of opposition to the Cordoba House project and the spasm of Islamophobia is the best recruiting tool that bin Laden and his imitators could possibly hope for.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Marshall implies that the activists slandering Muslims are unwittingly aiding and abetting Islamists and terrorists. I&#8217;m not sure it&#8217;s entirely unintentional \u2013\u00a0or, at least, undesirable. <\/p>\n<p>Those who benefit from &#8220;holy war&#8221;, whether actual or rhetorical, politically, in terms of fund-raising or marketing,  have an active interest in escalation and provocation. <\/p>\n<p>Bin Laden isn&#8217;t just a recruitment tool for Al Qaeda and like terrorist groups. He&#8217;s also a recruitment tool for those who would claim him as a political adversary \u2013\u00a0in distinction from those who view him, instead, as a marginal sociopath, failed leader and criminal on the run.<\/p>\n<p>The stronger Bin Laden appears, politically, the more attractive certain right wing policies and candidates seem.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Josh Marshall points out that the anti-Islamic fear mongering being perpetrated by right-wing activists is hurting America&#8217;s counter-terrorism efforts. He concludes: &#8220;the furor of opposition to the Cordoba House project and the spasm of Islamophobia is the best recruiting tool that bin Laden and his imitators could possibly hope for.&#8221; Marshall implies that the activists&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5,13],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.josemarquez.com\/etc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3275"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.josemarquez.com\/etc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.josemarquez.com\/etc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.josemarquez.com\/etc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.josemarquez.com\/etc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3275"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.josemarquez.com\/etc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3275\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.josemarquez.com\/etc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3275"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.josemarquez.com\/etc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3275"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.josemarquez.com\/etc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3275"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}