The Looming Tower
Have recently finished the acclaimed “The Looming Tower” by Lawrence Wright which is a history of Islamic radical fundamentalism beginning in the 1930’s and 40’s and ending with the bombing of the World Trade Center. Including the ridiculous and ultimately tragic machinations of the CIA and FBI, it reads like an unbelievable novel…and it left me drained and feeling hopeless.
The Christian Science Monitor reported today that Al-Qaida said in its monthly magazine posted on an Islamic web site that “cutting oil supplies to the United States, or at least curtailing it, would contribute to the ending of the American occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan.” The group said it was making the statements as part of Osama bin Laden’s declared policy. It was not possible to verify independently that the posting was from the terror faction, said the Monitor.
Al-Qaida claimed responsibility for last year’s attacks on oil installations in Saudi Arabia and Yemen after bin Laden called on militants to stop the flow of oil to the West. The group also was behind the 2002 attack on a French oil tanker that killed one person in the Gulf of Aden, according to the paper.
Also reported today was that Egypt has arrested nearly 80 members of the Muslim Brotherhood.
What really frightened me recently was the sight of a young artist, on his knees in front of Santo Domingo, working on a gigantic poster of Bin Laden. It was never put up because the next day the PFP routed and burned the planton in the Santo Domingo Plaza.
Tags: Egypt, Mexico, Middle East, Reading, Terrorism, World Watching And Politics
Zoe
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