After listening carefully to the tape, I realized that it is not just about one particular message as it was projected in the international media. Yes indeed, the most striking part was al Muhajir's statements about the results of the midterms elections in the US, and his direct threat against the White House. Without any doubt, to Americans today, this tape falls in the midst of their ongoing political transformations. And on that level, I will (later) provide a special reading of these statements. But the audiotape message included a revealing number of other important Jihadi issues, a real salad bowl. Here are the most salient ones:different concerns have been sawed to each other, with a variety of tones. Moreover, it is easy to realize the initial taping has been edited. His passion would explode mostly when the issues has to do with intra-Jihadist or intra Islamic issues, and his reading is faster when it is about the enemy, the infidels. The speech is a salad bowl from this perspective.
1) al Qaeda's penetration of American politics:
Interestingly, the message asks (American) politicians if they will implement their electoral promises to withdraw from Iraq. al Muhajir praises the choices by the voters of the enemy to "defeat Bush." More interestingly, he uses and American vocabulary by calling the War "stupid." Usually Jihadists calls it evil or infidel and rarely qualify it in secular "electoral" terms. But the most striking words used by a Jihadi commander is "lame duck." When I heard him uttering the words al-batta al arjaa' I realized he was off the classical Jihadi speech. The introduction of such words will certainly affect our reading of the speech (we will expand later on this particular point)
Al Muhajer, al Qaeda's commander in Iraq
2) Phonetics
The speech is definitely being read from a prepared text. Different subjects, with different concerns have been sawed to each other, with a variety of tones. Moreover, it is easy to realize the initial taping has been edited. His passion would explode mostly when the issues has to do with intra-Jihadist or intra Islamic issues, and his reading is faster when it is about the enemy, the infidels. The speech is a salad bowl from this perspective.
3) The intra-Islamic conflicts
They are of great concerns: The rise of Iranian-Shiite power, the Sunnis who are not joining his Jihad yet and the bad Arab regimes including the Hashemites of Jordan.
4) The allegiance to a higher commander in the region
Intriguing: al Muhajir, with great passion, committed 12,000 al Qaeda fighters to the "ameer al Mu'mineen" al Baghdadi. So, the Emir of al Qaeda in Iraq has pledged support to a regional "emir." Hence, the experts should be paying attention to the matter and watch for a transnational "Jihad chief" in the whole region.
5) Last but not least, from the whole speech, I begin to see that the final product is the result of two types of "material." On the one hand, the complex Jihadi jungle in the region with all the local stuff; and on the other hand Western-based (in this case American-based) Jihadist advice, relaying concepts not-native to the Iraqi Jihadists. Which explains the "salad bowl" structure of the speech and the use of alien political terms.
These and more items are very helpful in the continuous analysis of the Jihadi war of ideas against the West and the United States and the emerging war of ideas in the region.
Watch Dr Phares interview on MSNBC: "Lame Duck as a concept doesn't exist in Arabic. US based Jihadists are suggesting the use of these words to affect American politics. Download VIDEO_RM.IFO
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Dr Walid Phares is a Senior Fellow with the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies and the author of Future Jihad: terrorist Strategies against America
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