Why They Hate Us
The nature of the enemy.

By Ray Takeyh, research fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and author of the upcoming Receding Shadow of the Prophet: Radical Islamic Movements on the Eve of the Twenty-first Century.
October 9, 2001 8:45 a.m.

ince the September 11th bombings, a persistent question that belabors Americans is why do they hate us so much? From the president to media outlets a chorus of voices has been at pains delineating between Osama bin Laden and Islam. The former is vengeful and pre-modern, the latter peaceful and tolerant. Such demarcations miss the point. Bin Laden and his cohort form a specific subculture of Islam that has been evolving in the murky terrain of Southwest Asia. This species of Islam views violence and terror as legitimate tools against the infidel West. As such, bin Laden is not an exceptional case but representative of a genre and a new radical religious movement.

While much of the international community's terrorism concerns have focused on the Arab world, Southwest Asia has eclipsed the Middle East as the epicenter of terrorism. During the past two decades, a pernicious subculture of religious radicalism has been permeating Pakistan's theological schools (madrassahs) that act as the country's primary system of education. Such schools feature fiery clerics exhorting the virtues of martyrdom, encouraging the exegesis of theological texts pledging celestial rewards for suicide bombings, and promising ample financial support coming from Saudi millionaires. The messages of militant Islam and the lure of scholarships made such schools attractive to the region's impoverished young seeking a sense of mission and a means of subsistence. Moreover, the student body was not limited to young Pakistanis but Afghans, Chechens, Chinese, Mongolians, and Central Asians. In turn, Pakistani-trained clerics and missionaries went forth into the former Soviet bloc and Eastern Europe to begin work among the Muslim populations. An international jihad movement was gestating beyond the glare of the international community that would soon be puzzled by the intensity and scope of the new claimants of radicalism.

Among the most illustrious graduates of these centers were the Taliban. Young men from the Afghan refugee camps schooled in Pakistan (the very term "Taliban" refers to their student origins) were infused with religious fervor and captivated by a leadership shrouded in mysticism who preached an ideal utopia that could be created in Afghanistan under the rule of righteousness. The disciplined cadres that were produced undertook a relentless and successful invasion of Afghanistan, ending up in control of some 90% of the country.

The victory of the Taliban in Afghanistan marked the first major triumph of this new form of "international jihad," combining the foot soldiers provided by displaced Afghan refugees, the combat and organizational experience of Middle Eastern Islamist fighters, logistical support from Pakistan's intelligence services, and funding from the wealthy members of the Gulf Arab princely class. Whatever their shortcomings, the Taliban and their Arab compatriots soon became the purveyors of a new model of revolutionary Islam whose ferocity would soon be eerily felt.

Into this inflamed arena stepped in the Saudi-born master terrorist Osama bin Laden and his terror network, al Qaeda. In a sense, bin Laden was part of a larger movement of Islamic radicals defeated and expelled from the Middle East, seeking a new venue for demonstrating their distaste for the United States and the moderate Arab regimes. However, bin Laden's wealth and charisma gave the movement of refugee radicals shape and content. The nexus between al Qaeda and Taliban is easily decipherable, as the two share an ideology and a sense of commitment. The more murky set of connections is the one between bin Laden and Pakistan's intelligence operatives who appreciated his assistance to their cause in Kashmir while the retired generals made ample money selling arms to bin Laden. A diverse and complex network based on ideological amity, strategic convenience, and profit motive was born and became the backbone of the most destructive if ill-understood subcultures of hate.

As such, America's enemies are not just the rulers of a strife-torn Afghanistan or a master terrorist, but a specific culture. In the coming weeks, the United States may militarily succeed in dislodging the Taliban from power and even assassinating bin Laden, but so long as the international jihad movement is alive, Americans are at risk. To combat this type of culturally based terrorism, the United States has to compel its allies, particularly, Pakistan, to close down the radical madrassahs and eliminate the financial network that sustains them. But the U.S. also has to move beyond dealing with generals and princes and compel the region's clergy that have long winked at their radical brethren who have used religion to legitimize suicide bombings and demonization of the West to move to the forefront of the antiterrorism struggle. Only the region's clergy can negate the theological arguments of the messengers of hate. If Islam is the sublime faith that Peter Jennings insists on, then this will be an easy task for the Muslim world's clerics.