Why Al Qaeda is Different

Today’s terrorist attacks in London are another reminder on why we have to fight the war on terror was different from the past. Before the rise of Al Qaeda in the nineties, terrorism, though horrible, mostly followed a fairly predictable pattern. Terrorists would Hi-jack planes, kill some hostages, demand that their fellow terrorists be freed and have some political demands. Then the bombings started, small bombs designed to get media attention. The demands were always the same. Get Israel out of Israel, free terrorists in jail and some cash to boot.

Most of the terrorists from the seventies and eighties were of the anti Israel variety, they had a common goal of advancing the Palestinian cause. This is not the case with today’s Al Qaeda terrorist network. The underlying goal of Al Qaeda as stated in the Al Qaeda Training Manuel is “The overthrow of the godless regimes and their replacement with an Islamic regime.” This is different in the fact that they do not wish to carve out their own state and then rule that state, they will never consider the Jihad over until they have changed all the worlds nations over to Islam. This view is not one of all Muslims, but it is the primary view of the terrorists, the militant extremists that will not rest until dead or until they have converted everyone.

Al Qaeda is set to this goal and as they declare in the training manual ”…an Islamic government would never be established except by the bomb and rifle. Islam does not coincide or make a truce with unbelief, but rather it confronts it”. we can see that there will be no compromise nor any peace unless the world converts to these few peoples beliefs. It is a scared Duty of Islam to convert non-believers, as it is with most religions; however there is a huge difference between convincing someone to convert and forcing them to.

We will not have peace as long as Al Qaeda is allowed to operate. We will not have peace if we try and placate terrorists. Al Qaeda is different in they have larger and more unobtainable demands than any terrorists before them.