HOME :: PUBLICATIONS :: Exclusive: France and Al Qaeda’s War of Words, by W. THOMAS SMITH, JR.

Exclusive: France and Al Qaeda’s War of Words

by W. THOMAS SMITH, JR. July 30, 2010
Both France and Al Qaeda issued public statements about each other, Tuesday.
 
First, Al Qaeda’s number two man, Ayman al-Zawahiri, whined about France’s recent move to ban Islamic face veils.
 
“What France is doing, which is spreading across Europe and the West, should prompt us to hold on to our true religion in face of their deviant ideologies,” Zawahiri said in a previously recorded segment posted on an Islamist website.
 
In other words, Zawahiri is upset because Muslims might not be able to have things their way in a country that does not belong to them in the first place (Though France and so many other Western nations – including Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands, Spain, the UK, and, yes, the U.S. and Canada to name a few – have foolishly allowed their Muslim populations to expand and thrive to the point that those terrorist-sympathizing populations are now pushing with some success for the establishment of freedom-crippling Sharia law within the host countries.).
 
The same day Zawahiri was crying about hijabs, niqabs, and burqas; France’s prime minister Francois Fillon declared, "We are at war with al-Qaeda," after the terrorist group murdered 78-year-old French aid worker Michel Germaneau and after French commandos launched an unsuccessful raid against an al-Qaeda base in the northwestern portion of Africa’s Sahel belt in an attempt to rescue Germaneau.
 
At any rate, “good” on France. The country’s newfound commitment – or recommitment – to fighting the Jihadists is a first-and-ten for the West. I know, a few cynics and realists are rolling their eyes at Fillon’s bold declaration, and who hasn’t heard the jokes about French military prowess? But let's not forget, France produced the likes of William the Conqueror, Napoleon, Michel Ney (Napoleon's "bravest of the brave"), Joachim Murat, the Légion Étrangère (the French Foreign Legion), France’s paratroopers, the World War II French Resistance, and our own Marquis de Lafayette, Comte d'Estaing, and Comte de Rochambeau.
 
So as long as al-Zawahiri concerns himself with women’s fashion, and the French prime minister is sounding the call to arms, that’s a good thing.
 
FamilySecurityMatters.org Contributing Editor W. Thomas Smith Jr. is a former U.S. Marine infantry leader and shipboard counterterrorism instructor, who writes about military/defense issues and has covered conflict in the Balkans, on the West Bank, in Iraq and Lebanon. Visit his website at uswriter.com.

W. Thomas Smith Jr. is director of the Counterterrorism Research Center of the Family Security Foundation. He is is an author, New York Times bestselling editor, columnist, war correspondent, military analyst, field-grade officer in the S.C. Military Dept., former SWAT team officer in the nuclear industry, and former U.S. Marine rifle-squad leader and shipboard counterterrorism instructor, Smith writes about military/defense issues and has covered conflict in the Balkans, on the West Bank, in Iraq and Lebanon. He is the author of six books, and his articles have appeared in USA Today, George, U.S. News & World Report, BusinessWeek, National Review Online, CBS News, Townhall.com, The Washington Times, and others.



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