Jihad: A Worldwide Criminal Enterprise

I don’t know when it first dawned on me that the study of history was the study of a worldwide criminal enterprise, but a look back at just the last century reveals that the Nazis had it in mind to control and loot all of Europe, while the Empire of Japan sought to do the same with China and Pacific Basin nations.

If you go back in history, Pax Romana, imposed by the Roman Empire was, in essence, a huge extortion scheme in which the conquered nations paid Rome to “protect” them and provide some good roads. If you come forward to our times, for some seventy years until 1991, the Soviet Union basically plundered its captive nations in the Baltics and elsewhere until it fell apart due to the inability to do anything in a rational and productive manner. The examples are endless and the most recent is the massive United Nations “Oil for Food” rip-off of billions of dollars intended to benefit the people of Iraq, but which Saddam kept or used to bribe the French and others.

I got to thinking about this as I read “Funding Evil” by Rachel Ehrenfeld ($14.95, Bonus Books softcover); an extraordinary book about the way the Islamic Jihad is funded largely through the sale of narcotics and a variety of other criminal schemes. It also derives much of its funding from donations to “charities”, mostly by and from Saudis, the worst perpetrators of Wahabi fundamentalism on the face of the Earth.

Think about this, however. The whole justification for Islam is that it is morally superior to all other religions. The Saudis and their Middle Eastern brethren are forever denouncing America, Israel, and the West in general as dens of iniquity, places of corruption where pornography is rampant, people gather to drink and to dance together, casual sex is the norm, and just about everything else we do needs the curative effects of Sharia (Islamic) law.

May I suggest that any religion that funds worldwide terrorism to advance the destruction of Judaism, Christianity and all other religions, and to attack the citadel of liberty and freedom, the United States of America, is the new criminal enterprise that has replaced those of the past? They do this through the worldwide sales of illegal narcotics and other schemes. Moreover, they are funded as well by the billions Americans, Europeans, and other nations spend to acquire their only legitimate natural resource, oil.

The appalling hypocrisy of this seems to have escaped many otherwise law-abiding Muslims, but it is increasingly clear that the relentless terrorism which they claim is intended to advance Islam is wearing thin. So much of it has been directed against other Muslims that it was only a matter of time before the illogic of this began to set in. In addition, there appears to be evidence that, throughout the Middle East, the universal, human desire to live in freedom, under a system of laws that provide human rights and real justice, is beginning to manifest itself.

If you think about it, Iraq was a criminal enterprise run by the family and cronies of Saddam Hussein. Syria and Lebanon, under the control of the Assad family, is yet another example. Iran, under the control of its mullahs, poses yet another threat as it pours its wealth into various terrorist organizations.

When one looks at the Middle East, one sees nation after nation controlled by oligarchies passing themselves off as monarchs, mullahs, or we see warlords in places like the Sudan and Somalia running the show. Egypt is, for all intents and purposes, a dictatorship, as is, of course, Libya. Under the control of Arafat, the so-called Palestinian cause was little more than a way to line his pockets. Much of Africa is a sinkhole of corruption.

The greatest legacy George W. Bush and the much-maligned “neo-cons” in his administration will leave behind is a transformed Middle East.

Ehrenfeld has provided a detailed look at the billions being spent by the Saudis in particular and the Islamists in general. For anyone who wants to gain an insight to the scope of the Jihadist war, this book is required reading. “A significant portion of the financing of many terrorist organizations stems from the illegal drug trade,” says Ehrenfeld and then she meticulously documents how it stretches from Afghanistan to South America.

Along the way she notes that, “It was bin Laden who had managed the drug profits (from Afghanistan’s production of Heroin) for the Taliban and arranged money laundering operations with the Russian Mafia.” She traces the drug trade, its Islamic producers and distributors, to Uzbekistan, through the Balkans, and to yet another center, South America where a “lawless jungle corner of Argentina, Brazil, and Paraguay is “the heart of Islamist terrorist activity in Latin America, and home to tens of thousands of Muslims, mainly from the Middle East.”

Jihad may be the justification for this criminality that includes every kind imaginable, but the driving force behind it and the on-going threat to peace and stability is traceable to the complete and utter corruption fostered by Saudi billions and the billions derived from the scourge of illegal drugs.

Do not be fooled by the presence of Saudi “charities”, some of which still function openly in the United States, nor the pretensions of groups such as al Qaeda, al Fatah, Hamas and Hizbollah. These are criminal enterprises whose purpose is to line the pockets of those who control them. The war against America, against Israel, and “the crusaders”, i.e., Christianity, is just a subterfuge for the power being exercised by Middle Eastern dictators and others who use Jihad as their excuse and Islam as their instrument.

Alan Caruba is the author of “Warning Signs” and his weekly commentaries are posted on www.anxietycenter.com, the Internet site of The National Anxiety Center.

© Alan Caruba, March 2005

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