![]() ![]() They display an intolerant exclusiveness, and a belligerent sense of supremacy vis-à-vis the other. The theologically-based attitudes of these Muslim puritans are fundamentally at odds not only with a Western way of life, but also with the very idea of an international society or the notion of universal human values. This intellectual trap is easy to fall into when we deal with the theology of Osama Bin Laden, the Taliban, the Wahhabis of Saudi Arabia, and the Jihad organizations. We seem to project onto the other everything we like to think that we are not. The terrorist attacks are symptomatic of a clash between Judeo-Christian civilization, with its values of individual freedom, pluralism, and secularism, and an amoral, un-Westernized, so-called “authentic Islam.” Indeed, Islamic civilization is associated with the ideas of collective rights, individual duties, legalism, despotism, and intolerance that we associated with our former civilizational rival, the Soviet bloc. Islamic values, they say, are fundamentally at odds with Western liberal values. ![]() Others were confirmed in their belief that we face a great struggle between civilizations. For most Americans, the utter indifference to the value of human life and the unmitigated hostility to the United States shown by some Muslims came as a great shock. ![]() The terrorist attacks on New York City and the Pentagon have focused public attention on the state of Muslim theology. ![]()
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