Islamo-Fascist Nationalist v. International Jihadists?

"Rift Grows Between al-Qaida, Muslim Groups" sayz Yahoo! News:

"When terrorists blew themselves up in Egypt's Sinai Peninsula this week, the radical Palestinian group Hamas quickly joined Arab governments and Western leaders in condemning a 'criminal attack against all human values.'

Egypt's banned Muslim Brotherhood called the bombings 'aggression on human souls created by God.'

The denunciations were unexpectedly harsh from the Islamic fundamentalist groups — Hamas has killed hundreds of Israeli civilians in suicide bombings, and the Brotherhood is determined to impose an Islamic government — but experts agree that radical Muslim organizations want to distance themselves from al-Qaida.

The widening rift largely has not been acknowledged among Western powers, who tend to lump Islamic radicals together. The U.S. list of 'Foreign Terrorist Organizations,' for example, puts al-Qaida with Hamas and the Lebanese-based Hezbollah.

Scholars of Islamic movements and some Western policy-makers, however, say distinctions now must be made between hard-line Islamist organizations and 'holy warrior' groups such as
Osama bin Laden's terror network.

'There is a fundamental difference between Islamic groups: Most are sociopolitical reformists, others are religious extremists,' said Dia'a Rashwan, an Egyptian expert on radical groups.

Hamas and Hezbollah, for example, have national agendas, he said. They want to reorganize society according to Sharia, or Islamic law.

Extremist religious movements such as al-Qaida are international revolutionaries who excoriate not only non-Muslims but also Muslims who fail to follow their views. Theirs is a holy war to spread their views among Muslims and to repel any 'infidel invasion' of Islamic lands.

'Branding these two branches of radicalism the same way, as terrorist organizations, reflects a complete misunderstanding of the issue,' he said.

Rashwan said the confusion was a 'fatal mistake' of the Bush administration in its war on terror.

He said that to fight an enemy, one had to define it correctly: 'America doesn't, and this is why it is losing the war on terrorism.'

U.S. policy makers and the State Department did not respond to requests by The Associated Press for comment."

Dia'a Rashwan's distinction between Islamofascist terrorists like Hamas and like Al Qaeda makes sense. Hamas and Hezbollah, while murdering innocents through terrorism, haven't acted in any theater beyond the Middle East. Al Qaeda has certainly struck at US interests throughout the world, as well as her allies in the Middle East and beyond. It makes sense to respond differently to these terrorist affiliates based on their different MO and raison d'etre.

I part company with Mr. Rashwan's appraisal of the War on Terror. While the US government has perpetuated a costly catagorical error in identifying the enemy, the US is hardly losing the war on Terror. Can Al Qaeda claim any significant victory since 9/11? Has Hamas fulfilled its charter and driven every Israeli jew into the sea? Has Hezbollah completely humiliated Israel and conquered Lebanan? Yes, the blood-lusters have had their day: Madrid, London, Jordan, Tel Aviv/Israel, the Sinai Peninsula. What have these senseless murders accomplished?

Totalitarian, global islamofascists are the willing and unwitting agents of the enemy that currently threaten the civilized world. If Hamas and their ilk do not represent a global threat, then let the West deal with them according to the most prudent and proportional response that they deserve. I simply want to see the day that Civilization awakens anf finally hurls all the TGIs onto the ash heap of history where they belong!