Posted on 11/21/2003 1:55:19 PM PST by presidio9
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (Reuters) - Fired by promises of Paradise, Muslim militants have turned Islam's traditional month of piety, Ramadan, into a bloody season of death and destruction.
And some analysts, expecting militants to intensify their attacks as Ramadan draws to a close, fear that the worse is yet to come. The lunar month is expected to end early next week.
Suicide bomb attacks have ripped through the Middle East from Turkey to Saudi Arabia during the holy month, killing at least 133 people and wounding hundreds more.
The toll includes the devastating attack on the International Red Cross building in Baghdad, a suicide bombing at a housing compound in Riyadh, Saturday's attacks on two synagogues in Istanbul and Thursday's strikes on British interests in the same city.
"They (militants) were told that particularly the end of Ramadan should be the period of jihad and the period of rebirth of jihad," said Roland Jacquard, head of the Paris-based International Observatory on Terrorism, referring to militant leaders.
Muslims see the last 10 days of the month as particularly auspicious as the Koran was revealed to Prophet Mohammad on the Night of Power, or Lailat al Qadr, which falls during that time.
The bloodiest attacks have been blamed on Saudi-born Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda terror network, which has put the world on edge with its vows to send more "cars of death" into the United States, Japan, Italy, Britain, Australia and Muslim countries.
Abdullah al-Otaibi, politics professor at Riyadh's King Saud University, told Reuters attacks in Ramadan were highly prized, adding he feared more possible violence, especially in Saudi Arabia which is battling a surge in Islamist attacks.
"What they are doing -- according to their own discourse -- is considered a form of worship and piety. And when it's combined with Ramadan that's the ultimate," he said.
"They don't usually look for soft targets, but to do it in Ramadan they did."
While Islam strictly forbids suicide attacks and the killing of noncombatants, analysts and Islamists say the heightened religious fervor of Ramadan appears to encourage extremism.
Ramadan is the holiest month of the Islamic calendar, when practicing Muslims abstain from food, drink and sex from dawn to dusk -- a discipline aimed at bettering Muslims' souls.
But in ancient and modern Islamic history, Ramadan has also been a time of great victories for Muslim armies.
Muslims believe that the dead are guaranteed access to heaven during the holy month as the gates of hell are shut.
"According to Islam there is greater blessing in becoming a martyr during Ramadan. There is greater reward in the after-life," said Sheikh Abdullah al-A'ali, a Bahraini cleric and member of the Gulf state's parliament.
In the Middle East, Ramadan comes this year at a time of despair and bitterness for Muslims who witnessed the fall of Iraq, a Muslim country, into "infidel" U.S. hands.
Islamists said this anger against the West, in addition to the spiritual incentive Ramadan provides, had helped fuel a frenzy of violence during the month.
"Ramadan is a catalyst that encourages terror attacks," said prominent Saudi writer Dawood al-Shirian. "But these attacks were there before and they will continue after the month ends."
Some experts dismissed the idea that Ramadan had anything to do with the rise in violence, saying militant groups such as al Qaeda did not need a special time to strike.
"I don't think that the holy occasions are affecting the schedule of those militants," said Mohsen al-Awajy, a moderate Saudi Islamist who was jailed for opposing the government.
"There are just three days left in Ramadan. I think al Qaeda is more dangerous than to concentrate just on those days."
A particularly idiotic statement from the press.
Don't be so sure. It might not ;)
As if there were some other outcome possible?
BTW, I loved that line.
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