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Jewish World Review March 1, 2005 / 20 Adar I, 5765 Ignoring an assassination plot By Daniel Pipes
An American citizen trained by the Saudi government in Virginia will stand trial for plotting to assassinate the president of the United States and yet the media focus on allegations of torture? This debate wracks every Western country. Looking at the United States, the "united we stand" solidarity that followed September 11, 2001, lasted just some months, after which a much deeper divide emerged as conservatives proved far more profoundly affected by the atrocities than did liberals. The result has been the growing political acrimony of the past three years. Many examples illustrate this divide. For the most recent, take the argument concerning Ahmed Omar Abu Ali between the conservative Bush administration and its mostly liberal critics. Born in the United States to immigrant Jordanian parents, Abu Ali, 23, was indicted last week of plotting the assassination of President George W. Bush. The prosecution asserts he was in touch with Al-Qaeda and in 2002 discussed ideas of eliminating Bush by getting "close enough to the president to shoot him on the street" or by deploying a car bomb. Abu Ali's biography indicates how he might have ended up as an Al-Qaeda operative. He attended the Islamic Saudi Academy in Alexandria, Virginia, graduating in 1999 as class valedictorian. As an outpost of Saudi values on American soil, the academy enjoys Saudi government funding, is chaired by the Saudi ambassador in Washington, and boasts a curriculum imported straight from Riyadh. Thus, the first grade teachers' guide at the Islamic Saudi Academy instructs that Christianity and Judaism are false religions. When one realizes that the curriculum is overseen by Saleh Al-Fawzan, who in 2003 endorsed the institution of slavery, this comes as less than a grand shock. While still living in the United States, Abu Ali developed ties to the "paintball jihadists" of northern Virginia, nine of whom have served time in jail. In 2000, he went to study Islam at its source, at the Islamic University of Medina. In May 2003, a terrorist attack in Riyadh left 34 dead, 9 of them Americans; a month later, the Saudis arrested Abu Ali for connections to this crime, incarcerating him until his recent transfer to the United States. Conservatives focus on the hair-raising news that an Al-Qaeda affiliate had plans to kill the president of the United States. Liberals hardly note this development, focusing instead on the question of whether, while in Saudi custody, Abu Ali was tortured (Justice Department officials call this an "utter fabrication"). Note the editorials in four northeastern newspapers: These liberal analysts evince no concern that an American citizen trained by the Saudi government in Virginia will stand trial for plotting to assassinate the president. They decline to explore the implications of this stunning piece of news. They offer no praise to law enforcement for having broken a terrorism case. Instead, they focus exclusively on evidentiary procedures. They know only civil liberties; national security does not register. But, as British prime minister Tony Blair correctly writes, "there is no greater civil liberty than to live free from terrorist attack." To strike a proper balance, Westerners must ask themselves what happens in case of error about the Islamist threat. Mistakes enhancing national security leave innocents spending time in jail. Mistakes enhancing civil liberties produce mass murder and perhaps a Taliban-like state (with its near absence of civil liberties). Which emphasis, dear reader, do you choose?
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JWR contributor Daniel Pipes is director of the Middle East Forum.
© 2005, Daniel Pipes
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