David S. New - Holy War: The Rise of Militant Christian, Jewish and Islamic Fundamentalism

McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers
Jefferson, North Carolina, and London

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e-ISBN: 978-1-4766-0391-9

2002 David S. New. All rights reserved

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying or recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

Cover photograph 2001 Photodisc

McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers
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On September 11, 2001, the twin towers of New York Citys World Trade Center succumbed to a terrorist attack, presumably by Muslim fundamentalists. Thousands of people, most of whom likely knew virtually nothing about Islam and harbored no dislike for Muslims, died. American president George W. Bush asked, Why did this happen? Why do these people hate Americans? We are good people.

To Muslim fundamentalists, however, the United States is the leader of a Western culture that is the very embodiment of evil. As a prominent symbol of this culture, the World Trade Center became a logical target.

To understand this madness we need to understand religious fundamentalism. Just as there are Muslim fundamentalists, there are Christian and Jewish fundamentalists, some with terrorist plans of their own. The acts of September 11 were a response to, among other things, such plans.

This book is an account of Christian and Jewish terrorist plans, of the recent rise of Christian, Jewish, and Muslim fundamentalisms and how they are interacting to endanger peace in the Middle East and the world.

For some time apocalypticist fundamentalistsChristians in America, Jews in Israel and Americahave been working together, in the hope of hastening the coming of the Messiah, to bring about a Holy War to end all Holy Warsnuclear Armageddon in the Middle East. They have been attempting to provoke and draw out a violent Muslim fundamentalist response. As September 11 witnessed, their endeavors have clearly begun to bring forth fruit.

The Middle East is a powder keg awaiting a lighted match. Religious fundamentalism is that lighted match. Religious extremism and polarization are on the increase both in the United States and in the Middle East, and some political scientists think we truly are headed for a nuclear Armageddon. The ash point is Temple Mount, the site of Islams third most holy shrine, believed by Jews to be the locus of their ancient Temple. Jewish fundamentalists want to destroy the mosques on Temple Mount and rebuild the Temple. Christian apocalypticists are nancing and supporting their efforts.

The mosques on Temple Mount are the very soul of Islam, the symbolic equivalent of the World Trade Center. Destruction of the mosques would rally Muslims the world over behind the extremists who vow to annihilate Israel. But Israel is not going to disappearmemories of the Holocaust are too fresh. Israel would use its nuclear weapons if necessary.

Russian intelligence conrms that Osama Bin Laden, head of the terrorist Muslim network al-Qaida, has nuclear weapons, obtained in a trade for heroin with the Chechnyan maa. The Harvard Center for International Affairs ran a simulation game regarding Temple Mount and concluded that if the mosques are destroyed World War III will follow. Experts believe that the possibility of nuclear weapons being used is the greatest since the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962.

A professor of political science at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and fellow at the Center for International Development and Conict Management says that Temple Mount is the most volatile spot in the Middle East, perhaps in the whole world. A former deputy mayor of Jerusalem fears the apocalyptic dimensions of Temple Mount.

All of this sounds unbelievable, madfor religious fundamentalism is madness to those on the outside. So in this book we go inside, to understand the fundamentalist mind, what fundamentalists want to do and why.

We begin with the story of one group of Christian apocalypticists and the religious excitement surrounding the new millennium, and then go back in time to trace the recent history of Christian apocalypticism, noting how the dawning of the nuclear age in 1945 and the 1967 Six Day War in the Middle East gave impetus to this contemporary religious phenomenon. For the rst time in almost two thousand years the Jews were in possession of the holy Mount. Surely Christs return was imminent.

The burgeoning, yet hidden, culture of Christian fundamentalism has entered American politics, exerting a potent inuence on the foreign policy of the United States with respect to the Middle East. In considering this inuence this book focuses on three gures: Jerry Falwell, Ronald Reagan, and Pat Robertsonall ardent apocalypticists.

The astounding political success of these three demonstrates the powerful inuence of Christian fundamentalism in America. Forty-four percent of Americans now believe in a biblical Armageddon, and one American in three believes the Second Coming will occur within a few decades. American fundamentalists believe it is Gods will and command that we ght a nuclear Armageddon. Few people knew that Ronald Reagan, as his biographer notes, was hooked on Armageddon. As president he made secret plans for a nuclear war. Fundamentalists believed Reagans presidency would hasten Jesus return. Pat Robertson says God speaks to him: I have chosen you to usher in the coming of my Son. Robertson is a political genius. Political scientists say he has the most powerful political organization in America and that he is on the verge of seizing control of the Republican Party.

Falwell, Reagan, and Robertson are only the tip of the iceberg. This book traces the support and nancial assistance rendered by other American Christian apocalypticistsindividuals and organizationsin the promotion and subsidizing of terrorist acts by Israeli Jewish fundamentalists who wish to promote Holy War and the coming of their Messiah. The groundwork has already begun for the rebuilding of the Temple that will stand on the ground now occupied by the two mosques. Several minor failed attempts to destroy the mosques have already taken place.

Muslim fundamentalists are more aware of these facts than secular Americans. Osama Bin Laden and others like him are responding with a new type of warfare. That warfare gives small groups leverage against military giants like the United States. It is terrorism, the terrorism of Holy Warwar to the bitter end, a war where suicide has its religious reward.

The recent surge in the three religious fundamentalisms occurs within an increasingly nervous political environment in the Middle East. Separate chapters in this book are devoted to Israels nuclear program and political psychology, and to the fact that nuclear weapons are leaving the new nation-states resulting from the breakup of the former Soviet Union and nding their way to Islamic nations and Islamic terrorists. Nuclear terrorism is thought to be the wave of the future. These ingredients present a dangerous mix even without the addition of apocalypticist efforts. The book concludes with a possible futurea nightmare scenario, the self-fulllment of apocalypticist dreams.