MiamiHerald.com | 05/01/2006 | Bin Laden, al Qaeda losing support in Muslim world

MiamiHerald.com | 05/01/2006 | Bin Laden, al Qaeda losing support in Muslim world

It looks like campaign season is in full swing in the heart of the terrorist world. In just the last two weeks we have heard from Osama bin Laden, Abu Musab al Zarqawi and Ayman al Zawahri. Maybe it's election year. Maybe al Qaeda is about to hold primaries, and the ads filling the airwaves come from the candidates with the best fundraising machines, while the other candidates are working on their yard signs, roadside bombs and suicide belts.

Al Qaeda is going through a leadership crisis, and the tapes play a part in a furious political campaign. The tapes all carry the old standards about the evil crusaders. The wicked Zionists and even a Hindu-Zionist-Crusader alliance for a new geopolitical twist. But beneath the jihadist rhetoric, there are ''vote for me'' slogans playing in the background.

For years we've heard from the Bush administration claims that al Qaeda is ''on the run,'' because we're ''smoking them out'' and they're ''desperate.'' Despite being on the run, smoked out and desperate, they have continued blowing themselves up, along with hundreds of children, mothers, fathers and other assorted innocent civilians.

Slaughtering civilians may pass for success in the world of terrorists, whose peculiar theology holds that God rewards those who inflict suffering on the living. Success by the terrorists, however, started turning Muslims against al Qaeda very soon after September 11.

If al Qaeda played by democratic rules, Osama bin Laden would have been elected leader of the Muslim world on September 12. In my travels through Muslim areas in the first couple of years after 9/11, I saw bazaars filled with bin Laden T-shirts and heard Muslims, young and old, rich and poor, speak admiringly of the man. Al Qaeda, however, has not done a good job of holding on to its popularity.

Jihadist attacks against civilians in Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Indonesia, Jordan and, of course, Iraq, left a trail of heartbreak through the Muslim world and started turning Muslims everywhere against the group and its leader. A 2005 survey by the Pew organization showed support for terrorism and for bin Laden dropping precipitously among Muslims from the levels recorded in 2003. In some countries, bin Laden still held sway, but almost everywhere Pew looked it found support for bin Laden and his methods sliding steadily.

Terrorists, obviously, don't rule by democratic mandate. And even if their popularity ratings reach sub-Bush levels, they can still inflict much harm. Terrorist recruiters do extremely well in certain demographics, notably among psychopaths. That helps boost the blood flow, but it turns away popular support. And global jihad does require some degree of popular support. That's where Zarqawi and bin Laden have their problems.

When Zarqawi, one of the top recruits from the psychopath demo, started videotaping himself hacking the heads off his hostages, al Qaeda's popularity in Iraq began declining. Jihadists had hoped Iraq would become the epicenter of their new caliphate. But Zarqawi's tactics turned the Iraqi people fiercely against him and his movement. Bin Laden's deputy, al Zawahri, told Zarqawi to cool it in Iraq. And Zawahri was very possibly demoted.

Word began to spread that Zawahri had lost the leadership of al Qaeda in Iraq. A tape from al Zawahri, released on April 13, has the Egyptian doctor praising the ''beloved brother'' in Iraq; a clear political endorsement. But then came word from bin Laden, who has become so quiet lately that many wonder how much he even matters any more.

Bin Laden knows that his broad popular support comes from portraying the struggle as one against the West. The self-anointed defender of downtrodden Muslims spoke against international efforts to stop the genocide of Muslims in Darfur. An international force to stop the killing, he said absurdly, would constitute an assault on Islam; anything to stoke the party base and fire up the masses against the West.

But the Muslim masses are beyond getting fired up by al Qaeda. Bin Laden ''praised'' Zarqawi for taking a lower profile in Iraq. That sounds like a serious demotion for the man who aspires to succeed bin Laden as the next leader of the movement for a new caliphate.

Campaign season is on. The polls show overall support for al Qaeda dropping. But, as in every primary, the key vote comes from the party base. Even with low poll numbers, these committed activists can -- and will -- set off deadly fireworks.