We're only making more terrorists by fighting them...

... NOT! A recent Pew research study refutes that the general trend is that more and More Muslims all over the Muslim world are gathering to the Jihadist cause. Recently, it was said that while support for bombings and Bin Laden/Al-Queda increased in Jordan, generally in other Muslim countries such as Indonesia, Turkey, and Morocco, it has significantly dropped.

Support for Osama bin Laden and suicide bombings have fallen sharply in much of the Muslim world, according to a multicountry poll released on Thursday.

The survey by the Pew Research Center examined public opinion in six predominantly Muslim nations: Morocco, Pakistan, Turkey, Indonesia, Jordan and Lebanon. It also examined views in nine North American and European countries as well as in India and China. In all, more than 17,000 people were questioned either by telephone of face-to-face.

"There's declining support for terrorism in the Muslim countries and support for Osama bin Laden is declining. There's also less support for suicide bombings," said Pew Center director Andrew Kohut.

"This is good news, but still there are substantial numbers who support bin Laden in some of these countries," he told a news conference.

In Morocco, 26 percent of the public now say they have a lot or some confidence in bin Laden, down from 49 percent in a similar poll two years ago.

In Lebanon, where both Muslims and Christians took part in the survey, only 2 percent expressed some confidence in the Saudi-born al Qaeda leader, down from 14 percent in 2003.

In Turkey, bin Laden's support has fallen to 7 percent from 15 percent in the past two years. In Indonesia, it has dropped to 35 percent from 58 percent.

...

A similar picture emerged when respondents were asked whether suicide bombings were justifiable. In Morocco, 13 percent said they often or sometimes could be justified, down from 40 percent in 2004.

Unfortunately, not all of the countries polled had such a favorable outcome to their polls. In Jordan, sadly, "confidence in bin Laden, who took responsibility for the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States and many other attacks, rose to 60 percent from 55 percent." Also, Pakistan's stance on the issue is 51 percent favorable towards Bin Laden, as opposed to its previous 46 percent.

Thankfully, though, many countries see this terrorism as the evil it is:

Both in western countries and the Muslim world, respondents expressed fears about Islamic extremism.

Seventy-three percent in Morocco and 52 percent in Pakistan saw Islamic extremism as a threat to their country. The figure was 84 percent in Russia, 78 percent in Germany, and an identical 70 percent in Britain and the United States. The poll was taken well before last week's bombings in London.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20050714/ts_nm/
muslims_binladen_dc&printer=1;
_ylt=Ap_gAVoD1LZEgR9lC_MGgTtg.3QA;_ylu=
X3oDMTA3MXN1bHE0BHNlYwN0bWE-

There is much more work to be done if we are to win hearts and minds, of course. But to simply assume that the whole front for the US and the Western World to gain favor in comparison with Jihadists has been a failure because the US and others were fighting in Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere is pure uninformed silliness. Now, that being said, while I would not be surprised if these polls were a strong reflection of truth, I also have to admit that statistics are often very fuzzy in their collection of data, and often either merely reflect the biases of the pollsters, the takers' ignorance on the subject, and of course, the fact that one area or segment may, more often than not, be very different in views from the country as a whole. However, whether this poll ends up being 100% accurate or not is not entirely important if someone wishes to refute polls that may say the opposite of this poll. If this is a poll that does not truly represent with 100% accuracy the attitudes of the country, one can point out to an anti-war person that their poll may, in fact, be formed with such flaws as well. And if this poll is truly for the most part accurate, I doubt this will be seen anywhere in the Mainstream Press, who, along with the extreme Left and some of the Paleoconservatives and some libertarians, have succumbed to a certain nationalist-masochism where good news about our country is phased out and the bad news is hammered into people like there is no tomorrow.

This is a good sign. Progress is being made in getting the hearts and minds of more truly moderate Muslims in some countries, while others are slowly gaining more extreme views. We have done a good job, but as always, there is room for improvement. Of course, the more people the terrorists kill, the more they will be despised. Such viciousness does not gain fans when it is out in the open like what we've seen in London last week. Hopefully, this means that those worldwide who are not infected with Cranial-Rectal insertion will feel the push and gain the desire to call into question terrorists and their apologists.