Radical Militants on Planet al-Qaeda Wanted Bush to Win US Election

Georges Malbrunot, one of two French journalists recently released by radical Muslim fundamentalists in Iraq, spoke to CNN on Friday:

Malbrunot quoted his captors as saying Bush's re-election "would improve our ability to fight . . . We vote for Bush because Bush help us a lot by intervening in Afghanistan. So, from that point we could spread all over the world and we are now in 60 countries," Malbrunot cited one of the militants as saying on October 15, two weeks before Bush defeated Democrat John Kerry. Malbrunot, 41, quoted the same militant as saying: "Our main targets are Saudi Arabia and Egypt. And because of Bush, if he is re-elected, we are sure that American soldiers will remain in Iraq for years."

Malbrunot said that the group that held him was not Iraqi nationalists but rather internationalist jihadis and that he felt as though he were on Planet Bin Laden while in captivity.

Actually, that the radical Muslim fundamentalists much preferred that Bush win was self-evident, since Bin Laden and his fellow travellers want to sharpen contradictions between the Muslim world and the West. It is in that extreme polarization that they know they will find the best chance to pose as champions of Islam and ultimately to take over. They know very well that Bush has decided to make a long-term US push into the Muslim world, involving probably several wars and more occupations. If Bush had stopped with Afghanistan and rebuilt the country properly, he could have dealt a death blow to al-Qaeda. By occupying Iraq militarily, he has given al-Qaeda unprecedented access to the Sunni Arabs (and some Kurds and Turkmen) of Iraq. They hope to use this new base not only to roil Iraq but ultimately to throw Saudi Arabia into turmoil, as well. It is not that far from Mosul to Jidda, where al-Qaeda recently attacked the US consulate in revenge for the assault on Fallujah. Three years ago, an al-Qaeda attack on a US consulate in Saudi Arabia would have horrified most Saudis. Now? I'm not so sure.