Why You're Scared | Our deeply flawed numbers on the rise of terror.

i have to say that i'm not always impressed with zakaria's analysis. and this is no different. in a way, he's starting from a premise which presumes that the reason americans and other westerners are concerned about terrorism is because of the data he's referring to. he's begging that question and he never answers it.

including iraq war casualties in an overall statistical view of terrorism around the world is obviously problematic.

i did appreciate this quote:

An ABC/BBC poll in Afghanistan in 2007 showed support for the jihadist militants in the country to be 1 percent. In Pakistan's North-West Frontier province, where Al Qaeda has bases, support for Osama bin Laden plummeted from 70 percent in August 2007 to 4 percent in January 2008. That dramatic drop was probably a reaction to the assassination of Bena-zir Bhutto, but it points to a general trend in Pakistan over the past five years. With every new terrorist attack, public support for jihad falls.

and i think he has a point when he asks why these studies arent getting more play. but i think he's largely missing the point of the larger issue. first, i think it would be difficult for mainstream western media to present this information without implying that the war in iraq is helping to reduce global terrorism. second, there is still reason for westerners, especially americans, to be concerned that the kind of terrorism we're accustomed to seeing in israel, certain parts of southeast-central asia, and the rest of the middle east, is threatening to become a more frequent occurrence in the US. finally, as most of us know, terrorism in and of itself isnt the problem. terror attacks cannot be collected and dropped into a single box. different groups use different kinds of terrorism for different reasons. so i think that any study which focuses only on terror events is going to inherently lack sufficient meaning for explaining the issues and threats we face.

it's valid to say, i suppose, that terrorism in part is down because terrorists' time is occupied by the war in iraq, lending credence to the "fight em over there so we dont have to fight em over here" argument, flawed and ethnocentric and inhumane as that argument is. at the same time, since terror activities in iraq are frequent, what zakaria describes is going on in afghanistan in terms of how people exposed to "the jihad" are increasingly rejecting it, can also be happening in iraq.

still, the war in iraq is nothing but a diversion. once combat operations dwindle down, we're still going to have to deal with the fundamental problems which are causing extremists in the middle east and elsewhere to resort to terrorism to accomplish their goals. so while we may be seeing a decline in the past 5 years, thats hardly something we can hang our hat on. we are still expanding our empire in the middle east, we are still meddling with their commerce, and we are still supporting israel at the expense of palestinians. those are the issues which are causing groups to resort to terrorism, and until those issues are resolved, i see little reason to abandon or even decrease our concern about the safety of innocent people everywhere.

i would also like to say that 9/11 not only brought to american shores the fear of another domestic attack - it also raised the consciousness on the part of americans and other westerners for the plight of innocent civilians in other nations who are suffering as a result of our policies. not every group opposing what america is doing overseas is resorting to terrorism - and while we are seeing a positive trend in terms of how people in other countries view these "jihads," we still have to deal with the policies themselves.

zakaria is talking about research looking at a short period of time, during which the issues around which islamic terrorism has become so frequent have become complicated by the war, which is having huge impacts on many middle eastern countries. he goes into little detail about this fact, only talking about how the war statistics have skewed terror statistics. there are many other factors at work, and i dont think that such a short term study can really be used to make statements about the larger context of global terrorism and the west's reaction to it.

I agree. Zakarias is great, and I have been keeping an eye on him ever since he got appointed editor. In this case the misconception is blatant, and it is more boldness, integrity and civil courage to point it out, than it is cleverly discovering a flawed premise:

The Simon Fraser study points out that all three of these data sets have a common problem. They count civilian casualties from the war in Iraq as deaths caused by terrorism. This makes no sense.

We make the wars that create the terrorism. We then count the casualties of war as victims of terrorism, justifying more war. It has been taboo for ages, but it has been common knowledge for a couple of years, ever since the neocon cardhouse began to tumble. Zakarias says it without saying it directly:

Why have you not heard about studies like this or the one from Simon Fraser, which was done by highly regarded scholars, released at the United Nations and widely discussed in many countries around the world-from Canada to Australia? Because it does not fit into the narrative of fear that we have all accepted far too easily.

Watch zeitgeistmovie.com... Then ask yourself why the White House would want to inflate the numbers on terrorism as they have disengenuously asked to have done.

I've heard it said that, between Puerto Rican separatists, groups like the Weathermen, etc., that there was a lot more terrorism affecting the U.S. during the 1960s than there is today.

Of course, back then, the boogeyman of choice was communism, not terrorism.

Some key points.

1. The 9/11 atrocity kicked off the last 7 years of Zionist- and Bush-ite promoted anti-Arab anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, invasion, wars and US Alliance mass murder from Somalia to Waziristan. Yet former 7-year president of Italy, law professor, senator-for-life and intelligence intimate Professor Francesco Cossiga told a major Italian newspaper in 2007 that 9/11 was done by the US CIA and Israeli Mossad to assist US and Zionist hegemony and that his intelligence associates are well aware of this (see: former Italian president Professor Cossiga: US CIA & Israeli Mossad did 9/11 ).

2. The ACTUAL death statistics reveal the further extent of Zionist and Bush-ite terror hysteria lying (for details and documentation see: The big Lie. The falsity of Zionist, neocon & US Administration terror hysteria" ). Thus The actual annual risk to Western civilians of death from Muslim-origin non-state terrorists is of the same order as the annual risk of death from shark attack or lightning strike (1 in 4 million). The actual current annual risk to Jewish Israelis of death from Palestinian attack (2 in 100,000) is similar to the risk of death at the hands of a Jewish Israeli acquaintance or family member (1 in 100,000). In contrast, the "annual risk of excess death" in the Occupied Palestinian, Iraqi and Afghan Territories is 130 per 100,000 (Occupied Palestine), 890-1,190 per 100,000 (Occupied Iraq) and 2,100-4,200 per 100,000 (Occupied Afghanistan).

3. The COST of this Zionist and Bush-ite terror hysteria has been $3.5 TRILLION for the Bush War on Terror (US Economics Nobel Laureate Professor Joseph Stiglitz says that the Iraq War accrual cost of $3 Trillion has bankrupted the US) PLUS excess deaths (violent and non-violent avoidable deaths) in the Occupied Iraqi and Afghan Territories totalling 2 million and 3-7 million, SO FAR (see: Palestinian, Iraqi, Afghan, Biofuel and Climate Genocides – Silence Kills and Silence is Complicity ).

But the most significant, in the study's view, is the "extraordinary drop in support for Islamist terror organizations in the Muslim world over the past five years."

This is the headline, for me. Apart from saying to me that working with rather than against the muslim world is the best way forward, it also shows that despite Bush's pro-terror Iraq invasion, good sense can win.

Germany and Japan were both forcefully democratized.

Regardless of your numbers the fact remains that both countries represent successful forced democratization. Japan and Germany as they exist today are not fantasy.

Your numbers prove forced democratization as a primary means of globalizing democracy while plausible are not desirable. That does not automatically corroborate you're statement that forced democratization is a fantasy. It does support the statement that forced democratization of a global nature, undertaken single-handedly by the U.S., and or its' allies would take a long time and be very costly.

Generalizations are wonderful for getting a point across, as long as they stay within the bounds of being accurate.