I ran across this article after hearing news of this new al-Qaeda audio tape today. Be careful when you read through this as there is a racial slur quoted (sarcasm). If this wasn't so pathetic I'd find it laughable since Hamas has officially endorsed The One (I've made several posts on that subject). I reckon that the terrorist community have mixed feelings about what to think of America's first black (or, possibly,
mixed-race?; if that's not a racist term...
I did hear it used recently on television by British comedian Frank Skinner) President; The Obama.
This story is from Rueters and, as usual, all emphasis is my own:
Qaeda scorns Obama with racial slur and urges attacks
Wed Nov 19, 2008 3:16pm EST
By Randall Mikkelsen
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Al Qaeda's deputy leader accused Barack Obama of betraying his race and his father's Muslim heritage on Wednesday and urged more attacks, as the group tried to counter the incoming U.S. president's global popularity.
Osama bin Laden's second-in-command Ayman al Zawahri attacked Obama as a "house Negro," a racially-charged term used by 1960s black American Muslim leader Malcolm X to describe black slaves loyal to white masters.
"You represent the direct opposite of honorable black Americans like ... Malcolm X," Zawahri said in al Qaeda's English translation of his remarks. It was al Qaeda's first high-level commentary on Obama's election on November 4.
Zawahri criticized Obama's support for Israel and plans to send more U.S. troops to Afghanistan, where he said they were destined to fail. He called on Islamist fighters to keep striking a "criminal" United States until it withdraws from Muslim lands.
U.S. officials and analysts, alert for signs of an attack in the period leading up to the transfer of presidential power on January 20, said there was no sign of an imminent threat.
They cast Zawahri's message as an attempt to shift al Qaeda's focus from U.S. President George W. Bush and maintain an enmity against the United States among its supporters.
"They're faced with what is by any accounting a change in this country," said one U.S. counterterrorism official who asked not to be identified.
"The way they're dealing with the change represented by the election of an African American as president of the United States is to insist that nothing has changed," he said.
Obama's transition office declined to comment.
His election was greeted with broad hope in the Middle East, where relations with Arabic countries were deeply strained under Bush.
Daniel Benjamin, a counterterrorism official under former President Bill Clinton, said Obama's election on a platform of breaking with Bush policies was a boost to American "soft power," or nonmilitary international influence.
"I think they (al Qaeda) are deeply threatened by the fact there is a new American president and that he has come to office saying he wants to have a more constructive relationship with the one billion Muslims in the world."
Zawahri, he said, "feels like he has a competitor for the hearts and minds."
Zawahri referred to Obama's father, who was raised Muslim but became an atheist. Obama is a practicing Christian. "You were born to a Muslim father, but you chose to stand in the ranks of the enemies of the Muslims," Zawahri said.
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The rest of the story:
http://www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSTRE4AI47X20081119
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