Look, the whole "Great Satan" thing that ObL grabbed and ran with was invented by the rulers of the Islamic nations. The actual term comes from Iran, but the concept has been around for a long time.

And so has the reason for it. The Tsars did it; Hitler did it; every two-bit tyrant in the world does it. If they can point to them guys over yonder and say, "Those are the bad guys. They keep you poor. Hate 'em." it takes people's minds off the simple fact that they (the tyrants) could not, in fact, manage a lemonade stand with subsidies from Papa.

From full-blown support and encouragement in Saudi Arabia to tacit agreement in Egypt, _all_ of them use the tactic. Saddam is boisterous and defiant, the folks running Syria are sneaky and cruel, and the Iranians can't quite decide yet; Lebanon is still just a place on the map where people die, Pakistan would be halfway reasonable if India wasn't next door, and Indonesia is a dog's breakfast (or more accurately, what's left of one). All of them grab onto blaming the U.S. and/or Israel as an out for their own incompetence.

Now we have the Sons of Ibn Saud saying, oh, we miscalculated. F* em. Their "miscalculation" bought them Osama, who took what _they_ thought was a tactic to keep the people quiet and turned it into a political movement. If it wasn't for the fact that we've now declared we've got to hunt him down, I'd be tempted to offer ObL the throne of Saudi Arabia; at least he'd be where we could see him.

The Palestinians are a flag, a bloody shirt to wave; _nobody_ but the United States gives a damn about the Palestinians.

I would instruct every diplomat assigned to an Islamic country to respond to every question, pleasantry, or conversational gambit with the phrase, "Israel will continue to exist." Followed by whatever the actual topic was... If we could just get that concept planted in their minds, we might be able to move forward.