Islam's Hydra-Headed Monster

Al-Qaeda presents to the world as a venomous beast of hateful ideological/religious demonic power to terrify and to threaten death on a mass scale.  Those threats, allied with a number of scarifying successes electrified people into an existential fear that has been ameliorated over time, but which still resides deep in the consciousness of those whom the threats were and continue to be levelled against.

With the death of Osama bin Laden, the originator and main spokesman for al-Qaeda, there was some perceived relief at the knowledge that this man who inspired violent jihad as a goal for resentful young Muslims who presented as eager recruits for martyrdom and slaughter - a combination that was used to the advantage of global jihad in a horrifying attack on New York's Twin Towers - had met his deserved end.

His equally maliciously capable, second-in-command, Ayman al-Zawahiri is as fully capable and respected within the radical Islamist community and has every intention of continuing the war that fundamentalist radical Islamists have mounted against the West.  Al-Qaeda represents the brain behind a beast with countless heads, all of which spring to life anew when directed.

And when one head is killed, the monster is not disabled, it simply grows another, replacement head.  Like the Hydra of ancient Greek legend.  It seemed impossible to kill the main stem, for others would spring to life to replace that portion of the monster that threatened all living things with its venomous breath and dreadful intent.

From Iraq, with al-Qaeda in Iraq, to Yemen (al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula), Somalia, (al-Shabaab), Nigeria (Boko Haram), Aghanistan/Pakistan (Taliban/Haqqani network) and Mali (al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, and new entry points to Egypt, Syria, Tunisia, Algeria, Gaza and Libya. New heads are always popping up, scouting for recruits, threatening the 'moderate' Islamic regimes that rule as tyrants and dictators in Muslim lands.

There were always incidents of Muslim-on-Muslim terror inspired by sectarian hatred in the Middle East.  There has been a long-simmering resentment among Arab states at the loss of dominion in Europe where Islam once reigned supreme until Christianity fought back to assume the geography that was first its own.  Islam mourns its losses, historical they may be, but their loss burns in the hearts of jihadists.


There is an obvious similarity to the Hydra legend and al-Qaeda.  Both are given mysterious, sinister significance as threats to survival of Western society.  Al-Qaeda did its utmost to plan unexpected attacks on vestiges of American military prominence in areas of Muslim occupation.  With every success, killing scores of Americans, it moved toward its goal of committing an atrocity in the heart of America itself.

And when it succeeded in producing an atrocity on a new scale that struck horror into the most powerful country on Earth, it signed its own death knell.  Except that it didn't die.  It merely, on the American-led advance into Aghanistan, lost its perch there and re-located to Pakistan.  Bin Laden is now dead, but everyone is expendable to the greater purpose of chaos, terror and triumph.

Atrocities occurred further in Spain, in Britain, in Indonesia, and India.  New attacks are planned and detected, usually before they occur, those involved apprehended.  Groups and individuals inspired by the coda of al-Qaeda to succeed in destroying the institutions of the West, crippling their economies and their governments, impairing their justice systems, plan their unique attacks hoping to succeed without prior detection.

A few succeed; lone wolves that claim temporary insanity and who in their impassioned state of jihad-inspired elation and determination, announce their triumph with "Allahu Akbar!"  Many more are apprehended before their plans are carried through.  It has been pointed out often enough that the carnage need not occur for terror to have made its presence well known. 

Like the Hydra, kill one portion of the beast and it responds by giving birth to additional elements.  The scimitar of holy jihad has been taken up by an unending panoply of Muslim groups with their own plans to have their countries adopt pure Sharia in reflection of authentic Islam unsullied by time and modernity.