Personally, I don't believe that Bush, al-Qaeda etc want to "bring
on" Armageddon; it is more likely that they will "bring on" something
that they can "market" as Armageddon, as a precursor to faking the
Millennium, with their false Messiah, the Antichrist / Beast 666.

It is more likely that the war between Iran and friends and the USA
& the West will be in fulfilment of Ezekiel 38 & 39, and that those
who remain believe that they have survived into the millennial reign
of Christ / Messiah / Mahdi ... the New Age or Age of Aquarius.

=====================================================================

Armageddon: Bringing it on

By Syed Saleem Shahzad

And he gathered them together into a place called in the Hebrew tongue
Armageddon [Har Megiddo]." - Revelation 16:16

KARACHI - A short sentence in an American magazine has managed to do
what al-Qaeda has not been able to achieve since September 11, 2001 -
inflame large sections of the Muslim world and reignite passions
between Islam and the Christian West.

A report in Newsweek that US military interrogators at Guantanamo Bay,
Cuba, had desecrated the Koran - subsequently retracted - initially
set off protests in Afghanistan in which at least 15 people were
killed. These protests have escalated and are expected to come to a
head on May 27, when Islamic movements in 25 countries, notably
Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Malaysia and Indonesia, will
launch mass gatherings.

A largely disjointed al-Qaeda could not have wished for better, as its
underlying ideology is to stoke the fires of a civilizational battle
leading to Armageddon - which the Bible sees as the final battle
between the forces of good and evil, prophesied to occur at the end of
the world when Christ will return to smite his enemies, led by the
Antichrist. The same battle is predicted in the Islamic faith.

Newsweek's retraction comes after much of the damage has already been
done, and is anyway perceived as having been made under US pressure.
Further, leaders of Muslim groups now say that they have proof from
other sources that such incidents did occur.

Pakistan's News International published a story in its May 17 issue
based on an interview with a detainee at Lahore's Adyala prison. The
man had recently been released from Guantanamo Bay and was being held
pending final clearance. He claimed that he had personally witnessed
several incidents of desecration of the Koran by US soldiers in
Guantanamo.

Outrage in Afghanistan

The initial spontaneous reaction in Afghanistan against the report on
the desecration of the Koran has now turned into an organized anti-US
movement. Together with rising Taliban resistance activity in the east
and southeastern border areas, a political movement against the
presence of US-led troops in the country is gathering pace.

Soon after demonstrations started in Jalalabad and spread to Kabul,
the Islamist but anti-Taliban faction of the Northern Alliance was
activated near Mazar-i-Sharif in the north, where former Afghan
president Professor Burhanuddin Rabbani held a meeting with
representatives of four other groups, including the Ittahad-i-Islami,
Afghanistan and members of a group from neighboring Uzbekistan.
According to Asia Times Online contacts, the groups agreed to fuel
anti-US demonstrations and turn them into a national movement against
the US presence in the country.

There was a swift reaction in ethnic Tajik-dominated Badakshan, where
300 clerics issued a religious ruling against the US, and across the
country mosques echoed with anti-US rhetoric, from Kandahar to the
Panjshir Valley during last Friday's sermons. US forces arrested a few
clerics, but this only added salt to the wounds.

Political upheavals in the Central Asian republics of Georgia, Ukraine
and Kyrgyzstan could open the way in these countries for increased
civil liberties and a voice for once-repressed forces in the country,
especially Islamic ones. Similarly, the crackdown in Uzbekistan could
have the same effect by heightening the voices of opposition.

Whether they be the forces of Akramia, Hizbut Tehrir or the
traditional Central Asian brand of the Sufi school of Naqhbania, they
are all staunchly pro-Islamic. And given geographical and cultural
ties, this renewed Islamic fervor could easily spread to the ethnic
Tajik and Uzbek regions of Afghanistan, where Islamic movements have
been weakening over the past 10 years due to the Pashtun Taliban rule
in Kabul. The ethnic Pashtun belt of Afghanistan and Pakistan is
already under heavy Taliban influence.

Al-Qaeda's vision

In a recent interview with the Financial Times of London, Pakistan's
President General Pervez Musharraf claimed that al-Qaeda was now a
destroyed entity. However, the reality is different. The destruction
of al-Qaeda, or its survival, is beside the point. Al-Qaeda's success
will be judged by its ability to have brought about not only a
politically motivated anti-US backlash among Muslims across the world,
but at the same time to create the grounds for its recognition among
Muslim academics.

Ideologically speaking, at the time of September 11, it was impossible
for any Muslim academic to praise al-Qaeda or justify its modus
operandi in the context of Islamic teachings. However, over the past
three-and-a-half years, much has changed. The US has disbanded several
Muslim world-wide charity organizations; put pressure on countries
such as Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Kuwait to change their social
dynamics; attacked Afghanistan and Iraq; rolled back Pakistan's
nuclear program; and laid siege to Iran.

In this atmosphere, Muslim academics in countries as diverse as Yemen,
Malaysia and Morocco, and many others, have approved of al-Qaeda at a
minimum as Muqadamul Jaish - a front-line force whose existence is a
guarantee for the survival of all other forces behind it. The concept
of Muqadamul Jaish gained prominence toward the end of the Saddam
Hussein regime in Iraq, and has gathered increasing acceptance since.

'The end is nigh ...'

The Muslim media from Egypt to Pakistan consistently paint al-Qaeda,
the US-led "war on terror", the invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan and
events such as those in Uzbekistan in the perspective of the "End of
Time" and Har Megiddo.

In Islam, before the return of Jesus (Isa), the Mehdi (restorer of the
faith), will appear at the end of time to restore justice on earth and
establish universal Islam. The Mehdi will be preceded by al-Dajjal, a
Muslim anti-god, who will be defeated and will try to flee from the
valley of Har Megiddo, which is in the Jezreel valley, in the north of
Israel. Due to its strategic location, it has seen many battles. In
1918, there was a decisive battle between the British and the
Ottomans, and General Alenby won the title "Lord of Megiddo". The same
area now serves as an Israeli airbase.

In Muslim legend, "Khorasan" is from where an army will emerge to
support Muslims in the Middle East. Their battle will end with victory
in Palestine and the revival of Khilafah (caliphate). For the past few
decades, Muslim academics have described Khorasan as the Central Asian
states, Afghanistan and Pakistan.

"End of Time" programs are sold in CDs and DVDs across the Muslim
world, which romanticize the Taliban, al-Qaeda and Hizbut Tehrir and
add to their popularity.

Al-Qaeda is working to turn the story of Megiddo and the End of Time
into reality. And the president of the United States, George W Bush,
believes Armageddon is at hand: "The evil one is among us," he said in
2002, in a clear reference to the Antichrist. To quote Michael Ortiz
Hill, "[T]he Commander in Chief of the most powerful military force in
human history has located American foreign policy within a Biblical
narrative that leads inexorably towards the plains of Megiddo ..."

Syed Saleem Shahzad, Bureau Chief, Pakistan Asia Times Online.

Copyright 2005 Asia Times Online Ltd. All rights reserved.

                             -==-

Source: Raiders News Updates - http://www.raidersnewsupdate.com/


Cheers, Steve..

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