JIHADISM IN RUSSIA

ARTICLE CRITIQUE

Response to New York Times "Russia’s Knotty Policies on Islam, Mirrored in Trial" by Michael Schwirtz, June 3, 2009

by Gordon Hahn

The New York Times has published yet another U.S. mainstream media article on Russia’s Muslim regions that completely ignores” jihadi” violence in Russia and focuses instead on the Russian state’s violation of Muslims’ rights.  To be sure, the Russian state is not yet democratic.  Its soft authoritarian regime fairly frequently violates political, civil, and human rights of citizens, Muslim and non-Muslim alike, and the media should on occasion cover this issue.  However, since the tragic Beslan school massacre masterminded by Chechen, Ingush and Ossetian jihadists in September 2004 – nearly a full five years ago – not one U.S. mainstream media outlet has produced a single article focusing on Russia’s jihadists, their ideology, strategy, tactics, or record of violence and violations of political, civil, and human rights.  Why is this?

During the past five years period, jihadists (Ichkeria) from the ‘Chechen Republic’, who now call their movement the ‘Caucasus Emirate’, have carried out thousands of attacks and killed thousands of Russian civilians, civilian officials, and security, military, police servicemen and officers.  They have declared jihad on the U.S., the United Kingdom, and Israel and have published the vilest of anti-Semitic, anti-Western, and anti-Russian articles on their websites.  They lend moral, political, personnel, and technical support to jihadists fighting American and other Western forces in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan.

Despite all this, the New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Newsweek, and The Economist have totally ignored Russia's jihadi threat. As with all U.S. mainstream media articles on Russia’s Muslims and and Muslim republics, if the jihadists are mentioned at all, the present New York Times article mentions them only in passing and then quickly moves on to detail the Russian state’s less than ideal treatment of its Muslims.

To access the full analysis, please click here Download NYT_Jihadism_Schwirtz_3_June_09

Comments

[Vladimir Vladimirovich]

Why the euphemism? RE "less than ideal treatment"

I simply can't understand why you would intentionally use this tone. Do you WANT to sound like you don't care about Muslim citizens in Russia?