“The fight against China is our Islamic responsibility and we have to fulfill it”

Robert Spencer

Abdullah Mansour couldn’t have made it plainer: he is fighting against the Chinese because he is a Muslim. He believes that it is his Islamic responsibility to fight against the Chinese. Other Muslims the world over have proclaimed that they believe it is their Islamic responsibility to fight against the Americans, the British, the Australians, the Indians, and so on and on.

Yet Western non-Muslim analysts routinely ignore these declarations, or reflexively prescribe as the solution initiatives to aid Muslims economically, and to partner with Muslims in various ventures. When these remedies only embolden the jihadists, the analysts just apply them again and again, in the vain hope, apparently, that someday they will work. They never, ever question their core assumptions.

“From his Pakistan hideout, Uighur leader vows revenge on China,” by Saud Mehsud and Maria Golovnina for Reuters, March 14:

(Reuters) – Entrenched in secret mountain bases on Pakistan’s border with Afghanistan, Uighur fighters are gearing up for retribution against China to avenge the deaths of comrades in Beijing’s crackdown on a separatist movement, their leader told Reuters.
China, Pakistan’s only major ally in the region, has long urged Islamabad to weed out what it says are militants from its western region of Xinjiang, who are holed up in a lawless tribal belt, home to a lethal mix of militant groups, including the Taliban and al Qaeda.

A mass stabbing at a train station in the Chinese city of Kunming two weeks ago, in which at least 29 people were killed, has put a new spotlight on the largely Muslim Uighur ethnic minority from Xinjiang, where Beijing says armed groups seek to establish an independent state called East Turkestan.
Beijing has called the Kunming bloodshed a “terrorist attack” carried out by militants, and says separatists operate training camps across the rugged border which abuts Pakistan and Afghanistan.
In a rare but brief interview, Abdullah Mansour, leader of the rebel Turkestan Islamic Party, said it was his holy duty to fight the Chinese.
“The fight against China is our Islamic responsibility and we have to fulfill it,” he said from an undisclosed location.
“China is not only our enemy, but it is the enemy of all Muslims … We have plans for many attacks in China,” he said, speaking in the Uighur language through an interpreter.
“We have a message to China that East Turkestan people and other Muslims have woken up. They cannot suppress us and Islam any more. Muslims will take revenge.”…