"All
cultures have a degree of certain belief in magic and what Westerners
call “conspiracy theories” to explain otherwise unexplainable events and
inconvenient facts. In the Middle East, this is made worse by the
cultural distortion of "inshallah"
("If God wills it"). This is a basic tenet of Islam, although some
scholars believe the attitude was a 'fatalistic' trait that
preceded Islam. In any event, "inshallah" is deadly when combined with
modern technology. For this reason, Arab countries either have poorly
maintained infrastructure and equipment (including military stuff) or
import a lot of foreigners, possessing the right attitudes, to maintain
everything. That minority of Arabs who do have a realistic attitude
towards maintenance and personal responsibility are considered odd but
useful."
"The
"inshallah" trait is made worse by a stronger belief in the
supernatural, paranormal and magic in general. Thus, many Iraqis
believed that American troops wore sunglasses that enabled them to see
through clothing, and had armor vests that were actually air
conditioned. And they thought Americans took 'cool pills' to resist the
heat. When they first encountered these beliefs,
U.S. troops thought the Arabs were putting them on. Then it sank in that
Arabs really believe this stuff. It was a scary, or amusing, moment for
many Western troops.
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in 2008 many Pakistanis believed that the then recent Islamic terrorist
attack in Mumbai, India was actually the work of the Israeli Mossad or
the American CIA and not the Pakistani terrorists who were killed or
captured and identified."
"Currently,
interviews with refugees from the fighting in Iraq and Syria as well as
people still in those countries shows that over 80 percent believe the
Islamic terrorists in general and ISIL and al Qaeda in particular are
creations of the West (particularly the United States) and Israel as a
means to destroy their countries and Islam. Such fantasies
are a common explanation, in Moslem nations, for Islamic terrorist
atrocities. Especially when Moslems, particularly women and children are
among the victims. In response many Moslems tend to accept fantastic explanations shifting the blame to infidels (non-Moslems)."
"After
the September 11, 2001 attacks in the United States, many Moslems again
blamed Israel for staging those attacks. A favorite variation of this
is that, before the attacks on the World Trade Center, a secret message
went out to all Jews in the area to stay away. Another variation has it
that the 19 attackers (all of them Arab, 15 from Saudi Arabia) were
really not Arabs but falsely identified as part of the Israeli
deception. In the United States some Americans insist that the attack
was the work of the U.S. government, complete with the World Trade
Center towers being brought down by prepositioned explosive charges.
While few Americans accept this,
the CIA and Mossad fantasies are widely accepted in the Moslem world.
Even Western educated Arabs, speaking good English, will casually
express, and accept,
these tales of the Israeli Mossad staging the attacks, in an effort to
trick the U.S. into attacking Afghanistan and Iraq. Americans are
shocked at this, but the Moslems expressing these beliefs just shrug
when confronted with contradictory evidence."
Read about the difference between Sunni and Shia Predeterminism: