Bin Laden and the Monkey. I don't want to say that there is a trend. But I have at least seen some disturbing signs. First, there was a poll on Arabic aljazeera.net which showed that some 49.9% of readers sympathized with Bin Laden while 51.1% of readers opposed him (41,000 readers participated). And then AlArabiya TV conducted a poll (I did not know details about the poll but I saw it on the screen) which showed that 22% of those polled believe that Al-Qa`idah "improved" the image of Islam in the West (sic). And today, on Aljazeera's Ittijah Al-Mu`akis, a Moroccan writer (I have never heard of her before), who is secular (in speech and in appearance--which only made me wonder how she would fare in a Bin Ladenite state) began the show by saluting Bin Laden. She in fact is the first guest I have ever seen that expressed support for Bin Laden and even Zarqawi. But then again, I remembered that Palestinian kid who was interviewed back in 1991 when some Palestinians expressed support for Saddam Husayn. He told the Washington Post, if I remember correctly, that: "Look. We support whoever supports our cause. If the monkey supports our cause, we would support the monkey." Or words to that effect. But I think that there is something else here. I believe that those who are expressing support for Bin Laden do not necessarily count as Bin Laden supporters, or advocates of his horrific ideology and practice. They simply seem to be expressing an extreme point of view to provoke their governments (and their media) and the American patrons of Arab regimes. But I can't believe that people are actually identifying with Bin Ladenite terrorism. I know. I know. Some of you will accuse me of projecting my secular or leftist wishful thinking on the people of the region. But there is no evidence I have seen that people are actually identifying with Al-Qa`idah.