Al-Qa`idah discusses Hizbullah. Al-Qa`idah's "theoritician", `Atiyyat Allah, just released through the internet a new book titled: "Lebanese Hizbullah and the Palestinian Cause: A revealing Look." I thought that it would be interesting, so I read it. It comes in 41 pages but the author here does not begin to tackle his subject until the last third or fourth of the book. The rest is typical Sunni Salafite rhetoric against all Shi`ites and Shi`ism. (And much is based on Ibn Taymiyyah rulings on Shi`ites in volume 28 of his collection of fatawas where he calls for Jihad (or Jeeeeehaaad in Irshad Manji's pronounciation) against Shi`ites). There is quite a bit about Taqiyyah (dissimulation) and there is much misunderstandings surrounding this practice: people don't know that Sunni jurisprudential schools also permit dissimulation, and justify it on Qur'anic grounds but I don't have time to elaborate. What I find interesting in the writings of Al-Qa`idah dudes (which kind of rhymes with kooks) is that they cite the various volumes of Ibn Taymiyyah. So how do those people on the run manage to haul with them 35 volumes of Ibn Taymiyyah's Fatawawawas. The language is typical of the (fanatical) literature of the genre although the person has a library at his (I almost by way of habit said "or her") disposal. He focuses on Shi`ite critique of Qur`an and the allegation that some sections or references that would bolster the Shi`ite case were deleted by Sunni collectors. From a historical (or academic) point of view, there is no basis for that partisan Shi`ite claim: of all the allegations and accusations that were leveled at `Uthman, none mentioned anything about his distortions in the collection of the Qur'an. The book then deals with the matter at hand and quotes at length from the former secretary-general of Hizbullah, Subhi At-Tufayli, who broke with the party in 1991 and accused it of pursuing a hudnah with Israel. (Tufayli has been prominently featured in Saudi media since the assassination of Rafiq Hariri). But it hit the party where it is most weak as far as Arab public opinion is concerned: that the party has not challenged the puppets of U.S. occupation in Iraq because they are Shi`ites like them, and because they are both loyal to Iran. But the author tries to appear objective by denying that the party is friendly to Israel and U.S., which is sometimes alleged by fanatical Salafis. But the very production of the book points to a weakness in Al-Qa`idah: that it is aware that it is most discredited as far as the Palestinian questions is concerned, which is exactly where Hizbullah rose to prominence in Arab public opinion. So the author by trying to discredit Hizbullah only attracted attention to the bad reputation of Al-Qa`idah in Arab public opinion as a terrorist organization that specialized in attacking civilians around the world, without doing a thing to help the Palestinians.