"The U.S. always needs an enemy. It comes and goes. Today it is Islam. According to this plan or ideology of the born-again Christians who formed an alliance with Zionism, Islam is the monster"
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Walid Jumblatt, a longtime Lebanese Druze leader shaped by civil war and regional conflict, is pointing to a pattern he sees in American political life: the construction of a rotating adversary to organize policy, identity, and power. During the Cold War, the Soviet Union filled that role; after its collapse, the search for a new unifying threat intensified. After 9/11, jihadist violence became the lens through which broader Islam was often understood, and a diffuse faith community of more than a billion people was cast as a civilizational challenge. Jumblatt frames this shift as neither accidental nor purely reactive, but as the product of domestic coalitions and narratives that benefit from a clear enemy.
His reference to born-again Christians and Zionism evokes the alliance between parts of the American Christian right and strong pro-Israel currents in U.S. politics, especially visible in the early 2000s. For some evangelicals, support for Israel is theological; for many strategic thinkers, it is geopolitical. Jumblatt is not offering a neutral taxonomy but a polemical diagnosis: that this convergence helps sustain an image of Islam as a monolithic menace. The language of monster underscores how moral fear can simplify complex realities, justify exceptional policies, and normalize endless security postures.
There is truth and exaggeration intertwined. American politics often relies on external threats to mobilize resources and consensus, and the War on Terror fostered policies and rhetoric that blurred distinctions between extremists and ordinary Muslims. At the same time, U.S. society is not uniform: civil liberties advocates, scholars, and many religious leaders challenged Islamophobia; policymakers forged counterterrorism partnerships with Muslim-majority allies; and public opinion grew more nuanced over time.
Jumblatt’s critique reflects a region bruised by invasions, occupations, and proxy wars, where narratives have concrete costs. It warns how ideological alliances at home can harden imaginaries abroad, and how the habit of needing an enemy risks creating one where a more careful, differentiated understanding is required.
His reference to born-again Christians and Zionism evokes the alliance between parts of the American Christian right and strong pro-Israel currents in U.S. politics, especially visible in the early 2000s. For some evangelicals, support for Israel is theological; for many strategic thinkers, it is geopolitical. Jumblatt is not offering a neutral taxonomy but a polemical diagnosis: that this convergence helps sustain an image of Islam as a monolithic menace. The language of monster underscores how moral fear can simplify complex realities, justify exceptional policies, and normalize endless security postures.
There is truth and exaggeration intertwined. American politics often relies on external threats to mobilize resources and consensus, and the War on Terror fostered policies and rhetoric that blurred distinctions between extremists and ordinary Muslims. At the same time, U.S. society is not uniform: civil liberties advocates, scholars, and many religious leaders challenged Islamophobia; policymakers forged counterterrorism partnerships with Muslim-majority allies; and public opinion grew more nuanced over time.
Jumblatt’s critique reflects a region bruised by invasions, occupations, and proxy wars, where narratives have concrete costs. It warns how ideological alliances at home can harden imaginaries abroad, and how the habit of needing an enemy risks creating one where a more careful, differentiated understanding is required.
Quote Details
| Topic | War |
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