Moderate Muslims hide when they see the cross Bush has to bear

Relations between the West and the Islamic world are moving closer to collapse, writes Amin Saikal.

American voters, by re-electing George Bush with a clear mandate to pursue his first-term policies, have potentially set the scene for more confrontation between the United States and its close allies, and the forces of radical political Islam. The outcome will be critical in determining the future of world order.

With the faith-driven Bush determined to change radical political Islam, the Middle East and, for that matter, the world according to America's shifting interests and within a broad Judeo-Christian moral framework, many Islamists - who believe in Islam as an ideology of political and social transformation - and many ordinary Muslims around the world are now bound to become more wary of US policy behaviour than ever before.

They are likely to take extreme exception to Bush's now well-known personal identification with Christian evangelism, his faith-based domestic and foreign policy priorities, his division of the world in terms of "good" and "evil", and his uncritical support of Israel.