" I can see Russia from my mosque!"

Well, Uzbekistan anyway. What ever happened to Mullah Omar,infamous one eyed head of the Taliban? We never hear about him anymore. Yet he is just as important as Osama bin Laden. Two peas in a pod.They compliment each others existence. So who is Amir Mullah Muhammed Omar. Nothing more then the Sarah Palin of Afghanistan. He comes from a rural,tribal(read redneck) area of southern Afghanistan. He was a local Mullah( teacher,dispenser of Islamic law). Not well educated, even in Islamic religious tradition, he has no world view and longs for a time 1400 years ago when the prophet Muhammad walked the earth. He claims to be imposing the Shariat.(Islamic law) But his interpertation of it is rigid and highly influence by something called the Pashtunwali. The Pastunwali is the ancient code of ethics for the Pashtun Afghan tribesmen. It is more than medieval, it harkens back to the old codes of the steppe nomads, lke the Yasa of Genghiz Khan.The Taliban(the name comes the Arabic talib, student) is composed of many young Pashtuns,products of war, refugee camps and madresses(Islamic schools). These young men know nothing of th history and tradiitons of their land. These old tribal traditions and old crafts have been lost in the 20 years of civil war. Brainwashed in fundamentalist medresses,having no talent or occupation,they became his army and his government. They knew little of women, and succumbed to Omar's fear that sex and adultery pollute Islamic ( a hell of alot more uptight than a Massachusetts puritan.) He makes the Ayatollah Khomeini look like a liberal, hippy,pinko fag. His brand of Islam hails from the ultraconservative Wahabi teaching of Saudi Arabia. Only his are a hell of alot more conservative. Women are shut in the house with no education. War widows now have no way to earn a living. Most of Afghanistan's modern schools had women teachers,he closed them all.
His brand of Islam coupled with bin Laden's world view make up the philosphy of both the Taliban and Al Qaeda. Without Osama, Mullah Omar would have been one in a hundred minor Afghani resistance leaders. Without Omar,bin Laden would not have been able to have a base(Al Qaeda means the base in Arabic) to build his empire.
He is equal to, and just as dangerous as Osama,maybe more. He has declared himself to be Amir al Muminin, the commander of the faithful. Maybe a meanless title to us, but to Islam it is the very title Muhammad's successors used as Caliph(Khalifa, successor, leader of the world of Islam, the Ummah) He claims ultimate leadership of the whole Islamic community. Together, both him and bin Laden have trained thousands of soldiers and exported them to Islamic nations to stir unrest and lead a revoltution to build islamic states through out Dar al Islam( the world of Islam) Osama bin Laden accepts and endoreses this position and bows spiritually to Mullah as his leader, his Caliph. Fundamentalist Islam is not mainstream Islam, not intellectual thinking Islam. It is the rhetoric of demi gods who appeal to the poor and oppressed Arabs and other Islamic nationaliiies in refugee camps and war torn nations. They appeal to the Afghan, whose country was destoryed .They appeal to thousands of Afghan refugees in camps. They appeal to refugee Palestinians and Muslims locked in nationalistic wars, like Chechnya,Bosnia,Sinkiang(Chinese Turkestan), Algerians, Indonesians, Somalis and a host more. They envision once again driving the Jews and Crusaders out. Its not everyones Islam for sure, but it adherents are growing.
This is why Mullah Omar should share billing with Osama bin Laden as "most wanted"