Much of what I wrote thus far about these topics is now supported by writers and journalists, with  more detailed information available to them.
However there is no penetration of the underlying principle.

For the public, the US government needs to continue to proclaim that it is not fighting against Islam or it's people, but "that it is a war against terrorism". However I have to assume that they understand that because there are (at least) two opposing sites to the conflict, and one site promotes the conflict as being religious, that it is indeed a conflict of religious different based societies.

A simple principle is that comparing any two entities, whether it are two baseball clubs or two lawyers or two writers, however small the difference, one of each pair has to be the better.

These differences are not created by Osama b. L.; they are historical, absolute differences.
Osama has occurred as a phenomena of what can be described in secular terms as by "natural selection". He has floated to the top in the scum of the boiling soup, we call the Middle East or Arab World. (a little poetic freewheeling).

The opposing World views have developed with different stimulating impulses.

The Western World has developed with the New Testamentic "turn the other cheek, lay your life down for your brother love"  with some secular rational "common sense" self-defense justification impulse, plus a better "choice" of living environment.

The Arab-Muslim World including its diaspora and external converts, has developed, badly digesting impulses of humiliation and resentment and in physically harsh circumstances, while also handicapped in their progress by tradition. This does not describe any of the good aspects of their culture; it only touches the problems.

While the prime minister of Italy was widely criticized for his comparing of societies, there is no doubt, that  Westerns are quietly agreeing with his view. With the tolerance for different cultures, as in "multicultural", in the West, we leave space for inferior life forms (styles) as long as they don't harm. (As long as we don't identify the direct link to the harm).

 The ruling political elite of the so called "modern Arab or Muslim" or friendly nations, are in the un - enviable position to keep stability in their country where emotions characteristically, run high. The rulers might have done this already, with the strong arm of police and military, for many years.

The stability this has given in the past, might have allowed a chance to develop slowly more democratic forms of government. However the fanatic factor of the Al Qaeda organization has put this process in disarray and might have put the World on a course to elimination by competition between both West and Arab Worlds. 

The Western basic philosophy is to unite the World: "Democratic Multi Cultural Globallism".

The Al Qaeda concept is to divide the World if not conquer it wholly and throw it back to a lifestyle it understands and has been taught to be the only right one.

We are indeed in a struggle for "Our way of life". A way of tollerance for different opinions, however immature or unsophysticated, even wrong.

The word "terror" is also understood differently in the Arabic World than in the Western World.
Each site divines it by the originating provocation and the resulting scope of violence.

For civilians any form of mega violence is perceived as terror, no matter what the source is. A tornado can be pure terror. Only qualifying the event with more sophistication, crystallizes the Western concept as an evil deed done to innocent people. 

The acts committed against the US on 9/11/01 are according the Al Qaeda view just smart actions against an enemy. This might not be so strange if we remember how WW2 was fought. Whether it was London and Rotterdam or Dresden, Bremen an Hamburg, tens of thousands of civilians where killed in one night. Include also Hiroshima and Nagasaki. (If there was justification is not the point.) 

This also means that the Taliban Al Qaeda consortium doesn't expect mercy.

The provocation in the Osama mind is symbolic: He is expelled from his birth land and the US is allowed to have its military bases there.
The US also is in practical sense encroaching on the Islamic culture and undermining the desired purity with all freedoms and licentious morals the Western society exports. And indeed we are corrupted. Are'nt we struggeling with questions of the influence of sex and violence on TV on our kids? 

While the terror act is political, there still can be moral difference as seems to be expressed by Arrafat. His "Palestinian" gripes with Israel's politics are against Israel's "oppression and occupation". The terroristic faction of the "Palestinians" are according this view, more justifiable.

That Israel react in an "Old Testamentic an eye for an eye" manner makes the situation not better, but ripe to be plucked by Osama b. L.

The reason that Russia and China have taken sites with the US is not for a small part earned with the trust and reliability of the Western Diplomacy; remember the patience the US applied to solving the plane crash conflict of the surveillance plane and the Chinese Mig, earlier this year. There is also common purpose of the leadership: the prosperity of their peoples. 
The not totally unimportant Russian problem in Chechnia or the Chinese problems with Falun Gong and Tibet, dwarf compared to the danger of a United Muslim Empire as envisioned by the Taliban type fanatic Islam and aspiring "Sultan Osama".

The position of women in  "Islam in offensive mode" can be understood; women in a position of influence as in Western nations would be an obstacle to the violent plans to unite the Islamic World. Women have a natural socializing influence on society. It can as well be observed in American society and is resulting in what is called the "gender gap". Women in the Islamic World are not left the chance to influence politics.

Why are we not aware of the underlying principle? It is because we have to go back much further, than most are willing to go. Young spirits rather deal with the here and now. You think I touched the underlying principle? Barely! Why should I; you wouldn't want to know. For now just remember:
"Make no mistake about it, it's good versus evil".G.W.B.