The White House may slightly shift the spotlight from its woes in Iraq with the further declassification of the National Intelligence Estimate, but there is plenty more bad news in it for Democrats to chew on.

Most of the document that the White House declassified Tuesday is going to sound awfully familiar to anyone who has been closely following developments in the global war on terror over the past year — and there’s not much good news in it for the White House.

In particular, the intelligence agencies’ finding that the repressive and corrupt practices of Arab and other Muslim governments — as much as the U.S. invasion of Iraq — are swelling al Qaeda recruiting lines was the consensus of experts long before the Sept. 11 attacks.

But there’s little ammunition in that for the Bush administration to fire back at critics either, since some of those governments — Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan for starters — are Washington’s key allies in the war on terror. As if to italicize that point, the leader of Kazakhstan, one of the most repressive regimes allied against al Qaeda, is being feted by the White House on Friday, Sept. 29.

The attraction of jihad — Holy War al Qaeda style — has gone global, said the National Intelligence Estimate, or NIE, which reflects the consensus of the 16-agency U.S. intelligence community.

It’s not just the Iraq war that “is shaping a new generation of terrorist leaders and operatives,” the NIE said.

The growth and evolution of al Qaeda’s cause from a highly centralized vanguard to a broad-based movement in Iraq and beyond is spawning new and different kinds of attacks on the U.S. and Western Europe.

“Although we cannot measure the extent of the spread with precision, a large body of all-source reporting indicates that activists identifying themselves as jihadists, although a small percentage of Muslims, are increasing in both number and geographic dispersion,” said the NIE.

“If this trend continues, threats to US interests at home and abroad will become more diverse, leading to increasing attacks worldwide.”

Nothing less than turning the Muslim world upside down can stop this troubling spiral, the NIE suggested.

“Greater pluralism and more responsive political systems in Muslim majority nations would alleviate some of the grievances jihadists exploit. Over time, such progress, together with sustained, multifaceted programs targeting the vulnerabilities of the jihadist movement and continued pressure on al-Qaeda, could erode support for the jihadists.”

And if the foreign jihadists flocking to Iraq to bloody themselves in combat with Americans could be beaten, the NIE said, the word would spread to other youths contemplating enlistment.

“Should jihadists leaving Iraq perceive themselves, and be perceived, to have failed, we judge fewer fighters will be inspired to carry on the fight.”

The NIE also found a grisly sliver of light in jihadist attacks on public gathering places in Muslim nations from North Africa to Indonesia: They are killing fellow Muslims. The attacks backfire on al Qaeda’s claim to be leading the forces of Islam against Israel and its Christian “crusader” allies, believe U.S. intelligence agencies, as well as experts on al Qaeda.

Despite the steady resurgence of the Taliban, Osama bin Laden’s onetime protector in Afghanistan, the NIE also believes that al Qaeda and its puritan imitators carry the seeds of their own destruction — which the United States can exploit.

“The jihadists . . . ultra-conservative interpretation of sharia-based [religious] governance spanning the Muslim world is unpopular with the vast majority of Muslims,” the NIE argues. “Exposing the religious and political straitjacket that is implied by the jihadists’ propaganda would help to divide them from the audiences they seek to persuade.”

Moderate Muslim clerics are increasingly speaking out against the fundamentalists who call for holy war, the NIE noted.

As for the jihad’s leadership, the NIE, completed before last June’s elimination of Abu Masab al-Zarqawi, the commander of al Qaeda in Iraq, addressed the prospects of a future without bin Laden and his henchmen.

“The loss of key leaders, particularly Osama Bin Ladin, Ayman al-Zawahiri, and al-Zarqawi, in rapid succession, probably would cause the group to fracture into smaller groups,” the NIE predicts

“Although like-minded individuals would endeavor to carry on the mission, the loss of these key leaders would exacerbate strains and disagreements . . . (and) the resulting splinter groups would, at least for a time, pose a less serious threat to US interests than does al-Qaeda.”

In the meantime, however, the outlook is grim, the NIE suggested.

Nuclear, chemical and biological weapons “will continue to be sought by jihadist groups.”

And the problem is not just with al Qaeda. Anti-U.S. sentiment is spreading like a virus to other, even secular groups.

“Anti-US and anti-globalization sentiment is on the rise and fueling other radical ideologies,” the NIE said. “This could prompt some leftist, nationalist, or separatist groups to adopt terrorist methods to attack U.S. interests”

The Internet has opened the gates to jihad as much as commerce, it said.

“The radicalization process is occurring more quickly, more widely, and more anonymously in the Internet age, raising the likelihood of surprise attacks by unknown groups whose members and supporters may be difficult to pinpoint.”

Jeff Stein can be reached at jstein@cq.com.