He just knows JJ and that’s it

And what on earth has that incident to do with integration?

@Bob Beaman: When you’re a xenophobic Islamophobe making sense is not a requirement.

Joey, if other religious groups were responsible for anywhere near the level of terrorism in our world you’d have a point. At this present time, fundamentalist Islamic ideology is responsible for the vast majority of terrorist attacks today.

Jason, what religion are the US Drones terrorizing people in numbers far greater than we have seen terrorized in Europe??

Drones are machines, they don’t have a religion. Their operators don’t conduct their operations for religious or ideological reasons. They bomb targets for geopolitical motivations such as access to resources. Islamic terror is purely motivated by religious dogma and the belief that everyone who doesn’t believe in the Quran should be killed or forced to submit.

@Jason Culligan: Majority of terrorist attacks in Turkey in past few years were by Kurdish separatists, not ISIS.
Like with the IRA being seen as Northern Catholics by some, and like with Christianity, only a tiny minority of Muslims are motivated by the dogma you speak about – the Bible says adulterers and non-believers should be killed. Some fundamentalist Christians (militants who committed terrorist acts) in Africa wanted a state set up along fundamentalist Old Testament lines too.
Like with Irish Catholics, although this is how it was expressed, the real catalyst was actually political and human rights issues rather than being of a particular religion – the illegal invasion of Iraq and subsequent killing of so many hundreds of thousands of civilians, the ongoing western-supported injustice in the Middle East, have done more to contribute to misguided young men being radicalised than anything else. Had Iraq illegally invaded the UK or Ireland and killed hundreds of thousands, do you think that might have radicalised a few young men? Like with the IRA terrorism, when a political solution is found, the supply of young people willing to join this horrific movement will dry up.

Saying Islam is the devil and is coming to get us all is hysteria and does not stand up to scrutiny. You don’t have to like the religion – personally I find most religions have a regrettable effect on society but we have to live and let live. Stirring up hatred and conflict will only make matters very much worse and actually create a situation where more vulnerable, emotionally unstable young men will be drawn towards radicalisation. Be careful what you wish for.

@KingBen: Turkey is a repressive regime so why would you want to go there anyway – the vast majority of their terrorist attacks in the past year or so have been by Kurdish separatists, not ISIS. Geopolitical reality is more complex than the obsession of some with ISIS and Islam.

One of the reasons Turkey is attacked is because Islam and the state are not one as in the other Muslim countries …..Attaturk in 1920′s introducd some western ideas… Banned the veil on women allowed alcohol to be sold, western calender ….ISIL want Turkey to go back to more strict Islam when it was a Caliphate However present Turkish government also wants more strict Islam

Bob, You forgot racist. People like you who throw these words out at anyone with an opinion have rendered them useless, such a shame. Try commenting with an opinion of your own rather than shouting from your hight leftist horse.

Sorry @ Joey….

@Little Diddy “although this is how it was expressed, the real catalyst was actually political and human rights issues rather than being of a particular religion.”

Religious beliefs motivate people just as non-religious beliefs – like nationalism, socialism, liberalism etc – do. Why is this so difficult for people to accept when it comes to ‘irrational’ beliefs? They are not merely a cover for material motives that westerners happen to currently find easy to understand. Religious beliefs have real effects on behaviour. As any medieval Christian could have told you.

It’s not an either/or causation. I don’t agree with Jason that Islamic terrorism is purely motivated by religious dogma. Islam as a religion was not intended by its founders to be separate from politics and imposing that distinction is anachronistic.

Most jihadists today are motivated by the interaction between material realities such as western involvement in muslim countries and what they believe to be spiritual realities of heaven and hell. The crux of it is that they are Islamist supremacists and that is why they object so violently to people who should be second class citizens (i.e. non muslims) having power over muslims.

White men are not drawn to neo-Nazism or white supremacist movements because they are ‘vulnerable and emotionally unstable’. The same applies to men who join or ally themselves with violent, genocidal religious supremacist movements in which most members happen to be darker skinned.

@KingBen: If the cap fits.

Spain isn’t Islamic, though. Nor was Northern Ireland. Bit of a slim pretext there. Why not acknowledge that some terrorists want power over everyone else, or else? It is what they have in common. Nothing to do with east or west or fundamentalist religious freaks really, as alcohol is sold in Russia every day. Just more control freaks trying to rationalise their unpopular crimes.

@joey you do wear yours with pride.

@Fiona Fitzgerald: Obviously terrorism can be motivated by ideologies other than religion. And by religion alongside other more material motives. That doesn’t negate the fact that religious beliefs can and do motivate violence and Islam is no exception.

And this ‘power-hungry’ thing is just more western projection. Jihadists believe in the real existence of heaven and hell and their god. They really, really want to get to heaven and avoid hell and they believe that killing lots of infidels is one sure way to achieve that goal. That motivates them. Not power. Stop trying to squeeze a non-western cultural phenomenon into a western framework.

You are wrong Jason. Islamist leaderships exploit political and social grievance with simplistic populist messages that convince people who have nothing to lose that they can put the world right by inflicting terrorism on others. It has very little to do with religion in the real sense.

Actually Marlowe quite a few studies of white supremacism in the US have conclusively demonstrated that the kinds of young men who are drawn to bro-Nazi groups are emotionally unstable and vulnerable to influence, particularly by father figures.

@HOTBank: By your logic the desire of the overwhelming majority of Afghan muslims to live under sharia also has very little to do with religion in the real sense presumably. Since mainstream interpretations of sharia conflict with basic human rights.

Is anything bad related to any religion ‘in the real sense’ in your view? Or is Religion some kind of inherently happy clappy, unicorns and roses abstraction which is somehow terribly abused by bad people? At a wild guess, I’d say you apply that squeamishness to one religion only, and its not Christianity.

That is a deliberate distortion of what I said to suit your agenda Marlowe. I don’t engage with that, except to say your guess is way off the mark.

@HOTBank: Interesting article on Christian fundamentalist groups – it’s not really the religion; it’s people! In truth, as an atheist, I believe that people made up religions anyway, so they are just another form of ideology and as such there can be more virulent and nasty forms of any of them (though I would say Buddhism is impervious to that by nature!). http://www.salon.com/2015/04/07/6_modern_day_christian_terrorist_groups_our_media_conveniently_ignores_partner/

@Suzie Sunshine: Indeed – as with the IRA, it is only political solutions that lead to an end to conflict, violence and terrorism. In the case of Turkey, most of their terrorist attacks have been Kurdish separatists, not ISIS. They are a repressive state who have been clamping down on any voice of opposition recently, and also persecuting perfectly innocent people such as university professors. There is going to be a lot of conflict and terrorism so long as they remain so repressive and abusive of people’s human rights, as they have been for many years.

@Suzie Sunshine: Hopefully people are intelligent enough to see the difference between Turkey and Ireland – while there have been a lot of terrorist attacks around the world – from Christian fundamentalist and Muslim fundamentalists (in Turkey’s case it’s most likely to be Kurdish separatists) to right wing white supremacists – each country has its own particular geopolitical situation – Ireland was not, like the UK, involved in the illegal invasion of Iraq and has not supported Israel and injustice in the Middle East as have the US and the UK.

It should be clear to everybody that the genesis of the current Islamic terrorism (as with the IRA) was more political than religious – a clue would be that the reasons always given for many years following each incidence of terrorism WERE only political reasons (this is documented). It is tragic that the injustice in the Middle East has gone on so long that we now have a radicalised version of Islam (much as in Ireland colonial repression led to our creation of a priest-ridden ultra-Catholic state). Surely Irish people can see that had, say, the UK illegally invaded Ireland in the way that the US and UK invaded Iraq, and killed hundreds of thousands, that might have led to the radicalisation of a few Irish lads!

There are no terror attacks around the world from Christian fundamentalism trying to force people to accept new testament … It is true that oppression of the Kurds by Iraq Iran and Turkey have lead to terror attacks in Turkey …. However Qatar the richest country in the world still funds Sunni terror groups ISIL Muslim brotherhood and HAMAS …Cannot blame everything on western powers or Israel….Islam has a strong military side right back to its founder….. The sectarian division of Islam is a strong cause of the civil war in Syria for example

@Little Diddy No: Jihadism is a global phenomenon so talking about its causes on a state by state basis is nonsensical. It long predates Erdogan.

@Little Diddy No: “the reasons always given for many years following each incidence of terrorism WERE only political reasons.”

Externally, for the consumption of western non-muslims, yes. This is a war. All wars involve propaganda. IS are simply silly enough to go and tell non-muslims directly that they wish to kill them for theological reasons, rather than dressing it up in terms that irreligious westerners can grasp.

Radical Islam has always existed because it’s based on the Quran, hadiths and life of Mohammad – the perfect model of behaviour according to Allah in the Quran about 90 times. And Mohammad was a 7th century warlord with ethical standards that shocked even his contemporaries. That’s is the root of the problem and that’s why it will keep recurring regardless of what non-muslims do.

The ‘oppression’ and ‘injustice’ that Mohammad suffered from was that the pagans of Mecca refused to accept that God was speaking to him directly and refused to stop practising their own religion. He was oppressed by being governed by them, not because of anything they actually did to him and his followers, but because their refusal to follow him could only be motivated by Evilly Evilness. That is the same injustice and oppression that his supremacist followers today are spouting about, if you listen carefully enough.

Ireland has absolutely no influence over western foreign policy in muslim countries. And that intervention is in any event a done deal. It started properly with the British empire and has continued since and it can’t be erased. But Europeans can and must grasp the religious aspect of this problem and confront it as we did Christian fundamentalism centuries ago (and more recently in Ireland).

This is factually not correct, radical Islam has not always existed, the offensive theory of jihad has no foundation in the primary sources of Islamic law

Joey, until six months ago had you ever used “snowflake” as an insult? Seems to be a very trendy word nowadays. And vapid.

Yes Marlowe , but it is a bit simplistic of you to lump the separatists in the Philippines with Boko Haram with Hamas. And the Turkish situation is very particular to Turkey. What you have to grasp is that there are real grievances among large groups of people who happen to be Muslim and whose grievances have been exploited by those with a wider quasi religious agenda.

@Red Marauder: Sure. Mohammad’s raid on an unarmed Meccan trading caravan was ‘defensive jihad’ no doubt. And the Pope is not a catholic.

@Red Marauder: How do you think Islam evangelized Egypt and North Africa
They did it with the sword

Maududi, Qutb (inventors of political islam) and bin Laden, between many others, consistently referred to the Qur’an in order to obtain popular support and establish their basis for ‘jihad’ but all of them were highly selective on the Qur’anic verses which seemed to support their arguments . Neither of them had the appropriate authority to declare jihad since only legitimate Muslim rulers or Imams can legitimately do so

@John003 that is not in context with the term global jihad and is not related to political Islam we see today, which has it roots during the end of ww1, the fall of the Ottoman Empire, European colonialism, the creation of MB and the state of Israel

@Little Diddy No: The Turkish government want us to believe the Kurds carry out these crimes.
It’s more like they carry these crimes out themselves.

@HOTBank: I’m not ‘lumping them together’. I’m pointing out that they share a common ideology and motivation which is Islamic. Yes, there are also differences between them. Both the differences and the similarities matters but from the point of view of a non-muslim, the commonality – jihadism – is the more lethal and therefore more relevant aspect.

And you are of course infantilizing all muslims bar a minority which you acknowledge has a ‘quasi religious agenda’. They are not merely ignorant pawns being manipulated. Any more than those voting for Brexit, Trump, Le Pen, Wilders etc. are such. Many muslims worldwide are extremely religious and they share that religiosity with the leadership whose existence you acknowledge.

@Red Marauder: Qutb and the rest didn’t invent it from whole cloth you know. You’re repeating apologist propaganda.

“Scholars have debated the origins of the 19th century West African jihads. The first known jihad in West Africa was in Mauritania during the 17th century…

…From the eighth to the thirteenth century, contact between Muslims and Africans increased and Muslim states began to emerge in the Sahel. Eventually, African kings began to allow Muslims to integrate. Accounts during the eleventh century reported a Muslim state called Takrur in the middle Senegal valley. Around this time, the Almoravid reform movement began in Western Sahara and expanded throughout modern Mauritania, North Africa and Southern Spain. The Almoravids imposed a fundamentalist version of Islam, in an attempt to purify beliefs and practices from syncretistic or heretical beliefs. The Almoravid movement imposed greater uniformity of practice and Islamic law among West African Muslims.”

http://spice.fsi.stanford.edu/docs/the_spread_of_islam_in_west_africa_containment_mixing_and_reform_from_the_eighth_to_the_twentieth_century

You are trying to knit together specific events but there is no single cohesive and monolithic global Muslim community and there is no single Islamist ideology, with a single creed or political manifestation

Concerning Maududi and Qutb they became the two most important theorists of political Islam. These thinkers did not suggest Muslims should attempt to return to an ideal past, instead believed, Muslims should practice a defensive jihad in order to restore God’s sovereignty, A number of Afghan groups called Mujahidin, influenced by the ideologies of Maududi and Qutb, and with volunteers from outside Afghanistan, mounted a ‘defensive jihad’ against the invaders. Eventually, in 1989, the Soviets had to withdraw. Between the Mujahidin, there were two particular ‘freedom fighters’ Osama bin Laden (1957-2011), who eventually founded the Islamist group al-Qaeda and Abu Musab al-Zarqawi (1966-2006), who left al-Qaeda to establish the radical group Jama’at al-Tawhid wal-Jihad, eventually known as ‘Isis’

@Red Marauder: I didn’t make any such claim though did I? But what all these groups have in common is the Quran, hadiths and life of Mohammad. And all forms of political Islam cause the same basic problems for non-muslims so the differences are neither here nor there from the perspective of the victims.

You’re comments proof otherwise, the historical roots of political Islam as well as ‘jihad’ itself as offensive warfare are deeply related to political developments external to Islam. Even in circumstances when a minority but highly violent group of ‘Muslims’ conducted attacks against the West, jihad has not been declared following the traditional religious procedures of Islam and the purposes of these activities are always by far more political than religious. Any suggestions that there is an inevitable ‘clash of civilizations’ between Islam and the West ignores the “complex and fragmented nature of civilizations and the extent to which different cultures have coexisted peacefully and harmoniously, not in the perverted form hijacked by political Islam as a kind of collective aggression against the West

@Red Marauder: That’s just some copy and paste job. Go back and deal with the Almoravid. Africans have been confronting jihadism for far longer than westerners and the least they deserve is for people to recognize that fact.

@Red Marauder: You do realize that your division of phenomena into political vs. religious is simply the product of an anachronistic, western-centric worldview right? One you’re now imposing on a 7th century non-European belief system. I’ll be charitable and say that’s really just rude.

Yes i agree with you if they have it planned then it’s gonna happen. If it’s foiled then there will just be less fatalities until the next time.

It is not versus but intertwined, historical facts speak for themselves, the ideals of political Islam we see today started in 1926 as I stated before, not in the 7th century, the middle east wasn’t a colony then, and the muhajedeen weren’t armed by the profet but by the United States

@Red Marauder: And did the Americans arm the Sokoto caliphate too? Islam has a history and culture of its own. It is not merely a passive, reactive force responding to the west. That’s a very imperialist view. And, like all cultures, it has produced its own homegrown dysfunctions, extremisms, intolerances etc.

Violent jihad is part of that culture. Just as the persecution of Jews has been part of European culture. It really is a form of inverted racism to insist that Islam is the only major religion that had no violent fundamentalists and no religious bigotry until white westerners came along and did what they do.

@Dave Doyle: Definite possibility!

@John003: There ARE Christian fundamentalist terror groups! http://www.salon.com/2015/04/07/6_modern_day_christian_terrorist_groups_our_media_conveniently_ignores_partner/

@Red Marauder: Your analysis makes sense and history absolutely bears out what you say.

It would be ridiculous and naive to believe that current radicalisation has nothing to do with political events and the history of the Middle East – it clearly does. For decades now every terrorist act in any way related to Islam or Muslims has been accompanied with a statement that specifically references western actions in the Middle East.

It is only recently that we have seen this morph into the flowering of groups like ISIS – similarly we have Christian fundamentalist militant groups in geopolitical hotspots around the world who are reacting to a perceived existentialist threat by seeking to set up states based on Old Testament rules. http://www.salon.com/2015/04/07/6_modern_day_christian_terrorist_groups_our_media_conveniently_ignores_partner/

It is absolutely true to say that many of these groups DID coexist peacefully in the past. I am not only blaming the west (eg the UK’s shameful role in the Middle East over the past century or so) but there is definitely cause and effect going on here. You cannot forget something like the illegal invasion of Iraq, for example, in all of this. Just because terrorists talk about a religious war now does not mean that it is not possible to trace the genesis of that group.

The real issue is what will be effective in ending this ‘war of the worlds’ some people think we have. Firstly, perhaps we need to drop the ‘war of the worlds” mentality. Secondly, if people do really think that targeting mistrust and hatred against all who adhere to this one religion in society, or even vaguely come from a region where that religion is common, is going to work to create LESS radicalised young men, go for it. I cannot see it myself. I think perhaps working towards a peaceful and just solution in the Middle East might have more of an effect. What ended the IRA’s reign of terrorism in the UK?