Quote:
Dear ETWolverine:
In your expert profile, I read this description of your expertise under "Terrorism":
"I have also lived in the Middle East and have a strong understanding of the politics and history of the region, and the forces that create terrorism."
Please tell me about "the forces that create terrorism." Please give me a detailed answer -- I am not looking for the short answer on this. Thanks and God bless.
C.L.
Answered By Answered On
ETWolverine 01/03/06
Hello CL,
The forces that create terrorism in the Middle East (and to a certain degree other forms of terrorism as well), are threefold: Religious, political and economic. And all three play on each other.
Religious: Islam teaches that only Islam is the one true religion, and that eventually the entire world will be Islamic. Certain factions within Islam (what we call the "fundamentalists") believe that this means that they must take it upon themselves to MAKE the entire world into a Muslim world, by any means necessary. This includes by force of arms. Furthermore, these factions teach that there is no such thing as religious freedom, and that any society that offers religious freedom is blasphemous and must be destroyed, either for punishment or to keep them from creating further "damage". Thus the picture of America, which offers such freedom, as "The Great Satan".
Political: the USA has been for the past 60 years, one of the two major world political players. We are, therefore, seen as the force that dictates policy to other nations through a combination of political pressure, economic power and military force. We are seen this way both in cases that are justified as well as in cases where it is NOT justified. (Most of the time it is not justified.) Furthermore, we are the political ally of Israel, which is the focus of the majority of religious hatred of Islam, and thus we are complicit of Israel's crime of existing.
Economic: there are a number of economic factors to look at.
1)The Muslim LEADERSHIP (which, coincidentally, lives much better than the rank-and-file Muslims, but has no problem pointing out how Americans are rich and thus the cause of everyone else's poverty) sees that the USA is the premier power in the world, economically, militarily and politically. They see our relative economic success, our religious and political freedoms, and they see that our system WORKS. This flies in the face of their religious beliefs that say that anything that is not strictly Islamic is by nature doomed to failure. In other words, the successes of Western Democracies are the proof that their religion (or at least their interpretation of Islam) is wrong. This cannot be allowed to continue. Our very economic success makes us dangerous to their brand of Islam by providing an example of something else, something that works. And thus, they must destroy us.
2) The majority of people living in Middle-Eastern Muslim areas are living in hovels and are at or below the poverty line. THey are disaffected, hateful of anyone who has more than they do, and distrustful of authority. Add the religious zealotry, and you have created a petrie dish in which terrorists are grown. Many are willing to lay down their lives to show how much they hate those better off than they are, and they are indoctrinated into such religious beliefs from very young ages. They are then pointed toward America and other western countries and told "Those people are the cause of your terrible lot in life, they are the reason that Islam is not the dominant religion on Earth, and they are the ones keeping you poor."
Put together a leadership that teaches that the USA must be destroyed and is the cause of their people's economic strife together with a group of disaffected youths with a religious fervor, and give them bombs and small arms, and you have created the environment in which terrorists grow.
As I said before, the three factors play on each other. The economics and the politics create the target and the environment for terrorism. The religious factors create a zealotry necessary for the terrorists to exist, and a willingness to die and/or kill for the cause.
However, in the wake of the attempted UK car bombings, I am forced to review this answer. Clearly the doctors in charge of the plot were not economically challeneged... they were upper-middle to upper class members of UK society. So I must question my opinions of the socio-economic factors that are the cause of terrorism.