ACT FOR AMERICA 02/03/2016 Explaining the Islamic State Phenomenon

Part II:

Profiling the Jihadist

Almost all of those who join the armed Jihad, Al-Qaeda or the Islamic State fall into two primary categories:

1. Criminals, often recruited in prison by radical imams who manage to rally those individuals to their cause by promising them that if they continue their actions on behalf of Islam – and not just for their only personal enrichment – their actions will become lawful and consistent with the will of Allah.
2. The “exalted” and the “deranged” who dream of war and action, seeking to assert their manhood at all costs and who are in search of violence and epic adventure to express it. For these individuals, jihad offers a unique opportunity to indulge their inclinations and publicize them to satisfy their deranged ego.

Religion doesn’t have much to do with the jihadists’ actions. Most know nothing about Islam and mindlessly repeat some verses that have been hammered into them by radical imams, less stupid than them, but much more dangerous. Those who are outside these profiles are only a tiny minority – exceptions that confirm the rule. Jihadist university graduates, for instance, are often frustrated individuals who have failed to integrate into society through work, study, socialization, marriage, etc. There again, radical imams succeed to convince them that their failures are not of their making but that of the environment that dismisses them. They teach them the idea that it is legitimate that they restore the situation to their benefit and by acting with force.

Read Part II in its entirety here.
 

Part III of this series will be emailed Monday, February 8th.

If you missed it, be sure to read Part I here.