OPINION:
The recent terrorist attack on innocents attending a Christmas Party at a county social services center in San Bernardino, California, is another chilling reminder of radical Islam’s long reach. This soft target terrorist attack in a Western-nation urban setting follows a similar attack in Paris, France a few weeks earlier.
It should serve as another wake-up call to Western nations that these jihadi attacks are not limited to Central Asia, Middle East, and North and Sub Africa killing fields, but also places where people work, play, and celebrate in the West. Now, more than ever, it’s imperative to identify, define, counter, and eliminate this threat before more innocent lives are lost.
Despite compelling facts to the contrary, U.S. President Barack Obama refuses to use the term ’radical Islam’ to describe those who act in the name of Islam to commit terrorist acts like the one the world witnessed in San Bernardino, Paris and many other places around the globe in recent years. It’s worthwhile to look at the demographics and facts.
According to Pew Research Center, there are about 1.6 billion Muslims representing 23 percent of the total global human population, with Muslims comprising the majority in 49 countries. The United States has about 3.4 million Muslims, with California having the largest population.
The 2015 Global Terrorism Index, produced by the Institute for Economics and Peace with assistance from the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Response to Terrorism, reported an 80 percent increase in the number of terrorism related deaths over the previous year, with terrorists in five Muslim majority countries — Iraq, Nigeria, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Syria — accounting for 78 percent of the 32,685 terrorism-related fatalities. It lists Boko Haram, not ISIS, as the world’s deadliest group.
The 2015 U.S. State Department Annual Report on Terrorism lists 59 Foreign Terrorist Organizations which, among other things, threaten U.S. nationals and U.S. national security. 44 of them (75 percent) are Islamic groups in Muslim countries.
The 2015 U.S. State Department Annual Report on Terrorism lists three Muslim majority countries of Iran, Sudan, and Syria as its three designated state sponsors of terror.
In 2015, the Soufan Group, estimated that up to 31,000 foreign fighters from 80-plus countries have entered Iraq and Syria to fight with ISIS and other Islamic extremist groups. About 75 percent are from Arab Sunni Muslim majority countries. Many of these jihad-hardened fighters return to their countries of origin, including the West, ready to bring their jihad home.
In 2015, Federal Bureau of Investigation Director James Comey stated that his agency has ongoing investigations into the radicalization of young Muslim men in all 50 states.
Many Americans wonder what specific steps President Obama can further take to educate the public and counter the radical Islamic threat at home and abroad. Here are a few general suggestions.
One, acknowledge that most of the world’s terrorism attacks emanates from countries with majority Muslim populations, and from individuals and groups within Islam who become radicalized.
Two, explain the difference between Islamists and jihadists from the overall Muslim population. An Islamist is any Muslim who wants to impose and enforce Shariah — whether by violent or nonviolent means. A jihadi is an Islamic terrorist. The Muslim Brotherhood, which gestates Islamists, uses mostly non-violent means to create Shariah-compliant constitutions. Shariah Law is also incompatible with the U.S. Constitution and other Free World laws.
Three, recognize that the United States is facing an international army of non-state jihadists who move about and act with impunity, ignoring and/or using international laws of warfare and/or state gun control laws to their advantage. Despite strict gun control laws, jihadists in France and California were able to obtain and use weapons to commit terrorist acts.
Four, reincorporate radical Islamic awareness training into curriculums. Such training has been phased out mostly due to dubious political correctness and suppressing awareness decisions by the Bush and Obama administrations. An excellent training tool is the New York Police Department’s “Radicalization in the West: The Homegrown Threat.”
Five, do not engage in a military conflict overseas unless U.S. national security is threatened and Congress approves. Duly elected representatives of the American people should be the ones debating, making war decisions and setting legal war parameters, not a small group of administration officials, U.N. and NATO representatives and bureaucrats with varying security interests and agendas.
As President Obama approaches his last year in office, he has a chance to lead the effort to confront and reverse the gains made by ISIS and
other radical Islamists in and outside of the Greater Muslim World. For the sake of the Free World and humanity, let’s hope he does. Many
lives may depend on it.
• Fred Gedrich is a foreign policy and national security analyst. He served in the U.S. departments of State and Defense.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.